was awake.
I forced my mind to go blank and the air to fill and leave my lungs in a steadier rhythm.
A second later Tristan was at my other side. “I woke up and no one was around.”
“Just out getting some fresh air,” Dad murmured. “It is a lovely sunset, is it not?” A quick peek into his mind revealed he was thinking about nature.
But Tristan watched only me, frowning, his thoughts showing he was trying to read my emotions when he couldn’t get anything from my thoughts. “Are you okay?” Your heart is racing, and I can smell fear on you, he added silently.
I made myself smile. “Everything’s fine. How’d you sleep?”
He shrugged. “Okay, I guess. I woke up thirsty, though.”
Dad’s gaze darted sideways to meet mine. He turned toward us. “We should go inside and feed.”
But Tristan wasn’t listening. Frowning, he raised his chin several inches and sniffed the air. “What is that?”
“What?” I sniffed the air, too, but smelled only the chimney smoke, the dead leaves under our feet, the dirt.
And then Tristan was gone. He ran so fast that even my vamp eyes couldn’t follow his movements.
Shocked, I looked at Dad. “What the...”
“Deer hunters,” Dad growled.
Oh, God. Tristan had scented humans somewhere in the woods.
We took off after him with only the newly disturbed leaves to show where he had been.
CHAPTER 2
When we caught up to him minutes later, it was almost too late.
Trapped between Tristan and a tree, the lone human hunter gasped and struggled to breathe, Tristan’s hand at the man’s throat cutting off his airway, his rifle forgotten several yards away where he must have dropped it.
Tristan ducked his head, closing the distance between his fangs and the man’s throat, smiling in anticipation.
“Tristan, stop!” Dad shouted, forgetting that neither Tristan nor I could be compelled by any older vampire’s command due to our mix of Clann and vamp genes.
Tristan ignored him, his fangs burying themselves in the man’s neck a half second later.
“Tristan, please,” I begged, fear and horror making my own throat tighten up. If he killed this man, he would never forgive himself later. And I would never forgive myself for not stopping it. But how could I stop him? If I tried to yank them apart, Tristan’s fangs would rip the man’s throat open.
Either my words or the fear behind them made Tristan pause.
Why should I stop? Tristan thought, his fangs still deep within the man’s skin. But at least he was no longer gulping down his victim’s blood. I’m thirsty, and he’s food.
There are other ways to feed, ways that won’t hurt anyone. We have more than enough blood for all of us back at the cabin, I answered silently, not wanting to further scare Tristan’s victim, who stood paralyzed beneath Tristan’s grip. The poor man’s eyes were already round with terror because Tristan didn’t know how to gaze daze him first to calm him.
But why go all the way back there when this human is right here?
Tristan didn’t care about scaring the human, yet he continued to speak to me silently. He hadn’t responded to Dad’s command to stop, yet he was willing to listen to me. Whether due to my blood, the few memories we now shared because of it, or because some lingering emotion of love had survived the change within him, it seemed our bond was the only thing stopping him from going over the edge.
I had to find a way to use that bond to save him from his instincts. But how?
Because this isn’t who you really are, I thought.
But I’m thirsty, his mind snarled at me. And this blood is fresh. How could it be bad?
If only he had all his memories, this would be so much easier to explain. I struggled to find the right words, knowing this human’s life depended on what I thought next.
Right now, it seems like what you want. But that’s because you don’t have all your memories back yet. You will, though, in a few months probably. And when that happens, you’ll remember why you would never want to hurt this human or any other. Right now, biting him feels good. But later, the memory of that mistake will haunt you forever. And it’s a mistake you can’t ever take back once you make it.
That would have been enough of an explanation to make the old Tristan release his captive. But the new Tristan only raised his head a few inches and stared at me over one hunched shoulder, his red lips parted as if even this one small pause in feeding was excruciating to him. Gone was the boy I had loved for so long, replaced by a nearly mindless predator bent on ending someone’s life for his own pleasure. He had become everything I feared I might turn into if I made the wrong decisions or lost control for even an instant.
Something rang deep and hollow through me, reverberating off the core of love for Tristan that had always seemed so rock solid inside me and leaving behind a single, long crack. The strange sensation left me shaken inside and out. But I didn’t have time to figure it out right now. Something else to deal with some other day.
I had to find some way to convince Tristan not to kill this man. But what? He had no memories of his own to guide him, and obviously the few he’d gotten from my blood weren’t helping, either. Neither was trying to reason with him. If not for whatever blood bond we shared, he would have already drained the guy dry. He still could.
And if he killed this human with my dad as a witness, the vampire council would eventually read my dad’s memories of it. They would know we had been unable to prevent Tristan from losing control around a human.
I swallowed hard, my pulse beating at the base of my throat hard enough to rock my entire body. Tristan, if you hurt this human, I’ll—I’ll leave you. It was sheer desperation that made this thought pop into my head, and panic that had me latching on to it as the only threat that might get his attention.
His shoulders jerked up a couple of inches, his shock and hurt knifing through us both. You’d leave me? Over a stranger? But you made me this way!
I nodded and tried to ignore my own pain. This wasn’t about me. This was about saving Tristan. You’re right, I did turn you. But just because we’re different now doesn’t mean we have to hurt others. We still have a choice. We don’t have to be killers. And if you hurt this human, even if you get away with it, someday when you’re back to your old self and remember this moment, it will destroy you. And maybe what we have together, too. You might start to blame me for not finding a way to stop you. You would want me to do whatever it took to keep you from making this mistake.
I could see our future then, how his guilty conscience would tear him apart, how he would grow to hate himself. And me, too, even if he didn’t want to, because not only had I turned him but I’d failed to stop him from killing someone.
This moment would destroy us one way or another if I didn’t do whatever it took to stop him.
Curiosity kicked in within him. He cocked his head to the side, the human trapped beneath his grip all but forgotten. How are we different now?
You haven’t been this way for long. Before last night, you would never have even thought about attacking an innocent person like this.
And before last night, before I became...like this...were we always together?
We were best friends first, years ago as little kids. But I’ve always loved you. Since the beginning of time, it felt like. I’d give anything to go back in time to when things were so much easier for us.
You’re sad. You...don’t like me now because I’m different. Different