Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 91636 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91636 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
We sit down on the bed, which is a stretcher with a mattress and a thin pillow and no blanket on it. It’s not stained, but it gives the vibe of being stained.
She starts babbling. “He’s like my dad. Sort of. Stepdad. Dad I want to kill. Dad who killed my dad. If that’s what a dad is. I feel like it’s not really. My dad used to mow the lawn, and I’ve never seen Alexander mow anything. He kidnapped me after he ate my parents when I was about seven. And he took me here, and he…”
“Raised you as his own?”
She snorts. “He’s not really the raising anyone as his own sort of vampire. He’s busy. Travels a lot. Kills a lot of people. Terrorizes villages. Dominates other vampires mercilessly.”
“What did he do with you all the years he had you here?”
“Well, he forgot about me for most of them, I think. I lived in the castle. He had a cook and cleaners and I could go out during the day. I ran away a few times, but there wasn’t really any point. There wasn’t anywhere to go. I’d been taken a long way from home, and I didn’t know how to get back, and there was a bed for me at his place, and I got fed, and I could go to school if I wanted to.”
“He didn’t hurt you?”
“He hurt me by ripping my family away from me and then carrying me off like a hamster he forgot. He hurt me by making me understand how to live only by stealing and running, and being an asshole, because there was nothing to do other than learn how to be a criminal. If my family had raised me, I’d probably be an accountant. But no, he didn’t kill me. He didn’t beat me. He didn’t remember me most of the time.”
I think about that for a moment. “Is that why you did that? With the heart? Were you trying to get his attention?”
“No! Of course not!”
She blushes a little and I think I have gotten close. She may want revenge, but she also wants to be acknowledged.
This very personal psychodrama now involves a whole fucking war with humans. I assume the Rock City siege is still continuing. It’s not that uncommon, I suppose, for wars to be based on personal spats. Most of them might be, actually.
Tailor died because our mate started a fight with her surrogate daddy.
“You’re angry at me,” she says. “I’m sorry.”
We keep telling her these things aren’t her fault, but I am starting to consider that it’s very possible that quite a few things have been significantly impacted by her decisions. Like the one to run away while Damon was bleeding out.
“I am not pleased with you,” I say. “You shouldn’t have left us at the doctor’s. It resulted in Tailor’s capture.”
“And yours.”
“Yes, and mine.”
“I’m sorry. I really didn’t want you to come after me. I wanted you to just let me go. I figured, if I did enough terrible things, you’d realize I wasn’t worth it and then you’d lose interest and then you could go back to your lives and not worry about me…”
I grab her by the arms and give her a not so gentle shake. “You are our mate, Kita!” I snap. “We cannot abandon you. We will die for you. You need to understand that. This is non-optional for any of us. We are dedicated to you. The choices you make can get us killed.”
Her eyes widen and fill with tears, but I am not going to give her any respite. She should feel guilty. Tailor is dead, and though I am not going to make that announcement this minute, the truth is she and I could easily be the last ones standing at this point if the doctor was wrong and Damon did not survive his injuries.
“You should have let me go.”
“There’s no letting you go. We cannot get out of this. We are in it. You are in it. So fucking stop acting like a spoiled little girl and get your head in this game.”
I expect her to growl or pout or perhaps cry. But that’s not what happens. She turns pink. A very particular shade of pink.
She’s flushed.
“You’re kidding me,” I growl. “That turned you on?”
“No,” she lies.
“Yes. It did.” I clutch her jaw in my hand. “Is this all about getting some attention?”
“No,” she lies again. “It’s about saving you from me. It’s about keeping you from…”
Kita
I trail off, because the expression on Conroy’s face is making talking absolutely impossible. He’s glowering so fiercely it feels as though my words are stuck in my throat, unable to emerge.
“You…” he draws in a breath and growls at me. “Are lying.”
“I would never.”
There is a darkness, a sorrow, and an intensity behind his eyes that I haven’t seen before.