Page 97 of A Touch of Crimson
“I love you, Lindsay. You. Not her. I did love her once, but not anymore. Not like I used to. Not for a long time, I realized last night. And never like I love you.”
“I believe you love me,” she whispered, so quietly he barely heard her. “As much as you’re able. But that’s just another reason to finish this.”
His lungs were on fire. “I’m begging you…with everything I am—from the heart that belongs to you—don’t do this.”
“As long as I’m out there somewhere, you’re never going to be able to let me go—I can hear it in your voice. You’re going to bash yourself against the rocks over and over until you’re completely broken. I can’t let you do it. At least once I’ve Changed, you’ll let me go. You won’t want me as a vampire.”
Adrian shoved to his feet, his phone cracking under the strain of his grip. “Lindsay!”
“I love you, Adrian. Goodbye.”
Lindsay stepped out of the bedroom, freshly showered and feeling cleansed inside and out. Syre waited patiently at the dining table. She had the feeling he was the type of man who could sit absolutely still for hours, waiting, his patience infinite and unyielding. So much control and power—it radiated from him as it did from Adrian.
Adrian, whose beautiful voice had slashed and whipped with the force of his emotions. She was making him more human by the day, weakening him when he needed to be stronger than ever. Seeing Syre face-to-face proved that to her more than anything else. The vampire leader was a formidable force to be reckoned with, and his second was a homicidal manic. In the days ahead, Adrian would have to be at the top of his game in order to survive.
“Are you ready?” He stood in a display of sleek fluidity and grace.
She nodded. “Yes. I’m ready.”
He gestured for her to return to the bedroom.
“Can you tell me what’s going to happen?” she asked, lying on the bed as directed. Her heart was racing so violently she thought she might have a heart attack.
The vampire leader sat on the bed beside her and took her hand in his. He met her gaze directly, his perfect features soft with affection. Just looking at him told her what a stunner Shadoe must have been. An exotic beauty whose love had enslaved Adrian forever.
“I’m going to drink from you.” His voice was as warm and intoxicating as heated brandy. “I’m going to drain you to the brink of death. Then I’m going to fill you back up with the blood from my veins, and it’s going to Change you.”
“My soul will die.”
He looked for a moment as if he might lie to her. Then he nodded.“Mortal souls don’t survive the Change. But if it’s any consolation, I think Shadoe will have absorbed some of you over the time you two have been together. You might continue to exist in that way. I don’t think you’ll be completely lost.”
“But you don’t know.”
“No,” he agreed. “You are unique.”
She exhaled a shaky breath. “Okay. I’m ready.”
Syre brushed the hair back from her forehead. “You really love him. I wish I understood why. Every time you come back, you love him all over again.”
Her eyes closed. “Please. Just get this over with.”
She felt the humidity of his spice-scented breath against her wrist, then the sharp sting of his bite.
Lindsay floated in an oddly warm miasma. Like a swimmer on her back, she drifted languidly, all sense of time and urgency gone.
Around her, waves of memories rose and crested. Some were hers; most were not. She sifted through them with a lush fascination, watching reels of events as if they were movies. So many versions of herself, as if she were the only actress in an endless play with multiple characters, settings, and time periods.
In the back of her mind, she registered a distant burning. Around her, smoke and fire licked along the shores of her memories, making the water boil until it was uncomfortable against her bare flesh. She tried to twist away, then to dip beneath the waters, but below the surface, there was no bottom. There was only an endless void and the tickling sensation of that abyss suckling at her toes, luring her downward.
She broke the surface and returned to her horizontal position, keeping her legs away from the seductive pull below.
There was no escaping the growing heat.
“It’ll go away soon.”
Turning her head in search of the speaker, Lindsay discovered a woman floating nearby. A breathtaking woman. A woman whose rich beauty would make a stunning pairing with Adrian’s dark magnificence.
“Shadoe.”
