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She loved Lukas.

Her chest tightened as she suffocated on the reality of her situation. She was a fool, making the biggest mistake of her life.

The door opened to the dorm room, and Lukas stepped inside, his face weary and his eyes rimmed red. Blaire watched him from her bed, where she sat with her bag next to her.

Lukas closed the door and thunked his forehead against it before releasing the handle and turning toward the room. He looked up and froze, staring at Blaire as if he’d seen a ghost.

“You’re here…” His voice sounded raw. “Please, don’t leave.”

Blaire looked at the bag beside her and shook her head. “I couldn’t do it.”

He took hesitant steps toward her and then dropped to his knees in front of her. Her eyes widened at the tears running down his cheeks. His beautiful green eyes swam with emotion, and several of those emotions passed over his face, but the strongest of all, hitting her deep in her stomach, was relief.

Blaire’s heart jumped. “Why aren’t you angry? This isn’t like you.”

Lukas looked up at her with pure desperation on his face, his eyes glazed over. “This was always me. It was always there.” He closed his eyes as his tears spilled down his cheeks.

She had seen him vulnerable, but not like this. His sorrow washed through her, drowning the defensive speech she’d been rehearsing for the past half hour since returning to their room.

It was time to face this like an adult. To put into action everything she’d been learning with Professor Sinclair, to claim the life that had now become available to her with Caleb out of the picture.

She nudged him with one foot until he opened his eyes. “We need to talk, and it’s better if we’re not next to each other, so we know whose feelings are whose. Can you…?”

Taking a deep breath, he wiped his face and stood, moving to his bed to sit across from her, giving her space. “I waited for you at the gate.” Swallowing hard, he wrung his hands together. “But you never came, so I thought I was too late.”

“I didn’t make it that far.”

“Why?” Lukas looked up from his hands to meet her eyes, and his swam with more unshed tears.

“I couldn’t leave you.”

He made an odd noise in his throat, half sob, half laugh, his face a mask of tragedy. It broke her heart.

Taking a deep breath, she said, “I’m afraid, Lukas. I’m terrified of dying.”

“I said I wouldn’t let that happen.”

She held up her hand to stop him. “Let me talk… please.”

Lukas mashed his lips together and nodded.

“I want to be with you. The idea of having sex with you both excites me and scares me. I know it’s normal to be afraid, but you need to understand that before you, I’ve only associated sexual acts with something traumatic.”

Lukas nodded quietly, not interrupting but acknowledging he was listening.

“Couple that with the fact I have to let you bite me and drink my blood… I don’t know if you can stop. The idea of it already sounds off-putting—especially drinking blood myself—if I’m being honest with you. But even if I could get around that, knowing you might kill me has made me put on the brakes. It’s what has held me back for a long time. I know you said you could stop, but you can’t make that promise. This is new for you, too.”

Lukas closed his eyes and sighed, and when Blaire didn’t say more, he looked at her and said, “You’re right… but I need you to trust me. Blaire, you’re not the only one who’s afraid.”

“What are you afraid of?” she asked, studying his face.

“All those times I stopped myself when I felt you give in to me… I couldn’t do it. I knew you were afraid of me. Of what I am. That’s not the way I want to complete our pairing. I don’t want to be like your stepbrother and force my desires on you.”

Blaire shook her head and looked at him incredulously. “You’re nothing like Caleb.”

“I would feel like it, and that’s enough. I would feel like you were coerced into it because you were aroused, not because you wanted it in your heart, in your mind. As long as you respond to what I am in fear, then you’re not ready for it. I told you I would wait, and I meant that. I’ll wait forever for you if you’ll allow me to.”

“I’m not afraid of what you are. I’m afraid of what you’re capable of doing to me. I don’t think that fear will ever go away. Without experiencing it firsthand, I’ll never know if you have restraint, and without proof of that, I’ll always be apprehensive.”