Page 4 of Love Bites

“You—” he began, but I turned to my sister. Avery was beside me, her expression dark and worried. She was one of my four sisters, and though we weren’t related by blood, we were family through and through.

“I have to go. Thanks for this.” I gestured between me and Damian as I tried to slide off his lap.

His hand pressed harder against my lower back, holding me in place even though he released my hair. “I can’t?—”

Avery grabbed my glass of peppermint water off the countertop and splashed it at him.

I took his moment of surprise to push his hand away from me, and she helped tug me off his lap.

Adrenaline pumped through me as we threw ourselves into the crowd, letting the heights of the magical men conceal us from my blue-eyed meal. We were just as fast as vampires when we’d been fed, so he wouldn’t catch us if we didn’t let him.

But no one could run through a crowd of magical beings. Too many of them would be triggered by the urge to chase.

The satisfaction of not being hungry anymore was enough to put a smile on my face. And for once, I didn’t regret feeding on someone.

Damian was… well, delicious.

“Everyone else is in the car already,” Avery called to me, as we finally emerged from the crowd.

“How bad was it?”

She grimaced. The flashing lights above us highlighted her olive skin and long, dark brown hair, but all I really noticed was the worry in her eyes. “Bad.”

I didn’t ask anything else.

I’d find out soon enough.

And though I was worried about my sister, Damian’s magic somehow seemed to be lingering in my system. I felt like everything was going to be okay, even though logically I knew that probably wasn’t the case.

That didn’t make sense, so I chalked it up to not feeling hungry for the first time in a month, and moved on.

We had bigger problems than the vampire who had fed me.

two

BLAIR

The other girlshad our minivan waiting on the curb just outside the club. We got in quickly, and Izzy peeled away from the building.

“What happened?” I asked, turning on the seat to look at my sisters in the back. Clementine’s eyes were watering, her pale skin flushed, and her red hair flattened around her face. Zora was hugging her fiercely, though her tan skin was almost as pale as Clem’s. Her curly, cinnamon-colored hair was up in a bun.

And despite my question, I knew the answer as soon as I saw them.

Because on the center of Clementine’s neck, there was a big, bold mating mark.

Starting a mate bond was easy.

Really easy.

All it took was a brush of your hand to someone’s neck, a little spike of magic, and a three-word declaration.

You are mine.

Unless the magic user envisioned a prettier marking, the default one that appeared was a thick, navy-blue stripe that circled your neck like a magical choker. It felt like a new tattoo, barely raised from the skin, but there was no way to remove it.

If the bond wasn’t reciprocated, it would disappear—after an entire year. If it was, the blue turned black and became permanent.

Mating was our society’s version of marriage, but the magical connection was much more than a vow and a signature.

---