Page 37 of The Midnight Order (The Thorngray Vampires Duet #1)

Corvin

Silver holds the box in her arms like it’s fragile. Lowell returned immediately after speaking with Silver and reported what she had found. He also told us what he told her. She looks to be still reeling from his words, so I’m treading lightly as I clear off an old desk in the room's corner.

The temperature and humidity in this room are controlled, so I know anything we find in that box will be safe as we remove it.

“Alright, there we go. Do you want us to wear gloves while handling your documents?” I ask her.

As a tear tracks down her cheek, she looks at me like I’ve grown a second head.

I rush her, taking the box and placing it behind me on the desk. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Tugging her into a tight hug, I rock her back and forth, something innate in all of us when comforting.

“Everything. Nothing.”

Those two words I understand.

Lowell really got to her earlier. Jasper didn’t help, either.

I understand their points. I do. She gets to choose this life, and we didn’t have that luxury.

“We can go as fast or slow as you want to. We don’t have to start today. That box can sit on that desk for years if you want it to. We have plenty of time, Silver.”

She sniffles. “Haven’t you all wasted enough time waiting for me?”

I laugh. “Well, we didn’t know we were waiting on you, specifically. Plus, have you met Lowell? You’ll be the one waiting around in the end.”

Wiping her eyes, she finally breaks and smiles. “I guess you have a point.”

“Why don’t we go have some lunch or coffee or something? Get our minds off all of this.”

“We can’t go into town,” she offers.

“I know. Milly’s become quite the skilled barista with that machine, though. I hear it’s become an obsession of hers.”

Silver smiles, and it seems to light the entire universe.

“You’re sure we don’t need to dive into all that right now?”

“Who knows how long it’s been traveling with Soliel? It’ll keep. Come on.” I lead her into the hall, locking the door behind me and pocketing the key.

“You know, Asher says you and he sometimes have coffee on the back veranda. Maybe we could do that?”

I hear her swallow and wonder why it was so audible. Do I make her nervous? Does talking about Asher with me make her anxious?

She’s probably like everyone else in the manor: worried that history will repeat itself.

“It was only once,” she says, as if defending their time together.

“It made him very happy.” I stop her, turning her toward me. “Maybe you two should make a habit of it?”

She searches my face for something before smirking, tight-lipped. “Maybe we should.”

I sigh, feeling like I have made no headway in the wall that feels like it is building between us by the second.

Milly is in the kitchen, tinkering with dishes in the sink. She hears us come in and beams at us.

“Milly, we’d both like two lattes, please.”

“Straight away, Master Corvin.”

Silver and I wait for Milly, who mechanically works to make our coffee, and before I know it, we’re seated together on the veranda, the steam of our coffee billowing out of the cups we each hold.

“I forget how beautiful it is back here. I hardly ever leave the lab anymore.”

“Were you a doctor before you were… before you died?” Silver asks, and although I find her turn of phrase odd, I note it to discuss with Lowell later.

“I was. I was a medic in the Army.”

“So, as a vampire, you honed your craft?”

“I did. I learned more and more as modern medicine evolved. I still think some older remedies work better than any chemical-laced cream or pill.”

“I agree with you there.” She sips her coffee, her eyes traveling over the lawn.

It’s not enough that she’s had four vampires disrupt her entire world; now, she’s in a crisis of self and is questioning her entire reality.

I hate that we had any part in it.

But it all feels… fated.

A rare word for me. My rational, scientific brain doesn’t understand fate or the universe, but being a vampire, I understand that there are things out there that we don’t know and can’t explain.

I’m one of them.

“For years, I studied myself,” I tell her. “Tried to determine a way back to my humanity. Tried to find a cure for vampirism. Tried to find a reason for my existence.”

“And?” She turns, pinning me with her piercing blue eyes.

“And nothing. I found nothing. Each vampire’s genes are specific to them, and there’s no rhyme or reason for why we are still alive. It’s something in the blood, something untraceable to even modern science.”

She swallows, setting her cup down as she stands and walks to the stone balcony overlooking the grounds below. We’re not far above the sprawling lawns, but elevated enough to give the feeling of floating.

“Do you think she would’ve ever told me who I was?”

Her question is heavy, and I don’t know how to answer it. “Maybe. We’d have to know first why she was hiding the truth and who she was to you.”

She shakes her head as she turns, leaning back on the cold stone. “I’m so sick of the tangled web of secrets and the bullshit.”

It’s the first time I’ve seen her so… raw.

“I’m sure that you are. Maybe the box holds all the answers.”

“Maybe. But it won’t tell me if I’m Lowell’s key, and it isn’t going to tell me if triggering my gene is a good idea.”

“No. It won’t,” I agree, laying out the cold, hard facts. “But it might give you insight into who you are so that you might better understand what direction to go in.”

“You know, Asher says that you’re annoyingly smart sometimes, and I think I have to agree with him on that.”

I grin. “Is that right?”

She grips the front of my shirt, tugging me closer until I look down at her, my hands on the chilled stone on either side of her.

Our breathing mixes in a fog between us. “Did you get our test results back?”

I nod. “I did.”

I’ve tested us twice, in fact. The first time, three of us had trace amounts of a drug mixture in our blood that I’m still testing to determine its makeup.

The second time I’d drawn blood on us was only this morning, but I’d already gotten the readouts done before Lowell got back with a word about Silver’s finding.

“And?”

“All clear of drugs.”

“I think it’s time that you test me.”

“Silver, I don’t think now is the time for that. There’s so much going on. You have so much to think about and consider, and…” She stifles my words with her damning lips on mine and eats my moan when I let it slip free.

Her hands are cold as they slide beneath my black shirt, chilling my undead heart to its center.

I can’t help but answer the flick of her tongue with one of my own, angling to deepen the kiss when her little sounds of pleasure egg me on.

Now isn’t the time for this. She’s using me as a distraction from what she should be focused on, but still, I can’t stop.

My fangs descend into my mouth, aching to taste her.

That’s not the only thing aching for her, and I try to keep that fact under wraps, pulling my pelvis far away from her so that the evidence of what her kiss does to me doesn’t startle her.

When she hops up onto the balcony’s edge, however, I move with her, so I don’t break our kiss, and my very hard length settles between her warm apex.

“Corvin!” she whimpers, pleading with me with blown pupils as she elongates her neck to me for a second time. This time, however, I know her veins are free of drugs.

“Silver, don’t test me. I’ll fail.”

“You can’t be perfect all the time, Corvin.”

Even knowing that Asher has had moments with Silver, just the two of them, it feels wrong to have this right now.

Even if I want everything that she’ll give me.

Flashes of us watching television together spring to life in my brain. How right she felt at that moment.

How much I wanted to sink into her and never leave.

“We should give you some time to process your findings before we worry about the curse again. You have so much going…” Silver’s hand glides over my jeans, teasing along the length of my painfully erect cock.

“I don’t want to do any of that, Doctor Thorngray.”

“You don’t,” I stutter out.

“No.”

“What do you want to do?” My fangs nearly nick my lower lip as I bite it to keep from moaning.

Her touch continues, languid and arousing. “I want you to test me from my vein. Then I want you to spend the rest of the day with me. No more curse talk. No more talk of the box or my lineage. No more talk of anything to do with more than you and I.”

It’s dangerous to fall behind in one’s work; I know that better than anyone, but the retreat she’s offering is almost too sweet to pass up. Suddenly, I’m a male who couldn't care less about every machine currently running tests for me back in the lab. All I care about is pleasing her.

“Lowell won’t want me drinking from your vein.”

“Lowell can deal with me later. It’s my choice.”

I know what this means: She’s trying to control what she can. She has control over who she allows at her vein.

“Silver. I don’t trust myself.”

“I trust you.”

Damning words from such a pretty mouth.

I keep that particular thought to myself as I eye her throbbing jugular vein, dancing in time with her pulse. “We should get back inside and…”

Her grip on my dick tightens, and I thrust forward, my head bowing to her in servitude as I moan.

The sound carries across the lawns of Thorngray, traveling far enough to rustle birds in a nearby tree. The sound of them flocking away together nearly drowns out Silver’s following words.

“Give me this, Corvin. If you don’t give me anything else.” She licks her tongue over my bottom lip, and my fangs ache, dripping venom in answer to the tease.

“How will you stop me if I take too much?” My voice isn’t my own.

In place of my normal calm tone is one I haven’t heard for decades.

The darker side lurks in all of us Thorngray Vampires.

It’s the side we try to tamp down while we drink Cuisara instead of feeding directly from the vein as we’d prefer.

“I won’t,” she says too late.

My fangs penetrate her throat, popping her vein and allowing her tangy, sweet blood to flow into my mouth.

I let it fill before taking the first damning swallow, growling as frenzy sets in and takes over my better nature.

She tastes so good.

“God, it feels so good,” she whines, and I know I’m taking too much. That I’ve laced her with too much venom.

But I’m so free.

She’s permitted me, even if my maker hasn’t.

I justify it in my brain and take another long drag before I hear footsteps behind me.

Internally, I’m thankful.

Because without intervention, I’d drain the life out of her and watch her crumple to my feet.

She tastes that good.