“Even in hell, you make it beautiful.”
I stay there like a total idiot, unsure what to say or what I’m suddenly feeling when I look at him. It’s different. Something about us is different now from what it’s ever been. Maybe because Austin isn’t here, maybe because we have been through the trauma, we both understand. Whatever it is, something has changed.
Arlo realises he isn’t going to get a reply and nods his head to the door. “Let’s go. Hopefully, the vamp prince can cook.”
“He lives alone. No humans here but us, so likely he can,” I reply, thankful that the subject has been changed. I glance down at Arlo’s bare feet after he follows me out of the room. “And maybe we should ask for shoes for you.”
“One step at a time. We both already owe him,” Arlo mutters. “And I know vampires enough to know they won’t ever forget a debt.”
“Did you ever imagine there was a world like this? Vampires? Witches? Sirens?” I ask as we slowly find our way to the top of the staircase.
“No, and I wish the fuckers had stayed in the books and films where they belong,” he growls out before walking down the stairs. Every step is filled with anger, it’s bursting out of him, and I don’t know how to fix whatever is going on in his head. But I have a sneaking suspicion the sooner he is away from vampires, the better.
Chapter Twenty
“This way,” Reign commands, waiting for us at the bottom of the staircase. The prince of the vampires looks nothing but moody at best, lethal at worst, as he turns around. Arlo doesn’t look back, but his shoulders tense as I step off the bottom step to his side. Like Arlo is being dragged, he follows Reign around the glass staircase and to the back of the property, which is one large room with one hell of a view. A large crescent-shaped room is pure glass on the one side, looking over the sea from its place on the cliff, and the sun is setting slowly in the distance, bursting lights across the blue sky.
Right in the middle of the room is a dining table for four, with a dark green runner spread across the table and steaming food on plates in the middle. The rest of the room is plain, nothing more than a white piano on one side of the room and several doors leading off. Reign sits on one side of the table, and I sit with Arlo on the other. There are four pieces of steaming salmon on a gold plate, a bowl of vegetables, and a bowl of sweet potatoes.
“Thank you for cooking. It all looks good.”
He inclines his head but doesn’t say a word, even when my stomach rumbles aloud. We serve ourselves, and I try to pretend Reign doesn’t have a glass of blood as a drink, a big difference to the glass of water I have. The salmon is amazing, and it doesn’t take me long to eat everything before I place my knife and fork down.
“The kitchen is behind me through that door.” He points at the door for me. “Do not let yourself go hungry, you may help yourself.”
“Why are you so fucking nice?” Arlo cuts in. “She won’t fuck you, you know that?”
I cringe at his blunt statement. Reign slowly looks at Arlo. “I am aware my kind has impacted your judgment of us, but we are all the same. Yes, we are dangerous. Yes, we need blood to survive, and humans are our food source, but we are not all cruel.”
Arlo, who hasn’t touched a bit of his food, stands up. He sneers. “Yes, you all are.”
“Arlo—” I try to reach out for him, but he dodges my touch and walks away, heading up the stairs. I awkwardly sit back, looking at the bottom of the stairs like Arlo is going to come back. I am well aware he is not going to.
“The damaged need time to heal.”
I turn back to Reign, watching the casual prince. “Why do you have such a modern home? Why do you have so much respect for human life while your brother has none?”
Reign purposely picks up his drink and takes a long sip. “Who says I have respect for human life?”
“It’s clear you do,” I counter. “Tell me why.”
He sighs. “My mother was taken from the stealers, not born on this island. She was a brilliant and kind woman, who loved humans even when she was turned into a d’vampire by my father before he mated her. She taught me to respect human life because we are not that different from them. I remember those ten years I had with her vividly. But Maddox never had that, she died within a year of his birth.”
That makes a lot of sense. Maddox only had a grieving family to bring him up.
“And your father? What was his opinion?”
He sighs. “Humans were food, end of. Maddox is more like my father than I am.”
I turn my head to the side slightly. “Can I ask how your mother died? And your father, the king?”
His hand tightens on the glass. “I’m sure if you ask anyone, they will tell you, so it might as well be me.” He pauses and takes another drink, this time his bottom lip is coated in red blood, which he licks away. “My father only ever wanted one heir, me, and that’s why he named me Reign, but my mother wanted more children. For vampires and d’vampires to become pregnant, they need a potion made by sirens and blessed by witches, and she took one—unknown to her, a witch had placed a curse on it. See, my father hid all the potions, making sure that he would need to be asked for a vampire to have a child and therefore always being in control of the vampires.”
“Can vampires or d’vampires not have children with humans?” I question when he leans back in his seat, pausing his explanation.
“No, that is impossible and never has happened as far as I am aware,” he explains. “Back to my story. The second Maddox was born, my mother got sick, the curse was simple and effective. A year of pain and suffering, which built up and took her mind in the end. The everlasting curse, it is called, and it attached itself to Maddox for him to bear one day, when he falls in love.”
“I don’t understand. Will the curse kill him like your mother?” I question with a frown.
“No, the witch who cast the curse claimed it would kill the woman he loves, and that’s why Maddox never lets anyone close. It is why you must choose to come here at the end of all this. Even if you have to lie and say you are in love with me,” he coldly tells me, his voice empty of emotion. “The curse will kill anyone who loves him if he loves them back. And no one should die the way my mother did. No one.”
I believe him.
“Is the witch dead?” I ask.
He smiles. “Yes.”
One word but, damn, it scares me down to my bones. I dread knowing what was done to her, but she clearly deserved it. We drift into dead silence, and another question burns into my mind.
“Why did the witch curse your mother and brother?”
Reign crosses his arms and looks out over the sea. “That, we have never known. The witch never said why she did it, no matter how much she was tortured. We never found a cure or a way to end the curse either. I will find a way, somehow.”
“You look for a cure?” I ask. “For your brother?”
Reign looks down at the table. “No one deserves the death my mother bore. No one, especially not my brother.”
I stare at him, realising for the first time that he loves his brother. They don’t hate each other, not one little bit. I gulp and drink some water just before someone knocks on the door. I jump in my seat, confused at who might be here when Reign made it clear he likes to be alone. Reign looks even more confused.