“I was trying to protect you.”
“By keeping me in the dark about someone trying to hurt me?” There’s an edge to her voice now. “By letting me walk around without knowing there’s a vampire with a grudge watching me?”
“I was wrong.” I can’t defend it. I don’t try. “I was wrong about all of it. The secrets. The protection. The idea that keeping you in the dark would keep you safe.” I meet her eyes. “I’m telling you now because you deserve to know. Because you deserve to choose. Because whatever happens next, I want it to be real. No more lies. No more performances.”
She turns her back to me, and I can’t read her expression.
“You’re really two hundred and fifty-seven years old.”
“Yes.”
“You’ve really been alive since 1769.”
“Yes.”
“You’ve really been drinking blood this whole time. Like, actual blood. From people.”
“Yes. Though ‘drinking’ makes it sound more dramatic than it usually is. There are blood banks. Willing donors. It’s all very... administrative.”
She laughs. The sound surprises us both.
“Administrative.” She turns to face me. “You’re telling me that vampire feeding is administrative.”
“There’s paperwork involved. NDAs. It’s not very romantic.”
“Julian.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know what to do with this.”
“You don’t have to decide tonight.”
“Don’t I?” She steps closer. “There’s a vampire who wants to destroy you by hurting me, and possibly my family in the process. The wedding is in two days. Don’t I need to decide right now what side I’m on?”
“There aren’t sides. There’s just—”
“There are always sides.” She’s in front of me now, close enough that I could pull her into my arms if I dared. “And I’m choosing mine.”
My heart—my still, useless heart—somehow aches.
“Poppy—”
“I’m terrified.” Her voice shakes, but her eyes don’t waver. “I’m terrified, and this is insane, and I’ve spent the last week falling for someone who isn’t even human. But you know what scares me more than vampires?”
“What?”
“Going back to who I was before you. The version of me who acted happy instead of feeling it. Who built a life that looked so perfect in photos and felt so empty everywhere else.” She takes a breath. “You see me, Julian. Not the influencer. The real me.And I don’t want to give that up because the person who sees me happens to be two centuries old with a complicated relationship with sunlight.”
“This isn’t a small thing you’d be accepting.”
“I know.”
“I can’t give you a normal life. I can’t—” My voice breaks. “I can’t age with you.”
“I’m not asking for forever.” She reaches out, cups my face in her warm hands. “I’m asking for now. For this. For the chance to figure out what we are together instead of you deciding for both of us.”
“Are you sure about this?”
“No.” She laughs again. “I’m absolutely not sure about this. I’m probably making a huge mistake. But I’d rather make it with my eyes open than walk away and spend the rest of my life wondering what if.”
I pull her closer. Press my forehead to hers.
