Aiden’s head bowed, and his shoulders hunched up as if she were going to strike him. Part of her did want to hit him for allowing Carha to do this to him, for turning to that insidious woman in the first place. She’d only met Carha briefly, but she hadn’t survived numerous foster and group homes without becoming a good judge of character. Carha would make Jeffrey Dahmer smile and give her a thumbs-up.

The way Aiden looked as if he expected her to hurt him far worse than Carha ever had deflated some of her anger with him. It didn’t lessen her rage at Carha. Vampire or not, if Maggie ever saw that bitch again, they wouldn’t have a catfight. No, it would be a full-on tiger brawl, and Maggie knew more than a few moves that would have Carha begging for mercy.

“What is going on? Why would you let her do this to you?” she asked.

Aiden braced himself before meeting her gaze again. “When a male purebred vampire reaches maturity and stops aging, they experience an increase in other needs,” he said. “The women can feel it too, but not as badly. Most matured males experience an increase in one thing. Some want to kill more, others have a heightened appetite for blood, some need more sex, and others crave pain. Those incessant desires can sometimes push a vampire over the edge, turning them Savage. I stopped aging two years ago and have spent that time struggling to maintain control of my darker impulses.”

“And those darker impulses made you seek out pain?”

“Not just pain. I started seeking all those things in equal measure. Declan told me it happens to a few rare purebreds.”

Maggie gulped; she didn’t know how to feel about any of this. “So, to maintain control, you paid Carha to whip you?”

“Not in the beginning. At first, I went to some of the other women in her club, but after a while, they became unwilling to inflict the amount of pain on me I started to require. Only Carha was willing to slice me as badly as I demanded to be cut.”

Maggie’s lips thinned out. “Of course that bitch was willing to do this.”

Aiden lifted an eyebrow at the vehemence in her voice. It seemed some of Maggie’s vampire blood was emerging within her. It might be easier to get her to agree to become his mate than he’d thought; a part of her might already be experiencing the bond too.

“And did you have sex with Carha when she was done or before she got started?” Maggie demanded, nausea twisting in her stomach at the thought of him with that woman.

Aiden almost smiled over the jealousy in her voice, but she wouldn’t find it at all amusing if he did. “I’ve never had sex with Carha.” She gave him a doubtful look. “Never. I used her service for pain only.”

“I saw her in that club; it’s obvious she wanted you, and you said you wanted it all in equal measure, so that would include sex too, right?”

“Right.”

“So why wouldn’t you sleep with her? She’s beautiful.”

“Maybe on the outside, but she’s got the soul of a shark.”

“She does,” Maggie agreed, glad he saw it too. “Okay, so you allowed Carha to beat you to fulfill your need for pain, and she whipped you often enough that your body stopped healing as it should, but what about your need for sex, blood, and death? How did you satisfy those urges?”

“I started working with Ronan to focus my compulsion to kill on something good by destroying Savages. Whereas most vampires usually drink blood every other day, and some can go as often as three or four days in between feedings, I consumed blood every day. Sometimes I fed two or three times a day to keep myself in control, but I’ve never harmed those I fed on.”

“Do you always feed on women?”

“I’ve fed from a man when necessary, but mostly women.”

“Did you have sex with all those women?”

“Not all of them.”

“But most of them?” she pressed.

This was a conversation they should have had before she slept with him, but Aiden was like a tornado, once she got caught up with him, she couldn’t get free. She’d gone on the pill when she started having sex with A.J. and never stopped as it helped with her PMS. Aiden had said vampires couldn’t carry diseases, but she should have been safer, and she should have guarded her heart better against him.

“Many of them, yes,” he admitted.

“How many women have you been with?”

“It might be better to let this go.”

An icy chill raced down her spine. “Do you know how many?”

“No.”

This time when she pulled on her fingers, he released her. “Could you guess?”

“Do you want me to?”

What good would it do either of them for him to guess at that? “No.”

She scooted to the edge of the bed. Minutes ago, she’d been elated. Now she knew she was only one of hundreds of women, maybe thousands of them.

“I’ve never forced another,” he said. “And I’ve never gone to a prostitute.”

“It’s always good to have standards.”

She had no idea what else to say to that.

She gathered the sheet against her chest and wrapped it around her waist. It was ridiculous to cover herself now when he’d already seen it all, but she suddenly felt vulnerable around him in a way she hadn’t earlier.

She was about to rise from the bed when he seized her wrist. She jerked on it, but when he didn’t release her, she spun back to him. The anguish etching his features froze her furious words on her tongue.

“It’s the past,” he said in a gravelly tone she barely recognized. “It’s an existence I loathed and will never return to. You are my present, Maggie, and I hope you’ll agree to be my future too.”

Her mouth fell open as he clasped her cheek with his other hand. She should pull away from him, but she found herself entranced by his words and his touch. Here came the damn tornado again, and he could sweep her away as quickly as Dorothy had been taken to Oz. She needed to get her hands on some ruby slippers; maybe they would help fortify her against him.

“It’s all over now,” he said. “All of it.”

“But I won’t do to you what you asked Carha to do. I will not injure you in such a way, even if you ask me to do it, even if you need me to do it. And you can’t feed on me multiple times during the day, and you’ll—” She swallowed before continuing. “—you’ll turn to other women to satisfy your craving for sex.”

“No, I won’t. I don’t require those things now that I have you. You’re all I need, if you’ll have me.”

“How can you say that?” she demanded as her anger returned. “You’ve spent years engrossed in your hungers and trying to maintain control. You’ve spent three days with me!”

“Since the second I heard your voice and inhaled your scent in that alley where we first met, you’re all I’ve wanted.”

“Your fingers twitched toward me when I spoke,” she recalled.

“Yes.”

Maggie shook her head; her hand tightened on the sheet. “So, you’ve replaced all your other obsessions with me? It makes no sense. Why me?”

He couldn’t keep the truth from her anymore. “Because you are my mate.”

“I’m your what?”

“Some vampires have mates, and you are mine. I didn’t think I would ever find you. I believed I would lose control long before I discovered you and that I would have to be destroyed. However, the second I tasted your blood, I knew what you were to me. For the first time in years, maybe the first time in my life, I experienced peace.”

His words robbed her of her breath as she gazed at him.

“I’m not saying you have to feel it too. I’m not saying you have to stay with me; I’m simply informing you that you are it for me, Magdalene Doe. There will never be another,” he murmured as he rested his forehead against hers.

He couldn’t tell her he wanted her for eternity, not yet, she’d had so much thrown at her these past few days. He’d let her adjust to everything else before piling on more.

“But I can’t do for you what Carha did. And I can’t feed you multiple times a day, and if you’re used to numerous partners—”

“I’d never ask you to beat me or to nourish me so often,” he interjected. “I may still have to feed on others, but I can also use blood bags. Now that you’ve calmed me, I won’t have to feed as often, I won’t need pain and death, and I will never have sex with anyone else, ever again.”

“Aiden—”

“You’re the first one I’ve allowed to touch me during sex in years, Maggie.”

“It’s impossible not to touch someone when you’re having sex with them.”

“Perhaps, but it’s not impossible to minimize that contact.”

Maggie recalled the way he’d grabbed her hands and pinned them to the mirror before releasing her. Recalled the way he’d turned into her hand as if he were a beaten dog absorbing its first kind caress. The way he’d asked her for more of her touch. A sob lodged in her throat when she realized how starved he’d been for affection. Releasing the sheet, she tugged her wrist free of his hold and slid her arms around his neck.

He was so much more messed up than she’d realized, but she understood the vulnerability she’d sensed in him last night. He’d seemed vulnerable because he had been vulnerable.

“Aiden.”

She kissed the corner of his mouth before sitting back to run her hands over his chest. He closed his eyes as she explored his body, tenderly touching him everywhere. She had no idea what all of this meant for them or where it would lead, but she didn’t care as she pushed him back on the bed and climbed on top of him.