Dark Seduction (Vampire Royals of New York #2) - Sarah Piper Page 0,83

I broke off the relationship, acting as if I’d simply grown bored of her. I was cruel and terrible to her, but I knew she had a much better chance of surviving a broken heart than surviving the trauma my earlier confession had inflicted upon her.”

“Dorian, I… I don’t know what to say.”

“There are no words, Charlotte. Believe me, I’ve tried them all, and none of them ever make it any better.” He downed the last of his scotch, then headed back to the bar.

The next part of the story was the worst, and they both needed another drink.

He grabbed the bottle and topped off her glass, then returned to his chair, trading his empty glass for what remained in the bottle.

“It was my fault Rosalind died. I’d allowed her to get involved in something I should’ve dealt with long before—something I never should’ve brought to our doorstep in the first place. And then, when it mattered most, I failed to protect her. That is a vampire’s sworn oath to his bonded witch, Charlotte. Protection. Other than our blood, it’s the most precious gift we offer.

“Rosalind’s family had been bonded to our line for generations, but when they learned what had happened, they immediately broke their alliance—and rightfully so. Word travelled fast throughout the witch and mage community, and the once esteemed House Redthorne became overnight pariahs. Almost at once, the spells and enchantments Rosalind’s family had imbued in us—everything that allowed us to walk in the daylight and live essentially as humans—began to fade. My father and brothers found ways to cope, but I… I didn’t handle it well. Something inside me broke, and I just…”

Dorian took a long pull from the bottle, welcoming the burn. Across from him, he felt Charlotte shiver and shift in her chair, but he didn’t dare look at her again. He couldn’t. Not now. Not for this.

“No longer kept in balance by Rosalind’s magic,” he said, “unwilling or unable to consider alternatives, I began to revert to a vampire’s natural state.”

“Like the grays?” she asked, and Dorian nodded.

“The bloodlust quickly overwhelmed me. I flew into a murderous rage. Like a rabid animal, I tore my way through the city, slaughtering scores of innocents. I hunted them. I killed them. I didn’t feel anything—only blood and death. That was my life. I cared for nothing—no one. Not my family. Not my duty. Not even myself. The more lives I devoured, the worse I felt, yet I couldn’t stop. It was like something had taken possession of me, consuming a bit more of my soul with each passing day. The emptiness, Charlotte… It was like… like I died again every day.

“One by one, my father and brothers turned their backs on me and left—all but Aiden. No matter how ruthless and terrible I’d become, he never gave up on me.” Dorian took another swig of Scotch. “One night, after a particularly barbaric weekend, Aiden tracked me down—bloody hell, he quite literally fished me out of a dumpster, into which I’d stumbled hours earlier after killing four innocent college students out for a pub crawl. I was delirious from the blood overdose, but somehow, he managed to get me back to Ravenswood. I hardly recognized my own home, Charlotte. Hardly recognized my best friend. I was vicious and cruel to him, yet still, he remained by my side through all of it. He brought me back from the brink, and simply refused to let me fall again. To this day, I don’t know how the hell he did it.”

Dorian closed his eyes and shook his head. Those days… The recovery… It was the darkest time in his life. He barely remembered them, each one blurring into the next, a haze of hunger and pain and shame so hot and intense he’d feared it would incinerate him.

“What you found,” he said now, his voice thick with that old, familiar shame, “was the record of my rampage.” He finally met her eyes, bracing himself for the inevitable fear. The revulsion. The end. “I’m the Crimson City Devil, Charlotte. Never caught, never prosecuted, never punished. But guilty just the same.”

“And… and the names in your notebook?” she asked, her voice a broken whisper, her eyes shining in the firelight. “They’re all…”

Dorian tipped back the last of the scotch, then set the empty bottle on the table beside him. “They are the descendants of the one hundred and forty-nine innocent people I slaughtered. Every last one I’ve managed to track