“Yes.” Taylor pushes her glasses further up her nose and nods. She points to the tower of ice in the center of the lab. “Can I have that vampire over there to continue with Armand’s experiments?”
“When that melts he’s going to be pretty pissed off.” Julianna, who still holds Annie, runs her fingers across the icy block.
Loren lays his hand against the surface. “No, he won’t. Not now.”
“You can’t have one of my guards!” Christiana yells and with bloody hands, taps her phone furiously. “I’m requesting more of my men come here to collect Alexander. You’re not dead. You’re still mine. We’ll fix this in Philadelphia.”
“We gave him my blood, Christiana. It almost killed him.” Loren folds his arms. “You can’t try to turn him again.”
I gasp. Never would I imagine that was even a possibility.
Francisco places a hand on Alex’s shoulder and raising his eyebrows, lowers his face to smells his skin. “Wrong, Commander. He is not yours. Alexander is no longer vampire. Neither you nor even I have any say about what he does.” Francisco’s eyes are dark and angry. “This matter is closed. Go back to Philadelphia.”
“Let’s go.” Zander drags Christiana away while her eyes peer at Alex.
He stares back, wearing a face of stone even though it’s soft and tender now.
A team of what I can only describe as ‘cleaners’ rush in and are busy changing this room from a war zone back to a lab. Gaston, Pollack, and the gun-wielding vampire’s bodies are shoved into dark-gray plastic body bags, their crunchy zippers closing loudly.
Armand’s headless body is processed with a little more care. Taylor keeps her hand on him as they roll him out on a sheet covered gurney while Francisco places the icicle vamp in the freezer.
When Loren speaks to Francisco alone in that corner, Alexander takes my hand and walks back to Julianna who holds my Annie. “What is she doing here and not in DC?” He strokes my daughter’s soft, blonde hair gently.
“It’s a long story.” I reach out for Julianna to hand Annie to me, but Alex intercepts her.
Loren returns and lays a hand on my daughter’s head. “This is your allegiant now, Alexander.”
Seeing what Loren can truly do, that he’s capable of so much destruction and yet he can be so gentle makes me admire him even more.
“Loren, you tried to save me with your blood?” Alex places a free hand on his heart and from his expression I guess it’s beating. Wildly.
“Yes, but it nearly killed you.” He takes Julianna by the waist. “Then we gave you her blood.”
“Where did you find her?” Alex smirks at him.
“She found me.”
“And you think it was her blood that saved me?” Alex chokes up as he stares at Julianna. “You set me free?”
“Let me draw your blood and I’ll try to figure it out,” Loren challenges him.
“No way.” His hand rests on Annie’s back. “My bloodline is mine again. Whatever is in it.”
“Francisco asked me to go to DC and take care of that other matter, Cecilia’s betrayal.” Loren pats his body with his free hand and takes in his blood-soaked shirt. “After I change my clothes.”
“Oh my gosh, Stephen.” I consider my own disheveled appearance. “He will need to see his daughter with his own eyes to know she’s okay. I have to come with you.”
“That means I’m going as well.” Alex leans into one of the remaining glass panels and grimaces at his reflection.
The image is quite horrifying. I’m glad Annie is still asleep. He looks like a monster. Slowly he walks back to me. I have to get to know him all over again. New blood rushes through his veins. There may be more gifts that he will have to learn and understand.
“I can still protect you, Elizabeth.” He touches one of the metal panels of the destroyed surgery room. It crushes easily against his palm. “As Francisco said, I’m not a part of his allegiant anymore. I’m free to be with who I want.” His eyes move to Annie before they connect to mine.
“Should we wake her up?” I touch my daughter’s face.
“I would prefer she not see me like this.” He smiles at me. “Perhaps we can stop somewhere along the way so I can get a hat.”
I rush into his arms, next to Annie and he holds us both against his chest, half laughing, half crying. I hadn’t thought a sense of humor would be included in the new Alex.
“Do you really love me?” His knuckles brush my cheek but it feels like a stranger’s hand.
I was used to the sting of his perpetually cold skin.
“You heard me just now, didn’t you?”
“Yes. But I heard it before too.”
“I told you while you were unconscious.” I can’t help brush my fingers against his skull, wanting to soothe the pain I know he must feel.
“That.” He swallows. “That’s what I kept hearing in my head. Ringing. Over and over. It thundered through me, energizing me. Bringing me back to you.”
“With the help of Julianna’s blood,” I add.
He draws me in closer. “Say it with your voice. Please. So, I really know I didn’t imagine it.”
“I love you. So much, Alex.”
His new human body quickly gets the emotion memo, and Alex’s bright emerald eyes glisten. “I think you just signed up for forever, my darling.”
I laugh and bury my head in his chest, next to Annie’s beating heart which is as loud as his.
Even though Alex and I will have to take a step back to get to know each other again, with every minute that passes, I feel him turning into mine again. Really mine.
Mine all mine.
Epilogue
Three months later . . .
I yawn and stretch. Sleeping every night has been one of the many adjustments I made to accept my new body.
Waking up next to Elizabeth was easy to get used to. The mornings, however, are a bit of a circus. No matter what time these girls wake up, in the final minutes before Annie’s bus arrives, my cool, calm, polite Elizabeth turns into a foul-mouthed MMA fighter even I don’t want to get into the ring with.
Except this morning it’s not the bus we wait for. It’s Stephen. Tomorrow begins Spring Break and he’s taking Annie to his parents’ house for the week.
I sit at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee. It’s much different from the coffee I remember, still I drink it. But I put the cup down when hurricane Elizabeth blows in.
“Can you please help Annie get her bags downstairs.” Her satin camisole is neatly tucked into her skirt while Velcro curlers swing in front of her face as she moves. “I’m running so late.”
Annie sprints by asking for her knapsack.
“It’s on the dining room table, kiddo.” I push the glasses I now need further up my nose. After Annie tears out of the kitchen, I stand and whisper to Elizabeth, “Next time you want oral sex in the morning, I’ll remember to say no, Mrs. Manning.”
A curler whips past my head as she spins out of the room.
Fifteen minutes later, we sit in the living room like statues and wait for Stephen to arrive. He texted that he just got off the Turnpike and will be here any second. Elizabeth bites her nails as we trade glances.
Every time we see and speak to Stephen, she gets nervous. On the drive to DC three months ago, there was a lengthy discussion of what Annie’s father should and should not know. Having Loren’s mind-altering abilities with us meant all options were open. The altering part, being the key. Neither me nor Julianna can do that.
I met Stephen and we decided not to erase me from his memory. Elizabeth, however told him I was a vampire. Even if I’m not one now, we decided that whole part should be wiped out. Along with Zander attacking him in the Pentagon parking lot, chaining him up, and abducting Annie
.
The trip bore interesting fruit, though. In the course of Loren’s interrogation down in DC, he received a startling piece of information. Aiden, the Philadelphia Commander who went missing, is alive and being held somewhere. He suspects Francisco’s missing mate, Sophia, might be held captive as well.
As far as him and Julianna, all he’s been able to get out of her, relationship-wise are a bunch of maybes. The texts I get from him that ask strange questions about how to properly pursue her are hilarious. Julianna’s texts to Elizabeth, however, confirm she’s playing it cool.
I echo my wife’s sentiment: I really like that woman. And not just because she saved my life.
“Stephen’s here.” Elizabeth bolts up and pulls her daughter against her chest in a tight hug.
I step forward and wrap my arms around them, inserting myself into the goodbye scene. “Hey, kiddo, you have a great week.”
Her eyes have turned as blue as Elizabeth’s. “I will.”
“And call your mother,” I say, clipping her chin.
“I will,” she repeats. “If she lets me go.”
“Hey, sorry I’m late.” Stephen steps cautiously into the house.
“No problem.” I shake his hand and grab my keys. “I need to get to the hospital.”
“Wait.” Elizabeth nervously smooths her skirt. “We’re going to tell him, right?”
Stephen looks from me to her. “Tell me what?”
“Um.” Elizabeth takes a breath.
I run a hand through my hair, which grew back full and thick. With lots of glorious grays. A slight blow to my vanity, but one I embraced. It’s a sure sign I’m aging. And mortal. The other sign was our big surprise. I smile at Stephen. “Well . . .”
“We’re having a baby!” Annie blurts and shoots her hands in the air. It’s so adorable how she thinks the ‘we’ means her too. But I guess it does.
Stephen blinks a few times then hugs my wife. “Hey, that’s great. Congratulations.”
“Thanks. It’s just a couple of months. We didn’t want Annie to have to hold it in all week.” Elizabeth squeezes her daughter’s shoulders.
Annie’s ecstatic about being a big sister and says now she doesn’t need a puppy. But she still wants a treehouse.
That’s my job this summer.
Elizabeth walks Annie to Stephen’s car and I follow with the little suitcase and knapsack. As usual, Elizabeth is too choked up so I buckle Annie into her seat after which she gives me a high-five.
As the Jeep Grand Cherokee rolls down the block, I put my arm around my wife. My mate. The one I chose this time, for love.
And I love her with every fiber of my strange being and every beat of my brand-new heart.
Deborah Garland is a versatile author of women's fiction, contemporary and paranormal romances. Her books are about love and the struggles of complicated relationships. The heroines are strong and witty and the heroes fall hard for them.
She lives on the North Shore of Long Island with her husband and two pugs, Zoe and Harley. They like to vacation up and down the East Coast, but her favorite place is on a bar stool on a Friday night with a Grey Goose cosmopolitan, listening to her husband tell her the same stories over and over.
You can visit Deborah at:
http://www.deborahgarlandauthor.com/blog/
Drawing Bloodlines (The Princeton Allegiant Series Book 1) Page 29