But none of that was what gave her pause. No, it was the scars.
Everything about his skin looked perfect, his golden complexion, his lines of muscle…everything except for the scars. Her throat constricted as she stared at the hundreds of gruesome scars across his chest and stomach. Some of the scars were tiny while others were clearly caused by fatal wounds. Some of the scars looked like burns while others looked jagged like cuts and gashes.
“What happened to you?” she blurted before she could stop herself.
When she asked, he’d been examining his stomach wound that, surprisingly, was nearly healed. He glanced at her, his brows furrowing. “What?”
“The scars,” Rose said, swallowing. “How did you get them?”
His brown eyes narrowed at her. “That is none of your business.”
She bit her lip, her brows creasing with sympathy. “Of course. I’m sorry.”
Kallias stared at her curiously, stunned by her sudden change of attitude.
“And I’m sorry about whatever it was that happened to you,” she added.
He suddenly seemed uncomfortable. “I told you to stop doing that.”
She laughed softly. “I can’t just not be kind to you, Kallias.”
“Why not?” he asked, frowning. “I am unkind to you.”
“No, you’re not. You’re rude sometimes, maybe even most of the time, but you’re also kind sometimes, like when you saved my life or when you comforted me after Theron tried to…tried to…” she swallowed uneasily, “…rape me.”
His eyes darkened dangerously. “I will make him suffer for that. I swear.”
Rose blinked at the strange promise. “Uh…” she sputtered. “Why?”
He seemed taken aback by her reaction. “Don’t you want me to?”
“I appreciate the thought,” she said, “but revenge isn’t really my thing.”
“You realize that just makes me want to hurt him more, right?” he asked.
Rose frowned at him. “Why would it do that?”
“Because you’re too…good,” Kallias said. The word good seemed to get caught in his throat, as if it pained him to say it. “You don’t deserve any of this.”
She stared at him, stunned that he had called her good and stunned by the sincerity clearly reflected in his light brown eyes. “Whatever happened to you,” she said, her gaze shifting toward his scars, “You didn’t deserve that either.”
“If you believe that,” he said quietly, “you don’t know me very well.”
Rose didn’t know how to respond to that, not that he gave her much of a window to respond, anyway. Instead, he turned away from her, glancing around the warehouse, as if he’d rather look anywhere else than at her. She sighed and, deciding that the concrete floor wasn’t being too kind to her tailbone, tried to stand. Unfortunately, her tingling, numb legs didn’t cooperate, and she fell.
Kallias’s hand wrapped around her elbow and pulled her back to her feet so swiftly and easily that it seemed as if he’d been beside her the entire time, even though she knew that she had just seen him standing several feet away from her.
“Well, that was embarrassing,” she muttered as she straightened.
“Are you okay?” he asked worriedly. “Are your legs injured?”
“No, you were the one with broken legs. Is your memory injured?” she said.
He chuckled at her sassy remark. “And yet, you’re the one who fell.”
“My legs are asleep,” Rose said, thumping her thigh. She glanced at him, her gaze flicking briefly toward his hand that still felt warm against her elbow. “I bet you vampires don’t have that problem. You guys are probably always graceful.”
Kallias grinned. “Compared to you, yes, I am extremely graceful.”
She huffed at him and grumpily jerked her elbow out of his grasp.
He chuckled at her again. “Not that I mind, but you’re losing your pants.”
She froze and paled, suddenly realizing that her jeans did feel awfully loose around her hips. She shifted the phone in her hand to shine it down at her pants, her cheeks reddening as she saw that they were sliding down around her hips, revealing just a tiny portion of the band of her black cotton panties beneath her blue T-shirt. She jerked her jeans up to her stomach, grumbling under her breath about the missing button. Her face felt like it might melt when she finally glanced back at Kallias who stood there with his arms crossed across his chest.
“I need another pair of pants,” she told him, “and another shirt.”
That cocky smirk that he’d been wearing faded from his face. “We have to get out of town first,” he sighed, “but then, I’ll buy you whatever you need.”
“Buy?” she sputtered. “No. I have plenty of clothes in my apartment.”
His arms fell to his sides as he gave her his most exasperated scowl. “We’ve already been over this, Rose,” he said irritably. “Theron will expect you to show up at your apartment. You can’t go back there. Not yet, anyway. Once we get out of town, we can stop somewhere and pick up whatever you need.”
“I don’t even have my wallet,” she complained.
“I have more than enough to get you anything you need,” he assured her.
Her eyes narrowed. “No. Absolutely not. I’m not letting you pay for it.”
Kallias rolled his eyes. “Not this again,” he groaned.
“I do not need a man to pay for things for me,” she snapped.
“So, my penis is the problem?” he asked incredulously.
She scowled at him. “No! I just… I am an independent person. I have spent my entire life taking care of myself, and I don’t need anyone’s help.”
“Except you do,” Kallias argued. He sighed and stepped closer to her, his eyes softening with understanding. “Right now, by no fault of your own, you’re in a situation in which you need help. It doesn’t change who you are to accept help when you need it. I know that you don’t need anyone to take care of you, but there are some things that I can do that will help you. So, just let me, okay?”
She sighed, her anger deflated by the empathy she heard in his voice. “Okay,” she relented, “but only because I don’t want to walk around naked.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Wait. Was that an option?”
“Not actually naked,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Naked, as in this.”
He scowled at her torn clothing. “That does not count as naked. At all.”
She ignored him. “But if we do this, we’re considering it a loan. I will pay you back. Eventually. But it might take a while. I don’t make much at the café.”
“I figured,” Kallias said. “It’s a small café, and you’re a terrible waitress.”
She glared at him. “I thought you said you liked my service!”
“I did,” he said honestly. “But I doubt that many other people do.”
She scowled…but mostly because, truthfully, she couldn’t argue. She’d once had a customer demand that Eleanor fire her, just because she had corrected the customer’s spelling of twelve. But come on, how hard was it to spell twelve correctly? It was a one syllable word, for goodness sakes. The lady should have been ashamed of herself, in Rose’s opinion. She frowned when she noticed Kallias grinning at her, almost as if he knew what she was thinking.
“I have questions,” she said suddenly.
“You always have questions,” Kallias reminded her.
“I have questions about you,” she added, “and vampires.”
“Very well,” he sighed. “I might answer some of them.”
Her eyes narrowed. “First, I need to know if you eat people.”
“I’m a vampire, not a zombie,” he grumbled.
She sighed, “You know what I mean. Do you drink human blood?”
He stared at her for a moment, as if she had asked him a complicated question that required a lot of thought. Then, finally, he said, “No.”
She sighed in relief. “Okay. So what kind of blood do you drink, then
?”
His brows furrowed. “What kind?” he repeated bewilderedly.
“Animal blood?” she guessed.
He grimaced. “Ugh! Where did you get a disgusting idea like that?”
She frowned. “Uh… Well, blood is blood, right?”
“No,” Kallias said, shuddering in disgust. “Not right.”
She stared at him blankly, confused by how disturbed he seemed to be by such a harmless question. “Umm… Okay… Then, what is the difference?”
He sighed tiredly, as if she were the one acting weird. “Feeding is sexual.”
She blinked, not sure she’d heard him right. “What?” she sputtered.
“Drinking blood,” he rephrased, “is an intensely sexual interaction.”
Her nose wrinkled in disgust. “You’re kidding.”
“Not at all,” he said. “You said that you read up on vampire mythology and folklore, right? I assume you noticed a link between vampires and sex?”
Rose shrugged. “Well, yeah. Yeah, of course,” she agreed. “Vampires were often depicted as having some kind of seductive power over their victims, and stories often told of them drinking the victim’s blood during sex. Even the earliest and most gruesome tales painted vampires as sexual and seductive.”
Kallias nodded, impressed by how much she’d noticed. “Exactly. Every culture had their own stories about us, usually influenced by that culture’s beliefs and fears. For example, the Ancient Greeks believed in the Pantheon, but of course, our gods were different from your God in that our gods were imperfect. Greek gods could be vengeful and selfish. So, they were feared as well as worshipped. Greek gods were said to be beautiful and powerful. So, it only made sense that when the people of Ancient Greece encountered vampires, they often assumed we were gods or demigods. On the other hand, a severely puritanistic Christian culture was more likely to fear sex, murder, and demons. So, it only made sense that when people of that culture encountered seductive, murderous creatures like vampires, they assumed we were demons that should be hunted and killed, which is exactly what happened during the 1700s. The only thing that every culture agreed upon is that vampires were sexual creatures that drank blood.”
She stared up at him, curiosity burning in her bright blue eyes. What had taken her several days to find through research, he explained in less than a minute. “Okay. So, what made them all believe that vampires were sexual creatures?”
He studied her with a strange expression, his brows furrowing as if he found something unusual about her. “What did you feel when Theron bit you?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Revulsion,” she answered without thinking.
He scowled at her. “You must have felt something else.”
She frowned as she remembered that pleasant sensation. “No,” she lied.
Kallias sighed, “Rose, I need you to be honest.” He stepped closer to her and placed his hand under her chin, tipping her head back so that he could meet her gaze. She swallowed uneasily as he trailed his fingers down her neck. “Let me rephrase the question. What did you feel when I put my mouth on the wound?”
She shivered at the memory. “It was…” she paused, blushing, “pleasant.”
He felt her rapid pulse beneath his fingers. “Do you know why?”
“A brief lapse in judgement?” she guessed.
He smiled. “No. It’s physical, not mental. You would have felt it with Theron, too. Like the healing enzymes in our blood and saliva, our bodies also release sexual endorphins. It creates pleasant sensations for the victim when the vampire feeds from her…or him. It usually ensures that you don’t fight us.”
She blinked. “So, these humans enjoy it while they’re being murdered?”
He dropped his hand. “Unfortunately, yes.”
She stared at him, aghast at the realization. “That’s horrific.”
“Yes,” he agreed. “Nature is cruel. And the worst part is…we don’t need that advantage over you. We are already hundreds of times stronger and faster than humans. Even if you did fight it, you wouldn’t stand a chance against us.”
Rose stepped back, her throat suddenly tight. “I did feel that pleasant sensation when Theron bit me,” she admitted quietly, “but I also felt revulsion.”
He frowned curiously at that. “Really? That’s…interesting.”
She glared at him. “Why is that interesting?”
His gaze seemed both intensely focused and blank at the same time, as if he weren’t seeing her, but instead, seeing through her. “You have an extraordinarily strong will,” he murmured. Then, he blinked, and his gaze seemed normal again. He cocked his head to the side, a smirk pulling at his lips, and added, “I guess that explains why you don’t throw yourself at me like most women do.”
“Excuse me?” Rose snapped.
“You must have noticed that vampires are insanely attractive,” he said.
“I’ve noticed that you’re insanely arrogant,” she muttered.
“It’s another example of nature’s cruelty,” he explained, ignoring her snarky interjection. “We have predatory senses that are so sensitive that we can easily hunt down our prey, but we don’t need to hunt them because they come to us. We appear attractive to your kind. Physically perfect. And as if that weren’t enough, that seductive power you mentioned? That is real, too. I don’t know what it is, exactly. I just know that humans are unable to resist it. Except…you do.”
She frowned worriedly. “Why am I able to resist it, if no one else can?”
Rose thought she saw something flash in his eyes. Hesitancy…or nervousness, maybe? But he quickly looked away. “I don’t know,” he mumbled.
Her eyes narrowed as she realized he was hiding something…again.
“Anyway,” he said, flinching as he saw the glare she was giving him, “the act of feeding is highly sexual for the vampire as well. Our…cravings…are linked. When we want someone, we crave their blood as well, and when we feed from them, we usually want to…” He smiled. “Well, I think you understand the rest.”
The light drained from her eyes, and she suddenly looked sick. “Is that why Theron tried to…” she trailed off. She couldn’t say it. Not again.
Kallias suddenly growled…like an animal…exactly like an animal. Rose bit her lip to suppress a laugh at his strange behavior. Then, he suddenly blinked and looked away, as if just realizing what he’d done. “Theron is the kind of evil that makes me…sick,” he snarled between clenched teeth. Hatred dripped from every word. “He enjoys making people suffer. That is why he tried to rape you.”
She nodded uneasily. “I take it that your kind don’t usually do that?”
“Why would they? Most humans are more than willing,” he said.
She swallowed. “But isn’t taking advantage of that a little…”
“Immoral?” he asked, finishing her sentence. His lip curled with disgust. “You pretty much have to be immoral, don’t you? To kill just to sate the hunger?”
Her heart clenched at the self-hatred in his tone. “But you don’t do that.”
His gaze drifted down to her neck. “I still want to. I still crave it.”
Rose reached up and touched his jaw. Kallias shuddered the moment her fingers touched his skin. She tilted his face until his gaze shifted to meet hers.
“But you don’t,” she reminded him. “That counts for something.”
His face contorted, as if the thought caused him pain. “Not enough.”
She sighed in defeat and dropped her hand. “Okay, so, I think I’m starting to understand why animal blood isn’t an option,” she said with a grimace.
His nose wrinkled. “You think?” he grumbled in disgust.
“So, then, how do you survive?” Rose asked. “If you don’t feed?”
Kallias frowned at her, as if he found her question ridiculous. “I’m immortal,” he reminded her. “I can’t die from starvation. My body heals itself.”
She paled, her stomach twisting at the horrific realizati
on. “Are you saying,” she breathed, “that you just starve? Over and over? And you never die?”
He shrugged, his face a mask of stoicism. “You sound appalled,” he observed. “Would you have preferred I said that I kill sixteen women a night?”
“Of course not,” Rose muttered. “It’s just… That sounds like agony.”
“Yeah,” Kallias agreed.
“You said the hunger is all-consuming,” she said. “How do you resist it?”
He shrugged again. “You can resist anything with enough conviction.”
Rose nodded. “And what is it? The conviction that allows you to resist?”
He sighed, “I can’t…prey on the weak. I just can’t.”
She smiled. “How can you not see the goodness that’s inside of you?”
His eyes flashed with rage. He stepped toward her so quickly that she stumbled back. His hand wrapped tightly around her arm to keep her from falling as he leaned toward her, his face inches from hers. “You have no idea what is going on in my head. Your blood smells sweet and powerful, and I don’t want to resist it, Rose. I want to drain every drop of blood from your body,” he growled, enunciating each word, as if he were in pain. “Does that sound good to you?”
She glared up at him. “Let go of my arm.”
His eyes softened, and he glanced down at her elbow that he was gripping so tightly. He took his hand off of her arm, his brows creasing with regret. He opened his mouth to ask her if she were okay, if he’d hurt her, or if he’d scared her, but then, thinking better of it, he shook his head and walked away from her.
Rose stared at him. The flames on his neck and shoulders traveled a third of the way down his back, and along his spine, she could see more scars. Scars, she realized, from injuries that had gone all the way through his body. From the looks of it, he had been stabbed all the way through his chest and stomach, and not just once, but many times. “You never told me how you died,” she said quietly.
“And I don’t plan to,” he said without even turning to look at her.
“Fine,” she sighed irritably. “Will you at least tell me how old you are?”
He was quiet for a moment. “Do you want to know how old I was when I died, or do you want to know how many years I have been alive altogether?”
The Stone of the Eklektos Page 28