Longest Days

by C. L. Quinn

  His feet shoved the rest of the warm comforter away and he stood up. Well, he was naked. So, did they…? He shook his head, trying to recall. He’d been drunk and out of it most of the past year. But he had run out of booze. That’s why he was trying to get down the road to the bar. So he sure the hell hadn’t been drunk last night. And he had a distinct memory of the accident. He remembered thinking how it was about time. He remembered seeing his angel above him as she called him from this earthbound life. And he remembered losing consciousness in the snow. He should be dead.

  But here he was near a dying fire next to a woman he likely did not know, naked and shivering. He glanced at the comforter and wanted to crawl right back. But he was too freaked out. He looked around and found his clothes near the fireplace, spread out on a chair. They were dry, so he slipped them on, and gained back at least a little sense of control. He moved his arms and legs back and forth and bent over, then moved his head back and forth. Huh. Nothing was broken or strained. Nothing even hurt at all. Why did he remember the airborne machine crashing down on his body?

  One thing he recognized right away was that he was starving. He hated to impinge further on the woman’s hospitality, but he needed something, anything. So he opened a cupboard door in the small kitchen. It was a freaking food bonanza. Several kinds of bread, a couple of packs of cookies, boxes of cereal. The small icebox that sat perched in the corner of the room opened to reveal three different meats in large quantities. Damn. This girl was loaded for company. He hadn’t spent much of his wages for the past year, so he’d just give her some later to pay for what he used. He felt better taking two big slices of bread and filling them with a little of all three types of meat. Daniel thought it might be the best sandwich he’d ever eaten. Could have been influenced by hunger, but he was prepared to stand by the assessment. He washed it down with a bottle of cold water.

  He wandered back to the fire and looked down at her. Man, she was sleeping hard. He tried to see her face, but it was firmly buried in the plush pillow. He was just curious to know who she was, so he tried brushing her hair with his fingers to get her to rouse, or roll over. She didn’t move. He leaned in to make sure she was still breathing. She seemed to be. So he pulled the covers away just a little and ran his fingers down her bare back. She moaned, but still didn’t give him a view of her face. Damn.

  It was a beautiful back. Slender, smooth, strong. A lovely curve. He pulled the cover back over her, and gathered her hair in one hand, then let the sleek strands slip through his fingers. It reminded him of his dead angel. Daniel shook his head and started to get up when he heard her moan again. Then she rolled over. He stared at the face that had haunted him for a year. She was here. And she couldn’t be.

  He nearly fell over in shock. Well, now he had to reconsider his state. Was he dead after all? Because she couldn’t be real. She couldn’t be lying here warm and breathing when he’d held her in his arms…cold and dead.

  The ghost moaned a third time and then her tongue slipped out and slid around her lips. He watched it disappear inside her mouth and she rolled over again, pulled a hand up under her cheek and bit her lower lip. Well, it sure the fuck looked like she was alive. But how could another woman look so exactly like the one he killed? And how could it be that, of all the men in the world, that woman would end up in bed with him? He didn’t believe in magic. He didn’t believe in destiny. So how the hell was this real? Only one answer. It couldn’t be.

  He pulled the covers away from her and wrapped his hands around her shoulders, then pulled her up. She took a deep breath and dropped her head against him, then slipped her arms around his neck. Her skin was warm and soft.

  He had to wake her and find out what the hell was going on. But she didn’t waken. He stared at her perfect features, in sleep exactly as he remembered them that night in death. God help him. He was finally losing it.

  Daniel laid her back down and pulled the covers close to keep the cool air off her naked skin.

  Then he fell back onto the couch and collapsed. What the hell? He tried to reason this out. Tried to gather information, what he actually knew. Okay.

  He’d been in a snowmobile accident, badly injured, freezing and dying in the snow. And yet here he was, warm and unhurt in a cabin with a woman who looked like his dead angel. His chest felt like it was being squeezed of air, so he pushed upright and went to the door. He pulled it open, then surged forward to cold Arctic air and dancing flurries. It eased his anxiety enough he could draw another breath. Okay. Breathe, think, think, breathe.

  His rescuer looked like his angel. She couldn’t be. He needed to go back in there and find out who she was and what happened last night. And the air was way too cool to stay out here in shirtsleeves much longer. He glanced at the door, which was still ajar. Shit! He’d let the cold into the cabin. He needed to get in and bring the fire back up to warm the cold air for the sleeping woman. Shaking the snow off his boots, he looked up to see the door open further. Daniel stopped in his tracks.

  She was standing there looking at him, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. He felt dizzy. It was her. He knew that face better than he knew his own. She looked sleepy. Then she spoke.

  “Not the best night for a stroll.”

  She sounded amused. He wanted to answer her, but he couldn’t. He just stepped closer, his eyes locked on her face, searching for the truth. It had to be her, but it couldn’t be. He cleared his throat.

  “Yeah. I agree. Just needed some air.”

  She nodded her head and stepped back as he entered the small cabin. Then she pulled the door closed and turned to him. Hesitated, then said, “Hi, I’m Lia.”

  He stared again, the name on his tongue, in his mind. Lia. Lia.

  “I’m Daniel.” He finally got out. “Lia. Pretty. It suits you.”

  “Thank you, I think it does. Anyway, how do you feel? You had a nasty accident. Do you remember?”

  Her voice was beautiful, refined, a slight accent. He’d never heard the dead angel’s voice, so he’d never even been able to imagine it.

  “Yes. I do. Very well, in fact.” He paused. “I should be pretty banged up.”

  “You should. You were lucky.” She paused. “I have to get some more sleep. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. Uh, yeah. I had some of your food. I’ll pay for it.”

  “Not necessary.”

  “I will, though. And I guess I owe you a big thank you for the rescue. I would have died out there. Did you…did someone help you with me?”

  “Nope. Got you here all on my own.”

  “Really?” His eyes roamed over her small frame. “How did you do that?”

  “Guess I’m stronger than I look.”

  “Really? I’m a good two hundred pounds. You can’t be more than, what, a hundred ten, twenty?”

  “Like I said, I’m stronger than you’d think. Well, eat what you want. I have plenty. You should lay back down, get some more rest. I’m going to my room, so you curl up by the fire here, alright? We’ll get you out of here as soon as the storm breaks.”

  “Let’s hope so.” Daniel looked deep into her eyes. Unexpectedly, they were not dark, but a brilliant amber. “You don’t want to be stuck with me.”

  He smiled then. And Eillia could feel it in the

  deepest part of her. The heart that had been so shattered for so long, the place between her legs that had been so deprived. Her vampire desires were in high gear and she wanted nothing at this moment but to throw him down and climb on top of him. He’d never even remember it. She could work out every sexual need she had on his body. When she’d undressed him, she’d tried not to notice, but she knew his body was extremely well fit for a human. He was everything she needed right now. She hadn’t even been tempted before. But with him standing here, smiling at her, she could almost ask Hamid’s forgiveness, and then fuck this man until neither of them could move. But she wouldn’t.

  She still felt Hamid’s presence, and never more than right this mom
ent as she considered sex for the first time in many centuries with someone other than him. For a moment, she let herself imagine what it would be like with this man. It wouldn’t be the same. But that was as it should be. She’d been with Hamid so long, how would it feel to have Daniel’s hands on her? To feel him move inside her?

  She shook her head. She’d never know. She wasn’t ready.

  “Okay, well, rest…or keep yourself amused.” Eillia walked to her bedroom and closed the door, leaving the comforter by the fire. Damn. She’d be pretty cold in here without it but she couldn’t go back out there. She’d decided she wouldn’t jump him, but she didn’t fully trust herself right now. A good rest should shore up her resolve until she could get him out of here when she woke.

  She’d already decided to use her power to speed him to town, compel his memory, and get him out of her life. Her intense sexual reaction to him made that necessary. As she pulled her flannel sheet tightly around her body, she thought about their meeting at the bar. She hadn’t forgotten how she, too, had felt that somehow he wasn’t a stranger.

  Rolling onto her side, she let her hand move to her breasts and delicately circle her erect nipples. She was ready for him. It proved she was healing. Six months ago she would never have been tempted. Now, she had to fight her own nature to stay away from a beautifully cut body and pale eyes that seemed to see into her soul. He was just so fucking male! Soon, she wouldn’t have a choice. Blood and sex were primal, and now that she was drinking again, and deeply attracted to this man, it would happen if he stayed near her.

  She moaned as her own fingers excited her desires even more. She’d hoped to get a good blood meal from him before he left, but now she knew she couldn’t. If she drew blood from him, her sex drive would be uncontrollable. Even now, with her own hands sliding against her sex, she closed her eyes and an image of his lips there instead pushed her to climax. Eillia turned her face into her pillow to muffle her cry.

  It wasn’t enough. She wanted to rip the bedroom door off its hinges and go to him. With a deep sigh, she rolled onto her stomach and tried to relax and sleep. Shit!

  Even through closed eyes, she saw him waiting for her.

  She did not sleep.

  Daniel felt completely blown out. After the woman disappeared behind the scarred door, he dropped onto the couch, sinking too low as the broken springs tried to deal with his weight. He pulled his feet up and stretched out, then reached for the comforter a few moments later. It was too cold in the room without it. The newly stoked fire was gaining size, but it still wasn’t generating enough heat to raise the temperature in the room above “fucking cold.”

  He had a lot to sort through. This woman, she couldn’t be the one he buried a year ago. Just…how could two women look so exactly alike? Her face was burned into his memory, every detail. It was possible, but it still knocked him off balance to see this woman alive and speaking to him. He wondered at how the world worked sometime, to bring him to this extremely isolated place to try to heal from his culpability in so many deaths, particularly hers…and then bring her doppleganger to him. Was the universe laughing at him? Was it a lesson? Torture? He couldn’t know. He just had to deal with her existence.

  This woman was as beautiful and graceful as he knew his dead angel would have been. He’d had an immediate physical response to her, but that was because of the dreams he’d had of her for the past year, and many of them had been very sensual. His dates with Joey D’s mother had been less than satisfying on an emotional level. They had just been sex. That was the way it should have been. He didn’t deserve passion. Or love.

  But his reaction to his rescuer was something very different.

  He needed to leave. Soon. Before he was tempted to touch her. Even to just feel her skin beneath his fingertips would be heaven. No. It wasn’t going to happen.

  Daniel rolled up tightly in the comforter and tried to get some rest. It smelled like her. A light scent of vanilla and woman.

  He did not sleep.

  Alvin looked around the all-natural house built into the landscape on an ocean cliff on the island of Tasmania. The loony vampiress had retired to her chambers for a bath. She’d told him he may be welcome to join her in the future. But not now. Not yet. He was fine with that. It gave him a chance to nose around a little and try to find out more about this strange woman who was much too powerful. If there was a way, he wanted to see if she could give him similar powers.

  But there was nothing useable. The woman was apparently as vacuous as she seemed. He had just finished glancing through some papers on a desk when she walked out onto the second floor landing naked except for black stiletto heels. And dripping wet. The hardwood floors would appreciate that, Alvin thought.

  “Well, you’ve made yourself at home. Now. Tell me how long you’ve been here. I told you I’ve never seen another vampire here and I’ve been here a lot of years off and on. So, tell me your story. Don’t lie. I can tell if you do.”

  He believed her. She was something different. He just didn’t know how much to tell her. His hesitation caused her to laugh.

  “In spite of my warning, you’re trying to decide your spin. Little vampire Alvin. Would you like me to show you how I get the truth out of people? You don’t even have to speak. It can hurt like a mother, though.” She sighed and looked at the ceiling, coming down the stairs. “Your choice.”

  He watched her closely as she moved. Her excellent body was small with absolutely perfect breasts that had no sag at all. They were probably as pert as they were when she first changed god knows how many centuries ago. Vampire privilege. Perfect physical specimens. Well, mostly.

  He did have a thing for female breasts. She lounged casually on a rattan chair, and he wondered briefly if it was comfortable against her bare skin. He thought it might not have been since she moved her legs back and forth. The movement revealed her shaved privates, and the vertical slit captured his attention and distracted him too much to answer her. Yes, he liked that, too.

  “Hey!” she yelled, and Alvin lifted his head to look at her face. “Those lips don’t talk. Well, not like that, anyway. So, you better start doing so. You might have already noticed…I’m not very patient.”

  He sat down on a chair a few feet away that looked like it might have been made by locals. He leaned in.

  “You have to promise not to kill me. Is your word good?”

  He saw her brows come together. She began to speak, but didn’t. Her legs crossed and uncrossed again. He looked. He had to. She enjoyed her power to make him do that.

  “So, you’re asking if I can be trusted. Am I honorable?”

  “Exactly. If you tell me you will not hurt me, can I depend that you won’t?”

  Tamesine twisted around in the gliding chair. “Well, okay. I promise I will not hurt you. Unless you lie. I hate lies.”

  Alvin nodded and leaned back, then sat forward. “I told you how the love of my life died because the vampire that made me wouldn’t change her. I hate being vampire without her. I’m afraid I’ve done some things you would not approve. I have….” He hesitated and watched her face for any signs that she was going to eat his face. No reaction. Just a casual lean back into the chair that showed perfectly defined rattan patterns scored into her skin.

  He continued. “So, I started killing them one by one. The vampires. The abominations against nature. I include myself.”

  Tamesine was leaning in now, her eyes sparkling. “You’d have to, wouldn’t you?”

  He nodded. Interesting. She seemed intrigued and amused. This was going too well.

  “Well, I sort of started a war. Beginning with the vampire who betrayed me, I launched an assault last year on his home and killed two old vampires. But not all of them. Not Bas, the one who I wanted most. Suffice it to say, I am a hunted man. That is why I am here below civilization. I’m hiding out.”

  Tamesine clapped her hands and shot out of the chair. “What a wonderful story! Are you still at war? Or are you too
afraid of them now? I would love to join you.”

  Alvin couldn’t have been more shocked. What? She wanted to join him in annihilation of her own race? Well, he already knew she was nuts.

  He stared at her dancing around completely nude, tried not to let it turn him on, but that wasn’t the case. His cock shot up about as quickly as she had out of her chair.

  “Are you serious? You would be willing to hunt and kill vampires?”

  “I spent the last thirty years torturing one. It was fun, but then he disrespected me when I tried to make up for it. Cunt! He was a real shit! I just wanted to be welcomed back home. Killing some of those arrogant ass-holes sounds fun.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  He fell asleep finally and went into the dream that haunted him most in the past six months. The one where she was alive and came to him in the snow, wearing only white furred boots and a long furred scarf that reached her knees. In this dream, she circled him, like an animal might before it attacked. It was clear she wanted something other than a fight. Her long satin hair flowed behind her as she moved around him, and although he kept pace with her movements, she was the dominant one in the dream. But he never touched her.

  He watched as she moved her hands on her own body, sliding the scarf aside to reveal perfect full breasts with dark nipples erect in the cold air. Her breath curled away from her as she began to breathe harder and harder while her fingers curved down her body and into the heat between her legs. A large charcoal gray boulder was the only vibrant color in the mostly black and white dream, and she leaned against it, drew a leg up to reveal the core of her sex to him as he watched, frozen, while she massaged the area. As she reached climax, he dropped on his knees several feet from her, wanting nothing more in his life than to put his mouth where her hands were. But he couldn’t move. Even in the dream he knew he was unworthy.