“No.”
“Well.” He sighed. It sounded as though he was pacing, though not a far distance. “I’m starting to think I was wrong. That they don’t really exist. But I’ve lost too many years to this now to stop. Turned myself into an outcast. Pushed my son away over it. So I can’t very well quit now, can I? Then it would all be for nothing.”
Weight pushed down on Mary’s breastbone and it came from Tucker. His energy was at such a high note, she almost couldn’t breathe around the transference of it. And maybe she shouldn’t have pushed this man to dredge up the past, maybe it was unfair to invite the information out into the open when Tucker didn’t choose to hear it himself, but she had to follow her intuition. It sang in her blood like an aria, seeming to flow from a fountain of knowledge. “Your son?”
“I suppose you could say there’s some kind of dark irony to the story. I was looking for his mother, because I knew damn well I couldn’t fill her shoes. I told myself I was doing it for me and my son. But then I lost him, too. It’s just like they say, life is what happens when you’re busy making plans? I was so busy planning her return, I took my eye off the one who was still here.” He stopped for a breath. “I don’t mean to ramble on about my problems, it’s just that I don’t get a lot of people out this way for conversation.”
“You don’t have to apologize—”
Mary cut herself off when she heard Carl’s swift intake of breath. Heard the shuffle of his boots taking a hasty step backward. And she knew that Tucker had walked into view. Vulnerability and anxiety hung in the air like low cloud cover, so thick and acidic she could almost taste it. Please let me have done the right thing.
“Tucker?” croaked Carl.
“Pops,” Tucker responded, striving for his usual jovial tone, but it was halting. “Looking good, man. You been working out?”
His father inhaled a laugh. “Jesus God,” he wheezed. “Where have you been, son? I thought…”
Mary sensed Tucker bracing. “You thought?”
“Well, I thought whoever killed those kids must have taken you somewhere. Killed you, too.” Carl moved past her slowly, his feet crunching in Tucker’s direction. “I’ve thought you dead. But you’re here…I can’t believe you’re here. You…”
Silence landed and it landed hard.
Mary turned toward where she thought they were standing, breath caught in her lungs.
“Son. You don’t look a day older than when you left, but you don’t look exactly the same, either,” he mused in a thick voice. “I…don’t understand.”
“Pops,” Tucker said quietly. “Don’t panic. It’s all right.”
There was a loud thud in the dirt.
“What happened?” Mary half shouted, fumbling with her walking stick.
Tucker sighed. “He fainted.”
* * *
Almost everything in his life as a vampire was surreal, but walking into his childhood home and finding that nothing had changed, while carrying his passed-out father in his arms…that took the mother-loving cake.
Jesus, was this really happening?
Everything looked smaller, even his father.
He never thought I murdered those people.
He missed me.
The way his father had looked at him…with joy and regret. It brought everything rushing back. Laughter at breakfast and Christmas morning and playing catch in the front yard. There had been good times. A lot of them. Maybe they’d just been too hard to think about.
Mary, still dressed like a ghost princess, followed behind them with a hand on Tucker’s shoulder, apologizing faster than she could draw breath, which led to her puffing in his wake and his worry ballooning to encompass two people, instead of one.
“Honey, it’s going to be fine,” he said calmly over his shoulder. “Breathe for me. Please. This is not your fault.”
“Yes, it is.”
“No. It was my decision to present myself like some freaky corpse version of his son—”
Mary wailed miserably, turning the dial on his mate’s instinct, making it so that when they walked into the house, every piece of furniture bobbed several inches above the ground. Tucker took a deep breath through his nose and wove through the kitchen, turning sideways down the back hallway that led to his father’s bedroom. Nothing had changed there, either. His mother’s side of the bed was undisturbed, nary a dent in the pillow, while the sheets on his father’s side were rumpled and slept in.
He swallowed the lodgment in his throat and settled his father down, shaking his shoulder as gently as he could, trying not to dwell too much on the frail quality of his bones, his paper-like skin. “Pops,” Tucker said. “Wake up.”
The pace of the older man’s pulse didn’t change, keeping its steady thunkthunkthunk.
Concluding that Carl needed a few more minutes to mentally recover from seeing his son back—but not technically back—from the dead, Tucker turned away from the bed to find Mary wringing her hands beneath her ghost costume. There was no choice but to heal her feelings, make her better. The need pounded within him like a snare drum.
“Come here, honey,” he said gruffly, taking the crown off, followed by the sheet. Beneath the costume, she was flushed with moisture welling in her eyes and he didn’t stop to remind himself getting too close was unwise. No, he simply gathered her up off the floor, holding her to his chest, supporting her butt with his forearm so she could wrap her legs around his waist. “He’s going to be fine.”
“I should be comforting you.”
“I’m comforted when you are.”
She buried her face in his neck and languid fingers of pleasure stroked his senses. “How can I understand the consequences of my actions when I haven’t ever really done anything in my nineteen years? I need more life experience before I start meddling like this.”
“Mary, you did a good thing.”
“He’s unconscious!”
“Look.” He tipped her chin up so she would meet his eyes. “Whatever happens from here on out…” He shook his head. “Do you have any idea what kind of weight is off my shoulders knowing my father never suspected me of murder?” He hadn’t even truly taken the time to digest that yet. Or the regrets his father expressed, which had ultimately forced him out into the open. If only he’d had a chance to voice his own—and he would. As soon as the dude woke up. “And that, honey, is nothing compared to the ass whooping of knowledge you gave me tonight. You were right. I’ve been creating excuses to keep happiness just out of reach. For a long time. You made me realize that. So you’re doing pretty good at meddling, life experience be damned.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” he said firmly.
She cast a worried look over Tucker’s shoulder where Carl still hadn’t moved, so he carried her out of the room into the hallway. The drive to distract her from the distress was fierce and it multiplied when she started chewing on her lower lip anxiously. It was so full, that bottom lip. Smooth and rose hued. Just like her cheeks and the tip of her nose. Following that upward path brought him to her wide, luminous eyes.
Mary seemed to realize on a dime that Tucker had gone still. Well, not entirely still. His body seemed intent on swaying forward, taking the single step that would flatten Mary between him and the wall. With a feminine gasp, her small hands curled on his shoulders, her tongue coming out to wet her lips—and at the same time, he pressed forward with his hips, his palms smoothing up the outside of her thighs to cradle her hips.
“I feel like I haven’t kissed you in years,” she whimpered against his mouth.
“It’s torture,” he groaned, interlocking their lips, but not kissing her. In his current state of mind, a kiss could lead to a lot more.
Some part of him knew he was seeking comfort from Mary, because all of this, being home after so long, was overwhelming. But more than that, he was simply losing his grip on the ironclad control it took not to fuck his mate. Now was not the time, though. Not here and now.
The c
lock was running out on their time together, unfortunately. Fast. Yet another reason for his unholy surge in hunger. Could he keep it in check one more day?
He honestly didn’t know. But there was no way he could stand by with Mary in need.
“I will pleasure you later,” he vowed, sliding his lips down her neck, taking a hearty inhale of the scent of her blood. “I’ll kiss you as long as you need. Mouth and pussy. You’re going to feel my tongue everywhere.”
Tucker expected her to nod or ask for his attention now. He never imagined she would shake her head, a distressed line between her eyes. “It’s not fair. You get no relief.”
It was the straw that broke the vampire’s back.
There was the upheaval of returning home. Knowing he’d be giving up Mary soon, leaving her some place he would be unable to protect her. Now his mate was denying him the right to satisfy her body. A fuse lit in his head and the fire spread, burning down the mental blocks he’d erected to keep the truth hidden.
“I do get relief, Mary,” he said hoarsely, sealing their lower bodies together, dragging his mouth across her collarbone. “You don’t know what it does to me. To watch my mate receive pleasure from me…”
An ominous whirring started in his head when Mary jolted.
Several beats passed.
She took a labored breath and pushed away from him, her feet landing softly on the floor. Tucker could only stare at the section of the wall she’d vacated, wondering what the hell he’d done. And what’s more, wondering if he’d revealed the truth intentionally, because every second that passed without Mary knowing she ruled him mind, body and soul was unacceptable.
Now what, asshole?
“I’m your…mate?” With her question hovering in the air, Mary reached out and traced his features, finding the answer without him having to say a word. “You told me I wasn’t. You said a vampire could tell right away.”
The admonishment from his mate blasted him like a furnace. “I’m sorry.”
A clock ticked in the nearby kitchen. “I’m sorry?” she sputtered. “Is there an explanation to follow?”
“You’re my mate. A vampire has to drink from a woman to know for certain if she’s his mate, but I knew it after the fight at the diner. After I caused so much destruction…”
“It was you who made the windows shatter.”
“Among other things.”
She made a sound. “I knew it. I…how? How does it work?”
“When a vampire’s mate is in danger, new abilities form. They strengthen every time he or she is threatened or unsafe.” He yearned to reach out for her, drag her up against his chest again, but knew he would be rejected. And rightly so. He’d lied to her. But she looked so lost and disappointed, shifting side to side on the hallway floor. “When you are unhappy or scared, the atmosphere…it enlivens. It lifts. Like my outrage sucks up all the gravity. I don’t know how else to describe it and I’ve had no time to learn to control it.”
She said nothing, so he continued.
“It’s unusual for a vampire to have exceptionally strong feelings for his mate before the final test, before…drinking. But the same thing happened for Jonas. Elias. They both just knew. Like I just know.”
“Why did you lie about it?”
Her voice cracked on the final word and his knees nearly buckled. This was misery. Getting caught in a lie by someone so honest and pure. And then having to continue to lie in order to protect her happiness. Because there were certain parts of the lore she simply couldn’t know. For instance, that he would readily die instead of live without her. That if he drank from her, he would have no choice but to die without her to sustain him. “I worried that you would feel guilty for leaving me. I wouldn’t have been able to stand that.”
“Or that I might choose you. Did you not even think of that? You thought I could only possibly stay out of guilt, not lo—”
“Don’t say it, Mary,” he ground out. “There’s too much at stake.”
“You’re one of those things,” she whispered. “We are.”
Just hearing the word we on her lips brought forth such a tide of unadulterated yearning, he didn’t even bother trying to dam it. “I know what you’ll gain from Hadrian. More than I could ever give you.”
She made a sound in her throat and turned away from him. “What about you, Tucker? What will you do when I’m gone? There is only one mate for you.”
“Don’t worry about me,” he managed around the manacle circling his throat, forged from lies. “I’ve made it this long, haven’t I?”
Mary’s shoulder blades stiffened and she marched forward, away from him.
Tucker immediately shot forward. “Where are you going? I haven’t…you don’t know the layout of the house—”
She took a sharp right into his old bedroom and slammed the door. “I’ll manage!” she shouted through the barrier. “Just like you will when I’m gone, apparently!”
In a state of mental chaos, he twisted the knob, prepared to barge in and demand she let him make her safe. And apologize. Yes, apologize until he ran out of words in his vocabulary. No way he could let her go on believing life would be only slightly difficult without her. It would—will be—a living hell. But his father chose that moment to step out of the bedroom down the hall.
“Woman trouble?” asked Carl after a long pause, adjusting his glasses with artistic fingers. “Want to have a beer and talk about it?”
Tucker didn’t have the heart to explain to his father that he couldn’t drink beer.
With Mary pissed at him, he didn’t have the heart for anything.
“Sure, Pops.”
With a final glance at his closed bedroom door, he followed Carl toward the kitchen.
Chapter 15
Tucker sat down at the wobbly-legged kitchen table and ran his fingers over the wooden grooves. Wallpaper that had been fresh last time he ate breakfast in that very spot was peeling now, completely gone in some places to reveal a much uglier wallpaper underneath. There were buckets and boxes of discarded scrap parts shoved up in every corner of the room, clipped out newspaper articles rolling like black and white tumbleweeds on the linoleum floor.
His mother used to say, “What Carl lacks in organization, he makes up for with enthusiasm.” Tucker could still see her patting his head while saying it on her way to the sink.
Before sitting down on the other side of the table, Tucker’s father set the uncapped beer down in front of him and he eyed it lovingly. Same brand they’d always bought for the house, different label. What he wouldn’t have given to experience the bite of cold going down his throat, especially now when his dull, dead heart had never felt more so. But he settled for thumbing the condensation down the glass instead.
“Well, son.” His father opened his mouth to say one thing, changed his mind and seemed to pick another. “Hell, I don’t know where to start.”
“That makes two of us.” Tucker drummed his fingers on the table, his Adam’s apple about ten times its normal size. “I heard what you said out there. About thinking I was a victim, instead of being involved somehow. And I just want you to know…I’m grateful for that. Especially considering we didn’t part ways on the best of terms.”
The older man let out a puff of air. “Just because we argued doesn’t mean I’d go changing my whole opinion of your character. Of course I knew you’d nothing to do with that…grisly situation. I never could.”
“Thanks,” Tucker managed, unable to look at the man. Staring at the peeling wallpaper instead. “You never, uh…wondered if maybe I’d been abducted, too? Like Mom?”
“No.” His thinning hair trembled when he shook his head. “No, I would never believe an abduction took place unless I’d seen it with my own eyes.” He rubbed at the back of his neck, quietly chuckling without humor. “Or thought I’d seen, anyway. Beginning to doubt myself about the whole thing, you must be pleased to know.”
“I’m not, Pops.” Tucker sighed. “I’m not.”
Carl regarded him for a speculative moment before nodding. Falling silent. “Why did you stay gone so long, Tucker? Where have you been and…” His dad took a long pull of his beer and settled the bottle on the table, twisted it a moment. “What’s happened to you?”
He’d never felt shame over being Silenced. Not until that moment. When he sat face to face with his father and had to admit to being overpowered by two men, whether they were immortal beings of superior ability or not. He’d never thought himself prideful at all, but there it was. Shame over having his strength bested that had been lingering somewhere in his subconscious since the night it happened. “I’ll put us both in danger by telling you everything.”
His father’s gaze didn’t waver. “I accept the danger. Do you?”
Tucker nodded. “Where I’m headed, getting sanctioned for breaking the rules is the least of my problems.” His father started to ask a question, but Tucker shook his head. “Pops…” It was true what they said about age—and in his case, impending death—giving a man perspective. All the arguments and stubborn silences between him and his father were so futile now. Now there was only a need to reassure and embrace this man, faults and all. And hope his father could do the same. Maybe sometimes that meant allowing for the possibility that you’ve been wrong. Even if you don’t truly believe it. “When I lived here, I thought this fascination with extra-terrestrials was nonsense. I thought you were just refusing to accept that Mom left us. But since I’ve been gone, Pops…” He ran a hand through his hair, blew out a breath. “I’ve met beings that should only exist in horror flicks. There is a world that lives in the darkness and I didn’t have a choice when I was made part of it. There’s no going back. Once you’re there. But what I’m trying to say to you is…don’t give up on your aliens. Anything is possible—and I mean anything. I’m trying to say that if you saw Mom being abducted, then I believe you. I should have believed you all along.”
Gratitude and dismay warred in the older man’s expression. “I appreciate that, son,” he said, his lips barely moving. “Hell, it means the world to me.”
Today, Tomorrow and Always Page 16