Veronica had never cared for baseball, and didn’t know any of the rules, but decided if they were anything like what her mind was at that very minute conjuring, she might change her mind about the game.
When gentle fingers tilted her chin upward, toward the light of the moon, she all but wagged her tail. The most perfect guy in the world was going to kiss her. He hadn’t run away. He wasn’t going to disappear with the midnight hour. They were going to start over, on new footing.
This was, in all actuality, a dream come true.
“Wait!” she cried when his lips landed on hers.
Christian hovered a mere centimeter away.
“What if I change my mind? What if I want to stop?”
Christian drew back, took both of her hands in his, and folded all of her fingers into her palm, except two. He took the index finger from her right hand, and pressed it against the index finger on her left hand, forming a cross. A simple flesh crucifix.
As those fingers met, he shuddered, and closed his eyes.
“Hell,” Veronica whispered. “It really does work?”
Staring at her hands, she found them shaking to the point of being possessed. “Then you didn’t have the fangs implanted?”
Christian shook his head.
“You sleep all day?”
“Sometimes on Sundays, when I feel lazy. But I’m old enough to shun many of the rules, so you don’t have to worry about our sleeping schedules.”
She nodded. “I’ve never dated an older man.”
“You’re not dating one now.”
“What am I doing?”
“Marrying one, I hope, eventually.”
Veronica gasped. “You don’t just want me for sex?”
“Oh, I want that, too. I want everything, all of you, from this night on.”
Veronica knew that gaping was unattractive, but her face felt like cement. In contrast, everything below her waist was tingling.
“Does sex always have to take place in spooky locations?”
Could she get sex off the brain?
“It takes place wherever we want it to,” Christian replied.
“Not in a coffin. Nix on the coffin.”
“How about on some nice wet grass?”
Recalling the feel of the grass between her toes, and the weight of his hand on her knee, Veronica relaxed. “You don’t howl? Because my neighbors won’t like it.”
“Again, wrong species. Honey, you really must read up.”
“Do you have x-ray vision?”
“That was the Invisible Man.”
“Do you ever wear a cape?”
“No.”
Damn.”
“Oh, and there is something else,” Veronica said.
Christian’s right eyebrow went up. She loved that gesture, and how naughty it made him look. In fact, now that she thought about it, she loved just about everything having to do with this vampire.
She looked straight into his expressive brown eyes. “Do you have to bite me?”
“Nope. Your decision, totally.”
“Can we be together without the binding thing?”
"Of course. We can do most things that normal couples do.”
“Except that I’ll age, and you won’t.”
He nodded.
“And there will be no sunbathing,” she said.
“I burn rather badly.”
“Garlic?” Veronica said.
“Nasty stuff. Bad for intimacy, in any case.”
“Just so you know, I hate garlic, too,” Veronica confessed. “And you’re giving me a lot of information on how to hurt you. Crosses, sun, garlic.”
“None of those things would be as bad as letting you go, now that I’ve found you,” Christian said.
Ooh. Well said. Well said, indeed.
In fact, Veronica’s insides had gone soft and buttery.
“Soul mates, huh?” she muttered.
“You’ll agree in time, I think, if you give us a chance.”
Thing was, she believed it now. All that male gorgeousness, just for her, made her mouth water. The thought of actually confronting the pink lace dream head-on caused an internal riot of mammoth proportions.
Maybe he felt this, too. Christian’s pointy fangs were showing as he wrapped his arms around her. It was so unusual to feel this connection, Veronica laughed. They laughed together. He got hard. She got damp. And it felt good. It felt right.
It was a beginning. A step toward first base. And if it was in a graveyard? Well, okay, some things just weren’t made to be questioned. Sometimes a girl had to go on instinct.
A tumble on the grass between headstones wouldn’t be the true test of this relationship’s viability, anyway. Neither was the fact that his body parts fit well with hers.
Their future wouldn’t necessarily depend on biting, or home runs.
What was the ultimate test? Veronica asked herself as Christian’s fanged kiss became an action adventure . . . and as he folded her back against the marble slab with an expression that suggested she would soon be dessert.
What was the ultimate test of a true keeper? The thing just minutes away that would seal the bargain, in her mind, and shore them up against the world as a team? The thing she almost looked forward to now?
Almost.
She nearly sang out the answer as Christian’s hands slid possessively around her, opening the way for a one night stand that could actually last forever, if she chose.
The answer to relationship immortality consisted of just two words.
Charlene’s reception.
Her date was now officially a date. A real one. Hers.
Her father had been tongue-tied. Her sister had been bested, maybe for the first time in Charlene’s life. The percentages were good: Two out of three Davis’ down. One to go. The mother of them all.
This should have been worrisome, except for the light in Christian’s gaze, trained on her, right then. This light definitely spelled future. This light insinuated that tackling Mrs. Sandra Davis would be a snap.
Oh, yes, Veronica told herself as his hand moved just so, and just right; he certainly did possess special abilities. And though she didn’t know squat about baseball, or bases, she knew one thing for certain. If this vampire was pitching, then . . .
Batter up!
Probably Christian was a real vampire. In those big browns of his, as he drew his head back, Veronica saw movement that might have been tiny flying bats, sure — but the sight also suddenly brought with it a revelation to the acronym of the strange agency that had brought them together.
V.A.M.P. Inc.
Well, wouldn’t you just know it actually meant . . .
Very Acceptable Marriage Prospect.
So, although she was merely a human, and not anything remotely resembling a werewolf or any other genetically altered species, as far as Veronica knew . . . and though there were a lot of questions still in need of answers . . . when her befanged new guy took her to the grass and she felt him hard up against her, in spite of all the dead people who might be watching the show . . .
She howled.
Laughed.
Cried.
Then closed her eyes.
Fully intending to have the whole cake . . . forever . . . and bite it, too.
Veronica and the Vampire Page 10