Taken by a Vampire (Vampire Queen) - By Joey W. Hill Page 0,104

the mountain. “You don’t have to spare my feelings, Niall. I know what will happen when the Council kills Stephen.” Clearing her throat, she added, “Though I want them to achieve their objectives, I hope the wedding happens before then. I’ve never been to one.”

Carrying their empty picnic basket, she disappeared inside. Niall stared after her.

“Does it even matter to her?”

“Of course it does.” Evan sighed. “She’s been trained to accept a vampire’s will without question. Her life can be taken for no other reason than her Master desires it so, and she accepts that.”

“Bollocks,” Niall snapped. “She’s afraid. I can feel it, every time she lets herself feel.”

So could Evan. He knew it fought to take hold of her every waking moment, but she wouldn’t let it. “Her training ensures that every unpleasant emotion can be controlled. She treats her fear as an insult to her submission, her total acceptance that the Council dictates whether she lives or dies.”

“And ye have no problem with that?” Niall gave him an incredulous look.

“Vampires are what vampires are, Niall.” Evan set his jaw. “But training alone can’t make a person stand fast on a battlefield where they know they’ll be cut down. Honor and courage are required. Training only works if strength and integrity are already part of the mold.”

Niall met his gaze. “This isn’t about that.”

“The way a man—or woman—sees the world, is all about who they are, Niall.”

“She expected something different from her life. You made her admit it.”

“Yes, but one admission won’t change a lifetime of conditioning.” Evan lifted a brow at Niall’s sour expression. “First you criticize me for pulling her out of that shell. Now you’re full of moral outrage over the shell itself. Make up your mind, Niall.”

As the vampire turned toward the cabin, Niall stared at his unyielding back. Damn him. He was at the end of his life, and aye, he had a normal man’s anxiety about what happened in the hereafter, but she’d barely had a life at all. Twenty-nine years old. Bloody, fucking vampires.

He wasn’t ready to go into the house. He’d get a drink from the well, maybe chop some more wood. Instead, he pivoted and kicked the picnic table. The force of the blow was enough to flip it, and to bring Evan to a halt. Niall clenched his fists at the cool gray gaze that was judging, assessing. Waiting.

“She was a vampire’s ideal little Barbie doll. The moment she wasnae, her mind and soul were torn apart, and every day is borrowed time. She’s standing on the front lines like a lad at his first fight, only there’s nae telling when the horn will blow to have it done with. She has to hold that fear inside her every moment. No one even gives a shit. It’s all about catching Stephen.”

“Not for me.”

“No. She’s the same as everything else you encounter in your life. She’s a blank canvas.” Niall sneered at him. “When it happens, will you capture it all on film?”

Niall didn’t even see the blow coming. One moment he was facing the vampire, the next he’d been punched soundly, sending him rolling. Niall sprang back to his feet, a red haze across his vision. Throughout their lives together, Evan had inflicted pain for pleasure, because like all vampires, Evan enjoyed that. He’d even taught Niall to understand and embrace it. But he could count on one hand the times Evan had struck him down for crossing a line.

He was still vibrating from that hard fucking in the glade, the way it felt to be subjugated while over Alanna. She’d kissed him like she couldn’t get enough, pulling him in, twisting things inside of him. The unfairness of it all filled him with fury. With a bellow, he charged.

Evan could have let him crash like a bull into the cabin wall, but he met the frontal assault, and they went down together. He was sure Evan was pulling punches, else he would have knocked his sternum into his spine. It pissed him off further, but he was in the mood for a fight, dirty or fair.

He landed several hard blows, which Evan returned, driving the wind out of him with a fist to the gut. Fuck, he could fight, he’d give him that. Before Evan had been a vampire, he’d been a skinny Jewish kid, and his father had taught him to defend himself. Just as Niall’s da had taught him.

Did Evan remember what it was to be