I watched her from the shadows of the bar. No one noticed me at the edge of the crowd in the darkness. She certainly didn’t.

But everyone noticed her.

I wasn’t the only one staring. In a room full of beautiful women, this dark-haired goddess stood out like a fallen star. Her beauty and energy cast a glow on everyone around her.

She’s perfect.

Lust poured toward her from the human men in the room, though she seemed to be totally unaware of it. Her head was thrown back, her eyes nearly closed as her hips moved rhythmically, her delicate hands twisting through the air.

I remembered what it’d been like for me back at the start. It was like being reborn, seeing the world I thought I knew through a fresh set of eyes and experiencing every sensation for the first time. For a while, I’d been satisfied living in wanton carnality, indulging the whims of my flesh. Like her, I’d sought out throngs of people, not even aware I was doing it. Being surrounded by bodies with fresh blood pumping through them had given me a high like no alcohol or drug ever could.

A man stepped up to her, his grasping hands latching onto her hips as he matched his rhythm to hers. I watched them move together with an unpleasant mixture of jealousy and arousal twisting in my stomach. The fucking lech didn’t deserve to touch her body like that. He didn’t know the value of the gem he was pawing at.

Willow.

That was her name.

Sol had told it to me, a quiet pride in his voice as he spoke. As if she’d given him some kind of gift by telling him her name first.

But she had, and jealousy burned through me to think he’d known it before I did. Why hadn’t I asked her name? Told her mine? We’d been alone together in that room when I fed her, our gazes locked together—and yet I hadn’t found the mental acuity to say more than two words to her.

And now I watched her from the shadows like a goddamned stalker.

A fresh wave of self-loathing washed through me. But even that wasn’t enough to pull my attention away from the woman.

She was changing.

I barely knew her, had never spoken to her before my brothers and I turned her, but the shift in her was obvious anyway. I recognized it from the other new vampires I’d seen over the years. The transformation from human to vampire was like being put under a magnifying glass—it heightened and sharpened the traits that were already there. Leches became more lustful, risk-takers became daredevils, and the wise became sage-like.

Willow Tate was a woman who craved freedom, and as I watched from my hidden vantage point, she began to take it. There was a wildness and inhibition in her now that called to me, begging me to let go and join her.

I’d always lived with restraint. As a young man trying to make my fortune in the American colonies, I’d had to. I’d had grand plans for my life, before all those hopes had been ripped away from me.

The careful control I held over myself became even more pronounced after I moved on from the hedonism of my first months as a vampire. And it’d only grown stronger over the years.

Recklessness is a luxury of the stupid.

But now, for the first time in many, many years, I was acting both stupid and reckless.

I cursed myself for my weakness as I tore my gaze away from the soft curves of Willow’s body. I’d grown hard just watching her. It wasn’t like me to be this bewitched by a woman. My plan to send her away and erase her from my mind had proved a catastrophic failure. The harder I tried to forget her, the more deeply every aspect of this woman embedded itself in my memory.

Sol and Jerrett didn’t know I was here, and I planned to keep it that way. Jerrett would call me a hypocrite if he found out, and I’d have no rebuttal for him. I was a hypocrite. And an idiot.

We still hunted the shades that roamed the city, and I was convinced by now that Jerrett was correct—there was more than one of those creatures stalking the streets.

But every moment of the past week not dedicated to the hunt had been spent following Willow.

It had started when I tailed the car I sent her home in the night we’d said goodbye. Despite my brothers’ accusations of callousness, I’d been wracked with guilt for sending her away like that. Her glittering hazel eyes had been full of turmoil as I’d put her in the car. I had told myself my only intention was to make sure she got home all right, to ensure she didn’t lose control and attack the driver.

But somehow, against all my will and better judgment, I had kept watching her. Every evening for the past week, she’d taken down the blanket covering her window and gazed out at the street below, a look of such intense longing on her face it made me ache.

My flimsy excuse of following her for her protection was running out. She’d obviously handled the transition incredibly well. Some people took much longer to adjust to the onslaught of new senses and sensations. Some lost themselves to their primal instincts for time. But Willow’s recovery was faster than any I’d seen. She looked right at home in her newly vampiric skin.

Skin that was currently being salivated on by a Wall Street jackass with a bad spray tan and too much gel in his hair.

My lips curled back, my fangs dropping as unreasonable rage consumed me.

Mine.

The thought had barely registered before I was slipping out of the shadows, maneuvering quickly through the throng of bodies like a ghost. I circled around behind the two of them, careful to stay out of Willow’s periphery. Then I dropped a heavy hand on the man’s shoulder.

He glanced up, his half-lidded eyes foggy from drink. They widened as he took in the expression on my face. The man was smarter than he looked—he recognized a predator when he saw one. Backing away from Willow, he slithered into the crowd with his tail between his legs. She was so lost in the beat she didn’t even notice, brushing her ass against me as she danced.

My heart froze.

Against my will, as if someone else controlled the movements of my body, I put my hands on her hips, caressing her flesh gently through the silky fabric of her dress.

The rational part of my brain screamed at me to stop. This was too fucking dangerous. Worse than sneaking around behind my brothers’ backs. Worse than watching her in secret. Willow could turn around at any moment and discover who I was. She was a newly made vampire, with acute senses and enhanced speed and strength. It was only a matter of time before she recognized my scent.

But while those alarms rang in my mind, her body pressed against me, warm and sweet and impossible to deny. I wrapped my arms tighter around her and buried my face in her hair—as though indulging in my craving would somehow help me vanquish it.

Her body softened, becoming almost boneless in my arms as the smallest sound of pleasure fell from her lips.

We moved together in perfect harmony, as if the very rhythm of our souls intertwined. Her perfect ass ground against my cock, both intensifying and relieving the ache in my balls. I pressed into her harder, wrapping my arms more tightly around her.

Then she began to turn her head, and I froze.

Regret and shame barreled into me with the force of a speeding car.

What am I doing? Am I a goddamned animal? Can I not control my impulses at all?

I hadn’t acted this reckless since the days after I was turned, when rage and resentment had burned hot in my veins, eradicating all rational thought.

Her body began to follow the movement of her head, but before she could turn around and catch sight of me, I tore myself away, disappearing into the mass of writhing bodies.

I stalked outside and slid back into the shadows on the street. My fist lashed out, shattering a car window as I passed. Jerrett had been right about that, at least; it did make me feel marginally better.

Never again, Malcolm. Fuck. Never again. This ends here.