Chapter 21
Dylan
The security meeting was the same as any other, but sitting there and listening to the others bicker had me jumpy and on edge. I felt exposed, vulnerable, like Amara’s touch was a brand on my skin. Like the evidence of what we had done lay plainly on my face. I sat stiffly at the polished table in Jordan's office and tried to nod along to whatever the redhead was saying.
Jordan had gathered the entire security team this time, and everyone was up in arms about the dragon shifters’ presence, arguing over each other about what to do about it. After I had relayed the events of the previous day and given my description of the dragon shifters in the warehouse, I was relegated to sitting in silence while the others squabbled amongst themselves.
Only River seemed to notice my unease, eyeing me from across the table. I did my best to avoid her gaze and arranged my features into what I hoped was a calm, attentive expression. Internally, I was a nervous wreck.
I had awoken that morning to pale sunshine creeping through the curtains of the motel room, and Amara's naked body nestled against mine. I had stared for a while, watching her chest rise and fall, listening to her light snores until her eyes fluttered open. For the first time in a while, my mind had been quiet. Watching her blink sleep from her eyes, yawn and stretch and realign her body with mine, felt like the most normal thing in the world. It felt right. Until I heard a knock on the door.
We hadn't had much time to talk about what happened. Jordan's ride had turned up moments after we roused, and after that, I'd been carted off for an emergency meeting to discuss the dragon shifter debacle. Before I left the apartment, I'd only managed a feebly signed promise to Amara that I'd be back soon.
Her bleary eyes had watched me go, and it took everything in me not to carry her back to my bed to sleep the day away together. But duty called, and I found myself sitting in a room full of vampires, my mind half-focused on Jordan's voice as she outlined our next steps.
"The dragon shifters could be a serious threat," Jordan was saying. “If they are in league with Don then we need to act quickly.”
Her voice was a little more clipped than usual, tinged with urgency. No doubt Jordan was recalling the last time an enemy force gathered against us. Even this meeting proved just how shaken Jordan was, she’d allowed a few pompous highborns in to offer solutions.
She was right to be worried. I had seen the power of the dragon shifters firsthand.
I tried to concentrate, but my mind insisted on skirting the problem at hand and trailing back to Amara. The way she had looked at me, the brush of her lips on mine, the softness of her skin. I wanted to be back with her, to talk about everything that had happened, to figure out where exactly we stood. But instead I was here, subjected to strategies and plans and highborn politics.
A scowl settled on my face before I could stop it.
River caught my eye from across the table and raised her brow in silent question. The vampire woman was painfully perceptive, she could sense something was off. She knew that something had changed. I ignored her, dropping my eyes to the table and mulling over the events of last night and what to do about them.
In the back of my mind, I already knew what Jordan was going to suggest. She would want to wipe Amara's memory, to keep the Leyore vampires' identities safe, and to prevent Amara from reporting anything to her father. The thought made my heart seize. I didn't want Amara to forget. I didn't want to lose what we had, however brief and uncertain our marriage might be.
"Dylan.” Jordan’s voice dragged me back to the present and I snapped my eyes up. “You said that guy attacked you unprovoked?”
“Yes.” Every little scar on my body ached at the memory and I trailed a hand over the stitched slash on my thigh. “That was the second time if we’re counting the night I got jumped in an alleyway.”
My response did little to ease the tension in the room, triggering whispers and wary glances directed at Jordan. The redhead sighed and ran her fingers through her hair, haunching over with her elbows propped on the table. “So it’s safe to say they’re not here on vacation.”
I blew out a breath, leaning back in my chair. “Probably not.”
“All right then, River will lead a team out to that warehouse. We’ll meet them head on and if they’re not interested in talking, we take them out.” Jordan pointed a well-chewed pen at the other woman before turning reproachful eyes on me. “And then there’s Amara…”
My heart stuttered at the mention and I fought to keep my expression neutral.
"Amara has seen too much," Jordan continued. "She knows about you, what you are. We can’t allow her to jeopardize our existence or the safety of our coven."
I clenched my fists under the table. I knew where this was heading, but couldn’t bring myself to accept it.
"We'll have to wipe her memory," Jordan said. "It's the only way to ensure she can't report anything to her father or anyone else."
"No," I blurted out before I could stop myself. My voice reverberated around the office. All eyes turned to me.
“I mean –” I backpedaled quickly, shrugging the tension from my shoulders. "Isn’t there another way? She’s finally gotten comfortable, it would be cruel to wipe it all away and have her go back to being scared of me."
Jordan raised an eyebrow. "And she’s not scared of you now?”
I winced, a supercut of Amara’s wide fearful eyes flashing in my mind. “Well, not as scared as she could be.”
When I was met with blank stares all around, I squirmed in my seat, feeling a hot flush building in my cheeks and the tips of my ears. “I just think we shouldn’t be so quick to meddle with her mind like that. This marriage was meant to keep the peace, after all, maybe we should give her a chance.”
"And why would we do that?" another vampire interjected. "We have rules for a reason. Not to mention her father is a nuisance who could cause us a lot more trouble if he were to learn the truth."
“Amara doesn’t know about the Leyore coven. She only knows about me .” I struggled to find my words, my foot tapping a wild tempo under the table. "She doesn't need to be a threat. I can keep an eye on her, make sure she doesn’t snitch to Don."
“Don Leone and his people will be attending the upcoming ceremony.” One vampire directed his piercing words at me. “A ceremony to celebrate your union with his daughter. If this girl were to report this to her father, who knows what Don will do?”
I dug my nails into my palms. I’d forgotten about the upcoming ceremony. Jordan and Don had agreed that a gathering to show off our marriage would be worthwhile. It was, on the surface, a way to prove the peace between our factions. No doubt Don had his own schemes underway, and Jordan wanted to use it as an opportunity to gauge Don’s intentions.
Don aside, if he was working with the dragon shifters that would mean he had way more knowledge of the supernatural than we originally thought. And if Don wanted to stir up trouble, having the shifters strike at the gathering would be the obvious choice. The Leyore leaders and the rest of the vampires would be exposed, surrounded by humans, and unable to reveal themselves.
“This is ridiculous,” another vampire chimed in – a highborn snob who’d given Jordan grief after she bumped me up to head of security. “She’s a human. Why are we even debating this?”
“She’s more than that,” I muttered, scratching a deep gouge in the table with my nails. “I can keep her in check, but you can’t wipe her memories. She’s – she’s important.”
“Important?” Jordan echoed me, staring like she was only just seeing what River saw in my expression. “Important how?”
I sunk into my seat, shrinking under the many eyes that fixed on me. There were few shadows in the brightly lit office but they bled toward me. When I didn’t answer, I saw the highborn vamp scoff, leaning over to whisper to the woman beside her.
It didn’t matter how many battles I fought for them, or how many enemies carved me up in the process. Some of them would never accept me. I was the tainted second born of their revered general, dark sister to Damian’s light. In me they saw an unpredictable loose end that Jordan should have cut off, not a leader fighting to keep them all safe.
My father had a part to play in that, he turned them against me when he kicked me out all those years ago. He just hadn’t expected Damian to follow me. But I was also in part responsible for my damaged reputation. I had preyed on humans unchecked after Damian died. I should have been banished from the city for that, not promoted to head of security.
And now I was defending a human – a human who posed a threat to their way of life. No wonder they didn’t trust me. But even so, the fierce voice in the back of my mind held fast to my convictions. I had nearly lost Amara once. I would not risk losing her again. We couldn’t go back to how we were before. It would break what was left to be broken of me.
“You can’t do it.” I met Jordan’s stare, icicles hanging from every word. “I won’t let you.”
The mild threat was enough to stoke outrage among the highborns in our company. Their voices rose to a maddening crescendo. Jordan’s jaw twitched even as her eyes curiously searched my own. I felt a slither of guilt at defying her in front of her people. She had been my strongest supporter when I first joined the ranks of security, and she had defended me against the nobility ever since.
“Why?” Jordan asked eventually, her voice cutting through the chatter and silencing the gathering.
I held her gaze, but the truth stalled on my tongue. “I told you why. It’s not necessary, I can handle her.”
“Yes, but why is it so important?” Jordan pressed, leaning forward like she wanted to drag the words from my disobedient lips. “Why is she so important?”
The whispers started up again when I held my tongue, but Jordan narrowed her eyes, pushing for a response. “Her father is our enemy, she could betray you at any moment.”
My pulse quickened when she stood up, leaning her palms on the table while she interrogated me. “You didn’t want to marry her in the first place. Why are you so determined to defend her now?”
My lips moved but no sound escaped. The truth was a clawing animal in my chest, but I couldn’t let it out. Not there, not before all those condemning eyes. Not before I’d even admitted it to myself.
I recalled the crackle of electricity when I first slid that ring onto Amara’s finger, the intoxicating sweetness of her blood on my tongue. My heart slowed to deep rhythmic beats, reverberating through my entire body.
But Jordan was relentless as ever, unblinking eyes never leaving my face for a moment. “Dylan? Tell me why.”
“Because she’s my mate!” The words burst from my lips before I could swallow them, tearing through my chest with teeth and claws.
The room fell into stunned silence, even the highborns shocked at my booming declaration. The admission left me breathless, the confounding truth shaking me to the very core. But the words shimmered before my eyes, and they felt… right.
Jordan’s eyes widened but there was a softness there, and the corner of her mouth curled into a smile. “Your mate?”
I nodded, feeling a sense of calm wash over me now that the truth was out. "Yes. Amara is my mate. I can't let you wipe her memory. I won't."
The room was silent for a few moments, the weight of my revelation sinking in, but Jordan just stood there with that strange smile on her lips. It was almost like she’d expected it. At her elbow, River watched me with a knowing smirk. I realized in a rush that Jordan had been pushing me to confess, in front of everyone, for a reason.
I’d proclaimed Amara to be my mate. According to our own rules, no one could touch her.
"Well, this complicates things.” Jordan sat down again and laced her fingers under her chin, her voice much softer than before. “But if she truly is your mate, we will need to find another way.”
All I could do was nod mutely, reeling from the confession that had torn from my lips. Acknowledging it, saying it out loud, made me more sure of what I had known from the very beginning. Some part of me had known the moment I laid eyes on her what she was. Who she was to me. My head just hadn’t caught up with my heart.
Amara was back home, probably fast asleep on the sofa where I left her. But I could sense her with every fiber of my being.