“I’m not a fucking steak, Felix!” she seethed.
He arched a brow. “So you would’ve preferred I put you in danger, then?”
“Here’s a thought: You could’ve left me the fuck alone.”
Felix gave her a long look. “That was never an option.”
When Dahlia simply sat back again, arms crossed, he continued, “The hit at your bar ended the war. You weren’t supposed to be there. I madesureyou and Cecilia were off that night.”
She jolted, the angry flush in her cheeks draining away. “How do you know about Cece?”
Felix held her gaze steadily. The mask he normally wore slipped, revealing the dark, watchful predator underneath. “Pet,” he murmured, “I know everything about you. You’re mine.”
“She doesn’t know anything.” A desperate note entered Dahlia’s hushed voice. “I’ve never told her— She has no idea I’ve been talking to you. Please just leave her alone.”
Instinct kicked in his chest. Her distress was a sour note in the air, making his muscles tense like he needed to be ready for a fight. It’d make his life a lot easier if he could use her best friend to keep her compliant, but Felix had never been interested in Dahlia’s surrender.
“Cecilia is safe,” he promised her. “From me, at least. Whatever she gets up to on her own is her business.”
She still looked a bit queasy, but Dahlia seemed to accept that he was sincere. Still, she whispered, “She’s the only family I have, Felix. I can’t lose her.”
“Well, that’s not quite true.”
“The McKnights don’t count.”
He grimaced. “I wasn’t talking about them.”
“Then who?”
Felix rubbed his thumb over the corner of his jaw, watching her carefully. “The Bowans.”
“Mr. Bowan? What does he have to do with this? Besides the obvious, I guess.”
“When Alastair’s blood infected you, two things happened.” He held up a finger. “First, in the eyes of the vampire world, you became his biological daughter. That means that as far as vampires are concerned, your name is now Dahlia Bowan, your father is Alastair Bowan, and you are the heir to the Bowan family. Which happens to be an extremely old and powerful one, I might add. Congrats on your upward social mobility.”
He held up another finger and continued before Dahlia could let fly the barrage of questions and denials he suspected were bubbling up her pretty throat. “Second, youalsobecame venom neutral, which is… Well, we should probably both buy some lottery tickets, because the odds of those two things happening in one shot are astronomical.”
Her lips barely moved when she asked, “And what does that mean for me?”
“You heard Alvin. You can mate with another vampire, Dahlia. That means you can theoretically link anyone who claims you to the Bowan family. To some nuts, it means that you can make pure vampiric offspring, too. It’s fucked, but it’s what they think.” When Dahlia gave him a disgusted look, he spread his hands in adon’t blame mesort of gesture. “When that doctor sold your information, he effectively announced to the entiresyndicate that a new princess was just put on the market — one valuable enough to kill for.”
“So…” She paused, seemingly to try and catch her breath. It didn’t work very well. “So Devon…”
“I didn’t stop to ask, but he would’ve been stupid to pass up the chance to tie himself to the Bowans through you. And that’s why Alastair wanted to snap you up, too. He can’t have you running off with justanyvampire.”
The implication thathewas one such unsuitable match hung heavy in the air.
It didn’t matter that the Amauris had amassed an incredible amount of influence and money under his grandmother’s leadership. They would always be the newcomers on the block, the ones who didn’t abide by tradition or respect the rules designed to keep them in line with the old guard.
Alastair didn’t like change. He didn’t like new ideas or fresh blood running the game.
Tough shit, old man.
It filled Felix with a deep and malicious satisfaction to know that the old prick was gnashing his fangs, furious that he’d gotten to Dahlia first. Alastair had never liked him. He doubted that would change anytime soon.
“Now!”Felix clapped his hands together, startling Dahlia badly enough that she jumped. “We have one more topic to discuss.”
Dazed and pale, she looked around the room with wide eyes, like some monster was about to pop out of the wallpaper and bite her. “There’smore?What could possibly?—”
