“I am Carpathian. We exist on blood. We do not kill. We are careful to be respectful and to ensure those who supply us do not remember.”
“But not me.”
“You are entering my world. It will be necessary for you to accept the fact that we have no choice. We must have blood to survive.”
She shook her head. The taste of him was suddenly in her mouth. Her eyes widened. “Wait a minute. Don’t say anything else. Not another word.” She tried to break free of him, of the iron band of his arms and his mind. Suddenly other things were coming back to her. A dream world with her mouth on Andre’s neck.
“Oh, God. No. No. No, no, no.” She shook her head, panic filling her. “I didn’t. Tell me right now, I didn’t take your blood.”
“Be calm, Teagan,” Andre advised. “You need to be calm and accept what I am telling you. It simply is. There is no good or bad. It just is. This is my life. Now our life.”
She shook her head. “Not mine. I do not drink blood. Are you kidding me?” Her voice was swinging out of control. “I drank your blood once?” Her stomach lurched and she pressed a hand tightly against it.
“Twice,” he said calmly. “It takes three blood exchanges for you to come fully into my world.”
This couldn’t be happening. She really was batty. Completely around the bend. Grandma Trixie had infected her with some brain disease. They were all crazy. She belonged in a hospital. She tried again to pull away from Andre, but he held her firmly.
“Breathe. You need to breathe, sivamet. It is simply a fact of our lives.”
“Not my life,” she corrected. “Let go of me. I’m getting out of here. And don’t you try to follow me. You had no right.”
“I had every right,” he returned. “Calm down.”
“You be calm. I’m going to scream my head off if you try to keep me here. Blood? I ingested blood twice?” She touched her lips with trembling fingers.
The worst of it all was that she remembered now. She remembered his exquisite taste. Addictive. She craved it again. Just the mere thought of taking his blood sent tingles through her body—sent heat rushing through her veins, and her sex actually spasmed. She was crazy. Insane. And he’d made her that way.
Andre sighed. “Csitri, I would not hurt you for the world. Not physically and not emotionally. I cannot do anything about this situation you find yourself in. You are my lifemate. I see in colors. My emotions have returned and with them, when you placed yourself in danger, came terror. Absolute terror. I have spent centuries keeping this world safe from the undead, but throughout, the whisper of temptation was always with me. Crouched so close I could hear darkness breathing in my ear.”
Teagan went still again. There was something in his voice that told her what he was saying was extremely important. Something huge. A gift that he was giving her. This wasn’t a man who enjoyed having heart-to-hearts. She knew that instinctively. She knew he was hurting because she felt it. He was hurting for her. His resolve remained implacable, but that didn’t stop him from having compassion for her.
She wanted to be a woman who was understanding when her man was upset and behaving irrationally, but seriously, drinking blood? She was human. It was probably going to make her sick. And if her grandmother ever found out, she might use her Internet vampire-hunting kit on her.
Andre sighed. “You do not understand, Teagan. I have only tasted that kind of fear one other time in my entire existence. I have faced multiple vampires and deadly armies of humans. I have never felt fear. Or terror. The one other time ended far differently than this one did.”
She didn’t want to hear this. Or see it, but already images were in his head. Strangely, his memories were vague and always colored in gray. She found few memories of his childhood, and she’d actually looked because she wanted to see what he’d been like as a boy. But there was nothing. Not even a memory of his mother and father. She didn’t even know if he had siblings.
He was a confusing man. Monk. Bounty hunter. Vampire hunter. Now Carpathian. Who knew? But this . . . this memory was vivid, not in color, as if he were color-blind, and maybe he was. She shook her head and tried to pull out of his mind.
“I don’t want to see this, Andre. I’m too . . .” What could she say? Sensitive? He’d actually gone through the experience—the one time he’d been terrified just like this time. She sounded self-centered saying she was too sensitive, but truthfully, she was an empath and she already knew she wouldn’t be able to take what he was about to show her—as well as tell her.
“You have to know, csitri. I am not a dictator. I do not want things all my way. I meant it when I bound us together and said your happiness would be put before my own.”
Uh-oh. Bound them together? She liked the part about putting her happiness before his own. She was willing to do the same, but the binding them together only made her see red all over again. Where was free will in his world?
Fear cruised down her spine because the way was all too familiar now. Binding. Blood taking. Flying. Things were getting out of hand, and all Andre seemed to have to do was kiss her silly and she just succumbed. Went under his spell willingly. Drowned in him.
Teagan bit her lip. “Um. Seriously, Andre, we need to talk more about this binding and other things.” She didn’t want to talk about them. That was the last thing she wanted to do. His eyebrows drew together and he looked as if he was getting upset all over again.