Page 19 of Fanged Temptation

"What does he look like?" I found myself asking, tension beginning to coil in my stomach.

Eric rubbed the dark stubble on his chin. "Tall, blond hair streaked with grey – a silver fox if you will. Dorian ran into him last week at a gala. Said he has a bit of an old-world charm about him. Dresses like he's walked out of another era. Beard just a little bit grizzly – very dashing."

I shifted in my chair. Dorian was another member of our motley crew, a highborn vamp and a hopeless romantic. He swooned over just about anyone with a modicum of decorum, and it often led him to trouble.

Eric’s voice dropped an octave and we all edged closer. “But it was his eyes that added to the mystery. Dorian said they were red, blood red where they should have been white. And his irises were blue, crisp like icicles.”

A cold dread settled in the pit of my stomach and I stilled, my hands curling to fists on my knees.

It couldn’t be – it couldn’t behim. But… those eyes, that antiquated charm that masked a festering rot beneath. Could he have found me? After all these years?

“What did he want?” I asked abruptly, interrupting whatever Claire was whispering. “When Dorian spoke with him – Did he mention why he was here?”

Ethan raised an inconspicuous brow at me but I ignored him, fixing my attention on Eric.

The vampire man shrugged, scratching at his stubble. “I’m not sure. Dorian was probably too busy looking at his lips to listen to a word he said. But I think he mentioned a love interest? Most likely to shut Dorian down – you know the guy isn’t very subtle when he has his eye on someone.”

"I need to go." I pinged to my feet, standing so quickly my chair scraped loudly against the floor. “Tell Dorian no matter what, he needs to stay away from that man.”

"Maxine, what's wrong?" Concern flickered in Ethan’s eyes and he half-rose from his chair. “Do you know him–”

"Nothing’s wrong, I just... tell Dorian to keep his distance.” I threw down some cash for my drink, swiping my purse from the table. "Excuse me."

I hurried out of the coffee shop and something rancid curdled in my belly. That age-old primal fear settled over me,slick and oily on my skin. He was here, in the city, and he was looking for me. And I would never go back. I wouldn’t. Couldn’t. I wouldnever–

“Maxine! Wait.” Ethan’s cry reached me through the frenzied fog and I stumbled, my heel catching in the cracks of the sidewalk.

But I couldn’t wait. I had to prepare, to protect the life I had built here. I had to–

“Maxine.” Ethan’s arms circled me and I halted, my breaths coming in short sharp bursts. I sagged against his back, my legs turning to jelly, and Ethan exhaled over my shoulder. “Just, hang on for a second okay? Just breathe.”

I sucked in a breath. It came out again as a shaky sob. Ethan’s arms tightened around me and I clung to him. My mind raced, reeling through sunken memories that ripped to the surface again. Memories of being nineteen, when my short life had veered dangerously close to becoming a living nightmare.

When my parents, powerful nobles and painfully traditional, had arranged my marriage to a man I had barely met.

I squeezed my eyes shut, the memories coming back in waves, crashing over my bowed head. At first, I had resigned myself to fulfilling my duties, to abide by the expectations of my family. But then I had started to listen, to gather whispers and rumors, plucking hushed news from the grapevine and piecing together what I could.

My betrothed was known for his charm. It was a charm I had witnessed first hand, during our brief interaction at one of my parents’ parties – before they broke the news. But he was also known for his cruelty, his possessiveness that bordered on obsessiveness. He was an ancient vampire with a long, dark history behind him.

He was a man who viewed his partners as possessions, to be locked away in a gilded cage and gawked at. To churn out heirs and keep him happy.

And I had seen it, in that brief instance at the party, when he had taken my hand and kissed it – and gripped it just a little too tight. I had seen it in his blood-shot eyes when they tracked me across the room, cold and confident, like I already belonged to him.

The more I learned, the more I understood that marrying him would mean the end of any semblance of freedom I so dearly cherished. At the same time, my heart had begun to stray towards someone else – someone who showed me what it could mean to choose love, not obligation.

I gasped out a breath, leaning on Ethan as Leah’s face swam before my eyes. I had only just gotten her back, she had turned up out of the blue and offered me a second chance. I was not so bold to believe I would get a third.

And nowhewas back. He was going to rip me away from her all over again.

Back then, when I decided that I wouldn’t – couldn’t marry him, I ran. Driven by desperation and the first threads of real courage I had ever mustered I left everything behind – my family, my home, the life that had been meticulously planned out for me. And I left Leah too, unable to explain myself and unwilling to put her in danger.

I ended up in New York, a city bursting with strangers and big enough to hide in. I was utterly alone, scared, and without a plan. That was how I found myself outside High Stakes headquarters, having heard of the Leyore coven, and hoping that maybe, just maybe, I could find refuge there, or at least plead my case.

Instead, I bumped into Hunter, whose suspicion of me was immediate and palpable. Our first interaction was nothing shortof a verbal skirmish, with me firing off a rapid list of critiques about her approach, her strategy, and her outfit. All of which were in poor taste.

Ethan’s arms loosened around me as my breathing slowed, happier memories floating like snowflakes amongst the wreckage in my head.

Jordan had appeared back then, drawn by the trouble Hunter and I were stirring. Rather than dismissing me, she was intrigued – she’d rattled off something about my audacity and keen observations, impressed with my ability to point out ten things I disliked about Hunter in the short few minutes I had known her. Something Hunter had scowled at.

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