He returned to his chair.
“What Ego needs is his sire’s blood. What you’ve been doing is an admirable stopgap, but it isn’t enough.”
“So I’m going to die…again?” I asked softly.
Lysandro swallowed audibly, almost bringing a grin to my face, knowing that it was a human habit he also no longer needed to do.
“You won’t perish, but you’ll go into a comatose state unless…” He ran a hand down his face. “Unless an older, seasoned vampire steps in and feeds you.”
Delaney sat forward, her eyes calculating. “Do you know someone?”
I pushed myself forward. “Aren’tyouolder? Delaney said that the myths were true and vampires couldn’t be outside, but I met you at the boardwalk during the day. You were covered in clothes from head to toe with your umbrella over your head, but you were out in the daytime.”
Lysandro glared behind me. I turned, expecting to find the psycho who turned me, but there was nothing there but an expensive-as-fuck painting I’d had Delaney purchase at auction because I thought it would match the mini-castle aesthetic.
Finally, his gaze tracked back to me. “I am. But I’ve never—” He shook his head like he was frustrated. “I’ve never sired another of my kind.”
“So you have no fledglings?” Delaney asked.
Lysandro snorted. “Most certainly not. That’s a responsibility I’ve never wanted. I’ve never even shown who I truly am to someone who might want to be changed.”
Deflating, I sank back. “Oh.”
His attention snapped back to me. “But that’s not saying that I won’t provide you with what you need. It is unacceptable thatone of us would do this to you. I cannot make amends, Ego, but I will feed you for the necessary time for you to gain your strength.”
“That would be wonderful!” Delaney exclaimed.
Lysandro held up a finger. “But only until you’re able to get the necessary nutrients from a human. Living off blood bags will be unsustainable for you for at least a century.”
If it had been possible, the blood would’ve drained out of my face. That was the last thing I wanted. The idea of piercing someone’s skin with the canines in my mouth horrified me. I hadn’t even looked at them yet, only feeling them with my tongue when I first woke up after the sun went down.
Until I willed them up—or whatever it was that I did—I’d stayed hidden in bed. I didn’t want to see it, and I didn’t want Delaney having to witness that change in me either. It was bad enough to know without seeing.
Lysandro stood up, unbuttoned the sleeve of his shirt, and came toward me, his intention clear.
I shook my head. “No. I can’t do… that.”
Lysandro tilted his head, regarding me almost curiously before turning back to Delaney. “How have you been serving him his sustenance?”
She stood up and crossed the room to one of the duffel bags she’d brought in. Reaching inside, she pulled out a goblet in one hand and a bottle of sangria in the other.
“I mix the blood and sangria in this for him.”
Lysandro tsked and crossed the room, taking the fancy cup from her. Setting it down on an ornate end table, he freaking grew claws out of his fingers on one hand, and then slit his wrist where he’d rolled up his shirt.
The gash must’ve been deep because blood poured into the goblet before he raised his wrist to his mouth and licked thewound closed. Even from here, I could see his skin was once again as good as new.
As he crossed back toward me, Delaney rushed after him. “Here’s the wine.”
Glaring daggers at me, Lysandro held out the goblet. “You will not be tainting my blood with such nonsense. Those bags wouldn’t have sustained you much longer anyway, but you were doing yourself no favors blending it with that synthetic, man-made drivel.”
I wanted to recoil in horror. Not mixing it with sangria was bad enough, but it was fresh. Straight from Lysandro’s arm.Gag!
But the closer he got to me, the smell coming from that vessel made it like I didn’t even have my amulet on. A hunger unlike anything I’d felt—even more than the first time Delaney presented me with her concoction after I was turned—consumed me. The strength of the metallic scent of his blood acted like a live wire to every one of my nerve endings.
Lysandro smirked, his own canines dropping. “Yes, little fledgling. Drink.”
Shutting off the human part of my brain and everything I’d ever known, I swiped the cup from his hands and drank.
