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I ’m sitting at the island when Valen walks in. He’s well put together, his dark jeans and black pullover almost normal. Like he walked out of a clothing ad before the world fell apart.

The others left a few hours ago, though Gretchen volunteered to stay the night with me. I declined, and ever since, I’ve been waiting for him. Thinking about what I want to say but never deciding on anything.

Valen is like a black hole. I know nothing about him—I can’t know anything about him. His history is too vast, too far-reaching and dark. I can ask question after question, get veiled answer after veiled answer. But I still won’t know anything more than I do now. He’s a vampire, one who can walk in the sun. A killer, one who’s killed for me.

That’s all I know about him. But the part that scares me is what I know about me . Despite how much I hate him for what he is and what he’s done, I’m drawn to him. I always have been, if I’m being honest with myself. I can’t explain it. I don’t want to try. Not tonight.

“I suppose you have no updates for me.” He gives me his usual snide tone.

“Why?” I ask.

He stands across the island from me, his gaze searching my face. There’s not a scratch on it. He healed my injuries, every last one of them. My surface is smooth and unmarred. What lies underneath is pockmarked and bleeding.

“Why?” I repeat my question. “Why did you save me?”

His gaze narrows, the haughty facade still in place. “You know why. You’re an asset, one I’m bound to protect.”

“That’s not why.” I rub my eyes and refocus on him. “What you did in the atrium—that wasn’t an act of someone protecting an ‘asset’.” I stand and walk around to him. He follows my movements, his body turning in time with mine until we meet. “That was …” I remember the screams, the smell of viscera and death.

“Personal?” he asks.

“Yes.” I look up into his eyes.

He shrugs lightly. “Or perhaps in your sheltered life you’ve never seen true acts of violence done by someone who knows exactly how to inflict the most pain. Someone who enjoys it.” He smirks.

“You’re lying.”

“Am I?” He raises a brow.

“You tore them apart. I don’t think anyone escaped.”

“They didn’t.” He smiles coldly. “Some tried, of course. I hunted them down. They thought they’d gotten away. It’s more fun when they think they’re safe, that the shadow has passed them by.”

I should be horrified. I’m not. I’m … relieved. There’s a piece of me missing, a switch that flipped when Clay gutted me with enjoyment in his eyes. The missing piece has been replaced with something colder, darker, sharper. Akin to vengeance, but more vicious.

“You healed me,” I whisper so low I can barely hear myself.

He steps closer, so close my breasts brush against his shirt and his scent envelops me. “Careful, Georgia.” His voice is a low purr. “Some things are better left unsaid.”

I know then that I’m right, that it was more than him just doing his job. He doesn’t want Gregor to know he healed me. Why?

With trembling fingers, I reach up and press my palm to his cheek.

His pupils grow at my touch, two black abysses that swallow me whole.

“You saved me. You didn’t have to.”

He takes my hand and brings it to his mouth, his lips like the touch of feathers against my wrist. Just that simple contact sends heat coursing through me. He holds my gaze as he presses his mouth more fully to my skin, my body going prickly with awareness. “Yes, I did.”

Wrapping one arm around me, he leans down and pulls me against his chest, his hand in my hair as he kisses the spot just beneath my ear.

The heat of him pulls a gasp from me.

“Three bloodlines.” His voice is so soft that I wonder if I’m truly hearing it or if he’s speaking in my mind. “Dragonis. Gregor’s line. Blood of intention.”

The one with the power to control. I think back to what Gage made me memorize.

“My line.” His tongue dances along the shell of my ear, and my knees go weak. “The one sample you’ve never been given.”

“Why? If it’s the one I’ve needed, why would you keep it from me?”

He meets my gaze again, his eyes stormy and dark. “Because it’s the end.”

“Of what?”

“Everything,” he says. Then his gaze goes to my mouth. My skin buzzes, my heart thumping a perilous beat.

I grip his waist as he pulls my head back and fastens his lips to my throat. He scratches his teeth along my skin, then moves to my mouth.

When he kisses me, my eyelids flutter closed, and I’m lost in him. In his touch. A world of noise and fear goes silent, and it’s only us. Just this closeness, this inexplicable pull. I don’t want to fight it, don’t want to do anything except feel.

His arms wrap around me, and then I’m floating. My heart thumps out a tumultuous beat, my entire body sizzling just beneath the surface.

When my back hits my bed, I open my legs, Valen nestling between them as his tongue gives and takes. I grab his hair, holding onto the midnight strands as his hand roams lower, cupping my breast.

A gasp escapes me when he pinches my hard nipple. He swallows the sound, his body hard and tense. I whimper when he kisses to my throat, his fangs grazing along my sensitive skin.

“Your blood calls to mine.” He licks up the side of my neck, sending a shiver that spirals through me. “As mine calls to you.”

“Please.” I lean up and claim his mouth again, my tongue glancing along one of his fangs. The slightest sting, and then I taste blood. Coppery life.

A feral growl rips through him, and he pulls back, his eyes shining in the dark. The slight bloom of fear only heightens my arousal, my need for him like a chant in my head, my heart.

“I won’t be gentle, Georgia. I can’t. Not with you.” His voice is more monster than man, and it’s sick how much I want him just like this.

“Valen.” I grip the hem of his shirt and pull up. He grabs it and yanks it off, then does the same to my shirt.

When my breasts are exposed, my nipples hardening even more, he leans down and claims one in his mouth. His palm goes to the other, squeezing and kneading as he sucks and licks my stiff peak. My core is molten, my back arching. He thrusts his hips against me, his hard cock teasing my clit with pressure.

I pull his hair, my body attuned to every touch, every bit of friction between us.

“Perfect,” he murmurs against my breast then kisses down my stomach. “So fucking perfect, Georgia.” Hooking his fingers in my pants, he pulls them away, then my panties. I’m naked beneath him, and he sits back, his eyes taking me in, resting on every bare part of me until heat flares in my cheeks and I move to cover myself.

“No.” He’s on top of me again, pinning my hands over my head as he wrecks my mouth. I’ve never been kissed like this, never been devoured, never been desired so completely that I give myself over to every last sensation.

“More.” He shucks off his jeans, his bare body a marbled masterpiece in the low light. His fangs are long, the tips deadly. “I need all of you, Georgia. Every last bit.”

“Take it.” I run my hand down my breast and lower, then rub my clit while he watches.

“Mine,” he snarls and takes my wrist, pulling my hand away before he presses his mouth to my pussy.

I squeal at the onslaught, at the way his tongue plays my flesh. His hands grip my thighs, his fingernails grown into claws that prick my skin. Spreading me wider, he laves my clit, his head buried between my legs as he takes and takes.

When he presses his tongue inside me, my hips buck. He pins me in place in a merciless grip, his eyes holding mine as he returns to my clit. There’s nothing but his touch. I’m a slave to it, bound to him, to every swipe of his tongue, every groan rattling through his chest. I’m a wild beast, no thought, no reason. Only need that encompasses all else.

Everything inside me coils tighter and tighter. My hips move with him. I chase my pleasure shamelessly, and he gives it. I’m so close.

He pulls his mouth away.

I cry out in frustration as he crawls up my body, licking my wetness from his lips. “You come when I’m inside you. Not before.” His voice is deeper, gravelly, and when he presses his hard cock against my wet flesh, I make a keening sound.

“Mine, Georgia. Your blood, your body, your soul. Mine.” He grips my throat. With a hard thrust, he enters me. His head falls back, and he lets out a roar, the bed shaking from the power of it.

I yelp at the sudden intrusion, my toes curling as he pushes even farther, filling me until I know I can’t take anymore. “Valen,” I whisper as he presses his mouth to mine again. He moves back, his cock slick inside me, and presses forward again, more smoothly this time.

“Don’t stop,” I murmur against his lips.

He pulls back and presses deep again, and I know I’ll be sore later. But right now, right now feels fucking amazing. Starting up a steady rhythm, he pumps his hips, his gaze holding mine. Then he kisses to my throat again, his lips at the juncture of my shoulder and my neck. When his fangs ghost along my skin, I dig my nails into his back. I want it. I want his bite. It’s so fucking wrong, but it sets fire to my blood, my head buzzing with the anticipation of it.

I dig my heels into his thighs as he speeds up, pounding into me, making my mind go blank, nothing but pleasure. Amplifying and rising, the coil inside me tightening again.

He groans. His jaw tight, his entire body moving, working me, taking and giving until I’m breathless and needy. I work with him, moving my hips, grinding myself against him. Chasing, always chasing. Desperate for every bit of fire, even if it burns.

He leans down and claims one of my nipples, his pace never stopping as sounds of skin hitting skin ricochet around the room. I arch into his tongue, greedy for the feeling, needing every bit of sensation. He gives it, his mouth working first one nipple and then the other.

When he meets my gaze again, I turn my head, offering my throat. “I want it.”

He groans, his lips hot on my skin. “I’ll hurt you.”

“I know,” I whisper.

That’s all it takes. With the force of a blow, he strikes. Hot pain streaks along my neck, and I cry out and grab onto his arms. He doesn’t let go, a growl in his throat as he thrusts harder. The pain morphs into something else. Something scorching and delicious. I cry out, delirious in the euphoria of it, the pain and desire. My blood pumps out a beat of more, more, more, MORE.

He angles his thrusts, hitting my clit just right with every movement, every roll of his hips meeting mine. He pulls at my throat, sucking and licking as I hold onto him, my entire world folding in on itself over and over again until it’s nothing more than a tight square. When he locks his fangs into my throat and grabs my wrists, pinning them to the bed, the tight confines of my pleasure explode outward. I come on a strangled moan, my pussy throbbing through each wave of my orgasm, the release washing over me and through me. I moan and writhe, my body incapable of processing it, the sheer deliciousness of it. Valen holds me down, his fangs embedded just as deeply as his thick cock. I’m trapped in this bliss, locked in animal pleasure.

With a hard thrust, he grunts, and I feel his cock kicking inside me. My walls tighten around him, taking everything he gives with greedy aftershocks of pleasure. It’s too much, it’s not enough. It’s everything . I close my eyes, my body going languid, my mind floating on a sea of nothing.

Another sting at my throat. Then I feel his fingers there. And then I’m lost in him as he flips us over so that I’m lying on top of him. When his cock slips from me, I wince at the sudden loss.

With a yank, he throws the blanket over us.

Both of us silent, I simply try to catch my breath. He runs his fingers through my hair, then trails them down my back. Over and over again, stroking me into a comfortable oblivion. His touch, so vicious and so gentle. Both at the same time. He’s a contradiction. But I’ve just given him my body, this monster who I know I can’t trust.

He’s a contradiction, but maybe I am, too.

* * *

I wake to him stroking along my skin, his fingers following the curve of my side. Back and forth, almost lazily.

The night comes back to me in vivid detail, and I reach up to feel my neck.

“Healed.” He runs his fingertips down my back to the curve of my ass.

“How?” I open my eyes and look up at him.

The look in his eyes. No longer predator and prey. It’s almost … reverent. The sheer possessiveness of it, of his touch, has me resting my cheek on his chest again. That’s when I realize we’re not in my bedroom.

Disorientation makes me wary. I move to slide off him, but his hand comes down on the small of my back.

“Don’t.” He sighs.

“Where are we?”

“My apartment.”

“When did we get here?”

“You don’t remember screaming my name in this bed?” His arrogance is still intact, but he doesn’t stop petting me.

“Yes, but I thought …” He must’ve carried me down here so quickly that I didn’t even register it. Holy shit.

“You’re where you belong.” He spreads his palm across my back. “With me.”

“What about the gargoyles? Aren’t they looking for me?” Against my better judgment, I let my eyes close. I breathe him in, his touch sending shivers and goosebumps across my skin.

“Gargoyles?” He lets out a small sharp laugh. “You mean the wardens. They’re dead. The moment I discovered they’d abandoned you to the mob …” Stroke, strooooooke . “Well, let’s say that the Army won’t be finding pieces of them anywhere.”

“Won’t Gregor, I don’t know, be mad you killed them?”

“Maybe, but he’s far more interested in your work than their lives. I’ll take the risk.”

“You’re so warm.” I tuck my hands beneath his back. I should be leaving, doing the walk of shame up to my place. My rational mind knows it. I just can’t seem to act on it. “What do I taste like?”

He plays with my hair, his fingers sifting the strands. “You taste like mine.”

“Like your blood? Because you gave it to me earlier?”

“No. Like mine .”

I swallow hard and tell myself this is just some intense pillow talk. I’m not his. This isn’t anything more than releasing some tension after surviving a particularly dicey day. Even so, I snuggle tighter to him, my skin humming at all the contact. “You said my blood calls to yours. What does that mean?”

“So many questions. Shouldn’t you be sleeping?”

“Shouldn’t you?” I fire back.

“I don’t need to rest like you do.”

“You don’t sleep?”

“I do.”

“Do you sleep hanging upside down like a bat?”

He snorts another laugh, his chest shaking. “No. Would you like me to?”

I look up at him again, his eyes dark in the low light. “Is it safe to talk here?”

“Safer than at your place.” With an easy motion, he flips me onto my front on the bed, his body pressing against my back. “Which is good, because there are things you need to know.”

“Finally!”

He presses a kiss to my spine.

I squeal when he presses his legs between mine, his hard cock against my ass. “What are you doing?”

“I thought you were a medical doctor?” he purrs. “Must I explain this to you in detail?” He moves his hips until his cock is against my entrance. “Or perhaps the physical demonstration will suffice.”

My fingers curl in the sheets as he thrusts forward. I’m sore but not sore enough to stop him. He fills me so completely, my body stretching to accommodate him. He groans, his hands covering mine, our fingers interlacing. Lifting my hips, I take him even deeper, an ache beginning inside me that can only end one way.

“Tell me,” I breathe. “Tell me everything.”

“After.” He fists my hair, forcing me to arch for him.

I press my palms into the bed, leveraging myself against him with each thrust. He feels so good, so right that I want more. He sucks my neck, my eyes rolling back from the pure pleasure of it, and when he reaches around and palms one of my breasts, I moan.

“That’s it.” He thrusts harder, jarring the bed and sending me higher. “Give me what’s mine, Georgia.”

He bites my shoulder, and I let out a cry from somewhere deep inside. He growls against my skin, his fangs eliciting that first burst of pain followed by inexplicably profound ecstasy. His fingers find my clit, and he plays me as his thrusts grow more feral, more wild, his fangs still embedded in my skin. Forbidden and wrong, a violation, but one that sets my soul on fucking fire.

I gasp, my hips locking, my release starting deep and flowing outward like ripples on clear water. Diving under the wave, I feel every shudder, every stroke of his fingers and his thick cock. It’s too much. I’m drowning in him again. He bites down harder and grips my breast, then thrusts deep. He groans, low and sensual, as he comes. My body, heated and slick, practically vibrates with satisfaction.

Collapsing beneath him, I try to catch my breath, to come back down from the high of Valen. Again, he removes his fangs and swipes at the wound. A brief sting as recompense for the sweetest honey. Then he kisses it gently, his lips dragging across my skin, sending sparks of electric warmth all through me.

He slides to the bed next to me then pulls me to him. His lips graze my ear, one of his hands resting on my breast. “I’ve waited for you.” He traces the curve of my hip. “For so, so long.”

I’m still in the high, in the fluffy cloud of post-orgasm bliss. “How long?”

“My whole life.”

“And how long is that, exactly?”

“Births weren’t recorded with perfect accuracy back then, and mine certainly wasn’t. But the closest guess is around 700 years.”

Some of my haze fades. “That’s … That’s so impossible that I’m going to need to think about it for a while.”

“That’s how long I’ve waited for you.”

I scoff. “You’ve been a virgin that whole time?”

He laughs, full-throated and so damn warm. “No, I’ve been waiting for my Blood. Kedves verem, ” the foreign words roll off his tongue seductively.

“For blood? And what did you say?”

“For my Blood.” He tightens his grip on me. “For you.”

“This is just sex. You know that, right?” I turn to look at him over my shoulder.

“Is that what you’ve been telling yourself?” He smirks, cocky bastard.

“I’m not your immortal vampire bride.” I try to scoot away from him. “Wait.” I freeze. “I can’t get pregnant, right? You’re an entirely different species.”

“Already seeking my seed to start our brood? How wonderful.” He doesn’t let me move an inch. Pressing his nose to my neck, he inhales. “Can you hear it?”

“Hear what?”

“The call.”

“What?” I shake my head.

“Listen.” He lets me move just enough so that he can turn me around to face him. “Here.” He taps his chest over his heart.

“You want me to listen to your heart?” I arch a brow. “Cliché much?”

“To my blood.” No hint of amusement in his tone. He’s serious.

I grudgingly press my ear to his warm skin. His heartbeat is strong, steady. I close my eyes and focus on it as if I have my stethoscope and a nurse taking notes. Nothing remarkable. Nothing except the impulse to wrap myself around him. To kiss him endlessly. To talk and laugh and make love with no end in sight. I want all that so much it hurts, so much that the bridge of my nose begins to prickle with unshed tears.

He pulls me away gently. “Do you hear it?”

“I can’t do this. Whatever this is.” I wipe at my eyes, unsure of what the hell just happened. “I think … I think I should go.”

His face returns to its stoic mask.

I sit up. He doesn’t stop me this time. I swipe my shirt off the floor, questions spinning like a whirlwind through my mind. First and foremost, what the hell was I thinking? Fucking him? Letting him bite me?

He watches me dress in silence.

I march to his bedroom door, each step away from him only increasing my mental recriminations. “This can’t happen again.”

He doesn’t reply, only looks at me with his arrogant smirk. One that says, ‘we’ll see about that’.