Exposure: Bloodlust Series Book 1

by L. L. Ash

  “So? Will you come with me now, Raven?” he asked in a low voice. “Obviously the daywalkers cannot protect you as you need.”

  “No,” I whispered, removing his finger from my mouth. “My heart belongs to a daywalker.”

  “Hearts,” he scoffed, “Ours do not beat but still they persist to ruin our lives.”

  Calix took my arm and helped me to stand as Clarence scrambled to his feet, making his way quickly to my side.

  “One more thing,” Calix said as he re-sheathed his knife. “You are all troublemakers, you especially, Raven. If I have to come find you because you’re being reckless or stupid and causing attention, then I will not be so kind as I have been. Live silently, and try to live well or I will make sure you don’t live at all.”

  He looked around the room before finally resting his eyes on me, as I eagerly accepted Clarence’s arms as they came around me, his breath whispering how much he loved me, how he never wanted to let go of me again.

  “If you will not leave with me, Raven, then you are on your own from this moment. Use your anonymity wisely.”

  He took a couple steps toward me before meeting eyes with Clarence. Calix’s fingers pressed on his chest and Clarence’s arms loosened around me before he took a step back.

  “And from you. You owe me your life, Raven. What shall I take instead? As repayment?”

  My mouth popped open an inch to answer, but nothing came out. Instead Calix lifted his hand, drawing his thumb across my bottom lip.

  Clarence shifted toward me again but one look from Calix and he stood still again.

  “A token, I think. As thanks for saving your life, and the life of your weak friends.”

  “What token?” I asked, my voice not even loud enough to be a whisper.

  I didn’t need to ask though. I already knew.

  His thumb stopped it’s stroking of my lip and dragged up my cheek as his hand wrapped around the back of my skull, snaking fingers into my dirty and ratted hair.

  His head dipped, Clarence flinched, and my eyes squeezed shut as cool lips touched mine. They were softer than I thought they would be, attached as they were to such a hard man, but his firm kiss took my breath away. Somehow I felt his power radiate through me. It was unlike anything I’d ever felt before and it felt something akin to kissing a god.

  “I wish to never see you again, Raven,” he whispered against my lips. “Make it so.”

  With that he turned and he was gone, his men gone just as quickly.

  Arms folded around me again and I smelled Clarence there, his familiar scent surrounding me like a cloud of comfort.

  Embraces happened across from us, Mason falling over himself to reach Evelyn and hold her as they knelt there. Eddie sat back on his butt and watched the reunions.

  “Are you ok?” Clarence asked against my neck, his head tucked into me as we stood there.

  “I’m ok,” I nodded, holding him back as tightly as I could. “I’m ok, we’re all ok. It’s over now, Clee. It’s over...”

  He nodded into my shoulder and held me for a while longer.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I heard Eddie’s voice drift over my safe haven. “Just in case someone comes back.”

  Clarence released me, but took my hand tightly in his as we moved toward the door. Mason ushered Evelyn out and we ran out into the darkness and through the large estate. Eddie followed up behind us, making sure we weren’t being followed until we got to a car. An SUV to be exact.

  “Get in,” Clarence told everyone, opening the passenger door for me.

  Mason and Evelyn got in, but Eddie continued to stand there.

  “You go. I’ve got my den to take back.”

  “Let us help you,” Clarence told him. “We’ll take Addie back home, leave her with Eve and Mason and I can help.”

  “I don’t need help,” he shook his head. “It’s just Jo. I’ll handle it. If there’s another in charge I’ll challenge him. The way it was supposed to be done before everything went to shit.”

  Clarence stood there, looking at him for a long minute before stepping forward and putting his arms around Eddie.

  “Thank you,” I heard him say quietly. “I know what you did. And I know you did it for her. Thank you.”

  Eddie nodded, slapping him on the back before moving away from the awkward hug.

  “I swear to God. If you ever hurt her I will hunt you down.”

  “If I ever hurt her I’ll hand myself over.”

  With a sharp nod Eddie looked toward me. I slid out of my seat and ran to him, throwing my arms around him in the kind of embrace he deserved.

  “You’re the best, you know that, Eddie?”

  “Sure I do, Kid,” he held me back tightly. “If you need me, you know how to find me.”

  “I won’t hesitate,” I told him, releasing him.

  He nodded and kissed my forehead.

  “I’ll always love you. If you ever change your mind...”

  “I won’t. But thank you. You’ll always be my favorite werewolf.”

  He grinned.

  “Now go home. Rest up and eat. Eat a lot.”

  I laughed and he backed away before he changed right before us, dropping to his hands and knees as he roared, dirty cargo shorts shredding under the ripple of muscle that appeared down his back. Once turned, Eddie came up to us, nudged his head to my thigh and rubbed before licking my hand and sprinting off.

  He disappeared in the darkness, leaving me with three vampires to get me home.

  “Let’s go,” Clarence said gently as he helped me into my seat.

  “What was it like?” Evelyn piped up after a few minutes of driving in silence.

  “What was what like?” I asked her back.

  “Kissing a nightwalker. The Dracos KING!”

  “After days of incarceration and barely surviving the night with our lives, that’s what you want to know about?” Mason turned to her, his voice sounding annoyed.

  “Are you kidding me? Addie’s the only person on earth that I know that has kissed every species of human! Of course I want to know!”

  “It was nothing,” I told her. “It was cold and unwarranted. He didn’t give me a choice.”

  Evelyn pouted but I looked to Clarence.

  “I’m sorry,” I told him in a whisper.

  He shook his head.

  “I have you back whole and safe. I’m not going to begrudge a little kiss from a guy that can just as easily tear my head off.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Clarence stopped at a fast food place on the way home and got me about half the menu. The car smelled like meat and cheese and fried food by the time we got home. We gathered in the living room, looking around at each other as we all ate our respective dinners, shock and awe in everyone’s eyes.

  “So what do we do now?” Mason asked finally, putting his empty glass on the coffee table while I stuffed my face with a hamburger.

  “I don’t know,” Clarence shrugged.

  “Should we tell her?”

  “Tell me what?” I asked Mason.

  Mason looked to Clarence.

  “He finally did it,” Clarence whispered. “He made the cure.”

  “How do you know if it works?” I asked, shock spreading through me again.

  “We haven’t tried it yet. We couldn’t until we got you back.”

  My jaw flapped like an idiot.

  “I want to take it tonight,” Clarence said softly.

  “And what if it only lasts a week?”

  “Then we keep working on it,” Mason chipped in. “Or he can keep taking it.”

  “That’s why you haven’t eaten,” I asked, taking in the sight of his full glass.

  “Go get it,” Evelyn bounced on the couch. “Do it now!”

  Mason’s eyebrows raised and Clarence looked toward me.

  “Whatever you want to do,” I told him.

  “Get it,” was all he said, directing the words at Mason.

  Maso
n jumped up and sprinted to the back room, coming back with a syringe with pale purple liquid in it.

  “Let’s see if this is the ticket,” he sighed, plunging the needle into Clarence’s arm.

  “Here’s to hoping,” Clarence said and rubbed the little pin prick on his arm before leaning over and pressing a kiss on my lips. “Here’s to hoping...”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  “CANNONBALL!” screamed an all too familiar voice before water lulled then splashed all over me, lying on a sun lounge by the pool.

  “Mine was better!” Clarence called as he jogged around the pool with a grin, heading for the diving board again.

  Mason pulled himself out of the pool while Evelyn stepped up beside me.

  “Who knew? You take away their immortality and they become children again.”

  I grinned up at her.

  “I never heard you complain.”

  She shrugged. “I could never spurn a man for vigor.”

  I crinkled my nose before readjusting my bikini top straps.

  “Pretty sure I don’t want to hear about anybody’s vigor.”

  Evelyn laughed, then shrieked as Mason came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her and lifting her up.

  “Put me down!”

  “You’re chatting instead of playing,” he complained. “If you want vigor, I’ll give it to you, woman!”

  Evelyn shrieked again as Mason threw her into the water, following closely behind her.

  Clarence dived off the board again before reappearing near me at the side of the pool.

  “Not getting in?” he asked, flipping his overgrown mop of hair out of his face, spraying water droplets everywhere.

  “I’m working on my tan,” I grinned at him, wiping at my arm that had caught a couple of the droplets.

  “Fine, guess I should check the grill.”

  He lifted himself out of the water, his arms and chest bulging under the strain. I watched as he stood, then bent to kiss me, and watched his cute butt as he made his way to where the grill was smoking and hissing.

  It’s been 3 years since he’d taken the cure. 3 years since he’d been a vampire, and 3 blessed years we’d spent together, wholley together. He still looked the same, all things considered. He spent time at the gym and went running in the mornings to keep up his perfect shape once he realized that as a human eating an abundance of food, your body went to fat if you didn’t exercise.

  He still entertained me, always finding new things to be excited about in humanity. Learning to make friends just for the fun of it, swimming in a pool, having get togethers to hang out and waste time. Clarence always said how strange he found it that humans, who have so little time in their lives, have the most extensive ways to waste it.

  “Get your buns over here!” Clarence called to the three of us, waving the big spatula around. “Dinner’s ready!”

  I grinned and sat up, making my way slowly from my chair to where he stood at the hot grill.

  “Your buns ready?” he asked as he lifted a charred hamburger for me to see.

  “Smother that baby in cheese,” I told him, grabbing a plate and a bun from our loaded table nearby.

  “You’ve gotten more demanding since I married you,” he said with a laugh.

  He said that almost every day for the past 2 years.

  “You regret it yet?” I asked my typical follow up to his comment.

  “Not for one second,” he grabbed me around the hips, kissing me hard, but only for a moment.

  I grinned at him, shrieking a little as he slapped my butt, turning back to the grill to layer on two slices of cheddar onto my burger.

  “Cheese me up too!” Mason called as he and Evelyn got out of the pool, dripping water onto the hot cement patio.

  “Already did,” Clarence called back, putting the grill top down again to melt it.

  We all worked on preparing our buns and filling the rest of our plates with pre-made chips and mayonnaise sides.

  One of the downsides with surrounding yourself with people that were previously vampire was that absolutely none of us knew how to cook. Clarence was learning, but even still he could only do partially burnt hot dogs and hamburgers on the grill. Evelyn was a high class lady before she turned and had zero experience in the kitchen. As it was, we loved frozen or processed food, and I was learning slowly how to cook, something that didn’t come out of a can.

  When we were done eating we sat on the patio, the sun fading in the sky and a beautiful sense of sweet comfort surrounding me almost as tightly as Clarence’s arm.

  “Ok, we gotta go,” Mason said eventually, stretching on his chair and letting go of Evelyn’s hand. “See ya in the morning.” Clarence clasped his brother’s hand and nodded as the two of them stood and gathered their clothes and towels.

  “Call when you get home safe,” I told them and Evelyn nodded, wiggling her fingers at us before they left out the fence gate.

  I cuddled further into Clarence’s arms, resting my head on his shoulder as his chest heaved in a big, satisfied sigh.

  “We’re calling!” Evelyns voice rang from the other side of the high fence.

  “Ok! Have a good night!” I shouted back and she wished us the same before it went silent again.

  “I still think it’s hilarious that you make her tell you when they get home, 20 feet away.”

  “You can never be too safe,” I grinned at him and pressed a kiss to his lips.

  “Right,” he mumbled, slipping his hand around my neck as he continued the kiss. “Let’s get back in the water...”

  I grinned, knowing exactly what he had in mind.

  “Ok,” I agreed, grateful for our 8 foot tall fences.

  The sun was down now, the night lit by street lamps and the few lights on in the house. Clarence helped me up and looked at me with his smoky eyes as his thumbs dug into his own suit, slipping it down and off. Reaching behind my neck I pulled the strings of my bikini, letting it fall until we were just skin and heat.

  We took the steps down into the shallow part of the pool, glad for the millionth time that the pool was heated as the warm Miami day chilled around us.

  “It’s been years and I still can’t get enough of you,” he growled into my ear, lips brushing down my neck, nibbling as he went.

  “The best years,” I agreed. “Even the worst of it was good for us.”

  “But we don’t have to think about those days anymore. You’re mine, and you’ll be mine for as long as I live. You’re everything to me, my sweet Darling.”

  My legs curled around his firm hips, arms hugging his neck as my head dipped back.

  “God, I think you’re even more beautiful than normal,” he groaned, one arm circling me, pressing me to him as the other hand squeezed my thigh.

  I giggled but told him, “I’ve been wanting to tell you something.”

  “What is it?” he lifted his head to look at me.

  “Our family of two is about to become a family of three.”

  He stared at me silently for a long time, his face unmoved until finally his eyes opened wide and he gulped.

  “Pardon?”

  “We’re going to have a baby,” I grinned, stroking my hands over his stubbled cheeks.

  “A baby?” he asked, voice choked as he blinked rapidly. “We’re going to have a baby?”

  I nodded vigorously, grinning when he pulled me tighter to him.

  “You are a wonder of wonders, Addie!” he breathed, his voice cracking. “A baby?”

  I nodded again and he looked at me, his face lighting in rare unadulterated happiness as tears glistened in his eyes.

  “I am already the happiest man in the world,” he said to me, pressing his lips to mine between sentences. “But you have added to my joy. A baby! We’ll build a family, as we always wanted.”

  “As we always wanted,” I agreed, touching the golden and freckled bridge of his nose.

  “Thank you my Darling,” he grinned at me and kissed me again. />
  “My pleasure,” I sighed, thinking back to what point our lovemaking had implanted a baby.

  “It will certainly be your pleasure,” his grin changed, a foxy look on his face.

  I giggled as he boosted me back out of the water, laying me naked onto the warm patio as he rested my legs on each of his shoulders. Pressing a gentle kiss to my belly, still flat with no sign of pregnancy, he kissed it again and again. He probably couldn’t believe it. I know I myself could hardly believe it and I’d suspected for a few days, trying to get acquainted with the idea myself until I took a test that morning.

  “My wife, and my baby,” he smiled, stroking the skin across my belly button. “How do you want it tonight, Mama?”

  His eyes met mine and I grinned, trying not to cry of happiness.

  “Surprise me,” I told him and he grunted, then got to it.

  “KIDS!” I yelled, wondering where the hell they had all gone.

  Since Wesley got old enough to play with Adrik outside, the two were inseparable.

  “Mama,” Bev pulled on the leg of my jeans. “Wyer is cwying.”

  “I know, sweetie. I can hear him. Go play with him, give him his elephant, ok?”

  My 4 year old Bev nodded with a serious expression to go take care of her baby brother.

  “Wes! Adrick! Get back here!” I called again but no answer.

  “What’s the matter?” Evelyn came running up to me, looking for the boys.

  Her oldest, Adrik was out along with my 5 year old Wesley.

  “I bet they just found a dead squirrel or something,” I told her, sighing as I listened to Ryder continue to cry in his crib.

  “You go look for them, I’ll take care of Ryder til you get home. The boys are due home any minute. You know they wouldn’t miss dinner for anything.”

  I grinned and nodded, slipping on my shoes as I went out into the hot and wet Florida heat.

  “Rik! Wes!” I called again as I looked around the back fence of our property where there was a little green area between our houses and the houses behind us. It was kind of a maze but after 8 years here, I had it memorized.

  “MAMA!” a little voice screamed and my heart started pumping.

  “Rik? Rik where are you?” I shouted.

  He cried harder and I found him, curled into a ball behind some tall grass against a neighbor’s fence.