Page 120 of Our Sins in Blood (Coven of Sin 1)

Ha. Too flipping late for that. Apparently, Sterling still didn’t know about the bet. Then again, why would he? I hadn’t told him, and who knew if Corry was in on it. If he was, I doubt he’d nark. And holy shit, did he say tomorrow? The match was Friday, and if tomorrow was Friday, that meant I’d been out for two whole days.

“I say we go in there,” Vincent announced after a few moments of silence. “I don’t like leaving her alone with Sharpe. For all we know, he’s the mole.”

“Can’t be the mole,” Eros sneered. “Don’t go accusing people just because you’re too insecure to let other males around her.”

“Shut the fuck up and think about it for a second. Doesn’t anyone else notice that shit’s not adding up with the doctor? We all know Master didn’t want any of us to be king. He’d rather put a baboon on the throne than have one of us rule. So why have her go through this fucked-up courting bullshit with all of us?”

“Because you’re right,” Sterling agreed. “Thomas Knight would have put anyone on the throne so long as it wasn’t any of us, especially his own flesh and blood. But the fact of the matter is, she’s a half-blood. Ruby’s not fit to rule on her own. She barely knows how to be human, let alone a vampire. She needs guidance. She needs a mate. That’s the Elders’ reasoning. Is that so odd, Brother?”

“But whose idea was it for her to pick a mate out of the vampire king’s progeny?”

There was a moment’s pause before Sterling said, “Dr. Sharpe.”

“Exactly. Isn’t that weird, seeing as he was supposedly some great friend of the king’s? He seemed to support making Ruby as queen even though we all know Thomas Knight kept her locked up in that suburban hell to keep her away from us. He didn’t want her mixed up in this world.” Vincent’s voice dropped to a whisper so low, I had to strain to hear. “Sure, she was his heir, but between us four, we know our master never planned on dying. To boot, Sharpe was all for having her choose one of us as king when we know her father would have hated both of those options. If Master were here today, he’d kill all of us for even so much as breathing in her direction. Especially Sterling.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Corry spoke next. “Why would he have turned me if it wasn’t to keep her company? To make her feel more human?”

“Maybe that’s the case, but I can tell you, he sure as shit didn’t turn you so you could stick it to his daughter, Cor. He was protective of her. He didn’t want anyone to mate her, especially one of us. He was jealous and possessive, and he would have kept her there locked up forever if he’d had it his way.”

Sterling cleared his throat, his voice pinched. “So what are you suggesting, Vincent?”

“We know there’s a traitor in the Elders. How else would our cover-up for Master’s murder have gotten out? Sterling only told the Elders about the whole‘suicide’thing. And now Sharpe is changing his tune on making one of us king?”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Eros countered. “The Boston Coven member that Ruby and I tortured let it spill that Dagon Knight is supposedly, miraculously back from the dead and that all the opposing covens support him as king. So if Sharpe is loyal to Boston Coven, why would it be his idea to make one of us king?”

There was a tense silence that fell between the princes that allowed me to stop and gather my thoughts on everything I’d heard.

I already had my suspicions that Thomas Knight had been murdered and that it had been staged to look like a suicide, that the suicide was just the cover-up. And I still had a gut feeling that Vincent had somehow been the one to do the deed. The new thing I learned today was that all his brothers were in on it. Hell, maybe they even helped. They had at least covered it up to look like a suicide, and then the Elders had covered up the suicide—believing it was actually a suicide—to avoid making the coven look weak.

When I questioned Corry on our date, he lied to me to protect their secret.

Vincent had lied to me.

And Eros and Sterling had just chosen not to talk about it.

Meaning they didn’t trust me with their secret.

It hurt, knowing I wasn’t accepted as one ofthemyet. I mean, I’d barely been here even a week, so it wasn’t a big shock. But that fact did nothing to ease the ache in my heart.

The big question still on my mind was, had they done it? If it was supposed to be an impossible feat for a vampire to kill its maker, how had any one of them managed to pull it off?

Then there was still the question of the mole. While I didn’t like Sharpe one bit, I didn’t agree with Vincent’s suspicions. It couldn’t be him. Whoever the nark was, they were loyal to the Boston Coven. And if I learned anything from the torture session in Eros’ den, the Boston Coven felt this Dagon Knight should be the true king. So, it wouldn’t make any sense for Sharpe to suggest I choose a king for myself among the princes if he was in the Dagon Knight for king club.

But Vincent did make a great point. Sharpe had supposedly been loyal to my father all those years, pretending to care about keeping me safe from the coven and the princes. But as soon as the king had died, the good doctor had changed his tune, throwing me into coven life, into this courting game that would probably spur Thomas Knight into a murderous rampage if he were alive.

My attention was foisted away from the guys’ not-so-hushed argument when a small figure approached my bedside, heels clicking loudly against the flooring.

“You’re awake,” Lavinia observed in a placid tone as she strapped a blood pressure cuff around my upper arm.

The little girl took the stethoscope slung around her neck and put the plugs in her ears while pressing the cup to my antecubital fossa—something I recalled from Sterling’s lesson—in the interior of my arm. She listened for several seconds that lasted for what felt like forever in the awkward silence shared with the ancient little girl that was Lavinia Sharpe.

“Um… So, what happened to me?”

Lavinia didn’t bother looking up from her task. Her blonde brows pinched together as if annoyed by my question. “You had too much pure vampire blood.”

“I didn’t know it was dangerous to have too much, not for the person feeding.”

She sniffed, not looking up from her task. “It’s not dangerous to overindulge on a younger vampire’s blood, but our Prince Knight is old. His blood is potent. As a mortal, you have to pace yourself.”

---