Page 68

Reid

I stared up at the building in front of me, angst sitting low in my stomach and making the hair on the nape of my neck bristle. Guarded by shadows leeching over its concrete block exterior, the estate surfaced briefly in the dim moonlight from between ominous clouds above. More fucking rain. I swore this town was in a permanent state of moisture. Damp collected on my skin, my boots scraping the deafening quiet of the estate’s surrounds like chalk slicing over a blackboard. A shiver ripped down my spine. Cold. Nerves. A warning.

Every instinct I possessed screamed at me to leave. I ignored it, instead doing the one thing it wanted me not to do: visit the home of the vampire who bit me.

Being a blood mage, I could handle. But pile the fact I now had vampire venom crawling in my veins, ready to mutate, I could no longer ignore it. Without the tonic that suppressed the venom from mutating, I had no other option. Without it, I was a desperate man. Because I’d found my fated mate, and that changed everything.

I reached for the heavy knocker but, before my fingers made contact, the door swung open, leaving my hand in midair and a disgruntled breath lodged in my throat. A familiar face greeted me.

“Well, you’re certainly not who I was expecting. Witch, yes, but not,” Callan scrutinized me from head to toe, questions burning in his icy eyes, “you.”

Generally, the people of Cutters Cove ‘in the know’ kept a healthy distance from the vampires, but the bloodthirsty creatures would sometimes come to Jinxed and the town center. When they did, everyone knew to keep their distance.

I shoved my hands into my pockets. “Do I have to be invited in, or is that all bullshit?” I asked, because I’d never been stupid enough to turn up on a vampire’s doorstep before now.

The corner of Callan’s mouth turned up slightly, a glimmer of amusement brightening his pupils. “Come in,” he said, as though welcoming blood mages to vampire estates was an everyday occurrence. “Although I should warn you, Jetticus has,” he nodded toward the large open fire on the far wall, “company.”

As if on cue, a throaty moan spiraled through the air. I instinctively took a step back. “I have no desire to witness Jett balls-deep in another being.”

Callan’s smile doubled in size. “He’s feeding, not fucking.” Adjusting his suit jacket, he then straightened his tie.

“Yeah, sounds like it,” I countered sarcastically. That moan sounded like one thing only: a woman getting off and enjoy it immensely.

Callan opened the door wider, displaying the proof to me. A woman lay sprawled across Jett’s lap, his head in the crook of her neck. Her moan filled the room, and I stood in a trance at the scene in front of me. They were both fully clothed, hands nowhere near where I’d imagined them to be.

I blinked once. Twice. Nothing about the scene made sense.

“The fuck?” I turned my gaze back to Callan, who watched me closely. He shut the door, gesturing me to follow him into another room. His polished shoes clipped against dark-stained floorboards with every step, and my eyes lifted to two matching portraits of a man and a woman on the wall above. The black and white portraits looked to be drawn with charcoal but were scarily detailed.

Callan poured me a glass of amber liquid from a nearby decanter, before offering it to me. I took it, taking a sip. Whiskey on the rocks.

“We do not all feed like monsters,” he said as he sat in a leather armchair, motioning me to do the same in a matching one opposite.

I was stunned, stumbling to understand what I had just seen. “I don’t understand,” I said, deadpanning him. My fingers slid over the gold domes pinned to the pristine leather of the armchair. Eight traced a line underneath the pads of my fingers.

Callan continued. “Feeding for a vampire can be very…” He searched for the correct wording, eyes glistening. “Arousing, if thirst has been previously sated.”

This new information struck me as odd. Sated. Like there was more to just the feed itself. Hopefully, if luck went my way, I would never find out if it was true.

I got straight to the point of my visit. “The botanical was destroyed. Where do I find another of its kind?”

Callan’s eyes narrowed at my demand. His finger popped like a nervous tick on a gold dome. “There is none.”

I frowned. “There must be.”

An unbothered shrug. “Possibly, but none that I know of.”

“If I don’t get more of that botanical —”

A quiet chuckle. “You will become one of us. I assure you, youngling, there are worse things in this world than vampirism.”

I highly doubted that. Scar deserved better than a monster she hadn’t chosen.

Another moan drifted through from the living room. It sounded like the ultimate drug-free high. Something inside my stomach twisted. My spine blazed with intrigue. I pushed it aside. Stamped it under my heavy boot. “I would rather die,” I stated, anger stirring in my veins at the mere thought.

Callan’s head dipped to the side, joined by a casual lift of his hand. “Like I said, it’s not all bad. Find your fated mate and all your needs will be sated, just like Jetticus.”

My chest tightened. “You’re telling me vampires can have a fated mate?”