Page 101 of Nearly Dead

“You should rest,” he says, watching me from across the room.“Tomorrow will be challenging without the added strain of exhaustion.”

“Do vampires even get exhausted?”I ask, genuinely curious.“Or is that just one more human thing I’m supposed to outgrow?”

His expression softens.“We feel fatigue, yes.Not in the same way as humans, but we can be depleted.”

I nod, moving toward the bedroom.But at the threshold, I hesitate.“Costin?”

He looks up from the plans spread across the table.“Yes?”

“What if I can’t come back from this?What if this is just what I am now?”

He crosses to me in three long strides, taking my face in his hands with a gentleness that belies his strength.“Then I will love you anyway,” he says fiercely.“But I won’t stop fighting for your humanity, Tamara.Not ever.The fact that you even ask me that tells me it’s still there.”

The intensity in his eyes stirs a flicker of warmth in the cold void.I grasp at it, desperate not to lose this last connection to what I was.

“Stay with me,” I whisper.“Please.”

He nods, following me into the bedroom.We don’t speak as we prepare for sleep, moving around each other with the comfortable familiarity of lovers.When we slide beneath the sheets, his arms encircle me, pulling me against his chest as if he can physically prevent me from slipping further away.

I close my eyes, letting the rhythm of his heartbeat lull me toward unconsciousness.As sleep claims me, I feel the cold power recede just slightly, allowing me a moment of peace.

But peace doesn’t last.

In my dreams, I stand in a vast, empty landscape.No horizon, no sky, no ground.There is just endless gray nothingness stretching in all directions.And I am not alone.

“Hello, Tam-tam.”

Conrad stands before me, not as the vengeful ghost who haunted me, but as the brother I knew in life.His smile is the same smirk he always wore when he thought he knew something I didn’t.Which, honestly, was always.

“This isn’t real,” I say, watching him warily.“You’re gone.I freed you.”

“Did you?”He circles me slowly, hands clasped behind his back.“Or did you just open a door to somewhere else?Somewhere I can see things more clearly now?”

“What do you want?”

He stops, studying me with an intensity that’s unsettling.“What I’ve always wanted.To be seen.To be powerful.To matter.”His smile turns bitter.“The things you were given without even trying.”

“I never asked for any of this,” I remind him.

“Didn’t you?”He laughs, the sound hollow in the empty space.“You were always special, Tamara.Even as a mortal.Father’s favorite.Anthony’s precious sister.Astrid’s pet.The dragon’s chosen.Costin’s obsession.My responsibility.Even the mother who gave you up did so out of love.Mine left me at a gas station so she could fuck some lowlife for crack.”

There’s no hiding the envy in his voice, or the resentment that festered for years until it erupted in betrayal and attempted murder.

“And now look at you,” he continues, gesturing to me.“More powerful than any of us could have imagined.A hybrid with magic to boot.Everything I ever wanted.”

“And it’s destroying me,” I say flatly.“Is that why you’re here?To gloat?”

“No.”He steps closer, his expression shifting to something more complex.“I’m here because we’re still connected, you and me.Maybe we always will be.”

“Connected how?”

“History.Shared experiences.Trauma bonds.”He shrugs.“Take your pick.Or maybe it’s simpler than that.Maybe I’m just what’s left of your conscience, wearing a familiar face.”

I don’t know what to make of that possibility, so I ignore it.

“Is our deadbeat dad scrambling to protect his image?Or has he still not bothered to show up for more than two seconds?”

I don’t answer and he laughs like he already knows.

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