Page 43 of Let Sleeping Vampires Lie

“I don’t want a slave,” he whispered. “I want you.”

My chest tightened, heat gathering under my skin in a rush that had nothing to do with magic.

“So you push me away.”

He didn’t answer right away. His throat worked. His jaw flexed.

“I push you away,” he said slowly, “because one night you’ll get hurt, and I’ll be faced with a choice—let you bleed out… or give you my blood and lose you to me forever.”

“And if I’m dying?” I asked quietly. “If it’s the only way?”

He stepped so close I could feel the chill radiating from his chest. “Then I would damn myself,” he whispered. “But until that moment? I will not let you make that choice blind.”

I stared at him, anger melting into something raw and treacherous.

“You are so afraid of me becoming Amelia,” I said softly.

He stiffened.

“You’re terrified that if I drink from you, you’ll end up twisting me into your puppet,” I continued.

His hands curled at his sides again, knuckles pale.

“I can’t take that chance,” he murmured.

I shook my head. “You’re more afraid of loving me than of losing me.”

He let out a harsh, humorless laugh. “I’ve fought armies with less courage than it takes to love you.”

The confession stunned me.

And it cut through the last bit of anger I’d been clinging to.

“I’m not easy,” I whispered.

“Good,” he said. “I don’t want easy.”

I swallowed. “I don’t want perfect. I just want honest.”

“I’ve been honest,” he said. “You just don’t like what you’re hearing.”

“I don’t like you running.”

“I haven’t run,” he said. His voice was low enough to vibrate through my bones. “I stayed. Every damn time.”

“But you hold back,” I said.

He closed the final distance between us. Not touching—just close enough that the air shifted, charged with heat and tension and something hungry.

“I hold back,” he said in a whisper, “because I’m afraid I’ll overwhelm you and you’ll run. I’m trying to give you time to adjust to us.”

My breath caught.

Because I believed him.

Because he was right.

Because that truth was terrifying… and intoxicating.