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M ichaela blinked and attempted to clear her eyes, but when she opened them, nothing had changed, and her mind didn’t feel like her own. She had a problem sorting everything out and making heads or tails of anything when all her senses were overloaded.

She recognized that she lay on something soft while something light rested over her skin, and a deep, well-like structure sat above her head. But it caused her brain to ache to decipher anything more.

It was too much to sort out. The desire to close her eyes and drift back into the sweet abyss where only the most melodic sound filled her mind, calmed her thoughts and body.

However, as much as she wanted to disappear into nothingness, her body’s demands made it impossible. Hunger like she had never experienced before in her life, not even during the months and years of living on the streets at home.

Home. Such a strange word wrought with images and loneliness made her heart ache. She shoved that away and forced herself to focus on the hunger because it demanded she concentrate on that need, thirst.

Yes, thirst. That was the better word for it. Even though the gnawing ache started in her stomach and magnified through her lower abdomen to the point of pain, it spread out into every cell of her body.

Even her fingers and toes curled in want. The dryness of her mouth made her tongue stick to the roof, and she could do nothing to soothe it but lightly rub it along the ceiling of her mouth.

Then she heard it.

Thump, thump.

The slow, subtle beating of her own heart. Or the other tiny ones, which she didn’t quite understand, except to know that their lust for the liquid filler was infused with her own.

Thump, thump.

She swiped her stiff tongue over her cracked, parched lips to taste something. As the sound filled her ears again, she intuitively knew it was not in the room with her. But it was coming closer, and it made her more alert. She fixated on it.

Thump, thump.

Thump, thump. Thump, thump.

It wasn’t a knocking against anything hard and solid, but it struck against something delicate and tender. It caused a roar in Michaela’s veins, that she knew she had to seek out.

It was so close.

Then came the smallest of knocks.

Knocks?

It’s here. A woman has it , and I must take it from her.

Fighting through exhaustion and hunger, Michaela didn’t take time to analyze how she knew it was a woman approaching when she could not see her, but she knew.

In a flash, with speed and accuracy she had never known, Michaela found herself off her resting place and dashing across the open space of a room—the grandest she’d ever seen. But even as her mind instantly processed that information, she still had only one goal.

Blood . Get to the blood. I must have it.

She reached her hand out for the handle of the wide door only to slam into something solid and unmovable. Michaela tried to push past the impossible boundary and grasped the door just out of range as the tips of her nails barely grazed over the wood.

“No.”

“It’s alright, little angel.”

The euphonious sound from the abyss was back.

~YH~

“Shh.” He kept his arms wrapped tight around Michaela’s slim, nude form even as she fought the hold, attempting to get to the door. He’d been standing at the window watching the sunrise when the energy in the room shifted and became charged.

Turning, he’d seen the moment Michaela's nude, long, lithe form rose from the bed. She was majestic in her beauty. A fragile shimmer danced right along the edge of her skin, not quite a glimmer. But she was still lovely. He’d expected her to awake that evening, and the unexpected sight of her had him fascinated and rooted in place long enough for her to bolt.

He’d only needed a fraction of his speed to catch her.

Amaros knew who and what was on the other side of the entrance, making Michaela fight his hold. Blood.

Most likely, even if Michaela’s sense of smell was already acute enough to scent the carafe of blood the servant had delivered outside his room right on schedule, his little angel would have picked up on Maeve’s heartbeat.

That was the siren sound that lured all Vampires. Something that took time to build up enough fortitude to fight the instant need to feed. For a new vamp, especially one newly created, Michaela was nothing but instinct—a deadly predator hunting for prey.

If he released her, she’d wreak carnage all over the cathedral home, ripping out throats, draining and slaughtering both servants and primes.

In the days of old, newly turned ones, who weren’t monitored or trained and left to their own devices by reckless Vampires, vanquished small towns in a single nightfall.

They couldn’t stop the need, and through gluttonous madness, they terrorized, only to settle days later into a more conscience-driven mind filled with nightmares of what they had done.

The new Vampires did not spare men, women, or children from their feast.

Someone, human born, would find the memories of their senseless actions unconscionable and seek to end their life.

Only to find the feat difficult and nearly impossible to accomplish, deepening their misery.

Most learned to manage life by locking away the memories behind walls they built in their mind to keep them functioning and sane, but a few went to the extent of tracking down their Masters and woefully pleading with them to end their suffering and take their lives.

So, Amaros would spare his lovely Michaela the centuries-long tortuous guilt. He’d help her through this time.

“Please...” She pressed a hand against his chest even as she kept her other stretched behind him, refusing to stop trying to grasp the door.

“No.” He tightened one arm around her waist, only exerting an infinitesimal amount of strength to hold her slight form in her weakened state.

Besides, he had hundreds of years of power over her, and even when she gained all her abilities, he’d still be stronger, faster, more cunning than she.

Something he would vow never to abuse over his mate.

He pressed her tighter as his hand spanned the side of her narrow waist, feeling the coolness of her bare skin. The temperature of her flesh had more to do with her severe lack of blood than the change.

Michaela’s lissome body was delectable. His desire for her since seeing her and tasting the sweet spice of her blood had not diminished. Even while she was unconscious and transforming, his body craved her, and knowing that she was his increased it over time.

In the centuries he’d been alive, he had countless relationships, shared the company of women worldwide, and even had long-term affections where he had a genuine fondness for various women.

However, none of those beauties, although fascinating, compared to his desire for her.

He hungered for her like a man long in famine. He was an addict after one hit.

She was his, and that was a lure like nothing else.

“But I need,” she whined.

Caressing the side of her face, he leaned back and stared into her red-stained eyes.

Typically, when the lust of any kind was on them, and their beasts had risen to the surface, the permanent red ring would expand and saturate the irises.

Still, Michaela’s beast had complete control of her now, apparent by the leaching of red into the whites of her eyes.

The bright apple-red flood of color in her wide eyes made her appear possessed. She was. Her Vampiric nature, a Nature that would forever rule her into eternity, possessed her. But he would ensure she learned to control it.

“I know what you need, little angel.” He used two fingers to trace over her delicately arched light-brown brow, a contrast to the blonde dye of her short pixie cut, then he brushed along her temple and over the high arch of her cheekbone until he reached the tip of her pert nose only to stroke up her bridge and return to her brow—the gesture circling one of her lovely eyes.

He reveled in the beauty of how his bite had changed her, just the first action that would bind her to him forever.

When he cupped her gaunt cheek, more evidence of the lack of substance she endured in the days of her transition, his gut tightened as Michaela tilted her face into his touch.

Yes, this gorgeous woman was more beast than woman, but she was still responsive to him. As it should be, they were mates. And that would rule over everything for them.

“Please—” Her words broke into a cry as her sorrowful, empty eyes, too dehydrated to release tears, reflected her pain.

“Come. Let me take care of you.” Still keeping one arm banded around her waist, not trusting her not to attempt to bolt, Amaros dipped low and captured her behind the knees with his other arm, scooping her up.

Carrying her away from the door, he took them across the room to the bed that rested on a platform, and it brought the bed just below waist high for someone of his height.

As soon as he laid her down on the mattress and prepared to leave her there so that he could go and retrieve the blood at the door, he heard her shift.

He hated to leave fresh blood out to spoil, and their kind considered it sinful to do so, even pig’s blood.

However, when he was only a few steps away, he felt the shift in the air and knew Michaela was set to dash from the bed and get out the door again.