A Death So Lovely (Kissed by Darkness #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter

One

Elliot

The hunger rips through me.

Vast.

Deep.

Clawing.

His blood is still in my mouth, on my tongue, in my veins, and it sings.

It tastes so fucking sweet, the merest hint of salt. Of something ancient and sacred.

There’s a haziness to my thoughts at first, then my focus sharpens and narrows to one thing and one thing only: I need to eat.

Lucian’s blood might be the sweetest thing, but right now I want human blood.

My fangs start to ache to feed.

I try to stand, but a hand is quick to shove me back down to the cement floor. The grip is iron, the strength immeasurable, but all it does is annoy me. And when I peer up, I see Lucian kneeling beside me.

“Lucy.” I say his nickname again, and like before, it sounds strange coming from my mouth. Sharper and high-pitched. “I’m hungry.”

“I’m sorry, Monty,” he says softly as my mouth salivates and my stomach starts to claw itself raw.

The need pounds in my temples and veins. There are so many things in the air, scents, sounds but the only one that captures me is:

Blood.

I don’t remember what happened. I don’t even remember where I am. There’s just one thought blaring in my head right now, and it consumes me.

God. I’m so fucking hungry!

And Lucian is—he’s stopping me.

There’s blood close by. I can see it. Smell it. Almost taste it beyond the remains of Lucian on my tongue.

Wet. Visceral.

Life-giving.

Mine.

The copper scent fills my nose, canceling out all others.

It should be mine.

Lucian’s talking again; he won’t shut up. Anger burns in me at him for putting his hands on me. I don’t give a fuck what he is or that he can probably rip me apart.

With a howling roar, I rear up, coming at him with nails and fangs extended. I shove him, striking him hard with my hands, slashing my nails over his face as I scramble, sobbing and laughing, desperate for that food.

I stumble to a nearby body, and I rip the flesh to open veins to get to the blood. It’s wet, cooling, and I swallow it all, guzzling it into me with glee.

But that blood isn’t enough. This man’s already dead, and what should be an electric buzzing of his life essence is merely a whisper. It takes only a moment before it’s gone completely, and I’m left with blood that’s dull and bitter-tasting.

I toss the corpse, crawl into a small pool of spilled blood, and start to suck it up from the ground.

Strong arms come around me, and I’m ripped away. I scream, thrashing about.

I want to eat. I want to make things bleed and feed this voracious hunger that tears through me.

“No! No! Let me go!” I’m wild. Animalistic. Lucian’s stopping me again. The cruelty of him. He’d rather see me starve than live.

“You need to listen to me, Monty,” he growls in my ear. “You need to calm down.”

“Fuck you!” My feet kick the air as he lifts me a foot off the ground. “Put me down!”

“You want down? Is that it? Fucking fine.” He throws me down to the ground. The back of my head slams against the floor, my vision darkening for a second and the fight leaving me. Then his weight comes over me, pinning me there with his body.

“How’s this for down? Hard enough? Real enough? I know how you’re feeling, and it’ll pass, I promise.”

Promise what?

Torture?

I need to feed. I need all the blood in the world. I need flesh ripped open, hot blood gushing. And he thinks he can stop me?

With a growl, I try to rise up, but he simply slams me back down.

Lucian’s an elegant savage, and right now I despise him down to my core. Into the parts of me that are dying.

He grabs my face, fingers digging into my cheeks to hold me there, and makes me look at him. I don’t know how or why, but I’m compelled to, even though looking at him is the last thing I want to do.

Fuck, I hate him.

“Andrew,” he says, not breaking eye contact with me, “get this place cleaned up.”

The male vampire hovering nearby nods.

This place? What place?

Where am I?

I glance around—at least as well as I can with Lucian’s hands still on me—and I see the rusty metal beams and half-caved-in roof of a warehouse.

How did I get here?

Lucian’s fingers dig deeper, and there’s a warning in his tone. “Monty.”

A woman with vibrant red hair and ruby painted lips steps into view, hovering close to Lucian’s shoulder.

Her name springs from my fuzzy memory. Vittoria.

That’s who she is. Vittoria, Lucian’s second in command.

“Be careful, Lucian, that one had teeth before you turned her. She’s going to be a monster. ”

“Not if I can help it,” Lucian says.

Turned me?

Wait, what?

“Leave us, Vittoria,” he orders. “I’ll handle her.”

With a grunt, she saunters out as Andrew and some others start to clean up the bodies and the blood from the place.

I can see and hear and smell everything, like the place is lit up bright and filled with microphones. Like all the scents are dialed up past eleven.

“Monty.”

“Elliot,” I snap.

“Elliot. You are going through changes. Your body is trying to adjust to my blood. It’s going to take time.”

“W-what?” His words spin within me and panic begins to climb up my throat.

“I am your maker now. You are mine, my responsibility to teach, to control. At least until you settle into this new version of yourself.”

The seconds before I reopened my eyes slam into me like a freight train—Benicio de Santis, the ambush, the gun…

And I…died.

But then…how am I not dead?

I blink, gaze sharpening on the vampire in front of me. No. He didn’t. He wouldn’t— He—

White-hot fury blazes inside my chest. “You… You turned me…into…into…” It can’t be true. It can’t be true. “You made me like you?”

“You were dying.” He gets off me and pulls me to my feet. It seems leisurely, slow, but I think it’s fast. Preternaturally so.

I think about Nell, the now-dead love he could’ve saved.

He could have given her the lifeblood of the vampire, the thing that scrapes through my veins, changing me from within, making me mad with hunger.

Lucian could have done that. But he didn’t.

He said he loved her. He gave her a choice and respected her decision.

Not me. He didn’t give me a choice. He turned me.

Bitterness bubbles. The only thing overpowering the fury is this unrelenting hunger. It’s a fever in my veins, a raging tornado in my mind.

It’s all I can think of.

“I want to feed,” I say, and I hate how desperate my voice sounds.

“We’re going back to VMR,” he replies.

“To eat?”

He doesn’t say a word, just drags me behind him, out of the warehouse and into a waiting car.

I claw at the door the moment he lets me go, but it’s locked, and even though power bursts inside me, I can’t get out.

I’m like a fumbling newborn lamb, too big for my new legs but full of energy, and it’s frustrating.

“I don’t want to go to VMR!” I’m shouting now. “You made me, Lucian! I need to eat. You can’t let me starve! You fucking—”

He clicks his fingers.

“—bastard…”

As darkness swirls behind my eyes, fear hits me and my stomach tightens. Then I drop head-first into unconsciousness.

When I wake, we’re not in the car anymore.

For a wild moment, the double click of Lucian’s fingers rings through my bones and nausea roils.

What the fuck just happened? He did something. Used his power over me.

Is he magic?

This is insane.

I snarl, swinging around, taking in my surroundings.

The room isn’t that big. And it’s empty. White walls and floor and no windows.

Lucian is there, watching me with his dark eyes, and he stands between me and the door.

My heart beats hard and fast.

“I know what you’re thinking,” he says, his once immaculate suit a mess of blood and tears, “and you can’t get past me. Even as you are now, I’m too fast, too strong. You won’t be able to overpower me. You’re in here for your own protection.”

And to think, at one time I thought this man, this vampire, felt something for me. Cared for me in some way. And now he has me confined to a padded cell.

I was an idiot.

He pauses for a moment, just staring at me. He wants to say something more, but he’s rethinking it. How do I know this? I’m not sure. He used to be mostly unreadable to me, but now it’s like I can sense his thoughts as he thinks them. Maybe it’s his blood flowing through me.

The hesitation is brief, though. He walks up to me until he’s towering over me, looking down and then reaching out his hand to slide a slender finger under something on my throat.

I reach up and feel it, a cool metal necklace that’s tight against my neck. At some point, while he had me out of it, he must’ve put it on me.

“It’s a pure silver choker. You’re so new, precious metals like this will sap your energy, make the power less intense. But you should know that you can try to run, but with my blood pulsing through your veins, I’ll always know where you are. I’ll be able to track you.”

I won’t be able to ever escape him? That’s horrifying.

“What if I kill you?”

He smiles. Slowly. “You can try.”

His arrogance makes me want to lash out right now and show him that he underestimates me. He always has, even when I was human. And now, with so much strength and energy flowing through me, I can make it a mistake he’ll regret.

As if he can read my thoughts, he goes on. “Right now, you’re overloaded with new lifeblood, my blood to be exact, and I’m old. Very old. Very powerful. It can destroy you if you’re not careful, so you need to be alone for a while until your body adjusts to things.”

I tug at the metal collar and grumble when it doesn’t just snap off. This is ridiculous. I’m not a dog. I’m not his to control and own. “Scared?”

“Of you?” He laughs and shakes his head. “You’re nothing but a kitten with brand new claws.”

Anger flashes. Hissing, I leap up, nails out, but he captures me easily and pushes me back until I hit the wall.

“Calm the fuck down, Elliot,” he commands with fangs bared.

I show him mine right back. “Let me go—”

“No. Not until you relax. I’m not kidding when I say my blood can destroy you.”

I dig my nails into his arms, trying with all my strength to rip his grip off me. “Then let it. You should’ve let me die anyway.”

He stares at me, sorrow tilting his mouth down at the corners. But he doesn’t say anything and that only fuels my rage more.

“I didn’t want this!” I scream. “I never would’ve chosen this!”

Again, he doesn’t reply. His fangs slowly start to retract into his gums. His midnight-blue eyes move over me like ice. “I know.”

He knows? And still he changed me?

“You didn’t give me a choice,” I say, almost a whimper. “Not like you gave Nell.”

Using his grip on me, he turns me in his arms and holds me close to his chest. With my back flush against him, he presses his mouth into my hair, and a jolt shoots through me, like my body is a live wire.

“Oh, Monty…” he whispers into my hair. There’s a silent apology hidden in his tone, and a great sadness stretches over me. I suddenly want to get closer to the strange heat that comes from him because as much as I hate to admit it, being this close to him soothes me.

My shoulders sag, and for a few moments I just breathe him in. Let my eyes drift closed as the anger seems to drain from me and turns into something else. I’m not sure what, but my heartbeat steadies, my entire body relaxing for once, and it feels good. Normal.

Meant to be.

But still…

“Is this a punishment, Lucian?”

“No,” he breathes. “I was trying to save you. Just like I am now.”

“Saving me for me, though? Or for you?”

His body stiffens. “Don’t make me change my mind, Monty.”

That’s my answer. Right there. I pull free from him and stumble away, but my legs wobble and give out. I hit the ground hard. On my hands and knees, I rock back and forth. “I don’t understand. I-I feel so weak and yet so strong at the same time. How is that possible?”

“The bullet that hit you has been absorbed. Your organs have repaired, rewired, and every cell in you works on a different level,” he says.

Confusion and haziness swamp me, along with an inexplicable cramping in my stomach.

“As I said, you’re going through big changes.

And you have too much of my blood in your system.

Too much power. It’s temporary but it’s dangerous,” he says, watching me.

“I’m sure the hunger, the blood lust, is telling you to murder half of Tenebris City.

As much as you may not think so now, you’d regret it later.

So you’re in here for your protection. When you’re no longer a danger to yourself and others, we’ll talk. ”

Lucian turns and walks to the door.

After all that, he’s…he’s not going to feed me?

I crawl toward him. “Lucian, please—”

He doesn’t stop. Doesn’t turn back. He walks out and the door shuts behind him. A beep sounds and a lock snaps into place. Then the lights go off.

I scream.