Ice swept through me at his words. I should have expected that, but I hadn’t. What had Doctor De La Cruz sensed from me? Had I frightened him?
“And?” I asked, my voice a whisper.
“I know how seeing your brother again made you feel,” Eli said, his deep brown eyes searching mine. “And I know you’re feeling uneasy right now. I felt your fear when Morgan Peterson pointed his gun at me.” He shuddered, then added, “And when you were fighting Godric. You thought he might try to hurt me. And I—I know that you meant it when you said you love me.” He paused, raising his eyebrows. “What Ihaven’tsensed from you is the desire to hurt anyone. If you’ve had any compulsions in that direction, I haven’t picked up on them.”
I hesitated, not wanting to lie to him about something I barely understood myself. “It’s been some time since I’ve had a true compulsion to hunt anyone.”
If Thierry was to be believed, I likely never would again. But I didn’t want to promise Eli anything I couldn’t deliver. What if the compulsions were seared into me, part of the fabric of who and what I was?
“So this connection… it’s formed when we share blood? And it means we’ll be able to be in each other’s heads?”
“Yes,” I said, grateful for the distraction. “And it’s permanent—it only ever grows stronger over time with fated mates. You would sense my emotions and hear my thoughts. We might even share memories.” That thought made me feel a bit cold inside. There were hundreds of years of violence I didn’t especially want Eli to ever have to see. “There’s little we could hide from each other for very long.”
“Is that something you’d like?” he asked, his gaze searching mine. “Because I think I would. And I’d rather we do it on purpose, rather than accidentally. Or by necessity.”
His question was startling.
Eli was really asking me, wasn’t he?
He understood what I was, what I had done, and he was asking me for this anyway. My brave, beautiful doctor had been a man of science up until very recently, but now he was willing to step fully into my world in a permanent and unbreakable way.
“Of course I am. Because I’m in love with you,” Eli said, studying me with those deep brown eyes. Then he added, “When you’re emotional, your thoughts are louder, by the way. Just so you know.”
“It’s been a matter of lifetimes since I’ve been accused of being emotional.”
“Then you’ve got some catching up to do,” he replied. “I don’t want to bully you into something you’re not ready for, Nicolas.But if we do this, it will be because we both choose to—with our eyes wide open.”
In most stories about our kind, the vampire is the one to be feared. Not the mortal he’s madly, desperately in love with—the kind, beautiful, perfect man with brown eyes so deep and timeless it’s as though he’s seen eons pass him by. But I did feel fear. A simple and very human fear: what if Eli looked into my soul and couldn’t bear what he saw?
After all, it was a very real possibility.
But fear or no, I already knew it was an academic question the moment I considered it. Because I would do anything for him. Even risk him recoiling from me.
“Yes,” I said softly. “I would bind myself to you. I would give you anything and everything.”
His eyebrows shot up, and a grin broke across his lips. “Yeah?”
“Yes.” I paused. “You’re not frightened?”
“Of you? Never.”
“There’s one other thing,” I said slowly. “Usually a blood bond is just an intimate sharing of emotions and thoughts. I have no idea how our unique circumstances will affect it. Provided, of course, that it happens.”
“It will,” Eli said firmly. “Whatever happens, we’ll face it down together.”
“You may see things about me that frighten you. You may see things you don’t wish to see.”
“Nicolas, I trust you. I trust us.”
“And I love you,” I replied. “I never would have imagined it possible, but my heart—though it no longer beats—is for you and you alone. You’ve brought me back to life, and I would never hurt you.”
“I know.”
Then he tilted his head to the side, baring his neck for me. The pulse jumped in his jugular, in time with his pounding heart. With a hand behind my head, he drew me toward his throat.
I hesitated an instant longer, then let my fangs drop.
And I bit down.
