Were we ever going to have a single day that didn’t end with him either disappearing or us fighting?

I wondered again how many vampires were out there, lurking in the shadows… no, that wasn’t right. They didn’t lurk in shadows, they were right there mixing with everyone else. Letting you fall for them.

What was it Zac said to me the other night? “We don’t live on the fringe of society, hiding in the shadows and secretly stealing your blood like vermin. We walk amongst you; seducing you, fucking you, toying with you. All the while you’re captivated, enthralled, blissfully unaware of the monsters in your midst.”

Could it really be true that my need for him was all down to his fucked-up magical vampire powers? That I had no control over my own feelings?

I tore at the beer label in my hand, scrunching the pieces into little balls and flicking them across the room. He had lured me into his arms when he was supposedly so worried about the threat he posed me. What bullshit. I bet he loved playing me.

Still, I couldn’t deny the tenderness when we were close. And his haunted eyes. It was rare to see him smile and laugh, at least, to see genuine ones. A heavy burden always hung over him.

There was no question of me leaving. It didn’t seem to matter what he was. The idea of being without him sent spasms of pain through my chest. Luckily, (or not), tempestuous relationships were my speciality. Euphoric highs followed by desperate lows seem to be as much a part of my nature as my need for a buzz. I’m not saying that’s right, or healthy, but it’s what I know.

I tipped the rest of the beer into the sink and tossed the bottle. My motel room seemed different. Something I couldn’t put my finger on, but I wasn’t comfortable there. Uneasiness settled in my stomach. I’d rather go and face Zac’s weirdness than sit there another second in a room that felt like it was going to consume me.

Waltzing into the night, unfazed and ready for more, I flung the door open with certainty. I wasn’t expecting to see him standing rigidly in the parking lot. I blinked and he was beside me, holding my face in his hands.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered, kissing my cheek.

“How long have you been out here?”

“Too long. I was waiting for you to leave, so that it was your decision to see me. It felt like waiting to die, you took so long to come—”

He pressed his forehead to mine and inhaled deeply, groaning with pleasure. After a tentative kiss, we wasted no time in getting ourselves back to his place.

* * *

Something that surprised me was the number of guys that appeared to live with him in his stately mansion. Ten or fifteen of them. They came and went around us. Clearly part of his gang, but not one of the handful of inner circle members that were generally glued to him. I couldn’t tell you any of their names, we barely spoke. We encountered each other with cursory nods of the head and awkward smiles.

A few of them passed through the cavernous living room where we were lounging. They asked Zac if he needed anything and off they went. They always checked if he needed anything. Bowed their heads respectfully to him. Like he was their king.

“They treat you differently to the way Leon, Caleb and Eva do,” I stated.

He glanced up at me and shrugged. “Pecking order I guess. They’re not close friends. They just follow me.”

“Are there other vampires here, apart from you and Alex with your gangs?”

“Just us at the moment, that’s still too many.”

“I can’t believe Anna has been living here for years, all this time surrounded by this danger. It’s terrifying. She could have been killed. She still could be. How do I live with that knowledge without warning her?”

“I wouldn’t worry too much. They don’t kill people on the island either, unless their scent is overwhelming, which is rare. If she’s been here that long then she’d already be gone if she appealed to them.”

That didn’t make me feel any better.

“We’ll keep an eye on her. If she matters to you, she matters to me,” he said.

“Thanks. I don’t know how you can live here with them, too. You know what they’re doing, but you ignore it? What happened to that missing girl we found? Alex was involved.”

“I don’t have any choice,” a hard edge came into his voice. “It’s their business. There are vampires all over the world killing people, it’s not my problem. Just because he’s my brother, doesn’t mean I have to try and stop him. I gave that up a long time ago. He loves to antagonise me, but I try not to rise to it.”

“I still don’t understand why he hates you so much.”

“I hold him back.”

“How? He’s not part of your gang or lifestyle. He does what he pleases as far as I can tell.” I played with the silver necklace that I’d recovered from its hiding place at the bottom of a drawer.

“He could do a lot more with me at his side.”

“And hating you, causing you shit, that’s going to get you there? That’s madness.”

“Don’t be deceived, he’s no fool.”

“Oh, I know that. He’s on your territory, under your nose, killing the people around you, people you might care about.”

He growled, and my throat went tight.

“I don’t care about anyone. I mean…” he frowned. “Not before. I guess now it’s going to cause problems. He’ll somehow try and use you as leverage against me.”

“What for?”

“For the Legacy. It’s why he does everything he does. It’s the cause of most of my problems.”

“It sounds very imperial… The Legacy,” I mocked, with a posh emphasis on the word.

“It’s no joking matter. If I went ahead with my calling and activated the Legacy bond… it would grant us both with unmeasured power and ability.”

“And you don’t want that, because—?”

“Because Alexander and I would be inextricably linked, bound together in incomprehensible ways. The darkness would run wild. I would be rampant with power and need, I wouldn’t be myself any longer. I might learn to control it again, at some point, but it would take time. I’d be lost in the early stages of transformation.”

“And Alex wants nothing more than to have all of that.”

“He thinks it would give us the ultimate freedom. He doesn’t see it. We’re nothing but slaves to the darkness.”

His hands wrapped around my waist, cold and firm. He was darkness. And light. Walking the line in between. And here I sat, following him blindly into the unknown.

“I fear him, Jess. Because he’s stronger than me, because he would take everything from me without hesitation if he stood to gain from it, and mostly… because I could become so much worse than him if I fall off this path.”

* * *

We discarded the tension from our heavy discussion by letting our lips do the talking for a while. His kisses transported me to another world, far away from this one… somewhere I belonged.

I raised my hand and traced the line of a deep vein along his forearm. Why do some of us find those veins so damned sexy? Maybe it’s the indication of muscle and strength?

“You have veins.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” he chuckled, before sucking in his breath. “That feels a little too nice, Jess.”

“It does?” I asked hopefully, a dirty smile spreading across my face. I officially couldn’t help myself. Being next to him made me constantly rampant.

“Careful,” he warned lightly. “That looks like the sort of smile to get us both into trouble. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were going to try and seduce me.”

“Don’t be silly.”

“Exactly, I mean, what kind of idiot would try to seduce a vampire?”

“Not me. I never look for trouble. Little Miss Boring. You sit back and carry on telling me about yourself, don’t you mind me and what I’m doing, it’s nothing…” I unbuttoned his shirt, willing my fingers to stop shaking. I realised that the entire room had, at some point, emptied of the usual occupants. Had he telepathically told them to go?

“I’ll play along for now. You’re so ridiculously desperate to see my abs, it would be rude not to comply.”

“Oi! Stop reading my mind!”

“When you’re thinking about something so much, it kind of shouts out to me like a megaphone.”

“Oh yeah, well how about this one?” I stopped moving and he tilted his head in curiosity.

“Ouch,” he said dryly. “If you think I’m going to be that much of a disappointment then why are your fingers on my shirt again?” He lifted his eyebrows and licked his lips, making my stomach flutter.

“So they are,” I whispered, undoing the last button and sliding the shirt off his shoulders.

I didn’t mean to let my breath catch the way it did at the sight of him, but damn, his lean, inked body was perfection. He watched me with tense concentration, waiting for my next move. I had to kiss him, had to run my tongue over every inch of that body. But would he let me?

He shook his head the slightest amount.

“What about handcuffs? I have some at my motel you know, I like to keep them handy for kinky fun,” I continued to ogle every contour, my fingers itching to touch.

“You think handcuffs could hold me?”

“No. But it sure would be fun to try.” I flooded my mind with filthy fantasy.

“You’re such a tease, you don’t play fair,” he moaned. “You’re a very naughty girl.”

“So punish me. We both know your power and my subservience is where it’s at. You’re my vampire master.”

“Well now, that certainly is more my style,” he grabbed my waist and pulled me right into him, as if I weighed no more than a feather. “Although I assume you’re only referring to time spent in the bedroom, because you don’t take shit from me elsewhere, Miss. Layton.”

“Well, that’s bollocks. I’m under your power, and we both know it,” I moaned.

He moved slowly, cautiously, his lips hovering just a hair’s breadth away from mine. Dominating not only my mind and body, but the very space around us, stealing the air from my lungs. His tongue ran along my bottom lip and with one blink my mind emptied of all rational thought.

Instinctively, I dug my nails into his back, grinding myself into his erection. The kiss lost its gentleness, his tongue roaming forcefully into my mouth, his fingers curled around my hair. The feeling of his cool breath against my mouth, vaguely metallic, panting into me…

Need consumed me. The need to have him inside me. To feel him hard and strong, driving into me, filling me, owning me. I gasped and wriggled, rubbing myself against him, pushing for more.

His hand still tangled in my hair, he yanked it back, exposing my throat. My lips parted in anticipation of the pleasure, a groan escaping me. Overcome with desire, I closed my eyes and floated away to a different place.

His whole body tensed up and in a second he was away. Fucking hell. My life was going round in circles.

“You really are that willing to give yourself over to me completely? Sex is one thing, but you’re so eager to offer me your throat, too? You have to help me here, not make it harder,” he gripped a table, his face dark and anxious.

A loud cracking noise snapped me out of my daze, a little dizzy, like I’d just woken from heavy sleep. “I told you, I can’t help it. My body just reacts and I don’t even have a chance to think. Anyway, don’t you dare blame me. You’re the one that decided to expose my throat.”

Now wasn’t the time to tell him that the idea of him munching on my neck also didn’t seem so bad to me. At least, the outcome of that seemed like it had possibilities.

“I thought you wanted to practice, and so we did,” I snapped. “You can’t keep shouting at me every time we try and fail. That’s what practicing means.”

“Offering me your throat is too much.”

“I didn’t offer it to you! You pulled my head back and nearly fucking took it, all on your own!”

“Well, at least try and deter me then. Don’t conjure up images of me biting you, and you loving it. I’d really appreciate it if you could spend a little less time thinking about sex and a little more time thinking about the danger you’re in.”

“Oh sure, I’ll try real hard to remember that the next time you wipe my mind and body of all rationality with your impossibly intense kisses. But so help me God, if you don’t figure out the control soon I’m going to explode.”

“You just have to be good for a while longer, while I figure this shit out.”

“I don’t want to be good, I want to be bad. I can’t suffer this intolerable rejection any longer. For fucks sake, I want you to fuck me! I want it so much it hurts.”

He snorted and pressed a hand to his forehead. “It hurts? Do not talk to me about hurt. What hurts is what I have to go through, every second that I’m fighting the urge to kill you.” I cringed and he continued, “And as if that agony isn’t enough, you pull shit like that and increase it by the hundreds. Look at the fucking table, I’ve split the wood. That’s pain, Jess.”

I went to storm away but he caught me in his arms.

“I swear, you have a death wish,” he mumbled. “You should be running a mile from me, not luring me in further like some crazy siren.”

Thrumming filled my ears, my head felt distant, away from my body. I pushed out from his grip.

“You know what? I’m a little sick of you making out like you’re the only one with problems around here, and worse still, that those are my fault. Seriously? It’s my fault that you want to kill me?” I stormed around the room, gathering my stuff.

“My therapist taught me a name for that,” I went on. “It’s called victim-blaming. Maybe you could use some counselling sessions yourself? In fact, yeah… do that. You come find me once you’ve got your head screwed on, because for once in my life, it’s not me with the problem. It’s you.”