“I can safely swear that was at the very bottom of my list,” Victor dryly admitted. “I’ve never heard of a Jinn sharing his power with anyone, let alone a vampire.”
Uriel flinched at the memory of the white-hot pain that had drilled into his chest, spreading through his body like an infection.
“At the time I didn’t know what the hell he was doing. I assumed I was about to meet my well deserved end.” His lips twisted with a bitter smile. “Imagine my surprise when the bastard simply disappeared, leaving me with a pretty new tattoo.”
“Did he say anything?”
“He said . . .” Uriel hesitated, bracing himself for Victor’s response. There was the potential that his chief would consider the secrets he’d kept hidden worthy of a death sentence. Not the most comforting thought. “He said that I was to be ‘the instrument of his revenge’.”
Victor’s brows snapped together, his power slamming through the room with frigid force. Uriel hissed, struggling to keep his own powers leashed. The potential for violence quivered in the air, just waiting for the smallest provocation to erupt.
Uriel didn’t intend to be that provocation.
“Why didn’t you tell me what happened?” Victor growled.
“You had just rescued your new mate from the gaping jaws of death,” he reminded his chief. “You didn’t leave your private lair for over a month.”
Victor’s aristocratic features briefly softened. Like Pavlov’s dog, Uriel wryly acknowledged. Victor might be a fierce clan chief who enforced his laws with a brutal strength, but he melted at the mention of his mate.
“Ah yes,” the ancient vampire murmured. “Now that was a month to remember.”
Uriel refused to acknowledge his stab of envy.
What was the point?
Many of his fellow vampires joked that becoming mated was a fate worse than death (at least until they became mated themselves) but Uriel had secretly longed for the day when he would meet the female destined to stand at his side for all eternity.
Until he’d been cursed by the Jinn.