Panic tightened every muscle in Logan’s already trembling body. She braced her hands between her legs and gripped the edge of the stool. All she could feel was the fear churning her stomach, the acid burning the back of her throat.

She’d been through withdrawal once before; and there wasn’t a single moment while in its throes she didn’t believe or feel as though she’d die at any moment.

The thought of going through it again scared her more than any vampire ever could.

She looked up at Kerestyan. “I can’t do it again. I won’t do it.”

His face hardened, his eyes almost demanding. “You’ll die for certain if you don’t.”

She jumped off the stool as rage exploded in her stomach, its fiery shards tearing apart her insides. “Who the hell is your father to decide what I have to do to keep breathing? What the hell makes him so important? What is it with you vampires acting like you’re the only ones with say over my life?” She struggled to suck oxygen into her lungs as the white walls drew closer. “I won’t do it!”

“Logan, I don’t think you understand the gravity of your situation.”

“My situation? My situation!” She smacked a hand down on the countertop. “Then why don’t you explain my situation to me? I’m only here because of you.” She jabbed a finger at him. “You put me in this fucking situation.”

Something strange flashed behind his eyes. “I may have helped put you in this situation,” his fangs elongated as he slammed a fist against his chest, “but I don’t have any more choice in this than you do!”

“You expect me to believe that? You’re the Lord of New York, and you don’t have a choice? You killed three vampires without even touching them and you don’t have a choice?”

“No, I don’t. I won’t even spin your feeble human mind with how old my Father is. But I’m still a Child in his eyes. I have no choice but to obey him. He created me. The cost of his blood, which I accepted the day he turned me, was to abide by his rules. The only way you’ll live is if I do that very thing.”

The man wasn’t making any sense. “What the hell do his rules have to do with me?”

He gnashed his teeth together, as if he couldn’t believe she didn’t understand. “His rules dictate I obey the laws the Eldest of my species have set forth. The most important being the Veil. We hide from the humans, Logan. There’s a reason why you’ve lived the majority of your life unaware of vampires. A reason why the human population as a whole doesn’t know we exist.”

Is that all? She shrugged. “So what if I know? What the hell do you think I’m going to do, run off and tell everyone? For your information, aside from going to the cops the first time, who literally threw me out of the station – I’ve never told anyone about anything I saw. Not that they’d believe me if I did.” She closed her eyes as a dull ache pulsed beneath her temples. “You know what, as much as I don’t like the thought of you poking around my brain, maybe you should just try to make me forget all this. Then we can both go on with our lives.”

“It’s not that simple anymore. You know too much about vampires. Manipulating the human mind to forget even a brief encounter with a vampire takes a great deal of precision. To remove and reconstruct what you know, especially now, could very well damage your brain in an irreparable fashion. Your only options at this point are to become a vampire, or a Servio, which is a servant to a vampire. Either way, that involves Nelek blood, which I can’t offer you without my Father’s approval.”

“Whoa!” She opened her eyes and stared hard at him. “What do you mean my only options are to become a vampire or a servant? That’s what you meant by exploring other avenues? What if I don’t want to? What if I want my life back?”

He stared back at her, his pale face a mask of disbelief and anger. “This isn’t about what you want. The life you knew ended when I found you in the alley. And to be bluntly honest, it should have ended the moment you learned about vampires. You don’t have any control over what you become, only whether you do. Your life has changed, forever. You need to accept that.”

Logan stiffened. She’d never felt so frustrated or angry in her entire life. How could he stand there and tell her she didn’t have any control over her own life? How could he expect she’d just accept it?

She folded her arms over her chest. “No.”

He moved to stand in front of her then leaned down so they were eye level. “Listen to me,” his breath was cool against her lips. “You’re a breach of the Veil. Vampires, regardless of age, do not openly act in any way that allows humans to learn of our existence. You should have never seen a vampire feed. You should have never witnessed vampires fighting. I killed the three Fledglings in the alley because they broke the Veil. They wore their fangs openly, and you saw them. Not only—”

“Enough with the stupid Veil already! I get it.” She pressed the heels of her palms to her temples. “Jesus Christ, if seeing vampires was so damn bad, where the hell were you all the other times I saw them chewing on people?”

When he let out an animalistic snarl, she took a few steps back. “There are almost a hundred vampires in the city of New York. Could you watch a hundred humans scattered across the city at the same time? Could you make sure every single one of them never ate without your permission? Never did what was in their nature to do?”

“The question was meant to be rhetorical, but since it seems to have pissed you off so much, no, I probably couldn’t.” She rested her hands on her hips. “But I also can’t disappear in a burst of wind or mess with people’s minds. I’m sure if I could, I’d be more than capable of watching a hundred people.”

His sinister rumble of laughter sent chills down her spine. “It’s not nearly as easy as it sounds. The more a vampire uses his or her powers, the more blood they require. The more blood they require, the more they need to feed. The more they feed, the more they risk breaking the Veil. To use the power my blood grants as often as you suggest, I’d be forced to drain five humans a day. Should I wish to spare their lives, I’d have to spend my entire night searching for twenty different vessels. At that rate, I’d never be able to rule a city.” His gaze fell to her lips then lingered on her neck. “As you so invitingly put it, I’d be too busy chewing on people.”

She swallowed the knot tightening in her throat as he extended to his full height and slowly stalked towards her. His ruined shirt hung open, allowing her to see every ripple of his hard, sculpted abdomen as he drew closer. He looked every bit the dark, deadly predator vampires were rumored to be as he ran his tongue over his fangs.

And something deep inside her was thrilled by the sight of him…

No. Don’t look. Logan squeezed her eyes tight. She knew what he was trying to do, and she refused to back up and lose any more ground to him. She shivered when his hot breath touched her ear at the same time the heat from his body invaded her skin.

Why he was warm one time and cold the next, she didn’t know, but right now it felt like every inch of his hard body was on fire.

“I’m only going to explain this to you once, so I suggest you listen carefully. I may be powerful, but even I can’t be everywhere at once. Contrary to what you might think, I’m more than capable of guarding against accidents and have been since the night I took this city as my own. But what I can’t control, is someone like you. Someone who’s so detached you wear it in your eyes. You’re not in this situation solely because of me. You’re here right now because the Fledglings in the alley thought you were already a Servio. Why do you think they asked whose Puppet you were? ‘Puppet’ is the youth’s slang term for a servant.”

Logan opened her eyes and stepped back. “So now you think part of this is my fault?”

An eerie, almost superior smile spanned his mouth. “I don’t think, Logan. I know.”

She purposely fisted her hands as the urge to smack the fangs out of his mouth welled up inside her. “How the hell do you figure?”

He folded his thick arms over his chest. “Of all the times you stumbled upon a vampire feeding, how many times did you intercede on the human’s behalf?”

“I didn’t. Why would I?”

He shrugged a shoulder. “Why not?”

She scowled at him. “Because if some hooker is stupid enough to follow a John down a dark alley for fifty bucks and gets her ass drained dry, she chose to go with him. If a bum gets so drunk he falls down and can’t defend himself, he made the choice. Nobody put a gun to their heads. Everyone else in the world has to face the consequences of their actions. Why should they be any different?”

He took a few steps back and held his muscular arms out to his sides. “Behold the consequence of your selfish choices. You’re here because of your actions. The same actions, whatever they may be, that burned the distance into your eyes. And now you’re faced with a final choice.” He shifted his gaze to his left palm. “Heroin,” then cast a glance at his right, “or life.” He lowered his arms as the concern from before crept back into his eyes. “I could decide for you. I could manipulate your mind and make you believe the choice to give up heroin is your own, but I meant it when I said I’d give you all the choices I could.”