All Chapters of A Vampiric Kiss : Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

12Isabella. The walk into town was exactly what I needed, mostly because I didn’t trust myself not to overthin if I stayed cooped up in tbat cottage any longer. After the dream, the rose, the woods and that constant feeling of being watched, my braid had become a very noisy, unsupervised room filled with broken records. I was going crazy. I could feel it.The air was crisp and the ground was damp from last night’s storm. My boots squelched against the path and I found comfort in that sound. There was nothing mysterious about mud, at least.Willow Creek’s Main Street peeked through the trees, the view giving something out of a postcard. The buildings were old but charming. Ivy-covered brick, mismatched paint, warm little signs in hand-lettered fonts. Sienna’s apothecary sat on the corner, half-swallowed in flowering vines and herbs hanging in bundles outside the windows. The bell above the door gave its familiar jingle as I stepped in.Today, smelled like rosemary and sage and someth

14Isabella. I was distracted. I’d been lying to myself tbat I wasn’t thinking about Noah, tbat I was just restless and that my fingers just itched to type because it’s been too long since I actually did that.But as mentioned earlier, tbat was just a blatant lie. The truth was I couldn’t stop thinking about the way he looked at me yesterday like he wanted something and had hated himself for it. Or maybe hated me for pulling it out of him. I didn’t want to tell Sienna about that yet, so I did what I always do when I feel too much. I opened my laptop, made some tea I wouldn’t finish, and sat on the couch like I was about to perform surgery on my soul.The cursor blinking, waiting for me to type. I cracked my knuckles. “Let’s write something hot, shall we?” I murmured in a try to motivate myself. That wasn’t going well, but whatever.Tonight my characters were supposed to be having sex. Eva and Lucas.But really, I was writing myself and Noah. I began typing, my fingers skimming over m

16Isabella. I woke up with the sun on my face and Noah’s arm still wrapped around my waist.That realization alone was enough to make my brain short-circuit. It was not a dream. It was not one of my too-real fantasies where I woke up alone, frustrated and vaguely ashamed. No, this was real. His body was warm, his breath soft against the back of my neck, and his hand just resting beneath my ribs.I didn’t move first. I didn’t want it. I was afraid tbat if I did, he’d vanish. But eventually, I shifted just slightly, and he stirred.“Morning,” I whispered.He didn’t answer, instead he hummed in approval and then his lips brushed my shoulder.I sucked in a breath. He pulled me closer, nibbling and sucking and biting down on my lips. I pressed my palm to his chest and felt his heartbet matching mine.“Are you sure?” he murmured, his voice hoarse.“Yes,” I breathed, without hesitation.He rolled on top of me, his body settling between my thighs. His eyes searched mine one last time, check

1Noah. The blood was still warm when it hit the back of my throat.It wasn’t enough. It never was, but it quieted the edge and dulled the sharpness humming beneath my skin.The deer’s body collapsed soundlessly into the snow-flecked leaves, its eyes already glassed over. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and stepped away from it, breath shallow and lungs burning with guilt.Feeding was supposed to satisfy the instinct. The craving. The hunger that had been clawing at me since the morning I left her bed.But nothing about this felt satisfying.I hadn’t needed to feed this early. I could’ve waited. But the taste of her skin, the pulse in her throat, the way her warmth soaked into me, that had stirred something darker. Something I’d spent decades repressing.So now I was here, snarling into the woods like an animal, punishing myself on a cold morning with blood that didn’t belong to her.I staggered back against a tree, heart pounding.It hadn’t always been this way.The first t

20Isabella. I was standing on a red carpet. My feet were bare. Cameras flashed, blinding and endless, though I couldn’t see the people holding them. All I saw was her.Nadia.She wore a crown made of glittering silver. Her dress was blood red and perfectly tailored to her stolen curves. She looked down at me with that familiar tilt of her chin, like she was always three steps ahead. “I told you,” she said, grinning. “You were never meant to win.”People clapped. I looked around. My manuscript pages fell from the sky like confetti, catching in my hair and sticking to my arms. But they weren’t blank. They were bleeding. Ink ran down the lines like open wounds.“You stole—” I started, but my throat closed up.All that came out from my mouth was a gasp. She leaned in, the crown casting shadows across her face. “Maybe if you’d been stronger, smarter, better.”Then she laughed wickedly. And I screamed.***I shot upright in bed, drenched in sweat, with my heart hammering so hard it drown