by Amy Patrick
He shrugged as if the brutal schedule was no big deal. “It’s part of the job—or it was until someone convinced my commander I’d be more useful as a ladies’ maid, traipsing around the countryside owl-watching and collecting daisies every night.”
He sounded so disgruntled I had to laugh. “You’re welcome, by the way. Come on, you have to admit this is more fun.”
“Maybe.” He shrugged again, and then he laughed.
“So what do the Bloodbound usually do for fun?”
He gave me a funny look before answering. “We have our rare opportunities for... recreational activities.”
“Like what?” I asked, trying to get him to open up to me about the mysterious group of men he now lived and worked with—something he’d steadfastly resisted.
“You can’t date. You can’t swim with girls. What else is there to do—when you’re not working on your big muscles, that is.” I bent my arms into a comical bodybuilder pose.
That got a small grin out of him, but he shook his head in refusal. “I wouldn’t want to shock your delicate ears.”
The remark both titillated and offended me. I’d changed a lot since the night we met, but he seemed to want to continue viewing me through that same narrow lens, to keep me in the role of an innocent who needed protection.
“I’m not that same naïve little Amish girl you met at the bonfire, you know.”
The grin stretched to cover more of Reece’s face. “Oh really? How many other vampires do you see going for nature walks?”
He held his arms out to the side in an invitation for me to look around. Finally, his eyes met mine. “You still seem the same to me. And I wouldn’t be in too big a hurry to change—I liked that girl I met.”
Something warm and sweet curled in my abdomen. For a few minutes we walked in pleasurable silence, side by side.
Our path back down took us alongside a sparkling lake tucked into a high mountain valley, and the hazy reflection of the cloud-covered moon on its surface took me back in time.
“Reece?”
He glanced over at me. “Hmmm?”
“Remember that night... when you asked me if I believed in destiny?”
He huffed a humorless laugh. “Yeah. What a joke.”
“What? No. I was going to say... well, I never would have predicted the turns my life has taken, but who’s to say that wasn’t my destiny, you know? And you were definitely right about us seeing each other again. If things hadn’t changed the way they did, we probably never would have crossed paths again. We wouldn’t be here now—together. So, as it turned out, what you said was true. Destiny is real.”
“That seems like a million years ago to me. I was a stupid kid, Abbi. We were kids. Now we’re involved in something that’s so big and so ancient, there’s no fighting it or hiding from it. You don’t see it tucked away in the Bastion, removed from the outside world, but when we go out and do our patrols, I see the signs increasing every day.”
He stopped walking and picked up a stone from the lake’s bank, rubbing it with his thumb before putting it in his pocket.
Staring out over the water’s smooth, dark surface, he continued.
“There’s a war coming. And there won’t be any surrender or terms of peace in this one. One side will win, and one will lose. I’ve got to make sure we’re on the winning side. If there is such a thing as destiny, that’s mine—keeping yo—”
He stopped himself and started again. “... all of our people alive and safe.”
“Even if it means being at Imogen’s beck and call? Surely you wouldn’t be happy with an arrangement like that? Not when you could have a mate of your own.”
Slowly, Reece bent to collect another rock. “We’re not going to talk about that,” he said to the ground.
“Why not?”
Straightening, he drew his arm back. “We’re not...”
The stone flew, landing with a splash and turning the water’s glassy stillness into a broken mirror. “...going to talk about it. Come on.”
He turned and resumed the homeward trek. His pace was so fast I nearly had to jog to keep up with him.
“What if there’s another way?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, what if there is no war? What if it could be prevented? We learned about the Crimson Accord in class at the Bastion. Sadie Aldritch believes peace between the species is the only way, that the Accord can still work.”
“Sadie Aldritch is a dreamer.”
“Is that what Imogen told you? When she came to see you at the clinic?”
His lips pressed into a straight, unyielding line of silence.
“You know they’re sisters, right?” I asked.
“Yeah. I heard that. So?”
“So, sisters disagree sometimes. I had two of them myself. We loved each other, but sometimes we fought like a couple of barn cats. Usually neither one of us was right. I think Sadie might be though. About peace.”
“You think so, do you?” A bitter laugh preceded a snarl. “How peaceful were the humans you encountered after turning?”
I thought back on my first couple of days as a vampire. My father had not been welcoming, but I could understand his perspective—he was in shock at the sight of me and afraid for my mother and my siblings.
The people at the hospital had been kind though. Maybe they hadn’t recognized me for what I was.
Other than them, I hadn’t interacted with any other humans before Kannon had brought me here.
Clearly Reece had encountered some—and it hadn’t been pleasant.
“What happened to you out there Reece? You’ve never told me.”
“And I never will. Believe me, you don’t want to know.”
Reece was so stubborn. Even when we’d spent hours talking at the clinic, he drew the line at talking about those lost weeks in between his human existence and his time at the Bastion.
When would he ever open up to me and return to being that open-hearted, playful guy he’d been at the bonfire? I refused to believe that wonderful person was gone forever.
He picked up his pace again, glaring up at the clouds overhead. “The bottom’s about to drop out. We need to hurry.”
No sooner had the last word left his mouth than the skies opened, and freezing cold rain pelted us. We were still in the foothills, and there was as much rock underfoot as soil and grass. After a minute of torrential rain, it became slippery.
“Watch your step,” Reece warned, shouting to be heard over the wind and the downpour.
I was trying to watch it, but it was impossible to see more than a few inches in front of me. About thirty seconds after his warning, my left foot slid across a wet rock, then both feet flew out from under me.
I went down, sustaining a painful blow to my tailbone.
Reece, who was a few paces ahead of me, stopped and turned around then rushed to my side. He crouched beside me, sliding an arm around my back to help me up.
“You okay?”
I nodded, wincing over my sore backside—and my bruised ego.
“Yeah. I think so. Maybe let me... could we just rest here a minute? I don’t think I can walk yet.”
He looked around. “Sure. But let me get you out of the rain. Come on. Over here.”
Leaning on his supportive arm, I stepped gingerly alongside him. “Where are we going?”
“Just over here. Not too much farther. I think I see somewhere we can get out of the rain.”
25
Better Off Not Knowing
Sure enough, there was a shallow cave in the rocky hillside nearby.
We ducked inside, sitting with our backs against its stony wall because the opening was too low to allow for standing comfortably.
Shivering, I wrapped my arms around my knees and pulled them close, grateful to be out of the deluge.
“It’s really coming down out there,” I said. “My dad used to call this kind of storm a ‘gullywasher.’”
“Mine would say it
’s raining ‘pitchforks.’ At least there’s no lightning.”
As if on cue, white electricity branched across the sky. It was followed by a cave-shaking boom.
We looked at each other and laughed.
“Yeah. At least there’s that,” I said and laughed again. The laughter warmed me a bit but not enough. Another hard shiver rocked my body.
“You cold?” Reece slid an arm around my shoulders, cupping one of them in a large hand.
“Aren’t you?” I asked, turning my face to study his. It was close in this position—close enough I could see individual raindrops that had caught on his stubble.
He didn’t return my gaze but stared out at the storm.
“Nah. I’ve got all this tight leather to keep me warm, remember?”
He cracked a smile, and even in the darkness his teeth gleamed white. God he was handsome.
Reece had made a full recovery from the blood poisoning, and his grueling Navy SEAL-style workouts with the Bloodbound had enhanced his already impressive physique. His arm around my shoulders was heavy and well-muscled. Even his jaw looked stronger.
Unable to resist, I reached up and stroked it gently.
His fingers grabbed mine in a lightning-quick reaction, snatching them away from his face.
He frowned down at me. “What are you doing?”
“Wiping away a raindrop,” I lied. “Your face is wet.”
Staring at me for a long moment, he finally said, “Your face is wet too. And your hair... you’re soaked through. Here...”
Unfastening his jacket, he removed it then stripped the dry shirt underneath over his head and handed it to me.
“Use this.”
I took the offered shirt, but I wasn’t sure how much good it would do—not if the goal was getting drier.
The alluring scent of him filled the tight cave. That combined with the sight of his shirtless torso was causing sweat to pop out along my hairline and at the nape of my neck.
Using the soft shirt, I dabbed at my face and neck, darting glances at his bare chest, arms, and abdomen.
Wow. Heat was spreading rapidly through my body, and it was a physical struggle not to reach out and run my hands over his smooth, beautiful skin. It was like he exuded some sort of powerful but invisible magnetic force.
I wrenched my eyes away from his mid-section and those enticing V-shaped lines that disappeared beneath his belt.
“Do the Bloodbound take... steroids?” I asked, trying valiantly to sound unaffected by his partial nudity.
Reece’s head jerked back. He wore a quizzical look. “What?”
“Anabolic steroids, you know... to increase stamina, and strength, and speed, and... size.”
He laughed. “No. Is that what people say about us at the Bastion?”
“Well...” I gave him a sheepish grin.
“No. We don’t take steroids. I don’t even know if those would work on vampire physiology. But the blood we drink is a little different from the general population at the Bastion.”
“Different how?”
“It’s pure plasma. And it comes from a special group of donors.”
“How are they special?”
Reece waved a hand as if dismissing the conversation. “I don’t really know a whole lot about it. I haven’t even been initiated yet, remember.”
Ah. The subject I really wanted to talk about. Here was my opening.
“About that...”
“No Abbi. We’re not going to talk about that. I’ve made up my mind, okay? Why can’t you just accept it?”
“Because I can’t. Because I don’t understand.”
He got up as if preparing to leave the cave. The rain had dissipated a bit. “You done with that?”
He gestured to his shirt, and I handed it back to him—reluctantly. He pulled it over his head and down over his waist.
“You don’t need to understand everything, okay? Trust me when I say there are some things you’re better off not knowing for now.”
“I disagree.”
He stretched a hand down to me, offering to pull me up to my feet. “Well, you can disagree all you want to, but this conversation is closed. You wanted me to protect you, right? Then let me do my job and please... stop trying to make things harder than they already are.”
Harder than they are?
There it was again—a thinly veiled hint that Reece wasn’t happy with his “choice” to join the Bloodbound.
We trudged home side by side but worlds apart. The quiet between us cloaked a cacophony of arguments and questions screaming in my head. Reece hadn’t said it outright, but he’d hinted a couple of times now that his enlistment with the Bloodbound had something to do with keeping me safe.
At this point, only five days away from the ceremony, I was much more concerned with his safety—with his freedom.
And with his future. A conversation we’d had the night of the bonfire had stayed in my mind, the one about settling for a good-enough life.
It seemed obvious to me that was what he was doing by joining the Bloodbound.
Now to convince him of that before it was too late.
26
Beyond the Scope
Once we’d turned thirteen and had grown out of baby dolls and treehouses, Hannah and I used to spend a lot of time in my room—or hers—discussing her new favorite topic. Boys.
She’d had a lot of theories about what they liked, what they wanted. Some of them seemed pretty crazy to me, but one had stuck with me.
“If you kiss a boy, he’ll do anything you want him to,” she’d informed me.
Then she’d proceeded to prove her point by flirting with one boy or another in our village, finding an opportune moment for this magical kiss, then asking boy-of-the-moment to do her farm chores for her.
They always had.
It seemed to work pretty much the same for Heather. She always had some lovesick male vampire following her around, and since she did kiss and tell, I had a good idea why.
There were no unsavory chores I wanted Reece to take over for me, but I did want him to talk to me, to tell me the truth about what was going on with him. The whole truth.
So as we arrived back at the Bastion and he walked me to my chambers, I formulated a plan.
We arrived at my door, and Reece opened it for me.
“I’ll see you tomor—”
“Come in please,” I said, cutting him off. “I need your help with something.”
Reece inhaled a long slow breath and let it out but said nothing. He stepped inside, and I closed the door behind us.
I turned to him. “I’m still cold. Would you build a fire in my fireplace please?”
His eyes narrowed in suspicion. Noticing the dark circles around them, I felt a little guilty.
It was almost morning. He had to have been exhausted after training for hours and then accompanying me on my long hike.
But I stomped on the guilt, compressing it, and proceeded with my plan.
This was my chance to make Reece admit he didn’t want a mate-less, mostly celibate life—and to put Hannah’s theory to the test for myself.
Seeing him shirtless in the cave—his smooth, touchable skin, his incredible stomach muscles—was not something I’d forget easily. The images were imprinted on my brain.
Now it was my turn.
As Reece knelt before the hearth loading logs into the fireplace, I stepped into my closet and took off my wet clothing.
Instead of selecting a new outfit, I reached for my robe. It was long and warm and when cinched tightly, it covered my entire body neck to toe.
I did not cinch it tightly.
I left the closet with it loosely draped around me so the opening in front split to reveal my legs when I walked, and the neckline plunged dangerously.
Reece didn’t notice at first. He was too busy getting the kindling going beneath the logs. When they were crackling, I stepped close to the fireplace—and to Reece.
“Feels good,
” I said. “Thank you.”
He glanced up almost absentmindedly. “You’re wel—”
Popping to his feet, he let his gaze travel from my face down the front of my body to my bare legs and feet then back up again. He cleared his throat, swinging his eyes back to the fireplace, which was blazing now with light and heat.
“You should... put something on. It’s going to take a while for the room to get warm.”
“I’m fine in this,” I said, making my tone blasé. “It’s a warm robe.”
“Yeah, okay,” he said stiffly, sounding uncomfortable. “Well, I should go now and let you get some sleep.”
He turned to leave, but I said, “Wait.”
Dropping the robe from one shoulder, I turned my back to him.
“I’ve got a kink in my neck from hunching over in that cave for so long. I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep. Would you mind rubbing it for a minute?”
Our shadows danced on the wall in the firelight, though both of us were standing unnaturally still.
I wasn’t sure about Reece, but I was literally holding my breath.
When he spoke, I could tell he hadn’t been breathing well either. “I think that’s a bit... beyond the scope of my bodyguard duties.”
Still facing away from him, I gave it one last shot. “The Bloodbound are supposedly willing to die for their queen—and her daughter. Is a teensy little shoulder rub really that much to ask?”
After a few more moments of stillness, his shadow moved in halting steps toward mine. The two shadows melted into each other, and I felt his hands on my exposed skin.
Though I’d lied about the kink in my neck, the massage actually felt amazing. It was the first one I’d ever had.
Amish people didn’t indulge in expensive spa treatments or even bubble baths for relaxation, but suddenly I understood the allure.
Although, I wouldn’t call this experience exactly “relaxing.” Every cell in my body was wide awake and reacting to Reece’s touch.
It seemed to be affecting him too. As his fingers kneaded the muscles in my shoulder then moved up to my neck, I could hear his breathing accelerate and feel its hot, shallow strikes on my nape.