Page 16 of Crimson Mourning

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CASSIE

“Did Damon know about this?” I asked, as I watched this piece of shit lift his pants around his waist and fasten them.

“I suspect he had his suspicions,” Lawrence answered. “But he never said anything. Just as I never said anything.”

“Smart move.”

I had to admit it. Lawrence was pure trash. Scum. The worst of the worst. But he clearly had thought this through, and part of me admired his willingness to risk it all to accomplish his goals. The attention-to-detail was respectable.

This has to be the dark vampire side of me talking,I thought, as I tried to will myself to come to my senses.

Fuck this fucker.

“I know what you must be feeling,” he continued as he eye fucked the shit out of me. “To have the man you want to spend eternity with, not give you what you want.”

“You don’t knowwhatI feel, Lawrence.”

“No, you’re wrong. I do. In the fifteen years you’ve known him, I’ve seen you grow older beyond your years. The feedings took a toll.”

“Fuck you, Lawrence. You make me sound like I’m eighty.”

Lawrence held the human he’d brought in after we fucked, and bit his neck, extending his fangs down into the two puncture holes the man already had from when I fed.

“That’s not what I mean,” he said when he came up for air, a rivulet of blood trickling from his lips. “I see the subtle lines by your eyes. The frown lines around your pouty lips. The worry lines in your forehead.”

I had to laugh at how he was speaking. Did I fuck a man, or a cosmetologist?

“Now,” he continued, “you get to be thirty-five forever.”

As much as I wanted to join the elite, this was wrong. It should have been Damon who opened the doorway for me, but it was almost dawn and Damon still hadn’t showed.

Damn him and everything he said about always protecting me, about never letting anything happen to me. I needed to get out from under Lawrence. I needed to run, and scream. I needed to be free so I could think. Listening to Lawrence’s bullshit as he crowed like a damn rooster clouded my judgement. I couldn’t see anything, but sucking his cock dry. I’d been around vampires long enough to know the first night of a youngling’s newfound immortality consisted of nothing but feeding and fucking. I’d already let him have me once to complete my transition into the elite. If I hadn’t banged him, I’d be a shriveled-up corpse lying on the coffee table right now. No, I did what I did to survive, but it didn’t mean he would have me again. I needed to suppress the vampiric urges and get the fuck out.

“Welcome to my world, Cassie. Now, we can create our place in it.”

I bolted up at his remark, and put a six-foot distance between us.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Cassie,” he sighed. “You are mine. I’m the head of Shaye, and I’m choosing you as my bride.”

My head was swimming. “Is that what this was about? You did this because you think I will spend eternity with you? You have got to be fuckingkiddingme! This,” I said and pointed a finger to him, then to me. “This willneverhappen again.”

“Never, say never, Cassie. Forever is a long time.”

Joining the elite, and becoming a youngling meant I was faster than him. In his attempts to convince me to become his wife, he hadn’t noticed how often I’d stepped back and towards the only exit. I guess his attention-to-detail wasn’t as great as I gave him credit for. I spun and ran as fast as I could, out the exit, and into the path enveloped in darkness.

I needed to find Damon. I needed to explain to him what happened, before Lawrence had the chance to twist and corrupt the night’s events. But more importantly, it was essential for me to knowwhyDamon never came forme.

CHAPTER TWENTY

LAWRENCE

“She left me, Letos. After all this. Can you believe it?”

Letos’s body twitched in my hand. He was still alive on some level, even though Cassie and I damn near drained all of his blood.

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