Donovan (Vampire Vows Book 3), page 10
Somehow, I’d convinced Declan to stay longer, to let the dust settle before we made any decisions about where to go next. And to my surprise, he agreed.
I wanted to learn more about the shifters, about their way of life. We visited the village often, helping with small tasks, patrolling for them.
And Declan, he stayed.
He watched me with that careful, unreadable gaze as I laughed with the shifters, as I trained some of them to fight, as I fit into something that felt like home.
He didn’t say much, but I could tell. He saw it.
More than that, our bond had deepened in a way I never thought possible. He no longer resisted when I offered him my blood.
He drank from me daily, and though he was still careful, still controlled, I could feel the shift in him. He wasn’t fighting himself anymore.
That night, I wanted to show him something. I convinced him to go on a nighttime hike with me, just the two of us, beneath the stars.
He grumbled about it, of course, but he still followed, rolling his eyes as I led him along a narrow path winding up the mountain.
By the time we reached the clearing, I was out of breath, grinning as I turned to him. “Worth it?”
Declan exhaled, his gaze sweeping over the view, the valley below, the dark stretch of trees, the moon hanging bright above us. “I guess.”
I laughed, shaking my head as I lowered my pack to the ground. “You’re impossible.”
He huffed, but then, to my surprise, he pulled out a rolled-up mat and spread it out on the grass. I froze, watching him smooth it down, then raise a brow at me.
“Well?” he said. “You dragged me up here for a picnic, didn’t you?”
Something warm settled in my chest. He never did things like this, never made small gestures, never tried to meet me halfway. It meant something.
I sat down beside him, unpacking the sandwiches I’d made earlier, while he stretched out on his side, propped up on his elbow, watching me. I knew that look.
“You want some?” I asked, holding out a sandwich.
His mouth curled at the corner. “Not my type of meal.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re so dramatic.”
He didn’t deny it.
The night air was cool, but Declan radiated warmth beside me. The past few weeks had settled something between us and had built something unshakable in its place. I didn’t want to lose that.
When I was finished eating, I turned to him, lowering my voice. “You can have your kind of meal now.”
His eyes darkened, but he didn’t argue. He reached for me, guiding me onto my back, and the world tilted as his weight settled half over me.
Declan didn’t hesitate anymore. Didn’t fight the need that burned in him.
His lips brushed over my pulse, slow, teasing. I shivered, tilting my head to give him better access.
“Donovan,” he murmured.
It wasn’t a warning. It was reverence. His fangs scraped over my skin. I gasped and then everything shattered. A rustling in the trees. A snap of a branch. Declan moved.
One second, he was beside me. The next, he was crouched low, his body positioned between me and the source of the sound. I shot up, heart hammering, and then I saw Kit.
My breath caught. He stood at the edge of the clearing, gun raised, eyes locked onto Declan with a single, unyielding emotion. Hate.
I barely had time to process it before Kit barked, “Get away from him, Donovan!”
I shot to my feet, hands raised. “Kit, wait!”
His finger tensed on the trigger. “He’s a vampire.”
Declan didn’t move, but I felt the tension radiating from him. He was sizing Kit up, calculating.
“Put the gun down,” I said carefully.
Kit’s eyes snapped to mine, wild with disbelief.
“Are you insane? You went missing for a month, and now you’re lying in the grass with a bloodsucker’s fangs in your throat?” Kit demanded.
I clenched my jaw. “I wasn’t missing.”
His hands trembled, but he held his ground. “What the hell happened to you?”
I swallowed hard, forcing myself to stay calm. I knew Kit. Knew his stubborn streak, knew his unwavering loyalty to the Guild.
Knew that right now, he thought he was saving me, but Kit didn’t understand.
“He’s not a threat,” I said, my voice steady.
Kit scoffed. “He’s a vampire, Donovan. That’s all he is.”
Declan exhaled sharply. “I’m right here, you know.”
Kit’s grip tightened on the gun. “You don’t get to speak, traitor.”
Declan went still, and I stepped forward.
Kit’s eyes widened. “Stay back.”
I didn’t. “If you shoot him, you’re going to have to shoot me too.”
His mouth opened. Closed. Disbelief flickered across his face, followed by something like pain. “Donovan, ” Kit began.
“I mean it.”
Silence. The wind stirred between us, rustling the trees, the grass. Kit’s grip on the gun was still tight, his knuckles white in the moonlight.
He hadn’t lowered it all the way, just enough to keep me from doing something stupid.
But I could see it in his eyes, the barely restrained fury, the betrayal cutting deeper than any bullet ever could. He thought I was lost.
"Kit," I started carefully, keeping my hands up. "Just listen to me."
"Listen to what, Donovan?" His voice was sharp, trembling with frustration. "You disappeared. No word, no trace. And now I find you feeding a vampire your blood like you’re his personal donor?"
Declan tensed beside me, a muscle in his jaw twitching. He hadn’t moved much since Kit had arrived, but I could feel the cold, sharp edge of his patience thinning.
He wasn’t used to standing down, but he was doing it. For me.
I took a step closer to Kit, slow, deliberate. "It’s not like that."
Kit let out a humorless laugh. "Oh? Then what is it like?"
His eyes flicked to Declan, his lip curling.
"Any self-respecting hunter of the Guild would’ve ended themselves the moment they were turned." Kit’s voice was razor-sharp, his disgust palpable.
His grip on his weapon tightened, knuckles white. His next words came out in a low, venomous hiss. "And now, he’s got his claws in you, doesn’t he?"
I shook my head, forcing my voice to stay steady. “Kit, calm down and listen to me.”
But Kit wasn’t listening. His jaw clenched, his chest rising and falling with sharp, uneven breaths. I could see the war raging in his eyes. Anger, betrayal, fear.
"I get it," I continued, keeping my hands up in a gesture of peace. "I do. I get why you’re pissed, why you think I’ve lost it. But I left because I had to. The Guild doesn’t care about right or wrong. It’s just kill, kill, kill.”
I swallowed hard. “Declan’s important to me, and when he called me for help, I couldn’t just end him.”
His breath hitched. He stared at me like he didn’t recognize me anymore. Kit’s expression darkened. "Donovan.”
"Kit," I said, softer now. “I chose this. I chose him.” I took another step toward him. "He’s not a monster, Kit."
Kit snapped.
"Are you insane?" His voice cracked with the force of it. "You think he’s different? You think he cares about you?"
Kit turned his glare on Declan. "How long until you get bored of playing house, leech? How long until you drain him dry?"
Declan finally moved.
It wasn’t much, just a slow, measured shift, but it was enough to send Kit’s instincts into overdrive.
The gun was back up in an instant, the barrel aimed directly at Declan’s heart.
"Don’t," I said sharply.
Declan stayed silent, his eyes unreadable, but I could feel the tension thrumming through him like a wire stretched too tight.
Kit’s breathing was ragged. "I should put him down right now."
I stepped in front of Declan.
Kit’s eyes widened in disbelief. "Move."
I didn’t.
"You really think I’d let you do that?" My voice was low, steady. "You think I’d just stand here and watch you kill him?"
Kit shook his head, anger and something close to heartbreak warring on his face.
"Then tell me what is going on with you. Because this? This isn’t the Donovan I know,” Kit demanded.
I swallowed hard. "This is who I’ve always been. I’ve always been in love with Delcan.”
Kit’s hands trembled. "The Guild will never let you walk away from this."
"I know."
His jaw tightened. "Then you know I can’t either."
A cold weight settled in my stomach.
He wasn’t backing down.
I could see it in his stance, the way his fingers flexed around the trigger. If I didn’t stop this now, there would be no coming back.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
DECLAN/ DONOVAN
DECLAN
Donovan was trying so hard to reach Kit.
I could see it in the way he held himself, tense but open, his hands raised slightly, his voice steady even though I knew he had to be shaking inside.
Trying to explain, trying to reason with someone who had already made up his mind.
Kit’s hand never wavered on his gun. His fury rolled off him in waves, a wildfire ready to consume anything in its path. And Donovan?
He was standing in the middle of it, willing to get hurt if it meant keeping both of us alive. I clenched my fists. This was never going to end in our favor.
Kit wouldn’t stand down. Not for me. Not for Donovan. But Donovan wouldn’t let anything happen to him either. I knew that now.
He’d saved Kit’s life once. He cared about him. Even after everything, even when Kit was pointing a weapon at me like I was nothing more than a rabid animal.
If it came down to it, if I fought back, Donovan would be caught in the middle.
He’d have to choose, and I couldn’t do that to him. Not when I already knew how this would end.
I took a step back, my stomach twisting as I watched Donovan plead, watched him fight so hard to stop something that was already inevitable.
Then another step. Kit didn’t notice, but Donovan did.
His head snapped toward me, his brow furrowing. "Declan.”
I didn’t wait for him to finish. With one last look, I turned and vanished into the night.
A sharp inhale. Donovan realizing what I’d done. A curse. Him starting after me.
But I was faster, especially with this new body of mine. I ran, the cold air slicing through my lungs, the darkness swallowing me whole.
And even as I left him behind, even as I forced myself to keep going, the bond between us pulled tight, straining and stretching, like an open wound that would never quite heal.
I told myself I wasn’t leaving him. Not really. This was temporary. A brief step away, just long enough for Kit to lower his guard.
With me gone, he wouldn’t see Donovan as a threat anymore. Wouldn’t be forced into a fight he wasn’t ready for. Besides, I could use a little air. Time to think.
Time to figure out what the hell we were supposed to do next. The blood mark between us was permanent. That much I knew.
Donovan was bound to me as much as I was bound to him. No amount of time or distance could change that. But there were some things even a bond like this couldn’t guarantee.
Because if Kit somehow convinced him to go back, if he got into Donovan’s head, dredged up all the loyalty and history between them.
If Kit made Donovan believe that returning to the Guild was the right thing to do, I wasn’t sure I could stop him, and worse…I wasn’t sure I would.
Because I had never wanted to be the thing that dragged Donovan down. And if walking away was what it took to set him free, I would do it. Even if it killed me.
DONOVAN
Declan was gone.
One second, he was there, tense, coiled, ready to fight. The next, he was nothing but a whisper in the dark, slipping away before I could even open my mouth to stop him.
Rage and heartbreak warred inside me. My hands curled into fists, nails digging into my palms as I sucked in a sharp breath.
My first instinct was to chase him, to track him down and drag him back, to shake him and demand to know why the hell he thought leaving was the answer.
But then I felt it. A pull in my chest, steady and unbroken. The bond. He was still there.
Not physically, but metaphysically. The mark tethered us, an invisible thread that neither time nor distance could sever.
Declan knew that. He wasn’t truly leaving me. So why?
He trusted me, I realized. Declan believed I could handle Kit without him. I swallowed hard, forcing down the lump in my throat, and turned back to Kit.
He was still standing there, tense and on edge, his hands curled like he was moments away from reaching for a weapon. I didn’t have the patience for this.
“You need to listen to me,” I snapped, the sharpness in my voice enough to make Kit hesitate.
“I have listened,” he shot back. “And all I’ve heard is that you abandoned the Guild for a leech.”
I was in his face, my chest heaving.
“Don’t,” I growled. “Don’t call him that. You don’t know a single thing about him.”
Kit flinched, but his stubborn glare didn’t waver. “I know enough.”
“You don’t,” I bit out. “You don’t know what he’s done for me. You don’t know what he’s been through. And you don’t know what it’s like to have to choose between duty and someone you—”
I cut myself off, breathing hard.
Kit’s expression shifted. Uncertainty crossed his face. I exhaled and forced my voice to steady.
“If our positions were reversed…if you were in love with someone the Guild called a monster…would you kill them? Would you end their life just to ‘save’ them?” I asked.
Kit’s frown deepened, and for the first time since this conversation started, he hesitated.
His lips pressed into a thin line, his eyes flickering with something that looked dangerously close to doubt.
For a second, I thought I had him. I thought I’d finally broken through, but then he shook his head. His expression hardened, and my stomach dropped.
“I have to report this,” he said, his voice flat. “To the Guild.”
My heart pounded. “Kit.”
“They sent me here for a reason, Donovan,” he cut me off, jaw tight. “I wasn’t just looking for you specifically. The Guild wanted me to investigate what happened to Declan’s team.”
He let the words sink in, then said, “We found them. Declan’s team.”
The world seemed to tilt.
Kit’s gaze was sharp, cutting. “Their bodies were in that barn.”
I inhaled sharply, something cold creeping down my spine.
“It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened. Declan was turned,” Kit continued. “Then he went rabid and wiped out his entire team.”
“No,” I said immediately. “No, that’s not what happened.”
Kit’s mouth curled in disbelief. “You weren’t there.”
“But I know,” I insisted. “It wasn’t him, Kit. You don’t know the whole story. There was a vampire. A rabid one. That thing killed the other hunters.”
But Kit was already shaking his head. “You don’t know that.”
“I do.” My voice rose, desperate now. “You know Declan. The kind of man he is—”
“The kind of man he was,” Kit corrected. His gaze burned with conviction. “But he’s a vampire now, Donovan. And you can’t tell me for sure that he didn’t do it.”
I stared at him, something in my chest twisting into a painful knot.
Kit wasn’t just here as a friend. He was here as a hunter. And the Guild was already building a case against Declan.
If they thought he was responsible…if they decided he needed to be eliminated…I knew exactly what came next.
Kit’s eyes locked onto mine, his expression grim with finality.
“Come back with me,” he said. It wasn’t a plea. It was an order wrapped in the thin veneer of concern.
I exhaled sharply, rolling my shoulders back, forcing myself to stay calm. “Kit.”
“You need to come back and explain your side of the story,” he pressed, his voice steady, his stance unyielding. “The Guild—”
“The Guild doesn’t care about my side of the story.” My voice was sharp, cutting.
I continued, “They’ve already made up their minds. I go back, and they’ll see me as one of two things. A liability or a traitor. And we both know how they deal with either.”
Kit’s jaw clenched. “That’s not true.”
I laughed, but there was no humor in it.
“Isn’t it? Look me in the eye and tell me the Guild will just listen, that they won’t throw me in a cell, interrogate me, bleed me dry for answers before deciding whether I’m worth keeping alive,” I said.
Kit didn’t say anything.
That was answer enough.
I shook my head. “No. I’m not going back.”
Kit exhaled harshly, dragging a hand through his hair. “You’re being difficult, Donovan.”
“I’m not one of you anymore,” I said, softer now. “And let’s be real, Kit. You didn’t come here to bring me back for my sake. You came because the Guild told you to. You came to drag me home.”
My lips twisted. “But that place was never home to me. Not really.”
Kit flinched. He might have argued, but we both knew the truth.
The Guild wasn’t family. It was an obligation. A burden we’d carried since the day we were old enough to hold a blade.
And I wasn’t carrying it anymore.
“My place is with Declan,” I said, finality settling into my bones. “That’s not going to change.”
Kit’s expression darkened. “Even knowing what he is?”
I stepped closer, holding his gaze. “Especially knowing what he is.”
