Page 55 of Imprisoned with the Vampire King

"Yeah. No sign of him yet. Any idea what he's doing?"

"Probably something that's going to piss you off."

"Like..." I trailed off.

"I don't know. You asked for money and said he hates your blood. Something to fix one of those problems. The money thing, I would guess. That's easier."

"Just how rich is he?" I asked.

"The fae basically own their half of Rumor. We basically own our half."

"Really rich, then."

"Yeah."

The glass doors slid open, and Dante stepped out.

"He's finally coming back," I said.

"Alright. I'll call back to ask him about the business stuff in a minute. Pretend we didn't just talk about this."

"Okay." I hit the button to hang up.

Dante opened the door, looking slightly less ragey than he had before.

He still didn't say a word as he pulled out of the parking lot and drove away.

thirteen

OPHELIA

We made a few more stops—one at the brewery Jazz had mentioned, one at another office building, one for lunch, and one at a jewelry store—before Dante finally parked in front of a sprawling estate nestled in the forest.

It looked over the monstrous lake that had been magically modified by many of the immortals whose magic revolved around water.

The lake stretched far beyond the edge of Rumor, but I was pretty sure the wards had been adapted to wrap around the entire thing. Humans had no way to visit any part of it.

I fiddled with the air conditioning knob again, assuming we were just making another stop.

Dante put the car in park, then turned it off.

"What are we doing?" I checked.

"You're moving in." He opened his door.

My forehead creased, and I didn't open mine.

He was around the car moments later, opening the door for me and offering me a hand.

His anger had faded a lot, but it was clearly still there.

I didn't take his hand. Or get out of the car. "What do you mean, moving in? I have a house. And we agreed before we sealed the mate bond that we weren't living together."

"I changed my mind."

I blinked. "You don't get to change your mind. Not about where I live. We're barely mated."

"We're fully, permanently mated, Ophelia. I agreed to that while I was starving, and before the mate bond was reality. I sure as fuck can change my mind about it now."