Chapter 30: Chapter 30

Piper

After the party, things pretty much went back to normal. Wynn and I flirted around each other, neither one of us daring to take it any further. While in my bedroom, I pretended he was mine.

However, my daydreams had started to shift. It wasn’t just Wynn who whispered sweet nothings to me. More and more, my mind shifted back to that kiss in the hallway with Rayne. I couldn’t get it off my mind or the redhead in question, though I couldn’t say the same for him.

If anything, instead of annoying me beyond measure, Rayne had been avoiding me. If I entered a room, he left it. If I was in a room, he turned back around even if what he wanted was in the same room I was in. It was getting ridiculous.

“What are we, high schoolers?” I muttered to myself as I watched his back retreating from me once more. I had just sat down for dinner when Rayne had come in for his nightly ration of blood. His amber eyes locked with mine, and for a moment I thought he might stay, maybe talk to me, but then he swallowed visibly and fled the room.

“Master Rayne seems more distracted than usual,” Gretchen commented from the seat next to me. “Did something happen, perhaps?”

Licking my suddenly dry lips, I shook my head. I pulled my eyes away from where he had stood and back to my plate. “I wouldn’t know. I’m just the help.”

Gretchen snorted and exchanged a knowing look with Darren. The two of them knew the masters far better than I did, but if Rayne wasn’t telling about our encounter last weekend, I wasn’t going to be the one to do it.

“I hope you’re being smart.” Darren sat his plate down on the island on the other side of me and then slid into the seat. The warning in his eyes was clear, but I wasn’t taking the bait.

“Of course,” I snapped, stabbing at my food. “I do my job and go to bed. That’s it.”

“What about outside the house?” Gretchen asked, politely. “I’m sure a pretty girl like you has a string of heartbroken men out there just waiting for her to crook her finger their way.”

I barked a laugh. “Sure. Let me just find some time between warding off visiting vampires and cleaning the toilets.” I rolled my eyes.

“You have today off,” Darren reminded me with a frown. “Why didn’t you take that time to have a social life?”

Sighing, I pushed my plate away from me. My appetite had all but vanished. “Yeah, that’d be easy enough. And when they ask what I do for a living, what do I tell them? I don’t think Master Durand would be too happy about my spreading his secrets to the masses.”

Letting out an impatient sound, Darren folded his napkin in his lap. “You tell them you’re a maid which you are.”

“I think it would be healthy for you to find a friend outside of the house,” Gretchen went on as if there were no elephant in the room keeping me from doing just that. “Preferably a male one.” She winked at me, and I couldn’t help but smile.

“Fine. Fine.” I stood and pushed back my seat. “I’ll find a boyfriend if that will keep you all happy and off my back. Perhaps you’d like a play by play of our relationship? Maybe a video and an invitation to the wedding?”

“A video is hardly necessary, but I wouldn’t say no to a wedding invitation.” Gretchen beamed at me.

“Who’s getting married?” Drake asked, standing in the doorway of the kitchen.

“I am apparently,” I halfheartedly announced, moving to the fridge for a drink. “You’re all invited.” Pulling out a bottle of water, I twisted the cap off and took a long refreshing drink.

“Oh good, Rayne finally stopped moping and asked you.”

I sputtered and coughed, choking on the very water I had been drinking. “What?” I gaped at Drake’s grinning face.

“Master Durand.” Gretchen tut-tutted with a motherly grin, waved a finger at Drake. “You shouldn’t kid about such thing. You’ll give Piper a heart attack.” She moved out of her seat and over to the pot. “Can I get you a plate?”

Drake shook his head, still grinning like a fiend. “Not today, trying to watch my weight.” He patted his stomach, making me frown.

Did vampires get fat?

Continuing as if he hadn’t just come into the kitchen to screw with me, Drake moved to the fridge and pulled out his container of blood. “I actually came I here to tell Piper that Antoine is looking for you.”

I groaned, and Drake chuckled over the lip of the cup.

Sitting my water bottle down, I walked toward the stairs. My shoulders slumped and my eyes on the floor. “If I’m not back in thirty minutes, buy me a ticket out of the country.”

“For what?” Drake asked.

“For staking your brother,” I muttered low enough that I thought they couldn’t hear me, but Drake’s laughter followed me up the stairs.

Sunday, my one day off, had turned into the day that Antoine liked to call me into his office and ream me about all the things I’d done wrong that week. Last week, he’d chewed me out for leaving the house a mess after the party. What did he want me to do, spend my whole day off cleaning up after them? I mean, I did that the previous week, he couldn’t expect me to do it every weekend.

If so, I needed a new day off that didn’t follow an event.

Walking as slow as possible, I scuffed my shoes against the ground. It always felt like I was being called to the principal’s office which I wouldn’t have minded had it involved more spankings and far less sneers coming from both of us. I really think Antoine just needed a really good fuck or at least a hand getting the stick out of his ass.

“He can be so charming when he wants to be,” I reminded myself as I came to a stop before his office door. When I’d wanted to quit, he all but had me melting into his hands, but he only seemed to keep that charm as a last resort. “More flies with honey...”

“Are you going to stand out there all night?” Antoine’s voice wafted through the office door, and I scowled at the closed door.

Finally opening the door, I stepped inside.

Antoine sat behind his large desk per usual, the top of it covered with mountains of paperwork. I didn’t quite know what they did for money, but it obviously included lots of paperwork and the ability to sleep all day and party at night.

Maybe they had stocks from the 1920s?

“You wanted to see me?” I laced my fingers in front of me, choosing to try the polite approach first. He, like Rayne, had a way of rubbing me the wrong way. It was like they purposely sought to piss me off. However, it was more Antoine than Rayne lately since the latter was avoiding me.

Antoine’s long blonde hair covered part of his face, the face that hadn’t done the polite thing and acknowledge me. Even though he didn’t leave the house, not as far as I could tell in any case, Antoine still wore suits that accented his form and did nothing to hide that lovely body beneath it.

Stop talking about him like you’re ever going to get a chance to see it for yourself.

“I wanted to talk to you about an upsetting phone call I just had.” Antoine’s tone left no hint of what that phone call could have entailed or if he was actually upset by it.

“A phone call?”

“Yes, about you.”

I didn’t know who could have called him. Like Gretchen and Darren had pointed out, I didn’t have a tangible social life outside of the household, nor had I spoken to anyone who would have called Antoine about me. My parents didn’t call unless I did first. My brother was overseas still doing god knows what.

Shaking my head, I decided I couldn’t think of anything pressing that could have caused Antoine to be upset with me. “What was it about?”

Antoine put his pen down and placed his hands on top of the desk. His pale eyes locked onto me, a low, burning anger rising in the depths of his gaze. He was mad. Why?

“I knew this would happen. I blame myself. You weren’t ready to face the other vampires yet, and still, I pushed you to it.” Antoine sighed and rubbed a hand over his face as if he weren’t aching to yell at me.

“So, this is about last weekend?” I took a stab in the dark. “I already apologized. I can’t make up for my behavior any more than I already have.” Irritation itched at the back of my throat, and I refrained from raising my voice. Really? He couldn’t expect me to grovel for the rest of my life.

“You were supposed to be silent, seen but not heard,” Antoine started with a sharpness to his tone, “but that is an impossible feat for you, isn’t it? You can’t help but speak your mind.”

I scowled. “I’m not in the habit of letting people walk all over me.”

“Clearly,” Antoine snapped, “and now Valentine has put in an offer for you.”

“What?”

“He wants to buy you.”

My brows scrunched together, and then my eyes widened. “What? He can’t buy me. I’m not for sale.”

“He doesn’t see it that way.” Antoine picked his pen back up and shifted a few papers.

“And you told him no, right?” When Antoine didn’t answer immediately, I rushed for his desk, my hands curling around the edge of the desk. “Right?”

Letting out an agitated breath, Antoine dropped his pen. “Of course, I did. It was hard enough getting a decent maid, I couldn’t very well give you up so easily.”

“I’m so thrilled,” I replied dryly.

“It’s your own fault.” He pointed a long finger at me. “You should have kept your mouth shut and done your job.”

Why that arrogant mother fu—

“If you hadn’t dressed me like some plaything, then maybe he wouldn’t have noticed me,” I shot back, slamming my hand on the desktop. “Don’t think I don’t know what you were doing. I’m not your pet you can use to torment the other vampires. I’m a human being, and you will treat me with the respect I deserve.”

Antoine’s jaw ticked. He pressed his fingers into a steeple and locked those pale blue eyes with mine. “You are an employee of this household. If I want to rub you in the face of our competitors, then I will do as such. You were never in any danger, so your complaints are not valid nor needed.”

I opened my mouth to argue, but he beat me to it.

“Rayne told me what happened in the hallway, and you are lucky he was there to defuse the situation.” Antoine picked up his pen and returned to scribbling on his paper.

“I wouldn’t have been in that situation if it hadn’t been for you.” I pointed at him, pissed off that he’d dismissed me so easily. “My sexual status or lack thereof is none of your or your guest’s business.”

“Then perhaps you shouldn’t moan so loudly while in your bedroom in a house full of vampires.”

Antoine’s knee jerking comment made my stomach plummet. I always kind of assumed they couldn’t hear me. It’s not like I was being loud. I was in a locked room for crying out loud. Or rather that’s what got me into this mess in the first place.

“So, now, I’m supposed to be celibate as well as ridiculed?” I attempted to turn the conversation back to what really mattered, the fact that this was all his fault.

He paused in his writing to read over what he had written. “Your sexual escapades are none of my concern as you stated, as long as they are done out of this house and not with any of my brothers. However, if you are unable to refrain from scratching your itch on the premises, I suggest you practice orgasming without moaning like a dying cow.”

I gaped at him.

When I didn’t speak again for a moment, Antoine glanced up from his paper and shooed me with his pen. “If that’s all, I have work to do.”

Pure fury liquefied my inside and I grabbed the first thing I could get my hands on, a book in this case, and threw it at him. Of course, I never expected to hit him. Vampire reflexes and all. So, it was no surprise when Antoine shifted to one side just at the book sailed toward his face.

“Go find a stake and fall on it.” I spun on my heel and stomped toward the door.

“Close it behind you.”

Spinning back around, I grabbed the doorknob and yelled, “And I do not moan like a dying cow!” I slammed the door for good measure, half mortified and half wanting to burn the house down with Antoine stuck inside.

Marching down the stairs, I headed for the kitchen. It was my day off. I was going to eat comfort food, watch some T.V., and then rub one out just to spite him. “I’ll show you who moans like a cow,” I muttered as I jerked the fridge door open.

Darren, who was washing dishes, glanced up at me for a moment and then returned to his task. He was used to my temper tantrums by now, no doubt, and probably didn’t want to get in the middle of it.

I grabbed a pint of ice cream and then a spoon from the drying rack by the sink and made for the stairs. Stupid vampires and their stupid heightened senses. A girl couldn’t fantasize about her bosses in peace? What was the world coming to?

“Piper,” Darren called to me, stopping my ascent upstairs. Turning around to face him, he pushed a vase full of white roses toward me. “These came for you.”

Frowning, I climbed down the stairs and over to the island. With a curious little smile, I picked the vase up and sniffed the roses. A sickly-sweet scent filled my nose, making me sneeze.

“Who would be sending me flowers?”

Darren only shrugged and turned back to his dishes.

I plucked the card from the vase and opened it. As my eyes comprehended the words on the paper, the vase slipped from my hand and crashed to the floor. Glass shattered, the water and flowers decorated the pieces in an almost purposeful design.

Rushing to my side, Darren grabbed the broom. “What is it with you and vases?” He shouldered me aside to clean up the mess, but I didn’t bother to answer him.

My hands shook and my eyes watered. My lungs expanded and contracted in rapid succession to the point that I might pass out. Darren was saying something to me, but the blood pounding in my ears drowned out his words. All I could see in my mind’s eye were the red letters on the card written in a flourished script.

‘See you soon, V.’