Page 56

Sebastián

A s Flynn slept, I traced my fingers over his chest. Cold. So damned cold. And I was sure being wrapped around me all night hadn’t helped. The first rays of sunlight crept through the gap in the curtains, casting a soft glow across his face.

Flynn’s peaceful expression shattered. His brow furrowed, lips twisting into a grimace of pain. A whimper escaped his throat as his head thrashed against the pillow.

My hand froze above his ribs, above the darkness I couldn’t chase away. His legs tangled in the sheets as he fought whatever horror played behind his closed eyes.

“Flynn.” I gripped his shoulder, giving him a gentle shake. “Wake up.”

His eyes snapped open, wild and unfocused. His hand clutched at his chest, right over the spot where that damned mark festered.

“It was all…” Flynn’s voice rasped. “Dark. Dark and cold.”

I brushed his hair from his forehead. “The magic can cause strange dreams. But you’re okay now.” I pressed my lips to his temple, lingering there.

His breathing slowly steadied, though his fingers remained splayed across his heart. “Are you angry at me?”

I frowned at him.

“For last night? Untying you. It felt right in the moment, but I know you said…”

“No, I’m not angry.” As if I could harbour any amount of annoyance after sharing something so special.

“And you stopped right away. I asked you to stop, and you did immediately. But—”

I silenced him with a kiss, recalling how I’d sucked the blood from his tongue after he’d cut himself on my fang. Those blood-drenched kisses… I could have happily lapped at the wound for hours, but Flynn had asked me to stop, and I had. I’d controlled myself. For him.

My dead heart stirred like winter ice breaking in spring, a cascade of emotion flooding through the cracks—relief, pride, gratitude. Devotion .

Our kiss deepened—his lips parting sweetly beneath mine—but I couldn’t allow myself to indulge in him again, not now. If we started that, I may never leave his bed.

Pulling away, I traced my fingers along his jaw. “If anything, I’m in awe of your trust. Your bravery. You’ve trusted me with your life. Your body. And also your heart, by telling me everything that happened with Connor.”

He’d given me so many pieces of himself now, so it was surely my turn. My fingers stilled in his hair as the weight of what I was about to share pressed down on my chest. Even here with him, the looming date cast its shadow. “Six days until the thirty-first of October.”

Flynn shifted beside me, propping himself up on one elbow. “You don’t like Halloween?”

A hollow laugh escaped my throat. “It’s the date I have to read a certain collection of diaries.” I settled back against the pillow and stared at the ceiling, counting the cracks in the plaster. “My oldest diaries. From my human years.”

“You have to read them?”

“I force myself to read them every ten years. On the anniversary of her death.” The words came out clipped, mechanical. “To make sure I never forget what I did to her.”

Flynn fell very still. “ Her ?”

“My sister. Magdalena.” The name summoned a hazy fragment of her—thick brown hair dancing in a warm breeze, dappled sunlight through leaves, a moment frozen in time before I destroyed everything .

Flynn’s hand found mine under the covers, but I barely registered his touch. Every decade, October always felt like this—a noose gradually tightening around my neck, each day bringing me closer to those blood-stained pages.

“I spend the whole month dreading it.” My voice was a whisper. “Like a ticking time bomb, counting down the days until I have to face myself again.”

Flynn’s face crumpled as he absorbed my words.

The sheet slipped down his chest as he sat up abruptly, revealing the faint delicate frost patterns that now adorned his skin.

They looked almost beautiful, like intricate mantilla lace.

A stark contrast to their true meaning—death’s fingers slowly claiming him.

He shifted, expression gentle yet determined. “Hey… Why do we have to wait until Halloween? If this is hurting you this much…” He reached for my hand. “Maybe we could face it together. Today.”

“Flynn—” The protest died in my throat. How could I explain that these memories were like a poison so potent they had to be contained to a single day every ten years?

“I know it’s your private ritual, and I’m not trying to dismiss that.” He squeezed my fingers. “But watching you torture yourself with dread for the next six days…” He shook his head and started to pull on his clothes. “You don’t have to do this alone anymore.”

My teeth ground themselves together. The weight of his earnest gaze was almost unbearable. “You won’t like what you find.”

“I don’t care. I want to know every piece of you, Seb. Even the bad parts. Especially the bad parts.”

Self-disgust coated my tongue like ash. Memories threatened to surface—flames licking at wooden stakes, screams echoing through stone corridors.

“The things I did… The person I was…” My voice roughened.

“Once you know what I am—what I’ve done—you’ll see me differently. You’ll look at me and see a monster.”

“I already know exactly what you are,” Flynn insisted. “I’ve seen you kill. I’ve felt your fangs against my neck. I’ve watched you struggle against your own nature, to keep me safe. And I’m still here, wanting more of you, not less.”

I shook my head, chest tightening with a familiar panic. These were methodical acts of cruelty, performed in the name of God. “This is different. This is…” The words stuck in my throat. How could I explain the magnitude of my sins? The weight of centuries of guilt?

“This is something you did five hundred years ago? Yeah, I think I’ll get over it. Come on.”

I stared at Flynn until the reality of his determination sank in. Bloody hell. He wasn’t going to let this go. That stubborn streak of his was now fixed firmly on me. With a groan that could have woken the dead—and I would know—I dragged myself from the warmth of the bed.

My clothes from last night lay scattered across the floor. As I retrieved each item, I felt Flynn’s gaze burning into my back. When I glanced up, he quickly averted his eyes, a delicious blush creeping across his cheeks.

“Do you want to take a photograph?” I couldn’t resist teasing.

“Just making sure you’re actually getting dressed and not trying to distract me.”

“Distract you? Me?” I buttoned up my shirt with deliberate slowness. “I would never.”

“You absolutely would.” Flynn grabbed my hand, tugging me toward the door. “Come on. Your office. Now.”

I dug my heels in, though not enough to actually stop him. “I have work to do, you know. Important vampire business. Very pressing matters.”

“More pressing than this?”

“There’s a list of sightings I need—”

“They’ll wait.”

“And Kit needs me to—”

“He’ll survive.”

I let him pull me down the corridor toward my office, grumbling under my breath about pushy humans who didn’t understand the complex responsibilities of leading a supernatural crime task force .

We reached my office door, and I made one last attempt. “You know, I could make you breakfast instead… I’m sure a bowl of cereal is within my skill set.”

“Nice try.” Flynn pushed open the door. “In.”

I went straight to leaning against my desk, eyeing Flynn’s determined stance. “My, my. Your vampire hunter persona from last night has really gotten to your head, hasn’t it? Should I be worried about coat hangers appearing from hidden pockets?”

“Shut up.” Flynn’s lips twitched. “If I remember correctly, you rather enjoyed being at my mercy.”

I lunged forward, catching his waist, lifting him effortlessly and spinning us both around. His surprised gasp turned into a laugh as I deposited him on the edge of my desk, stepping between his knees. Papers scattered, a pen clattered to the floor.

My fingers tangled in his hair, tilting his head back to expose the line of his throat. The marks from the other night had already faded—a fact that both pleased and disappointed me.

“I think my fearsome vampire hunter needs a punishment. Or three.” I let my voice drip with promise.

Flynn laughed and planted his palm firmly against my chest, pushing me back. “Stop it. No deflecting.”

His eyes sparkled with his stubborn defiance, and my heart attempted to stutter.

“You’re infuriating.”

Flynn gently weaved out of my grip, heading to my bookcases, which were stuffed beyond logic. “Where do we need to start?”

Tension coiled within me as my gaze shot straight to the chest tucked away in the corner. Ancient wood, reinforced with iron bands that had rusted over centuries. The lock—newer than the rest—gleamed dully.

“In there?”

I nodded, unable to speak. The chest seemed to pulse with malignant energy, though that was only my imagination .

Flynn’s hand found mine, squeezing gently. The playful atmosphere firmly evaporated.

We crossed the room together, retrieving the key from my desk drawer. I knelt before the chest, and Flynn settled beside me, his shoulder pressed warm against mine.

“It’s rare that a vampire as old as I am would have perfect recollection of their entire life, but my memory has always been rather awful. I think it’s because of what happened within these diaries. I wanted so badly to escape from it all. To forget.”

The key slid into the lock with a click that echoed through my bones.

“I translated every single one of my documents about a century ago. Laid tracing paper over each page. The original Spanish underneath, English on top.” The lid creaked as I lifted it.

“I was afraid I might… forget. That the Spanish might slip away like so many other memories have.”

“But you can still speak it?”

“ Sí .” I managed a weak smile. “Though… it’s as if the vocabulary remains, but the soul of it has faded. If that makes sense…”

“It does.”

“Regardless, my accent’s probably atrocious by modern standards.”

Inside the chest, leather-bound volumes lay stacked in neat rows, their spines cracked and faded with age.

I forced my hands not to tremble as I lifted them out, arranging them chronologically across the floor.

Each one represented a piece of my human life—fragments of memories I could no longer fully trust.

The sight of them, laid out like corpses at a wake, made my throat constrict. These weren’t just books. They were evidence. Testimony. A record of my sins written in my own hand.

“These…” I had to clear my throat and start again. “These detail everything leading up to Magdalena’s death. And… him .”

Flynn shifted closer. “Him?”

“ Rodrigo de Valencia .” The name tasted like poison. “Though I knew him as Padre Rodrigo back then. Father Rodrigo. He was the one who…” I couldn’t finish. It had been so long since I’d spoken his name al oud.

“The one who what?”

I forced the words out. “The vampire who turned me.”

Flynn’s sharp intake of breath cut through the silence. His hand found mine, squeezing tight.

“He was a priest?”

I stared at the diaries. “He took everything from me. My life. My soul.” Something ancient and dark twisted in my chest, rearing a hideous head. “My sister.”