Page 88 of Our Sins in Blood (Coven of Sin 1)

I was willing to do whatever it took to convince the prince to turn me into a vampire.

But…would he even want me? He had no desire to be kind, and maybe that’s just because he wanted to separate himself from his old master as much as possible. If that was the case, why would he want to tie himself to me, the biological daughter of his tormentor?

A heady mixture of self-doubt and adrenaline pumped through my veins as I entered the very top of the eastern tower.

The space was surrounded by windows facing the ocean, billowing white curtains framing each one, fluttering in the ocean breeze that poured through the open glass. In the center of the room was a simple bed with plush white bed coverings stretching over it. Moonlight poured through the open windows, bathing everything in a pale light.

There weren’t many decorations in the room, with the exception of several bookcases that sat behind the bed and the countless stacks of books piled pretty much everywhere. Towers of books were pushed against the wall, stacked on the floor, shoved into the seats built into the stone beneath the windows. It was as if Sterling had tried to bring the entire contents of the library into his room.

The piles of books looked to be combined with a mixture of huge coverless tomes that looked like they were written in braille and plenty of traditional books.

On a shelf beside the bed sat a radio, and from it, smooth, classical music poured out, wrapping around me as soft and easy as the ocean breeze.

The space was absolutely magical. Beautiful, crisp and cool, and filled with moonlight. Nothing about it hinted at the fact that an ancient vampire lived here.

The only thing I had expected to find in the room wasn’t here. Sterling was nowhere to be found. When I’d seen him in the council chamber, I picked up the scent of the ocean rolling off him. But here, the salty fragrance was all around me, making it hard to pick out his location.

A book sitting on top of one of the stacks caught my eye, and I wandered over to it and picked it up.

It was a copy ofHarry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. One of my favorites.

“Miss Baxter.”

I nearly jumped out of my skin at the voice. Whirling around, I found Sterling standing behind me as if he’d just performed an apparition spell fromHarry Potter.

It had been dark in the council chamber, making his ethereal details difficult to discern from the shadows that had shrouded him. Now he was properly illuminated, and his every detail made my whole body go weak.

He was fresh from the shower, his silvery hair wet and falling in pieces around his sharp facial features. A fluffy white towel was draped around his toned shoulders, and beads of water trickled down his bare torso. I couldn’t help but watch the water as it rippled over his sleek abdominal muscles and slipped into the waistband of his gray sweatpants, which hung low on his tapered waist.

A crucifix tattoo decorated on his right pectoral and had been horribly scarred at some point. It was as if someone had tried to burn it off. My gut twisted as I had a pretty good idea who that someone had been.

Sterling was absolutely beautiful, with high cheekbones and white eyes so sharp it felt like they could see through my very soul.

“That’s a good one,” he said, nodding to the copy ofThe Half-Blood Princein my hand. “Vincent said you liked books, that your room was covered in them. Are you aHarry Potterfan?”

How had he known what book I was holding?

“Um… Yeah, I am. But how did you…?”

His pale eyes gleamed in the pallid light, glittering like moonstone, and his brows twitched in amusement. “I may be blind in the traditional sense, Miss Baxter, but my other senses make up for it. In the case of the book, I’d lent that particular copy to Miss Lavinia—Dr. Sharpe’s progeny—several years back. She spilled coffee on it.” His lips spread into a charming smile that struck a chord in my chest, making my heart ache. “I can still scent the stain.”

“Wow.” I swallowed, my throat growing thick with an unknown emotion that was slowly spreading to my whole body, making my limbs light and my heart heavy. “That’s amazing.”

He chuckled as he arched to retrieve a navy crew-neck sweatshirt sitting on his bed. He pulled off the towel, and the ache in my heart turned to sharp, agonizing pain when my gaze landed on a silver scar marring the otherwise flawless flesh of his throat.

It was a bite mark—no—a matingmark.

Sterling was mated to another.

And seeing that claim on his flesh made something deeply instinctual roar to life inside me. It was like another entity, the same one that had taken over at the gas station and was trying to push to the surface. It was the monster within me, clawing her way out. Every muscle in my body clenched as I tried to fight off the animalistic instincts battling for control. A sharp pain erupted in my gums as my fangs dropped, and I saw the red of my eyes reflected in Sterling’s milky ones.

TheHarry Potterbook fell out of my hand with a thunk, and I stumbled back into a pile of books, sending them toppling over. A low-rattling growl rolled up from my own throat, making the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

What the fuck is happening to me?

Seeing another’s mark on Sterling had set off some kind of instinctual reaction. The next thing I knew, a full-on war was suddenly raging inside me, and I wasn’t sure if the human part of me would win. In fact, I was pretty damn sure I was on the losing end here. Just like at the gas station, I felt myself being lost to the monster inside me.

There was no fighting the bone-deep urge to claim this male for myself and to place my own mark over the one on his throat.

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