Embrace the Night by Amanda Ashley Page B

in the company of the young man he had seen her with that first night, and the thought that she cared
for
that weakling mortal filled him with a monstrous rage.
    They held hands, and he wanted to rip the boy's arms from his body.
    They kissed good night at her door, and he was sorely tempted to tear the boy to shreds, to claw the flesh from his handsome young face until nothing remained.
    He hovered near her window, watching as she brushed her lustrous hair, and he burned for her, burned as though the sun had found him in the darkness.
    He could force her to love him. The knowledge was ever there, tempting, beckoning. He could hypnotize her with his revenant power so that she would do anything he asked, or he could take her blood and bind her to him for as long as she lived. She would be his slave then, mindlessly adoring, obediently doing whatever he asked. She would live for him, beg him to take her blood, willingly die for him, if he but said the word.
    But he didn't want a slave. He wanted her devotion, freely given.
    Filled with self-disgust, ashamed of the cowardice that kept him from confronting her openly, he dissolved into mist and returned to his lair, an abandoned cottage on the outskirts of Paris. It was an ideal place, located in a small clearing off the side of a badly rutted road, hidden from casual view by a grove of trees and shrubs gone wild.
    Assuming his own form, he prowled the empty rooms. He had sent Sara away to make a life for herself, and that was what she had done. She had dreamed of being a dancer, and now she was a
prima ballerina
, the toast of the Paris Opera. She had an apartment of her own, friends, a young man who obviously adored her. What need did she have for an ancient vampire?
    He paused before the darkened window and stared at the glass. Had he been mortal, his reflection would have stared back at him, but he cast no shadow, no reflection, because he was not alive, not in any sense of the word.
    He should have died long ago. What was the point of his existence? He contributed nothing, gave nothing. He was naught but a parasite feeding off the fear of mankind, existing on the lifeblood of others, never giving, always taking… but no, that wasn't entirely true. He had given Sara a few drops of his blood, and given the world a ballerina without equal.
    Sara… He had loved her for almost twenty years. It was a pitifully short time compared to the span of his life, yet they had been the most rewarding years of his entire unearthly existence. He had thought, when he lost Rosalia, that he had lost all reason for continuing, but he knew now that what he had felt for Rosalia was as nothing compared to the love he felt for Sara. But Sara, too, was lost to him now, and he had only himself to blame.
    For once in his life, he had tried to be noble, to do the right thing, and it had cost him the one thing he held dear above all others.
    He sensed the coming of dawn, felt his skin begin to tingle with the rising of the sun. He stared at the brightening sky. He had lost Sara, and he had nothing left to live for. He had only to stay where he was, to let the golden rays of the sun find him, and his existence would soon be over. A few moments of excruciating pain as his body burst into flame, and the hollow shell that had once housed his immortal soul would be destroyed.
    He felt a sudden yearning to see the dawn, to watch the sun rise above the horizon. Hands clenched at his sides, he stepped out into the yard and stared at the heavens, and waited.
    For the sunrise. For the fiery death it would bring.
    Slowly, the sun climbed over the horizon, its brightness blinding to a man who had not seen it in over three hundred years. Like a master painter, the sun splashed her light across the sky, streaking the dark canvas with colors—fiery crimsons and brilliant golds.
    Mesmerized by the wonder of it, he stood there, feeling a heat he had not felt for over three hundred years, seeing the clear golden light of