Chosen asc-6

by Jeanne C. Stein

  “It’s all right, Lance,” I whisper. “You’re safe now.”

  Only when he begins to shake do I realize he’s crying. He won’t turn around. Won’t let me into his thoughts. I’ve never felt so helpless. I do the only thing I can think of. I tighten my arms around him and hold him as he cries.

  * * *

  I’ve lost track of time.

  Lance is quiet against me, no longer shaking. I can’t tell what he’s thinking because he’s not letting me in. He still won’t face me.

  When the water in the shower turns cold, I stir and drop my hands. “We should get out.”

  At the sound of my voice, he rouses himself and pushes open the shower door. I turn off the tap and step out after him.

  He’s wrapping a towel around his waist. When he turns, he looks surprised to see I’m dressed. Embarrassment darkens his face. “I didn’t realize—”

  I put a hand to his lips. “It’s all right.” I begin to peel off my clothes, let them drop into the sink. When I’m naked, he steps close and wraps me in a towel. His hands are trembling, his fingers icier than usual. If he were a human, I’d say he was in shock. I don’t know if vampires experience such frailties.

  I take his hand and lead him into the bedroom. I’m not shielding my thoughts. I know Lance is reading them as we crawl exhausted under the bedclothes. Our bodies don’t touch, but I’ve never been more aware of a physical presence. We’re linked now by something more than mutual attraction or sexual convenience. It happened without my knowing it. It happened without my consent.

  But it happened.

  The feelings that washed over me when I saw Lance in that basement. The jealousy I experienced when I knew he’d been with a woman—even to feed. The deep rage that burns inside when I think about Underwood. The satisfaction I will experience when I make him pay for what he’s done.

  All real and powerful, emanating from the one emotion I’d managed to avoid my entire human life. The one emotion I never imagined I’d experience as vampire.

  The one emotion I expected to elude me forever.

  Lance rolls on his side and looks down at me. The halo of his hair surrounds his beautiful face and glows in the darkness as if backlit. “You still can’t say it though, can you?”

  I roll toward him. Brush a tangle of hair from his face. Touch his cheek. “You know,” I whisper. “Isn’t knowing enough?”

  CHAPTER 13

  Lance is asleep beside me. So why am I awake?

  The clock on the nightstand says six a.m. We’ve been in bed only a few hours.

  It’s the sun. The fucking desert sun, peeking through a chink in the curtains, sending a laser spear of light directly at my eyes. A cosmic wake-up call.

  That’s why I’m awake.

  I lift my face, sniff.

  That and the smell of coffee.

  I groan and roll over.

  Adele must be awake, too.

  Memories of last night flood back. I raise myself on my elbows and lean toward Lance.

  He looks peaceful. I doubt he’ll remain that way when he wakes up. When I start questioning him.

  I need to find out why Underwood attacked him so savagely. I need to find out what part I played in it, because the one thing I’m sure of is that I am at the core of Underwood’s cruelty. He wanted something from me last night and when he didn’t get it, he took it out on Lance.

  Why would Lance allow it to happen? Why wouldn’t he fight back? Or did he, and was what happened the result of his resistance?

  I scoot carefully away from him, not wanting to disturb him. I start to swing my legs over the edge of the bed.

  An arm encircles my waist, pulls me back. “Where are you going?”

  Lance wraps his arms around me, cradles me so that his head is on my shoulder. Our bodies fit together like two halves of a whole. It feels right—like this is the way we are supposed to start each morning and this is the way we are supposed to end each night. When he presses his body against mine, his erection nudges the small of my back. An invitation.

  I groan a little and try to move away. “Lance, wait. We need to talk about—”

  The words die on my lips.

  He’s smoothing the hair away from my neck, nuzzling my earlobe, tracing his tongue along my chin line. The tremor starts in my core, heating my blood, sending sparks of arousal to every part of my body.

  I’m lost. In the rhythm of Lance’s heartbeat. In the feel of his lips at my neck. When he opens the vein, starts to drink, the world is reduced to tactile pleasure. His hand slips between my legs, his fingers begin their persuasive and skillful exploration, his penis throbs against my skin.

  I don’t want him to stop. I moan and push back against him, urging him on, until I can control it no longer.

  The first waves of orgasm come quickly. I want him inside me. I push him away, feel the skin on my neck tear as we reverse positions. Blood trickles down my breasts. I don’t care. I’m on top, guiding him between my legs, forcing him deep inside, opening his neck. His blood is what I want. Blood that tastes of Malibu and the sun and me and—

  The host from last night.

  She’s there and I want to drink her in. Lance had her. I want to have her, too. She tastes like good wine and expensive perfume. Her blood rolls over my tongue and down my throat but as much as I drink, I can’t rid him of her. Not completely.

  Anna, stop.

  Lance’s voice from far away.

  No.

  I burrow my mouth closer to his neck, continue to drink, impervious to everything except the need to drain him of this woman’s blood.

  Lance grabs a handful of my hair, yanks hard, pulling my head away from his neck.

  I fight it, fight him, lunge again for his neck. She’s still there. Still running through his veins. I want her out.

  He flings me back on the bed. His hand is at his neck. Blood runs between his fingers, down his chest, soaking sheets and blankets. His eyes are wild, questioning, afraid.

  Anna. Heal me.

  For an instant I stare at him, uncomprehending. The animal disappears when the human Anna grasps what she’s seeing. My stomach lurches.

  What have I done?

  Lance. I’m sorry.

  I reach for him and he hesitates only a second, searching my face, assuring himself that he recognizes the human, before bending near me, allowing me to close my lips around the jagged wound in his neck. This time, I’m not drinking, not taking in blood, but sucking gently to repair the damage. The artery mends, the skin knits closed. The angry flush of my assault fades as I watch.

  But Lance is pale, weak. I drained too much blood.

  What have I done?

  I open a vein in my wrist with my teeth and hold it to his lips. He grabs my hand and sucks at the dripping blood eagerly. He’s like a starved animal. He drinks until the color returns to his flesh.

  Then he stops.

  He stops.

  He wipes his hand across his mouth and without hesitating, brings my hand once more to his lips to close the wound. Then he bends his head to my neck and I feel the rush of cells regenerating, of skin renewing itself.

  When he’s done, we both sink back on the bed. Instead of the pleasure of coupling, we’re drained, exhausted and confused. I feel it in Lance as strongly as in myself.

  I had questions for Lance. I imagine now he’ll have questions for me. But nothing he asks can be as disturbing as the questions I have for myself.

  CHAPTER 14

  A shudder of disgust racks my body. We’re lying close, but not touching. I’m afraid to touch him. Afraid he might pull away.

  I’ve never lost control like that. Never felt the bloodlust so strongly I didn’t know when to stop. I’m embarrassed and ashamed, hiding it behind a curtain of carefully guarded thoughts. I want to say it out loud, admit it to Lance, but the truth is too damning to drag into the light. I was jealous. Jealous of a mortal woman. Jealous of the woman who may very well have saved Lance’s life.
r />   Lance breaks the silence first.

  “I should never have brought you here.”

  His simple declaration fuels my shame. He blames himself.

  Not what I expected. Not what I deserve. My shoulders tense, a second tremor of disgust raises bile in my throat. I open my mouth to object and he puts a finger over my lips.

  I didn’t know he would be in town. Stupid. I should have asked Adele when I talked to her. I didn’t think.

  A thousand questions present themselves, but the most important thing I can say now is the truth. You’re here because of me. Because of that thing that attacked me in my garage. You’re here because you were helping me. None of this is your fault.

  Lance doesn’t answer. His mind is troubled; he is unconvinced. I take his chin in my hand, turn his face toward mine. We have to talk about Julian. Why did he attack you last night? Why did you let him?

  Lance releases a long breath. He doesn’t try to pull away, but he doesn’t meet my eyes, either. Julian is my sire. I owe him.

  Owe him? I think of the animal who sired me—Donaldson—who never planned to turn me, only to rape and kill. Somehow the idea of owing a sire anything is as repugnant as it is ludicrous.

  I sit up in bed, pull a corner of the bloodstained sheet up and shake it in Lance’s face. Julian is the reason this happened. What the hell is going on? He’s more than vampire. He possesses magic. How?

  Lance sits up, too, leans against the headboard. He claims his mortal mother was a gypsy, his father a warlock. He’s been vampire nearly five hundred years.

  A warlock? I flash on Belinda Burke and her sister, Sophie. Both witches, the female equivalent. The black magic witch of the pair, Belinda, I killed with my own hands. Magic is passed along in the genes like bone structure and eye color. That explains the magic, though I didn’t know it was possible for a warlock to become vampire. Two incredibly potent creatures combined in one. Leads me to the next question.

  How did he become vampire?

  This time there is no hesitation. Lance begins to talk as if sharing the story might lessen the burden of his guilt.

  He was born in Labourd in Basque in the sixteenth century, during the time of the Spanish Inquisition. His father was burned at the stake as a Sorginak witch. His mother barely escaped to Italy with her own life and the child. But when he was sixteen, plague hit her village. She died within a few days. Julian was left to die, too. That’s when he was “rescued” by a mysterious stranger who restored him to life and took him to live in Eastern Europe.

  Lance releases a breath, looks away, then back at me. You’re not going to believe who he claims sired him.

  Let me guess. Vlad. Dracula. Who else would such an egomaniac claim as his sire?

  Lance’s eyebrows shoot up. How did you know?

  If Lance’s expression weren’t so serious, I’d be laughing. You are kidding, right?

  He shakes his head. No. And he seems to be able to back it up. He has documents that date back to the fourteenth century, given to him, he claims, by Vlad.

  Now I do laugh. How could you believe that crap? Is that how he seduced you? What was going on in your life that would make you vulnerable enough to fall for such bullshit?

  Lance tenses. Anger shadows his eyes and tightens his mouth. He pushes away from me and swings his legs out of bed.

  I’m immediately sorry for the outburst. Truth is I know nothing about the circumstances of Lance’s becoming. I was taken without my consent. Perhaps he was, too. I watch him as he disappears into the bathroom. He slams the door shut and I hear the shower. He’s back in a few minutes dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. I jump out of bed and step in front of him before he reaches the door.

  I’m sorry.

  He stops, but only because I’m blocking his way. I can see he’s fighting the urge to push me aside. I hold up a hand in apology. I really am sorry. I had no right to say that.

  His shoulders remain rigid.

  Please. I want to hear more. I want to understand what the connection is between you and this man. It’s more than a familial bond. You let Julian whip you like an animal and you were willing to bear the scars of that whipping forever. I need to understand.

  Lance takes a tiny step backward. I can’t tell you why it happened. I won’t. I can only tell you that by allowing you to help me, I may not have forever. Not after this.

  After what? For Christ’s sake, Lance, tell me. If you don’t, I swear I’ll go after him. I’ll make him tell me. I’ll kill him if he doesn’t.

  Lance lets a smile tip the corner of his mouth. You plan to kill him anyway, don’t you?

  Then you lose nothing by telling me, do you?

  Jesus, Anna. The sternness has returned to his face. You may be powerful, but do you really think you can best a five-hundred-year-old vampire? You said it yourself; he’s more than vampire, he possesses magic.

  I can tell by the set of his jaw that this argument will get us nowhere. At least tell me how he turned you. You know my story.

  His expression says he recognizes a diversionary tactic when he hears one. His thoughts confirm the look, but to my surprise, he turns around and takes a seat on the edge of the bed.

  Better sit down, too, he says. This may take a while.

  Then he adds, “Suppose we could ask Adele to bring us coffee first? I smell it brewing.”

  I nod and he reaches for the phone, makes the request and hangs up. “She’ll be right up.”

  “Then I’d better get dressed.”

  I’m glad for the chance to gather my thoughts. Instead, as I pull on shorts and a T-shirt, I find gathering my thoughts is the last thing I want to do. Thinking means examining what happened in that bedroom and I can’t face it. So instead, I listen. To Adele’s knock as it announces her arrival, listen to Lance and her chat about last night—he gives her a highly fictionalized version of our evening—and listen to the clank of a coffee service being set up. I wait until I hear the snick of the door closing behind her before reappearing.

  Lance is pouring coffee into two mugs. He’s pulled the bedclothes up over the pillows to hide the blood. He looks up when he sees me. “Adele says good morning.”

  I take the mug from his outstretched hand, avoiding his eyes. Sip.

  Kona blend. Good stuff.

  We return to our perches on the side of the bed. I don’t look at Lance or push him to begin. I know he will when he’s ready.

  And he does.

  He drains his cup, slouches back against the headboard.

  “I was born in South Africa in 1925. On my family’s estate. You know the business they were in. From the time I was old enough to understand what diamond mining was all about, I hated it. Progress has been made in the last century, sure. But slave labor is still slave labor even if those slaves are now given nicer places to live and better food to eat.”

  Lance twists the cup in his hand. “My brothers and sister never seemed to mind. Their lives revolved around the next shopping trip to the continent, the next glamorous soiree. They paid more attention to their pampered pets than the people who broke their backs to provide that lifestyle. I couldn’t wait to get away.”

  He sets the cup down on the nightstand. “I shouldn’t have been so anxious. I ran away from home when I was seventeen. Went to Cape Town. It was December 1942. A British ship en route to South Africa, the HMS Ceramic, was torpedoed by a German submarine west of the Azores. Took the ship three hours to sink and the Germans let it. Saved one man for interrogation, but let the other six hundred fifty-six die. Most aboard were South Africans returning home.”

  His eyes take on a faraway look. “Like most South Africans, I was outraged. And like most idealistic seventeen-year-olds struggling with private demons I couldn’t fight, I wasted no time in joining the battle against demons I could. I enlisted in the South African Third Infantry Division. If I couldn’t fight my parent’s system, I could sure as hell fight the Germans.”

  I touch his arm. “What did your
parents do when they found out?”

  A bitter smile twists the corners of his mouth. “Nothing. My father decided the discipline would be good for me. Even took credit for my enlisting. Ironic. Since I was the only one in the family who exercised any kind of discipline at all. But it didn’t matter. Not really. For the first time in my life, I wasn’t Broderick DeFontaine. I was Aircraftman Rick DeFontaine, and I had work to do that would benefit all people, not just the self-indulgent rich.”

  He picks up his cup and crosses the room to the coffeepot. “The Third Division never took part in any battles while I served. We mostly organized and trained the South African home defense services.”

  He raises the pot in my direction. I nod and hold out my cup to him. He fills it, returns the pot to the warmer and rejoins me on the bed. “I don’t know how much you know about Germany’s war plans. Early on, Hitler devised what he called the ‘Madagascar Plan.’ All of Europe’s Jews were to be forcibly deported to Madagascar.” He shakes his head. “Maybe if it had been allowed to happen, lives would have been saved. But Madagascar was a strategic island and British troops invaded it in mid-1942. The Battle of Madagascar took place before I joined, but following the end of the campaign, I was assigned to a reconnaissance squadron. We flew missions over the countryside, looking for Japanese who had plans of their own for the island. During one of those missions, the engine on our plane failed. We crashed in an isolated area. The pilot died. I didn’t.”

  The tone of his voice suggests he might be thinking the pilot had been the lucky one. His thoughts are black with despair.

  I’m glad you didn’t die, Lance. My life would be empty if you’d died. You have to know that.

  He smiles at me, sadly, then looks away. “I was found by a peasant family. I didn’t speak Malagasy and they didn’t speak English. They tended to me the best they could, but I’d suffered a compound leg fracture in the crash and a couple of nasty cuts, one of which nearly took my right ear. Infection set in pretty quickly. I’ll never know why they did what they did next. Maybe they were afraid of what would happen if I was found with them. Maybe they thought they would be blamed for my death. But once it became clear that I wasn’t getting better, they took me to an area known as Tsingy. It’s a park now, but in 1942 it was nothing more than an isolated forest of limestone, mangrove swamps and lakes. They left me there. With water and a few scraps of food.”