Unholy Gambit — Candace Blevins

He buried her memories to protect her. She was never meant to remember the vampire who saved her.Aurélie de Saint Claire was five years old when she threw herself at a monster to save her mother's life. She doesn't remember the blood. Doesn't remember the fangs. Just the fallout: bones that never healed right, a limp that became her identity, and a fear she could never explain.Now twenty-three, she's a rising star in the international chess circuit, with a brilliant mind, a body that never fully healed, and a past that's beginning to unravel. When the truth begins to resurface, so does the dark, distant immortal who once silenced her pain with a thought and walked away without a trace. He's cold, controlled, and undeniably inhuman — and he's watched her grow from half a world away.Axel was never supposed to interfere, but a single encounter changed everything. The tiny child was too fiercely brave, too brilliant, too intense. For the first time in his long life, he broke the rules to save a life. He's never been the same.She was brave before most children can tie their shoes, and now she's a woman who tempts him in ways that have nothing to do with innocence.He rewrote her memories and vanished, but she was his the moment she stood on shattered legs and faced a monster. Their bond should have died when he erased her memories. It didn't.Now that Aury is remembering, the bond is waking up — and it's still alive. Still functional. Still binding them both.As she digs into the scars left behind, she's dragged into a world of vampire law, ancient debts, and a game more dangerous than she ever imagined.Because this isn't just about what happened that night. It's about the bond they forged, and buried obsessions can rise from the dark and crawl back. Fangs first.Even erased memories leave scars.