Page 80 of Mama Si's Paradise

“Look at me,” he finally whispered, and I’d never been more terrified in my life than when I did. His eyes were bloodshot, his lips parted, though he wasn’t breathing heavily. He was so, so close, the tips of our noses almost touching, his body practically holding me captive between him and the trunk.

“Your blood is mine, human,” he told me. “Your body belongs to me now.”

Oh, God. My knees were shaking so badly. “I don’t belong to anyone.”

If I only had the strength to push him off me…

“Oh, but you do,” he said, one corner of his lips turning up as his eyes fell on mine, and he looked hungry. He lookedstarved. “And your heart will be mine soon, too.”

He couldn’t be serious. “I willneverbelong to you,” I said, just in case he didn’t hear me the first time.

“Then I’ll just have to prove it until you believe me.”

Suddenly, his hand squeezed around my neck and his lips touched the spot right below my ear where my pulse was going fucking crazy. And he growled.

The man growled like a damn animal, so much more dangerous than that dragon on his shoulder. He didn’t kiss me, simply pressed those lips to me like he really did think he owned me.

My hands were somehow on his chest and I pushed him away with all my strength, but when he moved back and I saw his face again, saw thefangsslipping out his upper lip, my legs gave up on me.

Reality no longer made any sense. My legs let go but he was right there, and his arm was around my waist and he pulled me flush against his body, holding me up like I weighed nothing.

Vampire,my mind screamed.Vampire, vampire, vampire!

I’d seen movies. I’d read so many books. He had fangs—he was a goddamn vampire.

“Do you believe me yet?” he whispered, lips pressed to my cheek as he spoke, but my eyes were already closed. My mind was already shutting down.

I was gone within the minute, certain that I was never going to wake up again.

Twenty-One

I did wake up again—andI was lying on a bed this time, not the floor of a forest. There were no whispering leaves over my head, no twigs and no trees anywhere around me, but the darkness was almost the same. The only light was coming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows across from the bed I lay in. Orange light—like there was a fire burning out there because the sky was black as far as I could see. No sun or moon in sight, just darkness.

I sat up in the middle of the bed, just as big as the one I’d slept in at the Paradise. Except here the sheets were black, the curtains were a see-through black, the walls were black, the baseboards grey, the hardwood floor so dark it looked black as well. The doors on the walls were black, embroidered with silver vines around the corners, and the dressers and the wardrobe and the nightstand—even the lamp! There was a big lamp right there on the nightstand to my left, and it wasblack.

I’d never moved so fast as when I did to try to turn it on, convinced it wasn’t going to work.

It did.

Light spilled from the bulb, casting shadows all over thecold room, making it even scarier than it had been a second ago, but it also revealed that I was the only one here. Nobody else was between these walls with me, and for now, I took comfort in that.

Then I sat in the middle of the bed, hugged my knees to my chest as chills broke down my back, and I forced myself to just breathe.

The Whispering Woods. The small dragon. The man—Valentine Evernight. Thevampire.

My eyes squeezed shut. I’d passed out in his arms when I saw those fangs. Actual fangs coming out of his upper lip—had he bitten me? I raised both hands to the sides of my neck but there was no fresh blood, just the dried one from the dragon bite.

A dragon had bitten me.

Vampires are real.

And Mama Si was a fucking succubi, a creature I’d only ever read about—a creature who fed on people’s lust to gain magical power. Real.

It felt like I should have been laughing at that point. I should have been laughing my heart out because this was my life, because I was in a black room God knew where and I was somehow alive even though a vampire had had his lips on my fucking neck.

Everyone knew what happened when vampires craved blood. Everyone had seen at least one damn movie about it.

My eyes closed, and that face was right in front of me again, his hand on my neck, his eyes bloodshot when he sniffed me, his lips pressed to the vein right below my ear… Every inch of my body broke out in goose bumps. It felt like I was there in that woods all over again, and he was whispering those words in my ear—Your body belongs to me. Your heart will be mine soon.

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