Page 96 of Promised in Blood

Lucian? That’s the name of the professor’s son? His real son. Unlike us, the three idiots who idolize him despite everything.

“The time would have been right four weeks ago when you told us about the rest of your family,” Xavier snaps.

Alexandros shakes his head, his frustration growing more evident. “I had my reasons.”

Xavier sits back in the armchair and huffs. “Yeah, I bet.”

“Xavier,” Ophelia says softly, reaching for his hand, but he shrugs her off.

I glare at my sire. He has a son. A living, breathing son, and he never told us. “I can’t believe you kept this from us. Do we mean anything to you at all?”

Based on the veins bulging in his neck and face, Alexandros’s temper is approaching its boiling point, but I don’t care. I want to push him. Goad him until he explodes because that’s what I feel like doing. And if he comes at me, then I can fight back, and maybe that will make me feel better.

“Why are you telling us this now?” Malachi asks, frowning.

Xavier answers for him. “Probably because the prodigal son has learned his pop bonded with an elementai, and now he wants to come home and try to take what’s ours. Am I right?”

Alexandros’s body is little more than a blur crossing the room, and a split second later, he has Xavier hoisted in the air by his throat. Rage radiates from him like heat from the sun, and I take a step back for fear I’ll burn if I get too close. “I did not tell you about him because up until two weeks ago, I thought he was dead. And before that, you insolent little fuck”—he shakes Xavier, who claws at our sire’s arm for him to let go, but he takes no notice—“I never spoke of him because he destroyed my heart and shattered my soul. He killed his own mother and his little sisters, and he probably did it with a smile on his face. Is that what you wanted to know? Does that satisfy you?”

He throws Xavier onto the sofa and stalks back to his spot on the other side of the room, far away from all of us and, I can only assume, away from the temptation to rip someone’s head off.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Xavier chokes out, rubbing at his throat.

Malachi drops his head and refuses to look at any of us.

I can’t imagine living through that kind of betrayal, and although the words seem hollow now, I murmur my own apology.

Alexandros twists his head from side to side and closes his eyes, visibly regaining his composure. Ophelia goes to him, the only one of us brave enough to comfort him right now. “Does Lucian have anything to do with what happened to Esme?”

He clears his throat. “I believe he is connected to that and to the attack on the witch at Silver Vale.”

Malachi lifts his head, his mouth gaping open. “That’s why there was a trace of your scent?”

Alexandros nods. “Perhaps.”

Xavier stands, his sore throat already forgotten. “What do you think his angle is? I mean, the first attack seemed likean attempt to frame you, but this one was aimed at the Onyx Dragons, right?”

Alexandros blows out a long breath. “I have no idea. Perhaps to cause chaos with the vampire houses. Maybe they hope to destabilize the entire institution of Montridge.”

“Possibly to get closer to Ophelia?” Malachi suggests, and a chill runs down my spine. Lucian is a bloodborne vampire; he’d want her for himself too.

Alexandros nods. “It is possible he is aware of her existence, yes.”

Something the professor said earlier fills me with terror. “But he wants to kill elementai, right? He killed his own mom and sisters?”

“We cannot rule anything out.” He wraps a protective arm around Ophelia’s shoulder before pressing a kiss on top of her head. “I will never let him hurt you, agápi mou.”

She nestles her cheek against his chest and brushes a stray tear from her cheek.

Xavier snarls. “None of us will let him hurt you, Cupcake.”

I couldn’t agree more. Just give me an excuse to rip Lucian’s head off his shoulders, and I’m there. “So what do we do now?”

Alexandros stares at me, his dark eyes boring into my soul. I want to look away, but I can’t. It’s ridiculous, but I always felt special, thinking of myself as his first son. But now I realize I’m not even his son at all, and that hurts like a knife to the heart. “I believe that, as the threat toward Ophelia grows, it would be in our best interests to curate some allies,” he says.

Malachi blinks. “Allies?”

“People whom we can trust to learn of Ophelia’s identity and protect her secret.”

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