Warning! Extremely First Draft

But I promised, and so…here’s a snippet from To Embrace the Beast. 😀

***

“I can find my own way, my lord,” Remy said.

“You Taguns set great stock on keeping promises made to ladies,” Sammael said, moving down the corridor. Remy realized he’d followed a page to the dinner and paid little attention to the route, so he followed the duke’s lead.

“I’d heard you think little of courtly manners,” he said, catching up.

“When weak-willed ladies faint into my arms,” Sammael said, “I generally drop them.”

Remy snickered. Sammael led around a corner sooner than Remy had expected a turn.

“You were listening in the garden,” he said.

Sammael’s shoulders twitched in a disinterested shrug. “How could I resist, when I so plainly heard your father warn of eavesdroppers?”

Remy tried to remember exactly what had been said besides the talk of Elodie and his own need for a wife, but he couldn’t. He was at least fairly certain that while he’d thought a great deal about Sammael, he had said very little if anything about the duke.

“And will you let your father find you a plump, rich wife, Sir Remy?”

“Whatever lies in my future,” Remy said, “I will do the choosing.”

“And what if there is no choice?”

“There are always choices.”

Sammael grabbed Remy, shoved him to the wall and leaned over him, his face and his hair blocking out the light. “You think so?” he breathed, pinning Remy’s wrists to the wall above his head. “Sometimes there is no choosing. Sometimes we are chosen.”

“Then we choose,” Remy whispered back, “to resist or not.”

Sammael kissed him, right there in the corridor where anyone might come and see, and Remy kissed him back. Hungrily, though he was the one devoured, Remy kissed with all the heat of his pounding blood, tugging against Sammael’s grip only to participate more, not to escape.

When Sammael pulled away Remy tried to follow but Sammael held him still. He stood staring down at Remy, his eyes hooded. Remy leaned on the wall panting, his arms held and his knees weak.

“Have you chosen, Remy?” Sammael asked. “Will you surrender?”

“I will cooperate,” Remy said.

Sammael bent his head, nipped Remy’s jaw. Scraping teeth and scorching lips ghosted to Remy’s ear.

“You are a stubborn man, Sir Remy,” Sammael breathed, and kissed Remy’s neck. “You were told to stay away from me.”

“I choose,” Remy gasped. “I fight.”

“What if you lose?”

“One can choose to fight. One cannot choose to win.”