“Do you really want an answer to that question?”
In truth, I did not know. I could already feel the jealousy gathering in my chest, thick and hot.
“Did any of them try to bite you?” I bent over him, my lips hovering near his.
“Plenty,” he said.
“What happened to them?”
He raised a brow. “I’d rather not answer a thousand questions about the hundreds of vampires I have turned in two hundred years.”
Then he rolled, and I was on my back, pinned beneath his body.
“Suddenly I am no longer interested in fucking you,” I said.
“No?” he asked, holding my gaze for a moment before his tongue swirled over one hard nipple, then the other. I could not help the way my body responded, tightening, widening, preparing. He chuckled and then sat back and flipped me onto my stomach. Dragging my hips up, he ran his palm over my ass before smacking my skin.
“Fucking beautiful,” he said, his fingers diving into my flesh from behind. “Not interested in fucking me, hmm?”
“Adrian.”
I wasn’t sure why I was saying his name—it was half warning, half plea. He knew I hadn’t meant what I said, and now he intended to teach me a lesson. I wanted it. I even widened my legs and he chuckled as he smoothed his hand up my back until he reached my hair, which he pulled, tilting my head back, my throat taut.
“So rarely under my control,” he whispered. “I like you like this.”
He withdrew his fingers and pressed a kiss to my lower back before he guided himself into me. He still held my hair, and once he gained momentum, he released me and placed his hand flat on my upper back, pushing me to the bed. His movements were rough and hard, and I loved it, wanted more of it.
I panted, ragged and raw, and the only thing I hated about this was that I could not see the pleasure on his face. He moved his hand to my clit, rubbing furiously, and then suddenly he was bent completely over me, my whole body resting against the bed. He bit me in the hollow of my neck, and I completely came apart.
When he was finished, he rolled to the side and draped his arm around my waist. I was too tired to move.
He kissed me and then nuzzled my neck in the spot where he’d taken my blood over and over tonight.
“You are my light,” he said as I descended into darkness.
***
I was conscious that it was bright. I could tell, even though I had yet to open my eyes. There was a part of me that did not want to face the day, not in the aftermath of Sorin’s betrayal. Today I’d have to talk about it and feel the pain—but it was not just my pain. It was also Adrian’s and Daroc’s.
“I know you are awake,” said Adrian.
I opened my eyes, blinking up at my husband, who stood beside the bed, naked. His body was smeared with dried blood.
“I’ve had a bath drawn for us,” he said and held out his hand.
When I sat up, my head swam, and I accepted his help as I rose to my feet. I looked down at my body and then back at our bed—it was all stained with blood.
Adrian offered a small smile. “New vampires are messy.”
He walked with me to the metal tub, and I was glad for it because I did not feel completely stable on my feet.
I lowered into the water, steam curling around me as I did. Adrian followed, settling behind me. We spent a few moments cleaning the blood from our skin before I leaned against his chest, his arms crossed over my body, protective, comforting—and then he spoke, his voice soft and serious.
“Tell me what happened. Every detail.”
I took a few moments to gather my thoughts, to decide how I would present the story of Sorin’s betrayal. I was still confused by his actions. He had saved me from the vârcolaci only to stab me with his own sword. Had he had second thoughts? What about when we were in the woods on the night of the full moon? Had he hoped the villagers would do the job he ended up executing?
“I think I am responsible for the vârcolaci entering the castle,” I said, pausing, but there was no change in Adrian’s body, no hint that he was upset by what I was saying. “I…summoned Ravena via the mirror in my room, and when I broke it, I think I allowed the creatures in somehow.”
“You don’t know that,” he said. “Ravena could have sent them on her own.”
I did not acknowledge his comment, though what he said could be true.
“I realized what had happened, and Sorin came with me to my chamber. He fought beside me, even after I shifted into my aufhocker form.”
At the mention of my change, Adrian’s arms tightened around me.
“He saved me from one of the vârcolaci…and then…he stabbed me, and even after, he did not leave.”
I was so confused, so tired of crying over everything that had happened to my people and to me. I hated that my mouth quivered now.
“He held me and tried to tell me it was for the greater good.”
I hated those words.
You would be renowned, not just in Lara but all of Cordova, my father had said as he tried to convince me to die for something he’d called the greater good, which only meant a world where Adrian and I did not exist.
And apparently, Sorin believed the same.
Which hurt because I’d spent time with him as he’d recounted his trauma. I’d held him on the floor of the training room and mourned that his life had changed just as suddenly as mine. Maybe the most horrifying part of it all was that no one seemed to want me to die as much as they wanted Adrian to die—but I was the easiest target.
Well, no longer.
“What is the greater good?” Adrian asked.
“A world without you,” I said, quiet and sad.
I gripped the side of the metal tub and turned around to face Adrian. He drew me close, my knees on either side of his waist.
“What is it that you want?”
“You,” he said, trailing his wet fingers over my lips.
“Adrian,” I whispered. “You know what I am asking.”
“And I am answering,” he said. “My goal has never changed. I will rule Cordova with you at my side.”
“That is the destination. How are you getting there?”
He stared at me for a long moment and then answered, “You.”
I jerked my head back, surprised by his answer.
“Me?”
“I cannot be…free…without you,” he said. “Without your magic.”
I stared, swallowing hard. I was conflicted. I wanted Adrian to be free of Dis, but I had never realized that he saw me as the key to that freedom.
“What do you mean?”
“Vampires cannot fight magic. You have said so yourself,” Adrian explained. Then he whispered, as if he did not wish for anyone to hear, “But more importantly, witches are Dis’s creations; you draw from her magic. Does it not seem plausible, then, that you could harness it against her?”
With my skills, it was not plausible, but his admission hurt me. It made me feel like there was truth to what Ravena had said—that I did not truly know Adrian, that he had brought me along because I had use—and I hated that she would be right at all.
“What if I had not had magic?”
He said nothing, but I knew.
“Ana,” I whispered, and there was something about this that felt like deception. “Is this how I become useful?”