Free MIDNIGHT HUNT: Book 3 of the Bonded By Blood Vampire Chronicles by Arial Burnz Page B

into a disbelieving smirk. “Since you are such an example of shining health, I suppose you knocked upon my door for another purpose. What is it you seek, sir?”
    He couldn’t stop the flutter of unexpected laughter that rumbled from his chest. Broderick placed his hat upon his head, but tilted it back onto his crown. “Now who’s the saucy one?”
    Her full lips parted only for a moment in surprise before she jutted her chin forward and crossed her arms… so like Davina. Broderick clenched his jaw to gain control over his riotous emotions—confused one moment, laughing the next and now thrown into grief and longing.
    “I’m not the one stumbling from who-knows-what ailments. You can state your purpose or admit you need my assistance and step inside.” She jerked her head toward the cottage.
    Unless he revealed why he couldn’t cross her threshold, going inside was not an option. However, if he didn’t give her a reasonable excuse for near collapsing or why he refused her assistance, he would alienate this woman before he could discover if Malloren was right. “I have been traveling for many weeks now, and at a rather unforgiving pace. I’m sure my condition has more to do with exhaustion than illness.”
    She continued to glare at him, waiting for him to continue.
    She is full of fire, isn’t she? He chuckled again.
    Broderick’s immortal hearing picked up the rapid patter of her heart and desire swirled through the air around him once more, as if in response to his soft laughter. A rapid flow of intimate images flickered across the short distance between them, his own deep chuckle echoing through her mind. Visions of lovemaking as seen through her eyes assaulted his immortal senses.
    Ohhh, that same laughter.
    He narrowed his eyes. What was she remembering? The lover he saw in her mind was unclear and Rick bristled over the fact that Monika may have already been with someone else and that she was comparing her lover to him ! He curled his hands into fists and fought to manage a calming breath as glimpses of a masculine chest sprinkled with dark-red hair flitted through her mind. His ire increased the rate of blood pounding in his cheeks when the man’s square jawline and bulging biceps appeared…and a dark-brown stain on the inside of the arm. The blood drained from his face and the tension fled from his body like a scampering hare. Those were visions of him ! That was his arm with the mark he’d bore since birth. Broderick’s fingers itched to touch the dark stain on the inside of his upper-left arm, but he forced his hand to remain at his side. She was recalling their lovemaking…but how?
    Monika rushed forward and guided him back to sit upon the bench, nestled against the river-stone well. “You’re as pale as milk!” She pressed the back of her hand to his cheek, then the other, before she tugged at his collar and opened the first few buttons of his doublet. “Are you dizzy? In pain?”
    He gawked at her, unable to voice a response.
    “Do not move.” She picked up his hat and placed it on the bench before she trotted back to her cottage and disappeared inside.
    Broderick sat gaping at the empty doorway, mesmerized by the flicking firelight from what must have been the hearth in her tiny dwelling. When she re-emerged, she set his hat upon his lap and sat beside him.
    She wrapped his hands around a cup. “Drink this.” By guiding his hands to his face, she urged him to sip the minty-smelling brew and he almost groaned when his elbow brushed her breast.
    The strange concoction and the shock of the hot liquid returned him to his faculties and made him all too aware of her closeness. He tried to push the cup back at her. “Thank you, but I’m quite well—”
    “Oh, that’s drivel!” She stood and punched her fists onto her hips. “I watched you stumbling around as if you were drunk and then turn as pale as a ghost right before my eyes. I know an unwell person when I see one.”
    There was