by Dawn Gray
"I loved her too much." He whispered to me.
"But I'd still be here with you, I mean; she'd still be here with you." I said and took his hand, pressed his palm to my cheek and closed my eyes. I heard his breath jump when his hand fully connected with mine, and I opened my eyes. "Stay here with me tonight."
"I had planned on it." He whispered.
"No, I mean, lay with me on the bed, next to me." I said and watched his face seem to grow pale. He wanted to move away, and he did move his hand. He was about to stand up when I caught his arm. "Please, Jason, I don't want you to leave."
"It's too risky." He said and slipped away from me. I closed my eyes and looked away from where he had gone back over to the window. "Things can get out of hand, you know."
"I just want you near me." I said to him softly. "Tell me, Jason; am I not attractive to you?"
"Not now, Angel." He said and looked outside. I sat up on the bed and then climbed off it. Slowly, and quietly, I walked over to where he stood, with his back to me, and I put my hands on his hips. He turned quickly and looked at me.
"What are you doing?" He asked, suddenly, stunned that I was even attempting to touch him. I didn't answer him, but put my hands on his chest instead. I could feel his muscles through his shirt and his hands grabbed mine as I ran them over his stomach. "I thought you didn't want to be attracted to me."
"I was afraid." I said and looked up into his face. He leaned closer to me, not more than two inches from my face, his lips were so close I could almost feel them.
"I thought you said it hurt to be touched." He said and let go of one of my hands, wrapping that arm around my waist. He pulled me closer to him.
"I think I need professional help." I whispered to him, not looking away from his eyes as he released my other hand and held the back of my neck with his.
"I'm a professional." He smiled at me. I nodded as I started to feel the heat from his fingers. "Would you like me to help you?"
"Yes." I whispered to him. His lips touched mine and it was as if a fire erupted in my body. The way he kissed seemed to send chills down my spine and fire racing through my veins at the same time. It became almost like a race for the two feelings, trying to see which one would make it to my heart faster, but neither reached its goal because Jason pulled away. I looked at him as he backed away from my face, but never let go of my body. "What is it?"
"This shouldn't be happening." He whispered to me, not looking away from my confused eyes. He shook his head. "This is how it starts every time and it always ends the same."
"It will be different this time." I said, not quite sure what I was telling him.
"That's what you always say, and it's never any different." He explained. "You always die, always."
"Past lives?" I asked him. He nodded and looked away. "How many?"
"Six." He sighed and stepped away from me. "How could I have been so stupid not to recognize you? You're the same every time, the same eyes, the same attitude, the same...” he stopped and looked directly at me, "fire. This is the first time, though, that you've recognized me first."
"Hey, seven is my lucky number." I smiled at him. "Won't you at least give it a chance?"
"And, what if you die again?" He asked.
"Then I'll come back again." I replied and moved closer to him. I took his arms and wrapped them around my waist again. "Will you stay the night?"
"We have to take this slow." He whispered and then looked at me and nodded. I walked him over to the bed, curled up under the covers and waited for him to get under them before I even thought of closing my eyes. I was half-asleep, almost into the darkness, when I felt his arms around me and his body close, then I fell into it completely, a dark, welcome, dreamless sleep.
In the morning, I was alone, as I thought that I might be. I got up and got dressed, not sure what today would be like, since nothing seemed to be ordinary in my life since I got here. I walked down to the breakfast room and sat down at the round table. There were three other settings, which hadn't been touched, and two that had been cleared.
I was looking down at my plate, caught in a daydream, when a hand touched the back of my neck. I raised my head slowly and looked up at Quinn as he sat down in the seat almost directly across from me.
"So, your visitor didn't stay for breakfast." He asked me. I looked up at him from my pastry and shook my head, not at all surprised that he knew. "That's a shame, I rather like Jason."
"But, Julian doesn't." I replied and looked at the paper beside me. "So, what do you think? I mean, are you going to start lecturing me on why I shouldn't get involved."
"I'm not your father, Angel, beside I feel that the two of you are connected in a special way." He said and went about his breakfast.
"I've had six past lives with him." I told him. This made him put down the paper he was reading and look at me.
"How do you know?" He asked me.
"When I dream, I see things, last night I saw my life, my past life and Jason was in it, but his name was different." I shook my head and sat back in the chair. "I knew that it wasn't a dream because I could feel everything that she was going through, every cut and bruise, every broken bone."
"And, he recognized you?" He asked me. I nodded and then sighed. "Angel, it's very...unusual...to find a past life love, and it's even more unusual to find one seven times. Maybe he just thought that you were who he had been looking for."
"Quinn." I said in frustration. "I know what I know, I felt what I felt and that's the bottom line. Whoever I was, even if it were just one of his lost loves, I know that I was the girl in my dreams."
"So, maybe you were the girl, but what if Jason wasn't the man. What if you're mind placed Jason's image in your head so that you would think it was him." Quinn questioned.
"Why do you find this so difficult to believe?" I asked him. He smiled at me and took my hand.
"I only want you to ask the right questions about things that go on around you so that you won't get trapped." He said softly.
"Jason won't hurt me." I told him sternly.
"He's a vampire, Angel; you can't predict what a vampire will and won't do." Quinn said sternly. I looked at him and sighed. "Listen to me, Angel, please be very careful with this."
"He's not going to hurt me, Quinn." I said and stared him in the eyes. "This is what I truly believe." I looked at my breakfast, then up at Quinn and quietly left the table.
The woods seemed quite thin for that time of year, but it seemed harder than I thought it would be to find the large wooden door that was hidden under some vines. It looked like it might be some sort of root cellar, but when I pulled the door open, I was staring down a long well lit hallway.
I gathered my nerves and walked through the door and down the hallway. There was nothing but absolute silence in the place; it was very eerie. I almost held my breath when the hallway stopped at another wooden door, but I took a deep breath instead and pulled it open.
As I walked into the room that was on the other side, I noticed the walls lit by candles instead of light bulbs and all the furniture looked very antique. On the bed in the far right corner of the room, tucked away in a small nook, was Jason, curled up on his side with a hand on his forehead, like he had gone to bed with a headache and that was the only way to relieve it.
I walked over to him, slowly, and reached out my hand, gently, touching his face. His skin was cold, probably due to the dampness in the room as well as the obvious fact that he was a vampire. I brushed my hand against his face over and over and the warmth started to rise from it. He began to feel almost human under my fingers.
Jason opened his eyes slowly and moved his hand; his energy seemed drained because he didn't jump up at me. He looked at me calmly, still half-asleep, and licked his lips.
"What are you doing down here?" He asked softly, taking my hand and letting his eyes shut again. I smiled at him because it seemed to take him quite a bit of strength to even open them again.
"I figured
that you can sneak into my room, so I can sneak into yours." I whispered to him softly. He nodded, his eyes drifted shut once again and I smiled. I went to back away, but the hold he had on my hand, that I thought would be easy to break from, grew tighter and he sighed in his half-conscious state. "I'm going to let you sleep."
"No." His mouth moved slightly. His eyes had stopped opening at all, and his lips barely moved, in fact, they didn't move at all. It was his mental voice that talked to me. Stay with me, Angel.
"Are you sure that's okay?" I asked him, feeling confused that he hadn't wanted to be close to me last night because things might have gotten out of hand, but now he wanted me to stay. He didn't say much else, but moved over, slowly, on the bed and pulled my arm towards him. I climbed on the bed and curled up next to him.
Don’t go tonight. His voice whispered to me.
I hadn’t planned on it. I told him back. Will you be there?
What business is it of mine what the Council says about people that I already know how to kill? He said in his usual sarcastic voice, but then he laughed and that drifted off as he fell back into a deep sleep.
I fell asleep after a little while and woke up just before four. Slowly, I snuck out of Jason's arms and went upstairs to see if anyone had missed me. Julian cornered me as I snuck in the back door.
"There you are." He said and followed me into the sitting room.
"Yep, here I am." I replied, sat down, and then looked up at him. "So, what can I do for you?"
"It's about tonight."
"Julian, I'm not speaking to these people and that's final." I told him.
"You don't have to speak; you just have to be there." He told me. I didn't want to be there either. "If you don't go willingly, we'll just have to bind you up and force you." I stood up and faced him, this man almost a foot taller than me.
"Well, then, by all means, bind away." I told him sternly and walked away.
With forceful hands, I was put in the back limo that picked us up that night, with Julian on one side of me and Quinn on the other. How I hated family gatherings.
6
When we arrived at the state house, the lines of limos and cars were almost a mile long, but it took us only about five minutes to pull up and get out of the car.
"Why is it a rule that all vampires have to be driven around? Don't you people have your licenses?" I asked sarcastically, trying to wiggle out of the grip that Quinn had on my upper arm. He looked down at me, displeased at my humor, and then looked ahead of us. I surveyed the crowd, looking for any hunters, but I could see that whoever these other people were, they weren't going to let any hunters in tonight.
Once we were in the building, the group of us made our way to the second balcony. The whole room opened up into an arena type of setting; the speaker of the house was down on the main floor, on a small but ample stage from where he could speak, and there were seats lined up all along the floor in front of him. The room was shaped like a half circle and the second and third balconies went in a horseshoe shape around the room, each balcony held fewer seat than the one below it, however, the third balcony had to seat at least two hundred bodies, easily.
My mind seemed overwhelmed and the voices began to pile in, making my stomach turn, but Quinn wouldn't loosen his grip. I swayed and held on to him as the voices grew louder, but then
Michael took my arm and held me close to him. Quinn, thinking that Michael wouldn't lose me; let me go and I stood there with Michael's arms around me as his mind blocking out the voices.
Except one.
Angel. I heard him say and I opened my eyes. Michael looked down at me and asked if I were okay. I nodded as I looked around the room. I barely heard him say to hold on to him and not get lost as I waited for the voice to come again. Angel.
There he stood, directly across the balcony from me, in his usual black attire, black jeans, boots, shirt, a turtleneck this time, and his black leather jacket. I watched as the bodies around him moved, but he just stood there, disappearing in and out of the endless bodies, never moving from the same spot.
He looked straight at me with his brown eyes and just stood there. I let go of Michael's hand, and disappeared into the crowd.
When I stopped, I looked across the balcony at where I had been standing before, but Jason was nowhere to be seen. I turned in a circle and came face to face with him. He looked at me calmly, almost like he didn't have any emotions, then he reached out and hugged me. I put my arms around him and listened to his heartbeat, knowing that he had hunted before he had arrived.
"What are you doing here?" He asked me as he stepped back and looked at me. "I thought you said you weren't going to come tonight."
"My uncle forced me." I replied.
"What was Quinn thinking, bringing you into a place like this?" He asked me as the two of us moved through the crowd almost unnoticed. "This is very dangerous, Angel." He whispered to me as he backed us both into a quiet corner. "I don't understand how he thinks I can protect you when he put you in such a bad situation."
"Why were you like that earlier?" I asked him, suddenly. "It's not because you didn't get enough sleep last night, was it?"
"It's day sleep." He said and looked around the room. "If I don't feed early in the morning, I'm completely useless during the day."
"What about the day that you kidnapped me from the hunters?"
"I had fed that morning, but the clothes help it too, wearing black and the helmet seems to make the effects of the sun less damaging." He said and sat down with me. He had been staring out into the hallway for a long time. "You're uncle and grandfather will be looking for you soon, don't tell them that I'm here. We don't need a commotion; that would just give them an opportunity to move in."
"The hunters are here?" I asked him. I should have known that they were around here somewhere. I can't ever leave home without one or more of them following me. I grabbed Jason's arm. "What about Cecilia, I mean, the hunters won't get her will they?"
"I was thinking about that the other day and the agency thinks that it would be best to bring her here, to you." He said softly. I didn't understand him. Wouldn't that bring the bait all to the same place? "It will make sure that they can't get her, use her to lure you out of hiding, and if she's here, Quinn and I can protect her, too."
"Jason." I said softly and grabbed onto his coat. "I don't want you to get hurt, I don't want anyone to get hurt in anyway."
"No one's going to get hurt." He whispered to me. He hadn't touched me, except when we first met on the balcony and to hold my hand leading me to this corner we were in, but now, he put his hands on my waist and lowered his head and placed his forehead against mine. "Trust me, Angel. I won't let them get you."
"Sometimes it feels as if it would be all over if I just gave myself up to them." I told him quietly and closed my eyes, before I could look at him again, I felt his warm, wet lips against mine and he pulled me closer. Slowly, he pulled away and looked me in the eyes.
"That would be a very bad thing to do." He whispered and touched my lips with his fingers. "Quinn's coming this way. I'll see you tonight, remember, we haven't seen each other."
I watched him step away and disappear into the crowd, but I knew that he didn't go far.
Quinn stepped around the corner and looked at me as I leaned against the wall and stared at the ceiling. He had his hands in the pockets of his long, tan coat, and he rubbed his chin, as he looked me over.
"What, exactly, am I doing here?" I asked him without looking at him. "I don't belong here." I told him and looked directly at him. "And, neither do you." He took a hold of my arm as I tried to walk away from him. He looked at me sternly and I shook my head. "They're here, you know."
"I know." He whispered to me. I stared at his young face, thinking that he must have been no older than eighteen when he was turned, but I thought of his age in years and how he was, in an odd way, my grandfather, and this made me look at him differently.
"If you know this so wel
l, why the hell are you putting your life in danger for some stupid Council that's just going to tell you to stay alert and lock your coffins at night?" I asked him, with anger in my voice. His eyes showed me that he was untouched by my concern. "Look, Quinn, you've been on this Earth for several centuries, maybe you know how to handle hunters, but I've only been here for twenty and I would like to see thirty if you don't mind."
"Angel, you're perfectly safe." He told me. Just as he whispered this to me, a voice broke through the mental block that I had erected to keep the voices out.
Hello, Angel. A man's voice snarled at me. I recognized this voice and it scared the hell out of me. It was Isaac, and I knew that there had to be something going on if he knew where I was. I stepped back, away from Quinn and looked around the room. Want to play a game?
"Isaac?" I asked aloud, my eyes darting through the crowd. Quinn looked at me and watched the color drain from my face. "What do you want? Why are you here?"
The games called, hum, if you don’t show up in two hours, your friend dies. His voice mocked me. I closed my eyes and looked directly at Quinn. I knew whom he was talking about, the whole family was here, except for Cecilia, and at this moment, besides Jason, she was my only friend. The clock tower in Lourdes, that’s a half an hour from the state house. I expect you to bring your grandfather. Bye-bye, Angel Baby.
"Angel?" Quinn said and looked at me. I shook my head as I back up against the wall. "What is it?"
"I knew that this would be a bad thing." I told him and suddenly got my bearings. I walked right up to his face and stared him in the eyes. "The hunters have my friend and I'm going to get her."
"You could die." He said, though his voice never changed I could see the worry in his eyes.
"She could die and that's what I'm worried about." I told him and walked by.
I didn't stop; in fact, I did the only thing that I could do to get away from him before he caught me. I manipulated time. I watched as the people around me started to slow down as I concentrated on going from where I was then to the parking lot in an instant. While it seemed to me that I was slowing time down, slowing people down, it was really the opposite, I was speeding up and was standing out in the parking lot within seconds.