by Lund, S. E.
I struggle to get up and just stand by the couch for a while. Finally, I turn away and go to the bedroom. Perhaps in the night he'll come to me, forgive me. He has to understand. It's just too soon.
Soren's just such a bastard.
I lie in bed and squirm, for the blood is making me so aroused despite my sadness and regret. I toss and turn like this for an hour until finally, I get up to go to the bathroom to take a sleeping pill.
I should be with Julien right now, giving him the pleasure he needs, receiving the pleasure I need. Instead, I'm he's turned me away. Has Soren compelled him to fight me?
I tiptoe back into the bedroom and lie in my bed, my face crushed into my pillow to silence my tears.
Chapter 67
"Love and desire are the spirit's wings to great deeds."
Goethe
* * *
The next day dawns, and when I wake, I'm still alone in bed. Julien is still on the couch, the blanket twisted around him, the pillow over his head, his feet sticking out over the armrest. I go to his side and listen to his breathing, which is deep and slow. I wonder what Soren said to him last night – what new bit of compulsion he's inflicted on Julien to manipulate him and through him, me. I kneel beside the couch and rest my hand on Julien's arm, which hangs out from the blanket, his hand resting on the floor. I try to read him, but can't.
"Julien," I whisper. I run my hand down his arm to his hand and take it in mine. "Wake up."
He jerks awake, and removes the pillow from his face, turning his half-closed eyes toward me.
"What is it?" He sits bolt upright as if something's wrong and then he sees his hand in mine and pulls it away. "Don't touch me."
"Julien!" I try to take it back, but he resists. "Why are you being like this?" I try to connect with him again, but for some reason, I can't. "Are you blocking me?"
He says nothing for a moment, just runs his hands through his hair, his eyes not meeting mine. Finally, he speaks, his voice low.
"You shouldn't touch me. You can't connect with me either."
"Why?" I try to take his hand once more but he turns away from me and stands up, trying to hide his morning erection by pulling his t-shirt over it.
"Just don't even try," he says, his voice harsh.
He leaves the living room and makes his way to the bathroom. I follow him, my gut in a knot. Has Soren compelled him to avoid touching me?
When Julien reaches the bathroom he starts to close the door. I stop him with my shoulder, sticking my foot inside. He glances down at my foot and then at me.
"Don't come in."
"Julien!" I'm angry now, and push against the door, trying to get inside. "We need to talk."
"I have to take a piss."
"So?" I say, pushing the door all the way open.
He lets me in finally and turns his back to me, standing at the toilet for several long minutes before I finally hear him urinating.
"What do you want?" he says, his voice a bit shaky.
I stand behind him while he pees, waiting for him to turn around. He finishes, then goes to the sink to wash up. I just watch him, wondering what I can say.
"Soren's compelled you to stay away from me and not let me connect with you."
He says nothing while he washes his hands and then throws water over his face. He dries off, glancing at himself in the mirror before moving his eyes to my reflection briefly.
"Did you hear me?" I say, my voice near breaking. "I said Soren's compelled you to stay away from me. Not let me touch you. For us not to connect."
"Are you going to class this morning?" he says, sidling past me to the closet, where he takes out a clean shirt and then to his suitcase for a clean pair of jeans.
"Julien!" I say and grab his arm.
He glances at my hand on his arm once more like it's some foreign thing he doesn't recognize. He turns away, pulling his arm from my hand.
"Don't," he says, his voice low. "You can't touch me."
"Why not?"
He shakes his head as if he doesn't know the answer. "You just can't."
"Julien, don't you realize that Soren's compelled you not to let us touch? It's just to punish us. To torture us."
He pulls his jeans on and zips up awkwardly, then pulls on his white shirt, saying nothing while he buttons it. Finally, he looks at me, his face hard, but he says nothing.
"Don't you want to touch me, to connect with me?" I say, stepping closer. "Don't you want to kiss me?"
He says nothing for a moment. Then he sighs, exhaling loudly.
"Of course."
"Then do it."
"I can't."
I grit my teeth. That bastard…
I step even closer and the closer I get, the more uncomfortable he appears, his face showing actual panic.
"Please," he almost hisses.
"Kiss me," I say and take another step. Now he's pressed against the wall.
"Eve, don't do this. I can't kiss you."
"Why?"
"I just can't!" he says, chopping his hand down between us as if to demark where I may not pass.
"What will happen if you do?"
He slides away from me and I follow him to the kitchen where he starts filling the coffee maker with water. I come up behind him and slip my arms around his waist and he inhales, his breath sounding as if he's in pain. He pulls my arms away as if my touch burns him and steps away backwards. He holds his hands out, palms forward, like he's trying to ward me off.
"Eve, you can't touch me. I can't touch you."
"But you want to, right?"
He nods after a moment. "God, I want to, but I can't. You can't. I can't let you."
"Soren's done this."
It's like he doesn't hear me.
"Julien," I say and finally, he turns to me and looks in my eyes. "We can't touch, but we can watch. Each other."
Immediately, he knows what I mean. For the next fifteen minutes, we watch each other touch ourselves without touching the other.
It's not much, but it's better than nothing.
* * *
The school day passes quickly without incident and my shift at the Cove is busy. Before I know it, I’ve cleaned my twentieth table and it's almost ten. Julien shows up and is sitting at the bar, talking to the bartender while I finish up and sign out.
“How’d it go?” he asks as I get in the car. “Think you can manage two shifts a week? I was thinking we could stretch our stay here so you could at least finish one semester, get some credit. I don’t want you working too hard so that it affects your grades.”
I shake my head. “It was fine. Boss said if I work out OK, I could pick up a shift or two as a hostess. Get me out of bussing.”
“Yeah, they like keeping the sweet young thangs for the front, attract the customers in.” He glances at me, smiling.
I want to squeeze his arm but don't. “And the hot young studs behind the bar.”
He laughs.
"Hardly young or hot. I mean, temperature-wise." He has that playful sparkle in his eye.
I'm glad the tension has been eased between us and he feels able to speak to me now that we had our little mutual-masturbation encounter. But he was right before when he said I could easily get caught up in the whole university junior world if I let myself. I’ve always told myself my lack of normal didn’t matter. That I had a larger purpose in life – to protect our world against vampires. But in truth, in my secret heart of hearts, I really just wanted it all to go away, and for me to be ordinary. To have had my real family, friends and a boyfriend who loved me.
Julien knows how I feel. He understands how and why I'm so different. As much as I want to escape my previous life for normal, I know I can't ever do it, so being with him is a comfort.
I don't have to pretend with him. He knows me, inside and out.
“Eve, you have to understand that, every now and then I forget what you are,” he says as we pull in the driveway at the cottage. We sit in the car for a moment. “I
have to keep reminding myself that you’re actually very strong. Competent. Dangerous.” He turns to me, his expression serious. “I look at you and see this sweet young girl-woman who’s seen too way much blood and violence, experienced way too much heartbreak. I want to protect you. I’ve got to remember that you’re my partner so,” he says and looks away. “That’s my mea culpa. My confession.” He holds his hands up. “You said I was over-protective? Guilty as charged. I have to back off a bit.”
“Thanks,” I say, warmth spreading through me at how honest he's being.
* * *
I shower and dress as quickly as possible, but my hair is still damp despite the blow dryer. I put on this little black lace top, my jeans and heels. I put on some drop earrings and a bit more makeup than normal.
“How do I look?” I say as I turn in a circle in front of Julien. “Will I pass muster?”
He shakes his head as he looks me up and down. “You look,” he says and hesitates. “Good enough to eat. I might just have to take a shotgun into the pub with me.”
I laugh at that. “You look pretty nice yourself.” He wears a black sweater and jeans, with a black belt and looks like he might have stepped out of GQ with those whiskers growing fashionably on his jaw and the dark hair. I allow myself to see him as a man. The other female students will swoon over him.
If they knew he was a self-described day-walking super-warrior-vampire-hunting vampire killer, I wonder how they’d feel.
That's someone only I could love.
* * *
Julien drives to the fourth pub on the list after I finish getting ready and we enter and walk into the dimness of the bar. There's a small dance floor and a VJ had set up with a big screen playing music videos. Some students are dancing while others stand around in small groups. I stop beside Julien at the edge of the dance floor and watch, my heart beating faster than it usually did when I was in a fight. I think of how different this is from last night at Soren's. This is where I belong – feeling nervous and awkward at a college function, not an organized vampire and slave orgy.
I scan the floor looking for people I recognize, but don't see Nate – thankfully. I see Sarah Rhys and Brenda as well as several others at a table. Brenda waves at me and motions for me to come over. I nod and make my way through the dancers to their table, Julien behind me.
“Hi, Eve,” Sarah says. “Glad to see you here.”
I smile. “Thanks. I'm a bit nervous. I’ve never been to a pub crawl before.” I turn to Julien. "This is Julien. Julien, this is Sarah and Brenda from my history class."
They turn to him and he smiles and bows mock-formally, that grin of his starting.
"Such beautiful ladies!" He bows to Sarah and then takes Brenda's hand and kisses her knuckles as if he's trying to see if she's an Adept. "How am I so lucky to be the only man here?"
Sarah smiles and I see Brenda's eyes widen. When Julien lets go of her hand, she looks down at the table for a moment. Julien pulls up a chair from another table and Brenda makes room for us. I sit down.
"I'll go get us a drink. What will you have?"
I make a face. "Just whatever you're having."
He leaves us.
“You’ve never been to a pub crawl?” Sarah says. “How come?”
I shake my head. “I was a bit of a nerd.”
“We almost didn’t come,” she says.
“Why?” Then I cringe. “Oh, right. Your friend Christie’s funeral was yesterday. I’m sorry.”
Brenda looks quickly at Sarah. “Thanks. It’s hard, but she’d want us to come. She helped organize tonight.”
I’d completely forgotten why I came to Davis Cove, so wrapped up in the petty psychodrama of my so-called college social life.
“I read about it in the paper. She was your friend?”
Sarah nods. “My best friend.”
“Do they know what happened?”
Brenda shrugs, glancing at Sarah. “Overdose, from what the coroner said. It was weird because she never took drugs. Someone maybe spiked her drink, but the coroner ruled it accidental.”
I nod. Yes. It certainly was weird. But I know the real cause. She was an Adept and a Blood Slave.
They're silent for a few moments and then someone changes the subject, and talks about an upcoming football game against an old rival. Maybe I imagined the whole thing the other day when Brenda gasped when she touched me. Maybe she did get a static shock and I didn’t notice it.
I start to relax once the focus is off me and on to other subjects.
It's then that Nate strolls up, looking very handsome as usual, in a dark blue shirt and jeans. He says hello to everyone and then turns to me, holding out his hand.
“Eve, would you like to dance?”
"Not really," I say, glancing at the dance floor where a few people are dancing.
"Come on. Don't be a buzz kill. Besides, I have something to tell you in private."
I frown and stand up, taking his hand, because, what am I going to do? Refuse? I'm sure it's a message from Soren.
“Sure.”
He leads me to the middle of the dance floor and we wait for the next song. The music starts and it's a slow dance. Crap.
“I better not," I say stepping back from him. "Julien's a bit jealous."
I try to walk away, but he grabs my hand and pulls me against him. "You don't have a choice, Eve," he says and smiles. “Soren wanted me to tell you something and this is the best way to convey his message.”
I give in, but I glance over at the bar, where Julien is chatting with the bartender, his back to me while the bartender pours our drinks. Probably talking bar stuff.
“You're on the wrong track if you keep investigating these murders,” he says into my ear.
"What do you mean?" I put on a fake smile, not wanting Julien to get upset if he sees me.
“They're nothing. Just business. Not part of anything ominous.”
“Like I believe that.”
"Believe it. Soren doesn't want you to keep investigating them. You're raising all kinds of unnecessary questions. Back off or he says your little problem with Julien will continue. "
The song ends and I turn away without another word, going back to find that Sarah’s table is joined by a tall dark-haired young man I hadn’t seen at school before.
I take my chair and Sarah cranes her head to me. “Dylan, I want you to meet my new friend Eve. Eve, this is my big brother. He’s only a year older than me, but he likes it when I call him that. He's back from Boston for the weekend. He’s doing a degree in engineering at MIT. He’s studying nanotechnology.”
I smile at him. He looks a bit uncomfortable, but then smiles back at me. It looks anything but friendly.
“Nice to meet you,” he says stiffly. I figure he doesn't like being introduced to all Sarah’s little friends like he's some trophy on display. I wonder why he came if he's uncomfortable.
“I told you about Eve,” Sarah says. “She’s a classically trained pianist. Her father played violin for the Prague Symphony.” She raises her eyebrows at that.
I feel my cheeks burn. Her father or mother must have spoken about me.
“Yeah, I was my father’s performing monkey for a few years,” I say, trying to downplay it. Then I feel bad, saying something mean about my father, considering. I just don't like the limelight.
“Our mother said you made the first cut at Julliard for the pre-college program. That’s something you should be proud of,” Dylan says.
I look at him more closely to see his expression. He's darkly attractive, with longish black hair and hazel eyes.
I shrug and turn away, hoping the conversation will shift away from me and my background. I don't like lying or telling too much of the truth and most of all, I don't want anyone to talk about the fact that I lost my parents.
Finally, Julien returns and sits beside me on the chair, which he's turned around. Then, out of the blue, Dylan offers me his hand when the music starts.
“Care to dance?”
I smile and glance at Julien, who raises his eyebrows. What is it with these people and hand-holding? I don't want to say no, so I breathe in deeply and take his hand but get nothing strange from him when I do. The song turns out to be another slow one and so once again, I've broken Julien's rule about touching strangers. He can't come and rescue me either. We can't touch.
“You’re lucky to be able to play piano,” Dylan says, his mouth next to my ear, one hand on my waist, the other holding my hand. “My mother tried to teach me, but it didn’t stick. Didn’t get the talent genes, I guess. Sarah did, but then she got sick.”
"What's wrong with her?"
"Inherited neuromuscular disorder. Incurable. She'll likely be dead by the time she's thirty."
"I'm so sorry."
He shrugs. "I've known most of her life. It's hard to watch. She's still pretty good though."
He has the same accent as his parents and sister, called ‘Scouse’ to those who live in the region. When we lived in England, in Wales, I became familiar with the different accents.
An awkward silence passes.
He takes in a deep breath. “How come you didn’t go to Julliard?”
“After my mother died, I focused more on science and never went to the audition.”
He shakes his head and frowns. “That’s sad,” he says.
“I was in love with medicine, like my mom was,” I say, remembering my foster parent's insistence that I go back to full academics in high school.
“That's too bad,” he says, and his voice actually sounds sad. "The world has more than enough doctors but hardly enough really gifted musicians."
“So, you study nanotechnology?” I try to change the subject. “That’s amazing.”
He pulls back and checks me out. “You’re interested in science?”
“I’ve loved science since I was a kid,” I say. “I had a telescope back when we lived in Wales and I take pictures. I took one of Andromeda and a few nebulae that turned out well. Some time lapse video of the Milky Way rising.”