Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 119694 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 598(@200wpm)___ 479(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119694 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 598(@200wpm)___ 479(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
“That’s not what I mean, and you know it,” I snap, but I can feel my cheeks getting hot. I wonder if he knows I saw the sex dungeon. Maybe there are hidden cameras in there and he saw me look around.
Lucian just smirks at me, showing just a hint of fang in a way that’s absolutely infuriating. I can’t figure him out—I really can’t. If he wanted me that badly, he could have had me last night. I was in no shape to fight him off and even if I had been, he was about a hundred times stronger than me.
So why all this wooing? Why the slow burn romance instead of a quick and dirty encounter to take what he wanted?
“I’m not mad at you,” he says again.
“Well, maybe I’m still mad at you,” I snap, and my voice cracks on the last word. “My life back in the Human Realm might have been crappy, but there were things I liked about it. I miss my friends from Book Club and my cat, Mr. Mittens—he can’t be left alone for much longer. I mean, his automatic feeder will keep him from going hungry and thirsty for a while, but I need to scoop out his litter box and besides, he’ll be missing me, like I’m missing him! And…and…”
I stop, because my eyes are burning.
And because suddenly I can see Mr. Mittens in my head so clearly—sitting by the door, tail flicking, meowing at the empty hallway. He’ll be pacing…waiting for me.
Waiting when I’m never coming home.
“Oh God,” I whisper, and then I can’t help myself and the tears spill over.
“Now, now, little one…” Lucian crosses the room and crouches in front of me, cupping my face in his big hands. “Don’t cry,” he murmurs, brushing the tears away with his thumbs. “Please—it distresses me to see you so upset.”
“I can’t help crying,” I choke out. “I miss my friends! I miss my cat!”
Suddenly I’m bawling like a child, shoulders shaking uncontrollably.
Great. Very dignified, Jules, whispers a little voice in my head. But I can’t seem to stop.
Last night I felt strong—clever, even. I escaped. I fought. I did something. But now everything feels awful and hopeless, like the adrenaline has drained out of me and left nothing behind but fear.
Is this it? Is this my life now?
One day ago I was an accountant with a crappy boss and a cat and a book club and a life that was mine. Now I’m stuck in Vampire Town…forever.
How does that happen? How does a person’s whole existence get ripped away in less than twenty-four hours?
“Shhh, my darling.” Lucian scoops me into his arms and settles on the side of the bed, rocking me like I weigh nothing. His arms tighten around me for a moment, solid and unyielding, the way they were last night when everything felt unreal and terrifying and strangely safe all at once.
“If you miss your pet that much, we’ll find a way to bring him over,” he promises quietly.
I sniff, wiping my nose with the sleeve of the robe, painfully aware that I’m crying into a vampire mafia lord’s chest like my life hasn’t completely derailed. “You… you can really do that?”
“Yes,” he says without hesitation, as though moving a cat between realms is no more complicated than ordering room service.
Then his tone shifts.
“In the meantime,” he adds, “I have a gift for you.”
He reaches into the inner pocket of his suit and pulls out something small and clear. At first it looks like a marble—smooth, perfectly round, catching the firelight in tiny, bright flashes.
“What’s that?” I ask, frowning as I scrub the remaining tears from my cheeks.
“Retribution,” Lucian rumbles. “Just watch.”
He murmurs a single word in a language that prickles along my skin, and the marble grows. It expands smoothly, silently, until it’s the size of a crystal ball, heavy and cold-looking in his hand.
Mist blooms inside it—gray at first, then darker, swirling faster and faster until shapes begin to form.
I lean forward, curious despite myself.
The image resolves into an apartment—a messy one. The kind of mess that screams single man who has never once considered buying a laundry hamper.
Empty beer bottles litter the floor. Pizza boxes are stacked haphazardly in one corner, grease stains bleeding through the cardboard. Clothes are strewn everywhere—jeans draped over the back of a chair…socks kicked under a table… a rumpled work shirt hanging half-off a lamp. The bed is unmade, and the exposed sheets are gray and twisted around a single, flat pillow, yellowed with age.
The place smells stale even through the crystal ball—like old sweat and cheap alcohol.
I frown because I don’t recognize the apartment. It certainly doesn’t belong to any of my Book Club friends—all of whom are single women who like to keep their living spaces clean and organized. But who would I know that would live like this?