Rose watched him, the way his brown eyes seemed to simultaneously darken with desire and soften with affection. She felt his heart thudding against her palms, and she felt her own heart pounding against her chest. Then, acting on impulse, she gripped his shirt and pulled him closer. She lifted herself onto her toes and pressed her lips to his, earning a surprised groan from his mouth.
With a soft growl, Kallias pulled away sharply. His eyes flashed with dark hunger and lust, and he took a step forward, backing her into a bookshelf, like a predator pursuing his prey. The difference was that, in this instance, Rose, the prey, wanted him to catch her. His lips lifted into a dangerous, seductive smile.
Kallias pressed her against the solid part of the bookcase as he claimed her lips with his. He grasped her hands and pinned them on each side of her head as he kissed her hungrily and passionately. Rose moaned and pressed herself closer to him, tightening her hands around his. She whimpered when he pulled away from her lips. He chuckled softly at her reaction as he pressed his lips to the sensitive skin between her ear and her neck. She gasped at the sensation of his warm lips on her neck. He kissed her neck again, lower this time, and then again, trailing his lips lower until he reached the most sensitive place on her neck. Heat consumed her body, boiling the blood in her veins and setting fire to her skin.
Kallias nibbled and licked her neck, listening to her quiet, breathless moans, her rapid pulse, and the sound of her blood coursing rapidly through her veins. Her scent overwhelmed his senses, the soft scents of vanilla and honey along with the sweet, powerful scent of her blood. He grazed his fangs against her skin, watching as chill bumps swept across her fair skin in response.
As Rose felt his sharp fangs on her neck, she suddenly realized that some part of her actually wanted him to bite her. The dangerous desire came crawling out from some dark part of her mind that she didn’t even know existed.
But when Kallias pulled away from her neck and pressed his lips to hers again, that strange, dark thought fled from her mind, replaced by only one desire: him. He let go of her hands, one of his hands entangling in her soft auburn hair and the other hand grasping her hip, pulling her lower body flush against his.
He buried his face in the curve of her neck, breathing heavily, inhaling her appealing scent. He pressed his mouth against her neck. “Se thelo,” he groaned, murmuring the Greek words into her skin, not expecting her to understand them.
But she did understand. “I want you, too,” she whispered breathlessly.
His lips attacked hers again, as if he could consume her with a kiss. She kissed him back, matching his passion and hunger with her own. Her hands fumbled clumsily with the buttons of his shirt. She felt him groan against her lips the moment her hands found his bare chest. His hand moved along her hip, his fingers trailing down to her thighs and then moving toward the center of her legs.
“Gamoto,” Kallias cursed. He pulled away from her abruptly.
Not expecting him to step back, Rose stumbled forward away from the bookcase, but Kallias’s hand caught her elbow before she could fall. Still panting for breath, she frowned at him, worried that she’d done something wrong.
He glared toward the doorway. “What the hell are you doing, Erik?”
Rose blinked in shock and followed his gaze to find Erik standing in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe, watching them with an amused smirk.
Erik shrugged one shoulder. “Just enjoying the show.”
Rose felt her cheeks burning with embarrassment. “You’re disgusting,” she said. She’d intended to sound angry, but her voice still sounded breathless.
Erik clasped his hand over his chest. “Ouch. You’ve wounded me.”
“Wounding you. That sounds like a good idea, actually,” Kallias mused.
Erik raised both hands in surrender. “Whoa. Calm down. It’s not my fault you two decided to have sex in the library, of all places. No, seriously. Why here? This is the least arousing room to ever exist. Also, I think it’s a bit hypocritical, considering the way you acted about Amy and I having a little fun on the stairs.”
“Anne,” Kallias corrected. “Erik, her name was Anne.”
“We were not having sex!” Rose squeaked, her blush deepening.
Erik grinned at her. “From what I saw, that’s where it was headed.”
“You act like you didn’t know this was a bad time,” Kallias grumbled to Erik. “I know that you knew what was happening. You would have felt it.”
“What the heck do you mean by that?” Rose asked Kallias.
Erik answered her before Kallias could. “He means that I could feel your emotions. Desire is an emotion, babe.” His lips curved into a sickeningly smug smirk. “You know…that emotion that you were feeling so overwhelmingly?”
“I don’t think this could get any more embarrassing,” Rose muttered.
Kallias glanced at her and offered her a wary, apologetic smile. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Don’t say that. He will take it as a challenge.”
Erik pushed away from the doorframe and walked into the room. He smirked at Kallias. “So, is this what you meant by just protecting her?”
Kallias narrowed his eyes at his friend. “I am protecting her.”
“Clearly,” Erik snorted, his green eyes sparkling with amusement. “Ah, come on. Don’t look at me like that. You know I like to gloat when I’m right.”
Rose frowned at Kallias. “What does he mean? Right about what?”
“Nothing,” he muttered. He directed his next words at Erik. “So, did you have an actual reason for coming in here at such an inappropriate time?”
“Aside from the fact that you’re a creepy pervert,” Rose added.
Erik grinned in response to her insult. “Hey, what you call perverted was considered normal when I was human,” he said, shrugging nonchalantly.
“Erik, you were never considered normal,” Kallias muttered.
Erik laughed and shrugged. He strode over to one of the leather sofas and perched himself on the arm of the sofa. “Actually, I did need to talk to you.”
Kallias nodded. He buttoned his shirt as he walked over to the sofa.
Rose blushed at the reminder of how eagerly she’d unbuttoned his shirt. She noticed Erik glance at her and grin, and her blush deepened as she realized he must have sensed her embarrassment. He winked at her, confirming her fear.
“Are you coming?” Kallias asked, turning back toward her.
“I was actually thinking about standing here and dying of embarrassment. I prefer to die near books and not near perverted, empathic vampires,” she said.
Erik laughed. “I don’t think she likes me,” he said to Kallias.
Kallias sank down onto the sofa across from Erik. “I don’t blame her.”
“So, I talked to Geoff and Emma. They said they’d help,” Erik told Kallias. “Geoff, of course, expressed his doubts. He thinks she’s a lost cause.”
“She is not a lost cause,” Kallias stated, his voice firm and harsh.
Erik raised his hands. “I didn’t say it. He did. Don’t kill the messenger. You know how Geoff is. He’s always trying to be rational. He has nothing against her. He hasn’t met her. But even you have to admit the odds aren’t in her favor.”
“I don’t give a shit about the odds,” Kallias said. “I won’t let her die.”
A strange look passed over Erik’s face. A mixture of surprise and curiosity, Rose thought. Erik raised his eyebrow at Kallias, as if carrying on a silent conversation with him. Rose scowled at them, frustrated that she was being left out of the telepathic conversation that they were obviously having.
She walked over to them and crossed her arms. “I’m a lost cause?”
Erik looked up at her, seeming to suddenly remember that she was there.
“No, you’re not,” Kallias stated.
“I didn’t ask you,” she told Kallias. She looked at Erik. “I asked him.”
Erik looked taken aback. “No, you’re
not,” he said, agreeing with Kallias. Then, he shrugged. “Or yes, you are. I don’t know. My abilities are empathic, not precognitive. Geoff thinks that you are, but Geoff was a scientist when he was human. He sees everything in black and white…facts and numbers…”
She shrugged. “Then, he’s right. You can’t argue with statistics.”
“I disagree,” Erik challenged. “I don’t care about numbers and facts. Statistics treat everyone as if they’re the same, but everyone’s not the same. People feel differently. Emotions change things. I’d trust feelings over facts any day.”
“That sounds like a really irrational line of thinking,” Rose commented.
He shrugged. “I am an empath. Emotions aren’t known for rationality.”
“It’s true. He is the most irrational person I’ve ever met,” Kallias agreed.
Erik just chuckled at Kallias’s remark. Then, he returned his gaze to Rose, shifting his body toward her. “Think about it this way. All of the experts in the world might say that you can’t do something, but with the right motivation, if you feel strongly enough about it, you just might prove them wrong. Likewise, without the right emotion, there’s a chance that you’ll fail. People do crazy, impossible things for the ones they love all of the time. Because of what they feel.”
Rose considered that. “Why does your friend think that I’m a lost cause?”
Kallias frowned worriedly at Erik. “Erik, don’t.”
Erik scowled at him. “You know that thing that you do when you get all overprotective of people you care about? You’re doing it again. There are countless vampires who want to kill her, one of which happens to be a sadistic psychopath. Trying to protect her from being afraid is pointless, don’t you think?”
“I’m not… I just…” Kallias stammered, actually at a loss for words, for once. He glanced at Rose and sighed, “Fine. Tell her what she wants to know.”
Erik looked at her. He gestured toward the sofa. “Sit down.”
Rose hugged herself and shook her head. She felt too anxious to sit down, too worried about Erik’s answer. “No, thanks. I’m okay with standing.”
Erik rolled his eyes and stood. “Well, I’m not. See, I’m not usually an anxious person, and you’re anxious, which means I’m anxious because I feel what you feel. And I don’t like feeling anxious.” He grabbed her arm in the middle of his speech and dragged her toward the sofa. He pushed her down beside Kallias.
She glared at the blonde vampire. “Just who do you think you are?”
He grinned. “Erik Olafsson. We already went over this, didn’t we?”
Then, to her surprise, Erik leaned forward and placed his hand on her shoulder. Before she could ask him what he was doing, she felt a strange wave of serenity wash over her, slowing her heartbeat and calming her anxiety. For a moment or two, she vaguely wondered if she’d been drugged with a sedative or something, but then, she realized that she didn’t feel sleepy. She just felt…calm.
Erik sighed in relief. “That’s better.”
“What did you just do to me?” Rose snapped.
“Damn, your emotions are nearly as unstable as mine,” Erik complained. “I just calmed you, and you’re already pissed. Are you always like this?”
“Yeah,” Kallias answered.
Rose glared at Kallias. “I’m not emotionally unstable,” she muttered. She turned back toward Erik. “And…you calmed me? What do you mean by that?”
Erik sat down on the sofa that set opposite them. “That is how my abilities work. I control your emotions. I can either manipulate your current state, or I can create emotions and project them. In your case, I calmed your anxiety.”
“Do you have to touch the person to do that?” she asked.
“Not really,” he answered. “Physical contact just helps me control it.”
“If he didn’t touch you, he could accidentally manipulate the emotions of everyone in a five-mile radius,” Kallias said. “He doesn’t have great control.”
“Hey, asshole, you have no room to talk,” Erik countered. “At least I don’t carry on conversations with people’s thoughts without even realizing it.”
Rose couldn’t help it. She suddenly started giggling. When she noticed Kallias scowling at her, she covered her mouth with her hand in an effort to stop herself from laughing. “Sorry. It’s just…he’s right. You do that. A lot, actually.”
“Did she just say I’m right?” Erik asked. “I need to write that down.”
“Wait. Five-mile radius? You’re joking, right?” Rose asked, stunned.
“It only happened once,” Erik said. “My emotions were a little unstable.”
“Your emotions are always a little unstable,” Kallias pointed out.
“My emotions were a lot unstable,” Erik amended.
Rose stared at him in shock. “Uh…right. So…why am I a lost cause?”
“You’re not,” Kallias stated again, staring at the floor.
“Because Theron is ancient, and he’s determined to kill you,” Erik said.
Kallias glared at him. “Theron isn’t a problem. I will kill him myself.”
Erik scowled at him. “You keep saying that, and yet, he is still alive.”
“I told you. I’ve been distracted,” Kallias muttered.
“And you will continue to be distracted, as long as she is alive,” Erik said, jabbing his finger toward Rose. “That is how emotions work. They can empower you and make you stronger, but they can also weaken you and distract you.”
Rose frowned. She glanced at Kallias, but he shifted away from her gaze.
“Besides, even if you weren’t distracted, he is still older than you, which means, physically, he’s stronger. On top of that, you’re starved,” Erik added. “The advantage that your telepathic abilities give you is negated by the fact that he feeds, and you don’t. You might as well be centuries younger than him.”
Rose thought about that. “What would happen if he weren’t starving?”
Kallias scowled suspiciously at her. “Why does it matter? I am.”
“Oh, calm down. It’s just a question,” she muttered. “I’m curious.”
“Hypothetically, it would even the odds,” Kallias admitted warily. “But I don’t see why it matters because I am starving, and I don’t intend to change that.”
“It would do more than even the odds,” Erik interjected. “He is a telepath. Theron cannot compete with telepathy in one-on-one combat, not if Kallias has fed. But we’re not dealing with one-on-one combat. Theron has other vampires helping him, apparently, and most likely, there are more of them than there are of us. And the odds of us being able to defeat all of them aren’t great.”
Rose turned toward Kallias. “Why didn’t you tell me this?”
Kallias kept his gaze on the floor. “I’m not afraid of numbers.”
“You should be!” she snapped. “Did you honestly expect me to be okay with you risking your life for me? With all of you possibly dying for me?”
“Well, I don’t think it will really matter if you are okay with it, if we all wind up dying,” Erik said nonchalantly, “because you will be dead, too. So…”
They both frowned at him. “How is that helpful?” Kallias asked him.
Erik shrugged. “I was just trying to say something comforting.”
“You should probably stick with your supernatural ability,” Rose said.
Erik nodded. “Yeah, probably,” he agreed.
Kallias turned toward her, his knee brushing her thigh as he turned. “It doesn’t matter if you are okay with it. Risking my life is my choice, not yours.”
“It’s my choice whether I let you protect me,” she argued. “I could leave.”
Erik snorted. “And do what? Hitchhike?”
Rose turned and narrowed her eyes at Erik.
Erik cringed. “She’s going to kill someone with that glare one day.”
“If you leave, I will just follow you,” Kallias told her.
“
Even if I tell you not to?” Rose asked angrily.
Kallias stared at her, his gaze intense. “I can’t let you die.”
She studied him for several moments. “Well, maybe I can’t let you die either. Have you considered that? How is my life more valuable than yours?”
“Because my life is stolen. I should have died long ago,” Kallias explained. “You have a life to live. You have infinite possibilities ahead of you.”
“They’re hardly infinite,” Rose scoffed. “And none of that matters. The point is that I don’t want any of you to risk your lives for me. So, don’t.”
“I will be fine,” Kallias insisted. “And what they do is their choice.”
Rose frowned and looked at Erik. “Your choice is no, right?”
“What?” Erik laughed, as if that were absurd. “My choice is hell yes.”
“Why?” she asked. “I don’t understand why any of you would do this.”
“Well, first of all, this will be one hell of a battle, which means it will be the most fun I’ve had in a while,” Erik explained. “And second…this is what we do. Every time I go up against a vampire in order to save a human, I am risking my life. And not once has that ever stopped me…or any of us, for that matter.”
“Why?” Rose prodded.
“Because Kallias did it for twelve hundred years by himself, and he was so overwhelmed that he actually forgot how to get women,” Erik joked.
Kallias stared at him blankly.
“But why?” Rose insisted, scowling. “You must have a real reason.”
All of the humor suddenly faded from Erik’s face. “How many lives do you think someone has to save in order to ease the guilt of taking so many?”
She swallowed uneasily. “I don’t know,” she admitted.
“Neither do I,” Erik said. “I haven’t reached that number yet.”
Rose stared at him for a long time, her chest suddenly tight with sympathy. Should she feel sympathy for someone who murdered people? She didn’t know. She couldn’t help it, though. This had always been her problem. She sympathized with everyone, even those that others refused to pity. These two men were vampires, brutal, violent vampires, but to her, they were still people, damaged and hurting. How could she not believe there was still good in them?
The Stone of the Eklektos Page 53