Page 76 of Blood Bonds

In one way or another…

They would be the death of me.

My tears still flowed, even an hour later as I walked endlessly in search of them. The pull getting stronger the closer I got. My luck faded with the sunlight, and it meant having to use my card to get me around the city with what little money I had. Of course, I could have just turned my phone back on and had them pick me up. But that wouldn’t have given me the time I needed to try and compose myself.

Because, unlike them…I still had a part to play.

I would have liked to have said with each step it became easier but that was a lie. I could fool my senses for a little while, but it wasn’t enough to mask all of the pain. Pain they would see the second they saw me because my eyes felt sore from all the hopeless tears I had shed. I felt cursed without ever meeting that damn fortune teller, because wasn’t this my life?

Just one disappointment after the other. An endless cycle of them circling me like sharks smelling blood in the water. Like she had said, my desperate soul had been such an easy target. My hopeful heart the cause as well as the price paid. And one that kept on paying. Because I knew I would never get over this.

I would never get over them.

Fear them… oh yes, that I could still do.

I knew this soon enough when I finally found myself at some old warehouse in an unsavory part of the city. Because I was quickly reminded of who the brothers truly were at their core.

Just like that night.

Murderers.

I knew this the second I heard the screams of pain coming from the open door that I knew would lead me to them. A doorI really didn’t want to walk through. But just like that first night, I couldn’t seem to help myself. Now of course, I knew why. So, walking my way through the dangerous motions, having no choice, I inched it further open. I even held my eyes closed, shaking my head like a frightened child who really didn’t want to open their eyes in the dark. Who didn’t want to open their eyes to the monster who had just come home.

But until now, the monsters of this world had only ever been of their own making. The ones who had something sick and twisted inside them that they kept hidden to the outside world.

They had been the humans among us.

These two gave new meaning to my personal monsters. I knew that when I opened my eyes and took in the horror in front of me. Two formidable Vampires who were each taking their time beating a man near to death. Each blow broke a bone or split skin. It was the face of a man I barely recognized anymore.

He was hanging by the chains wrapped around his wrists. Held up and swinging around like a fish on a hook. There was a single tattoo that I focused on because it was one of the only places not covered in blood by the back of his neck. Those swirls of spiked patterns I had once traced with my fingertips in a loving caress.

Why hadn’t he ever loved me back?

How different our lives would be right now if he had. I wouldn’t be in love with my monsters, and he wouldn’t currently be at their mercy.

It was the man who was the first to steal my heart as well as my money, now hanging by a thread to the life Victor and Talon held in their hands.

And in the end, Victor was right…

I did end up screaming for him.

Chapter 28

Tears

Victor

Iswear that fate was fucking laughing at us!

After the night that we just experienced with our Moirai I thought we had made a breakthrough. Although Tal and I had both agreed it was too risky simply to let her roam the nightclub freely, as there was far more to our place of business than met the mortal eye. Meaning it wasn’t safe for us to leave her sleeping in our room, instead having the foresight that this might happen we had her situated comfortably in our vault.

Not that it had fucking mattered.

At this point, I would have believed her to be a fucking witch, despite it being virtually impossible because she tasted one hundred percent human. A fucking delicious one at that. In fact, it had taken every ounce of self-control I possessed not to drink from her last night.

But Tal and I had agreed that for now it was best that we each take turns when feeding from her. Because this was all too fresh, and our restraint was one that had to be cultivated. The Fatedwere usually only meant for one Vampire, not two, and therefore we wanted to build her tolerance to our needs slowly.

The same could be said for our sexual appetite, and last night had been only a taste of what was to come. For last night had been about her. About her pleasure, and in that was where we found our own of a different kind. A selfless kind that we had admittedly never bothered to explore… because well, pleasure had usually only been for our taking.

---