Page 54 of Fanged Temptation

“Hunter,” Jordan hissed, catching the seething vamp before she could stumble to her knees again. “Calm down. This isn’t Maxine’s fault.”

“Not her fault!?” Hunter raged anew, grasping desperately to her anger so she wouldn’t have to feel anything else. Anger wasalways an easier emotion to handle than grief. “I knew we should have done this in San Francisco. I told you—all of you!”

“Then we’re all to blame,” Jordan murmured, tentatively touching a soothing hand to Hunter’s back. “Maxine did the best she could.”

“I don’t care about that. Addison isgone!” Hunter slapped her hand away, bracing her hands on her knees when her unsteady feet refused to obey. Her accusatory eyes returned to Maxine, brimming with vicious fury.

I edged closer to Maxine, quietly planting myself between her and Hunter and lifting my chin. Hunter could tear straight through me, even in her roughed-up state, but even so, I did my best to shield Maxine from the brunt of her angry gaze.

“It’s going to be okay.” Jordan approached Hunter cautiously, eventually looping an arm over her shoulders. “Addison is going to be okay. We just need a plan.”

I found myself nodding along. We just needed a plan. We needed a plan and then everything would be okay… right? So, what was the plan?

All eyes looked to Maxine and she stared back, folding her arms over her chest. “I–I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.”

A few minutes later Hunter and Jordan were frantically debating our next move. Their voices merged into a muffled roar in my ears as I prowled the edge of the deserted lot, scanning for Maxine. She’d slipped away a moment earlier, so quietly I hadn't noticed her departure.

It was only when I reached for her hand and found empty air that I realized she was gone.

A jolt of alarm shot through me when I finally spotted her near a broken metal fence, moving with quiet purpose toward the shadowy street beyond. She was limping slightly from her earlier injuries, shoulders bowed under a burden of guilt.

“Maxine!” I hissed, trying to keep my voice down. “Where the hell are you going?”

She paused, glancing over her shoulder, eyes widening at the sight of me. We converged at the rusted fence, incessant rain splattering mud around our ankles.

“Where are you going?” I asked again, though I could already guess the answer by the haunted look in her eyes.

“I–” She hesitated, a flicker of conflict crossing her face. “I have to fix this.”

I eyed her warily, half-expecting her to bolt like a spooked rabbit. “What are you going to do?”

The rain hammered down around us. Water dripped from Maxine’s hair, rivulets streaking down her cheeks. Rain, or tears, or both? I couldn’t tell—my own eyes stung with the same mixture of salt and sorrow.

Maxine stood before me, jaw set, her battered body trembling.

“I’m going to give myself up.” She tried to say it firmly, but I could hear the waver beneath the words.

My heart lurched. Anger and dread flared so fiercely I could barely breathe.

“No. No—you can’t do that to me again,” I hissed, stepping closer until our faces were inches apart, the rain plastering my hair against my forehead. “You can’t leave me again!”

Maxine swallowed hard, dropping her gaze. “If I don’t, Gregor will kill Addison. You saw what he did—he’s unstoppable. This is the only way to make him back off, to–”

“No!” My shout cracked in my throat as I seized her shoulders. A fresh wave of raindrops spattered down, trailing icyrivulets along the exposed skin of my arms. “Don’t you dare walk away from me again, Maxine. There has to be another way.”

“I wish there was.” She looked away, tears mingling with the rain on her lashes. “But Gregor’s obsessed. You don’t understand how deep it goes. Ever since my family forced a blood bond on us, he’s been fixated on me. He’ll stay that way until the day he dies.”

I froze, dread wrapping cold fingers around my spine. “Blood bond?”

She nodded, something like shame crossing her features.

“When my parents arranged our marriage, they performed this ritual—mixing our blood with a muttered spell.” Thunder rumbled overhead, matching the anxious thrum in her words. “They said it would bind us so we’d always want each other, no matter what. And if one of us found our real mate—the person whose soul calls to yours—the blood bond would keep the marriage from falling apart. It was meant to override any actual feelings of love, to forge an artificial attachment.”

A ragged breath escaped her. “That’s why Gregor is hellbent on getting me back. But… the spell—it never worked on me.”

My grip on her shoulders tightened. “Why not?”

Maxine’s lips trembled. She closed her eyes briefly, rain tracing dark paths along her cheeks. “I never understood—until now.”

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