The Undead Heart (#1 in the Blood Thirst Series)

by Stephanie Jackson

  It felt very strange to be arguing with him while they were naked. “Well, you were wrong. What Alex did to me has nothing to do with how I feel about you. If you had listened to me, you would have known that! For your information, every time I have made love to you has been after that had happened! That’s something else you should have figured out on your own.”

  “I just thought…,” he started to say, but she cut him off. “Well, stop thinking! It doesn’t seem to work out well for you when you do, and I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself with the effort!” she yelled. She barely saw him move in the darkness. One second, he was at the foot of the bed, then the next, he was on top of her, crushing her lips with his. He stole away any breath she had to argue. He showed her exactly how much she did not disgust him, pressing her body over and over into the bed. When it was over, he collapsed on the bed beside her.

  “You have to be the most exasperating woman I have met.”

  “Leso shouldn’t have told you what we talked about. It was personal.”

  “Oh, he didn’t tell me. He yelled it at me, nearly bit my head off. But you’re right, he shouldn’t have told me, you should have. I’m not like you and Leso. I don’t know what you’re feeling unless you tell me.”

  “Then maybe you should ask me the next time.”

  “Does everything have to be an argument with you?” he growled. “Not always, but most of the time, I’ll back down when I’m wrong.”

  “You never back down.”

  “I’m never wrong.”

  As she was falling back to sleep, she remembered her vision from earlier; the vision of her death as seen through Richard’s eyes. Well, she hadn’t actually seen herself die, but she knew the attempt was still going to be made. When she’d been killed in the past, Elderson had told Richard that he would let her live if Richard and his family would join his clan. It was a lie. He’d never intended to let any of them live. She hoped that this time around, Elderson would be the one to die.

  ***

  The next afternoon found them alone. “Everyone’s going to do a bit of shopping, take in a play, and find lodging in the city for the night,” he told her when she had come back from her small bath in the stream. “They wanted to give us some time alone.”

  “They didn’t have to do that. This is their house.”

  “They know that. They wanted to do it. Rita said, ‘Young married people need time alone.’ I think she’s a romantic at heart.”

  “Well, it was very sweet of her.”

  “So, what do you want to do today?” he inquired.

  “You’re kidding, right? It’s 1888, there’s nothing to do,” she giggled.

  “Come with me. I want to show you something.” He led her back through the backyard to the stream. They followed the stream for about half a mile to where it opened up into a small lake that was completely enclosed by trees.

  “It’s beautiful!”

  “I thought you might like to go for a swim.”

  “I’d love to,” she said, already slipping out of her clothes.

  He had to restrain himself from jumping on her when she stepped into the water. When the cool water hit her legs, goose bumps raced up her body, standing her nipples on end. She took one more step and dove into the water in a smooth, fluid motion. He watched her surface and swim to the other side of the lake and back again.

  “Aren’t you gonna come in?” she asked. “I better not. The water is a bit cool.”

  “How exactly does that matter to you?”

  “It doesn’t matter to me. I was thinking about you. The water will make me very cold to the touch later,” he explained.

  “Are you serious? It’s about 200 degrees in our bedroom! The colder you are, the better. Besides, I’ll do everything in my power to get your heart pumping later and warm you back up. Come on.”

  He didn’t need any more encouragement to get out of his clothes and into the water with her.

  “I’m not a great swimmer,” he said. He was holding her and turning in slow circles in the water.

  “I would be terrified of the water if it wasn’t for you.”

  “How’s that?”

  “You know the memory I showed you where you saved me from falling in the water?” He nodded. “Well, the first time it happened, I did fall in. I nearly drowned. I guess that put me off of water sports.”

  “Well, I won’t let you drown this time.”He could feel the heat of her body against him. He shifted her weight in his arms and pushed her down onto him. She wrapped her legs around him and laid back letting the water hold her weight. He moved slowly inside her at first, letting her drift slightly away and then pulling her gently back down onto him. When she squeezed him with her thighs, he knew slowly was not what she wanted now.

  He grabbed her waist and pulled her hard against him until she cried out and his heart was racing. When it was over, she swam away across the lake, giggling. He was glad she had so much energy. He had not yet gotten his legs to quit shaking. When his heart stopped beating, he walked out of the water and laid on a large rock in the sun.

  He smiled as he listened to her splashing in the lake. He was glad they had this time together. He was married! The marriage may not happen for many years, but he already felt married. He’d wanted to marry her here, in this time, but she said no. She’d said that she would be more than happy to marry him when she got back to her time, but she wanted their next marriage to be permanently legal. If that was what she wanted, then he could wait.

  He opened his eyes when her shadow fell across him. Even with the sun affecting his vision, she was still the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

  “All done?” he asked.

  “Yep, now I’m starving.”

  “Well, let’s get back and get you fed. Then, we’ll see if we can put that empty house to some use,” he said, smiling.

  They got dressed and started back toward the house. She took his hand and exclaimed, “Wow! You are cold!”

  “I told you I would be. You wouldn’t listen.”

  “I don’t mind. I like it. I’ve never been good with the heat.”

  “I figured that. You don’t complain much, but when you do, it’s either about the lack of air conditioning or the lack of Coke,” he said, laughing. “I can’t help it. You’d be surprised how much you can miss the things that you are accustomed to having. I miss a lot of things, but besides my sister, Coke and air conditioning are at the top of my list.”

  “What else do you miss?”

  “My computer, fast food, television, French vanilla coffee creamer, shorts and tank tops, music. I miss a lot.”

  “Well, it won’t be long now, and you’ll be home,” he said sadly. “What’s wrong?”

  “It just doesn’t seem fair that you have to spend virtually no time without me, whereas, I have to spend over a century without you.”

  “True, but I’ll have to travel through time to get back to you,” she smiled.

  “I will have to travel through time to get to you, as well. It will just be a much slower process.”

  “Don’t be a smartass. The whole point is for us to spend our life together, right? When I get back, we’ll be able to do that.”

  She would be able to spend her life with him, but one day her life would come to an end, and she would be gone. He couldn’t change her into a vampyre, and he could not become human. He tried to be grateful for the time he would have with her, but could not always stop his thoughts from straying to when she would have to leave him.

  “I would love nothing more than to spend my life with you, Little One. However, you do know that in the winter I’m going to feel like a block of ice, don’t you?” he said, effortlessly changing the subject.

  “Well then, we’ll just have to make sure our house has really good heat. Or, we can spend our winters in Florida. You can feed on alligators and sharks.”

  They had made it to the backyard when he felt a tingling in his head. He pushed her behind him, a
nd in a low voice, hissed, “Vampyre!”

  ***

  Richard stood stone-still for a full two minutes. It had to be one of the family coming back. It couldn’t be anything else. There had been only one vampyre attack the last time she was here, and it had resulted in her death. That wasn’t supposed to happen for another month. She wasn’t ready. She thought of the hypodermic needle up in their bedroom and wondered if she’d wasted her time bringing it here.

  No, this couldn’t be happening. It had to be Leso or Bruce coming home early. It wasn’t though. She knew something had changed when the vampyre came around the side of the house. It wasn’t Elderson, but she had seen him before. It was the same vampyre she had watched Leso kill in her yard in Durham. SHIT! What was going on?

  “That’s the same…” she started. But he finished her thought, “vampyre that Leso killed. I remember your memory,” he said in a whisper.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Kill him, most likely,” he answered quietly. The vampyre walked cautiously towards them. “Good afternoon,” he said in a deep voice.

  “It was,” Richard replied. “I have come to meet the new female in your family. I see by your reaction that she is your female. How lovely she is.”

  “You need to leave,” Richard told him. “That’s not very polite of you. Aren’t you going to introduce us?” the vampyre asked.

  “Leave now,” Richard growled. She didn’t have to see his face to know that the whites of his eyes had filled with blood. The vampyre took one more step towards them and Richard jumped. The look of surprise on the vampyre’s face told her that he hadn’t really believed that Richard would attack him. He was terribly wrong.

  Richard landed on him with both feet and drove him to the ground. The vampyre jumped back up, but Richard was ready for him. From a crouch, he used his leg to sweep the legs out from under the vampyre. He jumped on him, landed with his knees on the vampyres shoulders, and used his hands to tear his head off. The head came off with a wet, sucking sound. “You were right. That move was very effective,” he said, getting off of the ground and tossing the head over his shoulder. “I did teach you that, didn’t I?”

  She couldn’t take her eyes off the headless body on the ground. It didn’t freak her out or anything, it was just a little strange to see the same headless body twice.

  “Are you alright, Beck?”

  “Yeah, I’m good. I was just wondering what the hell is going on. Why would this guy show up here now? Leso killed him in my time. He can’t come back to life, can he?”

  “No, he cannot. There’s nothing that can be done now to bring him back to life.”

  “This didn’t happen before. Something changed.”

  “We have to deal with other vampyres from time to time. That may be all this is. Maybe it did happen before, and I just didn’t think to mention it.”

  “Trust me, you would have mentioned it. Besides, if that were true, it wouldn’t have been this vampyre. He shouldn’t have been here today. You said yourself that he’s dead. He can’t die here and in the future, right?”

  “That’s true. Then it only stands to reason that something has changed, but what? What would we have done different this time?”

  “I don’t know. It could be anything. I just don’t know.”

  “Do you think it’s going to matter in the future?”

  “I doubt it. Not to the human world anyway.”

  “Then it doesn’t matter. What’s done is done, right?”

  “Right. Now, can you get that out of here? It’s kind of gross?” she stated and pointed at the body.

  “Alright.” He picked the body up like it weighed nothing and turned towards the woods.

  “Uh, Richard?”

  “Yes”

  “The head too,” she said, pointing at the head that he had left lying on the ground.

  “Right, sorry,” he smiled slightly as he came back and snagged the head up by its hair. “You stay here, I’ll be right back.”

  He was gone in a blur of motion. He was back in less than three minutes. “Did you take it a good, long ways away?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you sure? Because I have to pee out there. I don’t need that head staring at me while I do it.”

  “I’m sure. The body is miles away.”

  “Okay, I was just checking.”

  “Did what just happened not bother you at all, Little One?”

  “No, not really. It didn’t bother me the first time he got killed. Why should it bother me this time? Well, I guess this would actually be the first time since I’m in the past now, but you know what I mean.”

  “You are a very strange woman.”

  “Yeah, tell me something that I don’t know.”

  “Are you still hungry after seeing that?”

  “Absolutely. It takes more than seeing you kill a vampyre to ruin my appetite.”

  “It takes more than seeing me tear another vampyre’s head off to ruin your appetite?” he asked surprised.

  “Actually, I thought that was kind of sexy.”

  “You’re very strange. So, you still want to put the empty house to use?” he asked in amazement.

  “I’ll race you,” she said and took off running. She stopped about three yards from the porch steps and looked back. He was still at the end of the backyard. “What are you doing?” she called across the yard.

  “Giving you a head start,” he yelled.

  “Then I win. I’m already here,” she yelled back. “You’re not there yet.”

  He took two steps and turned into a blur. She turned to run up the steps, but he blew past her and was waiting on the porch, holding the door open. “That’s not fair. You used your vampyre super powers! I want a rematch when your heart’s beating and you have to actually breathe.”

  “You now there’s only one way to make that happen, Beck.”

  “I know. I’ll race you to the bedroom.”

  ***

  Much later in bed, after they had ‘made use’ of nearly every room in the house, Richard fell asleep. She laid next to him and let her mind wander. What had changed? She didn’t know what they had done different this time, because she didn’t know all the details of what they had done the last time. But Richard was right, what was done was done. She just wished she knew what it was she had done. What else was going to change? She was still thinking about it when she drifted off to sleep.

  ***

  Richard had taken a lover. How wonderful! A human woman at that. It would be so easy to break her. He’d sent Nicholi to Richard, and he had not returned. He had not truly expected him to return. He’d wanted to see what length Richard would go to protect the woman. Richard had been willing to kill or be killed for her. Could that mean that the woman was not just a lover but his mate?

  Had Richard really been foolish enough to fall in love with a human? Could it be that easy to destroy the hero? Kill the woman, destroy the man? It was too good to be true. This was so much better than his plan to kill Leso had been.

  Richard would truly regret the day he had taken it upon himself to kill Royal Elderson’s brother. He had killed Mitchell for what? Over a girl he didn’t even know?

  What Mitchell had been doing had been of no concern of Richard’s. He could have walked away, but he’d had to kill Mitchell; to play the hero. He couldn’t wait to watch the hero fall, to see him crumble before him, to have him beg him for death. He would give him death, after he had suffered enough, after Richard had suffered as he himself had suffered over the loss of his brother.

  He was only a little concerned over the loss of Nicholi. He was not afraid of Richard, but he now knew that Richard was willing to kill for this woman. There was no need for him to put himself at unnecessary risk. He had sent Nicholi to Richard when the rest of Richard’s family was in London. He could only hope that that particular opportunity would present itself again. If it didn’t, then he would find another way to kill the woman.

&nbs
p; ***

  She woke up to the feeling of pins and needles in her bicep. The sensation woke her up in the same place in her vision as she had been when Richard had slammed the door. Damn it! She’d like to see more of the vision, to see if she lives or dies.

  Richard had fallen asleep on her left arm, and she had not pulled it out from under him before she had drifted off. She must not have been asleep very long, because Richard was still asleep beside her. She tried to pull her arm out from under him but couldn’t. She couldn’t pull her arm out, because her arm was gone!

  She used her right hand to turn up the hurricane lamp on the nightstand. She had thought she may have been dreaming, but no. Her left elbow, forearm, and hand were gone! She wasn’t bleeding or in pain. Her arm was just gone. How could her arm just be fucking gone?!!!

  She did what anybody else would have done; she screamed. No one was home to hear her, and Richard didn’t budge. She had to find it!

  She didn’t know what she was going to do with it when she found it, but she had to look. She pushed Richard off the bed with her feet; nothing. She tore the sheets and pillows off the bed but came up empty. She looked under the bed…nothing. She sat on the bed and examined the area where her arm used to be attached. She could see the bone and flesh. It looked as if her arm had been cleanly sliced off., but there was no blood on the bed or on Richard. She was still sitting on the edge of the bed in shock when Richard woke up.

  “Beck? Why aren’t you sleeping?” he asked, getting up off the floor. “How did I get on the flo…What the hell happened to you?! Where in God’s name is your arm?!” he yelled, jumping over the bed and landing in front of her. He waved his hand through where her arm should have been. “It’s gone!”