Claimed by the Alpha and the Vampire Prince: Masquerading as a Man

REED POV

If someone told me the scariest thing I’d witness all week wasn’t a bloodsucker with fangs bared, but a human girl bleeding from her center in a bathrobe—I’d have laughed in their face.

I ain’t laughing now.

Nope.

I’m standing half-shifted, fists bruised from punching that undead bastard, when Clause explodes like a damn nuke in lace-trimmed rage. Her voice? Sharp. Loud. Furious. The kind of furious that stops you cold and makes your balls shrivel in self-defense.

But I’m not looking at her.

Not really.

I mean, yeah—she’s the one yelling, stomping, pointing like she’s casting a damn curse—but my eyes are locked on him.

Blaze.

Prince of the bloodsuckers. The cold-hearted heir with a jaw carved from stone and a soul dipped in tar.

And right now?

He’s unraveling.

I swear, it’s like I’m watching him break and he’s doing it silently, piece by piece, behind those red-glowing eyes. Not the dramatic vampire kind of break—no. I mean that cold, dead, rotting from the inside out kind of collapse that happens when someone realizes they’ve lost control of something they didn’t even know they gave a damn about.

Clause’s words are tearing through the air like bullets, and every single one is hitting him square in the chest. He flinches—flinches—like a goddamn guilty puppy every time she says his name with that venom-dripping disgust.

And me?

I’m watching it all with equal parts fury and satisfaction.

Because Blaze?

He’s not mad.

He’s not indignant.

He’s haunted.

There’s this heavy gloom rolling off him, like a damn thunderstorm wrapped in a funeral shroud. His fists are clenched, not in rage, but like he’s trying to hold something broken inside of him together. His mouth is tight. Jaw locked. And those crimson eyes? Yeah, they’re flickering. Not with bloodlust.

With regret.

The undead bastard is grieving.

Not for her, no. She’s still here—still screaming like a banshee with a megaphone and righteous fury.

He’s grieving for the fantasy he thought he could control.

I glance at him as Clause turns on me for my crimes, dragging my ass through the fire next. And Blaze doesn’t even blink. Doesn’t defend himself. Doesn’t speak. He just stands there, taking every verbal stab like it’s gospel, like he believes he deserves it.

And maybe he does.

Because something in his chest cracked the second Clause looked him dead in the eye and called him an "ancient asshole."

It was like watching a statue crumble.

No violence.

Just the quiet horror of realization.

That he couldn’t hide from this.

That he couldn’t control her.

That she wasn’t his timid pet...

...she was a mirror.

One that showed him exactly what he’d become.

And let me tell you—I’ve fought vampires. Ripped through packs of them in full shift, claw to fang. But I have never seen one look so human and so damned at the same time.

He was drowning.

Drowning in guilt, in confusion, in this sick, twisted obsession he couldn’t name because he spent centuries convincing himself he didn’t have a heart to feel with.

But oh, he felt now.

Every insult. Every glare. Every second she looked at him like he was filth.

And as Clause slammed the door with a final "fuck both of you," the silence that followed wasn’t peaceful.

It was choking.

Suffocating.

I finally tore my eyes off the door and looked at Blaze, expecting him to snarl or vanish like smoke.

But he didn’t move.

He just stood there, shoulders hunched like a beaten dog, gaze fixed where she had stood.

Like she’d taken his breath with her when she left.

"...You good, princey?" I asked, voice low and laced with mockery I didn’t fully feel. "Need a moment to cry into your cape?"

Nothing.

No witty comeback. No glare.

Just that same haunted stare.

And suddenly, I wasn’t angry anymore.

I was pissed off, sure. But not in the same way.

Because whatever delusions I had about Blaze being this cold, cocky bastard with no soul... were cracking. Right before my eyes.

He wasn’t soulless.

He was rotting from the inside out, and Clause had just pulled back the curtain on all his carefully buried guilt.

And the worst part?

He didn’t even fight it.

He just stood there and felt it all.

I should’ve gloated.

I should’ve rubbed it in.

But all I did was scoff and mutter, "Pathetic," before limping out of that wrecked room to find something—anything—to punch that wasn’t already emotionally shattered.

Because yeah, we both lost that round.

But only one of us was bleeding where no claws could reach.

And that was Blaze.

Blaze POV

I’d lived for over two centuries, seen kingdoms rise and fall, watched empires crumble beneath greed and time. I’ve seen lovers kill each other in the name of devotion, seen betrayal dressed in silk and spoken through poisoned lips. But nothing—nothing—had prepared me for her fury. Not the wars. Not the endless games of court. Not the taste of my enemies’ blood as it bubbled down my throat.

Clause.

She stormed out of that bathroom like a goddess pissed off by her own creation. Hair wet, curls wild like shadows in motion. Dressed in nothing but a robe and thunder. The air changed when she stepped into the room. Charged. Electric. Lethal.

And I stood there, still on the goddamn floor, blood from that stupid mutt staining my tongue. Reed’s wolf had clawed open my chest, but the ache there had nothing to do with his filthy nails. It was her.

I should’ve known. I should have known the moment I first smelled her. That addictive scent laced in defiance and danger. But I’d run from it. Denied it. Buried it in logic and pride and centuries of telling myself I’d never need a beloved.

Because beloveds were weaknesses. Softness. Chains.

And yet—when she came out and raised her voice at us, not even the most ancient vampire could’ve withstood it without flinching. Not because her voice held magic. But because her fury... it was real. Human. Raw. And aimed straight at me.

"Don’t you dare touch me!" she snarled at me like I was filth, something beneath her shoes.

I didn’t move. Couldn’t. My feet were rooted to the floor, but my insides were tearing themselves apart. Her heartbeat—furious, erratic—pounded against my mind like a drum of war. Her eyes were glassy, not with fear but with pain. The kind you don’t speak about. The kind that builds up until it explodes.

Then she exploded.

"You two ancient assholes—you—you think the world revolves around your stupid supernatural egos?! You fight like you own me! Trash my room like I’m some prize in your pissing contest?! I’m bleeding, I’m in pain, and the last thing I need is a damn wolf and a bloodsucker using me like I’m a f**king flag to stake on the moon!"

Each word was a slap across my undead face.

Reed looked as stunned as I was, his wolf recoiling like a scolded pup. And me? I just stood there—fangs still bared, fists still clenched—and took every word like it was a holy blade.

She didn’t stop there.

"You want to know what I really think?" she hissed, voice cracking. "You’re both bastards. Different flavors of the same goddamn poison. Reed, with your barking orders and your ’remove your pants’ bullshit. And you—Blaze. Mr. Broody vampire prince with the emotional range of a teaspoon. Stalking my f**king window like a discount Dracula and running away the minute sh*t gets real!"

The robe shifted slightly on her shoulder, and for a second I saw a glimpse of skin, bare, soft—vulnerable. Not in the physical sense. In the emotional one. It gutted me.

Because she was right.

I had run. Like a coward. Like some fledgling who’d just caught scent of his beloved and couldn’t face the reality of what it meant. I could’ve protected her. Should’ve. But instead I turned my back and left her to bleed alone.

"You know what?" she continued, eyes blazing with tears she refused to shed. "I’m tired. I’m exhausted. I’m bleeding from my uterus, not dying, not marked, not claimed. Just f**king human. And if you two so much as breathe near me again without being invited, I swear I’ll put both of you down. And I don’t care how many centuries or how many alpha titles you’ve got. I’ll find a way."

Then she pointed to the floor. At the mess.

"Clean this sh*t up," she spat, voice lowered now, trembling but still sharp. "And get the f**k out of my room."

She stormed out, slamming the door behind her like she was sealing us into a coffin of our own making.

Silence.

Even Reed—hotheaded, cocky Reed—just lay there, blinking.

Me?

I had no fangs left to show. No comebacks. No pride.

I just stared at the closed door and for the first time in over two hundred years... I felt ashamed. Not for what I was. Not for the blood I’d spilled or the games I’d played. But for hurting her. For abandoning her.

For refusing to accept the one thing fate had given me without warning—

A beloved.

And now?

Now she hated me.

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. But this? This wasn’t fury.

It was heartbreak. Hers. And mine.

And I had no one to blame but myself.