Page 24 of Craving Carla

“Why do we always have to keep paying prices for peace?” I snap, my frustration boiling over. “That’s the problem—this entitlement that something must be paid for the bare minimum.” I scoff, adjusting my suit again, clearly annoyed. “We deserve all of it just as much as humans do. We shouldn’t be relegated to one space, one island, one ‘sanctuary’ while they get the entire world.”

I take a deep breath, trying to calm the rage that’s always simmering beneath the surface when I think about this. “I’ve seen this pattern before, Carla. After watching Granada fall, I traveled—across Europe, Africa, the Americas. I witnessed the horrors of chattel slavery, saw how white supremacy methodically stripped people of their humanity before putting them on display.”

My fists clench at my sides. “The tourist island is just a modern version of the same thing. Humans paying to gawk at us, treating us like attractions in a zoo while we perform our ‘tricks’ for their amusement. It’s the same dehumanizing dynamic, just dressed up as cultural exchange.”

I gesture back toward the island. “The supernaturals who participate—many don’t even realize they’re reinforcing the very system that oppresses them. They think getting a small piece of the pie means they’re accepted, when really they’re just being used.”

The breeze picks up, rustling the autumn leaves around us. “After what I witnessed during the slave trade, I swore I would never watch my people—supernaturals—endure anything similar. That’s why I built my coven the way I did. It’s not just a collection of vampires; it’s an army of the trusted and loyal.”

Carla’s eyes widen slightly, curiosity replacing some of the defensiveness. “An army?”

I nod, my voice lowering. “When I started the Medina Shadow Coven, I wasn’t just looking for bodies to fill ranks. I waslooking for warriors—people who understood what it meant to be marginalized, to be treated as less than.”

I think of Bobby, one of my most loyal soldiers. “One of my lieutenants, Bobby, I found him in Alabama in 1974. The KKK had strung him up, left him for dead because he was black and proud during the Black Panther movement. I found him in that alley, more dead than alive, and I offered him a choice—die as a victim or live as a predator.”

The memory is still vivid, even after all these decades. “He chose life. And in exchange, he pledged his immortality to our cause. Now he guards my office in Detroit, wearing a tailored suit instead of a black beret, but still carrying that revolutionary fire inside him.”

I pace along the shoreline, energy coursing through me. “That’s how I built my coven—finding those who society had discarded, those who understood injustice intimately. Victims of racism, sexism, homophobia, religious persecution. People who knew what it meant to be caged.”

I turn back to Carla. “We don’t just drink blood and throw parties. We systematically undermine the systems that oppress us. We infiltrate corporations, redirect wealth back to our communities, sabotage hate groups from within. Every vampire in my coven has a purpose beyond mere survival.”

My eyes lock with hers. “So when I look at Wintermoon, I don’t just see a beautiful sanctuary. I see the beginning of a pattern I’ve witnessed countless times before—marginalized groups accepting scraps of dignity while believing they’ve achieved equality. I see supernaturals performing for humans’ entertainment when they should be living as equals.”

My voice softens when I see her face shift to what seems like embarrassment, as if my words had gotten the best of her. She clears her throat and doesn’t meet my eyes.

“I don’t have the same privileges you have. I never have,” she says quietly. “This is actually my first time out of the shadows. So I guess you’re right. Two things can be right at the same time. Maybe Wintermoon is for people like me.”

I narrow my eyes at her, stepping closer. This is strange. I cannot detect the fated scent on her at all. Why would a supernatural be born without it? Is Fate returning our free will back to us, testing the waters? I surely hope not. I would prefer to have a woman made just for me. Why? Because I know I’m a whore of a man. I’ll fuck everything moving and never attach myself to anyone. I want to be claimed, owned by the woman designed just for me.

And why the fuck am I wishing it was this woman? This maddening, incredibly beautiful, feisty, voluptuous woman who smells exactly like I love my women to smell, her curves shaped exactly in the way that gets me wild every single fucking time.

Maybe I need to just fuck her hard one good time to bring myself to my senses. I feel like I’m being bewitched by this woman and she’s not even trying. That’s the maddening part. She’s drawing me in, and I can’t figure out how to shake it. It’s starting to piss me off.

“Why did Jax say that to you? Not getting on his boat with what ‘things’?” I ask, genuinely curious. Her expression shifts, a shadow passing over her face.

She sighs and looks at me. Her expression saddens and I hate it. “That’s why we’re here. And it kind of sucks because I’m starting to like you.”

I raise an eyebrow at that.Oh really?

I grin, feeling a surge of satisfaction. Looks like I’m closer to having that juicy ass on my face a lot sooner than I think. Hopefully tonight. I don’t like feeding on witches—their blood has a strange flavor, but it’s sustenance. I will forever be cursed with the thirst for blood.

Her words distract me, something she appears to easily do. Carla points ahead to the bridge.

“There’s a radical bar at the border. That’s where the problem is coming from. We can’t shut it down because it’s on human territory.”

My eyes drift over the bridge, King Amir’s Island, the Tourist Island, then down at the ground where I stand. Immediately, my mind shifts into assessment mode, calculating angles, distances, vulnerabilities.

“I can set up a network of sensors around the perimeter,” I say, stuffing my hands in my pockets and walking toward the bridge. “They’ll detect not just physical intrusion, but magical signatures as well. Anything trying to breach the border would trigger an alarm system.”

I point at the waters. “The lake itself can be monitored too. We’ve developed submersible drones that can detect both physical intrusion and magical tampering. They’re practically invisible—running on a completely silent propulsion system that mimics natural water currents.”

I pause, considering the specific threats they’ve been facing. “Each drone is equipped with an array of sensors that can detect both organic and inorganic materials, as well as magical signatures. They can differentiate between shifter, witch, vampire, and human energies. We can program them to alert only for specific threats—in this case, humans with radical markers.”

Moving to the edge of the land, I gesture broadly. “But the real breakthrough is what we could do with the ground itself. Imagine an invisible dome covering Wintermoon—not physically restricting, but functioning as a filtration system. It would specifically identify and reject humans carrying the radical scent.”

I kneel down, touching the soil with my fingertips. “We’d embed microscopic sensors throughout the border areas—in the soil, the trees, even the rocks. They communicate with each other and with a central AI system that learns and adapts to new threats. Anything that doesn’t belong gets flagged immediately.”

Standing again, I continue, warming to my subject. “The beauty of this system is its adaptability. Once it identifies a new type of threat, it automatically updates all connected sensors. If radicals develop a new weapon or method, the system will recognize the pattern after the first encounter and be prepared for the next attempt.”

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