Page 29 of Eternal Surrender

“Are you suggesting there’s really such a thing as vampires?” asked Marcus.

“That’s what you are,” she said. “And I can prove it.”

Marcus shrugged. “We merely just enjoy the. . . Gothic lifestyle.”

“I’ve written evidence from my investigation.” Ingrid straightened her back. “Blood results. Photographs.”

“I’d like to see those,” Marcus answered casually. “I’m assuming they’re all fakes.”

“Unshackle me!” she snapped. “Marcus, please.” The way she spoke his name revealed her need to get through, connect with him.

It wasn’t working.

“You invited your way down into the heart of Belshazzar’s.” Marcus adjusted her bra strap through her shirt. “There’s only one reason you’d venture down here.”

Ingrid flinched. “Where’s Orpheus? I need to speak with him.”

“I never took you for a Goth,” Marcus said, “but we can certainly satisfy your secret proclivity.”

She lowered her chin. “He’s the one who calls the shots, after all.”

I realized what she was doing, flirting with danger by pushing Marcus.

Flirting with death.

Marcus continued, “We pride ourselves on fulfilling the darkest fantasies.”

“You’re his sidekick, aren’t you?” she said.

I was stunned with how she was riling him as though blindly endangering herself without any thought of the consequences.

Marcus leaned toward her. “Fantasizing about being screwed by the undead?”

Perspiration spotted Ingrid’s chest. I wasn’t the only one picking up on her frantic pulse racing ever faster. The room crackled with anticipation, the energy surging from one vampire to the other, their rising excitement seemingly bouncing off each other, responding to the challenge that hung helpless before them.

The passing seconds felt more like minutes.

“Marcus, I know you’re a vampire,” Ingrid said. “I’m going to have a forensic team comb this place.”

“Ah.” Marcus tuned to face us.

Ingrid raised her chin, full of confidence. “I’m not stopping until I find Orpheus.”

Marcus broke his trance and gestured for me to join him. He whispered to me, “Let’s get this over with, shall we?”

He was ready to turn her.

I motioned to the blonde to give Ingrid more wine and she responded to my order, pouring Bordeaux into a tall crystal glass. She carried it over to Ingrid.

With more subtlety than I knew I had, I took my entitled place in the center, and with that one confident move, I gained the lead position ready to dominate the situation.

The blonde grabbed Ingrid’s hair, pulling her head back and shoving the glass rim against Ingrid’s lips, forcing the wine.

Marcus grabbed my right arm. “Don’t fuck it up.” He took my place, leaning back against on the wall.

Ingrid spluttered, trying to catch her breath as scarlet droplets of Bordeaux spotted her lips and chin; panic seeped through her pores.

What I was about to do was monstrous. An intimacy, born of necessity, cruel in its tenderness, appalling in its inevitability. And yet it was the only means by which I could keep her alive. I would have to claim her in a language, older than mercy, touching a way that would echo through the blood of every immortal. A mark so intimate, so unmistakable that all others would know who’s she was⁠—