by Barb Hendee
Something in her voice sounded different now. This was the first time he felt she might really be trying to talk to him.
“Do you want to go upstairs and rest?” he asked. “Have some time to yourself?”
Her eyes flew to his face as if she was surprised by his concern. Then she glanced around the claustrophobic room. “What I really want is to get out of here for a few hours. I’m hungry, and I need to hunt. Anywhere. I don’t care where we go.”
He wasn’t certain what she was asking him, so he stayed quiet another moment, and she said, “If I go upstairs and change my clothes, will you meet me in the garage? We can take a car and go out for a while. Don’t tell anyone. They’ll just think we’ve gone upstairs to our rooms. If you tell Eleisha, she might tell Christian, and he won’t let…” She trailed off.
Every alarm in Wade’s mind screamed that this was a bad idea. If he took a car from Vera’s garage and took Ivory out hunting without telling anyone, there would be repercussions from without and from within.
For one, Julian was out there somewhere.
But he had his gun, and he knew how to avoid the shadows, and just looking down into Ivory’s face, he knew he wasn’t going to say no.
“I’ll meet you in the garage,” he said quietly, and he called out more loudly, “Eleisha, I’m going upstairs.”
A half hour later, Philip was alone with Eleisha in their guest room, and he watched her struggle out of the silk evening gown as quickly as she could, as if she couldn’t wait to get the thing off.
But he couldn’t even bring himself to talk. He’d never felt quite like this before—or at least not to this degree. He didn’t even know what he felt, and he hated it. It was the worst feeling he could imagine. It was worse than fear. It was worse than being alone for years on end.
It started when he’d opened the door to Christian’s bedroom, expecting to find it empty, and he’d seen Eleisha in that dress, with her hair styled and her eyes painted, and she was holding Christian’s hand, reading his memories.
It grew worse after the séance while he watched Christian whispering in her ear.
It was the worst feeling he’d ever suffered, and he wanted it to go away.
She laid the dress on the bed and looked over at him. The only thing she wore now was a small pair of panties…and the jeweled clip in her hair.
“Are you all right?” she asked. She looked almost sorry for him, and the last thing he wanted was her pity.
He couldn’t answer her. He didn’t know how. A part of him couldn’t help feeling that somehow she’d done something wrong, but she hadn’t.
In three strides, he reached the bed and grasped the back of her head. Her bones always felt so light in his hands that he was careful when he touched her, but now he jerked her forward against his chest.
“Philip!”
He barely heard her and brought his mouth down to hers, pushing his tongue between her teeth. Then he leaned forward, lowering her rapidly onto the bed and moving with her until she was pinned beneath him.
He took his mouth off hers long enough to say, “Turn on your gift.”
But he was vaguely aware of her struggling beneath him, and over the roar in his ears, he heard her trying to speak.
“Not like this…You’re too heavy. Philip, stop.”
He froze.
She sounded frightened.
He slid off her partially, removing most of his weight, but he turned on his gift. He wanted her to want him back, not to be afraid of him.
“Shhhhhh,” he said. “Turn on your gift.”
He let his gift wash over her and through her, and slowly, she began to relax and brought her hand up to his chest. He was addicted to her touch. He was addicted to her gift.
His gift was an aura of attraction, but he’d never considered it as strong as hers. He didn’t force his mouth onto hers again, but let her kiss him this time, softly, the way she always did. He closed his eyes, running his hands down her sides, over her hips.
They’d never done this when he was fully dressed and she was nearly naked before, but he didn’t want to stop long enough to get his clothes off.
Then she turned her gift on to join with his, only she channeled it, altering it slightly, focusing it on how helpless she was without him.
On how much she needed him.
He couldn’t stop himself from pressing his body harder against hers and pushing his tongue deeper into her mouth. He let himself get lost inside her gift, letting it combine with his own, meshing and churning and being absorbed into his own until a great release exploded inside his mind, flowing down through his body while he jerked and gasped.
He had to stop kissing her because his teeth were so tightly clenched, but he held on to the back of her neck with one hand, with his temple pressed up against her face as his body jerked several times.
When the sensation finally faded, they stayed locked together like that for a while.
And then…he didn’t know what to say. He thought this would take the pain away, but the awful feeling inside him remained.
Although he wasn’t given to apologies, unbidden, the first thing out of his mouth was “I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right.”
“Say you want to be with me,” he said, “at the church, at home, in our room, on our hunts. Say you want to be with me.”
“I always want to be with you,” she whispered in his ear, running her fingers up his back. “I don’t know what’s wrong, but you never need to worry about that.”
When she spoke, he believed her.
“Philip, it’s too early to go to bed,” she said quietly. “Can I get some of my own clothes?”
Her own clothes?
“Yes.” He jumped up off her and crossed the room, grabbing a pair of her jeans and her little red T-shirt. They smelled like her. He’d never complain about her lack of interest in clothes again. He held them out. “These are yours.”
She reached up to remove the jeweled clip from her hair. Then she took the clothes from his hand and pulled the T-shirt over her head. She looked like herself again.
He suddenly felt better.
Wade decided on a white BMW in Vera’s garage. As they pulled up to the front gates, Ivory gave him the code without blinking, and he punched it in.
Then they were on the road, heading downtown.
She looked different now, with her hair loose, wearing tan cargo pants, a tank top, and a light jacket. But she didn’t seem any more accessible than before, and he had no idea what to say. He didn’t know her. He didn’t know anything about her, and he’d just abandoned his friends without a word to take her hunting.
This was semicrazy behavior, and he knew it. But he couldn’t seem to stop himself.
“I don’t know this city at all,” she said suddenly. “Do you?”
“Yes,” he said, nodding with his eyes on the road, grateful to fill the silence. “We lived here for a few months last year. Up on Queen Anne Hill.”
“You did?” She sounded surprised. “All of you?”
“No, just me, Eleisha, and Philip. That was before we started the underground.” This seemed to be a safe conversation, so he asked, “Where have you and Christian lived?”
“Wherever the hell he decides.”
Her tone was bitter, and her voice sounded completely different from back at the mansion, less cultured…less serene, as if she were two different people, and he was just now meeting one of them.
Then she sighed. “I’m sorry. We’ve lived mainly in the southern states. You’d be surprised at the money in Louisiana. People pay big bucks down there to talk to ghosts. We’ve changed our names more times than I can count over the years, but Christian changes back when he can. He seems attached to his name.”
What a strange existence she’d led, moving from place to place, staying at mansions like Vera’s, and running fake séances with an undead partner.
For some reason, he blurted out, “You don’t like Chri
stian very much, do you?”
“He’s a bastard.”
Her honesty startled him. “Then why don’t you leave him?”
“I can’t.”
He slowed the car enough to glance at her. “Why not?”
She suddenly looked uncomfortable, as if she’d said too much. “Look,” she said, “I’m hungry and I’m tired, and I’m just babbling. Do you know how this works…the hunting? Is there someplace we can go?”
He already knew where they were going. “Yes. I’ll take you to the Seattle Center.”
From what he remembered, that place would be perfect. He and Philip had gone there a few times together just for fun. It was crowded and busy, but a surprising number of people, especially young people, ran around the grounds all by themselves, and there were several buildings where Ivory might leave someone unconscious and helpless but safe for a few minutes until her victim woke up.
After he’d given her their destination, they were both quiet until he turned off Mercer onto First Avenue and pulled into a parking garage. Although he knew the basics, he’d never actually gone hunting with Philip or Eleisha, and he realized he’d need to know a few things before they got started here.
“Ivory…,” he began, shutting off the car, “what’s your gift? I haven’t felt anything that I’ve been aware of.”
To his surprise, she suddenly smiled. Her whole face lit up, and he found himself looking at her small white teeth. “I only use it when I’m hunting,” she said. “Christian doesn’t like it.” Tilting her head to one side, she said, “Have you ever gambled? I don’t mean playing poker for a few bucks with Philip. I mean really gambled, where you lived through that one breathless moment of knowing you either scored big or lost everything?”
Confused, he shook his head. “Not really. I don’t follow sports, and I’ve never been to Vegas.”
He waited for her to go on, to tell him more, but instead, she opened her door and climbed out of the car. “Once I peg someone, just come inside my head and stay with me. You’ll see.”
To his surprise, the prospect intrigued him. He’d lived through a number of feedings—and sometimes killings—inside Eleisha’s, Philip’s, Rose’s, and Maxim’s memories. But he’d never actually participated like this before.
He followed Ivory without another word.
Mary had been standing guard outside the mansion, wondering if anything was ever going to happen again, when the garage door suddenly opened and a white BMW pulled out.
She sensed at least one vampire inside, and she wondered what was going on.
All she could do was follow, but at least someone had finally come out of the mansion. It was a good sign. Maybe they weren’t going to completely hole up after all.
The car headed downtown.
Sailing rapidly through the air above, she followed it to a garage on First Street, just outside the Seattle Center.
Floating near the ceiling, she tried to blend in with the concrete and still manage to watch what was going on below. Wade and Ivory got out of the car, and Mary tensed. Should she keep following them?
So far, Julian had expressed little interest in Ivory, and he seemed more focused on Christian…but still, he’d probably want to know about this, to know Wade and Ivory were here alone.
Coming to a quick decision, Mary blinked out to go report to Julian.
Wade just kept following Ivory, but she didn’t go far and headed only a few blocks south to the Pacific Science Center, which was a large building with too many nooks, crannies, and shadows for Wade’s taste. Julian always came swinging from the shadows.
“Ivory,” Wade said, “stay out in the open, under the lights.”
She didn’t even glance at him but started watching the people all around. There were few families out and about this late at night, and the crowds consisted mainly of teenage kids in groups. Wade suddenly reached out with his thoughts and entered Ivory’s mind. She didn’t block him or try to push him out.
Just stay with me, she flashed.
He could feel her doing surface scans as the teenagers walked past, and then he felt her pause as she spotted a kid about seventeen years old, off by himself, smoking a cigarette, looking toward the front doors of the science center. He wore a skullcap and faded canvas jacket.
She walked up to him. “You want to get in, don’t you? See the last laser show?”
He looked down at her face in surprise, and through her, Wade could see the boy’s thoughts. He was wondering what she wanted…why a pretty woman was even talking to him.
The boy shrugged. “Sure. No money for a ticket.”
“We don’t need money,” she answered. “I can get us in.”
Wade was still standing a few feet away from her, but an unexpected sensation began to wash through him, a kind of anticipation mixed with excitement. It kept growing until he could feel his other senses begin to dull.
“What do you mean?” the boy asked Ivory, his eyes slightly glazed now.
She smiled. “This way.”
She headed in the other direction, around the back of the building. The boy began to follow, but so did Wade, and the boy stopped at the sight of him.
“It’s okay,” Ivory told the boy. “He’s with me. Come on. I’ll get us inside.”
The feeling of anticipation kept growing as they walked up to a darkened door. There was no one else around back here, and Ivory looked to the boy. “I can pick this lock and get us in, but I don’t know who might be on the other side of the door. So either we get in for free and have a good time or we end up getting hauled away by security.”
The feeling building in Wade’s mind and chest took on a new element: danger, a sense of all or nothing, and he couldn’t believe the excitement, the adrenaline running through him. His heart was pounding, and more than anything, he wanted her to pick that lock. He wanted to see if they’d succeed or be arrested. He could barely stand the wait.
“Pick it,” the boy urged, and Wade could feel the same all-or-nothing excitement in his mind.
Ivory smiled and produced a small metal tool seemingly out of thin air.
Within seconds, she had the door open, and she peeked inside. Wade suddenly knew there was no one waiting on the other side because he could feel her doing a mental sweep. For some reason, he felt a stab of disappointment. But she led them all inside, and then they were standing in a darkened hallway, with passages leading left and right.
“Over here,” she whispered to the boy, and she crouched at the corner of the left passage. “I need to show you something before we go on.”
Wade could feel the state of the boy’s mind. He was so lost in the adrenaline of the moment that he’d have done anything she asked, and he crouched down beside her. Reaching out with one hand, she grasped his hand and whispered, “Will you let me do this or will you run?”
The all-or-nothing excitement intensified, and Wade just stood there, staring. Without putting the boy to sleep, Ivory bit down on his wrist…and he let her. She drank mouthfuls of his blood, and through her, Wade could taste them. He could feel the experience just as she did.
Memories of the boy’s recent life began flowing through her mind…longing for an absent mother, living with a grandmother who didn’t want him, applying for a job at a gas station, falling in love with a girl at school who didn’t know his name.
The memories sobered Wade and made him sad.
But then Ivory pulled her teeth out, and he felt her blurring the boy’s memories of the last fifteen minutes. The boy lost everything from the first moment he’d approached the building.
Leaving him there on the floor, staring into space, Ivory stood and grasped the sleeve of Wade’s jacket. “Come on,” she said. “He’ll come back to himself in a few minutes, and he won’t remember anything. But he’s safe here for now.”
Wordlessly, Wade followed her back outside, and they hurried toward the parking garage. But his thoughts were churning over what he’d just felt…the entire expe
rience.
“The rush of gambling?” he finally managed to get out. “That’s your gift?”
“I’ve always been a gambler,” she answered, walking faster. “I just made one wrong call, and I’ve been paying ever since.”
Walking swiftly beside her, he realized he had to find out what she meant by that last comment—and he had to find out tonight.
Christian was sitting by the fire, listening to Vera ramble on. In spite of the fact that he’d brought in several interesting guests to visit, he was aware that he’d been neglecting her most shamefully the past two nights, and that simply wouldn’t do.
She was his hostess and patron, and she was the one arranging for clients.
So after the séance ended, after Justin had gone home and the others had all gone upstairs, he felt a little alone time with Vera was in order so he could flatter her generosity, her kindness, and her beauty.
“Oh, Christian, stop,” she said, smiling. “You don’t need to go on like that.”
But he did, and he knew it.
Vera yawned and stretched. “That poor young man tonight,” she said. “His fiancé marrying his father.” She shook her head. “I hope you were able to comfort his mother as well.”
“I was.”
But even as he spoke attentively to her, he couldn’t stop thinking about how Philip had pulled Eleisha off by herself so quickly after the séance. What were they doing? Of what were they speaking? Something had to be done about Philip and soon.
“Vera, darling, would you mind if I go up and check on Ivory? I think three nights in a row has taken its toll on her. She seemed a bit done over.”
“Oh, of course I don’t mind,” Vera said, sounding concerned. “Go and check on her. Let me know if she needs anything.”
“You are a dear.”
He made his way upstairs quickly, but then he stopped outside Eleisha’s door, at a loss. What was he supposed to say exactly? Knock and ask her and Philip what they were doing in there? Perhaps he could invite them downstairs to play cards. At least that way he could keep Eleisha near himself and pass a few more impulses into her mind.
He’d just raised his hand to knock when a feeling hit him that there was something wrong up here in the guest wing.