Chapter 154

My head was pounding. The world was spinning. I felt exhausted, but the one thing I could note I wasn’t in a bed. I wasn’t in a warm room full of familiar scents and comforts. The floor was hard and cold beneath me. I smell stale water and stone much like the cell I had been held in. Was I back there?

My eyes burned. Had I gone through all of that with nothing to show for it?

Then, a familiar scent hit my nose: warm, a little musky and bright with just a tinge of the scent of whiskey.

It was Candido. Was he here?

I craned my head left and then right, hoping to see him, but I couldn’t focus. The world kept going in and out like my eyes couldn’t adjust to the light. I turned again, but all I saw were two wooden chairs that looked like they were better off as firewood, a cold fireplace, and a few other random things. This looked more like a storage room than a bedroom or a holding cell.

I lifted my head. Had Ian just moved me to torture me some more?

“You’re awake.”

Candido’s voice was right behind me. I turned over, happy to hear his voice. I sat up and gasped as tears pricked my eyes. I had missed him so much. Candido sat across from me. His chest was wrapped in bandages. He looked pale. There was dirt and grime smeared on his face and blood in his hair. He looked too real not to be.

The scent of blood drifted in the air. I sniffed, trying to find where it was coming from as I pressed a hand to my stomach. I was still hungry. I pushed those thoughts away and I pushed myself up.

“Candido… what took you so long to find me? Why aren’t you holding me? We haven’t—” I sniffled. “Do you… Do you even know what I’ve been through? You were supposed to protect me, and you weren’t there and—I almost died. There were monsters and all kinds of things.”

He said nothing and tears streamed down my cheeks. “Why aren’t you saying anything? I thought you were supposed to love me! How can you just sit there and say nothing seeing me like this?”

“… You look fine.”

I grit my teeth and got up ready to scream at him, but then I couldn’t, or rather, I didn’t, because something wasn’t right. There wasn’t a single ache, not even from lying on the floor in an odd position. My vision was still a little weird, but eyes didn’t feel dry. My lips didn’t feel dry. Nothing hurt, and that was odd. I felt maybe a little tired, like I’d been up all night but I didn’t feel anything else.

When I thought back to the battle and then running into Claire, it didn’t make any sense. When I thought back to the attack on the mall, it made perfect sense. Whatever Damian had put in the water, whatever made that fog worked a lot like blood did. Part of me wanted to gag as I remembered how much blood I had drank, but I couldn’t. My stomach rumbled instead.

I looked down, pressing on the places where the wounds had once been, but there was nothing, not even a faint scar or a still tender strip of pink. There was no sign anyone had treated me either, no bandages or anything like that. I turned to the mirror to get a look at my back through the tatters of my clothes. They were all blood-stained, but there was nothing I could see that looked like a wound.

How was that possible? Had it all been in m head? No, the tatters in my clothing, the fact that they were still a bit damp pointed to it all being real.

I looked across the room to where Candido sat. His eyes were red-rimmed, he looked exhausted and there were cuffs around his arms. It looked like he’d been pulling at them from the dried blood around his wrists. I could almost taste it. That was where the scent was coming from. I licked my lips.

My stomach clenched with hunger as I stared at him. His eyes were hard, simply watching me as I crossed the room, slowly. I wanted to run, to throw my arms around him and have him hold me. I wanted to argue that the wounds were just gone, but I had been wounded and he should care. But more than all that, I was hungry and I couldn’t help but think of how… helpless he seemed, shackled there. I could do almost anything I wanted. I could kiss him. I could kiss him until we were both breathless and sit in his lap until he begged me to pull his pants off. I could do anything I wanted to him.

I could lick every drop of blood oozing from his wrists and more. I could almost hear him moaning, high and breathy. Did it feel good to be bitten? I didn’t know, but something told me that I wasn’t wrong, that he’d enjoy it.

More than that, I’d enjoy it. I could almost feel his hands on my hips, pushing our hips together as I drank from him. The rich, hot taste of his blood and the pleasure that would shoot through me as he made me grind down against his erection.

I dropped to my knees, called forward by the fantasy. I wanted it. I wanted him to want it and he would. He did.

I knew he did. I didn’t know how I knew, but I knew. He loved me. He wanted me. He’d shared dreams with me in which he did all sorts of things to me. He had to want me. He had to want this. I reached his ankles when I started panting, drawn by the sound of his heart beating, pushing his blood through his veins.

I couldn’t help it. The scent of him made my gut clench with a different kind of hunger.

I wanted…

I wanted him so much, and he was here. All this time, calling for him, hoping he would come for me and he was here. We were together.

“Candido,” I whispered taking a deep breath of his scent as I raised my head, aiming for his neck. He didn’t move. His pulse didn’t jump, his scent didn’t change.

It all meant something, but I couldn’t focus on that. I was so close…

“When were you going to tell me that you are a vampire?”

I stopped mid-bite, all thoughts of what I could do seemed to vanish as I drew back to meet his gaze. His eyes stared up at me full of accusation.

“W-What?” I asked.

“You’re practically salivating,” he said baring his teeth. “Was this the plan ultimately? To capture me and drain me dead?”

“Candido, that’s not—”

“How long have you been keeping this from me?” Candido asked. “Since I found you on the road? All this time pretending to be some innocent, abused little girl and you’re a vampire?”

“I’m not—”

“Don’t lie to me!” Candido growled. “Don’t you fucking say another damn word if it isn’t the fucking truth. I’m looking right at you: covered in blood and still looking as though you’d eat me alive.”

I flinched because now that he’d mentioned it, I was tempted. The smell of his blood was calling to me. He smelled so good. I could almost taste it on my tongue.

“But I wasn’t thinking about biting you!” I said, pushing those thoughts away.

“How am I supposed to believe that?” Candido asked. “Look at you.”

My jaw trembled and pushed back and away from him. I crossed the room. “You said you loved me. You said that you’d always protect me. How can you just start screaming at me like this? You can’t treat me like this! I’m your mate!”

“I made those promises to a young werewolf running from her family,” Candido hissed. “Not a vampire spy.”

“I’m not a spy!”

“It should have been impossible for a vampire to break into headquarters,” he scoffed. “All this time thinking about who the mole could be, and it was you—”

“I would never betray you!” I cried. “You have to believe that. I love you. I’ve always loved you. I—"

“And why would I believe you?” Candido asked. “You were going to bite me.”

“I wasn’t…”

I blinked and looked at his face. That couldn’t have been right, yet my gaze drifted back to the slow trickle of blood down his hands. I was drawn to it. It was like my whole world was focused on it as I stepped forward. He moved and drew my attention from the clang of his shackles on the floor.

I looked up at him, jerking my attention to his face and his glaring eyes, but I knew I was caught.

“Try to deny it now,” Candido hissed. “I dare you.”