Aldron is silent long enough that I glance up.For once, there’s no amusement on his face.No old-world charm.No sly vampire distance.Only something tired and sharp.
“A mate bond is not a chain unless you make it one.”
My jaw tightens.“I know that.”
“Do you?”Everyone keeps asking me that tonight, and I am starting to hate it.Aldron continues before I can answer.“The danger with men like us is not that we feel too little.It is that we convince ourselves our control gives us the right to decide what others can survive.”
The words land too close to the truth.I think of Briana in the bar, eyes blazing.I am alive.Her voice still echoes in me.Not broken.Not pleading.Furious.Alive.
“I need to protect her,” I say.
“Yes.”
“I need to hunt the creatures who hurt her.”
“Yes.”
“I need...”
“You need to remember she belongs to herself before she belongs to fate.Or you.”
The beast hates that.I hate that.Not because it’s wrong.Because it’s true.
My hands flex at my sides.“If the ring comes for her, I will kill them.”
“I would expect nothing less.”
“If Lucius is involved...”
“Then you won’t face him alone.”
I look at Aldron.His eyes are ancient again.Empty of warmth.Full of promise.“Lucius is mine,” he says.
The temperature in the room drops another degree.For the first time tonight, my beast settles by a fraction.Not calm.Never that.But willing to wait.
I leave his office with the symbol burned into my mind and Briana’s scent still caught in my lungs.
Upstairs, the bar is empty.Cruz is gone, probably pretending not to wait near my apartment like an overgrown mother hen with horns.The lights are lower now, shadows tucked into corners, chairs still stacked.
The crater in the wall glares at me.I should fix it.
Instead, I leave and head to the staff apartment building, moving quickly through the dark, abandoned streets.Inside, the building breathes around me.Pipes.Distant traffic.Cruz’s heavy steps upstairs.
And above that, faint but there, a heartbeat.Briana.Fast at first.Then slower.My beast presses against my ribs, aching toward the sound.
Go to her.
No.
She is alone.
She chose to go to her apartment.She is allowed to be afraid without me forcing my presence into the room.
The beast snarls, and I close my eyes and lean my head back against the wall.The brick is cool against my skull.My body hurts.Chest sliced.Hand split.Jaw bruised.But none of it matters.
Above me, Briana moves across her apartment.Three steps.Pause.Two more.The creak of a floorboard near her window.She is pacing.I picture her in that oversized black sweater, hair tangled, eyes too tired and too fierce.I picture her standing in the dark, refusing to be a victim.
Mine,the beast whispers.
