“I know.” He slid his fingers down my face, over my neck and cupped my hips. “Let’s just do this quickly, okay. Lay down.”

My knees trembled until I felt the ground beneath them—felt the aged blood and sweat these floorboards had soaked up since this whole thing began. And Arthur lowered himself, too, kneeling before me, making the hairs along my neck prickle under his smooth touch. He traced every inch of my spine, slowly wrapping me up in his arms; I felt small but safe, cradled into his chest.

“You smell like strawberries,” he said, kissing my neck; his lips were so warm, so wet and so foreign, his breath hot down the curve of my tight shoulder—his teeth grazing the flesh above my artery. And it felt nice, but wrong; this was Arthur—not David, not even Jason; he was my husband’s uncle—a man I looked up to. A man I cared about, but never wanted to be with this way. I closed my eyes, praying for strength.

“It’s time,” he whispered in my ear, and though my stomach was tight and my body so stiff I could hardly swallow, I managed to roll myself back, restraining my tears, focusing on the chill of the cold ground under my tailbone, up each vertebra in my spine and across my shoulders.

As I lay flat, the world around me felt wider, larger, like there was suddenly more space, or like the roof I’d seen a thousand times before, laying right here, usually pinned by a knight, seemed to sit miles up in the sky.

My chest lifted, my ribs expanding around the fear and hesitation inside me. “What are you looking at?” I asked Arthur.

He studied my thigh, running his hand along it so slowly I held my breath. “You’re just so young, Amara—too young.”

“I'm nineteen.”

“Precisely.” He dropped his hand, his head following. “I'm afraid what this will do to you.”

“I’ve been through worse.”

He laughed, but I couldn't really see his smile in the darkness. He could see me, though—his perfect vampire vision making him privilege to all the things I would never have showed him.

I bit my lip when his cool touch parted my legs at the knees, and he knelt between them, his bare hip brushing the inside of my thigh.

“Oh, God,” I said to myself.

“Just don't look.” He wiped his thumb over my eyelid. “Just close your eyes.”

“I…I can't,” I said, looking up at him, and I couldn't help it, I cried.

He clicked his tongue, sinking back. “Amara.”

“I'm okay. I'm…I'm okay.” I let my knees fall softly together.

“You’re not okay.”

I nodded. “I am.”

“We can do this another time if you’re not ready.”

I shook my head. “It needs to be now.”

He moistened his lips, breathing out through his nose, his eyes square with hesitation. “Okay. Just…just imagine I'm him.”

I nodded, tangling my fingers in my hair.

“Lift your hips,” he said, touching the rim of my underwear. “We won't get far with these in the way.”

I shut my eyes again, feeling the lace slip past my thighs, over my knees and away from my ankles. And we were naked. Together. My legs completely open; Arthur between them.

He slid his hands under my bottom and pulled me forward so the harder part of him brushed softly against the warmest part of me.

I looked into his eyes, seeing the fear and concern I was feeling, too. One movement, one millimetre and he’d be in me—and with just a few strokes, all this would be over. Providing I actually fell pregnant.

“I'm just going to check you first—make sure you’re wet.”

“Wai—?” My toes curled over and I jumped when he placed a cold finger just inside me, then pulled it away.

“You’re not ready. It’ll hurt if you’re dry.”

All I could feel was a flood of adrenaline in my arms, making them weak, unattached, disturbed by the tension and memory of his finger inside me, and as soon as that feeling reached my heart, I broke apart into a mess of short, hiccupping sobs.

Arthur’s whole body moved, as if his soul had just been dragged backward inside him. “I'm so sorry, Amara,” he said. “I never wanted to see you this way—to touch you this way.”

“I know, Arthur,” I said, wiping warm tears from my temples and ears. “But I can't lose him. I have to do this.”

He nodded, watching my trembling lip.

“Oh no.” The shaking in my chest spread to my gut, twisting it, making dinner inch up my throat. I covered my mouth with the back of my hand.

“You all right?”

“Mm. No.” I shook my head. “I think I'm gonna be sick.”

He moved back just in time for me to roll onto my side and blast the contents of my gut all over the training room floor. As I heaved and gasped, a shirt came over my shoulders, and I felt the air on my cheeks and jaw where my hair had been. Arthur held it back until I finished, reaching around to guide my spine against his chest after.

“Feel better?” He chuckled, wiping my mouth with something cool and cotton, then placed the square of fabric into my hand.

I nodded, swallowing the horrid, sour taste in my mouth. My stomach hurt, contracting and quivering. I wrapped my shaky arms across it. “I'm sorry, Arthur.”

“No need to be sorry, my dear.” He sat down under me then, turning my body a little so I no longer felt his nakedness against me, and stroked my hair, wiping a few vestiges of puke or saliva away with his thumb. “You know I care for you a great deal, don't you?”

I nodded into his chest.

“And you know I…I love David, too, Amara. But, I'm sorry—” His chest sunk. “I just can’t do this to you. I just can't have you this way.”

I looked up at him. “What are you saying?”

“I'm saying I…” He moistened his lips, his eyes focusing on something across the room.

“Arthur, please?” I sat up from him; he looked down at my naked chest and pulled his shirt to cover me, slowly buttoning it closed, staying quiet. “Arthur. Please say something—anything?”

“Perhaps we should just let Drake live.”

My world rocked, heat rising as anger inside me. “David will never allow that—not as long as he knows Drake wants to steal power from our unborn child.”

Arthur nodded. “I know this. But look at you—look what you've done to yourself.”

I looked over my shoulder at the stinky pile of vomit. “I can't lose him.”

“Then we will have to find some other way to kill Drake, my dear, because this friendship has been pushed to its limits, and neither of us can take this. I won't see you destroyed by my touching you, and I won't see my nephew die because I can't bring myself to hurt you this way.”

I wiped my face with his handkerchief, sitting back as he stood up and, in the dark and the quiet of our little world, pulled his jeans on, grabbed his jacket and walked to the door.

“I'm sorry, Amara.”

“Don't be sorry,” I said to the ground, swiping a tear off the tip of my nose. “It’s not your fault.”

He looked down at this pathetic heap and then at my mess. “I’ll send someone to clean that up.”

“No.” I shook my head. “Don't. I just…I just need some time to myself first.”

He bowed his head and left me, in the middle of the training hall, wearing nothing but his shirt and deep concern for the fate of my husband.

* * *

The moon’s shadows gave proof of time passing. By now, the men who sat in the parlour and drank Scotch after dinner would have retired, and all around the manor grounds, lights would be going out, maids shutting their doors on the day, and knights and guests would be laying their heads on their pillows. But I was here, huddled against the mirror on the wall, half naked, feeling numb, sick, cold and so, so alone.

I failed David. I couldn't give him the one thing he deserved—life.

On my finger, the bare skin where my ring was until Jason took it off felt cold and empty—a reminder that David and I were so far apart and that, worst of all, might possibly be separated forever. What would my life be without him now? How would I kiss him when I saw him next, knowing it would be one of the last times? How could he kiss me each time he came here, knowing that when he said forever, it was a lie?

“Hello?” a cautious voice called into the room.

The moonlight outlined a broad silhouette. I tucked myself into a smaller ball and hid my eyes when the light came on, blinding me.

“Ar?” Mike landed beside me, taking my face in his thick fingers. “Baby, what are you doing out here?” He looked behind him then. “Did you throw up?”

I nodded, clutching my hands to my stomach.

“What…how did you…what were you…?”

“I…I think I was sleepwalking.” I hid Arthur’s hanky under my arm.

He sat back on his heels, frowning. “Then why can I smell Arthur all over you?”

I took a quick breath and looked down at the shirt covering my otherwise naked body.

He looked too. “What have you done?”

“I…”

“Ara!” He stood up, hauling me to my feet by the arm. “What did you do?”

“Nothing, I…”

“You’re naked,” he said, running his hand up the back of my thigh.

“I didn’t do anything, Mike. I swear, I—”

“Bullshit!” he screamed, the veins in his eyes bulging. “Did you fuck him?”

“No.”

He walked away, running his hands over his head. “No. Nup, this doesn’t make sense. None of it.”

“Mike, please?”

He appeared in front of me, pinning my back to the ice-cold mirror. “What are you playing at, Ara? What are you up to?”

“Nothing, Mike. I honestly don't know how I got down here.”

He studied my cheeks and my lips. “You’ve been crying.”

“I…I'm okay.” I reached up and wiped the moisture of remaining tears from under my eye.

“Wait.” Mike grabbed my hand, squeezing it so tight my fingertips pulsed with blood. “Where’s your ring?”

I looked at my hand then back at his fierce eyes.

“Where is your ring!”

“I…I took it off.”

“Why?” he said quietly, but an eruption of volume festered underneath. “Why would you do that?”

“It…” I couldn’t think. I couldn’t even remember when I took it off.

His fingers tightened on my arms, saliva leaving his lips, spattering all over mine as he screamed something in my face.

“Jason took it off me!” I wailed. “It looked wrong. My husband is supposed to be dead, Mike.”

“But he’s not dead.” He slammed me against the mirror again, cracking it under my spine. “He’s alive, and you're down here, naked under Arthur’s shirt!”

I looked right into his eyes then, both of us seeing truths about each other we didn't want to see, and my legs moved out from under me; I wanted to sink down and curl into a ball, but he held me up, leaning on my body with so much weight my lungs couldn’t draw a breath. “I didn't do anything with him, Mike.”

“Bullshit!” He walked away again. I sat on the floor, looking at the exit then my best friend. “Ara, you can't lie to me.”

“I'm not lying. I…All I remember is getting down here and then I threw up.”

He appeared beside me, squatting, lifting my face. “If that's true, then why are your clothes over there on the floor?”

I looked over at them, my lie falling apart before my eyes.

“You stupid little slut,” he said through his teeth and snapped his hand across my cheek.

I squealed, slowly touching my fingers to it, swiping my hair away from my lip.

“Do you know what this will do to him? Do you!” He grabbed me again, shaking me. “He will hate you, Ara. He will never touch you again, he—” His words stopped and he jerked backward, cool air rushing between us as he skidded into the wall across the room.

“Back down, or I will put you in a permanent state of vegetation!” Jason pointed at him, coming up out of nowhere.

Mike sat up, clutching his jaw, then stumbled to his feet. I saw the same shock I was feeling become present in his eyes; he looked down at his hands, and I turned away, burying my face in Jason’s shoulder as he squatted beside me.

“Baby. I'm sorry,” Mike said, and when I looked up again, he was gone.

“Ara?” Jason covered me with his jacket.

“I can’t do it, Jase. I can't.”

“Can’t do what?”

“What kind of a person am I?” I whispered to myself. “I couldn't even…I just couldn't…”

I felt his hands on me, trying to comfort me, but my breath became too thin, my head swirling as the sound in the room rang through my ears in a high-pitched tone.

I opened my eyes and smiled, turning my head away. “Don't look at me like that.”

“Like what?” Jason jumped up from the chair by my bed and came to sit right against my hip.

“Like you're really concerned.”

He stroked his thumb over my cheek. “He hit you.”

“It was a tiny slap,” I said, pulling his hand away. “And I kinda had it coming.”

“No.” He shook his head. “You’ve been through enough. He had no right to touch you that way. I will skin him alive.” He closed his eyes in emphasis of the word.