Page 30 of Love Heals
Chapter Twelve
Silas looked so lost, Jared didn't know what to do—or what to say—to make him feel better. He trusted Silas not to betray them, should he not have said that? For some reason, the sentiment had made the vampire scowl at him.
"You don't have to do anything you don't want to," Jared tried, needing Silas to see that he wouldn't be forced into anything, that he and his siblings weren't those kinds of people. He didn't want Silas to think that he'd simply moved from one slave-owner to another.
Slowly, Silas scowl fell off his face, but the expression that replaced it was almost worse. A look of deep sadness etched itself into his features, as if he had seen or experienced something that he didn't have the words to describe, but that had left him utterly empty. "I don't know what I want to do," he said finally, his words barely more than a whisper, as if the confession took everything out of him.
"You don't have to make a decision now," Jared promised. "You can stay here, or you can go back to your people."
Silas walked over to his bed and sat on it, peering up at Jared. "Would you really let me go back there?" he asked.
Jared pulled up the chair he'd spent so many hours in and lowered himself into it. "I don't think you should," he said, "but if that's what you want, I can't stop you."
Silas considered this silently. As he thought, one of his hands came up to his face, his thumb brushing his lower lip. Jared couldn't stop himself from following the movement with his eyes, his mind replaying the moment Silas had tried to kiss him. It had taken every ounce of willpower he possessed not to respond to that. He wasn't sure if he could do it again, if Silas made another attempt.
Silas glanced at him, and Jared scolded himself for entertaining those thoughts while knowing that Silas could literally feel it when he did.
"I'm sorry," he apologized before Silas could say anything.
"It's fine," the vampire claimed. "It's not your fault I look like this." Silas raked his fingers through his silvery blond hair as he spoke. "My sire used to tell me how pretty I was." His tone had something absent-minded to it, as if he hadn't actually meant to voice that thought. Something wistful too.
It was hard for Jared to understand how Silas could miss someone who had mistreated him, but he obviously did.Brainwashed, Aldrich had called his condition. He might very well be right about that. But there was still a fire burning in Silas too. A spark. Jared hoped that it would be enough to sever the ties that still bound him to his abuser, eventually.
Silas would have to want it, though.
Jared wasn't sure how to make Silas want something more for himself than what he'd had, how to show him that hedeservedmore than what he'd had. That he wasn't the lowly traitor he thought he was.
And that Jared wasn't attracted to him because of his looks.
At least, notentirelybecause of his looks.
They were what he'd first noticed about Michael, yes, but his fascination with the young man hadn't stopped there. He hadn't seen Michael as a pretty doll. He'd seen him as a smart young man, resourceful, independent and fiercely loyal. He'd wanted to lift him out of the life he was leading and give him something better.
He still wanted that.
"What do you think I should do?" Silas asked, pulling Jared out of his musings.
"I think you need to reconsider whether your sire is worth being loyal to even after he died."
Silas's eyes narrowed. "You know the life I lived before he found me. He took me out of that misery. I have to be grateful for that."
"It wasn't all bad," Jared argued.
"Wasn't it?" A challenging tone entered Silas's voice. "I guessyouwouldn't know what it's like to live on the streets, to be forced to sell your body for food and anything else you might need."
"I don't know what that's like," Jared admitted, "but I know that you had friends, people who loved you. You could have made it off the streets if given a chance. I was working on giving you that chance."
Silas looked aside. "I guess you weren't fast enough. So someone else helped me."
Those words stung. More than Silas could possibly know. "Nicolai didn't help you. He turned you into his slave." Almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth, Jared wished he could take them back. Yes, Silas needed to realize what had been done to him, but Jared could have worded that more kindly.
Silas stared at him, expression unreadable. "Is that how you see me?" he asked after a moment. "As a slave?"
"You're not a slave, but your sire treated you like one."
"You know nothing about how my sire treated me."
"I know a little," Jared insisted. "You spoke in your sleep, and sometimes while you were awake too. Half-awake, anyway."
