Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 61523 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 308(@200wpm)___ 246(@250wpm)___ 205(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61523 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 308(@200wpm)___ 246(@250wpm)___ 205(@300wpm)
“And the vampire who selected her?”
“Nathanial.”
I hum. “What made him decide to share her? Pardon my newness to the process and reasoning of the elites, but if I’m to understand it correctly, the whole point of the auction is for the highest bidder to win, is it not?”
“It is,” Lucian confirms hesitantly. “But you have to understand that some of the priorities were different back then. The blood of the four was, of course, sacred in a way, but there was an assumption of plenty. No worries of replacements and certainly no sense of long-term thinking. It took her being sold off to another group in Rome, dying, and killing off the fourth line for reality to hit home.”
Every painful revelation in my poor mother’s mistreatment makes me burn hotter. Shared. Sold. Abused.
“And…what did it change?” I grit, fighting to maintain control.
He sighs. “For some, nothing. But for the majority, it provided a steadiness to the process. A certain level of decorum and a proprietary level of ownership was born. There is no sharing once bonded anymore, and as a result, we’ve created a much more…maintainable environment for the women.”
I scoff, losing my cool for just a moment. “Maintainable.” The word is much more than a sneer. It’s an embodiment of disgust and betrayal and a life built on the back of the mistreatment of my mother.
“Yes, Calloway. I know our traditions don’t find favorability with you. You’ve made that clear in a myriad of ways over the last two weeks. But I’m afraid they are the way they are for a reason.” He folds his hands together at the small of his back before continuing. “Our culture is born of necessity. As you know, a vampire’s needs vary greatly from those of a human. We don’t need air or food or sleep. We need power. Precision. Drive. Without these things, survival becomes boring. Basic. Pointless.”
I shake my head but bite my tongue.
His description of pointless and my description of it are two ends of a very long stick. The meaning of a vampire’s life isn’t power—but connection. His precision the actual antithesis of the universe’s call to comply with it. His drive a slap in the face to the mates the fates created for us. Everything he claims we need are the very parts of the puzzle that don’t fit.
In fact, it makes us worse and brought us to the brink of ruthlessness.
I want to tell him he’s wrong. That every thought he has is an assault on the conscience of a real man. That his point, as it were, is my nemesis. But the argument will go nowhere, so I harness the rage this conversation has built for later use instead.
The time will come.
For him. For Rook and Kane and our fathers. For all these so-called elites.
“Don’t discount it until you’ve tried it,” he says then, stopping in front of a villa at the far end of the property—what must be a mile in the other direction, past the mansion and tucked away in a bed of low shrubbery and woods—and gesturing toward the door.
I won’t deny that I’ve done a piss-poor job of focusing on my surroundings until now, assuming the walk was more of a wander than one to reach a destination, but all engines are firing now. I don’t know where he’s brought me, and I don’t like the possibilities.
That he might know I went to Romy last night. That he knows my connection to her at all.
“Where are we?” I ask, skeptical but collected.
Instead of answering, he raises his cane to the door and knocks before taking a key from the fancy chain at his belt and unlocking the dead bolt.
“See for yourself.”
As he walks away, I steel myself for a fight.
An ambush, perhaps. A torture scenario with Romy or my brothers at the center. The Council heads, seated behind a table of entitlement and ready to distribute a judgment of my death.
But when the door opens, it’s Kane on the other side. Lucian has delivered me directly to my brothers, going so far as to unlock the damn door.
“Cal?” Kane asks, his excitement overwhelming him enough to send him flying into me in a hug.
I return the gesture and spin us to look for Lucian, but he’s gone, leaving behind nothing but the wind. I search the woods and the leaves and the piercing light of the sun from just beyond, my uneasiness growing.
This has to be a trap. Or a mind game at the very least.
I don’t trust it at all, but beyond that, I don’t understand it. Why he would allow me this contact, this boon, this help—I cannot, for the life of me, figure it out. It’s manipulation. I wish I knew the goal.
“Rook!” Kane shouts back into the house, the sound of his voice echoing off the walls. “Come here. Now!”