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VICTORIA HATED THE SUN.
She had since she was a little girl. Being a ginger really didn't help her. The skin that held her body together burned under it and during the summer her mother had often kept her inside despite her protests. From the large estate they lived in, Victoria made no friends.
Maybe that had been for the best, for it was a night in the woods away from her mother in an attempt to get some alone time with her older sister Anne. God, how she missed Anne now. They'd been a pair in their human lives and a pair while they were with their maker. Victoria never quite got over that immortal loss.
Yet, while she was human she'd been made to stay inside, make no friends other than her sister.
No enemies had been made either, which may have been why her mother persisted in telling her that being alone with Anne was better. Victoria had believed her until she'd met James. He'd been the light of her life, the one who always knew how to make her laugh. They'd hunted so many people together, basking in the immortality that she'd despised before.
Now he was gone and she felt so hollow. She didn't know what to believe when it was revealed that they were mates, but her life was over the second that he died. She knew that it was the truest form of love lost, and she'd spiraled in ways she didn't want to think about. This was so far from what she'd wanted to do with her time. Victoria never wanted children in her human life and she sure as Hell didn't want to guide vampire children in her immortal one.
Each and every one of these former humans got on her nerves. She didn't remember herself bumbling through immortality like them. She didn't spill so much blood. She wasn't so damn sloppy.
So she had to do what she did. Riley Biers was a stupid little boy so in love with the immortality that she'd given him that he wouldn't think about why she never touched him, never kissed him or made a single move on him. She led him on, but what else did he expect from her? Victoria told him exactly why they were doing this.
Her mate was dead and was never coming back.
So she'd laugh at the dumb jokes, at the cultural references that were so beyond her time. She was so old, this boy so young. Eighteen years old. Naive. In love. He reminded her of plenty of the boys she'd talked to while hunting. That was how they met. Hunting. When she realized that she could use the humans to get what she wanted.
Her revenge had been in the works for over six months now. These Newborns were trained enough to kill on command, yet strong as their human blood had not been fully replaced with venom yet. Their eyes were blood red, not pale or darkening with age.
Riley was everything that she needed right now. Someone who didn't judge, didn't question, followed her. Why would she need someone to actually be with her, when her beloved mate was dead. She would die doing these dark deeds, so finding someone real for her didn't matter.
