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“Who?”
“My wife.” He snickered bitterly with a grimace on his face. “It is often said that men seek out a version of their mother in their wives. I do not know if that’s true for all of us, but it was my fate. Orspina was very much like my mother, not in looks, for her hair was golden but in her selfishness. She wanted more than one man could offer. I gave her the status, the honor of being a commander’s wife, but she was not pleased that I could not give her all of my attention. Maybe I was wrong for focusing so much on my command and less on her. But she was wrong for laying with another man, and lying about whom her children belonged to, as was my mother.”
My mouth dropped open slightly. “They weren’t your children?”
“No, but I loved them even so, and even as they grew and saw they looked less like me, I loved them even still.” His voice became softer. “Had I found out, I would have forgiven her. I would not have abandoned the children we were raising. However, the man she slept with, her lover and the children’s true father, was hiding in my home. I assumed he and Orspina were together that night, and I returned sooner they had expected. It was late; I kissed the top of my children’s heads and returned to our chamber to rest with her. Like she always did, she removed my armor, but this time with my own sword. They slit my throat.”
I gasped, eyes wide as they shifted to his Adam’s apple, wanting to touch it, but he did instead.
“I do not think the man had ever killed before, for the cut was not deep enough. Nor do I think Orspina would do it, for she screamed in horror. I remember the look on her face as I fell to my knees. I reached out for her, trying to tell her to run only to watch this strange man pull her into his arms, kissing her. Telling her he would take of it, and he instructed her to stay with the kids. She did not even look back at me once. He left to tell the guards who had heard her not to worry.”
“You watched all of this as you were bleeding out of your throat?” I questioned, moving closer to him.
He nodded. “When he began to grab the linen, I closed my eyes. I went still, and I prayed to the gods. I swore that I would forgive her for this, too, had I lived. That I would go and do as they command. I just needed to live. I would hold on until they sent help.”
“And help came.” Obviously.
He nodded. “Yes, in the form of my mother.”
“Your mother?”
“My mother had left me when I was fifteen in Thessaloniki. I knew she was alive. I knew she was often watching. I would find food or silver left for me wherever I was staying. And all those who would try to harm me would vanish. But in my boyhood innocence, I thought she had simply remarried and didn’t want her son complicating or angering her new husband. I thought he must have been very wealthy. I was happy for her, although I hated her for leaving. Little did I know, she had been changed into a vampire.”
“So, your mother made you again?” I never thought that could be possible.
“No, she did not, but she snapped the neck of the man in my room. I remember her staring at me with tears in her eyes. I mentally joked that money truly cured everything, for she was so beautiful; no longer dressed in rags and covered in dirt. She told me to hold on and lifted me—a grown man twice her size, as if I were a child—from my home and ran. The breeze, the stars overhead, I honestly thought I had died already. She brought me to her mate, Sigbjørn Thorbørn, who happened to be the commander of all of Greece. He ruled the cavalry and was one of the first Vikings who swore allegiance to Emperor Basil I, the Macedonian, for land. She wanted him to change me.”
That bothered me. “You were bleeding out. You could have died. Why didn’t she just change you herself?”
“Because my mother is cunning, wise, and selfish. I love her dearly, but it is the truth. She risked it because she wanted me to have a father and because she knew that of all of his children, I would be the one that was of her and of him. Lastly, because Sigbjørn is an ancient and mighty warrior. Before he was a Viking, he was a Dane, before he was a Dane, he was a Visigoths, before even the Goths. He was born and reborn in the Dawn of Iron. My mother wanted me to be of that bloodline. And just like I had when I was younger, just like I had done without her, I survived. I may have even survived the cut to my neck had she simply nursed me, but she wished for me to join her in eternity. She was tired of watching from a distance. She did not ask. She did not tell me what was happening; she simply had me made into the creature she was. Part of me thinks she had been waiting for me to come close to death just so she could.”
I felt a tug on my heart. His mother had harmed him, his wife had harmed him. “Why the hell would you go looking for another woman after all the hell one put you through?”
He laughed outright, his head going back.
“I’m serious! If it were me, I would never want to look at another woman or trust them again.” I sulked.
“Forgive me, my second brother, his mate is a man, and he told me the same thing years ago, centuries ago when I spoke to him about finding a mate. He tried to convince me that I should choose a man and spare myself the heartache again.”
“Why didn’t you listen?” I joked, pushing his chest.
“I do not think we can control that.” He smirked, amusement clear on his face. His hand drifted to my waist, and I allowed him to bring me closer, until I was in his lap with my chest on his, looking down at his face. “There is something about the feel of a woman’s body against mine that I crave no matter the danger or pain it causes. Call me a fool, but I am not alone in this.”
“Oh, so anyone woman will do?” I grumbled.
“Any woman has done until I met you. And now, all I can see, think of, and crave is you, Druella.” His hands dropped to the back of my thigh right where the hem of my dress was, and he held on tightly; it felt like it was burning through my skin. “I wish to feel nothing but your skin and your skin alone on me. I wish to see you underneath me, on top of me, beside
me, I ache for it.”
He leaned forward and kissed my chest, and I was so grateful I didn’t need to breathe because, in this moment, I didn’t know how. Unable to stop myself, I bent over and kissed the side of his face, my hands going to the bottom of his shirt.
“I want you,” he whispered, wrapping his arms around my waist and hugging me to him. “But I do not want you because you pity my past. I rather battle your stubbornness and denial for years before you give yourself to me than it be based on anything but your true desire for me and me alone.”
“When I throw myself at you, you reject me? That’s going to bruise my ego for at least a decade.” I slowly sat back down into his lap.
He lifted my chin, holding it up.
But I ripped my chin from his grasp. “What?”
