Page 123 of Hunted

I’m almost grateful.

Almost.

Then I remember what started this detour into his inner sanctum and impossible mirror.

‘And what does all this have to do with the tattoo? I mean the mark.’

His nostrils flare for one brief heartbeat.

Then he moves me farther back, one hand at my elbow, positioning me so the chandelier light spills down over him at an angle. The Heartshard Glass catches it, bends it, and suddenly he looks less like a man and more like a painting some doomed aristocrat commissioned before a revolution.

‘Because, little hunter, it is more than a simple mark.’

I drag my gaze down from the hypnotic effect of his eyes and make myself focus on what he’s showing me.

He peels the shirt farther open.

And for a moment, stupidly, embarrassingly, all I can do is stare.

Valentin Moretti’s body is obscene in the old-fashioned sense of the word. Offensive in its beauty, its exactness, the arrogant way strength and grace coexist in him as if custom-built. His chest is cut in hard planes, his abdomen ridged and lean, his skin pale in the chandelier light but not fragile, threaded here and there with scars that should not still be visible on a vampire.

Thin silver-white lines at his ribs. A wicked little crescent low on one side. A deeper scar near his shoulder that looks old enough to have its own story and dangerous enough that I know better than to ask about it first.

Then I see the mark properly.

And all my thoughts go quiet.

It sits over the left side of his chest, close enough to his heart to make my own beat harder in response. A dark, intricate sigil that looks less like blood-red ink and more like something grown beneath the skin and pushed to the surface.

Veined lines branch from a central shape like cracked obsidian fused with emberlight, the deepest parts black-red, the edges glimmering faintly as if lit from beneath.

Intensely, decadently beautiful.

The way dangerous things often are.

Mesmerising.

Horrifying.

Because my stomach drops as I realise it’s exactly like what I felt beneath my palm in the dream.

I keep that to myself so fast it almost gives me whiplash.

‘What is it made of?’ I ask, because that’s easier than ‘why does this look familiar from a dream I didn’t tell you about?’

His gaze is on me, not the mark. ‘It is not made. It manifests. Keeps manifesting.’

I circle slowly, needing different angles. Distance and proximity at once. ‘You mean it’s grown since it appeared?’

‘Yes.’

‘How fast?’

‘Not at a uniform rate.’

Beneath the arm hanging at his side, I spot one branch with a sharp edge, as if it’s digging in. ‘Does it hurt?’

‘I’m a vampire, little hunter. Pain has a different meaning.’