The Truth about Vampires

by Theresa Meyers

  “Dmitri, please.”

  Hunger and desire fisted deep in his gut, demanding release.

  “Let me see you, Dmitri,” she coaxed.

  Good God. She was spread like a feast before him that would drive a man to his knees, let alone a vampire, and she was all his. “You are too much temptation, even for me. I want you all to myself. Forever.”

  “I’m yours.” Her words staked him in the heart. He slid over her, phasing away his clothing, reveling in the slide of her satin skin against his as he brushed against her. The panting moan that poured from her tightened everything within him another precious inch closer to meltdown.

  He circled the pink tip of her breast with his tongue. She groaned, wrapping her legs around his waist in response, pulling him in tight against her wet heat.

  He threw his head back and let out a fierce cry. Sparks ignited in his veins as his vision turned red. Need, raw and deep, took him to the edge. He pulled back for an instant, afraid of what he might do to her, the monster inside him too great to control.

  “Don’t stop. Don’t you dare stop now,” she growled as she pulsed against him.

  Unable to hold back the avalanche of sensation falling in upon him, he sank into her, giving her everything he had.

  For Kristin, it was as if a bolt of liquid lightning connected them. She felt it vibrate from the spot where he lay sheathed inside her to the spot where he sank in his fangs now. She felt as if she was being lifted off the bed, spun out into the air in thousands of shattering shards.

  Dmitri took everything she had and she arched, letting him in deeper still, so deep that it seemed as if he touched her very soul.

  His hands and his mouth touched every bit of her at once, electrifying every nerve. All the universe coalesced into one shining star centered within her, between them. For a moment she couldn’t even breathe. She was overwhelmed with rightness, the total completion, as if she’d only been half a person, missing half her senses and oblivious to the immensity of the universe around her.

  When it was over, she lay her damp head on his chest as he stroked her hip with his fingers. “Are you okay?” His voice penetrated her, rumbling inside her.

  She ran her fingers through the dark hair on his chest, loving how it felt against her flesh. “I’m not okay. I’m amazing. This was different than the other times, wasn’t it?”

  He nodded. “We’ve bonded. That changes everything.” He looked down at her, his eyes so full of love that it made her heart stutter. She glanced at the spot near her breast where the two puncture marks dimpled her skin. He bent down and laved them with a quick swipe of his tongue, and her body sat up and took notice, coiling and ready to go all over again.

  He dipped his finger into the red liquid that welled to the surface, tracing it on her bare stomach. Three interwoven circles, each crossing the other at the center where they met at her navel.

  “What is that?”

  “It’s our mark. Our way. It represents an interlinked web of life and death.” He retraced each of the circles as he spoke. “One circle for life, one for death, one for vampire. All complete, all connected, all dependent on one another.”

  “That’s the symbol on the dance floor at Sangria.”

  “Yes.”

  “You said we’re bonded. What does that mean?”

  “It means you’re mine. Now. Always. Forever. We’ll always share a connection of mind and heart with each other, even across lifetimes.”

  “And that frightens you.”

  He curled his arms around her, hugging her fiercely to him. “The only thing that truly scares me is the thought of anything happening to you.”

  Chapter 16

  How had his entire existence gone to hell in the short time he’d known her? Now, not only did he have the reivers to contend with, which he would do with relish, especially since Vane had it coming, but he also had the added weight of having bonded with her. He’d divided his loyalties when he most needed focus and resolve.

  He’d been stupid. Rash. Completely blown away. Completely enslaved to his desire for her.

  She was a temptation so complete, so utterly perfect, he’d been unable to resist. Saints above, Eris couldn’t have planned his downfall any better herself. Roman had been right. A woman able to tempt a trejan from his duty came along only once every millennium, and Kristin was that woman.

  Roman’s command to hightail his butt back to Seattle had come through loud and clear as he’d held a sleeping Kristin against him, refusing to let the real world ruin perhaps their last moment together before the coming battle.

  War with the reivers was imminent. Achilles had been able to extract enough information from the reiver they’d captured at Balor’s murder to know where the battle would take place, but not when.

  Dmitri had transported with Kristin back to Seattle, but settled her in his apartment where she’d be safest, and himself in Roman’s office to receive his briefing.

  “Reivers have been spotted gathering in smaller groups within easy transport distance of the confirmed battle location. We’ve already got warriors posted in the Fremont district,” Roman said as he pinpointed the details on his computer screen for Dmitri.

  “Hell. Are you telling me they are going to strike during the street fair?”

  Roman glanced up at him. “High concentration of mortals, huge chance for casualties, easy ability to blend in to the costumed crowds. Can you think of anything better to take down the reputation of our clan and cause mass chaos?”

  Dmitri shook his head.

  Roman clasped his shoulder. “We need you with us, Trejan. Remember that.”

  Dmitri straightened, offered Roman his salute of his hand across his chest, then transported to his assigned position in the field. The fighting members of the Cascade Clan waited, barely having to cloak themselves in the eclectic mixture of costumed people attending the annual Fremont Fair. They waited for the signs the reivers were coming, and had been given strict instructions not to incite panic among the mortals.

  The reivers came out of nowhere, a great mass of black and menace. At least that’s what it looked like as they transported en masse upon the street fair in progress. There was no time to warn the mortals. The members of the clan saw them moving quickly through the streets, dodging behind cars, jumping over them and swooping down from the buildings like enormous birds of prey.

  The reivers braced in a line against the mortals on the opposite side of the clan warriors, so that the hapless humans were surrounded by vampires. But the mortals could not know that on one side were the vampires that fought to save their kind and on the other were the ones who sought to subjugate them. Which was just what the reivers had counted upon. Panic, confusion and ultimately blind fear caused people to rush in every direction, filling the air with screams.

  As if they operated with one hive mind, the reivers advanced, pressing the mob of mortals back toward the clan.

  Without any warning, Kristin materialized by Dmitri’s side. Vane. The bastard wasn’t going to miss a chance to throw him off balance in this battle, so he’d targeted his one weakness—Kristin.

  “How the hell—” Kristin glanced at him, her eyes wide with fear as she stared with raw terror at the advancing reivers. “We’re dead. We’re all dead. Aren’t we?”

  “Not if I have anything to say about it.” His silver knife in one hand, he phased a sword into the other, as did Achilles beside him. The only thing that would stop the reivers now was the edge of a blade.

  He fixed his gaze on hers. “Stay behind the mortals,” he ordered. There was no time for her to argue. Not now.

  He and the others moved among the mortals like smoke, weaving their way between them quickly. In no time the clan was out in front of the mortals, facing the vampires advancing on their group.

  The time for words had passed.

  As the clan sliced through the reivers, Dmitri zeroed in on Vane at the back of the reivers, his red eyes both a warning and an incit
ement to battle. As the war started, the mortals fled in fear, running from the melee, their screams piercing the air.

  Several of the reivers went down in a spark of light followed by a flood of black ichor, looking like an oil slick on the road before evaporating into a swirl of smoke.

  A few of them simply exploded, taking some of the advancing clan members with them in a blast of heat and red light. But in the end there were far more reivers than the clan had counted on. They surged through the lines, vampires slashing at vampires and unfortunate mortals getting in the way.

  He threw a quick glance back at Kristin to find that she was in the thick of it, swinging wildly with an eight-inch bowie knife drenched to the hilt in dead man’s blood. While his heart nearly exploded out of his chest in fear for her, the reivers around her were dropping to the ground. Everyone she touched was destroyed. Everyone but Vane.

  His nemesis had transported closer to Kristin an instant before Dmitri’s sword had cleaved home against Vane’s neck. Now Vane stalked her, his duster billowing out behind him. Six reivers transported around Dmitri, blocking his path to Vane and Kristin.

  Kristin kept swinging at anything with fangs. Let the vampires sort out who was who from among the poisoned. Thank God she’d been able to persuade Beck to get her several quarts of dead man’s blood. She kept dipping and slashing, her arm burning now from the effort.

  From the corner of her eye she caught a flash of platinum and black bearing down on her.

  She faltered, her legs immobile, a scream frozen in her throat. Vane stepped over a fallen body at his feet and closed the gap between them in the time it took to suck in a startled breath.

  “Now it’s your turn.” He picked her up by the shoulders and flew fifteen feet up in the air. He could have dropped her, let her splatter over the pavement below, but something told her that would be too easy, too simple and not nearly frightening enough for Vane’s taste.

  “I’m going to enjoy eating you.” He closed his eyes and took a deep inhale of the air. His eyes snapped open, glittering like dark rubies. “No wonder Dmitri likes you. You’re sweet enough to be virgin’s blood.” He alighted atop a building overlooking the chaos below.

  Kristin didn’t—couldn’t—think. She was more scared than she’d ever been in her life. Her hand tensed around the handle of the bowie knife still clenched in her fist. There was no way she could let this guy win. She pulled herself together and slammed the knife covered in dead man’s blood hilt deep into Vane’s gut.

  He howled and grabbed her before she could scream, his fangs sinking like hot spikes into her throat. Pain exploded out her eyes, her heart pounding so hard she thought it might burst. Everything within her curdled and burned. Kristin could feel her life slipping away, her side drenched in hot stickiness. Her blood. She had only one last thought. Dmitri.

  Dmitri finished off the reiver he was fighting with an orichalcum star to the forehead, then raised his eyes to search for Kristin.

  She was nowhere to be found among the fighting. Neither was Vane.

  He reached out with his mind, searching for the link that bound them, and found it so weak it had nearly vanished.

  Dmitri.

  She was dying. Panic slammed into him with the power of a jet plane.

  He focused everything within him to take him to her. He found himself on a rooftop. Both Kristin and Vane were sprawled out on the flat roof.

  Vane was unconscious, but still very much undead. From ear to collarbone Kristin was savagely torn open, her skin in shreds, her shirt soaked through with bright red blood.

  He fell to his knees beside her and scooped her into his lap knowing there was nothing he could do to save her—unless he converted her right then and there. For a moment he faltered as he stared at her angelic face, the smears of red violently stark against the pallor of her smooth skin. Never, in all his existence as a vampire, had he ever changed another person. To do so now, without her knowledge, without her consent, would violate the very last thing he’d held sacred. The last shred of his humanity. But she was worth all that and more. If it worked.

  Blind panic and fear turned to determination. He’d never done it before. Had no idea how much to give her or how to keep her from the pain he’d experienced during his own conversion, but he’d do it nonetheless.

  He lifted his wrist to his mouth and opened himself to her, giving everything he had left in him.

  His ichor flowed into her slack mouth, staining her lips dark. She coughed, sputtering. His gut seized into a hard, hot mass. “Drink,” he pleaded.

  She swallowed and coughed again. He vividly remembered the suffocating sensation of ichor sliding down his throat, so he moved his arm to let the ichor flow into the wound at her neck. Still she struggled to breathe.

  He knew she knelt on the threshold of death’s door.

  Dmitri strained everything within him reaching out to her as he listened to the slow fading ka-thunk, kaa-thunk, kaaa-thhhunk of her heart. And then there was nothing. It simply stopped.

  Chapter 17

  For a moment Dmitri couldn’t think, was helpless to move. He pulled Kristin into his arms, her form limp and heavy, and held her close. He had twenty-four agonizing hours ahead of him, not knowing whether she’d survive the conversion or not. Regardless, he needed to get her into the earth as soon as possible to ensure every chance at success.

  “I’m sorry, tesoro. I didn’t know what else to do,” he whispered into her ear. He sent up a silent prayer that she’d survive, quickly followed by another that she wouldn’t hate him for what he’d done to her if she survived.

  Surely God could understand his fears. It was one thing to suffer damnation for one’s own stupidity and pride, as he had. Quite another to have damnation forced upon you without your consent.

  He stood, lifting her still-fragile mortal body in his arms. Strands of her flaxen hair floated ethereally around the dirty curve of her cheek, brushing against the lips that had already faded from a soft rosy pink to a dull purplish-mauve.

  From down below, the moans and cries of the injured could be heard drifting up from the city street, but the battle had stopped. He glanced only long enough to confirm that the clan had been victorious and the mortals were being helped. Achilles’s bright hair stood out and he called to his brother.

  How did we fare?

  Achilles raised his head, shielding his eyes as he looked up toward the building where Dmitri stood. There are several poisoned and a few beheaded, but the reivers are gone. How is your woman?

  I don’t know yet. Deep in his chest an ache radiated outward, painful and unnerving, paralyzing him as effectively as dead man’s blood.

  Dmitri took a breath, thinking it might ease the pain.

  Was she hurt?

  She was dying.

  Did you …?

  Yes. The pain intensified and he finally identified the burning ache as a mix of guilt and fear.

  Bury her quickly. The longer she’s in the earth, the stronger she’ll be.

  If she makes it.

  She’s a strong woman. She’ll make it, brother. He prayed Achilles was right. Vane is up here. Can you—

  I’d be happy to take out the garbage. Just go.

  Dmitri stood on the building’s edge, the wind coming off the bay lifting and slapping his trench coat like dark wings. He focused with everything inside him on his bedroom and transported there, Kristin’s body cradled in his arms.

  The bed was still secured in the hidden panel. He hadn’t bothered to reset it after he’d shown her where he truly slept each night. He knelt at the edge of his crypt, laying her gently down upon the black satin where he’d always slept alone.

  Her scent of cinnamon and vanilla had faded, only a faint whiff in the air around her. Dmitri shoved away the fear pounding insistently at the base of his skull. He’d assume nothing until the time for her conversion had passed.

  He phased away her tattered blood-soaked clothing and the grime, and clothed her inst
ead in a fresh white gown. His trembling fingers traced over the soft curve of her cheek. He tried to make her comfortable, phasing a bandage over the wound Vane had caused, adjusting the pillow beneath her head and crossing her hands over the concave curve of her stomach. There was enough room that he could curl up beside her. And God knew he wanted to. But the danger was not over this night.

  He’d have to face Roman and the council over the brutal battle they’d waged. The fault for it lay squarely on his shoulders. He should have been able to fend off the reivers before the mortals had become involved. It should have stayed an internal matter. And he would take responsibility for it, if only the council would spare Kristin, if she survived the change.

  He lit a candle on the nightstand in hope that she would wake. If she did before he returned—if he returned—she might want the comfort of the light.

  Achilles, he called.

  Yes, brother?

  I am reporting to the council. If I do not return, see after her.

  For a moment there was silence from his mentor. As head of security, Achilles knew exactly what was at stake during the tribunal. Tension pressed between Dmitri’s shoulders like a sharpened blade.

  I will.

  Dmitri took one last gaze at Kristin. With her hair spread on the pillow beneath her head, she looked like an angel cast in stone. He tamped down the raging ache inside him and seared the memory of her into his mind, in case it was all that remained.

  Achilles would see to her welfare and training if she awoke and he was gone. But his mentor would not love her. Not as he did. No one would love her more. Not now. Not ever.

  Trejan. We are ready for you. Roman’s voice echoed in his skull like a bell struck to announce the last steps of a man to the gallows.

  A barely audible moan came from her throat. He froze, every cell of his body focused on her.

  Kristin awoke suddenly from one hell of a nightmare. In the confines of her mind she’d screamed and writhed trying to escape the searing pain that radiated in burning waves through her body as it felt the destruction of each living cell one by one. But she couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. It was as if she’d had instant-set concrete poured over her.