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“But,” she starts, but her eyes close and when she opens them the past is gone. Her anger and hurt is alive again. “You will be with me.”

“Tiffany,” I sigh. “I won’t. The only way this ends is with one of us dead. Your obsession over me is done. I don’t think you reallyknow why you are doing this to me. It took you years to face me, to do something about it. Why? Why not move on?”

“Fuck you,” she shouts, throwing her drink on my chest and standing.

I hiss as the alcohol seeps into the cuts, which is nothing compared to when she brings her leg up and digs her heel into the open wound on my thigh.

“Motherfucker,” I roar.

“You will love me,” she shrieks. “I came all this way for you. I need you. I need someone to silence the voices. I need someone to love me.”

She breaks the glass against the leg of the chair and hold the biggest shard to my neck. “Tiffany,” I call out.

“I get what I want now. I was a weak little girl that nobody loved, but then you did. You rescued me. I’m not weak anymore,” she snaps, her hand shaking, nicking my skin.

“No,” I gulp. “You aren’t weak anymore. But you also are a fucking bitch that has to tie a man to a chair to get what you want. I am not weak. I may be the one in cuffs but I won’t go quietly. I won’t go with you thinking for one second that I love you, want you, or in any way miss what we could have had. You are the reason I hate fucking vampires. Just because you are physically strong does not make you the strongest one in the room.” I ignore the glass that is sinking deeper into my skin and the rage on her face. “You are weak. To kill a man that is tied to a chair is weak,” I repeat.

She screams in my face.

“Are you trying to die, cheetah?” Ryker drawls from the doorway.

“No, just getting some things off my chest,” I slur. She must have punctured my neck deeper than I thought. I smelled them coming about the time she put the glass to my neck.

“Elijah,” Saylor sobs as she skids to a stop behind Ryker and Bash. The others are here too, most surrounding the cabin.

Saylor tries to run to me but Bash circles her waist.

“Vampire,” Tiffany cries, her eyes wild as they bounce between Ryker and Bash.

“We are.” Ryker glides calmly closer. “You have broken many of our laws.”

“What laws?” she hisses.

“I had my friend look into you. You have left a river of dead bodies everywhere you have been.” Ryker stops when he is directly beside her. “Give me the glass.” He holds out his hand.

Even Tiffany can’t resist the power of the king of vampires. It fills the room. The pressure of it makes it even harder to breath. She pulls the glass from my neck, placing it in his open palm.

“I was hungry,” she pouts.

“I don’t give a fuck,” he growls. “They were not willing and certainly didn’t agree to give you their life.”

“Who are you?” she sneers, but it’s more of a groan as he directs his gifts at her.

“I am the king of vampires. I am older than you can imagine. You have taken a friend with the intention of killing him. You took him away from his mate. You caused her endless worry.”

I cringe when he calls Saylor my mate in front of Tiffany.

All it takes is a split second of Ryker’s attention turning to Bash to yell at him to keep Saylor back. The agony and rage that flows from Tiffany causes me to struggle fiercely with my cuffs. I know it is useless but I see her intentions before anyone else. I give up on getting out of them and stand with the chair attached to me a second before she lunges toward Saylor.

I knock her to the floor just in time and the chair busts into pieces around us.

“No,” Saylor screams.

Tiffany’s fingers reach for a broken legs of a chair and I am powerless to stop her from shoving it into my chest.

“Fuck,” Bash curses and reaches for me.

The sound of Ryker’s knife scraping when he pulls it from the sheath is loud in the silent room. I watch with closing eyes. He swings and takes her head.