Page 58 of High Stakes

I had no words.

“I want you to tell me what I am like in the future. In detail,” he added.

I drew in a shuddering breath. “What if I’m not supposed to? What if you aren’t meant to know such things, and I mess things up even worse by telling you? I’m not sure I could live with that responsibility, Enoch.”

“You came here with one intention: to kill me. Yes?”

“Yes.”

“And yet you haven’t.”

I swallowed. “No, I haven’t.”

His eyes softened, losing some of their intensity. “Because you put away your preconceived notions and chose instead to observe. All I ask is that you allow me the same opportunity. Let me learn from my future mistakes, so I can avoid making them. Put your trust in me, Eve. I will not let you down. I swear it on my life.”

I tried not to look at him. His green eyes were more than I could handle, but he gently gripped my chin and my eyes followed until they collided with his. “Please.”

In that moment, I realized everything had changed. I grew up believing that traveling into the past and killing Enoch was the only way to save the future. I thought it was what I was meant to do. But I was wrong. There was no way I could bring myself to drive a stake through his heart. Not when I knew there was a chance he might stay the kind, protective, gentle man standing before me.

The only word ricocheting through my mind fell from my lips. “Okay.”

I would tell him.

About every broadcast. How he rallied the vampires to take over cities, to ravage small towns, leaving nothing behind but rotting corpses; how little human lives meant to him, and how he kept siring monster after monster after monster, raising an army that enslaved the few humans they didn’t harvest for their blood. Caging women and children in vast warehouses to ensure their food supply, and draining the elderly who couldn’t possibly defend themselves. I would tell him every disgusting detail I could remember about who he would become.

But there were things, I decided, I couldn’t tell him. About the compound and the Asset program, about technology and advancements he didn’t know they were trying to perfect. He knew too much already, just from observing me and Titus.

In case this didn’t work, I couldn’t arm him against us.

I took an unsteady breath. “I’ll tell you everything, but after I do, I must leave here, Enoch.”

He opened his mouth to protest, brows furrowed, when a whoosh of air sliced the fog in half as one foot and then another crunched onto the carpet of leaves behind Enoch. “You called for me, brother?”

Enoch’s back stiffened at the sound of Asa’s voice.

Asa was as tall as Enoch and slightly broader at the shoulder. His dark hair was cropped close to his scalp, and he had a short beard and mustache in the same shade. There was a coolness, a conniving sharpness in his toffee eyes that Enoch didn’t share. Where Enoch was warm, Asa was ice cold.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Enoch slowly turned around to face his invitee. Asa was dressed in a dark suit, the stitches made with golden thread. The brothers stared at one another for a long moment before Asa turned his rapt attention to me. “Pardon the interruption, brother.”

Enoch never took his eyes off Asa. “You wasted no time.”

“What can I say?” Asa smiled cruelly. “I am ever at your disposal.”

Asa stared at me, tilting his head and inhaling deeply. His dark eyes closed. All at once, the creatures beneath the soil began to writhe. I could feel the vibrations. Worms and centipedes. Something crawled across my bare foot and I kicked it away.

“Asa,” Enoch growled. “Stop.”

Asa’s eyes popped open. He grinned and raised a brow. “Tell me, where is our beloved sister?”

“Inside,” Enoch snapped.

When Asa walked, it was like his feet didn’t touch the ground; he glided through the mist and entered the castle. Enoch muttered a curse. Pennants atop the three turret peaks flapped loudly overhead as the wind picked up and the sun finally broke through the cloudbank and began evaporating the fog hanging in the air around us.

“He’s so different from you,” I blurted.

“Yes,” Enoch agreed. “He is. He is the worst of us.”

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