Page 7 of Our Sins in Blood (Coven of Sin 1)

This hellish man was different. He was young, or at least he appeared that way. He wore sex and arrogance like freaking fashion accessories to complement his white t-shirt. The shirt struggled to contain his powerful, muscular torso, and the cotton fabric was so thin I could make out his perfectly sculpted pectorals and the dark circles of his nipples. The outline of his raven tattoos could also be seen, stretching from his defined jawline all the way down to the ripple of his abs and disappearing beneath his belt line into a world I couldn’t help but imagine.

He was male and death incarnate. And what did a shut-in know about death? Only what I had seen on TV from crime shows and action flicks. But somehow, I knew he wasn’t alive. I couldn’t hear the throb of his heart like I could with Mom’s when I pressed my ear to my door.

With quaking fingers, I reached out to stroke his cheek. He purred a growl, the sound scraping over my flesh and making it sting.

He was as cold as death.

My brain fumbled with all the pieces of the puzzle, and I knew I now had the complete picture, at least much of it.

The word was on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn’t bring myself to say it. “Y–you’re…” My tongue was heavy in my mouth like I’d been drugged by this gorgeous monster with just a grazing touch.

“I don’t have all night, Princess,” he snarled low. “The sun will be up before too long. So fucking say it already. What am I?”

I gulped and shivered as a rush of adrenaline coursed through me.

“You’re a vampire.”

“That’s right, little princess,” he said through a devilish grin.

“But… Vampires don’t exist.”

“And what does someone like you know about the world and the monsters within it?” It could have been a trick of the shadows, but I could see something close to pity in those bloody red pools. “Though I guess you know a thing or two about the monstrosity that is mankind, seeing how your own mother has kept you caged like an animal.”

A vein pounded in my temple, and my fingers tightened around the broken bedpost that had slipped from his attention. “My mom isn’t a monster. I don’t know what you’re trying to tell me with your lies about my pills and my adrenaline, but I’m just a girl with a medical condition. The locks are for my own good.”

“For your own good?” he gritted out, his tone razor sharp. “You’re fucking brainwashed.”

“I’m not like you! Get out of here!” I’d had enough. I didn’t like what he was implying, and it terrified me that I was even considering everything he was telling me.

I swung my weapon with as much force as I could muster. He was just inches away, so I should have been able to hit him. But he moved so fast, his hand was a blur. I blinked, and when I opened my eyes, his fingers were curled around my wrist in a crushing grip that made me wince. He gave a vicious jerk of my wrist, and the piece of wood fell to the mattress beside us.

“My patience is running out,” he snarled, yanking me close to him, so his breath feathered my skin. It smelled metallic, like blood. “You don’t have a fuckingheart problem. You’re perfectly healthy. People with weak hearts don’t have strength like yours. They don’t have senses like yours.”

“I’m not like you,” I balked, my protest weaker than the first. “I’m a human with a beating heart. When I stand by my window, the sun doesn’t burn. I can see my reflection in the mirror.”

“That’s because you’re only half-vampire. You’re more like me than you think. My maker was the vampire king. A cruel and miserable fuckhead of a master, let me tell you. He created four vampires in his long life. And you know what else he made? A biological daughter.”

My mind reeled at this impossibly. “No…”

“Yes.” The monster before me nodded, his fingers still wrapped like a vice around my wrist, so tight there was no way he wouldn’t leave a bruise. “So in a weird fucked up kind of way, we’re step-siblings.”

“I don’t want anything to do with you! My father wasn’t a vampire! Now let me go, you fucking monster!”

He didn’t let go. He only sneered, an expression so cruel it froze the blood in my veins. “Your father was a vampire. He was my father, too, at least the closest I ever had to one. You think I’m fucked? You better thank whatever god you believe in that you were never unfortunate enough to meet him. And I don’t want anything to do with you either, little girl. But vampire law states that on the king’s death bed, he pick a progeny to take his throne. And the real shit-kicker is he pickedyouas his heir with his final breath.”

The monster’s fingers clenched tighter on my wrist, making me yelp in pain, but the sound was drowned out by his heated growl.

“He pickedyouover his four, full-blooded vampire sons. And I’m not serving some halfling queen who doesn’t know shit about the outside world, let alone vampire kind. Our coven would eat you alive, Princess. So you’re coming with me to tell the Elders that you don’t want anything to do with us so they can gain some sense and make me or one of my brothers king. Got it? Then you can come back to your precious cage and rot here forever for all I care.”

I could barely hear what he was saying anymore. None of the words were making sense. Half-vampire? I never knew my dad. He could be a circus clown for all I knew. But avampire?

That would mean my mom hadn’t locked me up for my own safety.

She had done it for everyone else’s.

And Dr. Sharpe. His skin was as pale as a ghost’s… Could he be one of them? Were the pills he’d prescribed really to sate my thirst? Was it blood I lusted for? Every time I took those pills, my appetites seemed to die down.

My entire existence has always been kind of sad. But before, it was due to sad circumstances, a twist of fate no one could have prevented. But if what this monster said was true, it meant my life had been stolen from me.

---