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“I’m simply saying, if you have the option of a better experience, there’s no reason to deny yourself,” Amalthea countered, then focused on me. “You never talk about your life before. How you wound up where you did.”

There was an implicit question there that left my three companions looking at me expectantly.

Normally, I avoided any mention of how Raphael had found me—or the time before.

I assumed Raphael had given them some description, but since I hadn’t told him much either… “I was sentenced when I was eight.”

“Sentenced… to prison?”

I shook my head. There was a distinction—proper prisoners got to sit around, at least. Got regular meals.

“To serve the prison. Greymere drives witches mad, so only voids can work there, but a life cut off from magic is inconvenient even for voids. Most serve short terms. It’s a miserable, filthy place.

” Maybe the drink was affecting me. Or perhaps I just wanted to be able to tell someone.

“I was sentenced to serve fifteen years, and then I could be released. Or so I thought. The night Raphael and I escaped, I found out that was a lie. They had no intention of letting me go . ”

“But you were a child.” Amalthea’s voice was soft with horror. “What could possibly have been so terrible you were sent there?”

I took another pull of ale, savoring the burn down my throat. With every sip, it was easier to understand why others liked it. “Such is the king’s justice.”

“Not all kings,” Raphael growled.

I hadn’t looked at him while speaking. His expression was fierce, nearly terrifying. But I knew, in my bones, it wasn’t directed at me but at the injustices I’d faced. There was a comfort in that, in someone being angry at the old wounds I’d thought long since scarred over.

The night continued. I spoke no more of my past, but Demos and Raphael took turns telling stories from theirs.

The two had known each other for over half a millennium, which left plenty of fodder for entertaining tales.

I listened and drank more, eager to chase away the memories that had stirred. The wine made it easy.

“I think you had a bit much,” Raphael said as I stumbled out the door ahead of him, catching myself on the wooden frame.

“I fuh—” Hiccup . “Feel great.”

And then I nearly landed face-first onto the stone walkway.

Powerful arms scooped me up, and before I knew it, I was pressed against Raphael’s chest, one arm cradling my back, the other under my legs.

I nestled into his hold, liking the way his scent wrapped around me.

There was a low rumble in his chest, and something like, “Go on ahead without us.”

Amalthea’s and Demos’s voices were distant as they bid us goodbye.

I twisted to look over at them and then back at Raphael.

He was wearing an expression that was utterly foreign to me, so soft and concerned.

His white brows furrowed as he looked down at me, the red eyes I’d once found terrifying were warm with affection.

Gods, that wine was good. He had the slightest stubble covering the sharp planes of his face.

I lifted a palm to his cheek, marveling at the prickly sensation.

He halted while I ran my fingers over his skin.

Vampire stillness. I liked that I was getting to touch him.

I’d tried to stop noticing how beautiful he was—first, because he was a vampire.

Then, because of everything else. But now, those parts of my brain were as quiet as the empty streets .

“I forget human tolerance is vastly lower than a vampire’s,” he said, the low tone of his voice washing over me.

I curled in closer, dropping my hand to his neck. “Drank less than Thea.”

The rumble of his chest was soothing. “Sometimes I wonder if Thea might be part fish.”

My brain was too slow to understand what he was saying exactly, but it was with that same dry humor I’d come to recognize so I laughed all the same.

And then suddenly I was all too tired and too comfortable to stay awake.

I dozed for what could have been hours or minutes, waking up only as we reached my (recently replaced) door.

The little rest I’d had left me wide awake and even more aware of the male who carried me.

“You smell so nice,” I murmured, savoring the closeness. It felt so right. “I wish I could taste you.”

His fingers tensed around my legs. “And here I so often think that about you.”

“You did,” I remind him. “You said I was perfect.”

“This is true.”

Which part—that you said it, or that it’s true? “I shouldn’t have let you.”

“Because of the bond?”

I giggled. “No. Because of how it felt.”

It was a predator whose eyes pinned me in place, but for once I wasn’t scared. “And how was that, Samara?”

“Alive. Connected.” I shivered at the memory.

“I thought it would be painful. Thought I’d die before I let a vampire bite me.

But sometimes, when I lay in bed, I wonder if I’d die if I don’t get bitten again.

If that’s the only way to feel so gloriously alive.

My body ached in ways I’d never known possible, my skin felt tight.

For the first time, I felt like I understood what it was to be a woman.

I wanted you, Raphael. More than anything. I’d have given you anything.”

Raphael set me on the bed, gently, and took several steps back. “The bite sometimes makes humans… react , Samara. That’s all.”

I shook my head. “I’d never felt anything like that before.”

“Surely you’ve felt something like that. From a kiss, a caress.”

I laughed, a bit loud in the quiet of the room. “Raphael, when would I have ever kissed anyone ? Do you think Nelson was the kind to whisper sweet nothings? That any in Greymere were?”

There was nothing human about the growl that left his mouth. He prowled closer. “Did they ever hurt you, Samara? Mark my words, I’ll go back and slaughter them all if you say so.”

“Not like that. Nelson was the worst, but even he never…” I trailed off, not wanting to let him haunt my evening any more. I’d never been assaulted, but it hadn’t been chivalry that kept me safe. “In all ways, I’m ignorant, Raphael.” I paused. “Ignorant… but curious.”

Feeling braver than I ever had before, I reached my hand out again, crossing the space between us. I ran the back of my hand down his chest. Beneath the fabric, I felt his muscles. Solid. Strong. Would his bare flesh feel the same? Raphael caught my wrist, pinning it against him.

“You can feel my emotions right now, can’t you?” I asked.

His face was strained. “I think you should sleep, Samara. You’re going to be exhausted tomorrow.”

“Then you can,” I said, ignoring his statement.

“If you couldn’t, you’d deny it. If you can feel it, you know,” I said with relief.

“I don’t need to tell you.” I didn’t need to admit how desperately I wanted Raphael in that moment.

How I’d looked at him over and over, wanting, not even letting myself accept how badly I did.

Now here he was, tantalizingly close. The top of his shirt was unbuttoned, showing an expanse of hard muscle. I tilted my head back at Raphael, who stood right in front of the bed.

The desire brewing inside me was as heady a mixture as the ale. “Won’t you give this to me?”

A low sound shuddered through him. “No, dove. Not like this.”

He stepped back and I stood, stumbling into him. He caught me quickly, arms wrapped around me, steadying. I clung to the lapels of his shirt. “Don’t you want me?” I whimpered. Was I so undesirable, that even tossing myself at this male, he was repulsed?

“Samara…” His thumb stroked the side of my face.

“If you tell me you want something with a clear head, anything in my power, it’s yours.

But not tonight. Not when you would wake up hating me more than you already do.

” He gently guided me back to the bed. My body protested, but I lacked the words to tell him he was wrong.

Maybe because I knew he wasn’t. I wouldn’t find this courage again.

It wasn’t even real courage, just borrowed from the intoxicating mix of attention and alcohol.

A mix that let me look past the fact the one man I’d ever wondered about like this was the king of vampires.

That let me ignore the fact I’d be leaving.

Suddenly, I was annoyed at Raphael. It was bad enough I’d trusted him to drink and now made a fool of myself. But what was my reward for being foolish? Shame, and a heated body that didn’t understand the denial.

“Sleep, little dove. Or you’ll regret it all in the morning.”

I harrumphed, crossing my arms over my chest. Then I rolled farther and farther until I reached the edge. Then I grabbed my pillow and rolled off the bed entirely.

“Samara,” Raphael said.

“I’m not sleeping up there,” I said petulantly.

Raphael leaned over the bed, looking down at me. The sight made me giggle. “Because I’m here?” he asked.

“No.”

Even drunk, I expected mockery. What kind of person couldn’t sleep in a bed? “I can’t sleep in this bed.”

He frowned. “I’ll get you another mattress. ”

I shook my head. “I can’t sleep in any bed.”

“You slept in one at the cabin,” he pointed out.

True. It had been another world. With my back wrecked, there’d been no other option.

And the cabin was different enough that it hadn’t stirred memories with the same viciousness.

But here, the halls, the finery… despite being a world apart, it was all too similar.

“I was lying in bed when they came. That night.” The night they’d come for Mother.

Raphael’s body went still in my periphery, but I was lost to the memory.

“Traitors,” the guards had snarled when they barged through the chamber doors. The same guards I’d known all my life, who had smiled when I passed by. “Ungrateful whore.”

“I did try,” I added quickly, the words stumbling over each other as they left my mouth.

“But I couldn’t sleep. Even in Greymere, I was in the habit of hiding myself somewhere different each night.

I can’t sleep if I feel exposed.” In a bed, waiting for anyone to come in and grab me.

Tears pricked my eyes, hating my weakness.

Obviously, Raphael had known I was weak compared to him, but he had no idea just how pathetic I was. And here I was, telling him.

I braced for the revulsion, the derision.

He lifted up, disappearing from view. Leaving? No. Another pillow dropped to the floor, and he pushed it under the bed.

“Then we won’t sleep on the bed,” he announced .

“W-we?” I stammered.

He dropped down, sliding under the bed. The bed was elevated, enough that I could comfortably slip under each night and be hidden by the long, draping bedspread.

Raphael, in contrast, filled the space. “Of course. I said I would watch over you, Samara. What would keep you safer than sleeping at my side?”

It was an overreach of logic, the kind of declaration that only made sense because Raphael said it with such arrogance, and the glasses of wine and ale had a way of muddling my mind.

And because I wanted it to be true.