Alaric continued to regard me silently, an indecipherable expression on his face. I fought against the urge to squirm beneath his icy gaze. Biting my lower lip, his eyes tracked the subtle movement and he finally spoke.
“That’s too bad.”
Once more, words failed to present themselves. It was boarding on ridiculous, even for me. I’d seen attractive men before.
Granted, none came close to him, but I never got tongue-tied. Majority of the time I avoided men like the plague. Most offered nothing but audacity.
Something told me Alaric wouldn’t have been an exception, and after seeing the lower half of his house, I figured now was as good a time as any to find out where I would be staying.
“Is there a hotel nearby?”
At my question, he straightened to his full height. “Unless your idea of a hotel is pitching a tent in all those trees you seen on the way up, no.”
I couldn’t tell if he was joking or being serious. “I don’t want to be in the way.”
“You’re not staying at a hotel.” His tone transformed from friendly to harsh. I was thrown off enough by it that I couldn’t immediately respond.
Staring me down, he moved a few inches closer, making the room feel ten times smaller. If intensity was a person, it would be Alaric. I crossed my arms and resisted the urge to retreat.
“There’s no reason for you to stay at a hotel. I have more than enough space. It’s just me and Demetri now.”
The latter part of his sentence seemed to be added as an after-thought, as if he’d just remembered my sister was gone. I didn’t know what to say to comfort him. I sent my gaze to the waves outside, weighing my options.
“I would feel better knowing you were here. It’s what your sister would have wanted,” he persisted, his tone warm again.
I took a quiet breath and relented. Partially so he would stop mentioning Meg, more so because I was exhausted.
The nap in the car had done nothing for me.
“If you’re sure…” I trailed off, letting him know I agreed, albeit reluctantly.
“One thing you should know about me Catalina, is that I never say what I don’t mean.”
“Um. Okay”
“Follow me, I’ll show you to your room.” He turned and began to walk away. With no other option or reason to linger, I did as he asked.
The upper level of the house was made up of long hallways lined with art—erotic and disturbingly macabre art. All the women were naked, their vividly painted bodies being fucked or touched by some type of evil entity.
The painting centered at the top of the stairs was of a woman playing the piano, a horned beast sat between her legs, spreading them apart.
His nails were digging into her thighs so severely they were bleeding, his abnormally long tongue lost deep inside her. The pinched expression on her face wasn’t one of fear or pain. It was of obvious pleasure.
Realizing I’d stopped, Alaric did the same. “That’s one of my favorites,” he commented, making his way back towards me.
“It’s…different.”
“It’s beautiful,” he corrected. “Imagine how the artist felt bringing this to life, the state of mind he was in.”
“There’s a demon giving a woman oral, I’m not sure his state of mind could be considered sane.”
His pouty bottom lip disappeared between his teeth for a moment, and then a slight smile came to his face.
“Insanity and art go hand in hand.”
I turned that sentence over in my head. “Who said that?”
“Alaric Schyuler.”
I scratched my temple with my index finger, withholding a smile. “That would explain why I’ve never heard anyone say it before.”
“Very few people understand what it means. Most, they never will.”
“I think I may be one of them.”
“No,” he retorted, the surety in his tone causing a breath to catch in my chest. “You get it, you just don’t allow yourself to embrace it.”
He moved closer to me. His cologne enveloped my sense of smell, the scent a mixture of citrus and spice.
“Look again Catalina.”
Partially distracted by the way he kept saying my name, I hesitated a second before doing as he said.
I narrowed my eyes and studied the image more critically as he narrated.
“Her pussy is being thoroughly ravaged by a demonic beast, yet she still continues to play, lost in the pleasure of it all. Caught in his web of insanity.”
Shifting my attention from the painting to the man beside me, I met his steely gaze head on, and a shiver swept down my spine. His voice had been impassioned with every word he’d just spoken.
I’m not sure how long we stood like that, staring at one another without saying a word. Could have been hours or minutes. Maybe seconds.
A sudden burst of air from directly above us had me looking away from him. There was a metal vent in an upper portion of the wall, the grates slanted to cool the hall. I was grateful for the interruption.