Page 13 of Forced Vampire Mate

Luken hummed. “It wasn’t such a terrible fate for Thessa.”

I narrowed my eyes. “And if I’m dying, then I’d rather be a vampire than dead. Doesn’t mean it’s my preference.”

Now that he brought up Thessa, my stomach squeezed. I hadn’t been paying enough attention. How far away from Thessa and Darcie had he already taken me? I pulled to a stop and turned to face him. He was going to try to take me back to the palace. He would lock me up in my room and make me wait out their deaths, then pretend as though he did me a favor.

I felt the shift of his surprise through the bond and realized my sudden anger and fear had seeped through to him. I shut down the bond quickly, not wanting him to feel any part of me.

Luken turned to me, frustration dancing in his eyes. “What just happened, Elara?”

I lifted my chin and stared into his devastatingly handsome face. I couldn’t risk this going on further than it already had. Everything that happened over the past few months had sent me spiraling off course again and again. Luken wouldn’t let me save them if he had a choice, which meant I had to take away his choice, the same way he was trying to take away my choice to go after them.

“If we don’t save Darcie and Thessa, I will kill myself,” I told him. “If you try to take me back to the palace, I will hurt myself any way I can. A sharp rock, running off cliffs, stealing your weapons. I don’t care what I have to do; I will hurt myself, and it will make you weak.”

Luken’s face hardened. He went very still as he studied me, without emotion. I didn’t dare open the bond to try to get a sense of what he was feeling.

“Rather than asking, you jump right to blackmail, do you?” He quirked one dark eyebrow.

I rolled my eyes in answer. He’d already proven again and again that he wasn’t going to help me get Darcie back. Why would that change now that Thessa was taken away, too? Threatening him by threatening myself was the only power I had in this relationship. My hands clenched at my sides. I was ready to prove myself if he started arguing.

He didn’t fight me on it, though. Instead, he said, “I have a better hiding place for you to regain your strength, rather than sitting out in the open forest. We’ll plan how to get Darcie and Thessa back once my brother’s mercenaries can’t ambush us again.”

My fists loosened. Could I believe him? He started walking again, and I followed, struggling to find balance after this. He was right about one thing. If we were ambushed, I wouldn’t do much good. I might be healing, but I was still weak. I needed rest and food.

“Where are we going?” I asked cautiously.

“A safehouse near the border.”

We arrived at a little village shortly after. It was a quaint little place, full of brightly painted houses and a handful of stores, or at least that’s what it looked like from the outskirts. Luken led me to a two-bedroom cottage on a well-maintained property close to the forest. A fence surrounded the property, blocking out spying eyes. Several large trees shaded the cottage and there was a ring of stones just inside the fence that were etched with runes.

“It’s protected by wards and charms,” Luken told me. “Nobody in the village even knows this place exists. Draven’s people won’t find us here.”

Inside, the cottage was decorated in cool shades of blue and green. Everything was soft and organic. The carpets had vine-like patterns, and the curtains were lacy, letting in plenty of natural light. The furniture was modest and inviting. The main room was an open-concept kitchen and living room. Luken had me sit on the couch while he went to the kitchen and started to prepare some food for me.

“What is this place?” I asked him.

“A safehouse.”

I eyed the fresh fruit sitting on the counter. “And it just happens to be fully stocked?”

His eyes flickered up at me. “Do you really think I wanted to spend my honeymoon with a million people underfoot?”

My cheeks heated. That was exactly what I thought would happen. That I’d stay in my room, and he’d come every night, trying to convince me to accept him as my husband. I looked around the cottage with new eyes. It wasn’t just some place. It was a honeymoon cottage.

“Oh,” I mumbled.

Luken sighed. “I was hoping we’d have time to talk and get to know each other.”

I didn’t like the uncomfortable prickles of conscience that accompanied his words. It was all too easy for me to fall into the fantasy of what I wanted him to be. I had to be strong, to fight against these moments of quiet. Even if he had planned out a private honeymoon, he hadn’t bothered to tell me about it. And how did he think I was going to be happy here while Darcie was still set to be sacrificed?

If we were going after her, though… he needed to be strong, too. “You haven’t had blood for a few weeks.”

He had pulled some cheese from the fridge and was slicing it thinly for my sandwich. “I have not.”

I braced myself. “You’ll need to drink from me before we go after them.”

“No, I won’t.” Luken nodded toward the fridge. “I have a store of blood bags. Since I haven’t had a personal donor in… a while, I’ve made do with the frozen kind. It’s enough to keep me strong. Like I said…” He looked up at me, his amber eyes smoldering. “Not until you’re begging me for it.”

Heat washed through my system. If he drank from me, it would cause all my hormones to flare to life. I would beg him to take me. I opened my mouth to say just that, only to pause. That was exactly why he wasn’t going to drink from me, wasn’t it? Because he wanted me to beg for him because I wanted him that badly, not because of the aphrodisiac response of being drunk from.

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