Page 66 of Illusory

Trusting Dominic, I nodded again and watched as Gabriel stalked over to the prison cell door with the keys in hand and unlocked it. My heart thumped wildly against my ribcage as he pulled the steel-bar door wide open and then stood back and waited, his arms poised at his sides and ready.

My gaze darted across the cell to Trace as I hugged my waist nervously and waited to see what he would do—waited to be near him again without the spelled bars between us. And then my stomach dropped as I realized he still hadn’t taken a single step toward the now open door. Toward his freedom. All he did was stand there and stare at me through the bars as though he was just as scared to be near me as I was.

Dominic clicked his tongue and then spun around and sauntered over to where I had cemented myself. He picked up my hand and then walked me over to the middle of the room—mere feet away from Trace. I glanced up at him from under my lashes and then gasped as the mesmerizing blue of his iris’ became swallowed by the blackness of the instant hunger at the sight of me.

“Care to join us now?” asked Dominic, smirking at the sight of Trace’s famished gaze.

Trace shook his head, still not moving an inch despite his feral eyes telling an entirely different story. It was clear to methen that he was at war with himself. At war with his own nature. The torment and confusion were written all over his face and my heart ached for him.

He didn’t want to feel this way. He didn’t want to crave my blood or risk hurting me. But this was who he was now, a Revenant, and fighting against it would only make him suffer longer. And I didn’t want Trace to suffer. Not now and not ever. I needed to help him. I needed to find a way to make this better for him. To make it easier on him. To somehow lessen his torment.

“Trace…” His name sounded so small and meek on my lips, but it was enough to capture his full attention. “It’s okay. I…I trust you.”

His jaw muscle throbbed as he shook his head again, his pupils dilating erratically with hunger. “I don’t trust myself. I don’t want to hurt you again,” he said, wincing as though his memories were causing him actual bodily harm.

As much as I had wanted to give him time and space to process this change, to keep away from him as he had asked me to, Dominicwasright. Denying the incessant cravings was akin to denying his own nature and that was only going to prolong his pain and suffering and make this transition harder and longer than it needed to be.

If my blood was what he needed—what he wanted—then I would happily open every vein in my body for him. “I promise I’ll be fine,” I said and then tried to smile at him, to reassure him that I was okay with it. “Dominic and Gabriel will make sure you don’t go too far.”

A look of repulsion distorted his features at my words, and I recoiled, instantly wanting to cower from the look on his face that made me shrivel with shame. I didn’t make it very far though as Dominic stopped me from stepping back and kept me rooted beside him.

Keep going, said Dominic to my mind as though he thought this was going well. As though he knew something that I didn’t.

But I couldn’t.

I didn’t know how to keep going when he was looking at me with such visceral disgust, like I had offended him somehow. Like I was the vilest creature that ever lived.

Then again, I supposed he wouldn’t have been that far off from the truth. I shook my head and whispered, “I just want to help you.”

Trace made an angry sound at the back of his throat, and I fought hard against the urge to rear back again. “You shouldn’t have to do that,” he said, his expression still twisted with anger. “You shouldn’t have to sacrifice yourself to me. I should be able to control myself enough tonothurt you!”

“You aren’t going to hurt her, Romeo.”

“You don’t fucking know that!” roared Trace, unwilling to take the risk. “You can’t know that.”

“But I do,” answered Dominic, his mouth curling into a mischievous grin as though he were playing an entirely different game than the rest of us were. “You aren’t putting her out,” he said and then dropped his voice when he continued, “In fact, I promise you she’s going to enjoy every second of it.”

White-hot fire exploded in my chest and then rushed up into my cheeks to color them with a blaring scarlet letter for all three of them to see. I shifted uncomfortably, wanting to suddenly run away from the entire situation, including myself and my sick vampire kinks, and then it dawned on me.

“Is…is that the reason you’ve been pushing me away?” I asked softly, unsure. “Because you’re scared to hurt me?”

“Ididhurt you,” he said through clenched teeth. “What I did was fucking disgusting.”

Everything finally made sense. The anger Trace had been feeling…the disgust. It wasn’t for me. It was for himself. For the fact that he craved my blood, that he’d attacked me, that he couldn’t control himself around me when everything inside of him was telling him that he should be able to. All this time, it was about him, and that…thatwas so much fucking worse.

I looked up at him and studied him. His tense jaw and pursed lips. His tightknit brows and white knuckles. His eyes filled with regret and shame. Everything was clear to me in that instant, and I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen it sooner.

He saw himself as the predator—the perpetrator—and me as the victim. That even now, standing here and offering myself up to him, I was somehow making a terrible sacrifice in order to satiate him. That I was doing him some kind of favor by being there.

“You didn’t hurt me, Trace. I promise you didn’t. Dominic is telling you the truth. Your bite…it’s not meant to hurt. It never hurts. It—” I paused and took a small step toward him, leaving Dominic behind me. “It feels good.”

His brows drew together, barely perceptible as he searched my eyes for deception, but he wouldn’t find any. What I had said was the truth. There was damn near nothing as exhilarating and enjoyable as a Revenant’s bite. He needed to know that, if for no other reason than to quell the guilt inside of him.

“I want you to,” I went on, my voice sounding far more needy and sultry than I had intended it to.

At my admission, his death-hold grip on the bars loosened and he straightened to his full height. He met my eyes for a brief second and then he was gone, disappearing from my sight as though he had only ever been a figment of my imagination. As though I had hallucinated him into existence.

Panicked, I turned to look at Dominic for answers, and inan instant, Trace was behind me, his hand on my shoulder as he turned me around to face him. I gasped in surprise and Gabriel immediately shoved forward, ready as always to take a bullet for me.

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