Chapter 2

Shouting erupted down the hallway.

“Get the physician! Now! Something’s wrong — if anything happens to her, it’s on all of you!”

Someone hammered on my door so hard the frame shook. “Lord — the east wing. Vivienne’s in pain. She’s bleeding. You need to come. Now.”

Alaric was gone before the word “bleeding” finished.

He pushed me aside on his way out. He didn’t mean to — he just forgot how strong he was. My back hit the edge of the bed frame, and the impact knocked the air out of my lungs.

He didn’t look back. He was already through the door, moving faster than I could track — the curtain lifted, then settled. “Get the physician. Take my car. Go.”

The door slammed.

The room went dead quiet. Just the hum of the wiring in the chandelier overhead.

And her perfume. Still hanging in the air.

I grabbed the bed frame and lowered myself to the floor, waiting for the pain to pass.

Rose found me there. She didn’t ask questions. She helped me up, braced me against the mattress, and pressed carefully along the bruise forming on my back. Her hands were calm.

“Don’t cry, Maren.”

I paused. Was I crying? I touched my face. Wet.

I let out a short laugh. My throat was raw. “Help me change. I should go check on her.”

Rose’s hands stopped. “Now? After what just—”

“Especially now,” I said. “If I don’t show up, Elaine will have something to say about it tomorrow.”

The east wing was on the opposite side of the estate. Getting there meant walking the full length of the portrait gallery — three hundred years of Ashford lords staring down from the walls in the dark. I walked past every one of them on my way to pay my respects to the woman who was replacing me.

Vivienne’s door was open. Light and voices spilled into the hallway.

I stopped in the shadow outside.

She was curled up in Alaric’s arms, face tilted up, pale, trembling. The trembling was perfect — just enough to seem fragile, not enough to mess up her hair.

“I didn’t mean to scare you.” Her voice came out thin and shaky. “It doesn’t really hurt that much. I just — I got so scared. I kept thinking, now that I’m pregnant, you’ve done your duty, and you’ll stop coming to see me. You’ll go back to her and forget about me.”

“I don’t know why I think like that. Don’t be mad. I just needed to see you. I can’t stand it when you’re not here.”

The physician was packing up his instruments, head down. Everyone else in the room was pretending to be invisible.

Alaric held her, one hand resting on her belly, light, careful.

“You’re carrying my child. I’m not going anywhere,” he said. “Don’t scare me like that again.”

“This baby is the firstborn heir of House Ashford. I need to know you’re both safe before I leave.”

“Feel.” She pressed his hand down harder. “The baby knows you’re here. The physician says purebloods can sense their father.”

The physician didn’t look up.

I stepped back. Then another step. The dark of the gallery swallowed me again.

Nobody noticed one fewer person at the door. Nobody had noticed one more.

I stood against the gallery wall for a long time with my head tipped back.

Three hundred years of Ashford lords looked down at me. Not one of them gave a damn.

My eyes burned. I didn’t let the tears come.

I’m a Hartley. My father is General Hartley — the highest-ranking human commander in the Border Alliance. Half the treaty between humans and vampires was negotiated at his table.

Alaric and I grew up together. Later, my father planned to marry me off to a young officer in his command — good family, good prospects. Alaric found out.

He showed up at the Hartley gate and got on his knees. Three nights straight. Out at sunset, back into the shade at dawn, then out again the next evening. Same spot. The steward went out to talk sense into him. He didn’t move. My father sent men to dump water on him. He didn’t move.

On the third night, my parents opened the door.

He begged them to let him have me. Swore he’d love me and only me, for as long as he lived. No other woman. Ever.

They said yes. Before leaving for the border, my father looked Alaric in the eye and said: “We won’t be around. Maren is in your hands. She’s not to suffer.”

Alaric said, “General, if I ever let Maren down, may I never again be loved by anyone I care about. My life is immortal. That’s how seriously I take this.”

Those words were less than three years old.

And he’d broken every single one. He’d given his body to another woman. Given her a child. And called it duty.

I stared at the gap in the curtains. There should’ve been moonlight out there, but in this house, even moonlight got rationed.

He’d given his body, his blood, and his child to another woman. Fine. She could have him. I was done being kissed by a man who still tasted like someone else.

I sat under the lamp all night. Didn’t move.

At the first gray light of dawn, I opened the encrypted channel my father had set up for me and sent one message. Five words.

“Ready. Waiting on the date.”

The confirmation came back. My heartbeat slowed. For the first time in three years, I felt like I could actually sleep.