The Vampire King’s Captive

MARIA

“But we just had sex,” she cried. “Portraits now, then maybe sex later.”

She still had her hands around his neck and he still had his hands on her ass. Her nipples were two puckered little points digging into his chest and her breaths were shallow, betraying her.

How could he even take her seriously when she was still rubbing against him like a freaking cat in heat?

Taking a much needed step backwards, she was surprised to see that he let her go. But his eyes still didn’t leave her body and the scowl didn’t leave his face either. He still very much wanted her, and of course it got her all hot and bothered to see how much he wanted her, mere minutes after just having her, but it wasn’t enough to take her mind off the portraits.

She would take anything that would give her a peek into his life as a child and if portraits were the only available way, then she wanted to see them.

“You should be punished alone for pushing sex till later,” Bran muttered gruffly, and the word ‘punishment’ had a variety of images crashing into Maria’s mind.

“Punish me how?” She breathed, staring up at him from under her lashes.

Bran’s eyes darkened and he absently palmed his erection. Throwing his head back on a tortured groan, he grunted, “Fuck me,” then traced away.

The tracing gave her pause because she still wasn’t used to it, and she was just about to start looking for him when he traced back to her, now wearing a shirt.

“Ready?”

His hair was damp-like hers-and went in every direction on top of his head, and with his grey sweatpants, which did nothing to hide his massive erection, and black T-shirt, he was so sexy, he took her breath away.

How on earth had she managed to get this man’s eyes on her long enough for him to decide that she was worth his attention?

Simple; She’d killed his parents and captured his sister.

Oh gods, that was so dark. Too dark, maybe, because it killed her happy mood and replaced it with guilt.

Attempting to hide it as best as she could, she extended her hand to him, palm up, and forced a smile. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

With one more heated glance at her body, lingering on choice parts, Bran’s scowl deepened and he slid his hand into hers, tracing them.

Her jaw dropped once she saw where they were. It was a room, and like Bran had said, on one side of the wall were a ton of portraits. She couldn’t see what was on them because the room was dark and the only light trickling in was from the window.

But then Bran left her side and a few seconds later, the room was bathed in light.

“Oh,” she gasped, because what the actual fuck?

The room was large as hell and she’d thought that it was only the wall she faced that had portraits but when she turned, she saw that there were more.

A lot.

So much to feed her eyes for hours.

And that was exactly what she spent the next hour doing.

Young Bran was beautiful with the same shade of green eyes, and the same tan that he had now, which meant that he was born with it. Puzzled by that, she dragged her eyes from his face and stared at the woman he was standing next to, his mother.

A face that was vaguely familiar as it was strange.

She was hauntingly beautiful with dark olive skin-that was where Bran has gotten his complexion from-and a smile that just seemed so… perfectly in place on her face. Like she wore it constantly.

“Did your mother smile a lot?” She asked the second person in the room without taking her eyes off the portrait.

“Yes,” was all Bran said and even though she was not looking at him, she could tell that he was sad.Property © of NôvelDrama.Org.

She heard it in his voice and knew that if she turned, she would see that his face was in a blank mask because he so liked to hide his emotions from her.

A huge part of her wanted to turn and check, but the smaller part warned her to stay put. That if she turned and looked at him, he would hate her anew.

Gods, how insensitive was it of her to ask him to see his family portraits when these people were no longer alive because of her?

Swallowing past a tight throat, she dragged her eyes from his mother, the Queen, and saw that the next person on the portrait, was the King. For someone with such handsome features, there was no smile to be found on his face, very much like his son-or the other way round.

Iris wasn’t in that portrait, probably because she had not been born then, but she was in the next one.

Fair and beautiful, she had her mother’s looks, but her father’s complexion. And in the picture, she was smiling up at Bran.

Oh, Iris.

She continued exploring, looking at different portraits that elicited different reactions in her. Guilt, love, happiness, sadness, name them.

When she reached a particular portrait where a strange man stood behind Bran, she asked, “Who is that?”

“My father’s brother,” the man who had been quiet behind her all this while, answered.

“Are you close with him?”

“No.”

That sounded a bit too final, and without hesitation.

She turned to look at him and saw that his expression was hard, eyes vacant. “May I ask why?”

Bran shrugged dismissively. “We’re related, yes, but I do not consider him family.”

Well, that was enough of an answer, wasn’t it? She could ask why but she didn’t want to dig deep. The atmosphere was already strained as it was and she didn’t want to make it worse.

Plus, what were the chances of him actually telling her the truth?

Yet, she worsened it when she opened her mouth and asked, “Bran, aren’t you worried about Iris?”

She didn’t know how she had expected him to react. Maybe give her one of his one-word answers or tell her not to worry about it, but whatever it was, she had not expected something so dramatic.

He sagged, shoulders hunching forward and his hands flew to his face, scrubbing at it fiercely before digging his fingers into his eyes. He suddenly looked ten years older.

“Fuck, I’m terrified for her, princess.”

Maria ached with the need to go to him, to do anything that she could to make him feel better.

Gods, she hated seeing him like this.

“What are we going to do?” Her voice cracked, her body weakening. “My fa-Ariti still has her and gods knows what she’s going through.” Those words obviously made Bran feel worse because he squeezed his eyes shut, his expression one of pure torture. “Is there anything I can do? Anyway I can help? We could-”

“Just touch me, Maria,” he begged in a guttural voice.

And she did.

She hurried over to him and wrapped her hands around him in a hug. She wished ahe could absorb some of his pain and make it bearable for him but unfortunately, her powers didn’t do that and all she could do was hold him and hope that she was actually helping him.

She would hold him as long as he would let her.

Always.