Christ. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on. A dream come true.
And he wanted to drink her blood. Wanted it so bad, his fangs sliced into his bottom lip again and they ached so badly, he couldn’t close his mouth. Could only surge forward, along with the rest of the mob of monsters, his sole purpose in this horrifying afterlife to reach her.
His vision was sharp enough to see her face pale, the roses tumbling from her hands.
Screams shattered the peaceful scene. People started to run, but not Roksana. She remained stock still, unblinking, watching him tornado through the white pews that were already being sprayed with the blood of victims.
As badly as he wanted to throw Roksana to the ground and obey the call for sustenance that refused to be denied, her obvious fear slowed his progress. She made a tiny sound of shocked distress, a single tear sliding down her cheek—and he stopped two feet away, as if hitting a wall of solid glass.
Think about what you’re doing.
Control yourself.
Elias attempted to breathe deeply out of habit, but the usual calming effect never took hold. He couldn’t even feel the oxygen expanding his lungs. Couldn’t feel his pulse or the beat of his heart and yet somehow, he was positive that organ still functioned because with the falling of one tear from Roksana, it sputtered one last time and broke.
“Elias? H-how did…what did they do to you?” she whispered, flinching and stumbling backwards when one of her friends screamed in agony. “Oh my God. No. Vampires.”
Roksana tried to run past Elias, but he stepped into her path and wrapped his arms around her, holding her with ease as she fought like a wildcat.
“Let me go. They’re killing them!”
The volume of the ring in his head amplified until he could hear nothing, not even her screams. Her sweet neck was so close. He could hear the life pumping in her veins. It would take no effort to insert his fangs into that beating river of red and end his misery.
The end of his thirst was only the beginning. There was more. It was as though drinking her blood was inevitable. Written in stone. Futile to resist.
You’re losing your mind. Remember who you are.
His time as a human felt like it had lapsed years ago, instead of hours. Who had he been? Not a man who hurt women. Not a man who would take something from a woman against her will. And with absolute conviction, Elias knew he would have rather died than see Roksana in the kind of emotional pain that had her shaking like a leaf in his arms.
Quench your thirst. Drink from her. You can’t help it.
Yes, he could. He would.
Before Elias registered his own actions, he picked up Roksana in his arms and blew through the chapel, through the chaotic violence, and taking one last, longing look at her beautiful, devastated face, he deposited her in a back office and held the door closed until the massacre was over, his bones riddling with agony every time she screamed.
CHAPTER TEN
Moscow, Present Day
Roksana peeked under her pair of cards, memorized her hand and quickly slapped them back down on the cardboard box. A pair of jacks. That was good, da?
After the painkillers gave her some blessed relief, she’d drifted off to sleep for a solid nine hours, waking to Elias watching her in stoic silence from his seat on the kitchen counter, shuffling a deck of cards deftly in his hands.
It was nighttime again, Tuesday, though she didn’t know what time exactly. Time and space had been whittled down to this dark, little flat. And Elias. Now she sat on a nest of blankets and the clothes she’d been wearing upon arrival in Moscow, grateful she could finally remain upright. Lying down like a useless baby was hell on a slayer’s pride.
“I know you have a hand, Roks.”
She frowned. “Of course I have a hand, vampire. You dealt me one.”
“A good hand, I meant.”
“How do you know this?” She sat up straighter, pleased when her spine didn’t shatter. “Is my pulse giving me away?”
Briefly, he tucked his tongue into his cheek. “Your pulse is always a little…rocky. Around me.” Words of denial flooded her mouth, but he held up a hand, before she could give them a voice. “I know. It’s because you want to kill me. No other reason.”
“My fighter’s adrenaline senses a threat. That is the explanation.”
“Right.” He nodded at the cardboard box where each of their two-card hands was laid out. “Every time you have decent cards, you smack them down on the table after looking. When you don’t have shit, you stare at them longer, trying to decide if you’ll limp into the pot and see the flop.”
“Limp?”
“Yes. Like throw in the blind without raising, just to see if you hit a pair or something on the flop, even though you have bad cards.”