Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 72056 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72056 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
No. I don’t buy it. I don’t buy my father’s explanation at all.
I’m far from the only strong and assertive woman in Las Vegas, yet Rogan was drawn to me. Only me.
My father knows more than he’s saying, and now that I’ve chosen to renounce my vampire blood, I’ll get no more of an explanation from him. It’s a waste of time to try.
“All right,” I say. “Tell me what I need to do to break the blood tie to you.”
“You can’t do it here. We have to go to Chicago. To my office.”
“For God’s sake. Are you kidding me?”
“No, Hannah, I’m not kidding you. You’ll have to cut yourself with the sacred blade, and I didn’t bother bringing it with me here to Las Vegas.”
“Can’t you...consecrate another blade or something?”
He shakes his head. “You really know nothing of your vampire side, do you?”
“I never wanted to. Knowing I had to be at your beck and call is enough.”
“All vampires are at my beck and call, Hannah. Did you ever stop to think why I choose you for such important tasks?”
“Yeah. To punish me. To drive me insane.”
He shakes his head again. “I choose you because you’re the smartest person I know. You have the intelligence of your mother and you have my shrewdness and cunning. And Hannah, there’s something else you’re forgetting.”
“I’m forgetting nothing, Dad. I want out.”
“You’ve made that clear, and I won’t stop you. But you realize, then, that when I die, the council will take your sister as monarch to the Brotherhood.”
A brick hits my gut, knocks the breath from me. “What?”
“What did you think? That the vampire heir could leave to join the enemy and there would be no consequences?”
Oh God Oh God Oh God.
No. Just no.
“Why? Why didn’t you make that clear when you said I could renounce my blood?”
“It would have been made clear to you in Chicago, during the ritual.”
He has me. He has me and he knows it.
I won’t forsake my sister.
But I won’t forsake Rogan either.
Blood. Blood versus mate. Blood versus love. Sister versus mate. Sister versus lover.
Where does my loyalty lie? I thought it lay with Rogan, but now...Larissa...
A choice no longer exists for me.
My father knew I still had a choice when I uttered those words only seconds ago.
I close my eyes, try to clear my mind...
And then I'm falling...
Falling...
Into nothingness.
43
Lover or sister?
Sister or lover?
Can I live with myself if I condemn my little sister to the vampire life? She doesn’t even carry the blood gene.
Falling.
Still falling...
I love Victor Rogan. I can’t deny it. He says I’m his mate, but does he love me? He’s never said it.
I never wanted to be that woman—the woman who needs to hear those three damned words. That’s not me. That’s not Hannah Bates.
When did I stop being Hannah Bates and start being Rogan’s woman?
Rogan’s mate?
So much I still don’t know. He says he killed those vamps to protect me—only he didn’t know me at the time. He knew only that they threatened his mate, and at that time, he didn’t know I was his mate.
I was his mate.
Isn’t it bizarre that he’s the first alpha wolf to claim a non-lycan mate? And isn’t it also bizarre that only a small percentage of wolves still claim mates? And Victor Rogan just happened to claim me, the heiress to the vampire throne?
And now...we’re going to war with the wolves.
No.
No, no, no.
I’m in love with him. But...
Damn.
This can’t be happening.
“Hannah...”
My father’s voice.
I open my eyes and stare into his—into his eyes that are so like mine. I’m him in female form—dark hair, dark eyes. I look nothing like my mother and sister.
“How, Dad? How could Larissa take my place? She doesn’t have the gene.”
“She doesn’t need the gene. She carries my blood. She’s my younger daughter, second in line to the vampire throne.”
“But...without the gene, she can’t use mind control, she doesn’t crave blood.”
“That could be a strength.”
“Yes, in that she’s not driven by it, but she also won’t have the strength it gives us.”
“Hannah,” he says, “none of this has to happen, because you can still change your mind.”
Part of me already has changed my mind. I had no choice but to be thrust into this life. My genes gave me no choice. But Larissa... She can escape this altogether.
And I have to make sure she does. I can’t condemn her to this.
“Do you still want to know how to renounce your ties to me?” he asks.
I stay silent for a second. Then, “Would it change my genes? Would I no longer crave blood?”
He chuckles. “We’re powerful people, Hannah, but we don’t have the technology to manipulate genes. Not yet, anyway.”
“Not yet?”
“Our vampire scientists are on the cutting edge of some revolutionary findings. We’re looking at gene therapy, and so far we’re ahead of human scientists. We’ve achieved some amazing results just in the last few months.”