“Look at you, dear,” Diana says. “So desperate.”

Jacques kneels in front of Diana on the dark patterned carpet of their bedroom, her knees spread apart. A ribbon of deep maroon, the same color as Diana’s lingerie, binds her hands behind her back. So rarely does Jacques notice temperature, but the way Diana is looking at her, the way she’s leaning back on the chaise lounge, her light skin stark against the dark forest green upholstery, her hand between her thighs, the amused, teasing look in her green eyes, it all makes Jacques feel pleasantly warm and dizzy. Diana has one knee bent, her high heel propped up on the chaise lounge, her legs spread at an angle that gives Jacques an unobstructed view of her crotchless, lacy lingerie and her fingers idly caressing herself.

Jacques lets her gaze drop to the floor. If she could blush, her cheeks would be as dark as the ribbon that binds her wrists. Though she’d become more comfortable with pleasuring herself in the past few decades, and she’s been intimate with Diana more times than she could count, this, watching someone else pleasure herself, it feels like an intrusion. Like something she shouldn’t be allowed to see.

Oh, but she wants to see. 

A shudder runs through her as Diana’s gentle fingers brush against her face, trailing the length of her jaw, and she lets her eyes fall closed.  Diana, leaning forward now, gently tilts Jacques’ chin up, her face close to the vampire’s. Jacques can feel the heat of her breath, can hear the blood pumping through Diana’s veins. So alive. So warm. She opens her eyes, and her gaze catches on Diana’s lips, parted and painted dark red. She sucks in a sharp breath. She is desperate. Desperate to feel her girlfriend’s touch. So desperate that when Diana presses their lips together and slides her tongue into Jacques’ mouth, Jacques moans. She tilts her head up, wanting more, wanting to taste Diana, to touch her, but Diana pulls away, and Jacques whines. 

“Watch me, Jacqueline,” Diana says, returning to her previous position on the chaise lounge. 

“Yes, ma’am,” Jacques says, obediently keeping her eyes on her girlfriend. She feels so alive. She can almost feel a heartbeat deep within her. Almost. 

“Tell me what you want to see me do,” she says, her voice low and husky. “How do you want me to fuck myself?”

Jacques chokes, all the languages she’s learned over the centuries becoming a jumbled, incoherent mess in her mind. She opens her mouth, trying to form words, but she can’t. She’s overwhelmed with arousal, overwhelmed by the way Diana is looking at her, overwhelmed by this voyeuristic act. The most coherent response she can muster is a quiet whine.

“Disappointing, dear,” Diana tuts, pursing her lips. “I have to do all the work myself.”

The thought of disappointing Diana eclipses her flustered embarrassment. She forces herself to focus. She doesn’t know if she’s capable of verbalizing what she’d like to see. She’s not even sure what exactly she wants to see. Dirty talking isn’t her forte. She’s not even good at everyday conversation. 

Jacques lets her gaze drop to the ground, “I want—”

Diana cuts her off, “Ah-ah, eyes up, darling.” As she looks back up, Diana smiles. “How are you going to watch me do what you ask if you’re looking at the floor?”

Taking a slow breath, Jacques trains her eyes on Diana, on her warm, sultry smile, and says, “I want...I want to watch you touch yourself—spread yourself...” 

“Like this?” Diana asks. She strokes two fingers over her pussy slowly, then uses them to spread herself. Jacques feels dizzy. “Now what, darling?”

When Jacques flounders, unable to come up with anything more, Diana says, “What do you want me to use on myself? My fingers? A toy?” She glances at Jacques’s lips and smiles, “Your mouth?”

“Fuck,” Jacques hisses out, watching as Diana strokes her middle finger over her cunt. 

She would love for Diana to use her mouth, to ball her hands into fists in Jacques’s hair and hold her in place as Jacques goes down on her. But if she chooses that option, she can’t watch Diana’s face. She wants to watch the way Diana’s darkly painted lips part as she pleasures herself. 

Without thinking, Jacques shuffles forward on her knees. With almost lazy grace, Diana extends her leg and presses the ball of her heeled shoe, one that has never walked on anything other than hardwood and cushy carpets, against Jacques’ shoulder, a silent reminder that she didn’t have permission to move. Jacques nearly moans at the contact. 

“Well?” Diana prompts. 

“I can’t decide,” she whines. 

“No?” Diana quirks an eyebrow, prompting the vampire to continue. 

For a few seconds she says nothing, still working on forming the words. 

“I want to watch you touch yourself,” Jacques says, her voice so quiet she’s barely audible. “But I want you to…” She bites her lip, her sharp fang digging in.

“To what?” Diana asks. She leans forward again, her heeled shoe still pressed against Jacques’ shoulder. She hooks the forefinger of her free hand through the o-ring in Jacques’s collar and tugs, continuing to caress herself with the other. “To use your mouth?” Again, her gaze falls on Jacques’ lips. “You want me to ride your face until I cum? Or would you rather stay kneeling on the floor while you eat me out? You do look so pretty like this, tied up, legs spread.”

A whine escapes Jacques’ lips and she looks up at Diana with dark, pleading eyes. 

“Yes,” she gasps. “I want—I want to watch you, and I want you to use my mouth. I don’t care how. I just—I want…” 

“Both? Awfully greedy,” she says, loosening her grip on the collar. “Perhaps if you’re good, and if you can convince me you really want it, I’ll give you both.” 

A smirk touches her dark lips, and she leans back. With her middle finger, she rubs her clit in small circles. Watching Jacques through long lashes, she moans quietly, then slips a finger into herself. The sound fills Jacques with overwhelming arousal. When Diana slides a second finger in, she can’t resist the urge to shuffle forward, but Diana’s heel keeps her in place. 

“My desperate darling,” Diana says, her tone affectionate and teasing. Something warm stirs within Jacques at the word my. To be Diana’s is heaven. 

Diana removes her fingers from herself and bends forward, lowering her leg. She pulls at Jacques’s bottom lip with her thumb, and without hesitation, the vampire opens her mouth, allowing Diana to push two fingers over her tongue. Jacques closes her lips and sucks softly. The taste of Diana makes her dizzy. Makes her entire body tingle. 

“Ma petite lapine,” Diana whispers. “So pretty.” Jacques whines as Diana pulls her fingers from her mouth. The whine morphs into a startled gasp as without warning, Diana slips her hand between the vampires thighs, and strokes her cunt before pushing two fingers into her. They slide in easily. 

“You’re so wet already, and I haven’t even been touching you,” Diana teases. She curls her fingers inside of Jacques. “Maybe I shouldn’t keep you kneeling like this. You might drip onto the carpet.” 

Jacques whines, humiliated and knowing that her cheeks would be burning if she could blush. She leans toward Diana, trying to ride her fingers, grind against her palm, but Diana pulls her hand away.

“Open,” Diana whispers, and Jacques parts her lips, allowing Diana to put her fingers back in her mouth. She’s tasting herself now, and the thought of that makes her feel almost as dizzy as the taste of Diana. 

“You’re going to sit nicely and watch me fuck myself,” she says. “And if you sit still and really convince me you want it, I’ll use your mouth to cum again.” 

Jacques moans around Diana’s fingers.

Jacques was born in France in 1518; her parents were servants at a French estate, and she ended up working as a servant as well

When she’s 19, she catches the attention of Ruprecht (the same vampire that turns Ursula). Jacques has no interest in him, her main focus being keeping her head down and getting her work done. She doesn’t want to get involved in drama or be involved with a nobleman like Ruprecht.

Her mother is very superstitious and believes Ruprecht is a demon that drains the life of his victims. Though Jacques isn’t sure if she believes that, she follows her mother’s precautions to appease her, which keeps her safe from Ruprecht for a while.

When she’s 20, a man named Johannes begins to court her. Jacques is under the impression that she and Johannes are from the same social class and allows him to court her. Over the course of several months, he coaxes her into ignoring her mother’s precautions against Ruprecht.

Johannes and Ruprecht are working together to create their own vampire harem. At the first opportunity, Ruprecht turns Jacques. After waking up as a vampire, Jacques meets Ursula and the two team up to kill Ruprecht and Johannes. Johannes escapes.

Jacques is traumatized and very upset about being turned into a vampire. She feels her life was robbed from her. Her family thinks she’s dead, she’ll never age, she has to feed off of people.

After Ruprecht is killed, Jacques flees France, and begins a search to cure her of vampirism.

Up until this point, Jacques had been going exclusively by Jacqueline. She begins dressing as a man sometimes and going by Jacques.

In the 1770s, she finds a witch who grants her the ability to go in sunlight without burning up. However, being in the sun is very draining and Jacques has to feed sooner than she would if she stayed out of the sun.

Forsaken Bluff

Shortly after she gets the ability to be in sunlight, she travels to the U.S., disguised as a man

She stays in the New England area, working different jobs and keeping her head down while she looks for possible cures to vampirism. A young woman named Catherine begins to fall for Jacques, believing Jacques is a young man. Jacques falls for her hard but realizes they can never be together bc she’s a vampire and also a woman. She flees New England and heads West

Spends a few decades on the East of the Mississippi, moves further West in the 1820s. Meets a young woman named Laura and there are sparks between them. Laura finds out Jacques is a woman, and Jacques is prepared to flee again but Laura begs her to stay.

They marry and have a happy decade together. Laura eventually finds out that Jacques is a vampire and still wants her to stay.

Someone finds out that Jacques is actually a woman. A scandal ensues and Laura ends up murdered.

Heartbroken, Jacques drains the men who killed Laura, then leaves town. Begins her career as an outlaw, taking out her heartbreak on men growing rich from the gold rush.

Catches wind of Forsaken Bluff. She’s always on the lookout for other supernatural creatures, so she decides to check it out. Meets Uriel, who makes her feel understood

Becoming Vampires

In the 1520s, Ruprecht suggests to Johannes that they build their own vampire family comparable to Johannes’s original family. Johannes is like “but they suck and also u can’t have kids” and Ruprecht is like “I don’t want kids. We’ll just turn them ourselves and have an army of vampire allies” and Johannes is like “ok bet”

Ruprecht and Johannes turn a few people in the late 1520s and early 1530s, choosing to seduce and romance the people before turning them in an attempt to ensure loyalty and affection from the new vampires.

In 1537, Ruprecht sees Jacques (19) for the first time and is like “I want her.” Jacques has no desire to get involved in the life of a nobleman and ignores him as politely as possible. He can’t get near her bc Jacques’s mother is convinced Ruprecht is a life-draining demon and makes her do a bunch of things to ward him off.

Since he was born a vampire and not turned, Johannes is not as affected by the wards and starts courting her in 1538. Over the next several months, Johannes convinces Jacques to stop taking her mother’s wards so seriously. He presents himself as a servant, and though she’s not actually interested in romance (she’s actually just not interested in men, but she doesn’t realize that yet), she figures getting married is in her best interest and doesn’t resist his advances.

Jacques is a servant for Ursula’s family. While Johannes is busy trying to get Jacques to let her guard down, Ruprecht turns his sight on Ursula (24, almost 25).

Ruprecht starts courting Ursula and a few months later, starts feeding off of her. She believes she’s dying. She laments that her and Ruprecht’s love affair is being cut short by her impending death. Ruprecht reveals that he’s a vampire and offers to turn her so they can be together ~forever~.

At this point, Ruprecht and Johannes have turned several people, and Ruprecht is confident in himself and their little harem. He doesn’t tell Ursula about his other lovers before turning her because stupidly, he’s not concerned about the possible consequences of turning a lovesick, entitled, rich girl.

A couple weeks after turning Ursula, Ruprecht turns Jacques.

Johannes is more careful than Ruprecht and suggests easing Ursula into the idea of being part of a vampire harem. If it had been up to him, they wouldn’t have turned Ursula at all. She’s too volatile.

When Jacques wakes up as a vampire, she’s furious, betrayed, and hurt. She’d always had a lot of internal anger and frustration, but Johannes and Ruprecht didn’t realize that. From the moment she wakes up, she starts planning her revenge. She lets Johannes and Ruprecht introduce her to the harem and pretends like she’s content to be there.

She realizes that Ursula, who supposedly died a couple weeks ago, was likely turned into a vampire too. She finds Ursula hidden in a house that Ruprecht owns, where he’s keeping her until Johannes is confident that Ursula won’t snap if they tell her the truth about the harem. Jacques never interacted with Ursula much, but she knew from other servants what Ursula was like. She tells her the truth about Ruprecht and Johannes and convinces Ursula that she’s on her side.

Ursula is pissed for many reasons. She wants to be the only object of Ruprecht’s affections. She’s also classist and homophobic, so she’s extra pissed that Ruprecht took interest in Jacques, a poor servant girl, and is in love with Johannes, a man.

Jacques and Ursula team up to kill Ruprecht and Johannes. They have to kill a few of the other vampires in the harem who try to protect them, but neither of them are broken up about that. Ursula kills Ruprecht in a very brutal and messy way, making sure he feels plenty of pain before he dies.

Johannes escapes before they’re able to kill him. They spend a few weeks trying to track him down, but they lose his trail and decide to part ways.

Wandering Years

Ursula and Jacques both spend a few centuries wandering. Ursula moves around France, and eventually around other areas in Europe, marrying men whom she inevitably kills.

Jacques searches for a cure to vampirism while also trying to track down Johannes. In the early 1770s, Jacques finds a witch that grants her the ability to survive in sunlight. Shortly after that, she moves to the New England area of the U.S.

Around the same time, Ursula decides to move to the U.S. She’s suspected of murdering her past three husbands and decides it’s best to leave Europe for a while.

Ursula marries a man in Massachusetts. This is the first time since the 16th century that Ursula and Jacques are in the same area. They have a few meetings, but they mostly run in different circles and don’t see much of each other. Jacques is presenting as a man, which Ursula thinks is weird.  

Jacques finds out that Ursula has been trying to track down Johannes for as long as Jacques has. Ursula doesn’t hate Johannes the way that Jacques does, but she sees him being alive as their job being unfinished.

Jacques falls in love with a woman named Catherine Williams. When Ursula finds out about this, she’s like “uhh Jacques you know you’re not actually a man, right? How’s this going to work?” and Jacques, in denial about being gay is like, “I’m just playing the part of a man!” but she’s also like “oh fuck this won’t work out what will happen when Catherine finds out I’m a woman” so she dips

Moves westward over the next few decades, living in different towns east of the Mississippi, usually pretending to be a man. Eventually ends up in a small-town west of the Mississippi in 1824, where she meets Laura Wood.

Falls hard for Laura (which she again attributes to just playing the part of a man) and indulges in Laura’s affections. She tries not to let Laura get too close, but she’s super in love with Laura and isn’t good at keeping her distance, especially bc Laura is also in love with her.

Laura finds out that Jacques is a woman. Jacques is fully prepared to flee but to her surprise, her being a woman changes nothing for Laura. They get married in November of 1825.

A few years after they get married, Laura finds out Jacques is a vampire. She’s not bothered by it because Jacques generally doesn’t kill people, just drains as much as she needs to get by.

For the first time ever, Jacques is happy.

Unbeknownst to Jacques, Johannes has been tracking her and Ursula, mostly to ensure he stays out of their way, but also because he loved Ruprecht and wants revenge for his death. Seeing Jacques happy and in love with Laura infuriates him. He disguises himself and heads to the town where Jacques lives. He spreads some rumors about Jacques and Laura, including revealing that Jacques is a woman. In 1837, his rumors result in the murder of Laura and the attempted murder of Jacques.

Jacques goes on a killing spree and kills everyone who was even remotely responsible for Laura’s death. She’s unaware that Johannes had anything to do with it.

She isolates herself for several months, grieving Laura’s death. One day, a group of wealthy travelers get a little too close to her hiding spot and she takes out her anger and grief on them, killing all of them.

The killing feels good, and she wants to do more as a way of coping with her anger and grief. This marks the beginning of her career as an outlaw, where she tracks down people growing wealthy off the gold rush and kills those she considers “guilty.” Her definition of guilty is pretty vague and she’s kinda insane during this time period.

In 1854, Jacques ends up in Forsaken Bluff. She meets Uriel and he helps her work through some of her grief.

Once she’s settled into Forsaken Bluff, Jacques stops disguising herself as a man as often.

20th Century

Other stuff related to Forsaken Bluff happens, but I haven’t decided on that yet so we’re just gonna skip all that.

Jacques helped found SBI, but she hates bureaucracy and is a jaded person in general. She’s not very happy working there and does it because she feels obligated to. Every few decades, she’ll take a decade off of work and isolates herself or obsessively looks for Johannes and/or a cure to vampirism.

In all this time, Ursula has been what she’s always been doing: getting married and then killing the men she marries. In the 1950s, she stops marrying the men she’s interested in. Her relationships get shorter and she kills significantly more men. She has a type and by the 1970s, she’s attracted the attention of the SBI for being a serial killer that goes after wealthy, high profile men.

Because of their weird bond, Jacques warns Ursula that the SBI is on her tail. Ursula flees to France while she waits for things to cool down.

Jacques has a lot of informants around the world, and in 1990, she gets reliable information on the recent whereabouts of Johannes. She finds Ursula in France and asks if she wants to help her track Johannes down once and for all. Ursula is more than willing.

In 1993, Jacques and Ursula find Johannes. Before Jacques kills him, she finds out that he was responsible for Laura’s death. This stirs up the old feelings of grief and anger that Jacques never got over, and she tortures him for weeks as retribution before she finally grants him some mercy and kills him.

Ursula is shocked by how cruel Jacques gets while enacting revenge. When she points that out to Jacques, Jacques is like “oh no I’m a terrible and cruel person I can’t believe I’ve let myself behave this way” blah blah self-flagellation. Ursula is less impressed after Jacques’s “woe is me I’m so awful” speech

After Johannes is dead, Jacques hermits again, isolating herself from everyone for about a decade. She’s grieving Laura again and also having a crisis about herself and how she’s a terrible person and how Laura would be so disappointed in her. It’s very emo and whiny

Ursula moves back to the U.S. in 1994

Jacques returns to work at the SBI in 2004. She’s working just to work at this point. The SBI regularly pisses her off, and she frequently goes against the orders of the SBI. It’s hard to fire her though because she’s been there longer than anyone else and she has a lot of power.

Her daywalker wife is a very serious person, and shopping is no exception. She picks up every item of interest as they wander the mismatched stalls of eccentricities and oddities, assessing its value and age in a snap, and deciding if she wants it in less time than that.

Jacques has a keen eye for antiques, being one herself, Diana thinks affectionately. 

The early morning sun is warm on the back of her neck, and Diana lifts her gloved hands to adjust the silk scarf tied around her hair, critically eyeing a shelf of books and bric-a-brac at the back of a stall.

“See something you like?” Jacques asks, sliding an arm around her waist, looking around furtively as the two women move on to the next vendor.

“Yes,” Diana replies, leaning in to peck Jacques on the cheek. “You.”

The vampire’s thin mouth quirks up into a small smile.

“I meant from the market, Di,” she says softly, squeezing the hand on Diana’s waist. “I have figured out that you do, in fact, like me.”

Diana laughs melodiously, reaching for the hand behind her to stroke Jacques’ wedding rings on her left hand, steering her towards the next stall. 

“I should hope so, seeing as we’ve agreed to spend literally forever together my darling,” she says, holding Jacques’ hand in hers as they assess paintings hung on wire racks. Jacques gives her another small smile, squeezing her wife’s hand gently before pulling her grasp away to go inspect a set of encyclopaedias. 

Diana rolls her eyes at her wife, turning to the stall’s patron.

“This one here, how much?” she asks, gesturing to a small painting in an ornate frame.

“Six hundred,” the person replies, and Diana shrugs, reaching into her handbag.

“A steal,” she replies brightly, lifting out her wallet. She sorts through the bills, pulling out the amount and handing it over.

“Not even trying to bargain the price down?” the patron asks, and Diana shrugs, as Jacques comes over to look at the painting. 

“I think it’s fair value,” the artist replies with a smile. “Will you wrap it, please?”

Jacques lifts an eyebrow as the painting is taken down, joining her wife at her side.

“A ballerina?” she asks, looking at her wife. Diana smiles, watching as the painting is wrapped with care.

“One of my first paintings with movement,” she explains quietly, leaning in to whisper in the vampire’s ear, “My grandmother was gracious enough to pose for me. I thought it was lost to time, as so many other of my pieces are.”

The money is exchanged, the painting is placed in a bag, and  Jacques takes it in one hand, the other holding Diana’s gloved hand. 

“We can hang it in the upstairs hallway,” Diana says, already redesigning the upstairs hallway’s art layout in her head. “Or perhaps in the guest room in the east wing.”

“Wherever you like it, mon amour,” Jacques murmurs, holding her hand tightly as they walk through the market. The sun has risen higher in the sky, and the crowd has thickened with tourists and treasure-hunters. The vampire wrinkles her nose as the mingling scents of perfume and sweat as the summer’s heat begins to settle over the day, walking closely to her wife.

“What I would like,” Diana pronounces, two stalls down the way, “Is a coffee. And some brunch. What do you say we call it a day, and head out?”

“I think there’s another three markets on the route home you want to see,” Jacques replies dryly, as she steers Diana towards the parking lot. “And you want to get there before any other treasures escape you.”

“So lovely,” Diana purrs, stroking her fingers down the line of Jacques’ jaw.The vampire, to her credit, only whimpers slightly. Diana smirks, tangling her fingers in Jacques’ short hair.

She circles the vampire, admiring her arms bound behind her with a simple silk tie, on her knees against the plush carpet of Jacques’ personal library. Diana smirks, as she twists her fingers tightly in Jacques’ hair, pulling. The vampire breathes in sharply, and Diana tugs her head again, Jacques eyes looking up to meet hers.

“I love that I can make you breathe,ma petite lapine,” Diana chuckles, bending in her corset as she drags her other hand down Jacques’ throat. “You’re so good for me, aren’t you?”

“Yes, yes, I’m good,” Jacques pants, her hands clasping together behind her back in their tie, ”Please, let me be good.”

Diana walks around to face Jacques, the heel of her stiletto digging into the carpet in front of Jacques as she bends, meeting Jacques’ eyes as she slides a finger into the metal ring on the front of the black collar Jacques wears, tugging her forward on her knees with only a crook of her fingers.

“So desperate,” Diana sighs, sitting back in Jacques’ favourite leather armchair, as Jacques whines, moving forward on her knees, “Very well. Show me just how good you can be,” she drawls, setting her arms on the chair, spreading her legs slowly for Jacques, who sighs with a moan.

***

Anya can’t help the smirk that sits on her lips as her husband - husband! - blushes a bright red under the spray of the shower.

“Ah, Doc, aren’t- won’t your knees hurt?” he asks as she settles on her knees in front of him on the tile in the absurdly large shower in their village. 

“I’ll be fine, Lucas,” she says with a laugh, glancing at the separate soaker tub she’ll definitely take a soak in after, before dragging her hands over the planes of his sculpted abs, pressing a kiss to the juncture of his hip and thigh.

He gasps above her, and Anya smiles up at him through her lashes, lifting a hand to wipe some of the water out of her eyes before dropping her hand to wrap loosely around his rapidly hardening cock.

“Oh- oh, Anya,” he moans, resting a hand on her head. He tenses, squeezes slightly before pulling back, swallowing hard as he looks down at her, biting his lip in a way that makes her want to kiss him.

“You’re good, solnishko,” she assures him instead, shifting her posture, tilting her head downwards, “Just don’t push.”

She looks up at him, enjoys how his eyes widen and fingers tighten in her wet hair as she takes him in her mouth, reveling in his strangled moan.

Well worth the wait to the honeymoon, she thinks.

***

If she’s not careful she’s going to rip apart the duvet balled up on the bed behind her.

Teale’s eyes roll back in her head and she lets out a long moan, her fangs biting into her lip.

“Babe,” she whines, drawing it out as she looks down at Rhonda, on her knees, between the vampire’s thighs, “Please!”

Rhonda pulls away from her centre with a grin, pressing lazy kisses to Teale’s shaking thighs, her fingers still crooked inside the vampire. With a gentle motion, Rhonda coaxes another keening whine out of Teale, whose nails slice through the duvet.

“Please what, Teale?” Rhonda drawls, lowering her mouth to flick her tongue over Teale’s sensitive clit, drawing her fingers out of the vamprie slowly.

Teale whines again, a garbled mess of words and begging, and if she could, would be beyond red, flushed over her cheeks, breasts and thighs with arousal.

The brunette looks like she desperately wants to leave the conversation, and Diana feels like she really ought to oblige her.

There’s no rings on her fingers, and though she stands very still, the woman’s finger taps the rim of her glass lightly, her eyes darting about the room. Diana approaches slowly, listening in to the conversation.

“There you are, darling,” she says gently, slipping her hand into the other woman’s with a kiss on the cheek. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

Diana offers a gentle smile and tosses her hair as she gestures to the terrace windows with her head.

“Ah, yes, I’ve just been...here,” the woman says with a raised eyebrow and a squeeze of her hand. “Did you need…?”

“A word, on the balcony, my dear,” Diana replies, as the woman - vampire, Diana suspects - gives her excuses to the others and follows Diana to the balcony.

“I suppose I should thank you,” she says as they step onto the moonlit balcony. “But I don’t even know your name.”

“It’s Diana,” she says, looking down at the other woman, “And you?”

“Jacques.”

“A pleasure, I am sure,” Diana says with a wide smile, “You looked as though you’d been ready to leave that conversation for a hot minute.”

Jacques - a fitting name for the beautiful creature in front of her - nods hesitantly. “I had been trying to leave for some time,” she admits, “It’s not that I don’t like the extended Rachkov family-”

“Careful,” Diana says, wagging a finger, “I’m extended Rachkov.”

Jacques flicks her eyes over Diana and nods slowly. “I can see the resemblance now,” she says carefully, and Diana smiles, taking a few steps closer to her. “But your family can be-”

“Overwhelming.”

“Indeed.”

“And I just pretended you were my girlfriend.”

“You did.”

Diana sighs dramatically and smiles, reaching for Jacques’ hand. “Then I suppose we have no choice than to carry out the charade until the end of the evening, at least,” she says, lifting Jacques’ hand to press a kiss to the back of her cool hand.

Jacques doesn’t reply, and Diana gazes down at the brunette with her hand against her lips, lowering her hand slowly.

“At least,” Jacques echoes slowly, swallowing. Diana takes a step closer and smiles, tilting her head.

“So, we’ll have to be at each other’s side at midnight,” she murmurs, looking quickly over Jacques’ lovely face. “For our kiss, of course.”

“Of course,” Jacques says weakly, meeting Diana’s gaze. “Our kiss.”

“For the New Year.”

“But of course.”

Diana smiles, and presses a kiss to Jacques’ cheek gently. “Shall we rejoin the party then?”

Jacques takes a deep breath - Diana isn’t sure she has to - and holds out her arm to her.