When the Night Breaks (Midnight Series Book 2), page 1
Copyright © 2023 H.M. Darling
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
CONTENTS
Also by H.M. Darling
Content Warning:
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Acknowledgments
About the Author
ALSO BY H.M. DARLING
Heir of Ashes Duology
Heir of Ashes (#1)
Master of Flames (#2)
Coven (#0.5)
Midnight Series
Till the Sun Dies (#1)
CONTENT WARNING:
When the Night Breaks is a new adult novel and contains materials that may be triggering to some readers, including suicide (on-page attempt and regular discussion), depression, off-page domestic violence and emotional abuse, a brief mention of death by cancer, and explicit sex scenes (all consensual). Please do not read if any of this is triggering to you.
For those who never stop worrying about what comes next.
I had twenty-seven minutes to figure something out.
Twenty-seven minutes before my mother stormed into the hotel room that had become my sanctuary and dragged me out—by my hair, if she needed to.
I’d been in Paris too long.
I only planned to get away for a week or two while I figured out whether I wanted to marry the man my parents chose for me. A breath of fresh air, I thought—some time to clear my head and warm my feet. Then, everything would be fine, and I would return home to the perfect future that was planned for me.
Except, I didn’t want to go home.
I’d found something in this city. It was still too early to know if it was something real, but god, I wanted it to be. I thought I deserved a chance to be happy.
Unfortunately, my parents disagreed.
I grew up in a family with a defined set of rules: shut my mouth, smile, and never, ever do anything to tarnish the family name. Years ago, my brother made the mistake of breaking rule number three. First, he brought his boyfriend home for Thanksgiving, which wouldn’t have been the end of the world if he hadn’t also announced that he wanted to be a doctor instead of inheriting the ranch. Three months later, he went fishing with my father and never came home. The family called it an accident; we all knew what really happened.
I didn’t want that to happen to me. For once, I wanted to make my own decision and take control of my future.
Twenty-six minutes, and I still didn’t know what to do.
I could leave the hotel and hide at my best friend Addie’s apartment. She waited in the room across from mine; asking her would be easy. Or, if I was really sweet, maybe I could beg Thierry to let me stay with him for a while. He’d expect sex, of course, and blood.
I could deal with that.
I could sell my soul for a chance to live.
Weakly, I sobbed, placing my hands on the edges of the bathroom counter and letting my head hang.
Of all the things I expected to find in Paris, vampires hadn’t been one of them.
Twenty-five minutes.
Vampires.
That was it.
I glowered at myself in the mirror. For a moment, I hated the tears tarnishing my blue eyes and streaming down my face. I despised the terror I found in each of my features.
I checked the time.
Mom would be here in twenty-five minutes.
Was that enough time to die?
It had to be.
I scrambled away from the mirror, finding my phone discarded on the bed. I ignored the half dozen threatening texts from my parents, instead opening Thierry’s contact. I put the phone to my ear, listening to it ring… and ring… and ring… and go to voicemail.
“Hey, Thierry. It’s Willa. Can you come by the hotel? Right now? I need you. Please.”
I hoped the pathetic break of my voice was enough to dredge up whatever fondness he had for me and bring him running. He was my last chance.
Because if I had to choose between staying in Paris with a vampire who didn’t love me or going home to a life that would inevitably destroy me… I chose Paris.
I returned to the bathroom, staring at myself in the mirror.
Twenty-four minutes.
Thierry would make it.
Twenty-three minutes.
He would save me.
Twenty-two minutes.
I checked my phone. Nothing. I texted him. Please, come. I’m scared. I need you.
Twenty-one.
Nothing.
With a frustrated yowl, I threw my phone at the bathroom mirror, leaping back when it shattered into a hundred pieces. Glass shards littered the ground and filled the sink in front of me, some big enough to use as… a blade.
I stared at them, determined.
I refused to go home. I would not end up like my brother.
This was my life.
I reached for the biggest shard of glass, turning it over and over in my hand.
Thierry was on his way; I reminded myself when my stomach flipped. He would be here in time to save me.
I wouldn’t be alone.
Twenty.
Death was only temporary.
Nineteen.
It was a means to an end—the key to my freedom.
Eighteen.
Seventeen.
It was now or never. With each minute that passed, I became less and less sure I would be dead before my mom arrived to drag me home.
I came to Paris to find a life.
What did it matter if it was an eternal one?
I lifted the glass shard, pressing it to my wrist. Every muscle in my body screamed for me to let go. I didn’t.
Thierry would be here soon. He would feed me his blood at the last second. I would wake up safely in his arms, and everything would be okay.
I would never have to go home again if I didn’t want to. I wouldn’t become just another Bennett disaster.
I was Willa Bennett, and it was my life.
I wanted to live it.
Sixteen.
Fifteen.
With a yowl of determination, I raised the glass shard and brought it back down on my arm as hard as I could.
Then everything was red.
Soon after, it was dark.
Three months ago, the man I thought I loved let me die.
Three months ago, I became a vampire.
I had spent three months in this desolate, shit city without a clue what I was doing with my now-eternal life.
I tightened my cardigan around my torso, looking up at the flickering light in the apartment I’d come from. Inside, I heard my best friend, Addie, laughing and falling into the arms of her perfect vampire boyfriend, Holland—like they did every night after I left. We had a comfortable routine; we spent our days working at my apartment and nights eating dinner at hers. It worked for us.
Except, it always ended with me walking home alone.
The misty rain left an uncomfortable sheen on top of my hair, destroying the perfect curls I’d spent hours on the day before. I cradled my thermos against my chest, shivering from the chilly November air. I opened the top, hesitating momentarily before taking a sip. Warm, human blood washed over my tongue and filled me with life—a strange sensation. The veins beneath my eyes rippled and turned black. I frantically rubbed them away, as if it could erase the monster I had become. Holland said the control came with patience and time—two things I’d never been very good at.
I still wasn’t sure how I ended up here.
Besides the obvious answer: I acted irrationally and, by a stroke of luck, Holland arrived in time to save me from actually dying. Now, three months later, I was an emotional mess of a vampire too caught up in pretending to be okay to ask for help.
Before I came to Paris, I lived at my family’s ranch in Texas. My parents were planning my summer wedding to an Ivy League lawyer with a prominent last
One night, I couldn’t take it anymore. My fiancé spent the entire dinner party pinching my arm and watching me squirm, only to demand I suck him off the moment it was over. I excused myself, telling him I wanted to freshen up. While he waited, I packed my suitcases and called a car to take me to the airport. I booked my flight to Paris on the way there.
I cried a lot the first day; I turned off my phone because I couldn’t stand the threatening messages from my fiancé and father. On the second day, I found the courage to leave my hotel room and explore. I discovered I hated croissants, but felt safe in the bustling crowds of this beautiful, foreign city. I fell in love with the history and the architecture and the bright blue of the sky. That was the day I knew I’d never be able to go home to my marriage and chains.
On the third day, I met Thierry.
The first time I met him, working in the crêperie, I thought I’d never seen anyone more charming. His blonde hair and blue eyes swept me away, and his broken English caught me in a web. He blushed when he talked, and let his fingers brush my shoulder every time he walked away. I spent all day at the crêperie, enchanted by him. Each day after that, I went to visit him again. He made me feel a little less lonely.
Then, Addie arrived in a storm of sadness, with a broken spirit and eyes devoid of hope. In her, I saw pieces of myself, a girl running from a life that would have drowned her. Just like I was. The moment I met her, I knew I would do anything for her. Hand-in-hand, we explored Paris and discovered what it felt like to be free.
Oh, how I loved the freedom.
My life couldn’t be more perfect. I had a best friend and a lover. Falling into bed with Thierry the first time was easy. Until it wasn’t, and I discovered the world was a much darker place than I ever imagined. One moment, we were lying naked in bed, him nestled between my thighs. Even now, the memory was hazy. He was kissing my neck... or nibbling my neck. Biting, maybe? Then, there was pain. And blood. And screaming. Crying. Terror.
Everything changed after that.
I never looked at Thierry the same again, no matter how hard I tried to find the charming server who made my stomach flutter. He apologized and promised to control himself. He told me pretty lies about how irresistible I was and how much he adored me. Even so, he never apologized for the pain, and he never stopped himself from taking what he wanted from me.
I dismissed his behavior as protective, praying he cared about me so much, enough to keep me safe. I wanted him to be the one. I let him pull me into his bed and take my blood over and over again, turning a blind eye when he lorded over me like a prison guard. I told myself I was lucky to be cared for so deeply.
Before Thierry, there was Duncan, the Harvard lawyer who pinched me in public and called me names in the dark so he could watch me cry. We were childhood friends who got engaged because our parents wanted us to, not because we ever cared about each other.
I had terrible taste in men.
So terrible, in fact, I ended up dead.
I didn’t want to die, but I would have done anything to get out of going home to a lawyer and a prenup and inevitably becoming yet another family disappointment. The moment I slit my wrists was the last moment of my Parisian fairytale.
I shook my head to bring myself to reality, taking a longer drink from my thermos of blood. It did little to assuage the cold from the rain. I should have taken Holland up on his offer for an umbrella. Why didn’t I? I’d been so damn stubborn lately, determined to convince everyone, including myself, that I was handling this transition better than I actually was.
In fact, I hated every second of it.
I didn’t know my body at all anymore. Every sensation was heightened; the November rain felt like ice, the heat of a candle felt like a wildfire. Daylight was brighter, and every noise was louder. My emotions gave me whiplash. Sometimes I shattered glass in my hands without realizing how hard I gripped it. I drank human blood to survive. When I cried, I cried blood. I had fangs. If I looked in the mirror, sometimes I would find blackened veins beneath my eyes and the smallest rim of red around my irises.
On top of all that, I would live forever.
If I could take back the moment I broke the mirror in my hotel room and drove the shard of glass into my skin, I would. I would take it back a thousand times if it meant I wouldn’t be living this nightmare.
At least the Paris streets were quiet at night. There was no one around to watch me walk home with blood on my lips and tears in my eyes. The rain glowed under the streetlights. Around the corner, a person snored beneath their newspaper blankets. Inside the building I walked past, a man talked to his cat and a woman cried watching a sitcom. It felt strange to be so aware of everything—I hated it.
I brushed a wet strand of hair off my forehead, pausing when I saw someone kneeling at the edge of the Seine. It wasn’t uncommon to see people along the stinking river. Tourists even found it beautiful. His knees, though, were at the edge of the stone. If he shifted his weight, even just a little, he’d tumble forward.
My steps slowed to a stop, and I looked around to see if anyone else noticed him. I was the only one on the street. He may as well have been a ghost.
He moved sluggishly, pulling something long and thin out of his coat. A bakery roller? A paper towel roll? I squinted through the dark, watching him twist it in his hands. Then, he lifted it and pressed a pointed end to the center of his chest—and I realized what it was. A wooden stake.
My heart pounded in my throat. He held the stake to the middle of his chest for a long time. The rain came down harder, soaking my clothes so they clung to my skin uncomfortably. Through the rain, the man began to cry. Panicked, I glanced around the street again in the hopes someone would appear and know what to do. There was no one; it was just me.
Should I stop him?
Would he stop himself?
I would have wanted someone to stop me.
When he pushed the stake into his skin, and I smelled his blood as it began to flow, I ran. My body moved faster and smoother than ever before, and I made it a second before the stake broke through his ribs. With a feral cry, I threw myself on him.
Our bodies tumbled onto the stone. I scraped my elbow and bumped my chin on his shoulder. He yelled in shock. The stake clattered to the ground.
“What the fuck?” He snarled. He was American.
“What are you doing?” I cried, pushing myself off him.
He didn’t answer, shoving away from me and standing. A flash of fangs confirmed all I needed to know—he was a vampire. “I was trying to die. Thanks for ruining my night,” he snapped.
“Why would you want to die?” I breathed, splayed out on the ground. I pushed myself into a sitting position, swallowing my heartbeat.
The vampire faced me. Even in the dark, his eyes were the most shocking shade of green I’d ever seen. I thought his hair might be red, but it was hard to tell as it clung to the sides of his face, soaking wet. I blinked raindrops out of my eyes.
“Because life simply isn’t worth living anymore,” he said.
Then he was gone, and I was alone in the rain.
I tried to follow the vampire, but he disappeared before I got to my feet, using some of that superhuman vampire speed I hadn’t gotten the hang of yet. Instead, I picked up my things that had scattered across the cobblestone, and his stake, and continued my walk home.
I pondered his sadness for the rest of the walk. When I got to my door, I wondered if I should have tried harder to find him. I worried he would try to hurt himself again. At the very least, I had his stake. I turned it over in my hand, my stomach churning at the sight of the pointed end. The rain had washed off his blood, but I imagined it piercing skin, shattering bones, and killing. Three months ago, this would have been a piece of junk to me. Now, it was life and death. Disgusted, I tucked it under my arm and unlocked the door to my apartment.
