Page 81 of Queen of Vampire Hearts

I hated that I warmed at how awful he looked. Some part of me was happy he hadn’t returned to his hedonist ways the second he turned me over as ifwehad never been. When I had awakened to the familiar warmth of his body, I was convinced I was still dreaming. When he’d kissed me, my heart leaped. Then I registered how the dream felttooreal, realizing he was, in fact, cradling me in his arms.

It had taken everything I had to extricate myself from him. I was so surprised by his sudden appearance that I wasn’t able to call forth the mental fortitude to throw him from the room. I didn’t know why I’d agreed to listen to him, though some terrible, foolish part of me still yearned for him, still loved him despite everything. It was that part of me that nodded and waited for him to begin.

“When I first met you in Tír nAill, I didn’t know who you were. Who you were to me.” He glared at his hands in anger before fisting them closed as if he was resisting the need to touch me with all his might. “When Titania interrupted us, she mentioned Erik was there to see me. It was about the bounty.”

Just the mention of it had me flinching in remembered pain. He looked tortured by that small reaction. I tried to remain impassive, still determined to send him on his way. “The bounty was vague, only listing the Atreus & Margaux descendent, with no physical description or anything. I thought it was intriguing.” He laughed bitterly. “Erik claimed the witches suspected you’d glamoured yourself so many times that any description they could provide would be worthless.”

“When I first escaped, I implanted distinct memories in the survivors’ heads. They couldn’t come to a consensus on what I looked like.” The bounty should have been useless. No doubt, the Council hoped by some stroke of dumb luck Lucien and Erik would stumble across me. They’d been right.

“It was that same night that Erik pointed out my desperation to get back downstairs to you was a sign that you were my mate.” He laughed again in remembrance, but it was still brittle. “I completely forgot about the bounty, focused only on finding you. It was the furthest thing from my mind.”

He hadn’t recalled the bounty when we met in New Orleans? I couldn’t remember ever telling him my last name. He never knew my line was Atreus—when I still thought it was Atreus.

“When did you recall it?” I snapped, trying not to fall for his explanation, although it was making me forgive him, bit by bit.

Lucien hadn’t realized the bounty target and his mate were the same, at least not at first.The brief space between us was killing me, my heart begging me to close the distance, but I brutally shut that thought down. I was attempting to fortify my resolve to show him the door when his explanation was over. I crossed my arms over my chest, preventing myself from reaching out to touch him.

“I didn’t. Erik did,” he admitted. His eyes laser-focused on me, his face observing every minuscule change in my expression, so I tried to maintain a blank look. “He came to me a couple of days before your coronation and told me he’d figured out the bounty from Tír nAill was you.”

“How many days before my coronation?” I gritted out. I needed to know if he’d been aware before he slept with me.

He rubbed the back of his neck. “A couple...” The way he trailed off was damning.

I leaped up, my rage returning, muting other emotions. “You knew when I asked you to claim me, didn’t you?”

He stood warily, his hands out in supplication. “I was on my way to tell you that day, but…”

I had seduced him. Could I truly blame him? I thought back to that day, recalling the glazed look of desire that had come over him. I’d never felt more powerful than I had at that moment. It was doubtful I could have resisted him if our roles were reversed. “Why didn’t you tell me after?”

“I had hoped Erik would find a way out of it, but it was already too late.” He turned his back on me, concealing his face. “I don’t know how much you know about mystical bounties, but saying no is not an option. After that first night together, I woke up hovering over you, the cuffs in my hand.”

“What do you mean, you woke up? You don’t remember retrieving them?” Had itcompelled himto complete the bounty? I remembered the way he’d told me to run in Texas. Had he meant runfrom him?

He shook his head. “Not at all. I fled from your side, horrified that you would wake up and see me standing over you.” His hand tunneled through his hair. “I knew you wouldn’t stay and listen if that happened.”

I felt a flash of guilt at that, knowing I likely wouldn’t have. The sight of the cuffs was a bit of a trigger. I would have run if I’d seen him standing above me holding them. My survival instincts would have kicked in, and I would have left. He was right.

He had predicted my reaction and hidden the bounty from me because he knew he would lose me. He had told me so many times of his fear that I would disappear. There had been so many mornings he woke in a near panic, afraid I had snuck away during the night.

“I ran into Erik in the hall, and I clung to the hope that he would find a way out of it for us. I refused to let my guard down, refused to sleep until I heard from him.”

“You should have told me,” I said softly. He whipped around, and I started at the absolute agony on his face. I reached out to touch him but stopped, pulling my hand back. He noticed, and raw, unfiltered pain shone in his eyes at the action.

“I wanted to. I…I was so afraid.”Hewas afraid? I struggled to believe that. Then I remembered the way he’d clung to me in the night and how he’d stormed through the castle searching for me. Had it been fear of losing me that made him so paranoid and not his lack of faith in me?

“Afraid of what?” I murmured, still struggling against the need to provide some comfort to him. It hurt me to see him in such pain.

He sighed, falling back into the chair and glaring at his hands, seeming to plan his answer. “Afraid that you’d leave me.” He released a mirthless chuckle. “It was indeed a well-founded fear.”

“I—” I broke off, realizing that if he’d told me about the bounty, I still would have left, despite my feelings for him.

“The thought of you leaving me…” he trailed off, running his fingers through his hair and gripping his head. “It eats at me.”

I’d confirmed his deepest fears when I left.I tried not to feel remorse for that. “The thought of you being one of the bounty hunters I dreaded ate at me,” I responded, and he laughed emptily.

“That day, when you took me to your parents’ markers and we were ambushed, I tried to warn you to run from me, but the compulsion was too strong. I hated binding you, but the bounty was stronger than I was. I was too weak to protect you.”

It had forced him to complete the bounty.For the first time, I saw the day through that lens. I remembered the tortuous look on his face as the bindings had come down, how he’d seemed to battle some unseen foe. I realized he had been waging war with himself.

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