Chapter 71

'You couldn't be serious down there,' I say softly as the doors slide closed and we headed up to our suites.

Nick stood silently beside me as the floors ticked by. The room had exploded with Ki yelling and Igor having to calm him down. Ki had looked murderous, but Igor was as cold as ever. Nick had explained that I needed to be able to go to the library in Kotowa as it truly was the oldest library in the world unlike Alexandria. The only loophole available was for me to marry either a Pureblood or high ranking A rank, which there were none. This had shocked me as he continued to explain his reasoning until finally it was agreed on.

Igor had left first and Ki seemed reluctant but soon followed after. I had sat in stunned silence through all of it. Thankfully, Nick never mentioned that I could walk in the daylight, even saying it was irrelevant to what we may have discovered. Now as the elevator moved higher, I ask again, 'You weren't serious down there, were you?'

'Wasn't my reasoning in the conference room clear?'

It had been, cold and clinical. There had been no profession of love, or even asking me if I wanted it. Looking up at this man, I find myself assessing him in the same clinical way he had explained his reasons for marriage to me. I was young, he wasn't. He was ancient in comparison to me. However, that age made him more experienced in life. Vampires didn't reach that age by accident. Most C rank made it to five hundred before they died at the hands of their elders, so I would be safe with a husband that was an ancient Pureblood. Just that single thought made my gut twist coldly.

The doors slide open and we step through. Reaching my door, I unlock it and open it slightly before stopping. Nick asks, 'What is it?'

'Why?'

'Why what?'

'Why me?'

He sighs and pushes the door open wider and murmurs, 'Let's talk inside.'

Stepping inside and sitting on the couch, I watch as he goes into the kitchenette and grabbed to glasses and a bottle of red wine from the fridge. He walks over and pours a glass for me and then for himself. I stare down at the liquid as he sits beside me, taking a sip of his own. My eyes slowly lift to his face and I see he is clenching his jaw.

Finally I break the awkward silence, brushing back a lock of blond hair, 'You don't have to do this out of sympathy.'

'I'm not.'

'You couldn't possibly love me,' I say with a snort even as my heart squeezed with hope at the possibility.

'Vampires don't marry for love, but prestige.'

This sobers me as I think about this and put my wine down on the coffe table. I had hoped he would confess that he had some feelings for me, but that was asking too much of a creature such as he. The only time that true, raw emotion had come on the country road with an eletric kiss.

If Nick married me he would gain nothing, no prestige. That's when another thought slammed into me and I jump to my feet, turn to him, and say forcefully, 'If you marry me you can't marry again. Vampires mate for life!'

Shaking to the core, I stare down at him in shock. Would he give up a chance to marry someone of his own status just like that?! Unless one of us died, we would be bonded for life, unable to break free. My heart burned with longing for him to look at me the way he had so long ago, but I knew just from how he wouldn't look at me now, it wasn't so. He had completely forgotten about me. This was a business transaction and suddenly black raging bitterness swelled in me.

Turning, I grab my wine and take it to the kitchen. Dumping the wine into the sink, I look up at him and say, 'I bring nothing to the table. I'm not even bitten. I can barely be called a vampire at that. So what if I'm a daywalker?! I am nothing in your society. Or is it the fact I'm now a rare bird that you look at me as a potential mate?'

Nick just stared at me, a flash of anger crossing his face at that final taunt, but still he sat there on the couch. Finally he stands, puts the glass against his lips, upends his glass, emptying its content, and walks towards me. I want to jump back as I'm blasted with pheremones that smelled of foreign spices. I couldn't explain and stare at him. He hands me the glass and says as I take it, 'I well know if we marry we will be blood bonded, unable to remarry while one lives. That is fine with me. I'm tired of being hunted by the A rank females that don't know when to stop. A Pureblood bachelor is rare, and one a few millenia old even more so. Yes, you are truly a rare bird, and have powers that when unleashed are terrifying, but it's not the reason I intend to marry you. We have a mutual hatred for the one who took our families away from us, you have a sharp mind, and it isn't so bad knowing I changed you into what you are.'

A small charming smile came to his face as I let go of the glass, shake my head and walk around the counter towards the windows. Looking out at Central Park, I felt hot with embarrassment and longing from my past. He was wrecking havoc on my senses, the smell of orange blossoms filling the air now. No, I couldn't let him know how much I loved him, the foreign man of my past who had changed my outlook on life. Wrapping my arms around my waist, I say, head down, 'You made it clear you are the last Dracul Pureblood. Any...'

A lump swelled in my throat just thinking about how clinically we spoke about this, feeling my breathing heavy and short. I hear him whisper right behind me, making the hairs raise on my neck, 'Any what?'

How had he gotten behind me without me noticing, but squeezing my eyes shut to ward off my feelings, 'Any ch-children we have will never be considered full-blooded Pureblood's, not even A rank. Your clan will never be great again.'

'I don't think any of them will for some time. But even so, I don't care about that.'

Suddenly my breath halts and my eyes snap open. Slowly I look up, seeing his reflection in the glasses face. He was staring right back at me. Holding my breath, I turn around and stare up at him. Those shattered blue eyes stare down at me, as I whisper, 'I'll be a laughing stock to your kind.'

'I don't care.'

I lick my lips, feeling suddenly jittery. He was too close and smelled too good. This wasn't right, I couldn't think. Looking at his chest, so as not to stare at those smoldering, and slightly darkening blue eyes, I stutter out, 'I..I..'

'Yes?'

The word was questioning, but had a smile in it as I whisper hoarsely, 'Why me?'

'Because, despite your fragility, you are strong willed, the fact you are a C rank that can defy me says as much. Unlike others, you question me... often. You are beautiful.'

My eyes jerks up to his as he brushes my hair away from my face and murmurs, 'What I said down in the conference room was technical and clinical. But there is more to being blood-bonded mates, there has to be a mutual connection, we have it. Just touching you feels like holding a live wire, and you can't drink anyone's blood but mine. You and I both want the same thing, the end of the Phantasma. I know your history and you will know mine soon enough. I never make decisions lightly and you need a connection to our world. I am that.'

My breathing was shaky, heart slamming in my chest. How could this be happening? He hadn't even trusted me yesterday, so why now? And not just that to marry me?! Why didn't that suddenly not matter anymore? Did he remember me now? So many questions bubbled forth in my mind, but one kept nagging at me and I ask, 'Do you love me?'

I can feel him staring at the crown of my head, his mouth lowers to my ear as he murmurs, 'I haven't considered myself the marrying type for centuries now, having come to believe it arciac, a pointless constitution that only frayed what which we consider a perfect romance. I considered love fragile, easily shattered and cold, but in fact it is warm, like a soft breeze by the seaside or the fire in the hearth. I have never known it, my life perpetually cold and darkened by power and greed. You, however, have shown me that it is stronger and more powerful than anything. I can't say that I love you yet... but I am coming to know of it, my strange and beautiful dutchess.'

Slowly I look up at him, my heart slamming at his words. His eyes were staring down at me, and slowly he puts his hands on my upperarm. We stare at each other, his hands warm and eletric on my skin. Finally I whisper, 'You never asked me.'

'Asked you?'

'To marry me.'

'Will you?'

Something inside me kept hesitating, even as I said, 'Yes.'

Slowly he takes my head in his hands and kisses me gently. It felt like molten lava spilled into me, warming the coldness inside, and any hestiation that still lingered.