Escaping From His Love

Five years ago, I offered up my neck to Kieran, the Shadow Lord.

After that night of insatiable hunger, he didn't drain me dry.

Instead, he sank his fangs deep into my veins. At the zenith of pleasure, he whispered repeatedly into my ear, "You are mine."

Just as I mistakenly believed this twisted possession was love, his so-called "savior," Seraphina, returned.

To appease her, Kieran demanded my heart's blood every night. He callously tossed my mother's only keepsake into an auction. Worse still, to quell her jealousy, he personally locked me away in a prison bristling with silver torture devices...

When I finally broke the blood pact and, my heart shattered, fled to Los Angeles to marry his sworn enemy, Lucian, Kieran descended into complete madness.

I was in my fifth year of a secret affair with Lord Kieran, and everyone noticed he treated me differently.

By day, I'd dismiss any talk of our relationship with a simple, "I'm just the Lord's blood perfumer."

No one knew that each night, he would hold me possessively, his lips tracing my neck as he murmured, "You are mine."

On our last night together, he held me so tightly, it felt as though he wanted to crush me into his very being.

"Aurora, your blood smells like roses that have begun to rot."

Kieran's voice was low as his fingers clamped around my wrist in the dark.

His touch was unnervingly cold, even for a creature of the night.

Usually, I would have instinctively wrapped my arms around him.

But this time, a bitter ache blooming in my chest, I simply pulled my hand away.

"If that is how you feel, then you should let me go, my Lord."

He didn't.

Instead, he leaned in, his fangs brushing against my carotid artery, sending a shiver of pain through me.

"Don't move, Moonlight," he rasped, using the private, ancient nickname we shared. "You know I can't resist your scent."

I closed my eyes, surrendering to the last vestiges of my affection, and embraced him once more.

He had no idea I was about to marry someone else.

The next evening, the grand hall of Nocturne Castle blazed with light.

I managed a faint smile. Only yesterday, I was his secret lover, the only "antidote" he ever spoke of.

But now, everything had changed.

In the center of the hall, the crystal chandelier's light converged on two figures.

One was Kieran. The other was Seraphina.

That girl, with her half-human blood and dress of faded white, trembled like a porcelain doll.

She wasn't even a noble, merely a low-ranking hybrid.

But Kieran did something that silenced the entire room.

He unclasped his black and gold velvet cloak, a symbol of the Nocturne family's highest authority, and gently, almost reverently, draped it over Seraphina's shoulders.

"That's the token of every mistress…" a gasp rippled through the crowd.

I stood in the shadows, my knuckles white, clutching a glass of crimson liquid.

Beside me, my father,