She didn’t like the way he didn’t look at her, but she liked the way he looked at her much less. His blue eyes, so often brimming with compassion now felt distant. Cecilia wondered if she could really touch him, just then. Jackson felt so miserably far away and she felt as if the person before her could see every bleak spot on her clouded soul.
she listened patiently and hoped. Perhaps it was some small concern, something that might easily be sorted out and mended. Or perhaps some misconception had infected his brain, something that she could lay to rest. Fangtopia was an odd choice for him and her concerns were magnified when he said he had had to do something. Still, she did not suspect the lie. That was. It was not Jackson’s way to lie and she had placed her trust in that.
Cecilia felt a glimmer of hope when he said he had to speak to her. At last, a confidence. Taking a step forward, she was about to tell him how she’d welcome a chat - when he uttered a single word that left the sentence dead in her throat. Bellefry.
Her eyes were hooded. The vampiress felt oddly chilled as if someone had reached into her heart and replaced it with a frozen hole. Cecilia turned suddenly, hand moving thoughtlessly towards her throat. “Surprise,” she muttered, arching one slender brow. “Yes, indeed.”
All at once her hand dropped to her side and Cecilia closed the distance between them. “Why, we go way back,” she began. “Back to the beginning.” At last her blue eyes found his. “Back to a time when I was only a young girl - a young girl, and a mortal.”
Cecilia wondered if she’d ever told him the story in full. Oh, she’d made allusions to it but…her throat tightened as she wondered what he’d heard. The chill clamped her dead heart tighter, still, as if the skeletal fingers of Allyson’s ancestors had at least seized hold to rip it from her chest. Cecilia shook her head. Reaching out, she touched his cheek. “Jackson, don’t ask me this unless you truly wish to know all.” She searched his eyes but there was something hard in them, something she couldn’t see past. But she knew, too, there was nothing she could truly deny him. “Tell it true, Jackson. Is this what you desire?”