It hadn’t bothered her too much at first. Adjusting to life outside the crypt had been so overwhelming that every other need had been briefly muted. Every day she felt as though she was fighting to survive some hidden test. Spending time with Adriana and Zia helped, and so did knowing that Atticus’s cottage was a very short walk through the woods from hers.
Carmine was never alone for those first few weeks, and having a fellow bride nearby helped her confidence flourish. The fact that Adriana was allowed to come and go freely — even live on her own in a city! — was mind-boggling. They’d often stayed up late into the morning discussing their lives, and Adriana had even gone so far as to invite her to live in the city with her.
At any other time, Carmine would have leapt at the chance. Living with afriendin a glamorous city like San Francisco was a scenario straight out of her wildest fantasies.
But Atticus wasn’t in San Francisco, and when she imagined leaving him behind, that ugly, screaming feeling from her encounter with the Patrol captain returned with a vengeance. Not to mention the way she broke out into a cold sweat at the thought of trying to learn how to function in a place crammed cheek to jowl with people.
Saying no was automatic, instinctual. Adriana didn’t look the least bit surprised, but she gently explained that the offer would always be open to her, no matter what happened.
When she left, Carmine was filled with a mixture of anxiety and excitement. She didn’t like how empty the cottage felt, but something about being alone felt like an opportunity — a big, open space that was just waiting to be filled withhim.
Atticus was almost always nearby, hovering at her elbow or driving her places like the registration office for her interview or the local funeral home to inquire about a job. He texted her at dusk and at dawn. He kept careful track of how much she drank, and urged her to spend time with Zia, Harlan, and little Serafina when he was busy.
He was always present, always careful and kind and steady in his growly way, but he wasn’t hers. Not completely.
While Adriana stayed on the estate, Carmine’s feedings were discreet. After she left, they became more frequent, often ending not only with an orgasm but with her spending the day in his bed or vice versa.
They didn’t talk about how they’d long ago crossed the line. They didn’t speak about the fact that he was her anchor, that her venom flowed through his veins. He never brought up how bad withdrawal would be, nor even mentioned the fact that he’d begun taking supplements that would allow her to feed from him without worrying about depleting his vital nutrients.
When they were alone together, Carmine was the happiest she’d ever been. She loved the taste of him, the sound of his laugh, and how he introduced her to sexual pleasure. He loved to put on a show for her, drop to his knees, and eat her out on his couch. Sometimes he’d crawl into her bed at dawn and demand she feed while he slid his hand between her thighs, sending her off to sleep with her fangs in his throat and an orgasm singing in her nerves.
He kissed her. He encouraged her to feed. He stood proudly when Zia commented on how healthy Carmine had begun to look, with her shiny hair, her fuller cheeks, and her eyes brighter than they ever had been.
At first, it was perfect. If he’d asked anything more from her during those first weeks, Carmine would have become even more overwhelmed and uncertain of her place. But as time wenton, she started to wonderwhyhe never took more, like she’d been told to expect.
When a vampire, a groom, claimed her, there would be no guessing, no hesitation. Theytook.They drank and they fucked and they bred.
But he didn’t.
He never asked her to reciprocate sexual favors. He never even hinted about wanting a child. Most critically, Atticus never once tried to bite her.
Not when he had his head between her thighs, his fangs mere inches from lush veins. Not when she lay prone and sated from an orgasm beneath him. Not when she silently begged him to.
Her instincts didn’t know what to make of it. On one hand, he was her anchor. Her venom coursed through his veins, making his blood even sweeter on her tongue. Her bites decorated his throat, his chest, even his arms. He’d begun to smell a bit like her, her claim permeating all the way through his pores.
On the other hand, she found herself disoriented byhislack of claim. She’d made her mark on him, but he hadn’t done the same with her. Something that would have been a relief not too long ago now left her anxious and confused. In the RV he’d said he wanted to bite her, but his behavior since then implied the opposite.
What had at first unsettled and confused her had begun to fill her with cold dread — the very same kind she felt whenever she realized she’d made a critical social error or forgot to clean something in the morgue.
Confronting him about it wasn’t an option when she feared it would push him away. Carmine knew she couldn’t ask Zia, Adriana, or Harlan about the situation, so she’d turned to her old friend: covert research. The answers she’d turned up hadn’t reassured her.
Her exact situation wasn’t common, but the advice she’d found on mates reluctant to make a claim made her go from cold to downright frigid. As one helpful magazine article said,“The bottom line is, if he really wanted you, you wouldn’t be reading this article. Sorry, babe.”
All the signs pointed to him not wanting her the same way she grew to want him, but why then would he feed her? Touch her? The uncertainty was agony, but the suspicion she’d begun to nurse was worse.
He feels like he has to.
Logically, she understood that Atticus was a good man with a good heart who’d seen a woman in need of help. He’d rescued her and, when she couldn’t feed herself properly, he’d offered himself. The arousal he’d clearly experienced was simple biology, which she understood better than most. He’d made no promises, nor declared any feelings for her.
Which was good, because she’d never wanted to be a vampire’s bride in the first place. Knowing that Atticus didn’t want her shouldn’t have slowly strangled the life out of her.
But it did.
“Are you nervous?”
“Yes,” she answered, smoothing her sweaty palm over her short hair again. Carmine wanted to say more, but she knew it was best to stick to monosyllables when they were in the car. She had to be very careful how much of his scent she breathed in, and that made conversation difficult.
In an effort to gently wean them off each other, Carmine had begun stretching out the time between her feedings. She tried to stay busy, to time things so they conflicted with his schedule,and forcing herself to take sips of synth on nights when they didn’t see each other. This was the longest she’d gone since that first bite, and the craving was brutal.
