Page 139 of Dark Flame
“You’re a vampire. Forever. You know what this means?”
“That your obsession gets to continue until the end of time. Which, according to Cedric, will be any year now.”
His expression doesn’t falter with my sarcasm. “I was always told as a vampire, we lost our ability to love, that the closest thing we can feel to that level of longing is obsession. Miss Sinclair, while I’ve been obsessed with you since the moment we met, obsessions, even for immortals, can be fleeting once satisfied. With you…I’ll never be satisfied. There is nothing that’ll ever fulfill this need inside me. Obsessions end, but you’ll never be my ending. You’re my middle, my forever, until eternity reaches a conclusion—ifthere is an end. What I feel for you now is different than when we first met, and if it is possible for an immortal to love, then this might be it, because obsession…obsession is too weak of a word. You were the unexpected in my life. My lungs inhale air only so I can take your scent inside me. I blink so each time my eyes open, I’ll see you all over. And if my heart could beat, it would beat to the rhythm yours used to. Now, it beats to you.Onlyyou. All of you. I don’t know what to say, what words to use, what title to give it. Love, obsession, something grander. Not that it matters, because it doesn’t change the simple fact that you’re a part of me now. The best parts of me, and I’ll never let you go.”
The feeling of completion upon finishing the change wasn’t true completion because this right here, right now, my heart knitting its final few stiches together is true completion. A conclusion.
“You claimed to not know what words to use, but that was a lot of them. I’m no longer Harlow Sinclair, the witch with the cure. Are you okay with that?” Is the cure even still a part of me or did me dying end the curse for good? As an immortal, I’ll never have a child, so I’ll forever be the last of my line.
“You’ll always be my Sinclair.”
“I’m still a witch. Still have powers”
“You’re a fuckingmiracle.You’re perfect.” He angles my face up, his fingers sliding into my hair and keeping me trapped. “My feelings aren’t dependant on your magick and—” He stops abruptly, loosening his grip on my scalp to bring forward a chunk of hair, allowing me to see what he has.
My normally orange-red hair is mingled with black streaks, like a dye job. The Darkness within me chuckles before slithering back to sleep. It’s black like Violet and Arthur’s hair was before their deaths, which was obviously an effect from black magick, based on their early wedding photo where Violet’s hair was brown.
“What does this mean?”
“It means I’ve fully embraced black magick.” But not entirely, because I still retain my red. Violet and Arthur still used elemental magick right up until the end and they had no physical signs of it. So many questions that I might never have answers to, though perhaps Morgan knows something.
Morgan. Coven. Shit. If they barely could look at me after seeing what Violet and Arthur did to me, how will they take this? Alec may be my forever, but I don’t want to lose the family I’ve just gained.
“You’re a creature of Darkness in every sense of the word. How do you feel about that?”
Comforted in a way. Fulfilled in another. For so long, my fire was enough, but now my worries over going completely bad and losing myself seem so silly. Darkness is power, not evil.
“I feel perfect.”
“Youareperfect,” he growls, hauling me closer. His body feels impenetrable. His scent is stronger. Everything about him ismore. “You’re all mine, Sinclair.”
I feel it,I tell him in his head.The moment the change happened, I felt your emotions. Felt you. Guess you’re my mate too.
His eyes narrow.As though I’d allow another outcome.
“Earlier you mentioned being told vampires don’t feel love. If that was true, then what I felt for you this morning would have disappeared, maybe been replaced by something else. But it hasn’t. If anything, it’s more intense. A festering ofneedinside me I can’t ignore. I love you, Alec. I don’t have a big speech, though. Call it the shitty education of the twenty-first century, but we don’t profess our love with sonnets or anything like that. Just three simple words.”
Three simple words are all I want from you, Hellion.
I love you.
He growls again before my back is shoved against the wall, the aged stone cracking beneath the force. What would have broken my back hours ago feels like nothing more than me leaning. Such a strange thing, to gain so much strength within minutes.
He yanks me up until I’m suspended in his arms, his hands splaying along my ass. His mouth clashes with mine, his kiss hard and possessive, teeth nicking my bottom lip. His tongue lays his claim as surely as his speech moments ago.
I no longer have to be gentle with you.Even his inner voice holds a sense of wonder to it.
You’ve beengentle?Each time with him hasn’t been hearts and flowers—not that I wanted it to be—but I can’t imagine harder.
Introducing to you every aspect of immortality will be my undoing, Hellion.He pulls back from the kiss to rest his forehead on mine. “I’m still trying to convince myself you’re real. That all ofthisis real.” His finger strokes the side of my face before pausing, his hand flattening on both cheeks as he lifts away, a slight shake making his hair bounce. “Harlow, I felt you die.Idied too, only returning to life when you did.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I had to kill them. I remembered your blood was still in my body, though I wasn’t sure if it’d work considering I know next to nothing about the process, and took a gamble that paid off.
“You knew you’d transition.” His hold tightens on my face. “You chose it anyway.”
“I choseyou.”
His eyes ignite into black molten, but before he reacts on it, he asks, “Who took you? By the time I arrived, the witches who kidnapped you were already dead and gone.”
