Special Note: Please kindly excuse any discrepancies you may come across as you read this book including formatting issues. I hope the power, depth, and beauty of the content outweighs any grammatical inconsistencies or lack of aesthetic quality. Thank you again for allowing me to be a part of your life through my writing.
Adult Content Warning: some parts in this chapter contain content of an adult nature and are for mature audiences only ages 18+. Proper caution should be excerised. Reader discretion is advised.
Much to her amazement, Beth slept the entire day away. Apparently stress and fatigue had caught up with her, but when she awoke she was curled tightly around Soren, who felt cooler now than when she had fallen asleep. Wrapped in her favorite blue sweat suit, she felt warm enough, and found it easy to wind herself around him, although she wondered if he could feel the heat of her body in his...
In his what? Was he really dead? She couldn't tell if he was breathing, and when she laid her head on his chest, she heard no heartbeat. Yet he said he could be wakened if necessary, so he couldn't really be dead.
The ravages Kane had wrought on his chest were gone as if they had never been, the shredded, slightly bloody shirt the only evidence.
She studied him in awe, and something warm curled up like a kitten in her heart. He had trusted her completely. Trusted her not to harm him when he was as helpless as he could be. Trusted her not to fling the door open and let the light in. Trusted her not to take advantage of his helplessness.
That was trust indeed.
Sighing, she laid her head on his shoulder again and waited for some sign of life. It wouldn't be long now, she was certain.
She wanted to share the moment with him, to truly see what it was like. He called it resurrecting. Was that really what it was?
Ordinarily she would have been annoyed with herself for missing an entire day's writing, but not today. She had needed the sleep. Even more she had seemed to need these moments of intimacy, to realize what he had offered her.
To face the fact that he had given her utter trust and that she seemed to be unable to give him the same. Her cheeks heated when she remembered his response to her offer to give him her blood. Now that she was calmer, she could easily understand why he had been so offended.
He was not her mother. Not by the least word or sign had he indicated that she was an unwanted burden. Maybe she could learn from him.
Maybe she could learn for the first time that friendship need not be a debt that must somehow be repaid. That it was possible to act out of sheer kindness without expecting something back.
She wrote such characters in her novels all the time. But they were, to her way of thinking, a mythical ideal, as mythical as the creatures she created out of whole cloth. Heroes of fantasy, never of reality.
Just then an ugly thought wound its way into her head and made her nearly gasp with pain. So he said she owed him nothing? But what if that was because he was being paid to watch her? Before she could even begin to deal with how that idea made her feel, he awoke.
She felt Soren jerk and heard him draw a sharp breath. She lifted her head at once and found his face locked into a grimace, his eyes wide open. Then he drew another breath, and his expression relaxed.
Slowly his black-as-night eyes tracked to her. "Have you been here all day?"
"Mostly. I slept. Does it hurt when you wake up?"
"As if every cell in my body is filled with fire. It passes quickly." He smiled almost gently. "Your warmth. Thank you. It feels especially good right now."
So she curled in closer, because it seemed like the least she could do. But the ugly question wouldn't rest. "Is Asher paying you to help me?"
"No. I don't need money." He fell silent for a moment, then to her amazement she felt him stroke her hair gently. "Are you still questioning my motives?" At least now he didn't sound angry about it.
"No. Not exactly. I just...I have a hang-up."
"About what?"
"I don't ever gain want to be a burden."
"Who taught you that?"
She turned her head to conceal her face from him, and even then the words didn't seem to want to some. It was one of those things she couldn't thinking about, when she let herself, but never had spoken about. In some essential way she felt shamed.
"Beth? Did no one ever teach you that some burdens can be borne with joy?"
She caught her breath. His words seemed to plummet straight to her heart. "No."
He fell silent for a minute, still stroking her hair lightly. "When I was a father, my children could sometimes be burdensome. Things they needed or wanted. It was my greatest joy to be able to provide for them. I never begrudged it. Well, all right, almost never. There were a few silly things they wanted that irritated me. But mostly I felt happy about meeting their needs. And I missed it when I could no longer do it except from a distance."
Beth's heart squeezed painfully, for herself, for him. "How did you help from a distance?"
"I was always able to see that they had enough to eat, adequate shelter even in hard times. Medical care when they couldn't afford it. Sometimes I think I may have helped too much because I felt so awful at having to abandon them in every other way. But when I could do something to make their lives easier or better, it was my privilege to do so. I still watch over my great-grandchildren, although by and large they need almost nothing that I'm able to give."
He stopped stroking her hair, caught her beneath the chin with one fingertip, and turned her face up. "Who made you feel like such a burden?"
She answered obliquely. "I wish I'd had a parent like you."
His face stilled. His dark gaze grew distant. "I see," he said finally, and she believed he did. Then he looked at her again and gave her a crooked smile. "I'd much rather be your lover than your parent, if you don't mind."
Her world tilted in an instant, and her insides turned warm and syrupy. Time seemed to slow down as she hovered in exquisite and painful anticipation and hope. All the things she had been worrying about and trying to work out vanished in a yearning so intense she felt like a drawn bow.
His arms snaked around her gently, though she could feel the strength in them, and he turned until they met face-to-face, body-to-body. Shocks erupted from every point of contact. She drew a deep, quick breath as she melted into him and gazed into his eyes.
They were golden, gloriously golden.
"You are so beautiful," he said, sliding his fingers into her hair to cup the back of her head. "You have no idea. And you're not just beautiful. Your scent is intoxicating."
She offered no more than an incoherent murmur in response.
"Tell me if I frighten you," he said.
Her heart nearly stopped. Frighten her how? She didn't care because she was certain that all she wanted right now was to find out what it was like to make love to a vampire. All his warnings couldn't quell her desire for him.
And he seemed about to...about to...
Slowly, very slowly as if to give her every chance to object, he moved his face closer and finally their lips touched. Lightly at first, then more hungrily as she arched into him, wanting, needing, to be closer.
His kiss was deep, passionate, stealing her breath and her mind along with it. She responded in kind, dimly aware she reached up to clasp the back of his head so he would not pull away.
She was going somewhere she had never gone before; of that she was certain. No kiss had ever stirred her like this, never had a simple kiss made her feel prisoner to need.
When he at least tore his mouth from hers, she gasped desperately for air, but just as desperately tried to bring him back.
"Easy," he whispered. "Easy."
Easy? She didn't want easy. For the first time in her life she wanted to be conquered into total submission and carried away like a captive on his feelings he evoked.
He must have sensed her need, or smelled it, because he came back for another kiss, and another, lifting her higher into the universe of passion. But each time she tried to touch him, to pull at his clothing, to act on some of her feelings, he hushed her gently, soothed her to a lower plane of need.
Then she stiffened. Unmistakably she felt his teeth. A gentle nip just below her collarbone, not enough to breath the skin she was sure. But that nip was the most electrifying thing he had yet note, and she heard herself saying, "Please, Soren. Oh, please!"
"Don't move," he said huskily. "Whatever you do, don't move."
She gave the barest nod of comprehension, stiffening herself to hold still. She felt the lap of his tongue, cool and soothing. Moments later her heart skipped into a higher rhythm, loud in her own ears. Or was that his heart? She couldn't tell... There seemed to be two heartbeats.
Orgasmic pleasure flooded her entire body, something she wouldn't have dreamed possible. Her brain fogged with yearning for more, and then she grew overwhelmed by a sense that she and Soren were one. His heart and hers, two hearts beating independently, began to beat in precisely matching rhythms. She lost all sense of where she ended and he began, and gave herself up to it.
His hands stroked her, kneading her breast to an aching peak. But more than what she felt in her own body, she was certain she was feeling it from his perspective, too. She was kneaded and stroked, and kneading and stroking.
And when his hand slipped down to touch her between her legs, through layers of cloth, she felt not only her response, but this, a dual hit of desire, aching, yearning, throbbing, so magnified that it left her senseless of everything but sensation.
She didn't know how it was possible nor did she have the ability to wonder. Instead she felt racked, imprisoned in a cycle of need: him, her, the two of them, rising s one ever high on pain and pleasure until she thought she would literally shatter.
Perfect. Perfect in every single instant. A rising tide of desire, hunger, need, lifted her up. Hers or his she couldn't tell. It was more than enough to be lifted, to be swept away toward a pinnacle she could barely imagine.
Each time their hearts throbbed, her body throbbed, too. Each breath she took was answered by a deep, quiet groan from him.
Then came exultation. She was feeding him in the way he most needed. At that moment she'd have gladly given him every drop of her blood, and died in a state of bliss.
All of a sudden, the connection vanished and she tumbled back to reality to feel him gently licking her skin where she had earlier felt his nip.
"I'm sorry," he said, lifting his head. "I shouldn't have done that. But I didn't take very much."
She didn't know what upset her move: having the incredible experience end this way or hearing him apologize for showing her a transcendent experience.
Feeling weak, wanting more, all she could do was press a finger to his lips. "No," she whispered. "Don't apologize. I wouldn't have missed that for another."
His expression grew grim. "I was afraid of that."
Her voice grew stronger. "It's better to have some experiences only one than to miss then entirely."
His gaze leaped to hers, his yellow eyes intense. "Easy to say, hard to know. Never forget I'm a predator. I just crossed a line I shouldn't have. And now it'll be even harder not to cross it again."
She gasped, and in an instant he slid away. The next she saw of him, he stood in the bathroom doorway.
"I need to clean up, and need to think of other things than all the ways I want you. All the ways I'd like to love you." He paused, then added, "You really mustn't tempt me, Beth. All those things Kane did? I'm capable of them, too, and worse. Never forget, in my essential nature I'm a hunter, and I'm everything that goes along with that."
He left her breathless. Speechless. He closed the door quietly and she rolled back on the bed to stare at the ceiling. No one, absolutely no one, had ever made her feel like this before, as if she couldn't breathe, as if her body had turned to warm molasses. The fear he'd tried to make her feel couldn't even penetrate the heat and longing he'd aroused. And never, not even in the earliest, giddiest days with Tommy had she ever felt such a strong connection.
She was tempted to do something she had never done before: walk into that bathroom and make herself available. Instigate. Be bold.
But then she remembered is description of claiming. His self-proclamation that he was a predator. It was enough to nearly freeze her.
Not for herself, but for him. Did she want to risk causing him that kind of pain? Especially when she hardly knew him and couldn't begin to guarantee that she'd want to stay with him?
Questions swirled in her head as she continued to stare at the ceiling.
What was she getting into here? How far did she want to go? Even the threat of Asmodai seemed distant and inconsequential in comparison.
Not good, she thought, pushing herself off the bed. Somehow she had to get her priorities straight.
First a demon who terrified her, one she hardly believed in though she had felt his presence. Then, and only then, other stuff.
Because then and only then could she be sure she was thinking straight, not just feeling.
And she knew all too well where these sorts of feelings had gotten her once before.
-
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Beyond the windows, the last glow of the setting sun rimmed the world with gold, and clouds overhead gleamed striking colors of red.
Beth looked down at her coffee mug, trying to remembering the wanting, the hunger, she had felt only a short time ago. Her limited experience had taught her sex was nice, but not something worth craving. Now she craved Soren.
But with him, it was so much more complex than a powerful craving. There was danger involved, danger he kept trying to warn her about, and yet the danger only seemed to whet her appetite.
Suddenly she laughed. Talk about a new insight into herself!
"What's so funny?"
She turned and saw Soren emerging from the bedroom with a bag of blood in his hand.
"Oh, something I just realized about myself. I thought you didn't need to eat every day?"
"We're going to Asher's office. That means passing through the vampire deli of mortals going about their business on the streets, and spending time with a few humans who, I admit, tend to smell like a well-laid banquet table."
"Do I smell like that to you?"
"That and more. Much more. But it's best to be sated when I have to wander among mortals. I don't see the point in making temptation any harder to resist."
She touched her breast just below the collarbone, feeling again the tiny scabs. "You drank from me."
"Yes. Are you angry?"
"I seem to remember sort of asking you to."
"I didn't take much." He went into the kitchen and took out a glass to empty his meal into. "Far less than I could have taken without harming you."
"Why?"
He paused in the process of pouring the blood into his glass. "Why?"
"Yes, why. If you can stop yourself, why didn't you take more?"
His brows knit. He finished pouring out the blood, then tossed the bag in the sink before coming to join her in the living area. The careful space was between them again, she noted, and felt a pang.
He spoke finally. "What did you thinking of the experience?"
"It was incredible." Her voice expressed her amazement. "I was... It was..."
He shook his head and smiled faintly. "You don't have to tell me. I was experiencing it with you. All of it."
"I felt... I felt like we were one."
"For a little while. My heart eats as yours beats. My body responds as yours does."
"How is that possible?"
"I don't know. It's the way it is. Everything in me seems to synchronize with you. Not just your heart beat, but your feelings, as well. The danger is that you also synchronize with me."
"Wow." Astonished, even shocked, by the idea, she made her way to a chair and sat hunched with both her hands around her coffee cup. "Wow," she said again.
"That's part of what makes it so addicting. For both of us. The thing is, I stopped soon enough."
"Soon enough for what?"
"Soon enough that you didn't get addicted. Oh, you'll want to repeat the experience, I'm sure. Which is why I shouldn't have done it. But ask yourself if you want to experience it again enough to ask another vampire. Kane for example."
"Lord no!"
"Then you're still safe."
"You mean I might get to the point where I'd want just any vampire?" The thought appalled her.
"That's what I've been trying to tell you. It can happen. Well, I won't do that to you. I won't take you to the point where you'll spend the rest of your life hunting for another vampire. Any vampire." He sighed, then sipped his blood. "Damn, I don't know what got into me. I know you nearly craze me, but to give in and even give you a taste for me like that..." He shook his head in disgust.
"Don't beat yourself up."
He set his glass aside and came to kneel before her. He caught her face between his cool hands and made her look at him.
"Beth, we're playing with some serious fire here. I just found out that when it comes to you I can't always hold myself in check. That's dangerous for both of us."
She read his worry in his face and reached to lay her palm against his cheek. At once his eyes closed, and a sigh escaped him, as if that simple touch was the most wonderful thing in the world.
And maybe it was. He could only feel warmth if it was human. He wanted her, he'd said as much many times. He'd warned her it was dangerous, he tried to keep a distance.
She remembered what Julie had told her and finally faced up to the fact that she was playing with fire all right.
"Should I leave?"
His eyes snapped open. "You wouldn't get very far. I'd follow. Don't even think of it. You're in worse danger than just me."
"Odd, I don't feel in danger from you at all. But I feel as if you're in danger from me."
A groan escaped him, and then before she could blink he was standing across the room. "I'm not in any danger I can't deal with," he said flatly. "Let's get that clear right now. You might drive me to the brink of madness, but I'll survive. What you absolutely, positively must not do is leave. It could cost you far more than I ever could."
"What's that?"
"Everything." He shook his head. "There are other realms than this one, other worlds and realities. Trust me, you wouldn't want to exist in whatever pit Asmodai is trying to climb out of. You wouldn't enjoy your life here if he emerges and makes you his plaything."
"Is that what he's after? A sex slave?"
"I don't know, Beth. I just know he likes human women. He always has. What I'd like to know is if you've been offered to him in exchange for something else, because as beautiful as you are, there are other equally beautiful women."
Beth felt horror tingling along her nerves. "You do think Tommy is involved somehow. You think he offered me to that...that thing?"
He came closer and perched on the arm of a nearby chair, crossing his arms loosely. "What I know is that people who want things from demons must satisfy a demon's demands. Asmodai wants things, and he sets the price. His price is probably emergence into this world, and you. And perhaps some other things."
"But what could he give whoever summons him?"
"He might promise to perform some tasks. Might even promise great wealth and power. Sometimes demons even promise immortality, but they really can't keep that promise. Not for long."
"But you are immortal."
He shook his head. "No. I have a very long life. As you could see with Avi, it will be measured in thousands of years. But immortal life? No. Eventually we all die. There seems to be a natural order that cannot be defeated. To a gnat, you must look immortal."
She nodded slowly. "I suppose so."
"Now tell me about Tommy. What does he want?"
"That's easy. He wants to be a famous singer and musician. And he doesn't want to be a flash-in-the-pan, either."
"So, he would ask for fame and fortune as a rock star?"
"Probably. It's the only thing I ever saw him passionate about."
He smiled faintly. "But you don't think he'll make it on his own?"
"I don't like his music. He plays in small clubs, he's thirty and he's never had a nibble from a recording company even though he keeps sending demos."
"Well, that sounds like something Asmodai could promise. A lifetime of success, adoration and groupies."
Beth nodded glumly. "He'd go for that, all right."
"We'll ask Jay to look into it tonight."
"Jay?" She felt surprised.
"Oh, trust me, Jay is better at what he does than Asher lets on. The comments are merely a way to keep the rambunctious pup in line. But if he weren't good, Asher wouldn't put up with him."
"Is Asher very impatient?"
"He can be. But I actually think he enjoys being sardonic and sarcastic. Must be something left over from the world he grew up in."
"And that was?"
"A scion of nobility in an era where good form was everything, and good form apparently involved heavy doses of boredom, cynicism and world-weariness. Asher's rather a passionate sort, but he hides it behind a cultivated sarcasm."
"Well, I like him, but I like you better."
"What? This old professor? I'm boring."
"Not to me."
"Well, then, I'll become boring for a while. I need to look at the book Avi gave me."
She watched him pick it up from the table where he'd left it, blowing more dust off of it. Then he settled in an armchair and opened it. Curious, she rose and walked over to see pages yellowed and crinkled with age, and covered with characters she didn't recognize.
"Is that Hebrew?" she asked.
"Actually, no. Avi assures me it's angelic script."
"Really? And you can read it?"
"I've had a lot of time to learn to read things like this. Give anyone a century pretty much along, and either he learns new things or he become the 'idle hands' of the aphorism. My kind in particular."
For the first time she wondered just how many esoteric things filled his head, and wished she could ask. But he was busy now, so she went to get herself another cup of coffee and a couple of cookies. Back on the sofa, she waited patiently, letting her thoughts roam freely, distracted only when she noticed how fast he seemed to be turning those pages. Evidently his speed wasn't limited to traveling.
She was just beginning to drift away into a dreamy sort of state as she recalled what it had been like to be drunk from by Soren. As a writer, she wanted to put it into words, to capture it in a way she could record, but it kept slipping out of her grasp, something so incredible her brain couldn't quite latch onto it.
Tommy had been her only lover, and in the early days she had been sure nothing could have been better. Well, there now was something in her experience so far beyond it that she couldn't capture it. Shattering, in a way, leaving her certain that she would never be that same.
That was what Soren feared for her. Exactly what he was trying to protect her from. Except she didn't want to be protected. Not from that, not from him.
Not that it made any difference what she wanted; Soren had made it obvious what he did not want.
She sighed silently, then stiffened. Sitting up straighter she waited, then was sure.
That thing was watching her again. The back of her neck pricked with awareness, but when she looked at Soren he was still reading, near the end of the book.
She hesitated, wondering if she imagined the sensation. What could possibly be watching her?
But the feeling grew, beginning to creep down her spine like a chill.
"Soren?" Her voice was thin.
"Yes?" He didn't look up.
"It's here. I feel it."
At once he snapped the book shut and an instant later he stood over her. He sniffed the air around her several times.
"Where your coat?"
She waved vaguely toward the spare bedroom where she had dumped it last night. He vanished in a flash, then reappeared like magic with her coat. "Put it on. We're getting out of here now."
"I'm not imagining it?"
"I'd recognize that stench anywhere. I never forget a smell."
With trembling hands, she pulled her coat on while rising to her feet. "How did it find me?" she whispered.
"It probably always knew where you were. It was just biding its time."
Horror slammed her. Always? God, how was she ever going to escape this?
Soren brushed her fumbling hands away and fastened her coat for her. Then he scooped her up, settling her on his back.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"To Asher. He's got enough wards on his office to hold off the entire army of hell. At the very least, he has keys to a number of churches. We may need one."
That sent another shiver racing through her, but all of a sudden she was racing through the chilly night, too fast to see much, aware of little more than the stinging cold, the bunching of Soren's muscles, the sensation of flying.
She tightened her legs around hiswaist and hung on for dear life.