“I want to kiss you again, Tess.”
“Why?”
He chuckled, low under his breath. “Why? Because you’re beautiful, and because I want you. And I think you want me too.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“It's the other part I'm not so sure about. You got any advice for me on that, Lucan?"
"Sure." The vampire grunted, his smile filled with dark amusement. "Dust off your knees, brother, because you may damn well end up walking on them before the night is through.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“You would quit the Order for her? Niko asked, the youngest only behind Dante, and a warrior who relished his duty perhaps even more than Dante had himself.
I would quit breathing for her, if she asked it of me.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“It kept him alive, he was certain; even more, it kept his darkest of his demons at bay.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Holy Moses on a pogo stick!!”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“There’s danger in feeling,” Tess murmured. Although she could not begin to imagine what kind of pain Dante carried within him, she felt a kinship growing between them. Both alone, both adrift in their worlds. “I don’t want to feel anything for you, Dante.”
“God, Tess. I don’t want to feel anything for you either.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Dust off your knees, brother, because you may damn well end up walking on them before the night is through.”
Lucan (in response to Dante's request for advice) - Kiss of Crimson”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“You have quite a way with animals.”
“They’re my business,” she said, as if she needed to explain her delight.
“You’re good at it. That’s obvious.”
“I like helping animals. It makes me feel . . . useful, I guess.”
“Maybe you could show me what you do sometime.”
Tess cocked her head at him. “Do you have a pet?”
Dante should have said no, but he was still picturing her with those two ridiculous furballs and wishing that he could bring her some of that same joy. “I keep a dog. Like those.”
“You do? What’s its name?”
Dante cleared his throat, mentally casting about for what he might call a useless creature that depended on him for survival. “Harvard,” he drawled, his lips curving with private humor. “I call it Harvard.”
“Well, I’d love to meet him sometime, Dante.” A chilly breeze kicked up, and Tess shivered, rubbing her arms. “It’s getting kind of late. I should probably think about heading home.”
“Yeah, sure.” Dante nodded, kicking himself for making up a pet, for God’s sake, just because it might win him some favor with Tess.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Everything makes sense when I’m with you, Tess. My life makes sense, after so many years of running scared in the dark. You are the light, the reason I live. I’m bonded to you deep, woman. For me, there will never be another.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“You don’t think I’m . . . some kind of monster? That I’m not much better than him to have killed him like I did, in cold blood?”
“Never.” Dante lifted her chin on the edge of his hand. “I think you’re courageous, Tess. An avenging angel, that’s what I think.”
“I’m a freak.”
“No, Tess, no.” He kissed her tenderly. “You’re amazing.”
“I’m a coward. Just like you said, I always ran away. It’s true. I’ve been afraid and running for so long, I’m not sure I can ever stop.”
“Then run to me.” Dante’s eyes were fierce as he held her gaze.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“No … she is mine. She stays with me.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“We're more of a bag-and-tag operation.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Dante watched Tess eat the thick, caramel-laced brownie, feeling her pleasure radiate across the small space that separated them on the river-walk bench. She’d offered him a bite, and although his kind could not consume crude human food in anything more than a mouthful, he accepted a small taste of the sticky chocolate confection if only to share in Tess’s unabashed enjoyment. He swallowed the heavy, pretty much revolting bit of pasty sweetness with a tight smile.
“Good, huh?” Tess licked her chocolate-coated fingers, slipping one after the other into her mouth and sucking them clean.
“Delicious,” Dante said, watching her with his own brand of hunger.
“You can have some more if you want it.”
“No.” He drew back, shaking his head. “No, it’s all yours. Please. Enjoy it.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Anyway,” the agent said abruptly. “I just . . . wanted you to know that I’m sorry for everything. I want to help you and the rest of the Order in any way I can, so if there is anything you need, you know where I am.”
“Chase,” Dante said as the male turned to leave the room. “Apology accepted, man. And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry too. I haven’t been fair to you either. Despite our differences, know that I respect you. The Agency lost a good one the day they cut you loose.”
Chase’s smile was crooked as he acknowledged the praise with a short nod.
Dante cleared his throat. “And about that offer of help . . .”
“Name it.”
“Tess was walking a dog when the Rogues attacked her tonight. Ugly little mutt, not good for much more than a foot-warmer, but it’s special to her. Actually, it was a gift from me, more or less. Anyway, the dog was running loose on its leash when I saw it a block or so away from Ben Sullivan’s place.”
“You want me to go retrieve a wayward canine, is that where this is heading?”
“Well, you did say anything, didn’t you?”
“So I did.” Chase chuckled. “All right. I will.”
Dante dug his keys to his Porsche out of his pocket and tossed them to the other vampire. As Chase turned to be on his way again, Dante added, “The little beast answers to the name Harvard, by the way.”
“Harvard,” Chase drawled, shaking his head and throwing a smirk in Dante’s direction. “I don’t suppose that’s a coincidence.”
Dante shrugged. “Good to see that Ivy League pedigree of yours comes in handy for something.”
“Jesus Christ, warrior. You really were busting my ass since the minute I came on board, weren’t you?”
“Hey, by all comparisons, I was kind. Do yourself a favor and don’t look too closely at Niko’s shooting target, unless you’re very secure about your manhood.”
“Assholes,” Chase muttered, but there was only humor in his tone. “Sit tight, and I’ll be back in a few with your mutt. Anything else you’re gonna hit me up for now that I opened my big yap about wanting to get square with you?”
“Actually, there might be something else,” Dante replied, his thoughts going sober when he considered Tess and any kind of future that might be deserving of her. “But we can talk about that when you get back, yeah?”
Chase nodded, catching on to the turn in mood. “Yeah. Sure we can.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“By the time the human stuck his key in the lock of his third-floor apartment door and pushed it open, Dante was shoving him into the dark, tossing the guy across the spartan living room.
“Motherfu—” Sullivan came up out of his crash on one knee, then froze, his face caught in a wedge of light from the bare bulb glowing in the hall outside.
Something flashed in the human’s eyes, something beneath his immediate fear. Recognition, Dante thought, figuring he probably remembered them from the club the other night. But there was anger there too. Pure male animosity. Dante could smell it seeping out of the human’s pores.
He slowly got to his feet. “What the fuck’s going on?”
“How about you tell us,” Dante said, willing a lamp to come on as he strode farther into the place. Behind him, Chase closed and locked the door. “I’m pretty sure you can guess this isn’t a social call.”
“What do you want?”
“We’ll start with information. It’ll be up to you how we go about getting it.”
“What kind of information?” His gaze swung anxiously between Dante and Chase. “I don’t know who you guys are, and I don’t have any idea what you’re talking abou—”
“Now, see,” Dante said, cutting him off with a chuckle, “that kind of bullshit answer puts us off to a real bad start.” As the human’s right hand slid into the deep pocket of his down-filled vest, Dante smirked. “You wanna convince me you’re an idiot, go ahead and pull that gun out. Just so we’re clear, I really hope you do.”
Ben Sullivan’s face blanched as white as his apartment’s unpainted walls. He pulled his hand back out, nice and slow. “How did you—”
“You expecting somebody besides us tonight?”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“His mouth was the only bit of softness on him. Wide and sensual, lips parted slightly in his drugged state, his mouth was profanely beautiful.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Using the dagger next to him on the nightstand, Dante scored a fresh line on his wrist. He pressed the bleeding cut to Tess’s lips, waiting to feel her respond, wanting to curse to the rafters when her mouth remained unmoving, his blood dripping down, useless, onto her chin.
“Come on, angel. Drink for me.” He stroked her cool cheek, brushed a tangle of her honey-blond hair from her forehead. “Please live, Tess . . . drink, and live.”
A throat cleared awkwardly from the area near the bedroom doorjamb. “I’m sorry, the uh . . . the door was open.”
Chase. Just fucking great. Dante couldn’t think of anyone he’d like to see less right now. He was too entrenched in what he was doing—in what he was feeling—to deal with another interruption, particularly one coming from the Darkhaven agent. He’d hoped the bastard was already long gone from the compound, back to where he came from—preferably with one of Lucan’s size-fourteens planted all the way up his ass. Then again, maybe Lucan was saving the privilege for Dante instead.
“Get out,” he growled.
“Is she drinking at all?”
Dante scoffed, low under his breath.
“What part of ‘get out’ did you fail to understand, Harvard? I don’t need an audience right now, and I sure as hell don’t need any more of your bullshit.”
He pressed his wrist to Tess’s lips again, parting them with the fingers of his blood by mild force. It wasn’t happening. Dante’s eyes stung as he stared down at her. He felt wetness streaking his cheeks. Tasted the salt of tears gathering at the corner of his mouth.
“Shit,” he muttered, wiping his face into his shoulder in a strange mix of confusion and despair.
He heard footsteps coming up near the bed. Felt the air around him stir as Chase reached out his hand. “It might work much better if you tilt her head, like th—”
“Don’t . . . touch her.” The words came out in a voice Dante hardly recognized as his own, it was so full of venom and deadly warning. He swiveled his head around and met the agent’s eyes, his vision burning and sharp, his fangs having stretched long in an instant.
The protective urge boiling through him was fierce, utterly lethal, and Chase evidently understood at once.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“She started shaping the face, using a wire loop to gently carve the slope of the strong forehead and brow, then the nose and the lean angle of the cheekbones. In little time, her fingers were moving on automatic pilot, her mind disengaged and gone into its own flow, her subconscious directly commanding her hands into action.
She didn’t know how long she’d been working, but when the hard rap sounded on her apartment door some time later, Tess nearly jumped out of her skin. Sleeping next to her feet on the rug, Harvard woke up with a grunt.
“You expecting someone?” she asked quietly as she got up from her stool.
God, she must have been really zoned out while she was sculpting, because she’d seriously messed up around the mouth area of the piece. The lips were curled back in some kind of snarl, and the teeth . . .
The knock sounded again, followed by a deep voice that went through her like a bolt of electricity.
“Tess? Are you there?”
Dante.
Tess’s eyes flew wide, then squeezed into a wince as she did a quick mental inventory of her appearance. Hair flung up into a careless knot on top of her head, braless in her white thermal Henley and faded red sweats that had more than one dried clay smudge on them. Not exactly fit for company.
“Dante?” she asked, stalling for time and just wanting to be sure her ears weren’t playing tricks on her. “Is that you?”
“Yeah. Can I come in?”
“Um, sure. Just a sec,” she called out, trying to sound casual as she threw a dry work cloth over her sculpture and quickly checked her face in the reflection off one of her putty spatulas.
Oh, lovely. She had a slightly crazed, starving-artist look going on. Very glamorous. That’ll teach him to do the pop-in visit, she thought, as she padded over to the door and twisted the dead bolt.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Todo tiene sentido cuando estoy contigo, Tess. Mi vida tiene sentido, después de tantos años de estar huyendo asustado en la oscuridad. Tú eres la luz, mi razón de vivir. Estoy profundamente unido a ti. Para mí, nunca habrá nadie más.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
“Then run to me.” Dante’s eyes were fierce as he held her gaze. “I know all about fear, Tess. It lives in me too. That ‘seizure’ I had in your clinic? It’s not a medical condition, not even close.” “What is it?” “Death,” he said woodenly. “For as long as I can remember, I’ve had these attacks—these visions—of my last moments alive. It’s hellish beyond imagining, but I see it as if it’s happening. I feel it, Tess. It’s my fate.” “I don’t understand. How can you be sure of that?” His smile was wry. “I’m sure. My mother had similar visions of her own death, and my father’s too. They happened precisely as she envisioned them. She couldn’t change what was to happen, or turn it back. So I’ve been trying to outrun my own end. I’ve been running from it forever. I’ve kept myself insulated from things that might make me want to slow down and live. I’ve never permitted myself to truly feel.” “There’s danger in feeling,” Tess murmured. Although she could not begin to imagine what kind of pain Dante carried within him, she felt a kinship growing between them. Both alone, both adrift in their worlds. “I don’t want to feel anything for you, Dante.” “God, Tess. I don’t want to feel anything for you either.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Kiss of Crimson
Lara Adrian
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― Michael Buckley, quote from The Unusual Suspects
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― R.K. Lilley, quote from In Flight
“Anyone can make a mistake.... It's how they learn from it and recover from it that shows their true worth.”
― John Flanagan, quote from The Invaders
“What we have loved, others will love, and we will teach them how; instruct them how the mind of man becomes a thousand times more beautiful than the earth on which he dwells...”
― William Wordsworth, quote from Lyrical Ballads
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