My jaw dropped, which was a deeply humiliating reaction I hadn't displayed since I was eight and realized Santa wasn't real.
"Collect your—what?" I managed, my voice sounding strained and utterly inadequate against the rich, dark rumble of his. I should have been terrified. I was terrified. But mostly, I was annoyed that this insanely hot, red-eyed man was interrupting what was supposed to be a restful evening.
"The proposal," he repeated, his eyes not moving from mine, but somehow sweeping over the exposed skin of my chest and legs simultaneously. The heat in my core intensified, and it was taking every shred of my hard-won control not to slam the door in his face just to break the spell.
"Look, 'Lord Darius Dreymont'," I said, leaning casually against the door frame, forcing my expression into one of bored skepticism. "If this is some kind of elaborate college prank, it's garbage. And if you're trying to sell me a time-share, I'm Eighteen and broke. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have physics homework."
I made a move to close the door. It didn't budge.
He hadn't moved a visible muscle, but the massive weight of the door remained fixed and immovable. His gaze narrowed fractionally, and the air around us dropped ten degrees, instantly chilling the sweat drying on my back.
"I assure you, Miss English, this is neither a prank nor a common business transaction." His voice dropped, sounding less like an intimate caress and more like a threat whispered in a cold condemnation.
"I refer to the Marriage Contract. The one your great grandfather, Thomas English, signed four centuries ago."
My laugh this time was real. It was loud, sharp, and laced with disbelief. "A four-century-old contract? Did you drive here in a horse and carriage, or did your ancestors forget how the mail works?"
"The contract has come due," Darius stated, completely ignoring my humor. His crimson eyes flicked to my mother, who was still frozen by the flower arrangement in the kitchen, and then to the closed door of my father's study. "Your parents are aware of the obligation. They have been notified."
That stopped me cold. Not the ancient contract because that was still absurd but the fact that he seemed to know the layout of my house and knew exactly where both my parents were.
"Nomi! Back away from the door!"
My mother's voice, usually soft and melodious, was a tight, choked sound of pure, unadulterated fear. She stumbled back from the counter, dropping her precious roses uncaringly on the ground. Her guilt-stricken eyes darted between me and the horrifying man on our porch.
But I was trapped. Darius held me captive, not with chains, but with the terrifying, arresting power of his gaze. His red eyes were the only thing that mattered, demanding every shred of my attention, every shameful spike of adrenaline. He finally let the faintest of expressions cross his face. It was a slow, predatory curve of a smirk that was absolutely visceral, dark, and possessive. As he did, the soft pink of his lips parted just enough to reveal the startling white points of his upper canines, sharp and utterly wrong.
The sight of them, combined with the raw, unspoken promise in his eyes, sent a dizzying jolt through me. It was more than heat; it was a sudden, heavy flood of need that made my legs feel weak and my skin flush instantly. The moisture that sprang up low in my body felt like a sickening betrayal of my own fear. I was rooted to the tile, my tank top suddenly feeling like far too little fabric against the cold intensity radiating off him.
"NOMI, MOVE!" My mother shrieked, the sound finally piercing the haze of lust and terror.
I snapped out of it, scrambling backward from the doorway so fast I nearly tripped over the rug. Darius didn't move a millimeter to follow. He remained anchored to the threshold, a magnificent, terrifying obstacle. His eyes, however, stayed locked on mine, tracking my retreat as if calculating the precise velocity needed to catch me.
My mother grabbed my arm, her touch clammy and desperate. "Robert! Robert, get out here! He's here!" Her voice was shrill, terrified, cracking with the kind of primal panic I had never, ever heard from her. She pounded frantically on the study door. "Robert, they're taking her! He's come for Nomi!"
The study door opened with a slow, deliberate click. My father stepped out calmly, not even panicked by mom's terrified voice, just... resigned. He wasn't in his usual weekend sweater and slippers, either. He was wearing a suit. The good one. The one reserved for funerals, job interviews, and—apparently—apocalyptic family revelations.
My mom released me instantly, stumbling backward like the air had been punched out of her.
"Robert," she whispered. "Please."
He didn't look at her. His eyes went straight to Darius. And I swear to God, the quiet, polite cowardly man who used to freak out over misfiled taxes bowed. Not like a goofy half-nod either. No it was an actual, full, formal bow, shoulders squared, chin dipped low.
I blinked. "Dad? What the hell are you doing?"
Darius inclined his head in return, as if my father's submission was merely expected, not appreciated. The faintest trace of satisfaction ghosted over his lips. "Mr. English," he said smoothly. "I trust the terms have not been forgotten."
My dad straightened, his hands trembling. "We received your letter, Lord Dreymont. But she's only eighteen. Surely there's—"
"There is nothing 'surely,'" Darius interrupted, his tone flat, absolute. "The contract was written in blood. It binds through generations until fulfilled."
"Blood?" I said, my voice cracking into an incredulous laugh. "Okay, enough with the historical fanfiction. Whatever cult this is, you need to leave before I call the cops."
"Nomi—" my dad started, voice rough, pleading.
"No, Dad, seriously, what the fuck is happening?" I took a furious step toward the door, intending to push Darius off my porch and finally wake up from this nightmare.
Darius moved faster than humanly possible. One moment he was standing at the door and the next, his towering frame had breached the doorway, his arm snaking out like lightning. He didn't grab my arm or my shoulder. Instead, his freezing fingers curled around the back of my neck, right where that cold awareness had first struck me hours ago.
The shock was electric and total, shutting down my lungs and short-circuiting my rebellious fury. I gasped, the sound thin and useless. His proximity was a brutal, overpowering heat against the bone-deep cold of his touch. I could feel the powerful tension in his forearm, the expensive fabric of his suit jacket brushing against my exposed shoulder.
"The police are irrelevant in my world, Nomi," he murmured, his voice now right beside my ear, sending shivers—the bad kind, the good kind—down my spine. His breath was unnervingly cool against my damp hair. "And if you utter another curse in my presence, I will be forced to administer a far more physical lesson in etiquette than this."
The threat was explicit, dominating, and utterly erotic. My eyes instinctively fluttered shut under the pressure of his hand, and the heavy flush of shameful desire returned, overwhelming the rational fear screaming in my head. He felt utterly dangerous, yet my body was already betraying me, leaning into the contact.
He gave my neck a single, possessive squeeze, then released me as abruptly as he had seized me. I stumbled back, gasping for air, looking up into his demonic red eyes.
"Collect the dowry, Mr. English," Darius commanded, ignoring my existence entirely once I was out of his immediate grasp. "The proposal is accepted."
My father didn't argue. He just gave a small, defeated nod. "It's ready. In the safe."
I stared from my father, wearing his funeral suit, to my mother, sobbing quietly behind her hands, to the magnificent, terrifying man standing on my rug.
"You can't be serious," I whispered, shaking. "You can't just... let this crazy man into our home. You can't possibly be thinking of...giving me away.."
Darius finally spared me a quick, dismissive scan that lingered, possessive, on my exposed legs. "I am always serious, little runner. And as of this moment, you ceased being 'given away.' You are merely being reclaimed." He turned his attention back to my father, who was shuffling down the hall. "The hour is late. We leave within the quarter-hour."
My mother finally found her voice again, a desperate, broken plea. "But the sunlight, Lord Dreymont! It's still too bright!"
Darius tilted his head, a smooth, elegant motion that was completely chilling. "The sunlight is no longer a threat, Mrs. English. I travel as I please."
Sunlight? I was still grasping for straws. Maybe he was a billionaire eccentric with a rare skin disease? Maybe this was some elaborate, traumatic intervention orchestrated by my screwed-up parents? My brain stubbornly refused to accept the evidence in front of my eyes.
"You need to stop talking nonsense," I demanded, adrenaline finally mixing with fury. "Get out of my house right now before I call the emergency line. I'm eighteen. I don't belong to some four-hundred-year-old bullshit contract."
"You belong to me," Darius corrected, his voice hardening into an iron rod.
Before I could back up, he moved. Not with the impossible speed he'd shown moments earlier, but with a sudden, devastating shift in presence. He closed the remaining distance, his body slamming into mine, driving me backward until the small of my back hit the cool plaster of the wall with a painful thud.
His hands, still impossibly cold, shot out and clamped around my wrists, pinning my arms against my sides. I gasped, struggling uselessly against the vise of his grip, the desperate movement only increasing the friction and the shameful heat between us.
"This is not a negotiation, Nomi," he murmured, his gaze dropping to the rapid pulse point visible above my collarbone. His eyes glowed like embers, redder than ever. "Your human laws, your human whims, your human defiance... they are meaningless to my kind."
He wasn't acting. His proximity was suffocating, his strength utterly absolute. My furious resistance died in my throat, strangled by the raw power radiating off him. He was too fast, too cold, too strong to be just a man.
He leaned down, his lips brushing the shell of my ear, sending a deep, penetrating shiver through me. "Do you still believe this is a prank, little runner? A cult?"
Then, he forced the truth.
Darius pulled his head back just enough for me to see his face, and with a silent, terrible grace, he let the mask drop. I watched in frozen horror as his soft, pink lips curled back, receding from his gums. The white points of his upper canines didn't just appear.. No they elongated, sharpening into perfect, deadly spikes, catching the soft light of the chandelier and glittering like diamond daggers.
And as I stared at the monstrous, beautiful reality inches from my face, the absolute, cold truth finally crashed down on me, shattering my world into pieces.
"You're no human are you?" I whispered, the words trembling and thin. "You're a monster."
Darius smiled, a flash of pure, primal hunger that erased every ounce of his previous aristocratic pretense. He reached up, his thumb still tracing the line of my throat.
"I am Lord Darius Dreymont," he confirmed, his voice a low, terrifying growl. "And yes, little Nomi. I am the vampire who owns you."