⚠ Content Warning: This chapter contains themes of emotional vulnerability, coercive intimacy, and blood-related violence. Reader discretion is advised.
The kiss lingered in the air long after it ended. Not the taste. Not the heat.
The weight.
Something had cracked.
No—opened.
The silence that followed was louder than anything.
He didn't speak.
She didn't move.
And somehow, that frightened Nyra more than if he'd screamed.
Her thoughts spiraled.
What did I do? Why did I do that?
She couldn't answer herself.
She could still feel the outline of his lips on hers. Still feel his gaze crawling over her skin, tracing every uncertainty, every wound, every trembling nerve.
Darian hadn't looked away. Not once.
Not after the kiss. Not after the apology.
And now—he looked like a creature with his hunger finally unchained.
Eyes narrowed. Chest rising slowly.
Watching her.
Studying her.
Like prey.
Nyra's voice barely cracked the space between them. "I… I'm sorry."
Drunk. Drenched. Vulnerable.
She looked down, like a child who knew she'd done something wrong.
So innocent it made his fists curl.
Something about her innocence didn't soothe him.
It infuriated him.
He stood slowly, wordless. His fingers brushed the edge of her coat. She flinched—not from fear, but something rawer.
A heat that shouldn't have been there.
Darian leaned down, his breath grazing her cheek.
"You're not sorry," he murmured. "Not yet."
She didn't protest when he lifted her gently, not forcefully, but with control that didn't ask permission.
Didn't need to.
She let herself be led. Her mind unspooling into fog.
She followed him up the narrow hallway of the bar. Stumbling once. Then again.
He caught her. Every time.
Too easily.
Room 8.
Dimly lit. Smelled of dust and old smoke.
She stood in the center like she didn't know where her body belonged.
Then she turned—slow, almost mechanical—and looked at him.
That gaze again. Unsure if he would kiss her or kill her.
He stepped closer. One hand reached out, touched her waist. Just barely.
She sucked in a sharp breath.
Her head tilted back slightly.
That was all it took.
Darian kissed her.
This time, there was no hesitation.
It wasn't romantic.
It wasn't gentle.
It was wrong.
Each touch deliberate.
Each movement calculated, slow, suffocating.
His hands explored her body like reading a book he intended to burn afterward.
This wasn't real. It couldn't be.
We were in a bar, not a dream. Not a story.
He was touching me like I was glass, but I'd already been broken.
And maybe that's why I didn't stop him.
Because even shattered glass reflects something back.
His hand didn't wander. It pressed—lightly—against my ribs. The space under the bruise.
He didn't kiss me yet. He just stared. And it was worse than kissing.
My breath stuttered. My heartbeat didn't know what to do.
He moved a thumb to my collarbone. Nothing more.
It felt like he was marking me. Without ink. Without teeth. Just intention.
. He kissed the space there, then lower. Her waist. Her ribs. The inside of her wrist.
He kissed places no one had ever thought to kiss.
Not out of love.
But because he wanted to unravel her.
She tried to resist.
Whispered things—
"This isn't right…"
"I can't do this…"
He leaned in, lips brushing her ear. "Do you trust me?"
She didn't speak.
Couldn't.
She was breathless.
Her body betrayed her.
Not from lust.
From surrender.
Then—
He stopped.
He pulled back slowly. Looked down at her neck.
She didn't see the change in his eyes. But she felt it.
Like something ancient had taken hold inside him.
He lowered his mouth to her skin.
Paused—so slow, so quiet.
Then sank his teeth into her.
No warning.
No question.
Just the bite.
It was sharp. Yes. But there was something else.
Something worse.
It wasn't just pain.
It was being claimed.
Her back arched. Not in pleasure. In shock. In surrender.
The cold shot through her chest. Her breath hitched.
She wanted to scream—but her throat was locked.
And he—he fed.
Her blood wasn't warm. It was electric.
Old. Wild. Wrong.
It tasted like grief held too long and beauty never spoken aloud.
I drank like I could translate it.
But it translated me instead. He thought.
Greedy. Slow at first, then harsher.
Darian's eyes fluttered shut.
God, she tasted like fear and heartbreak and sweetness and ruin.
She was unlike anything he'd taken before.
He wanted to mark her. Turn her.
Like all the others.
A new one. Another night's memory.
But something went wrong.
He felt it first in his jaw—his mouth twitching, recoiling.
Then her body.
Rejecting.
Not physically.
Biologically. Spiritually. Completely.
Her blood turned cold under his tongue.
Bitter. Then searing.
Like her body knew what he was trying to do.
And it fought him.
It was rejection. Pure. Primal. Not hers—but her blood's. It had chosen.
He jerked back violently. Blood trailing from his mouth. His eyes wide, unnatural.
"What—what are you?" he hissed, breath ragged.
She didn't answer.
She couldn't.
I felt it all. Every inch of his mouth on my throat.
But it was deeper than that.
He was inside me. Not just drinking.
Searching.
I heard sounds. I think they were mine.
My body arched. My skin burned cold. My mind... disappeared.
Nyra collapsed.
Body limp. Mind unraveling.
She wasn't just unconscious.
She was spiritually severed.
Her last memory wasn't of pain.
Not even of fear.
But of his lips.
Of the kiss.
The need he left inside her.
Darian stood over her, fists clenched, veins rising beneath his skin.
He should've erased her.
Like he always did.
Take the memories. Wipe the night clean.
But he didn't.
She was limp in my arms. Her skin still warm.
Too warm.
I could take it all. Wipe her clean.
But I wanted her to remember the want. The kiss.
Not because I loved her.
Because I needed someone to know I was still real. He thought.
He let her remember.
Let her ache.
Not the bond. Not the truth.
Just the want.
The hunger that would never be satisfied.
And that…
That was enough to destroy them both.
He didn't just fail to claim her.
He doomed them both the moment he tried.