Page 42 of Soren

“I think I’ll pace, actually,” Soren said. “Take a page out of Roman’s book.”

Whatever. Soren needed to talk, and Gabe didn’t care if the vampire floated around midair to do it. He sipped his drink and waited, watching Soren move from one end of the small kitchen to the other.

Gabe’s beverage was half-empty before Soren’s voice finally rang out. “I wasn’t like Roman. I wasn’t dying when I was turned. I was…chosen. For a purpose.”

“Like, to do a job?” Danny had always said Soren was exceptionally good at tracking people.

Soren cleared his throat, not breaking his stride. “No, not a job. I was turnedforsomeone. To be with someone.”

Gabe felt his stomach drop. “Amate? You have a mate out there already?”

He tried to take another sip of his drink but stopped when he realized his hand was trembling. The thought that Soren had a mate out there…hurt. Quite a lot, if Gabe was being honest with himself.

But Soren was already shaking his head. “No. Definitely not. Although, he tried to convince me of it at one point, after I found out they existed. Evil bastard.” Soren gave a bitter laugh. “Really, he just chose me for my looks. He thought I seemed…sweet. Delicate. Called me his angel.”

Gabe resisted the urge to snort. Soren was nobody’s angel.

That was part of what made him so great.

“He came from a small community of vampires. A den,” Soren continued. “They were of the mind that if you turned a human, they were yours. To do with as you wished. Toserveyou however you wished.”

Gabe caught the unspoken message in Soren’s story. So Soren had been turned to be someone’s…sex servant? “That’s— That’s fucking awful.” It was beyond awful, but Gabe couldn’t find any other words at the moment.

Soren paused his pacing, approaching the kitchen counter, although he kept his gaze on the counter itself, still avoiding Gabe’s eyes. “It wasn’t always, honestly. Hendrick was handsome. Powerful. Seemingly enchanted by me. And I was…young and stupid. I thought we were partners at first. He let me think that.”

Gabe didn’t think it made someone young and stupid to expect respect from a partner, but he kept silent, not wanting to interrupt the story.

“But as you know”—Soren gave a wry twist of his lips—“I’m no angel. And over the years, anytime I would act contrary to the way he wanted…anytime I acted likemyself, it made him…angry. And he let me know it. In many varied, creative, violent ways.”

Gabe’s stomach hurt. His chest hurt. His fuckinghearthurt.

Poor Soren.

Soren kept talking to the counter. “I stayed with him, in that den, for over a century before I finally fled, venturing out on my own. He left me alone for a while. But eventually he found me again. He always finds me. And he likes to remind me, periodically, that I’m only alive at his whim.”

Fuck. This was all so fuckinghorrible. Gabe gripped the kitchen counter with white fingers. “Because he turned you?”

“Because he didn’t kill me when I left.” Soren finally met Gabe’s eyes, and the pain Gabe saw in the vampire’s gaze made his chest ache that much more fiercely. “Roman has told you vampires don’t always get along? Our…inner beasts don’t always play nice. Turning someone to be your companion naturally doesn’t always work out. In that den, when it didn’t, the new vampire would be executed, not released.”

Gabe’s stomach gave another twist. “What the fuck?”

Soren laughed, but there was no humor in it. “He considers himself merciful, actually, for not killing me then. Personally, I think he just likes knowing he has a plaything out there. Someone he can use and abuse whenever he gets the…itch.”

It was…wrong. All sowrong. Soren was strong. Powerful. Spirited. The thought that there was another vampire out there thinking heownedthe mischievous blond imp made Gabe feel absolutely ill. “Where is this guy now?” he asked, afraid he already knew the answer. Soren’s odd behavior at the club was beginning to add up.

“Here, possibly.” Soren’s tone was light, but there was no mistaking the tension in his body. The thought clearly terrified him. “I thought I saw him at the club. I usually keep track of his movements—that’s part of how I got so good at tracking people to begin with. But I got a little complacent here, I guess.”

Gabe felt like a thousand different emotions were competing for space in his mind at once. Fear. Sadness. Worry. Regret. “Shouldn’t we be packing? Do you need to leave? You should leave, right?”

He didn’t even know what he was saying, but the thought that someone might be coming to hurt Soren—someone strong enough that Gabe had no chance at stopping him—was making him panic.

Gabe’s instincts had been right. Bad thingsweregoing to happen.

“I’m not leaving.” Soren’s pale-blue gaze held his, and Gabe had a feeling the vampire’s words had surprised even himself. “He could hurt you, Gabe. He probably saw us together. And he’s not beyond petty jealousy. I’m not leaving you to be hurt by him.”

Gabe had known moments of feeling helpless in his life. When his dad had died. When he’d heard his mother had Alzheimer’s. And now here he was again, scared and helpless and hating the feeling just as much as he ever had. “So what do we do?”

Soren shrugged. “I don’t know. I could have been wrong.” He reached out across the counter and placed a tentative hand on Gabe’s arm. “I’m sorry, Highness.”

---