A/N: *waves white flag* I'm sorry, I know I left you all over a cliff there!

I want to give a Happy Birthday shout out to lovemesomedanilalol.

Disclaimer: I own nothing

He keeps his hand wrapped around my throat but does not change his grip. I breath comes out in uneven pants, tears streaming down my face, waiting for him to end it all. But he doesn't - he just keeps his hand there.

Roza.

My eyes flutter open and are blurry with the tears that are gathering in them. There is no ice in his eyes now, and he looks down at me with uncertainty. He loosens his grip on my face and neck, and I sink to the floor with a whimper.

The floodgates open, and I shuffle away from him, sobbing uncontrollably and curling into myself, wrapping my arms around myself. I can feel Dimitri kneel in front of me, I suck in a shaky breath, not daring to look at him.

"Roza," he whispers, placing a hand on my arm and I flinch away from him.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry," I whisper over and over, choking on my tears.

Rose. Look at me, please.

I gingerly raise my head to look at him, my lip trembling in fear. He raises a hand to my face slowly, and I flinch again when he caresses my cheek.

"I'm sorry," I whisper again. He frowns and wipes his thumb under my eye, catching the tears that stain my cheeks.

"I know. It's ok," he whispers, shuffling to wrap his arms around me. I press my face into his chest and close my eyes again, trying to calm myself down. He rocks us gently, shushing me and kissing the side of my head.

I can not only feel Dimitri around me physically but mentally. There is a hum in the back of my mind, like the bond with Lissa.

"What about the wolves?" he whispers. I pull up to look at him, wiping my face with my hands.

"What?"

"When I came back into the room, you were thinking about wolves. Why?" he says, moving to sit on the floor and pulls me into his lap. I rest my head against his chest, closing my eyes and breathing him in.

"My favourite subject at the academy was Animal Behavior. When an outsider or member of a pack attacks the Alpha and fails, the Alpha will kill them. I was just waiting for you to kill me," I whisper. He sits silently, running his hands over my arms and nuzzling my hair.

I pull myself out of his arms and drag myself to my feet unsteadily. He stands as well, taking a step closer to me, and I move away slightly, watching disappointment flash through his eyes. I don't want to fear him, but I'm terrified of what I feel instead.

You don't need to be scared of me. I am not going to hurt you.

"You can hear me?" I ask, tucking my hair behind my ears.

"Yes, I can feel you too. More than usual."

I nod and run my hands through my hair, letting out another deep breath. What is going on? Dimitri cautiously comes closer, wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling me to him. Cupping my chin with tenderness and tilting my face up to his. He leans down and brushes his lips against mine.

"You are just as much of an Alpha as I am," he says, pressing kisses to my lips and running his thumb across my jaw.

I press my lips firmly against his, cupping his face in my hands and standing on my tiptoes to be closer to him.

"I'm sure Dominic thought you were going to kill me," I say, pulling away to breathe. Dimitri shakes his head and rests his forehead on mine.

"He does. He gave me this whole spiel about how you were trying to kill me and that he felt I should be the one to take you out for it. But the moment I felt your fear escalate and you started crying, I knew something was wrong. I can hear you pleading to me in my head and I pushed in, looking through your thoughts. I heard you tell me you love me," he says, caressing my neck with the back of his fingers.

"We're changing," I whisper. The thought of that makes me uneasy. Why are we changing, and how much can we change?

Kicking snow off our shoes, we walk through the lobby of the estate towards the living room to meet with the rest of our team. Seeing Dominic standing in the corner with his arms crossed, I can feel anger building up inside and I shift to stalk towards him, but Dimitri grabs my hand.

"I'm surprised to see you around," Dominic says snidely, uncrossing his arms and moving towards the couch to stare me down.

"Knock it off," Dimitri snaps. He moves towards one of the chairs and sits gracefully, pulling me down into his lap and visibly running his nose over the curve of my neck, glaring at Dominic. Dominic rolls his eyes before moving to lean against the mantel of the fireplace. "We need to discuss how to advance on our next target."

"Yes, you explained you had a list. Who all is on this list?" Ivan asks, setting his tumbler down on the table and resting his ankle on his opposite knee.

"Natasha Ozera, Adrian Ivashkov, and Randall Ivashkov have already been crossed off our list. We have two more people out there and two people we plan to visit. Our next target happens to be another Ivashkov – Tatiana Ivashkov." I explain and take over. "Our final target is my dear old friend Lissa. The two of them are going to be much more difficult to reach because of their statuses."

"How was an Ivashkov Lord, the favourite great-nephew of the Queen – an easier target than the final Dragomir?" Ivan asks, shaking his head and giving me smirk.

"Adrian had a habit of visiting strip clubs and brothels. It was easy enough to sneak in and switch places with one of the girls," I say with a shrug.

"You dressed like a prostitute?" Delilah chirps, giving me a skeptical look.

"Not exactly, I just wore a costume for all of twenty minutes. Nobody saw me besides Dimitri and Adrian," I snip back at her, narrowing my eyes at her.

The others in the room watch our stare down with interest, Ivan smirking at me while Dominic throws me hateful glances.

"Back to the topic. How are we going to get to Tatiana?" Dimitri says, stirring the conversation back to the main point. Dimitri moves his hand to my thigh and squeezes gently. "But you did look sexy in that little getup," he whispers into my ear, nipping the shell of my ear as well.

I smirk and wiggle a little in his lap, turning to kiss his cheek and stand up, walking to the liquor cabinet and pulling out a bottle of gin and a glass.

I can feel multiple sets of eyes on me and smirk to myself when I can tell that the ones with the hungry gaze are Dimitri's.

Comrade, if you keep staring at my ass, we are going to have a problem.

I turn around to see a smile cross his face before glancing over at Ivan, who has an equally hungry gaze on me, more importantly on my chest, and he lets out a huff.

"We may be best to wait until she leaves court, she may have more security, but she will be out in the open. We may have to wait longer, but she does trip all over the world in the year and transport doesn't always have wards," I say, leaning back against the cabinet, sipping my gin slowly.

"I thought we supposed be pursuing our targets, not waiting for them to fall into our laps," Delilah says, standing up and putting her hands on her hips.

"We cannot ambush her at court; it's too risky. We need to think before acting. If not, we get slaughtered," Ivan pipes up, rolling his eyes at her. Delilah is seriously getting on my nerves.

We spend the next few hours discussing plans and strategy on getting closer to Tatiana, but we agree - well, everyone but Delilah – that we would wait until she travelled.

Swallowing harshly, I rub my neck as hunger creeps up again. Even though I fed on Dimitri longer than we do for pleasure, I haven't had a meal in a few days, and I am starting to really feel the pangs in my stomach and throat.

"Are you ok?" Dimitri asks as we walk out of the main room, Ivan and Dominic, a few paces behind us.

"I need to feed. I haven't fed in a few days, that's what happened earlier," I whisper. Dimitri nods placing a hand on my back and rubbing soothingly.

"Do you want me to come with you."

I shake my head. After what happened earlier, I do not want him anywhere near me when I feed next.

"No, I'm just going to go out and feed quickly. I'll be back soon," I say reaching up on my tiptoes to kiss him and heading towards the door.

Finding a meal was easy, and after draining two people to be safe, I sigh and hide the bodies before heading back towards the house. I can sense footsteps behind me and I pay more attention to the person behind me, listening to their breathing.

Spinning around when they could within arm's reach, I find Ivan walking behind me.

"I know."

I scoff and tilt my head, shoving my hands in the pockets of my jeans.

"Know what?" I ask, kicking some snow with the toe of my boot. There are a thousand things he could be talking about, but there is only one thing I hope he doesn't know about.

"Don't act stupid, Rose, it doesn't suit you. I know about the two of you feeding on each other. I know that it makes you feel things, and that you can see into each other's minds while feeding," Ivan says stepping closer, his chest brushing against mine, leaning down into my face.

"You're joking, right? You sound insane," I say with more bravado than I feel.

"Oh, come on. I can see when I look at the two of you, and I'm surprised the others haven't noticed it yet. You are good at hiding it, but I know Dimitri," he exclaims, his breath fanning over my face as he throws his hands out to the side.

I step back from him and proceed towards the house, but Ivan reaches forward and yanks my arm, spinning me towards him.

"Don't walk away from me. You two need to be better at hiding this shit. And you know to figure out why it is happening," Ivan snaps and I punch him square in the jaw on instinct.

"Don't you dare lecture me! You think I don't know this!" I scream shaking my head and stalking away from him. Screw you.

Ripping my coat off as I slam the door, I stalk through the house to the kitchen and pull out a bottle of vodka from the cupboard and taking a swing from the bottle.

Hopping up on the counter, I pull my phone out and dial a number.

"You do know it's five in the morning, right?" Abe grumbles through the phone and I take another swing from the bottle.

"I need your help," I whisper. I can hear rustling on the other end of the phone and a clicking noise.

"Rose?" Abe says, sounding less asleep than he did a moment ago.

"Something is happening to us… we are changing. I need your help to figure it out why," I say quietly, and I can hear the uncertainty clear in my voice.

"What is happening?" he asks, and I can hear him opening drawers.

Explaining in detail what has been happening for both of us, he asks more questions and promises that he will get back to me as soon as possible.

Locking my phone and setting it back down on the counter, I drink again from the bottle and sigh deeply. Hearing Dimitri walk into the kitchen behind me, I set the bottle down beside me.

"Ivan knows,"

Dimitri moves in front of me, cupping my face and stepping between my legs to get closer to me.

"Knows what?" he asks.

"About us. The feedings, the feelings, seeing into each other's minds. He confronted me about it, told me we need to be more careful," I reply, leaning into his touch. He sighs and kisses me softly, twisting his hand into my hair and holding my gently.

"We'll figure this out," Dimitri says against my lips. I nod and peck his lips again, wrapping my legs around his hips and place my arms around his neck.

Rubbing my nose against his, I smile and play with the hair at the back of his neck. "I love you," I whisper with a small smile, embracing the feeling blooming in my chest that was dormant for so long.

"I love you too, Roza," he says pulling me closer to him. "It feels good to say that and mean it."

I giggle and lick his bottom lip, moving my hands down his back and dragging my nails to make him shiver.

"I think we should go upstairs," I giggle against his mouth and he picks me up to carry me. Reaching our bedroom, he sets me down on my feet and I fist his shirt in my hands, walking him back towards the wall.

Pushing him towards the wall with a saucy smile, I stalk towards him but my smile falters when instead of moving towards the wall, I pushed him closer to the curtained window.

I let out a gasp and lunge to pull him out of the wall as he stumbles back into the window, yanking the curtain down.

"NO!" I scream, shooting towards him to pull him out of the sun, not caring about the pain I am about to feel. Crashing into his body, he wraps his arms around me to try and cover me with his own.

But there is no sting, no burning or pain. Looking up at him slowly, I breathe heavily as we stand together in a pool of morning sunlight, unharmed.

"It-it doesn't burn," I whisper in awe. He nods and we both of us start to laugh. Cupping my face with a large smile, he turns the both of us towards the bay window and I rest my face on his chest and bask in the warmth of the sun.

"I forgot what it feels like – the sun," Dimitri whispers and I hum against his chest. Looking up to him, I lean up and kiss the underside of his jaw.

"Hey, we both could use a tan," I chirp, and he laughs again, his hearty and deep laugh that I feel in love with all those months ago. Smiling down at me, he moves his hands to the hem of my shirt and pulling it up over my head.

Looking down at me with adoration, he runs his fingertips over the exposed skin of my chest making me shiver. He moves to brush my hair over my shoulder and dips his head to place a kiss on my shoulder.

"You're beautiful. I miss the lovely tan of your skin and the smile that you always had when you had a moment in the sun," he murmurs into my skin, breathing deeply as he kisses across my shoulder to the curve of my neck.

And for the rest of the day, we stayed in that patch of sunlight, making love and laying curled together, reminiscing about our memories of being in the sun before being awakened.

For a few hours, we felt like we were different people. We felt like we were in our own world where there was no such thing as an ancient race of vampire, we were just Roza and Comrade.