Page 124 of Her Vampire, His Ruin

“No.” I shake my head. “Of course, I didn’t.”

“You want to be one of us then?” he asks, cupping my wrist as he checks my pulse. The room spins once again, and I close my eyes, breathing through the dizziness. “What happened in that room, Edie?” He leans back in his seat, his eyes tracking over me.

“Why are you here? Where’s Dorian?” I ask, ignoring his question.

“He left a few hours ago. He asked me to take care of you.”

“He left?” My throat tightens, emotion threatening to spill over. I willingly risked my life for him and he just left? The sex might’ve been wild, feral, but it mattered to me. To him, it was clearly just another conquest. That hurts. “So this is it? He drains me then he disappears, and you replenish my blood so he can start all over again?”

“No. Dorian was…” He shakes his head, grimacing. “He told me to take you home after you’ve recovered. He asked me to tell you to rescind his invitation to your home.”

“He’s letting me go?”

I don’t know how I feel about that. I should be relieved, but a thread of disappointment wraps itself around my heart, squeezing tight. I’m nothing but a threadbare rag, torn up both physically and emotionally. I don’t know how to stitch myself back together again. But I do know that I’ll never be the same.

“It would appear so.” Viktor waits for me to speak, and when I don’t, because I can’t, because I’m too overwhelmed, too conflicted, he asks me the same question again. “What happened in that room, Edie?”

It takes me a moment to respond, but when I do, my voice is barely audible. “I confronted Dorian. I told him what you told me, that the only way I’d survive is if I get him to feel.”

“And?”

“And he denied he could. I didn’t believe him. I know he…” I shake my head. “I thought he cared for me. I believed he did.”

“He does.”

“He isn’t here, you are. That tells me all I need to know.”

“Dorian was cut up about what he did. I’ve never seen him so distressed. That man cares about you.”

“He’s a vampire, not a man.”

“Underneath all of the darkness, he’s a man. What I don’t understand is why he can’t just allow himself to feel. It makes no sense to me.”

“Because it hurts him,” I whisper.

“What?” Viktor asks, his shoulders rigid.

I drag in a slow, measured breath, the memory of what happened crawling back in sharp, jagged pieces. “I saw his bones break, saw them pierce his flesh. He was torn apart from pain, and I was the one that caused it.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Neither do I, but I can only tell you what I witnessed. It was horrific. It was as though he was dying.”

“Sunlight is the only thing that can kill us,” Viktor says, his brows pulling together in a frown. “That and decapitation.”

“Decapitation?” I swallow hard, bile rising in my throat.

“We can heal from many things, but nothing will fix a head severed from a body.” For a moment, he sits quietly, mulling over what I’ve said. “In all the years I have been a vampire, nothing like this has ever occurred. Did Dorian tell you anything that might help to explain why this happened to him?”

I shake my head. “Other than the fact he said he can’t feel, no.”

“And yet his empathy for my plight was what caused him to turn me. That was a human emotion,” he muses, settling his kind eyes on me once again. “So, Edie, it would appear his feelings for you are the issue. That’s unsettling, don’t you think?”

I nod. “Yes,” I whisper.

“Did he tell you anything else?”

I could reveal everything Dorian told me about the curse, but that feels like a betrayal, and I’m not willing to share something he’s fought hard to keep secret. Dorian has his reasons, and I’m not comfortable breaking his trust. “Perhaps you should talk to him,” I offer instead.