~~Author's Note~~
This is a fun, silly chapter, a break in the story before things get serious. Feel free to skim.
~~Damien~~
After being pestered by Fiona until the Lord himself would have broken, Damien agreed to go to Bloodlust. He loved hanging out with Fiona, but going to a nightclub was the last thing he wanted to do, and she knew it. So she dialed up her pestering and playful prodding until he relented. It was probably healthy for him to socialize, even if he'd prefer to be home alone, or home with Fiona.
He picked up Fiona at her apartment. She wore a dress obviously meant to kill him, because he froze when she opened the door. A living man would have died instantly. A vampire was thankfully only struck dumb for several long minutes of staring and gawking.
A deadly green dress, open back, two tiny straps over the shoulders, holding up the tight, plunging bust snug to her huge breasts. The green glittered, and the extremely short skirt had a split that went up past her hip, with little green straps connecting the split. No underwear.
"What do ye think?" she said, grinning up at him before spinning around once.
"It's... shiny."
"It's sequin!" Giggling, she reached out for his chest, and undid a couple buttons of his suit shirt. "Come on ye dobber, show some skin!"
He frowned down at her fingers, but didn't stop her. "I probably should, I suppose. I'll never, uh, have cleavage like yours though."
Her giggles turned into squeaks, and she stepped onto her toes to reach up and kiss him.
"Aye, but I'm a pretty lass. Yer the lad, the man, and should be... strong!" She raised her arms and flexed her biceps. Vrall may have been a very strong creature, but Fiona was soft. Thin, but soft, and didn't have much muscle to show off. It was adorable.
He laughed, nodding. She was too damn cute to not. "Unbuttoning my shirt makes me strong?"
She touched his chest, traced his pectorals, and ran her fingers down to his abs. "Aye."
The fire in her eyes blazed, and he gulped down on a dry throat. If he'd been Blushing Life, he would have pushed her back into her room, closed the door, and thrown her onto her bed. But with it off, he could ignore the biological half of him, mostly, and smile down at his girlfriend.
He did not look forward to going to some sort of impromptu gathering at Bloodlust, but if he was going with Fiona, he knew he'd have fun; not sexual fun, but fun. It was a public place, after all. But, Fiona made him laugh, made him smile, made him feel warm, and made him feel like he wasn't hiding out in a sewer rat hole anymore. Hanging out with her was always fun.
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Ok, maybe it might not be so fun.
Damien groaned, but Fiona pushed him up the stairs. All the kine had vacated the second floor, leaving only vampires and werewolves above the dancing kine beneath. And to Damien's surprise, there were a lot of vampires and werewolves.
There was no denying that Fiona had called it right. Tonight, the theme was sexual attraction. That made sense for a nightclub, but vampires and werewolves had some massive advantages. Vampires were groomed before their embrace, and turned usually when at peak physique and attractiveness. Werewolves overflowed with energy and life, probably because their wolf spirit wanted them to be the strongest vessel possible. So, everyone on the top floor was gorgeous, and considering what they were wearing, basically half naked.
The largest booth, further back on the floor, contained the group of people he'd expected, his friends and whatnot. But the contents of a nearby booth caused Damien to raise a brow. That was Caleb, Brianna, and the two vampires he'd seen sandwiching her at the ball. A couple other vampires were with them, women, members of Isabella's acting troupe. Both had their hands on Caleb. Another werewolf, Erica, sat closer to Brianna, and one of Brianna's male companions had his hands on Erica, evidently at Brianna's request. Fiona had somehow invited a lot of paranormals, paranormals he doubted she'd ever spoken to before. It wouldn't have surprised him if Fiona could easily get herself invited to a stranger's wedding, through her sheer sociability.
The smell of alcohol was blatant, and Damien noticed many bottles and glasses of alcohol at both tables. The werewolves were getting drunk -- were drunk -- and considering what he'd heard from Jessy, their blood was extremely potent. Any vampire who got a nibble was bound to be borderline high on the bliss.
He sighed, and forced his eyes to the group waiting for him. Jack sat in the middle of the group, with Elaine, then Eric, then Jessy on his right. On his left was Antoinette, then Matthew, then Natasha, then Arturo. Matthew was the only person there taller than the Prince, though Arturo seemed to match it.
Jack was dressed in an Invictus suit, shirt undone, same as Damien. The werewolves, on the other hand, were dressed for a club. Eric wore a casual shirt that was open to the navel, while Matt wore a tight tank top, and Art wore some kind of fishnet shirt, nothing underneath.
The women were dressed as he expected women to dress in a nightclub, except of course, taking advantage of their immortal beauty and endless money. Elaine wore white, Antoinette wore black, both dresses nothing but a few loose straps that barely covered their enormous breasts, and probably less of their legs. Jessy wore a see-through, tight dress made of some sort of thin, black material, and underneath he could see she had X-shaped nipple pasties on. Most surprising was Natasha, who wore a tube top, except, tube top was too generous a word. More accurately, it was a three-inch thick strap of black that circled her chest at the perfect position to hide her nipples; you had to have small breasts to wear something like that, and it looked amazing on her tiny frame. He couldn't see anyone's legs, booth table in the way where he stood, but he imagined she wore a tiny black skirt to go with.
She noticed his staring, and looked down, embarrassed. Which earned a laugh and elbow from Art in her side. Which earned a hard punch from her, a punch that landed in Art's side and didn't faze him in the slightest.
Damien smiled, took Fiona's shoulders, and forced her to sit down before he did. No way he was going to join this giant group and not be on the outside edge of the booth. Just getting Fiona to sit down was already enough to have people shoulder to shoulder. Once he sat down, everyone was thoroughly squished.
"How nice of you to join us, Damien," Antoinette said, with a little more edge to her voice than he felt strictly necessary. "I had been wondering, considering this was Fiona's event."
Fiona giggled and shrugged. "Fashionably late, aye?"
Damien twitched, but the Prince laughed and nodded.
"Ben oui."
"Gonna be straight with ya," Jessy said, "didn't expect the elders."
Everyone looked at her like she'd just lost her damn mind, but Elaine and Antoinette laughed more, eventually shrugging.
"I had heard," Elaine said, "that the tiny redhead had invited Jack to a gathering at Bloodlust. Antoinette has spoken to me of the unusually friendly nature between certain members of her city, and I wanted to see it firsthand." She leaned forward, placed her elbows together on the table, squashing her hanging breasts together, and grinned at Jessy. "Invictus are not known for playing well with others."
Jessy grinned, but Damien recognized the itch of fear nagging at her. Talking buddy buddy with an elder wasn't exactly smart, but somehow Jessy had managed to survive over fifty years talking like that. Maybe she knew something he didn't, but regardless, she wasn't so stupid as to not be a little afraid of Elaine.
