Page 2 of Make Me Bleed

Dorian nods at me. “Hey, if the waiter comes by, let him know I’m done with the pasta. I will take a tiramisu, though. I know how much you like it when my blood is sweet.”

“Are you going somewhere?”

“The restroom. I won’t be gone long.”

Ah. The restroom. As a born vampire, that’s one of those things that I don’t have to do. That I’veneverhad to do. Even when I eat human food, I don’t have waste, and if I stop and think about it too much, I simply hand-wave it away asmagic.

But Dorian is human, and if he needs to pee before we go in the back, I can wait a few moments more. Especially since he’s right: a spike in his glucose makes his hot blooddelicious.

I know I shouldn’t flirt… IknowIshouldn’t… but I can’t keep myself from leaning forward in my seat, inadvertently plumping my cleavage as I tell him, “Hurry back.”

Forget the shrimp linguine. I’ll ask the waiter to pack it up for me so I can bring it home for Bridget. It’s been days since I’ve had more than some of the chilled AB-positive we keep inthe office fridge. A vampire can go weeks at a time without blood before it affects them, but I was born an only child to a bonded pair of vampires who were also born vamps; obviously, since turned vampires can’t reproduce as they’re technically ‘dead’, while born vamps are a different strain ofvampire. I’ll admit that, for the first sixty years of my life, my parents spoiled me. Even after they relocated to Holland after my sixtieth birthday, living in Clarity means that I’m never without blood for long.

So maybe I’m a bougie vamp. I want fresh blood whenever I can get it, and I only hope that the waiter comes by so that I can pass over my plate and order Dorian’s dessert.

And then, as if I summoned him myself, he’s at the table.

I expect him to ask how our meal was. In Notturno, the human waiters know better than to comment on whether their vamp customers actually touch the food they order. He’ll see that I made a small dent and react as though I cleaned my plate before offering me the dessert menu.

But that’s not what the dark-haired human does. Instead, bowing slightly, he places a crystal goblet in front of me.

You’d never mistake the chilled blood in front of me for a glass of red. Everything, from the rusty, tangy scent to the way it fills the cup makes it obvious what it is. No one in the restaurant cares, of course, but I frown anyway.

Because I didn’t order that.

My full glass of water is still sitting near my plate. That’s what I asked for, and I give the waiter a slightly puzzled look. Did Dorian flag him down on the way to the toilet to tell him to bring me a little blood to quell some of my thirst?

His eyes flicker across the restaurant. “From the gentleman at the bar, miss.”

I follow the direction of his stare—and sit straight up in my seat.

Oh, no.

Peter.

How did I miss him before?

As a vamp, my sense of smell isn’t as strong as, say, a shifter’s. I’m fast and I’m strong and I have a sixth sense when someone is approaching my lair, but I can’t pick one scent out of hundreds and know that someone I’m avoiding isright there. Notturno might be my favorite restaurant to go to for my dates, but it’s notmyterritory. I had no idea that someone was watching me… but there he is.

Peter Hawkes.

Double crap.

It’s been almost two months since the last time I caught him stalking me. A handsome human male with a head of thick, dark hair, a muscular build, and insane dark eyes, I swear I would’ve noticed him lurking at the bar before. I didn’t, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been watching me on my date.

Knowing Peter, that’s exactly what he’s been doing.

I’m not surprised to find him inside Notturno, either. He knew the secret of who really owns Clarity long before I met him, and during our year-long arrangement—the longest I’ve ever had with one of my donors—I’ve brought him here dozens of times. He’s alone now, though, but considering I know he wears Delilah’s fang under his jacket, that explains how he got in tonight.

His continued obsession with winning me back explainswhyhe’s here…

He has no chance. Up until last summer, I was happy with our arrangement. I thought Peter was, too. But then he pushed me to turn him into a vampire and take him as my mate, and when I told him I needed time to think, he betrayed me by propositioning another vamp in Clarity.

Delilah gave him her fang. She refused to change him, and she wasn’t interested in making a human hers, but she gavehim a fang—and that was it for me. She marked him as her possession, and when he looped the gold chain it was on around his neck, Peter was telling the entire Fang City that he belonged to her.

To Delilah James, not Elise van Duren.

It’s been months since I ended things with him.Months. And there he is, intruding on my date, buying me blood.

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