by Lund, S. E.
He needs to feel my response to his touch – his own desire isn't enough. For him, it feels empty, disconnected. Incomplete. So I let him in.
He trembles as our senses join and for a moment, the wave of desire from him overwhelms me. He pulls his lips away from mine and, with his eyes still closed, he tilts his head to the side and runs his fingernail along the skin beneath his ear, opening up a seam from which his blood flows. I lean down and cover it with my mouth, sucking, his response so strong that my body convulses with pleasure. Coupled with the rush from his blood, I barely needed his touch between my thighs to climax, my body shuddering as he bites my neck and drinks from me.
He lies me back on the sofa and this time, he pulls his mouth away, no longer drinking, having taken only a mouthful. Just enough for the connection between us to deepen, growing stronger as his desire builds until the world falls away and there's only pleasure too sweet to endure.
Michel agrees to let me meet with someone from the Council a few days later. He isn't happy that we're leaving the warehouse and it's only using an armed escort that I'm allowed out. He spends a very long time with me that night after I feed, our arms and legs entwined.
"I hate this," he says, running his fingers over my lips. "To find you, to claim you, and then to have you leave me."
"I'm not leaving you," I say and kiss his neck. "I'm going to kill Soren. It has nothing to do with leaving you. When this is all over, I'll come back."
"With Soren dead, there'll be big changes here. There'll be a turf war over who'll replace him among his coven. I'm thinking of relocating. Maybe leave this place. If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you want to go?"
I sigh, thinking of the places I've been before in my life.
"Somewhere by the ocean," I say without hesitation. "Maybe it's just in my blood. The sea."
He studies my face for a moment with an expression of resignation.
"Things are going to happen that will shock you," he says and strokes my cheek. "Since I agreed to let you try to fight Soren, I've been planning with my remaining contacts in the Council, trying to arrange things, letting certain information slip. Just follow your instincts. You and I will have to part for a time, but Soren won't deny you when he takes you. Just don't fight him and he'll be only too glad to keep you as his pet."
"Can't you tell me what the plan is?"
He shakes his head.
"Just know that you'll be taken from me. It will look like an ambush. You'll become Soren's possession – there's no way that he won't take you as his own given the chance. When the time comes you'll be given what you need to kill him."
"Why didn't he take me before?"
"Don't worry about that," he says. "He'll take you now. The less you know about this, the better, so that's all I can say."
I nod, the solemnity of his voice making me fearful. The prospect of killing Soren doesn't seem so appealing all of a sudden. I pull Michel closer, emotion choking me at the thought I'll be taken away from him soon.
"You agree that this is the way to proceed? Your friends in the Council do as well?"
"There'll be someone to replace him when he's destroyed, but this way we'll have an advantage. He's the most powerful of us now, and as leader of this gambit, without him, there's no one strong enough among his coven to take over and follow through. Just me and Julien. No one strong enough to challenge us. But the plan won't involve your death," he says, and brushes my hair away from my face. "I'll only agree to this if it means you're to survive and come back to me."
I kiss him, my arms tightening around him. There's no bliss for us that evening. Only sadness at the prospect we'd soon part.
Despite my growing ambivalence about leaving on this mission, I'm happy to walk the streets of my old neighborhood, past the bakery directly beneath my apartment where I buy black rye and crusty Italian loaf and the butcher a few rows down where I purchase pickles and ripe olives when I lived there. I bought most of my groceries at a small fruit and vegetable shop that sells fresh flowers.
Seeing the familiar landmarks drives home how much my life has changed in such a short period of time. We stop at my apartment so I can run in and check on my cats. Vasily arranged for someone to come by and feed them but they've been alone all this time. Michel comes in with me and walks around the room, and it reminds me of that day back in time when all this was brand new. Such a short time, but it seems a lifetime ago. He does the same visual tour of the apartment, picking up my possessions and smiling. He holds up a plastic Nemo fish I keep by my kitchen sink.
"A toy?"
I laugh and pour fresh kibble in the cat bowls. "I had a clownfish once and was very fond of it. When the movie came out I had to get one as a reminder." I spend a few moments giving the cats attention while Michel inspects my bookshelf, picking up my texts and flipping through the pages. I wash out the water dishes and fill them, then look around the tiny apartment. What a difference from the warehouse or mansion. The kitchenette in my apartment is the size of that in an RV. The shower isn't much bigger. But it was home once and I feel a sense of melancholia for my past life. The world seemed so full of promise to me then. I thought I'd actually have a normal life once upon a time, despite my horrible adolescence. Now? I'm not sure how long I'll even live. This is war. My mother died in the cause.
I lock the apartment up, sad that I won't be staying there with the cats.
"Tell me how I’ll know what to do."
"You will just know. Someone will contact you and you’ll know.”
"Is that all you can tell me or all you will tell me?"
Michel places his hand behind my back and ushers me into the vehicle, then sits beside me, one arm around me on the back of the seat.
"Eve, I tell you what I think you need to know, and nothing more. It's strategically important that you not know some things. All you have to know is that there is a plan in place. You'll know what to do when the time comes."
I nod and watch as Michel's guards return from their posts at the front and back doors of my apartment. One stands outside our vehicle with his hand on a weapon at his hip like the Secret Service.
We drive farther south towards the docks. The vehicle slows and I look out the front window to see a traffic jam ahead, the flashing lights of a fire truck in the middle of the street.
"Looks like a fire of some sort," I say.
Michel doesn't look up. He takes my face in his hands.
"Eve, I love you." He kisses me, his emotions washing over me, bringing tears to my eyes. "Don't forget that." He reaches into a pocket and takes out a tiny glass ampoule and breaks the tip off it. Inside is a clear liquid. "Drink this."
I take it from him and examine it. "What is it?"
"It's to make you forget." He pulls me closer.
"Forget what?"
"That this happened – this plan and whatever you know about it. I can't let Soren know you're part of a plan to kill him or he'll kill you."
"If you think that's necessary. I could block him out."
"Not good enough – he may use something on you to force you to reveal information. I can't take the chance. Just drink it. Now."
The urgency in his voice makes me comply and I nod and take in a deep breath, swallowing it down, the bitter taste making me squint.
"Oh God," I say and grimace. "That's terrible, whatever it is."
"You're so brave." He buries his face in my hair, his mouth on my neck. "Whatever happens," he says, his lips at my ear. "Remember that I love you." He pulls his small crucifix over his head. "This is for you," he says and slips it over my head. I examine the crucifix.
"It's beautiful." I look up at him. "It's Marguerite's."
He nods. "It's very old." He holds my face in his hands. "Eve, when you look at the cross, you'll remember that the vampire who gave it to you loved you."
"I'll remember," I say. I smile at him and he makes a sound deep in his throat and kisses my cheeks, his tongue touching each dimple,
one after the other.
"I love you," he says.
"You said that already," I say and smile. "Three times."
Then an explosion rocks the car.
"What happened?" I crane my head to look, but Michel takes hold of my face and makes me look in his eyes.
"Tell me you love me."
I smile. "Of course I do."
"Say it."
I kiss him. "I love you, Michel."
He kisses me back, deeply. Then he brushes my hair off my cheek.
"That should start to make you feel a bit dizzy."
As if on cue, I do start to feel a bit strange. The world spins for a second. The last thing I see is Michel's face, his clear blue eyes filled with tears as he lays me down on the seat.
"I'm so sorry…" he says, "…but I can't let you go to him."
Another explosion down the street rocks the car again with its shockwave, this time more intense. Michel wraps his arms around me, covering me with his body. Over his shoulder I see a huge black cloud of smoke and fire coming towards us.
And then, darkness.
Chapter 48
“The first magic of love is our ignorance that it can ever end.”
Disraeli
Ipswich Medical Clinic, Two Months Later
I BLINK WHEN THE LIGHTS FLICK BACK ON, my head throbbing as if someone hit it with a rubber mallet. I'm sitting in an examination room, dressed in a paper robe, paper slippers on my feet.
"Do the bright lights still bother you?"
I nod.
"You need to wear sunglasses whenever the sun's shining. The headaches will go away soon. The explosion caused quite a concussion."
"Will my memories ever come back?"
The doctor shakes his head.
"Some will never come back. The brain swelling caused some permanent damage. Others will return. Give yourself time. You're lucky to be alive."
The doctor leads me back to his office in a corner of the clinic. He has a television on, tuned to one of the local news channels.
As he writes in my file, I watch the news. It's been two months since the bombing in downtown Boston and the investigation's still ongoing. I just get so upset by it all, I can't watch. It's just too depressing.
"The case is still open," he says, glancing up at the television from his files.
I nod, feeling a catch in my throat. My case.
"Well, Eve, I've written you another prescription. You're getting your supply of tonic all right?"
"Yes," I say, remembering the thick black syrup I drink every day to help build up my blood.
"Good," he says. "Don't miss a dose or you'll feel really sick. If you have any problems, any new symptoms, just give my office a call."
“Thank you."
I take the prescription and go back to the dressing room and change back into my clothes. I step outside into the late afternoon sun and squint, slipping on my sunglasses. The fall has been unusually wet, with fewer days of sun than normal – right up until I needed it. With my extreme sensitivity to light, I hope the cloud cover will soon return.
My foster dad and mom are having a few friends over, trying to introduce me back into polite society, but I've got an excuse to avoid them. I'm setting up a camera down on the beach to take time-lapse photographs of the rise of the Milky Way and so after introductions, I escape. I can't stand the way they look at me as if I'm some kind of mental patient just because I have amnesia from the bombing.
I go to the beach below the cottage, carting my load of equipment. There's a shirtless man in the surf, a hand shading his eyes, looking out to the glittering ocean. I almost don't go down to the water because I don't want to intrude, but I brought my equipment and want to set up so I can do the shoot. This section of beach is the best because it's sheltered, with cliffs and dunes breaking the wind. I take a narrow passageway through the rocks that litter the coastline, descending on a path that's been worn down from years of use.
I walk along the beach, looking for a good spot to set up my tripod, keeping as far from him as possible. I stop near a flat rock where I put down my camera case and equipment. I stand gazing out across Ipswich Bay and then take out the tripod, struggling to get it set up in the sand. When I'm busy fighting the bolt to lock the tripod into place, the man I saw in the surf comes to my side, his pale skin glistening wet in the last rays of sun.
The first thing I notice, other than he's completely gorgeous with black hair and incredible blue eyes, is that he's so pale. Unnaturally pale, and I think he must be ill. Maybe terminal.
"Hello," he says. "Can I help you with that? You look like you're having trouble." He has this soft French accent that sounds more continental than Cajun.
I smile, and step back from the tripod, my cheeks burning.
"I didn't realize my mechanical ineptitude was so obvious. I think the bolt was screwed on a bit too tight and now I can't unlock it."
"I've seen you here before," he says as he bends down to examine the tripod. "You come to this beach a lot. I'm Michel," he says and then holds out a hand. He pronounces it Mee-shell like a proper Frenchman. "I'm staying just up the coast a bit."
I look at his hand, surprised at the formality. People don't usually shake hands but maybe it's some French thing.
"Eve," I manage and he holds my hand in both of his for a bit too long. I try to pull my hand away, and finally, he releases it.
When he turns back to the tripod, I noticed strange marks stretching from one shoulder to the other, browny red like a tattoo but raised like a scar, the marks resemble wings and I can't imagine what caused them. I think maybe it's some kind of kelp that attached to his skin while he was swimming and touch the marks, but they don't brush off.
He glances at me, squinting as if to gauge my response.
"It won't come off," he says. "It's part of me."
"I'm sorry," I say, embarrassed. Then I realize they must be scars – maybe burn marks – and sympathy fills me. He works away at the tripod and manages to get it set up.
"Thanks," I say. "You're a godsend."
"I wouldn't say that." He smiles and then picks up a flat stone from the sand and throws it out, skipping it across the surface of the water. "What are you taking pictures of?"
"I'm going to do some time-lapse photography. I saw this really great time lapse video that shows the Milky Way in Atacama Chile and I thought I'd give it a try," I say, "but given my lack of technical expertise, I think I'm probably a bit too ambitious."
"I saw that video on YouTube," he says. "Amazing. What we only can see using technology. It's there, but our light and time perception prevents us from seeing it."
I smile at him, glad to have found someone else who's interested in such things. I attach the camera and timer.
"I read up on it and the timer is set to take a twenty-second exposure with a 2 second pause between images."
"Are you an amateur astronomer?" he says, and I feel his eyes on me, watching me instead of the camera. When I glance up at him, I can't help but blush. God, his eyes are so blue. My heart does a little flip-flop because he's just so beautiful but for some reason, I feel incredibly sad when I look at him.
"No," I say. "I just saw the Hubble Ultra Deep Field Image one day in an old National Geographic at my doctor's office and I couldn't get it out of my mind. I started looking at YouTube videos of stars and saw the Atacama video. I'm recovering from an injury and have some time to kill. I thought I'd give it a try."
"You don't look injured."
"It was my brain," I say. "I was in a coma for a while and now I have memory loss."
"Permanent?"
"The memory loss is, but the brain swelling is down now so everything pretty much works."
"That's good."
That's the most I've said to anyone outside of my neurologist and my foster parents since I woke up in the ICU after the bombing.
He goes to his clothes, which are folded on the sand. Once he's dressed, and I have everything set up
, I start the timer and we watch as it takes a few exposures.
"Keep your fingers crossed," I say.
He smiles at me, tilting his head to the side.
"You don't have faith?"
"Oh, no," I say. "Atheist. No faith in anything. Just trust in science. And good instructions."
“How long will it continue to take pictures?"
"A few hours."
"Would you like to go for a walk along the beach?"
I take in a breath. I don't know him from a hole in the ground but he seems nice enough and for some reason, I feel no threat from him. We walk along the beach in silence and I examine him from the corner of my eye – he's about a foot taller than me, his body well-muscled but not overly. His straight black hair is longish, beneath his chin and long down his neck. His blue eyes seem to shine with intelligence.
"So what are you doing in the little hamlet of Ipswich, Massachusetts?" I say, awkward with the silence.
"I have a cottage along the coast just about a mile from here. Come to get away from it all."
"What do you do for a living, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Private consulting, research, investigations."
"Sounds cryptic."
He laughs.
"Yes, very. Pointedly so."
"All right," I say, smiling. "I won't ask."
We round the point and I find an injured Gannet, its feathers still dark, a late season fledgling probably flown from the nesting colony in the cliffs in the distance. We kneel in the sand and I pick it up, concern for the young bird flooding through me, making my throat close. Still alive but clearly in pain, its wing hangs at an odd angle. It flops around, breathing heavily, gasping for breath. I hold it in my hands, but it falls limp and still. I can feel the moment it dies and blink away the tears that fill my vision, embarrassed to show emotion in front of a complete stranger.
He tilts my chin up and examines my face. "Not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it."