Free Miss Austen's Vampire by Monica Knightley Page A

after what we just shared, you have any need to be concerned about my reaction to whatever this information may be.”
    Gabriel bent forward, staring down at his boots, and reached over to Jane to take her hand in his. Jane was surprised that despite the heat in the orangery, his hand was icy cold. She had noticed when they were in bed that he seemed cool to touch, but thought it just his particular temperature. But now, within this warm, humid room his icy coolness seemed out of place.
    “Are you well, Gabriel?”
    He turned his head to look up at her, his brow still knitted. His eyes didn’t leave hers as he answered, “I am well, but I am not eager to end this night with you, for it will end when I tell you my—” He broke off and stared back down at the floor. Still he held her hand, squeezing it rhythmically.
    “Whatever it is, it will stand between us now whether or not you share it with me, so you may as well tell me. Seeing you in such agony tells me it won’t be easy for either of us, but that it must be shared.”
    He nodded and gently rocked his body, as one foot raised up on the toe, then returned to lying flat on the floor, over and over again.
    Jane started for him. Gently, softly, she said, “The bite, Gabriel. You bit me, made me bleed. That, well, that is not normal behavior, in or out of the bedroom.”
    Without her eyes being able to register the movement, Gabriel was now sitting upright, holding her chin in his hand, peering into her eyes.
    “No, it is not normal behavior.” His voice was so low Jane had to strain to hear him. “It is the behavior of a monster.”
    Flinching at the word ‘monster,’ not from the word itself but from the way he growled it, Jane leaned back away from him.
    “Yes, dear Jane, you should try to distance yourself from me. A monster. You just made love with a monster.” His face was so close to hers that under different circumstances she would have assumed he was preparing to kiss her. She could feel his breath on her lips, see each eyelash framing his eyes, smell his particular, sensual scent.
    Holding still, Jane waited for him to continue. She dared not say or do anything to stop him now.
    “You have nothing to say about making love with a monster? What a curious woman you are, Miss Austen. A virgin not three hours ago, and now the lover of a demon.” His chuckle was not one of amusement, but sinister, sending a chill down her back. “Try writing that book. Your readers would be thoroughly shocked.” Again the nasty chuckle.
    “As I recall this evening’s events, I seem to remember being very happy, satisfied, and pleasantly surprised by what a man could make my body do.” Her voice was a mouse’s squeak. “And more important than that, I was with a man I respect, admire, and for whom I feel true fondness.”
    This provoked a loud, unpleasant guffaw. “Yes, that may be so, but you did not know at the time that you were with a monster.”
    Sitting up straight, squaring her shoulders, Jane turned and looked Gabriel in the eye. “You keep saying that. What do you mean by it? Why are you a monster? Because you gave me a love bite?”
    “A love bite?” Gabriel shouted. “Dear God, woman, how can you call what I did, ‘a love bite?’ I drank your blood, did you not know that?”
    Jane remembered the suckling sounds, and her stomach clenched.
    Her face must have shown distaste, for Gabriel barked, “Yes, at last! You see. You remember. Men do not drink their lover’s blood, Jane.”
    She squinted into his face, trying to find within him the man whose bed she had shared. Cold now, bitterly cold, she shivered and drew her arms around herself.
    “Then why?” she whispered.
    “Is the answer not obvious? Men do not drink blood. So I must not be a man, Jane.”
    He searched her face, and when there was no reaction, he continued, “I am not a human, Jane.”
    Her stomach went to lead and she couldn’t draw breath as she stared into the glorious face she