"I have a safe place.” She gestured towards the house. “My roommates are gone. They won't be back all day. You'll be safe.” She risked a glance at the yellow eyes. “We'll all three be safe. Okay?"
A shimmer of light danced just below the inky skin.
"I'll take that for a yes.” Kate got out of the car, held open the door. After a moment, the demon slowly emerged, flowing like diesel oil and molasses. It formed its legs a little longer, so that they stood eye to eye.
"Come on.” She turned towards the house. The demon strode with her, side by side. They'd made it. Kate began to think that everything might work out according to her plan. For once.
But then the demon's smooth, flowing progress stumbled.
Kate paused, looking back.
A ripple passed through the demon's form, like a contraction across a pregnant stomach. The thing hunched in an obvious gesture of self-protection.
Kate glanced up at the sky. A ridge of light glowed on the horizon behind the trees.
The ripple turned into a wave, rocking the demon's surface, dropping it to the ground.
Before she could think about it, Kate went to her knees beside it. She had seen the pain Paul suffered at dusk. She hadn't realized that sunrise would hurt the demon, too.
The yellow eyes flared and then faded. Its body bowed, straining.
Kate lifted her hand, tentatively reached out to touch it. She felt the convulsions wracking the thing. It had no facial features but the yellow eyes. Without a mouth it couldn't groan or scream. Light flashed deep inside the darkness of it, and any pretense of human form it had melted away. It ran together, creating a vortex of blood and oil. The yellow eyes came loose from their anchor in the black liquid flesh, drained away into the swirl.
Kate knelt, unable to move. A breeze kicked through the trees, and she felt tears dry on her cheeks. She hadn't even realized she was crying.
From the swirling black vortex of the demon, a hand thrust out into the air.
Kate fell back, scrambling crablike away, as another hand, two arms, shoulders, and then Paul's face broke through the inky surface. He gasped as if he'd been underwater for far too long. Paul pulled himself out of the demon, and he flopped onto his side, his cheek pressed against the grass. What was left of the demon—a black, oily substance—pooled on his chest and drained into his pores, until finally, when the first real shaft of sunlight touched the grass, Paul lay alone, covered in nothing but sweat.
For a moment, Kate could do nothing but stare. Stare, and try to recapture her galloping heart and erratic breath. Simultaneously, Paul moaned softly and somewhere in the neighborhood, a door slammed, startling Kate into action. She shrugged off her jacket, fell to her knees, and laid it, inadequately small as it was, around Paul's shoulders as he sat up.
He looked at her, his eyes dark with a mix of resentment and resignation, then looked away. “Why did you do this?"
The question surprised her and angered her. “Why did you come along?"
"I didn't. It did."
She had to swallow a laugh. At least the demon had some sense. “Come into the house. It's safe and warm.” Surely he was cold, the sweat drying in the frosty October dawn.
"I should go.” He didn't meet her eyes.
Kate got to her feet. “You should give up the noble suffering act,” she said. She walked towards the house. She didn't look back. Please God, let him come along. Don't let him leave. Her feet hit the first stair. But she didn't look back.
* * * *
Paul watched her go, fully intending to walk the other way. But shafts of sunlight glinted through the trees, catching her in motion. The white dress she wore went translucent, revealing golden curves.
He closed his eyes. “We could go for coffee."
"You don't have any clothes.” Her voice was a sweet, teasing lilt from the porch.
He opened his eyes. She was going through the door, her hair floating around her like a halo.
He'd lied, of course. It wasn't just the demon who'd agreed to follow her home. It was just easier to believe that she could know the truth about him and still want him when he was imprisoned in the demon. Now he was flesh again, and she was flesh, and he wasn't sure he could get up from the grass.
Kate put her head out the door and snapped, “Don't make me come get you."
She was impossible to deny. The demon sent a wash of agreement through his nerves. The demon—it had stepped between Kate and Sander's gun. How long had he misunderstood and underestimated it? Probably for as long as they'd shared the same space in the universe.
He got to his feet. The trench coat she'd been wearing fit him like a cape. He tied it around his waist instead, strategically arranging the drapes and folds, before trotting up the little grassy hill, onto the porch and across the threshold.
He found himself in a little utility room, jackets on hooks, boots and shoes kicked under a sturdy bench. Kate waited for him, framed by the doorway into the main house.
"My roommates are gone for the day."
Two roommates, gone at dawn. She'd engineered this. He felt a flicker of gratitude, a wave of anticipation, and a chill of fear. He winced internally: Paul Dumond, artist of seduction, bringer of joy to unhappy ladies, afraid of being alone in a house with a woman.
"I don't know ... what you do ... after...” She shrugged helplessly, her eyes asking him for direction.
"A shower,” he said, then paused to clear his throat. “A shower would be good."
Kate nodded, businesslike and efficient. “Follow me."
Paul followed. She led him through the house, an old Victorian with walls beginning to lean out of square. When he had fled Bonaventure in the early 1920's in his mad attempt to escape Sander and the curse, the house had been a falling down mess. When he'd returned someone had restored it. He'd made inquiries over time—he'd had a lot of time—and found out it had been built the year he'd been born. He and his mother had rented a room in it for a time, during a period of renovations on their estate. Eerie, that Kate would come to live in a house that had ties, however impersonal, to his original life.
Paul realized that he was filling his mind with thoughts about the house to chase out thoughts of Kate's hips swaying up the stairs in front of him. Because when he focused on the shadow of her skin inside the white cotton fabric, he started to get hard.
She took him upstairs to the third floor, motioned to the right once she reached the top of the stairs. “Everything's in there."
The door to the bathroom was partially ajar. Paul could see the vanity mirror, the row of small lights above it. There was only one other door, and it was closed. Surely it led to her bedroom. A tremor ran through him, but it wasn't fear this time.
I don't know if I can do this. He wasn't sure if he remembered how to love a woman properly. He wasn't sure if he could wait long enough to take a shower.
He ducked into the bathroom, muttering a quick thanks, and closed the door behind him.
* * * *
Kate stood at the top of the stairs, eyes on the closed door. This isn't going how I imagined.
In her fantasies, Paul arose from his transformation, newly minted sunshine beaming down on his shoulders as he swept her and her white dress into his arms, carried her upstairs, kicked in the door, and threw her on the bed.
She heard the shower pipes rattle, heard water hit fiberglass. With a sigh, she folded up on the top step. Maybe now just wasn't the time for romance. In the space of the dawn just past and the next dawn to come, Paul's life—and Kate's—might be altered forever. Paul might be free of the curse the next time the sun came up. Or Kate could be dead.
Once he came out of the bathroom, cleansed of whatever the change did to him, freshened with the new toothbrush she had thoughtfully purchased, armored against her in clothing, he would insist that they go to the coffee shop and return the relationship to breakfast only. Kate felt certain of it. Just her luck. Now that she had made the decision to enter his weird, cur
sed life, he would make his decision to keep her out of it.
She scrunched her fingers through her hair, feeling the curls Gwen had carefully smoothed spring loose and frizz out. If it's not my stocking, it's my hair. If it's not my hair, it's the car breaking down. If it's not the car breaking down, it's a giant meteor...
She should really be glad. In point of fact, she should feel wildly relieved. Paul was the sensible one. He knew the score. Kate didn't belong in his shadowy world. She hadn't been born in 1868. She didn't have a favorite flavor of anything, didn't have a favorite color. Red, green, blue—what did it matter, really? She should be glad that this absurd little fantasy had been slapped in the face by the light of morning. She probably didn't even really love him. It was all just a hormonal Molotov cocktail set alight by the idea he hadn't been with a woman in a whole century, and, big deal, he just couldn't hold out any longer the moment she was within arm's reach. It was embarrassing, really, to be just a convenience. She was glad it wasn't working out. Glad. Really, really.
Besides, when I tell him that I'm going through with Vern's plan, he might be mad enough to kill me before Sander does.
Which was why she was very carefully not going to mention it, until they'd made love at least twice.
Kate dropped her head into her hands. What the hell am I doing?
* * * *
What the hell am I doing? Paul dropped his head, let the warm water pound against the back of his neck. I can't do this to her. It's wrong.
The demon radiated a wave of disapproval that cramped his stomach and brought the taste of bile to the back of his throat. It wanted to make love with Kate as much as he did.
He had the distinct feeling that the thought made the demon laugh.
Clearly, Kate had brought him here to make love. It would be their last chance before the ritual. She wanted to have all of him, and give him all of herself. He'd forbidden her to try Vern's all-too-dangerous plan, so this would be the ultimate goodbye.
If he was a better man, he would find a way to sever himself from her heart and her life, hurt her if he had to, but free her from loving him. She had a natural life to look forward to, while he only had misery and impossible choices. He should just find a way to set her free. But he was not that good of a man. He wanted her, and he'd denied himself so much for too long.
He could never live with himself if Kate died like Gloria. He couldn't face an eternal half-life buried under the guilt. But he couldn't face an eternal life without her, as Sander's slave. He wasn't strong enough to let her go.
Paul saw only one alternative, and it terrified him. She won't like my plan, but it is the only way. She'll see that. She'll understand.
The demon sent another wave of nausea and vehement disagreement through him.
"Cut it out,” he muttered. “How am I supposed to make love with her if you are trying to make me puke?"
Immediately the swirl of discomfort subsided. For whatever reason, the demon wanted this as much as he did. Of course, when it ended, the demon would have everything.
He turned off the water, dried himself with the towel she had so thoughtfully provided. She'd thought of everything: toothbrush, clothes, shoes in four different sizes, though all of them too small.
The sensation of the towel rubbing over his chest and thighs was only making him harder. His skin was that eager. His nerve endings screamed like baby birds in a nest.
I'll tell her my plan before we do anything else. If she can't go through with it, then I'll leave.
He didn't bother with the clothes yet, just wrapped the towel around his waist. He wiped the steam from the mirror with his palm, smoothed back his damp hair, checked his teeth.
I'll tell her my plan, and then she can choose if she wants to make love or not.
He put his hand on the doorknob.
What the hell am I doing?
He dropped the towel, and opened the door.
Chapter Seventeen
The bathroom door opened. Kate came to her feet.
Paul was not wearing the gray t-shirt or the sweat pants. Or the tightie whities. Or anything at all, except for whorls of still-damp hair on his chest and stomach and thighs.
"Wow.” Her tongue stuck to the roof of her suddenly dry mouth.
He tilted an eyebrow.
"I mean, I'm so glad to see everything is the right size ... I mean just your style."
His other eyebrow lifted.
"You look great. You look...” He was fully erect. “...great."
Oh God, I am the biggest, dumbest geek on the planet. She had to stop talking, or he would get dressed and leave.
"Kate."
He was naked and saying her name in a low tone that made her think of wood smoke and red wine and distant summer thunderstorms. Her pulse doubled, and she seemed to grow extra hearts: one in her throat, one at the tip of each finger, and one between her thighs.
He moved out of the bathroom doorway and she moved away from the staircase, until some invisible force stopped them an arm's length apart.
"Kate,” he said again, and she saw it in his eyes. Some question, some condition, that was going to ruin this. “There's something..."
"No."
"Kate..."
"There's nothing that matters right now except this.” She lifted her right hand, which she couldn't stop from quivering, to the first pearl button of her bodice.
His eyes followed the movement and he sucked in a deep breath. “Kate, I have to..."
"No, you don't.” Fumbling only a little, she popped the first button, the second, the third.
A tremor ran the length of Paul's body, from shoulders to hips. “Kate..."
He was going to insist on something stupid like her promising not to try Vern's plan, or rationalizing why she should just let him go and forget him. Then, instead of making love, they would spend the morning fighting, and she was not going to let that happen.
"Kate, I have to tell you..."
She leaned forward and brushed the tips of her fingers across the tip of his erection.
Paul jerked like she'd sent an electric current bucking through his nerves. He came at her so quickly, the sight of his open mouth and wide eyes filled up her field of vision. He pushed her back, his hands digging into her shoulders, back, back, back, until she slammed into her closed bedroom door. Her breath came out in a sudden burst against his neck. He gathered a handful of curls and pulled her head back, closed his other hand around her exposed throat. He bared his teeth and went at her mouth, sucking and biting, forcing her lips wide and reaching for the back of her throat with his tongue. His hips jerked and rammed against her body, bouncing her against the wooden door. His hand released her throat and plunged down between their bodies. His fingers convulsed. Kate heard fabric tear. Little pearl buttons hit the floor, and Paul suddenly leaned away.
"Oh God, Kate.” His face was still flushed with excitement, but his eyes were cold with shame. “I'm sorry."
Feeling dazed, Kate looked down the length of her body. He'd torn her dress at the stomach. The pucker of her belly button and the waistband of her panties peeked up at her.
"I'm sorry...” he whispered again.
Kate lifted her eyes to him. “For what?"
"I ripped your dress."
She laughed. “It's Gwen's, who cares?"
His erection bobbed eagerly in response to her laughter, but it was with deliberate tenderness that he lifted his hand, traced her cheek with careful tenderness. “I don't want to rip you, too."
"You won't,” she assured him, groping behind her for the doorknob. She twisted it. Golden light spilled out around her feet. “Come on."
Warily, Paul followed her inside. Then his eyes lit with wonder.
With her roomies’ help, Kate had blocked the sunlight with heavy drapes on the window. The only light was the glow of the dozen candles they'd bought, turning her bedroom into a hazy, secret place for just the two of them.
"It's our own private night.”
Kate said. Would he like it? Would he think, after a hundred sexless years, that romance should be damned?
Paul kept his back to her. She couldn't see his expression when he whispered, “Thank you."
"For what?"
Too many heartbeats went by in silence. Kate's spirits began to sink. Oh my God he's going to thank me, leave, and go find some skank who wants it rough and...
"Thank you,” Paul said again, breaking her thought. “For three hundred and fifty nine breakfasts. For coming back when I chased you away.” He turned. His eyes gleamed brightly in the candlelight. “For still wanting me, even when you found out...” He reached for her with a shaking hand. “For being alive."
His fingers found the fourth button of her white dress.
Kate felt herself go profoundly still, barely able to breathe. She wanted to close her eyes, but she couldn't lose the sight of him naked and candlelit, tense and gentle. He undid the next button. His eyes flickered from her face to the skin he was revealing. The next button popped loose. The next.
Paul raised his eyebrows. Kate glanced down her body, to see what he saw. He'd revealed her bra. His fingers caressed the front closure.
"Thank you, that was a very thoughtful choice.” His other hand lifted towards her, and he unfastened the hooks.
Kate drew in a sudden, shaky breath. “You're welcome."
He chuckled, a low, intimate sound that released her from the stillness and set her trembling. He kept on unbuttoning, hardly touching her. When he reached the place he'd torn the fabric, though, he brushed his fingers over the skin he'd exposed. Shivers cascaded through her.
He ran out of buttons. The dress clung precariously to her shoulders. He closed his fists over both the dress and the straps of her opened bra, and gently pulled them down her arms. He paused for a moment with the sleeves halfway down, her arms trapped. He knelt down in front of her.
It surprised her. She pulled back just a little, but he held her steady. His tongue tickled the line of her ribs. The sensation sparkled through her, raising the hairs along the nape of her neck.
Bonds of Darkness Page 19