When Valentine’s sire is forced to take a mate by his Clan leader, Valentine is reduced to stoking the castle’s furnaces as nothing more than a cindered servant to the new matriarch. With his sire Libertine incarcerated and Valentine forced to wear a cursed collar, there seems no way to escape Belladonna’s hold on them. When a stranger appears, Valentine is surprised by how quickly he trusts the other vampire. He accepts the request to go to the castle of his Clan Lord, the ancient and powerful Hades, to uncover who is working to overthrow him. His reward is freedom for both him and his sire. No one is meant to know who he really is, and Valentine pretends he’s one of Hades’ favorites while in the castle, adopting the name Cinder and playing his Seductive nature to its full. But his world is shaken to its core when Valentine finds himself falling for the enigmatic Cole. As a Seductive, Valentine never imagined he’d want an Alpha Predator as a mate. Worse yet, it may be that Cole could be the very one he’s been sent to uncover. When the battle for dominance begins, where will Valentine’s loyalty lie?

Cinis

“No, sir. Nothing until the ball. Master Hades wants it to be the spectacle of the century.”


“I’m sure it will be.” Valentine nodded at the servant who bowed and hurried away, and Valentine focused on his new abode.


The room Valentine was given looked comfortable enough, if one liked one’s bedroom predominantly black. The high, vaulted stone ceiling was echoed in the high arches carved into the wooden frame of the four-posted bed. Dark blue drapes were pinned back from the posts and were the same midnight hue of the bedspread.


All the furniture in the room was black, blue being the only splash of color. The over-large and ornate dressing table was topped by a dark mirror which allowed Valentine to peer at himself. A chaise lounge in black was set beside the window, which opened out onto a small balcony.


Chapter 14