“I don’t understand why everyone talks about Rowena’s heir as if she’s a goddess reincarnated because you’re a fool. I never loved you. It was all an act, and you fell for it. I had youeating out of my hand, and you were so in love that you were ready to throw away centuries of tradition and family dignity for sweet words and a cheap proposal.”
“They were more than sweet words to me,” Belladonna spat. “And maybe instead of becoming our parents and continuing a war that began in a different era by people who no longer exist, I wanted to further the peace my mother started and lead by example.”
“You’re pathetic.”
“Then why date me? Why propose, Gabriel? If I’m so disgusting to you, why did you approach me at that bar?”
“Because I want war.”
Belladonna sat back in her chair and pinched her eyebrows at her ex. “War? I… I don’t understand.”
“My father signed that disgrace of a peace treaty with your mother, and any act of violence against the witches would violate the agreement. It might lead to war, but it would be a weak attempt. Too many vampires have grown complacent in this peace. If I were to attack, most would view me as the villain and call for my head instead of following our true purpose,” Gabriel said, leaning forward with anticipation. “No, if I want war, I need a cause every vampire can rally behind… like the death of a beloved wife.”
Belladonna recoiled, his words like a punch to the gut. How had she been so blind? How had she been so stupid to believe him? She’d been ready to marry this madman, but then another thought slipped into her brain. She’d tried not to love Vlad. Tried to hate him for his actions at the church, but she could no longer lie to herself. She loved her husband. He was her mate, her true partner, and her connection to Gabriel had brought him into her life. She hadn’t been a fool. It had been fate drawing soulmates together in the only way it saw how.
“You’ll be dead in a few minutes, so I suppose I can tell you my plans,” Gabriel said, his chest puffed up like a damned peacock. “Do you recognize where we are?” He waited for her to answer, and when she shook her head, he gestured behind him. The vampires lit the candles, and the room came into brilliant view, the sight freezing her heart.
“We’re in the Coven’s sacred gathering place,” Gabriel said. “I figured out where it was when I was dating you, and we were able to get past the protection spell tonight because of your DNA. When I heard Rowena kept her special daughter hidden, I made it my mission to learn everything I could about you. I used my father’s deep pockets to loosen lips, and when I finally approached you, I was a man tailored specifically to your preferences. I molded myself into a boyfriend you would date, and you played right into my plan. I did whatever it took to ensure you fell in love and then married me, and now that it’s Halloween, I’m going to kill you.”
“My mother will destroy you for this,” Belladonna growled. “And the vampires who enjoy this peace will never rally to your cause.”
“I know,” Gabriel said, completely unbothered. “It’s why I’m not killing you… well, I am, but the world won’t see it that way. It’s why we’re here, in your coven’s sacred space. I’m going to kill you and frame your murder on the fanatic witches. I’ll spread their manifesto that claims you’re a traitor for marrying a vampire. So, as you can see, your marriage to my father makes this plan work even better. Imagine how the vampires will rally to their leader’s cause when he learns the witches he tried so hard to make peace with slaughtered his young wife.”
“You’ll never get away with this.”
“You actually did me a favor by marrying dear ole dad.Seems like you’ve got him under your spell, and he’ll be all too eager to declare war when he sees what I’ve done to your body. He’ll push the vampires to annihilate the witches, and then Halloween will finally be ours. Rowena loves you, and your death will cripple her, making her incapable of leading her army. A few cheesy dates and a brutal murder, and you’ve destroyed a race that has lasted centuries.”
“You’re wrong about my mother,” Belladonna said. “She’s stronger than you give her credit for. She won’t crumble.”
“She’ll believe her own people tortured and killed her only child,” Gabriel said. “The bitch will cave.”
Belladonna swallowed her tears, forcing herself to remain stoic in the face of unspeakable agony. Her heart broke for her mother, knowing that tomorrow’s dawn would destroy her life. Her heart shattered for the husband she’d fallen in love with. She regretted she would die without telling him that despite his poor behavior in the beginning, he became the husband she always dreamed of. A man who respected her boundaries, who never tried to make her feel small or young or ridiculous. He let her dress how she liked, act how she pleased, speak how she chose. He made sure to always stock her favorite things, never once forbade her from keeping yet another cat, and even invited his sworn enemy into his home for dinner at her request. Vlad was a good man hiding within the skin of the devil, and she hated that she never got to tell him he was the love of her life.
“I understand my fate,” she said, her voice shaking despite her resolve. “I cannot stop you, nor can I change your mind, but know this, Gabriel. You will never be your father. You want to rule. You want power, but you’ll never have it. Not like him because you are too blinded by prejudice to realize that Vlad’s peace has been the greatest reign our races have seen. You’re nothing compared to him. I thought I loved you,but you were merely my path to finding Vlad, and I love him. He’s my true mate, and I hope you live forever knowing that you were the one who killed your father’s soulmate. You should be ashamed of your?—”
She gagged, choking on her words as an enraged Gabriel lunged for her and closed his fingers around her throat.
Vlad ripped the vampire’s spine from his body and dropped the vertebrae onto the pavement with a wet thud. The vampires tasked with keeping him from his wife had surrounded him, assuming because he was outnumbered, they could contain him, but they learned the painful way what it meant to defy the angel of death. They screamed Belladonna’s whereabouts in the end, and Vlad raced into witch territory, arriving at the coven’s sacred grounds with record speed. A small army was stationed outside to protect the holy space, but the skull on his hand craved blood. Its thirst had not yet been quenched, and Vlad slaughtered every last guard, putting his name to the test.
He’d called Rowena on his drive over. Normally begging her for help would humiliate him, but he felt no embarrassment as he pleaded with the witch. At first, the woman assumed it was a Halloween prank, but when she heard the fear in his voice, she promised him the entire coven’s aid. Only it seemed he’d beaten the witches there, and something told him he shouldn’t wait for their support. He didn’t knowwho had stolen his wife, but the dread festering in his gut urged him to enter alone. So, he obeyed, fearing that if he waited for Rowena, Belladonna would pay the price.
Vlad slipped through the darkness, becoming one with the shadows, and voices reached his ears. He angled toward the sound, and both relief and panic overwhelmed him as he recognized the feminine voice. Belladonna was alive, but the despair in her tone warned she was running out of time.
Vlad picked up his pace, his immense size invisible as he melded with the night, and as he rounded a corner, a candlelit room came into view. Vampires obscured his wife from his sight, but her terror echoed off the cavernous walls.
“You should be ashamed of your—” she gagged as someone cut her off, and Vlad knew what had caused that sound. He’d inflicted it hundreds of times, and his vision went black with rage. Not his wife. Never his wife.
Vlad surged forward, breaking the necks of two vampires with a single blow. He then ripped out the heart of a third, and with a roar of vengeance, he lunged for the man choking Belladonna.
“I won’t kill you quickly,” he roared as he seized the vampire. “You will suffer for putting your hands on my wife.” Vlad twisted the vampire around, but the eyes that greeted him felt like a punch to the face. He stumbled backward, his voice strangled in his throat, and he dropped the man as if he were a burning flame.
“Gabriel?” He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t feel. His son. His only son. The boy he loved yet failed so many times stood before him, his handprint on his beautiful wife’s throat. “What...” Vlad choked on his own breath. “What are you doing?” He glanced at Belladonna, her small body chained to the chair, and his rage burned white hot. He couldn’t kill his son. He refused to, but Gabriel had put his hands on his wife, the woman he would sell his soul for.
“What you should have,” Gabriel snarled. “Seize him.”
“Vlad! Look out!” Belladonna warned, but he couldn’t focus on anything except the shock of his only child readying to murder his soulmate.
“Vlad!” Belladonna screamed again, waking him from his trance, but it was too late. Vampires descended upon him, and unlike the guards he’d interrogated earlier, these men were prepared. They pinned him on his knees, driving stakes into his limbs to immobilize him. It wouldn’t kill him, but the pain was overwhelming, and he spat blood onto the ground.
