JENNIE

My bitten lip throbbed.

The pain spurred me onward until I was running blindly through the corridors, heedless of anything but the need to escape. Shadowy figures gazed on in amusement as I staggered from room to room like a lost child, but no one tried to stop me—not that they would dare. I was Lisa's 'pet,' after all.

Eventually, I found myself outside and the icy air—as startling as a slap to the face—snapped some clarity back into me. I inhaled deeply, desperate to regain my bearings.

Then I saw it.

As patiently as if this had been the plan all along, Lisa's vehicle idled in the driveway. The driver climbed out to hold open the door to the backseat, but I didn't waste any time contemplating the fact that she must have known all along what my answer to her little game would have been.

It didn't matter.

I was done being stubborn, through with being brave. I was perfectly content to huddle in the backseat and face the fact that I was a foolish idiot who'd finally been put in her place. Those four little words taunted me during the entire ride; this isn't a game.

For once, Kim manor was a beacon of safety that I couldn't enter fast enough. I stumbled up the front step, nearly tripping over the hem of my dress. Heedless of any servants who might have lingered after hours, I wrenched the red gown over my head and threw it onto the floor. Half-naked, I raced up the staircase clothed only in my underwear and heels. My room was a chilly, empty refuge that greeted me with darkness and dull furniture; safe, boring, mine.

This is where you belong, Jennie, I told myself as I wrenched off my heels one by one and tossed them into a corner. This is who you are.

I spotted my mother's hated nightgown resting over the edge of my bed and gratefully slipped it on over my head, fastening the buttons up to my chin.

On an impulse, I gathered up the other clothing scattered about as well—all those black garment bags from Mystic—and carried them down the hall. The first room I entered was my father's old study, complete with its very own fireplace, where I promptly tossed the lot of fabric.

She's wrong, you don't crave danger, I told myself as I scavenged a package of matches from the top of the mantle and struck one.

You don't like pain, I added as I allowed the match to fall over the topmost pale gray shift.

"I don't want her," I said out loud as I watched the clothing burn.

I tried not to care as every handmade garment smoldered, but when that last bit of silk finally disintegrated to ash, I didn't feel any less unsteady than I had staring down Lisa. In fact, as I curled up in a corner, I could almost hear her laughing at my pathetic attempts to erase her.

The sound of the doorknob turning jolted me awake. As my eyes flew open, I half-expected to find a pair of mocking, gray ones peeking through the crack: Did you think it would be so easy? Guess again, silly Jennie—you can't escape the Devil.

But rather than Lisa, another familiar face greeted me.

"Harper?" I yawned as I pulled myself upright. "Is something wrong?"

It wasn't like him to seek me out on his own without a specific reason; one that I figured had something to do with what he held in his hands.

"A call for you, Miss," he said as he offered me a silver tray, on top of which rested a slim, portable phone.

Warily, I took it and pressed the receiver to my ear. "Hello?"

"Jennie, God! Finally!"

I flinched at the bubbly, yet irritated tones. "Rosé?"

"Yes," my sister snapped. "Where the hell have you been? I've tried calling for at least two days!"

"I … I …"

As always, she didn't give me the chance to speak before launching into her real concern: herself. "Oh, it doesn't matter! I don't mean to sound like a brat, really, Jennie, I don't, but you did promise me that money days ago …"

The money.

Of course, she wouldn't be calling about my welfare or wondering as to the reasons behind my two-day absence. After all, I was dutiful, dowdy Jennie; what kind of life could I have possibly led outside the family's home?

"I'll have it sent today," I heard myself respond, cutting her off mid-sentence.

"Thank you." She sighed and the sound was as heavy as a gust of wind—relieved. Could she, perhaps, be in more trouble than just lacking funds to buy the newest, pretty sundress? "I'll be back in town on Thursday. I'll see you then, okay?"

She hung up before I even had the chance to say goodbye. Numb, I set the phone back onto the tray while Harper watched.

"I can take care of that for you, Miss, if you would like."

By now, of course, he knew the drill as to what any one of my sister's rare phone calls meant.

"Thank you." Suddenly exhausted, I sank down into a nearby chair and cradled my head in my hands. Mentally I counted the days from now until next Thursday: seven.

The coincidence had me shivering so violently that my teeth chattered.

What had Lisa told me again? Have your seven days …

"Are you all right?" Harper sounded concerned, but I brushed him off with a shrug.

"Fine. Would you mind terribly if you handled the transfer?" I knew that Mother and Father had used him to send Rosé her hush money before—but it still felt wrong, somehow. Poor Harper had already been shoved in the thick of one Kim drama too many.

But the man was dutiful to a fault.

"Of course, miss."

Grateful, I told him the amount, but right when he turned, heading for the door, something made me call him back. "Wait! I've changed my mind." A sudden thought appeared before me like a stabbing dagger; sharp, dangerous, irresistibly shiny …

Years of being 'good, dependable Jennie,' goaded me toward the rebellious plot like a moth to flame.

I want you, Lisa had said.

Liar. She merely wanted my checkbook; they all did. As Rosé had just reinforced, money was my only purpose. That bastard wasn't any different, and I would prove just how true that assessment really was.

I knew the idea was stupid—even as it formed most deliciously in my mind—and that I'd most likely end up injured in the end, broken.

But it wasn't like I had much left to lose. Nothing but my pride, life, and blood, of course ...

"I'll do it myself." My voice rang out, confidently clear as I tried to shake the doubts away. "In fact, I need to make a withdrawal."

I barged through the sleek glass doors of the office building, clutching a leather handbag to my chest and holding my head high.

For the first time in days, I wasn't wearing a flimsy shift or pretty fabrics. Instead, my outfit of choice would have done Mother proud: a brown tweed skirt and a sensible, emerald blouse. In other words, I looked like a nun on her day off, and I was damn proud of the fact—never again would I forget who or what I was: dependable, homely and safe Jennie Kim.

Whether she claimed to be the Devil or not, Lisa Manoban would never change me.

"Good morning," the blonde receptionist chirped as I marched past, but her cheerfulness soon turned to confusion when I headed straight for the elevator doors, rather than stop at the desk.

"Miss?"

Her voice followed me up twelve stories, but unfortunately I remembered the way without any need for direction. Like the remnants of some sick, twisted nightmare, every inch of this place seemed ingrained on my sub-consciousness.

When I finally reached that infamous corner office, I wasn't surprised to find her already there, dressed in a gray suit, intently studying a stack of paperwork. My, she certainly was dedicated to that 'doctor' rouse of hers.

I didn't think she even heard me come in until I slammed my bag down on her desk.

She glanced up and observed me with a pen still trapped between two fingers and a line of ink drying on a sheet of parchment. Her eyes honed in on mine, a dark, stormy gray completely devoid of emotion. Contrary to how I had envisioned her while planning this little rendezvous in my head, she didn't look shocked.

Not even when I proceeded to pull stack after stack of money from the depths of my bag and drop each one onto her desk.

"Five-hundred thousand dollars," I announced, laying down the final amount. "More than enough to settle our debt."

"Is that so?" Lisa sat back in her chair, lacing her hands behind her head, though she barely spared the money a passing glance. "I suppose it would be, if we were talking about some cheap piece of art or a limited edition copy of Pride and Prejudice."

There was no emotion in her voice. Those eyes perfectly displayed what she felt; uninterested, bored, un-amused.

"Even your soul has a heftier price tag," She added, while my simple grasp on the world imploded for the umpteenth time.

"B-But—"

"If absolution could be so easily bought with paper, then where would that leave me? You've sold your soul to the Devil, Jennie, and believe me …it is a long road to redemption from the pits of hell."

Something told me that she was no longer referring to our hand-written contract.

I opened my mouth to respond, but the words wouldn't come. In the end, I could only stand there, stunned, as she lifted each stack of bills, one by one and then proceeded to toss them all into the wastebasket. In the span of five seconds, a small fortune settled in amongst balls of crumpled paper.

"S-Stop!"

I knew that I was being ridiculous, even before I lurched forward to salvage the discarded bills. Silver eyes burned the back of my neck while I foolishly placed each one back onto the desk. When I finished, I stood, smoothing out the front of my skirt with shaking fingers.

"Why can't you just take the damn money?" I demanded in exasperation.

My own sister had no problem with using me as her personal ATM. What made her so damn different? My thoughts or feelings never mattered to anyone, just as long as I followed my usual routine.

Dependable Jennie.

Dutiful Jennie.

Stupid, predictable, Jennie.

Heaven forbid that I forget my place.

"All anyone ever wants from me is money," I insisted, painfully aware of how naïve I sounded.

Nevertheless Lisa humored me with a shrug. "Not everyone," she said. "Though, why should it matter? You're still clinging to your role of dowdy spinster, and as I recall, I've already sent you on your merry way. You're free."

Free.

Why was it so hard to breathe all of a sudden?

The word should have been my salvation—seven days was still enough time to draft a will and explain everything to Rosé. So why did it feel like my damnation instead? As I tried to imagine myself living out the rest of my days in Kim Manor, I only saw an endless, dark eternity.

"I have your contract," She added, as an afterthought before returning to her paperwork. "Though I won't bother enforcing it."

"E-Enforce?"

"In other words you are no longer my concern." She made me sound like a naughty child who'd been spanked into submission.

And suddenly, everything was crystal clear—her so called 'new bargain' had been a bluff; nothing more than a ploy to get me out of her hair once and for all. Apparently, even my money meant nothing to her in the long run.

"So why do any of this in the first place, if it doesn't even matter?" I demanded, furious though I had no clue as to why. "Why even offer me a contract at all and not someone like—" Somehow, I managed to stop myself before I could utter the name Roseann.

Regardless, those gray eyes narrowed, fathomlessly dark and I had enough sense to read the warning flashing through them. Watch yourself, Jennie.

"As I recall, I've told you what I wanted," she said in a tone that made me shiver. "You, without the charming, yet unattractive emotional baggage of a naïve, sheltered spinster. I want you to stop pretending, Jennie. I want the woman who climaxes whenever I sink my fangs into her throat."

My cheeks flamed. I sputtered. "How dare you—"

"Let us drop the pretense, shall we?" she stood, hands slamming down hard onto the desk, and leaned across it as if threatening to lunge for me right then and there. "Forget your Goddamned contract."

She reached into her pocket then, giving me the feeling that she had been prepared for this 'ambush' of mine all along. She withdrew the folded slip of paper, which I knew in my soul to be our 'renegotiated' agreement, an agreement that she promptly tore in half before tossing both slips of paper into the wastebasket.

"Do you understand now?" She all but growled, eyes burning in a way that made her resemble the infamous Lucifer more than ever. "I don't want the empty shell of Jennie Kim that you show the world—I want you, willing and bound to me by something more than a damn piece of paper."

"Bound?" I heard myself croak. How pathetic that it was the only thing I could think to say. "Why?"

She glowered, her beautiful face all but transformed into a snarl. "Shall I put it crassly so that you can understand? I want to be able to fuck you, and take your blood, and have you bend to my will, without you once being able to fall back on that damned contract as an excuse. I want you to submit to me, and only me, because you simply want to."

The world swam in and out of focus. Submit. Bound. Contract.

This wasn't about blood anymore, and I couldn't understand. Someone like her didn't desire women like me—at least, outside of the realm of possible food choices.

"Don't mock me," I hissed, voice shaking, convinced that this was some elaborate joke at my expense. "You could have any woman you wanted—"

"Oh, but I don't want any other woman," she snapped. "I want you. I'd be damned if I knew why."

The grudging sincerity in her tone sliced into my core, forcing me to submit to the truth—but I wouldn't, couldn't, when this frantic little voice at the back of my mind was screaming, she's lying! She's lying!

"You're being ridiculous."

If only she didn't look so damn serious. Her eyes obsidian, without a shred of amusement glimmering within their depths.

"Am, I now?" she sat back in her chair, her demeanor dismissive once again. She even lifted a hand to wave me off; sayonara.

"Then, I suppose we're done here. Go return to your Ms. Austen, Jennie—"

She froze at the sound of a brass button snapping loose to bounce across the floor.

So did I.

But my hands were at the collar of my blouse, shaking as they slowly undid another button, and then another …

What the hell was I doing?

This time, real surprise crossed Lisa's face. A greedy, childish part of me relished the way her eyes traced the growing triangle of bare flesh, wide and unnerved for once.

The reaction goaded me on. Clumsily, I continued to unhook my blouse one button at a time, never taking my eyes off her face. My hands were somewhere over my navel when she stood, eyes so fathomlessly dark they swallowed all the light like two black holes.

The temperature in the room plummeted as she surged forward like a true creature from hell. I jerked, and abruptly the two final buttons went flying. But Lisa only blew past me for the door, which she promptly slammed shut.

"Jennie—" I had never heard her sound so rough, and I knew without even having to turn around that her eyes would be that dangerous shade of silver. Wolfish. "I'm only going to ask you this once: why are you really here? Say it."

Don't listen, Jennie, my conscience whispered. You could still leave. The door's right there …

Regardless I glared at her empty chair as if it were a good enough substitute for the man herself.

"Why am I here?" I spoke while yanking my arms from the sleeves of my blouse. "I'm here because I would rather string myself up by my toes for your amusement than ever let you think that you have some kind of power over me. I am not afraid of you."

Liar, my inner voice hissed. You're shaking. You can barely stand up. Your heart is racing.

But, a tiny part of me wondered if that had anything at all to do with fear.

"I know—" Suddenly, she was speaking directly into my ear, body pressed against mine from behind. As I stiffened in shock, she took my blouse from my shaking hands and tossed it to the floor. "Jennie Kim, the woman who doesn't even fear death itself. What is a mere vampire in comparison?"

I couldn't tell if she was taunting me. Without warning, she shoved me toward the desk and I had no choice but to grab onto the edge of it or risk falling altogether.

Her palm thudded against the wood, as she came up behind me and reached across my shoulder to wrench open a drawer. From it, she withdrew what seemed to be a small, triangular object with a golden dragon embossed on the ebony casing. I gasped as she casually tapped the head of the emblem and a silver blade sprung from the tip, gleaming in the sunlight. A knife? I tensed, watching as she drew a thumb over the knife's edge, smearing a drop of her own surprisingly bright blood on the metal.

"Bend over."

"W-What?" My voice came out sounding tiny, weak and pathetic, but there was an edge to it that even I couldn't deny no matter how much I may have wanted to ...

Excitement.

"Don't question." With a hiss of irritation, she shoved me down herself, placing one hand on the small of my back. "Don't move."

Her voice was low with warning and I could only lay there, heart pounding as she brought the blade down, slicing through the side of my shoulder. I jerked in shock, but the pain wasn't as sharp as I would have expected. It stung briefly—a burning, fiery line—but before agony truly had the chance to flare, an icy chill smothered the heat, caressing …

Her tongue.

I knew without even having to turn around and see her there for myself, tasting me.

She swirled her tongue almost reverently around the wound once, as if to seal it, before her lips returned to my ear, imparting three, guttural words that made me tremble. "You are mine."

She slammed the knife down in front of me and I could only gape at my own blood streaking the silver.

"There is no contract, Jennie Kim," Lisa growled, drawing my attention back to her. "Make no mistake: there are no more easy outs. No more games. You are mine, body and soul."