Chapter 16 - Daniela

Maybe I have lost my mind. It’s about the only thing that makes sense. Why else would I say Khalid is mine? I don’t want a mate! I’ve never wanted a mate. I’ve been alive for seventy-nine years and have only loved once and realized that it wasn’t even real love, just teenage hormones. I’ve had plenty of lovers since I was turned but never considered claiming them.

I wouldn’t even mark Byron, and he was my longest relationship. I made him a vampire as he wanted, but when he pushed to be my mate, to mark him and be marked by him, that was a line I wouldn’t cross. I didn’t trust him to remain with me. I didn’t trust him to be faithful, especially as we are immortal. It was the breaking point of our relationship. The night he tried to mark me by force, I left him paralyzed in a pool of his drool from my psychic attack was the death knell.

Yet here I am, without thinking it through, claiming Khalid in front of Tulio and his nest. That’s a lot of witnesses to take it back. I don’t know wha