Page 6 of Roman

But sometimes he just wanted his mom. He wanted her to hug him, toknowhim.

Danny was starting to worry he’d passed the point of her ever recognizing him again. He just wished he’d known the last time had been the very last one.

He would have savored every second of it.

If tears streaked down his cheeks on the drive home, there wasn’t anyone around to see them.

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Roman

Romansuckedonhispilfered blood bag—cold, tasteless, garbage—and tried to keep himself and his demon from spiraling.

What in God’s name had just happened?

He hadn’t even meant to stop in this charmless mountain town. He’d meant to keep driving south for hours longer, possiblydayslonger, before pausing even for blood. But he’d passed by that tiny little hospital and felt suddenly that hehadto stop.

His demon had practically put his foot on the brakes for him.

Roman normally stuck to larger hospitals when he went the blood bag route for his feedings. More people coming in and out, fewer people stopping to notice a new face, fewer to have to compel to forgetfulness. But apparently his rules were out the window. And he’d felt it as soon as he’d stepped inside.

A presence. A scent. Like warm milk with honey.

And, following that scent, he’d found the boy.

A young man somewhere in his early twenties. Practically an infant compared to Roman.

Big brown eyes, messy brown hair, a smattering of freckles across his nose.

Lovely.

Even with the dark shadows under his eyes and his skin a shade or two paler than natural.

The pull Roman had felt had been so strong he’d assumed the boy must beother. Not like him, clearly, but surely not just human. He’d been so nonplussed he hadn’t even put on his normal, charming human act.

He’d acted like a creep.

But young Danny wasn’t anythingother, was he? He was just a boy. A simple human man. One with a smart mouth and a smile that could take someone’s breath away.

Not just boy, his demon snarled at him.Notjustanything. Special. Perfect. Ours.

Right.

There was another word for what this boy could be—for what he could be to Roman, to his demon. But it was a word Roman hadn’t believed in for decades.

One he refused to believe in any longer.

This obsession must be just another symptom of his demon becoming more and more unhinged. It had been a trying few years. Every feeding becoming more fraught, his demon constantly restless and demandingmore. More violence, more fear, more sex. Moreanythingto keep it entertained, keep it sated.

Each time, it was harder to stop a feeding from going too far. Harder to keep from killing.

So he’d been sticking to blood bags. But the lack of a hunt just made the demon angrier. And now Roman was afraid to switch back to live bodies. Afraid he’d been depriving his demon for so long that the first taste of fresh blood would lead to a massacre. Afraid that this time, he wouldn’t be able to stop.

And, most of all, afraid he wouldn’t even care.

It was what happened to their kind in the end, after all. Complete disconnection from their humanity. A feral state. Lord knew how Soren had evaded it all this time. Luc certainly hadn’t been so lucky.

Fucking Lucien.

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