Mika sat curled up on her couch, a soft blanket wrapped around her shoulders like armor. Logan lay beside her, resting his head in her lap, his amber eyes watching her every move. The television was on, playing a documentary she had seen before, but her thoughts were too loud for her to hear a single word.
Her mind kept replaying the moments she had spent with Lex—his cold hands, his strange yet intoxicating presence, the way he looked at her like she was the only person that mattered. There was something about him that didn't sit right, something both beautiful and terrifying. She'd only known him for a short time, but he already took up more space in her head than she cared to admit.
She reached for her sketchbook on the coffee table and opened it, flipping past pages of flowers, animals, and abstract designs. Her hand started to move on instinct, sketching the shape of Lex's face. His sharp cheekbones. That messy dark hair. His eyes… ice blue and somehow ancient. The pencil strokes were soft, but her heart raced as the image formed.
"Who are you really?" she whispered to herself. "Why do you make me feel like I've known you forever?"
Mika frowned and looked down at Logan. "You didn't like him at first," she murmured. "Why?"
Logan gave a soft huff but didn't move. She traced the outline of Lex's face again, then paused, remembering how Logan had growled and hidden behind her legs. That wasn't like him. Logan was fearless. Protective. And yet something about Lex had unsettled him. It unsettled her too, but in a different way. She felt drawn to him. As if something ancient inside her was waking up.
She leaned back and stared at the ceiling. "This is insane," she muttered. "He's probably just… mysterious and weird. That's all. A little cold, a little off, but… still just a guy."
Still, she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something more—something dangerous beneath his charm. Something that made her blood run cold and warm all at once.
A few blocks away, Lex leaned against the wall of his dimly lit bedroom, staring at the ceiling as the rain tapped against the windows. His room was modern but cold, furnished in blacks and deep blues. The only sign of personality was a faded photo of an old house that hung on the wall—his home from another lifetime.
He ran his fingers through his hair, still thinking of her. Mika.
There was something different about her. He had fed on countless people over the centuries, forgotten faces and meaningless names. But Mika wasn't just another person to him—she was fire and softness, beauty and scars, everything human that he had long since left behind.
He clenched his jaw, remembering how the bikers had touched her, spoken to her like she was a thing to take. His hands curled into fists, the memory of their arrogance still fresh. It had taken everything in him not to rip their throats out. But he couldn't risk it. Not in front of her. Not when he still had a chance.
A black rose sat on the desk beside his bed, its petals tinted with crimson. A drop of blood ran down its stem—his own. Lex had pricked his finger intentionally, letting it soak into the thorns. He had always found something poetic about pain and beauty. Just like Mika. Her face—flawed and freckled, soft and full of fire—was haunting him.
He stood up and walked to the window, peering out at the quiet street below. He had lived through centuries of loneliness, moving from town to town, hiding in plain sight. No one had ever stirred anything in him. Until now.
She made him feel human again.
But he wasn't human. Not anymore. And if she found out what he really was—what he'd done—would she still look at him the same way? Would she still smile at him?
He growled under his breath, frustrated by his own weakness. This wasn't how it was supposed to be. He was supposed to be in control. Detached. But Mika had already gotten under his skin. Into his blood.
And now, he wasn't sure he could live without her.