Sharp as a tack, she doesn’t miss anything, he mused as they talked. No one should underestimate her, he thought, including me.
They shared an order of tiramisu before he paid the bill and they walked out to his truck, arm in arm.
TEN
He had never done this before, take a woman on a date because he always feared what the consequences would be. Tonight he felt wonderfully alive and normal. He didn’t say anything as they drove to the bar where they’d first met, his thoughts mulling over the events that had happened at the restaurant. He handed her the keys to his car and when she looked at him quizzically, he realized she had no idea which car was his.
“Sorry,” he smiled, “it’s the black BMW M6 convertible.” When he saw the horrified look on her face, he tried to reassure her. “It’s an automatic not a stick shift, so you’ll be fine.”
“You want me to drive a hundred and fifty thousand dollar car, through the streets of New York?”
He laughed and gave her a kiss on the lips. “I’m impressed that you know your cars! I trust you, besides, it’s fully insured.” When he saw she wasn’t convinced, he chuckled again. “I’ll wait here and you can follow me. I won’t lose you even though you know where you’re going.”
She pursed her lips and nodded, sliding out of his truck. He watched her use the remote to open the door to his car and was about to go back and ask her if she was okay when he saw the headlights turn on. After a long moment of hesitation, she finally pulled out into traffic and he flipped the truck out in front of her. He chuckled every time she turned on her blinkers half a mile before every turn and had sympathy for the drivers behind her. She was obviously not used to driving in the city.
They made it to the parking garage with no occurrences other than a few irritated honks and a flip of a finger from a following motorist when she crept off the streets into the lower level. She pulled into a spot next to him and he was there opening the door for her before she had even shut off the engine. She was white as a ghost when he helped her out and she trembled as she stood. “Please don’t make me do that again, those drivers are crazy!. It would take a year’s tuition to fix a dent on that thing!”
“Uh, but you’re already out of school.” He teased and was thrilled when he saw color flood back into her face as she glared at him. “You just need practice, Tabs. Next time, we’ll go where there is less traffic, I’ll ease you into driving the streets of New York, promise.”
He was taken off guard when she slipped her arms around him and started kissing him. “There’s something else I’d like to practice.”
He growled throatily and leaned her against his car, claiming her lips before moving down her neck. He was tempted to lift her onto the hood of the car when he felt her freeze and the shudder ripple through her body. He instantly pulled away and looked around the garage. “Tabitha?” He glanced at her and saw the color had drained from her face once again.
With wide eyes, she started searching the area. “They are here and there’s more than one.” she whispered before closing her eyes again.
He instantly pushed her back against the car and turned, placing himself between her and the unseen enemy. He heard her groan and call out his name but realized too late that there were too many shadows for him to protect her. She screamed as he wheeled around to pull her away from the shadow underneath the car. He saw the deformed claw as it gripped her small ankle, trying to twist her foot underneath the vehicle.
“No!” he yelled, pulling her body up into his arms as the thing locked onto her foot, turning into a desperate tug of war. She whimpered as they both struggled to free her foot from the demon underneath and when its talons slipped on her soft skin, Justin yanked her back, tumbling both of them onto the fluorescent lit concrete. They both watched in horror as the creature’s arm, keeping its purchase on her leather shoe, slithered back into the shadows of the car. Red glowing eyes were the only evidence of their assailant. A growling, chattering noise, almost painful sounding, emanated from underneath the BMW and soon they heard answering alien voices echoing throughout the garage.
“Oh my, God!” Tabitha gasped.
Because of the echoing acoustics of the garage, Justin couldn’t tell exactly how many of them were actually in the garage and he wasn’t willing to risk a standoff here, not with Tabitha. “Come on but stay out of the shadows.” He helped her up and gently pushed her towards the elevator. He kept his back to her, keeping an eye on their retreat. The growling and chattering seem to follow their path but he couldn’t see where they were, only their noises were proof that the demons followed them. He didn’t start breathing again until they were safely behind his apartment door and pouring salt along the threshold. He turned to look for a towel when he saw her sitting on the futon, her face pale and white.
“Tabitha, are you okay, honey?” When she didn’t answer, he started searching her body for injury, sucking in his breath when he saw the blood trickling down her ankle. “Dammit.” He quickly got up and went to get bandages from the bathroom. When he came back, he frowned with worry, seeing that she hadn’t moved.
“Tabitha, are you okay? You need to talk to me, honey, are you hurt anywhere else?” He began to search her body.
“It burns, like a fire, is it supposed to?” The disconnected voice that came from her disturbed him. “They’ve never hurt me before, just scared me. They’ve touched me but never drew blood, is it supposed to hurt like this?”
He looked up to her face and was relieved to see some emotion there, even if it was tears that he saw, as she looked into his eyes.
“It does hurt, honey, they’re not exactly clean. It needs to get disinfected then you should be fine. I’m so sorry, this is all my fault, I should have never forced you to go to that restaurant.” It was his turn to babble and he couldn’t hold back the terror that he felt.
“Hey, it’s okay, you didn’t know.” Her voice sounded stronger and she reached down to stroke the side of his face. He looked up and was relieved to see her eyes focused and color coming back to her cheeks. Before he could say anything, she tried to smile and he knew she was trying to soothe him now. “Can we do something for the pain? It really burns…”
Relieved she was responding logically, he nodded and went to get her some aspirin before going back to cleaning her wound. There were three gouges along her ankle, nothing that required stitches but deep enough to be painful. He cleansed her ankle before wrapping it with the bandage. With that securely in place, he sat on the couch and pulled her into his arms.
She curled up in his lap and allowed herself to be comforted. Logically, she knew everything had changed when she met Justin, she just never thought that it would open herself up to be attacked by the demons. So now she had a decision to make. Try and go back to pretending they didn’t exist, which would mean cutting her ties with Justin or accept the fact that she would always be in danger as long as she was with him. She knew he had gone through his tests of getting them to kill him and it failed, but they were in uncharted territory with her, did the same rules apply to her or could they kill her as they did her parents? These thoughts whirled through her mind, an uncontrollable storm, until she focused on the strong arms around her. Even as he whispered into her hair, she knew her decision had been made. She couldn’t go back to the bleak life without him, she needed him, wanted him and she wouldn’t allow a bunch of demons to keep her from the one person in this world that understood her, understood what she had gone through and still wanted her.
She pulled away from him and placed her hands on his face. “No shivers, I think we’re fine now.” She attempted a grin and hoped it eased him as much as it eased her. She could see from his reaction that it didn’t, so she tried harder. Seeing the grief on his face tore at her heart and endeared him to her even more.
“This is not your fault.” she exclaimed a little more harshly than she had intended. When he opened his mouth to argue, she placed a finger over his mouth. “This is new ground.
Before I met you, I thought I was alone in this world and I had no idea about these things other than that they tormented my life. Now I have you and we can figure this out together. I didn’t have that before.”
“But you had never been attacked before. This is my fault! You wouldn’t have been hurt but because I pushed you to go out in public, you did!” he snapped.
“Says you! Who knows when they would have drawn my blood. They like to torture me in my shower and in the dark corners of my life. It could’ve been the next time, we don’t know! All of this is the unknown, remember?” When he didn’t answer, she forced him to look at her, “Remember?”
“I remember.” he conceded quietly. “But it doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
“I know, I don’t like it either but if we work together, we can figure this out.”
He was amazed at how strong she sounded, considering how frail she’d appeared just thirty minutes ago. Adaptable, that’s the word that formed in his head. She was so open-minded that she adapted to any situation, no matter how unbelievable it was. He stared into her eyes, searching for doubt or fear, something that would show him that if he argued long enough, he could change her mind on helping him with his quest. When he saw nothing but love and compassion, he leaned down and kissed her softly. It was a kiss that projected his feelings of thankfulness that she was okay and still here with him. Her scent filled him not the sweet floral of her perfume but something sweeter underneath, more seductive and he realized it was her essence. He was suddenly overcome with desire, it was like her pheromone flipped a switch in his brain, he had to have her, now. He needed to feel her, taste her, make her respond to his touch, almost as a reassurance that she was here.
She felt the change in Justin’s body, the tightly wound adrenaline that was instantly changed to a raw need for contact, his fear of losing her, his vulnerability. She returned his kiss, meeting his frantic desire with her own, realizing he was leaving himself unguarded and emotionally unprotected, something he hadn’t allowed himself to do since the loss of his family. The insight made her desire for him that much more fierce and she let it take over. She’d been alone for too long, hell, they both had. They deserved a little happiness with the lives they had been given. Even if their life together was short, she would memorize and treasure every moment they had together.
“Tabitha, did I hurt you?” Justin’s breathless voice was filled with worry as she opened her eyes to look at him. She hadn’t realized she had been crying until he wiped a tear from her lashes.
“No, not at all.” She smiled at him and kissed his wet fingers. “I’m just not used to the feelings I’m experiencing. It’s... beautiful.” She hesitated before kissing his cheek then slowly moving down to his neck. “You’re beautiful. Make love to me, Justin, please.”
He moaned as her lips teased his ear lobes and her fingers ran through his hair. “You’re amazing, Tabitha, anything you want from me.” he whispered, “I’m yours.” He brought her face up to his, crushing their lips together, seeking her tongue with his.
She quickly removed his shirt, popping a few buttons off when the fabric wouldn’t release itself from his body quickly enough.
He didn’t notice his shirt being ripped off of him, concentrating very hard on not damaging the dress she’d been so proud of. He was surprised when she groaned, stood up and shimmied out of her dress, letting it drop to the floor before she started fumbling with the button on his pants.
When Justin stopped moving and was staring at her, she froze. “What’s wrong?”
“Oh my, God! You are so beautiful. You literally take my breath away.”
She felt her face flush, embarrassed at the words she had longed to hear but never did because of her choice of solitude. She leaned down to place kisses on his muscled chest. “Not as stunning as you are. You could be a movie star.” She marveled as she stroked his chest, then giggled as she reminded him about the ladies at the restaurant trying to figure out what films they had been in.
He smiled at her, the desire replacing the look of awe. “Let’s make our own movie together. It will be an epic love story!”
She started nibbling on his chest, working her way down his stomach as she mumbled, “I don’t know, don’t epic love stories have tragic endings?”
He sucked in his breath as her tongue teased his bellybutton. “Not ours. Since we are writing it, we will give us a happy ending.”
She stood up and gazed into his eyes soberly, “as long as I’m with you, I’m happy.”
“You are with me, Tabitha. You keep me so captivated that I worry I can’t keep my senses with you. It would kill me if anything happened to you.”
Seeing his eyes grow dark with worry, she quickly kissed him, teasing his lips with her tongue. “Nothing will.” She promised, pulling his head down harder to end any more discussion.
ELEVEN
“I need to do this.” She grumbled as she rose to clear the dishes from her table. They had spent a wonderful Sunday together, sitting on her patio, poring over the books and notes Justin had collected over the past few years on folklore and myths. Because he knew them by heart, he had insisted that they take all of the information back to her place so she could read and study them. They also went over the books she had bought on psychic phenomenon, trying to find something that tied their gift to those that communicated with the dead.
She had been debating all day as to whether or not to tell Justin that she was going to keep her job with Stacia Todd. She knew that financially she didn’t have to work, but with all of the chaos she was feeling, she needed some stability, some normality in her abnormal world.
She’d told Justin of her plans over the salad and spaghetti dinner they’d prepared together, knowing he would be disappointed but not realizing the anger her revelation would invoke.
“So what the hell do you expect me to do, Tabitha? Wait around until you get home every night, being relieved that for one more day, you weren’t torn to shreds? Only to have to go through another day of hell, waiting for the day that you don’t come home?”
She cringed at the harshness of his voice but refused to let it show. She would not feel guilty for wanting to keep the job she had worked so hard to get.
“You told me yourself that they can’t seem to hurt us and I’ve gone twenty-five years without getting shredded so I think I’m going to be okay.” She threw back.
“I did that experiment on me! When I didn’t care if I lived or died. Who knows what the rules are and if they’ve changed. I’m not willing to risk you to find out!”
She softened at his statement, realizing it was coming more out of fear of losing her than anything else. “I’m going to be just as careful as I ever was. Even more, now that we are together. We can study every night and try to figure out this thing together.”
She walked over to where he was sitting and kissed him lightly on the lips. “I need this for me, Justin. Please.”
He tried to stay angry, to hold onto the fury to help keep him strong, but he felt himself weaken and lose his resolve. How could he ever deny her something that she wanted so bad, when all he wanted was to give her the world? He sighed as he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her closer, burying his face in her stomach.
“You better call me, every hour! And no text messages. Anyone could grab your phone and do that. I need to hear your voice to know that you are okay.”
She smiled as she ran her fingers through his dark blonde hair, pulling him closer. “How about every two hours? I might be with clients and Stacia isn’t exactly the type to understand a loving boyfriend.”
His voice was soft and she almost didn’t hear him. “Is that what I am to you? A loving boyfriend?”
She pulled back alarmed, forcing him to look at her. “No! God, no! You are my life now. But others may not understand that. You are everything to me!”
He smiled and pulled her into his lap. “Well, if I’m everything you need then you don’t need this job.”
“Justin…” She groaned.
“I know. Sorry, low blow. Keep your job with Stacia,” he conceded, “for now. But promise me that if things get weird, you’ll quit.”
“I promise.” she murmured as she kissed him again.
TWELVE
She quickly got dressed, trying not to wake Justin as she made herself ready for her first day of work. She fumbled through her closet, searching for an appropriate suit for work. She found herself a little frustrated at the frumpy outfits she had been so comfortable with just a few days ago. Now they felt bulky and uncomfortable. As she dressed in a gray pantsuit, she jumped when she heard Justin’s unexpected voice.
“We really need to take you shopping for some clothes that fit.” he drawled sleepily.
She whirled and found him propped up on one elbow, his hair mussed up from their night of passion and sleep.
“I never wanted to draw attention to myself but now that I have your attention, I’m not worried about anyone else.” She smiled shyly. “I wouldn’t mind wearing some clothes that actually fit me.”
“How about not wearing any clothes at all right now?” The dark desire filling his eyes made Tabitha feel giddy but she found herself checking the clock to see if she had time. She pouted her lower lip and shook her head. “I don’t have time this morning. I don’t think Stacia Todd would be sympathetic to my being late on my first day on the job.”
“Come on, Tabs. What’s the worst she could do, fire you?” He grinned wolfishly. “I’ll take care of you. What’s she paying you? I’ll double it!” Justin saw her glare at him and for a moment, he was confused, his mind still groggy from sleep and desire. When he ran his words through his head again, he slapped his palm to his forehead and groaned. “Oh God, Tabitha! I didn’t mean it that way. You don’t look like a … I’ve never thought of you as a…”
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