“Enraged beyond belief.”
“Stop doing that,” Ronan complained, this time sipping from the highball glass. “You feel alive. Invigorated. Like you could conquer the world and defeat your enemies with a single blow. I know how you feel, Mikhail,” he said, low. “And it is not enraged.”
Ronan was an eager fool.
Michael continued to pace, his frustration mounting with each carefully placed step. Already the distance between him and the human was too great to track her, and with the rising sun he risked the chance that the distance would grow greater still. Ronan’s elation would be short-lived once he discovered the female—and the source of Michael’s resurging power—had disappeared into the night thanks to his untimely interruption.#p#分页标题#e#
A tethering with a human was unheard of. Would Ronan even believe it if he told him? Michael wasn’t sure he believed it himself. “Gone,” he said, interrupting his own train of thought this time. “The female is gone.”
Ronan gave an unconcerned shrug. “How hard can a dhampir female be to track once you’ve shared blood? Besides, maybe you spooked her with your”—Ronan waved his hand up and down—“dark prince vibe. Once she calms down, she’ll come sprinting back to you.”
Insufferable. Ronan rambled on, about what Michael had no idea. He pinched the bridge of his nose, eyes squeezed shut. Had Amy been a dhampir, she might have recognized the tethering for what it was and stayed by his side. It was Michael who let her run. Let her slip through his fingers. His own confusion and shock had gotten the better of him. He’d let Ronan distract him. Let the dhampirs overtake him. And it was a choice that soured his stomach with regret.
The memory of her, soft in his arms, full lips parted as sweet gasps of pleasure brushed his face, assaulted his mind and Michael’s eyes flew open only to find Ronan staring once again. He quirked a brow, his single set of short fangs protruding from a cocky smile. “You’ve been resurrected, my friend.”
Understatement of the millennium. Michael didn’t know how much of tonight’s events he should divulge to Ronan. It wouldn’t be fair to give the male—any of them, really—false hope. Especially if there was no chance of the race’s grand return like Ronan imagined. Even now Michael couldn’t make sense of what had happened. The human whore had given him sustenance, encouraged his heart to beat as fresh blood did every time he fed. But the other woman—Amy—she had performed the true miracle. Her mere presence had returned his soul to him and just a taste of her blood had awakened his power. He craved her more with each passing moment. How could his soul possibly be tethered to a human’s?
“Seriously, what’s got you so riled?” Ronan let out an overdramatic sigh and pondered the amber liquid as he swirled the crystal tumbler in his grasp. He took another sip and pinned Michael with a stern look. “You act as though you’ve been handed your death sentence.”
Like a sword thrust to his friend’s chest, Michael’s words were sharp as he cut deep. “The female was human. Not dhampir. I am not resurrected. I am lost. We are lost.” She is lost.
“Not dhampir?” Ronan repeated the words as though they were incomprehensible. “That’s impossible. I felt your power. Feel it still. A human’s blood could have never—”
“And yet, she did.” Michael didn’t understand why or how, but it had happened nonetheless.
“Okay,” Ronan said cautiously. “So she’s human. It’s weird, but whatever.” Beneath his overpriced designer clothes was a strong male, a male worthy of Michael’s bite. But no dhampir had been turned in over two centuries, and without the continued strength the female’s blood had given him Michael could never risk Ronan’s life by trying to turn him. He would remain a dhampir, never knowing his true birthright. “She could be a mermaid for all I care. She’s changed you. All of us. That’s all that matters.”
“You think so?” Michael asked. A dhampir would have been easy to track thanks to the blood bond that linked them all, but once the human female put enough distance between her and Michael tracking became problematic. “And how do you suggest I go about finding this … mermaid?” She might as well have been a fucking unicorn. The possibility of being tethered by a human was as much the stuff of mythology.#p#分页标题#e#
“You can’t sense her,” Ronan said as the realization struck. He sat for a quiet moment and Michael could almost hear the gears cranking in the other male’s head. “But you can still feel her.”