Page 123 of A Bond with the Dark

“This is Lasayah,” Dom answers for me. Hearing him use my full name makes me feel like I’m in trouble.

Maybe he’s being formal to hold a point with his brother.

The brother that has been haunting my dreams for months.

Bash holds out his hand for me to take, but I hesitate.

“Lasayah,” he whispers, sliding his tongue carefully across each syllable of my name.

A feeling of virulent and noxious love hits me like a tidal wave. I’m sure if I hold out my hand, it’ll be shaking. But I do. And it’s not.

Bash stands and grasps my hand, pulling it to his lips. “Pleased to meet you, Sayah.”

The way his mouth caresses my name holds a viscous potency, a hesitating and murderous curiosity all rolled into that decadent cadence.

Black hair disarrayed, blue eyes brilliant with a glint of danger and rapture as though seeing me is all the joy in his heart, he calls me by the name that only people who know me call me. He knows me. I can see it in those crystal blue eyes.

We’ve been haunting each other’s dreams, and I know that more than anything else.

An imagined chill laps at the nape of my neck, along with a wave of unnervingly intense emotions. I fight to breathe normally; the feeling of asphyxiating sends hot flashes to my cheeks, and I swallow hard, trying to calm myself.

Dom looks at me, and I feel a tickling in my mind like he’s trying to get in. I pull my hand back and look at Dom, shaking my head as though telling him I’m all right, fortifying myself against his attempt.

“Why are you here?” Dom asks again, his brows furrowing together as his frown turns grim.

Bash plays with the glass, slipping his fingertip along the top, making it sing. “I told you. I wanted to see you.”

His eyes catch mine again, and I fall into them, take a running spill into his darkness, and feel myself falling into a void, unable to return.

I look away.

“That’s a fucking lie, and you know it,” Dom retorts.

“Quit with the bull shit already,” Everett says raucously from the bar. “We can always use Jasantha to get you to spill the truth, so stop beating around the fucking bush.”

“All right!” Bash says, and his voice is terrifying. “All right. I need a favor.”

“A favor?” Dom asks. “What do you want now?”

“I need a drop of each of your blood. It’s for a spell.”

“What kind of spell?” Scarlet asks, flaying him with her gaze.

Taking a quick slug of the wine, he says, “I can’t say. But just know it’s not shady.”

“Bash, everything you do is shady,” responds Jasantha.

“No, it’s not.” Bash is indignant. His voice is defensive now, “It’s to break a curse. That’s all I’m telling you.”

“We’re kind of in the middle of breaking our own curse,” Hattie says.

“What curse do you have?” Bash asks, and suddenly, it dawns on me that this is a typical dinner conversation for vampires.

“Dom was marked,” Hattie answers defiantly.

Bash’s eyes draw cold indifference initially, then grow a little lighter. “What?”

“A tracker,” Dom answers. “I’m marked for necromancy.”

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