Page 108 of Our Sins in Blood (Coven of Sin 1)

Sterling hadn’t been my father’s mate by choice, which was not a stretch to believe, knowing what I did about the massive fucking monster that was Thomas Knight. He loved inflicting pain. Eros had even said the old king loved turning men just to make them break. But that picture tacked to my father’s coffin lid shed light on a different side of the relationship between the master and his eldest progeny. Sterling’s face was worn on the polaroid as if someone had reached to touch it countless times.

“I… I don’t get it. He kept a photo of you in his coffin. That’s something lovers do, not rapists.”

The vampire’s expression hardened, and for a brief moment, his line of sight shifted to the painting of his former master as if he could see him, feel him staring at us both.

“I fully believe my master was under the impression that he loved me. But the only love Thomas Knight was capable of was a malformed and twisted thing. His demented obsession with inflicting pain destroyed any shred of good intentions he ever had.”

“That’s why you were trying to keep me at a distance.”

Sterling gave me a grim nod. “I didn’t feel right claiming you as my mate before you knew about…” His blank gaze shifted to the display cabinet filled with bones, knowing exactly where it was without needing to see it at all. He blew out a sigh, raking his slender fingers through his silver tresses. “The skeletons in my closet.”

“Why didn’t you say anything before?”

His brows crinkled. “Do you think it’s easy for me to talk about it?”

“Of course not. I’m sorry I—”

“Don’t apologize. I’m in the wrong here. Admittedly, I liked being the object of your lust. I didn’t tell you because I knew your view of me would change when you discovered my sordid past.”

“You thought I wouldn’t want you after I found out?”

“How could you? I’ve lain with your father.”

“It would be different if it had been your choice but… But if you’re saying it wasn’t…”

“When he first turned me, I was no one to him. He did it to torture me. It was nothing more than to bring me pain and suffering, a punishment for standing up to him at the monastery. In addition, I think I was getting a lot of the wrath that this one failed to survive,” he added, pointing to the display case of bones. I guess that solved the mystery of who was in the case. It was the vampire hunter who had killed my father’s mate all those years ago. “But after I was freed from that cellar and sought him out, he had a different reaction to me. He had a mating urge, just like you. I refused him, of course, and for another few hundred years, he continued to make advances.”

“But he didn’t force you?”

“He was aggressive with his advances, but there was a line he didn’t cross. Until we moved to London. There, I met a woman. She was our human blood thrall who lived with us. We fell in love, but for obvious reasons, we had to keep our relationship from our master.”

Sterling was speaking about something that had happened several lifetimes ago, but his eyes were wide, brimming with memories that made his face contort as if the hurt from all that time ago was still fresh. When he spoke next, his voice was choked with emotion. “Then she became pregnant.”

A chill, colder than anything I ever felt before, filled me, making my insides freeze over. This was one of those stories I knew had a horrible ending, and still, I couldn’t help but keep reading. And even though I just knew there was no chance for happiness at the end of the book, I rooted for the characters even more.

“What happened? Tell me she lived. At least the baby, tell me the baby lived.”

Sterling leaned against the wall opposite me and slid down so that we were facing one another. Something moved down his cheek, and I had to strain my eyes through the dark to see it. A single tear, slipping down his cheek.

“I tried to have her leave without me, but she refused. I begged her. Had she listened to me, perhaps both of them would have survived. Since I was weaker then, I eventually gave up trying to convince her. Neither of us wanted to be apart. So we risked everything and escaped together one night while Master was out feeding.”

“But…isn’t there a link between a master and their progeny? It’s why you were able to find him after you were released from the cellar.”

Sterling held his head in his hands, his fingers splayed over his face in shame. “Yes. And I was a fool for letting my love and my desire for a family blind my judgment.”

I crawled across the attic floor on my hands and knees until I was kneeling in front of him. I reached to touch his hand, and he looked up in surprise, his cheeks crusted in fresh tears. “He raped me in front of her, Ruby. And that wasn’t the worst part. When he was finished with me, he murdered her. He murdered my mate and my unborn child right in front of me. Then he used the same silver dagger—while it dripped with their blood—on me to make sure another ‘accident’ couldn’t happen again. As if I were some naughty mongrel in need of neutering.”

My throat burned with a swallow. Sterling’s moonstone eyes were bright with tears, and as I stared into them, my heart broke a thousand times, shattering into countless pieces and lodging in my throat, making each breath painful. Then, I started to cry with him.

The injustice done to Sterling was deplorable and filled me with a hatred so pure and hot, I thought it might eat me alive.

Maybe that’s why I had ached to place my mark over the one my father had left. I wanted to take Sterling’s pain away. I wanted to replace all that hurt and fill that hole in his heart with as much of me as he would take.

“Do not weep for me,” he muttered. “I do not shed tears because I am still hurting from what happened. It was five hundred years ago, and the pain has dulled.”

“Then why?”

“Because I want you to the point of madness, Ruby Renada. It’s beyond reason, stretching deeper than lust for your body and your blood. I want to claim you as my own and reclaim what Thomas Knight stole from me. He owes me a mate, one that I have chosen.”

---