In that moment, Sebastian felt more alive than he had in over a century. But as she drew that one, small object from her nightstand his dead heart, beating only for her, stopped.
"He had damned himself centuries ago for a love he could not save. And tonight, he had damned himself again by ensuring she would never, ever truly know him. The ache of being known had been replaced by the far more exquisite torture of being forever a monster in the dark."