Page 64 of Vampires of Eden: Oliver
“Because I refuse to sit there for another second, watching you fidget and swoon over that fucking designer!” His stare is intense. Accusatory.
I take another step back, shaking my head. “I don’t know what you—”
“Bullshit, Oliver. Don’t play me. You think I don’t know you? I’ve been feeding from you since we were teenagers. I can read your aura and energy better than my own! You almost always run dormant and cold, but lately, the energy inside of you is bubbling and sparking like a damn volcano. And it sure as hell isn’t because of me—so it’s him. Stoplyingto me.”
Alexander steps away, huffing as he walks toward the wall beside us. He leans with his back against the stone, rubbing his face as his chest heaves.
I don’t know what to say. In all my years of knowing him, I’ve never seen Alexander like this. Serious and upset. Usually, he’s flippant and confident. Like the whole world is balanced on the tip of his pinky finger.
When I don’t say anything, he drops his hands and looks at me. “Why? What… what does he do that I don’t? Why do you hate me so much?”
I swallow. “I don’t hate you.”
“But you definitely don’t like me. You never have. Seeing how you behave next to this Aries vampire, it’s very clear to me now.”
“It isn’t just you, really—I…” Alexander and me, we don’t talk this way. We don’t have candid, real conversations, so I’m hesitant to try. His intention seems sincere, but I’m also waiting for him to flip this into a joke and call me a nerd or a loser.
Inhaling a breath, I steel myself. “It isn’t just you, necessarily. I hate the circumstance. I hate being made to do things with no consideration of my personal wants, thoughts or feelings. It’s demeaning and empty. Like I’m a puppet.”
Alexander blinks, frowning as if I’ve given him a complex mathematical equation to solve. “But that’s your role.”
“Wow—”
“No, I mean… it’s your station, Oliver.”
“Maybe I don’t want this to be my ‘station.’ Maybe I want something else! Something completely different.”
“But what would you even want? This is who we are. These arrangements are the basis and core of our aristocracy. We don’t have a choice.”
“Wrong. You chose me—you at least had a say in this.” I point between the two of us. This is a smaller, less relevant point in the bigger picture, but I want to make it.
Alexander shrugs. “Yeah, but you’re the onlyaspect of my life that I’ve ever intentionally chosen. Everything else is told to me—or I’m pushed in some direction or escorted down another. But with you, I just… I don’t know. I wanted you, Oliver. I’ve always known that.”
How do I respond? How can I express that what I desire is far beyond him—or us or this. I want to get away from here. To be free and to make all my own choices. Is that so unfathomable?
I stand across the hallway from Alexander, picking at my hands and trying to find the words. He surprises me when he pushes off the wall, stepping closer.
“You don’t hate me,” he says, his eyes searching. “But could you like me? Could you try?”
“I… don’t know if it works like that.”
“Why can’t it?” he asks, stepping even closer but more cautiously this time. His anger has diffused. “What if… you tell me what he does? What is it about him that makes you smile and stirs your nature? What about him turns you on?”
Heat flashes in my cheeks and I bring my palm to my forehead, stressed. I cannot do this. “Alexander, please stop, I don’t—I don’t think I can talk about this.”
“Ollie.” He wraps his fingers around my wrist, pulling my hand from my face. The blush is running all across my skin, and as I look at him, his face is flushed, too. His golden-brown eyes are soft. Almost pleading.
“I don’t want to have an empty and fake bond with you. I need us to be real. Can you… Would you pleasetry, with me? Not daydreaming about the designer, but looking at me and letting your aura flare because of me. Because I love you.”
How can he say that so casually? What does he even know about me? I’m not sure how to respond to any of this and I feel inundated with emotions. I need to be by myself to process.
“I’d like to go to my room alone to think,” I say, keeping my voice low to match the tone he’s set. “I’ll see you soon, for the tour?”
Alexander nods, still holding my wrist. “Okay, but… may I feed first, please?”
“Yes.” I don’t want him to feed right now. He’s so close to my face and it feels too intimate. The way we feed is usually clinical. Distant to where I can shut my mind off and let it wander.
But there isn’t any of that as he brings my palm up and licks my skin with a slow, intentional drag of his tongue. He bites down while staring directly into my eyes. As he pulls, his brown eyes alight, glowing fiercely in a radiant golden hue just before he shuts them and exhales a satisfied sigh. I look away, ignoring the warm and strange swish of feelings in my stomach.
