His upper torso was practically covered in scars as cut after cut marred his body. I trembled even as I ran a finger over one of them.

“How were you able to survive this, Ben?”

“That’s the last round of torture that you see. She used a dagger to cut me, deep enough to scar, but shallow enough not to cause internal damage. The first two rounds of torture, she beat me up to a bloody pulp and then made me drink her blood so I could heal so she could torture me again.”

It took everything I had to keep myself from vomiting. Tears were dripping down my cheeks, horrified by what he had to go through.

“These creatures are evil savages, Sofia. All of them. They don’t have a conscience just as much as they don’t have a life. You might think that this prince of theirs has a heart in him somewhere, but he doesn’t, Sofia. No matter how he’s taken care of you, he’s still a vampire. And whenever he lays his eyes on you, all he sees is a beautiful young woman he can sink his teeth into.”

And yet… he hasn’t. No matter how tempted he was, he never gave in. I looked up at my best friend, wanting to agree with him, but still finding my inner conscience standing in defense of Derek. It made me feel guilty, because after all Ben had been through, it felt like he deserved to have me on his side on this, but all I could think of was the smile on Derek’s face and the way he looked at me when he motioned to kiss me. No matter how I tried to recall, the times that I could consider negative about my captor, I found that I didn’t have it in me to see Derek as a savage… simply because that wasn’t what he was.

“I can’t blame you for thinking that. Claudia certainly is,” was the compromise I could come up with to appease my best friend.

“But you think your prince isn’t?”

“Derek has his flaws, but he’s far from being a savage.”

Ben responded by cupping my face with his large hands and planting a kiss over my forehead.

“You’re wrong, Sofia, and for your sake, I hope we could find a way out of here before his true colors come out.”

“Well, well, well…what do we have here?”

As if the thoughts Ben was laying on me weren’t enough of a burden to bear, I now had to hear the blood-curdling sound of Lucas’ voice.

“You’re one naughty girl, Sofia. I hate it enough when I see Derek touch you, but now this?”

Before I could even start formulating a response, Lucas had both Ben and I backed up against a wall, his powerful hands keeping us both in place by our necks. Lucas’ glare settled on Ben.

“If it isn’t Claudia’s slave… Weren’t you the one serving us during those pleasurable rendezvous that I spent with your mistress?”

Ben struggled vainly against Lucas’ grasp. However, we both knew that there wasn’t much he could do to harm Lucas.

“Welcome to the Pavilion, boy,” Lucas grinned, showing amusement over Ben’s failure to get away from him. “First lesson you ought to learn is that you never touch what’s mine. Even though my brother still thinks that he owns her, Sofia is mine.”

Ben spat on his face. “Sofia is neither yours nor your brother’s. She belongs with me.”

I shot a surprised look his way, not quite knowing what to make of that statement. I didn’t have much time to mull over what he just said though, because infuriated by Ben’s insolence, Lucas growled and hurled Ben to the other side of the room. Ben’s head hit the wall and he fell to the ground unconscious. I let out a scream and tried to rush towards Ben, but Lucas’ cold grip held me back.

Lucas’ manic glare focused on me. “I think it’s time I got what I want from you. It’s been long enough. Don’t you agree, Sofia?”

CHAPTER 26: DEREK

What have I done? After that stunt I pulled with her, I might as well have just delivered her to that boy on a silver platter.

From the moment I left Sofia trembling in my bed, I’d done nothing but chastise myself for what I did up to the very point I found myself wandering back to the penthouse, feeling like I’d just lost Sofia. I couldn’t believe myself. I actually accused her of being with Lucas, whom I was certain was the person tormenting her over the past weeks, out of my jealousy over this friend of hers. I walked all around the Blood Shade, hoping to clear my mind, but not succeeding in achieving that goal at all. If anything, I was more confused than ever, because during my walk and the time I spent thinking, only made me paranoid enough to think up every scenario possible upon my return. I was actually gearing myself up to stop myself from ripping someone’s head off in case I found Sofia sleeping with this friend of hers.

Get a grip, Derek. I kept telling myself. I was being irrational. Sofia said the boy was her best friend. I believed her. Then I’d remember how she looked at him… how I was certain that she never looked at me that way before and my paranoia would once again kick in. There’s no way that boy is ‘just a friend’.

I only returned to the Pavilion after I felt I was ready for the worst possible scenario upon reaching the penthouse, but nothing could’ve prepared me for what I found upon my return. The first thing I noticed was Sam and Kyle waking up from unconsciousness on the living room floor.

“What happened?!” I yelled, though I already had a clear enough idea of what occurred there.

“Sun…room,” was all Sam managed to say. “Ben’s…there…too.”

My gut clenched. I actually felt betrayed that Sofia would be with any other person in the sun room who wasn’t me. I forced my jealousy aside, knowing that something was wrong and that I had to get my head on straight, but there was no way to prepare myself to see Ben’s unconscious form on the ground and hear Sofia’s whimpers as she tried in vain to push my brother away from her.

Lucas had her up a wall, naked from the waist up, as his teeth sank into her neck, his hands freely groping her body, obviously enjoying the sensations the feel of her provided as he greedily drank her blood.

I lost all sense of control as I attacked my brother, making a huge crack on the wall when I pushed him into it.

Lucas actually had the gall to laugh. I punched him in the face with such great force, I half-expected his neck to crack from the way his face swung violently to the side.

I was sure that he had gone completely mad based on the wild expression on his face. I was wrong.

He knew exactly what he was doing. “I can’t let you have her, brother,” he spat at me – a mixture of her blood and his own. “I will lose everything the moment she becomes completely yours.”

I didn’t understand what he was saying. I didn’t want to. I just wanted to end him, end this bitter rivalry we’d had for so many years. It was clear that I was far more powerful than he was, because his struggles to get away from me didn’t do him any good. I retrieved the wooden stake I kept on my person all the time.

“Is that the wooden stake? The same one you kept from all those years of being a shadow hunter?”

Lucas showed no fear. I knew that he knew me well enough to know how important family was to me, but he grossly underestimated how important Sofia had become to me. After all that time I spent weighing who mattered more to me – my brother or Sofia, at that moment, the choice was crystal clear: I had every intention of stabbing that stake through his heart – if only to protect the woman I loved.

I caught my own thoughts. I tensed at the realization. The woman I loved. That’s how I saw Sofia. Now that Lucas had tasted her blood, he would always be after her, though I was certain that he’d been after her since the night of the attack. I had no doubt in my mind that it was him who hurt Sofia and killed Gwen. I hated that I was too much of a coward to face him. This was my fault.

I raised the stake and targeted my brother’s heart.

The smirk on his face disappeared when he realized I had every intention of killing him. He had simply gone too far. He actually cowered in fear when I made the motion to stab him. Relief washed over his face when someone stood to his defense.

“Derek, no…”

At first, I thought it was Vivienne, but it wasn’t. I would know Sofia’s soft voice anytime I heard it.

“You’re not safe from him,” I hissed through gritted teeth.

“I never was.” She panted.

I could tell from the way she spoke that she was conflicted, most likely debating against her own reasons for keeping me from driving that stake into Lucas’ heart.

“Then why should he live?! He has to die!”

Sofia’s answer reminded me why I adored her so much.

“If you kill your own brother, Derek, you might never be able to forgive me. Or worse than that, you might never be able to forgive yourself.”

She knew me – all sides of me – but she never treated me like a creature of the dark. When she looked at me, it felt as if she still saw someone capable of light.

I dropped the stake and loosened my hold on my brother. He lost no time in taking advantage of what he most likely perceived as a momentary lapse of sanity and rushed out of the room. He hasn’t changed at all. Lucas was a coward and a bully. He never did stand up to those who were more powerful than him, but he found enjoyment in preying on the weak.