A TASTE OF HEAVEN

The mirror looked older than the age she was pretending to be. Its silver had dimmed and picked up a smoky haze at the edges so that her reflection flickered in and out of focus as she tugged at the strap of her gown. Tugging at her gown would make anyone watching think she was nervous, and that was the point. The room smelled of beeswax, old stone, and something else that she couldn't name. Once, she would've been able to name it right away. She would've known the thoughts of every soul in this house just by their presence, in the same way she knew her own hands. But that sense had faded, tucked away with everything else she'd given up to live in a body that could bleed. Without thinking, she reached for her perfume. The woman in gray caught her by the wrist. "Not tonight. He does not care for it. He says it covers up the only thing he is actually interested in." Elaine knew what he was interested in; she'd spent three weeks learning it. She put the bottle down and let her hand tremble just a little. The tremble would make her act more believable. There were ten other women in the room, and several of them had bright, obvious beauty she'd purposely chosen not to have. She knew he didn't choose women for their prettiness. She made herself into exactly the type of woman he could not walk past. Now she only had to hope that she'd read him right. Three weeks of watching, and still, maybe she just saw what she wanted to see. The woman in gray snapped her fingers and told them to line up. Elaine went to the back of the line. From the back, she could see everything. They were led down a hallway full of portraits of people she didn't recognize, which eventually opened up into a space that was way too big to just be called a room. The ceilings were high, and the lights were kept low. She could hear a fire crackling somewhere, though she couldn't actually see it. Men in suits were holding drinks in long-stemmed glasses, whispering to the women standing next to them. The atmosphere felt wrong, like the room was off-balance somehow. It wasn't the fancy crowd making her feel that way, though. It was the one man standing in the shadows of a massive marble pillar without a drink. He was the only person in the entire group who wasn't even trying to pretend he was having a good time. She looked at him and reached out with her mind, the way she used to be able to, for the truth of what he was, but she sensed nothing. The wealthy-looking men and women in the room occasionally glanced his way. Whenever his eyes swept across the floor, the whispers and laughter quieted. Elaine found it amusing that these people were likely CEOs, politicians, or old-money heirs, yet they were acting like court jesters desperately trying to please their king. A king who appeared to find the entire situation boring and tedious. The woman in gray snapped her fingers again and signaled for the line of women to stop. Elaine felt the temperature in the hall drop; she felt her stomach drop with it. The woman in gray stepped forward and bowed stiffly. "The new selections, My Lord." The man didn't move. He looked directly past the woman in gray to the line of women. The women in front of her put on their biggest practiced smiles. He ignored their smiles, and he ignored the women that Elaine felt were prettier than her. His eyes were an impossible shade of obsidian, and they locked directly onto Elaine. Elaine felt like she couldn't breathe. Her heart pounded against her chest so hard that she was convinced the entire room could hear it. He pushed off the pillar slowly. The movement was too smooth, too liquid. The type of motion a human wouldn't be able to mimic. The crowd of wealthy humans threw themselves backward to clear a path for him. No one spoke, no one laughed, and the clinking of the crystal glasses stopped. He stopped a mere eight inches in front of her. Elaine looked up at him. He was at least a foot taller than her; he had broad shoulders, and his dark features were so sharp that they could've been chiseled out of cold stone. He tilted his gaze to the strap of her gown. The same strap that she'd been tugging at in the cloudy mirror. The plan worked. He had seen her exactly the way Elaine wanted him to see her. Every instinct was telling her to flee. She was flying blind now, judging him the way any mortal human would, by his face, by his stillness, by the cold coming off of him in waves. "You're shaking," he said in a low, rich baritone that seemed to vibrate up Elaine's spine. "I am not." She tried to keep her body still by sheer force, but she couldn't fool her own heart. Her pulse rattled on, loud in her own ears, and she understood then that even though she had rehearsed, her own blood betrayed her. He reached out. His fingers were so close to her neck that she could feel the coldness of them. Even without touching her, the coldness radiating from his skin gave her goosebumps. "Your pulse says otherwise, my dove," he whispered. As he leaned down, his mouth brushed dangerously close to her ear, and his freezing breath caressed her skin. "Are you going to beg me to stop?" "I don't beg." It was true and useful, and the first honest thing she had said all night. Something shifted in his face. She couldn't name it. His eyes went to the woman in gray. "Bring this one to my study."