Page 38 of Fated In Blood

Even though I had every reason to.

That was the last I saw of her, in a heap on the floor, clutching her ruined dress, blue eyes brimming with tears as I walked away.

Good fucking riddance.

20

EVANGELINE

Istared at the swirling shadows marking where Blake had just disappeared, bile crawling up my throat like lava.

“What in the fuck just happened?”

My mind spun, trying to grasp onto my new reality, but life had changed too much in these past twenty hours for me to get my bearings.

I was a vampire. One of the very creatures I’d been raised to hate. I’d drank blood, had fucking sex, then been discarded.

But beneath the confusion, the rejection, the betrayal, lay a kernel of absolute truth.

I knew what had happened. The same fucking thing thatalwayshappened. The sins of my family had come back to haunt me, like evil ghosts I’d never be able to purge from my life.

I’d spent nine years looking over my shoulder, keeping my sister protected and safe, and yet I couldn’t outrun my past, not even here…wherever I was.

Naked, alone in some ancient museum of a house, laying on a cold stone floor surrounded by furniture—was that a fucking suit of armor?—that could have come over on the Mayflower.I closed my eyes and started scraping my cobwebby memories back together.

This felt like being trapped underwater. A side effect of drinking blood, from Blake’s brief, angry explanation. I’d fed from him.Fuckedhim. Given myself wholly to him. No,beggedhim to take me. I buried my face in my hands.

Fuck my life. Self-loathing and fury and regret shivered through me in a cold, slimy river of shame.

As it was, I barely managed to get to my feet, sore between my legs, knees shaking as I stared down the long, dark corridor where Blake had disappeared.

Head in the opposite direction, Evie.

Get as far away from that bastard as you can.

The second the thought struck me, my chest tightened, lungs contracting until spots danced in my vision. I searched through my memories for a clue to what this was and came up empty, except for one image of Blake rubbing his chest in the exact same place where mine currently ached.

Panic rose, but I shoved my fear back down. Forced myself through the breathing exercises father had drilled into Angel and me from a young age.

Right. I couldn’t be here, which meant I had to get back to my apartment. Take a shower. Wash the smell of Blake Marten off my body, his seed off the insides of my thighs.

Figure out how to crowbar my sister away from Tyrell, preferably with a couple bricks of C-4.

Definitely forget what had happened in the garden.

I searched through the closet in the entry hall and, wonder of wonders, found an ancient wool coat smelling of mothballs that hung past my knees. Sage green Wellingtons covered my bare legs, and once I shoved my snarled hair up under the hat I dug out of a corner, I was unrecognizable.

The big front door didn’t make a sound when I slipped through, before I crunched down the gravel drive to the main road and, on a hunch, hung a right. I reached downtown Thorndale midafternoon, streets already filled with drunken college students, laughing like they didn’t have a care in the world.

These…children were my age.

None of them had seen half of what I’d seen. I hated them for their innocence, and at the same time was equally jealous. To be so at ease in this world, so blissfully unaware of its dangers would be a gift.

A group of girls staggered past me, taking selfies with their phones, and every cell in my body went berserk. My fangs punched out so fast I tasted blood, and even from ten feet away, I heard their hearts racing, the scent of strong perfume and liquor sweeping over me in a sweet-sour wave.

Before I was even aware of what I was doing, I trailed them down the street, my senses homing in on their rushing blood, their footsteps speeding up when they realized they were being followed.

Fuck. What was I even doing?

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