Crimson Storm (The Crimson Accord #2) - Amy Patrick Page 0,1

had reached inside my muddled brain and latched onto my last remaining shred of sanity like a lifeline.

She might have been the only person on earth who could have pulled me back from that abyss. It was a good thing there had been bars between us because my body and soul had responded to her so powerfully I’d wanted to grab her and drag her off to the cavern’s remotest corner where I could keep her all to myself forever.

I’d actually been a little afraid for her to be around me. But her quiet courage seemed to know no bounds. Neither did her sweetness. She was hands down the bravest, kindest, most beautiful person who ever lived, and I loved her beyond reason.

And there it was, the sweet pain that wrapped itself around my heart and squeezed like a boa constrictor anytime I let myself think of her. Which was far too often.

The torment of her absence was only slightly better than the agony of her presence. Having her close but always out of reach would have driven me mad.

I would have eventually caved to the temptation and gotten us both beheaded.

So it was good she was gone.

Really, it was.

I was just sad about the way she’d left. I knew Abbi didn’t understand my decision to take the Bloodbound vows and pledge myself to Imogen for eternity.

But even if I hadn’t gone through with the ceremony, even if Abbi hadn’t left, I would still have lost her. Because Imogen would have told her what I did.

There was no way Abbi’s love for me could survive that.

Kannon and I lifted the rogue vampire between us as our brothers kept watch. Moving toward the van parked nearby, we passed under a streetlamp, and I caught the glint of a ring on the girl’s left ring finger. It was a silver band with an eternity knot design. A promise ring.

Another spasm gripped my heart. I’d given Abbie the vampire equivalent when I’d handed her that pendant necklace containing my blood. It was a stupid thing to do, but I hadn’t been able to bear thinking of her out there in the world, moving on with her life and forgetting about me entirely.

She’d probably tossed it in the garbage by now—as she should. It had been over a year since she’d left the Bastion with her friends, Kelly and Heather, and gone to Los Angeles to work for Sadie Aldritch, the leader of the Vampire-Human Coalition.

She was better off there. There was certainly nothing left for her here.

Though it killed me to think of her with some other guy taking moonlight strolls along the Southern California beaches...

Stop thinking about it

Though it killed me to picture her with someone else, I did want her to be happy. I wanted her to be safe.

I couldn’t guarantee she’d be either of those things if she was here with me. And so I would try—once again—to let go of her memory the way I’d let go of her hand that night.

Maybe one day I’d actually succeed.

2

Abigail

I missed butter. The hand-churned kind Mamm used to melt and pour over kettle-cooked popcorn back when I was a kid.

Back when I was human.

Rubbing a palm over my stomach to dismiss the phantom hunger pangs, I watched the guard in his tower shove his hand into a bag of the microwave kind. Each time he brought a handful of popcorn to his mouth and chewed, the glowing tip of his specially outfitted ultraviolet assault rifle bobbed up and down.

“What are you looking at leech?” he barked when he noticed me. “Keep moving. And stop staring at me.”

He probably thought he was clever for calling me a slur I’d heard at least a hundred times before.

I shook my head and strolled along the perimeter of the yard. The man acted as if I was the one with the deadly weapon in hand, as if I could mesmerize him with just a look.

Of course that was ridiculous, one of the many bits of misinformation that had been spread about my race. At least it kept the guards here at the Merced Safety Center from getting too close to us.

Unless you counted Gatlin. He liked getting a little too close to the female vampires being detained here—especially during daylight hours when we were nearly catatonic with sleepiness. I did my best to stay as far away from him as possible and off his radar.

At the moment, he patrolled the western perimeter of the exercise yard,