by Chris Lange
His education system definitely didn’t correspond to hers, but in the long run, they’d have reached an understanding. As much as she hated the idea of becoming his mistress, if cheating was the only way to have him, she’d have gone for it. That was, before his wife implored her to back off, and she’d willingly given her word to Lady Garrett Burnes.
Lying and deceiving might agree with her father, not so with her. Whatever the cost, she’d bear the pain, keep her promise to Ashton, and never touch the woman’s husband again. But it hurt.
A ruffle came from Johnny’s bedroom. She went to the doorway, tiptoed to the slumbering child, and took his shoes off with careful movements. He mumbled in his sleep as she pulled the bedcover over him, maybe dreaming of fantastic adventures in a world where vampires existed.
She also needed to rest, yet that notion belonged to wishful thinking. The image of Garrett seemed stuck to her brain, his intense gaze riveted on her as he brought her into the warmth of his embrace.
Would she ever forget him? Would she someday be free of the memories and be able to move on? Emotion threatening to bring her down, she backed to the door without a sound to approach the second secure room.
Raphael was reading, his long legs resting on the bedspread, his back and head propped up against a pillow. He glanced up when she came in, closed the book with a soft sound, and placed it next to him. “How are you feeling, Tracy?”
Even without his vampire’s acute sense of hearing, he’d have known her inner world just got trampled and crushed to dust. She sat on the edge of the bed, feet on the floor and hands on her thighs.
“You heard?”
“I did.”
“I’m devastated.”
She’d come to Raphael for comfort before. She’d cried on his shoulder when the cross she had to bear became too heavy for her, yet it felt different this time. Until five minutes ago, circumstances used to dictate her fate. But the wheel turned and she alone made the decision to cut Garrett out of her life.
As though sensing her aloofness, her guardian vampire didn’t attempt to get close to her but stayed motionless. “Can I help in any way?”
“As a matter of fact,” she said, “you can. I don’t want to keep thinking about this or I’ll go insane. Tell me about you.”
“What would you like to know?”
“Everything. What happened to you after you saved my life and took off with the immortal? What did he want with you? I never got the chance to see you again until today, but you had me really worried.”
He acknowledged her concern with a nod. Neither man nor monster, imprisoned in a life he probably didn’t want, he remained so shrouded in mystery that curiosity replaced the pain eating at her.
“Raphael, can I ask you something personal?”
“It will be my pleasure to answer.”
In spite of his polite reply, intruding on his privacy might put him out yet she suddenly had to know. “Do you make love?”
If her question surprised him, it sure didn’t show in his plain expression or the stillness of his body. “I sleep with women. I get into their beds, and I leave them when I’m done. No strings attached, no feelings involved.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
His tone of voice somewhat reminded her of a robot. What was the point of living without emotions? With slowness, she rubbed the lengths of her thighs. “Don’t you care for anyone?”
“No. My heart died when I became a vampire. Now it’s just a shriveled piece of flesh inside my chest that I have no use for.”
“God, this is unbelievable. So why do you protect me? What prompts you to watch over me the way you do?”
For the first time since their paths crossed, uncertainty rippled across the blandness of his gorgeous features. “I don’t know. As you can imagine, I’ve asked myself this very question about a million times, but I haven’t been able to come up with a plausible explanation. Do you remember how we met?”
“Of course, I’ll never forget. San Francisco, almost five years ago, you rescued me from a couple of thugs.”
“Yes, but I spotted you before that. You came out of a restaurant with your friends, and I felt struck by lightning.”
“What do you mean?”
His gaze abruptly lost its clarity, giving him a faraway look that reverberated throughout her limbs.
“I hadn’t felt anything for hundreds of years,” he said, “but as soon as I saw you, I knew you were different.”
“How?”
“What I feel isn’t about love or sex. It’s a sensation, deep in my bones, that compels me to help and protect you. I believe the closest term in the English language for what I experience toward you is kinship.”
“Wow, just wow.”
Her heart began palpitating, her pulse accelerating as the vampire’s dark gaze penetrated her soul.
“Don’t think before you reply, Tracy, just tell me straight. What do you sense deep down when you look at me?”
The answer exploded in her head, clear and simple, like a beam of sun shining through the black of night. “Family.”
He nodded once more. A single muscle in his jaw bulged while she couldn’t keep staring at his face.
“But, Raphael, that’s impossible. I come from a whole different universe and time. We can’t be blood-related.”
“We aren’t.”
“Then what . . . how . . . ?”
“I have no idea. It just is.”
Everything fell into place as the realization of this powerful connection binding them shed a new light on her behavior toward him. She had trusted him with her life since the first minute, not solely because he never lied to her but for the sake of this inexplicable attachment.
“I need to know, Raphael. Is that why you went with the immortal?”
“Yes, I wanted answers. Khrull has lived through two millennia, and I thought he might impart some wisdom.”
“Jesus.”
The bastard was two thousand years old? No wonder he ruled over entire gangs of bloodsuckers and treated humans like cattle.
“Why didn’t you stay with him?” she asked.
“I did, until I realized he had nothing to teach me. He’s so bored that anything out of the ordinary entertains him, which is why he wanted me in the first place. He considered me his new puppet for a few months and then the novelty wore off and he started killing people again. That’s when I left.”
“He could have destroyed you for defecting from him, you know.”
“I didn’t care. I’m three hundred years old, I lost the grace of God a long time ago, and I don’t mind dying.”
His matter-of-factly admission turned her blood cold. Raphael wasn’t living, merely existing and just waiting for death to free him. And how could anyone blame him? No love, no friends, no passion, only time spent in an endless void. Yet he was real, and a few tears slowly ran down her cheeks.
“Please, Tracy. Don’t cry for me.”
“I can’t help it. I wasn’t aware you suffered so much.”
“I don’t really, at least when you aren’t around.”
With a quick gesture, she wiped her skin dry and swung one knee over the bed to find a more comfortable position. “Am I making it worse?”
“In an odd way, yes. Your presence awakens in me a powerful urge to protect and to be part of someone’s life.”
“Like having a family?”
“Exactly.”
So she was the person responsible for shattering his inner peace. As though losing Garrett didn’t hurt enough, she also had to accept the fact that her guardian should stay as far away as possible from her. Were the forces of the universe aligned against her? She cast him a glance. “Can’t you fall in love with a vampire?”
“Our females are even more vicious than the males. I’d rather lie down on railway tracks and be done with it.”
“How come you aren’t? Vicious, I mean.”
His eyes dropped to the book sitting beside him. He looked at it for a moment before raising his gaze. “That’s a long story for another time.”
“If you say so.”
Raphael wouldn’t tell her until he felt ready. Yet the compulsion to help him pushed her to ask another question.
“Do you believe you’ll find a girl when you least expect it?”
“No, I can’t love a mortal. Even if I did, what would be the point? To care for her, watch her grow old, and die in my arms? It’s no use, Tracy, you’re the only woman I’ll ever feel connected to.”
Words of support eluded her as the concept of his immortality annihilated any hopes of living by human standards. She stretched out her hand in a desperate attempt to give him some small measure of comfort, but he didn’t reach out. Instead, he stared past and above her shoulder.
“And how connected might you be?”
She pressed her lips together at the sound of Garrett’s voice. He stood at the threshold, his fresh brown three-piece suit accentuating the severity of his gaze, the hair on the top of his head still a little damp.
How typical of him to intrude on her private conversations with Raphael. Did he have warning bells ringing in his mind each time they opened their hearts to each other? Still, Garrett looked amazing and she yearned for him.
From the corner of her eye, she saw her guardian vampire getting to his feet. He circled the bed without a sound and halted a few paces before the man whose glare spoke of jealousy, possibly envy.
“Be it male or female,” Raphael said, “I treasure friendship.”
What was he saying? That he also considered Garrett a friend? She must have heard right because her former lover nodded and then stepped aside to let Raphael pass. Once outside, the vampire turned to her.
“Take all the time you need, Tracy. I’ll watch over your son.”
With an indistinct smile softening his usually bland expression, he grabbed the knob and shut the door, leaving her alone with . . . Whom exactly? A severe man who had proposed to her before he married another woman, or an ex-lover intent on ruining the remaining shreds of her life?
Nails scratching her jeans, a nagging sensation compelled her to justify herself. “Raphael is just a friend, you know that.”
“A deeply connected friend, it seems.”
“Actually, yes. What’s it to you anyway?”
He looked at her, the coldness coming out of him feeling like hostility, and crossed his arms. “You entrust him with . . .”
Out of the blue, he began pacing the room, his long strides back and forth soon rubbing on her nerves.
“Chill out, Garrett. I’m not sure what you’re trying to tell me, but stay cool. There’s no harm done.”
“Harm has already been done.”
She jumped when he struck the back wall with the flat of his hand. He knew she didn’t have sex with Raphael, so what the fuck had gotten into him? And since when did he become so frustrated and full of anger?
Unwilling to let his fury burst out, she stood, palms open in a peaceful manner. But she didn’t go near him. “Garrett, you really need to calm down and talk to me.”
“Why? It appears no plea touches you.”
Gee, but the man was totally weird today. She didn’t remember him asking her for anything, let alone begging. That didn’t change the fact that his attitude got to her more effectively than insults.
“What’s wrong with you?” she said. “You’re acting like I owe you something, and if I didn’t know better, I’d say you’re jealous. Now get your shit together or I’m taking off and this conversation is over.”
His contemptuous snort raised her hackles. She felt like strangling him when he encompassed the room with one large gesture. “Your father employed reinforced steel, unbreakable, impossible to breach, and entirely soundproof. You cannot leave.”
Was he threatening to lock her in here? She watched him advance on her, his face a frozen mask and his stare hot enough to burn holes. Trapped with a man so mad that he might lose his reason, she waited for fear to grab her guts.
But nothing came, even when he stopped inches from her. “Have your affections for me waned?”
God, no, she loved him more than ever. Whether he praised her, scolded her, or acted like a lunatic, her heart beat only for him.
“That’s not the point, Garrett.”
“I believe it is.”
His icy undertone clashed with the swelling surge of warmth erupting between her thighs. Damn, now was so not a good time. He looked infuriated, yet there must be a way to cool him down before . . .
She gasped when he seized the top of her jeans. He brutally pulled the zip down and popped the button.
“Garrett, what are you doing?”
The high-pitched voice coming out of her mouth didn’t seem to pierce the vapors of his fury. He hooked his fingers around the waistband and tugged so hard that her pants came down to her knees.
“Teaching you discipline, Miss Richardson.”
Her pussy palpitated with want. Suffocated by the sudden sensation taking control of her body, she edged sideways toward the door. “That’s it. I’m outta here.”
He blocked her with his body. She tried to circle him, but he gripped the bottom of her loose top and pulled it up with a single move. The seams pinched her skin so she lifted her arms. Then she stood more than half-naked, goose bumps sending pinpricks all over her flesh, moistness drenching her panties.
She had to tell him to stop, but she couldn’t. His coldness had vanished, replaced by such a look of raw lust that her breath hitched in her throat. No hesitation in his stance, no loitering in the way he stared at her, just pure intent to . . . To what, except fuck her brains out?
“Garrett, you—”
“Be silent.”
The command came out as a hiss while he yanked down her underwear. His hand hovering above her belly, he licked his lips.
“You are naught but a scatterbrain.”
Thanks, what a nice thing to say to a woman. Why not also tell her she was a spoiled brat unfit to bring up his all of a sudden precious son and heir? Garrett sat on an empire. He owned properties, lands and people, but heck no, she would not be manipulated like this. “Get away from me.”
He pressed one hand on her folds and her mouth opened to let out the moan of pleasure she couldn’t stifle. Excitement igniting her veins, she bit her lip when he glided his fingers into her moistness. A light smoldered in his eyes, a reflection of his wrath mingled with unrestrained lust.
“No, no, Garrett. You don’t understand, I promised—”
“Be silent!”
His sharp tone whipped her, the loud drumming in her ears eradicating her train of thoughts. She was losing it. The burning touch of his fingers would undo her as surely as his blatant desire. But she had made a promise. With the last of her judgment, she summoned all her strength. “No.”
Garrett removed his hand at once when she took a step back, the abrupt chilliness between her legs making her want to cry with frustration. He didn’t back away but observed her with his best disdainful air. “No?”
“You heard me. I can’t—”
Her ass landed on the mattress. Instead of lessening her arousal, his deliberate push brought forth a new surge. Resisting him demanded a lot of effort, yet it was nothing compared to the struggle of fighting her own body. She envisioned his cock and her inner muscles quivered.
Before she gathered enough willpower to adjust to her new position, her sneakers hit the floor while he freed her ankles of the jeans. So much like the same s
cene a few hours ago in an impersonal hotel room, she lay on a bed again, sprawled and open to him. He might have relieved himself earlier, but obviously not enough. She squeezed her legs together and he shook his head.
“No sentiments, faithfulness, or loyalty.”
His voice struck her. His ramblings about her absence of feelings must mean something to him, but for the life of her, she couldn’t find a logical explanation. Clad in his strict brown suit, towering over her, he looked unbelievably tall and powerful as he leaned over to place his hands on each of her thighs.
“Be that as it may, my lady, I cannot bring myself to banish you from my thoughts and dreams.”
The unexpected confession stung her failing resolve. Stung, bit, gnawed, and ate. Yet when he talked of her lack of loyalty, the picture of his perfect wife briefly glimmered in front of her eyes. Lady Ashton begged her to leave her husband alone. Was she capable of betraying a genuine promise for a bar of flesh rubbing her insides? No, but would she do it for the passion lighting his gaze, the mirror image of her love for him?
With a sharp tug, he splayed her thighs open and her dilemma jumped out the window. His ruthless determination to conquer her mind and body stabbed her through, his arousal pinned her down.
She was a weak woman. She didn’t possess the strength to resist him when her whole body craved his touch. Palpitations streaking her heart and limbs, she watched him lower his face between her legs.
“I shall teach you discipline, Tracy.”
He disappeared.
Then his hot lips touched her folds, licked their lengths, sucked her wetness, and the room dissolved. She fell back on the mattress, eyes staring but not seeing the metallic ceiling, a low throb expanding throughout her arms and legs. Air gushing out of her lungs, she raised her buttocks.
Chapter 12
Tracy’s moans blended with each sweep of his tongue. Regardless of the pleasure he was giving her, feeling his inexperience while licking her private parts flooded her with happiness. Just like the first time he went down on her, his floundering set her off more surely than firecrackers. Didn’t he have enough years to perform with his wife?