by Sotia Lazu
I rolled on my side, facing away from him, and pushed my body into the curve of his. The planes of his chest and abs felt like living marble against my back, as he ran his open palm from my throat to my breasts, and then down my stomach. His fingers were rough, callused with years on the force, but his touch was as soft and tender as the kiss he laid on my shoulder.
I spread my thighs in invitation, and draped a leg backward over his thigh, opening myself to his exploration. He briefly cupped my mound over my panties before he returned his attention to my breasts, slowly kneading each in turn.
“I want you,” I said. “Gently, but now.”
He chuckled in my hair. “You’re the personification of patience.”
I growled. “In me. Now.”
He pulled my underwear to the side and slid inside me slowly, filling me up until his pelvis was flush with my ass. Then he began the exquisite torture of gliding in and out of me one inch at a time, stoking the fire inside. I rocked against him languidly, both incredibly turned on, and slowly lulled by the swaying rhythm of his strokes.
There was no moaning, no panting, just a steady, quiet climb to pleasure.
He slipped two fingers between my folds, and started circling my clit in tandem with his thrusts. I could stay like that forever, my entire body tingling with sensation, and Alex pumping slowly inside me.
My orgasm had a different idea. It sneaked up on me, and the waves rocking me suddenly sent me crashing over the edge, the assault on my pleasure sensors so immense, my vision blurred. My limbs went rigid with the effort to contain the feeling of utter bliss.
It couldn’t be contained.
Among the craziness and chaos that was my life, this connection with Alex—this perfect synchronicity of our bodies—kept me in check. Because of him, I could be happy.
“I love you,” I said.
He spilled inside me as, tears sprung from my eyes. This man was perfect for me, and I was so lucky to have found him at a time when everything around me was collapsing. So lucky his turning hadn’t taken away everything that made me love him.
“I love you too,” he said. “So very much.”
I drifted off still linked to him. Still happy.
My dreams wouldn’t let my happiness last. In them, Alex finished his declaration of love with another woman’s name.
Ádísa.
I snapped awake, feeling an eerie cold. It was a weird sensation, to say the least; due to our low body temperature, vampires are way more sensitive to heat than cold. “Alex?” I whispered.
Nothing.
I turned to look at him, but his side of the bed was empty.
“Alex?” I said again, as if calling his name could conjure him out of thin air. He was probably taking a shower. But I heard no sound of running water. Inexplicable dread dug talons in me.
I got out of bed and pulled on my jeans, not bothering to change my top or wear a bra. My cell phone lay on the floor by the bed. I picked it up and checked the time. Almost seven in the evening. The sun was low, but not down yet.
Careful not to make a sound and wake up Constantine, I left the room and climbed up the stairs. At the ground floor landing, I sucked in a useless breath. Now we’d see if Ruby’s potion really worked.
Scrunching my nose in anticipation of scorching pain, I held my hand out to a patch of light.
Nothing.
A beam of bright afternoon sun sliced my palm in two. Painlessly. I turned my hand, fingers up, and waved it through the light. Gentle warmth caressed me. I didn’t need more proof. Ruby had done the impossible; she’d given us back the day. Now I was going to make sure Alex didn’t do anything that would stop him from sharing it with me.
I was out the door in no time, despite Mom’s warnings that the potion’s results were short term at first.
At the end of the driveway, I sniffed the air. Bad choice. I hadn’t been out in daylight in a long while, and even the scent of freshly cut grass was different than it was at night. It was disorienting, until I decided to tone down my sense of smell and try another way. A quick glance around revealed no onlookers, but I’m not sure the existence of witnesses would have stopped me from taking off.
Maintaining a high enough altitude that I would look like a large bird to anyone happening to look upward, I scanned the surrounding area. There he was, entering the woods. I made as inconspicuous a landing as I could, and hurried after him. It wasn’t hard keeping track of him; he was walking at zombie pace and seemed more asleep than awake. I thought of calling out to him, but something held me back. I wanted to see how it all played out.
I waded through the trees after him, scrunching my nose every time I stepped on a dry twig or my movements sent a bird or little animal scurrying. I needn’t have worried. Alex was oblivious to my following him. Gradually, my steps became bolder, until I was only a couple feet behind him by the time the trees began giving their place to tall shrubs.
We’d reached the edge of a small clearing, strewn with grass that seemed to have been stepped on once too often, the green blades no longer making an effort to stand. The place seemed as good a picnic spot as any, complete with a handful of logs that came up to my knee and could be used at seats. We were lucky there were no families around, in case the sleepwalking vampire in front of me woke up feeling grouchy. Alex sat on one of the logs, his moves deliberate. I rounded the clearing until I was almost facing him, trusting the foliage to conceal me.
Had he come here before? When? When I’d gone flying by myself? I’d have seen him. Before I could figure that out, he spoke. “Are you there?”
I thought he was talking to me, and took a step forward, before I realized his eyes were closed. I’d been right. He was sleepwalking.
Someone apparently responded in his dream, because Alex smiled and turned his face upwards. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Nobody knows. It’s our secret.” He nodded.
He seemed so absorbed by whatever reply he got, for a moment I was convinced someone was speaking to him. I looked more intently, trying to make out a shape. Nothing. The forest had gone quiet around us too. I rubbed my arms. Despite the mild weather, I was feeling chilled to the bone, and getting more creeped out by the minute.
Alex opened his eyes, and I thought he finally woke up, but his gaze was unfocused. “Cherry loves me.” He said something else, but it was too low even for my vampire hearing. Little more than a breath.
I heard a hiss and looked around, but the sound had come from Alex. He was smoldering. Like, literally. The potion was apparently wearing off, and plumes of smoke were wafting off him. No longer mindful to stay hidden, I ran to him, calling out his name. He just sat there, smiling, so I threw him over my shoulder and flew us home as fast as I could, trying to keep his face shaded and praying nobody saw us.
When I returned Alex to safety, Constantine was up, prowling the limited space of the basement like a caged animal. “Is it true? Did you really walk in the sun?” He sounded like a little boy asking if Santa was coming. “I wanted to see for myself, but the older we are, the more brutal the sun.”
I couldn’t help a fleeting smile. “Yes. But it wore off fast, and Alex is burned.”
Constantine was all-business in no time. “What do you need of me? Blood?” He reached for Alex’s prone form.
I shook my head. “I’ve got this. I’ll need to run something by you after I feed him, though, so maybe don’t go too far.”
“Or I could stay here and help you.”
I wasn’t very comfortable with him watching as Alex drank my blood, but I needed to pick his brain about the one-sided conversation I’d just witnessed. I sat on the pullout Constantine used as a bed, and my ex helped me lay Alex down so I cradled his head on my lap. I popped a vein in my forearm with my fangs, and held the wound against Alex’s lips. He remained motionless, but I could see his throat working, so he was swallowing at least some of it.
“It will not be enough,” Constantine said. “Our bodies do not work the same wa
y human bodies do, and our circulation is much slower. He needs to suck to keep the blood flowing, or you’ll heal before he feeds.”
“He will. Give him a minute.”
A couple of seconds passed, before Alex’s mouth turned firm against my skin, and soon his fangs extended. In as much pain as he had to be, with patches of skin on his face and arms burned almost to a crisp, he was surprisingly gentle reopening the wounds I’d made, and sucking my blood.
“You are too calm for someone whose lover was minutes from turning into charcoal,” Constantine said. His tone was glib, but his gaze searched my face.
“Once I got him inside the house, I knew he’d heal.” I was right. Blackened ashy flakes peeled away, and tissue rejuvenated in front of my eyes.
“He was lucky you were there, although I cannot fathom why the two of you decided on a midday stroll all of a sudden.” Constantine arched a mocking eyebrow, but dark violet swirled in his blue eyes. The way they changed color, betraying his emotions always mesmerized me. From past experience, I knew violet came with a primitive lust, completely inappropriate for our current situation.
Another thing for me to lock away deep inside, and pretend not to have noticed.
I turned back to Alex’s face, and gently removed my wrist from his mouth. His face looked tired, but the flesh was now intact. Perfectly smooth.
“We didn’t go for a walk,” I told Constantine, gazing at him again. “Alex was sleepwalking, and I followed him.”
“Sleepwalking?” Constantine’s eyes were their normal clear blue now, his focus on the information I provided.
“Yes. It was weird. He was walking like he was a puppet on a string, but purposefully at the same time. More robot than zombie, if you know what I mean.” Constantine nodded, and I went on. “He stopped in the middle of the forest, sat on a log, and began talking to someone I couldn’t see.” I shivered—which I rarely ever do since I died.
“That is weird, as you so eloquently put it. Freaky, even, as Sally would say. Did you make anything out? What did he say?”
“He said nobody knew…something. I don’t know what he was talking about, but I think it was a secret. Could be about his turning?” And he’d said I loved him, but there was no reason to bring it up.
“Has he done this before? Does he have nightmares in general?”
“Yes to the nightmares, no to the sleepwalking. At least, I think it’s a no. We’d have noticed if he’d walked out of the mansion in the middle of the day, right?”
“Maybe we should ask him?” Constantine indicated Alex with a tilt of his head, and I saw Alex’s eyes were open.
“You’re awake.” I ran my fingers through his hair. “You scared me. I’ll start locking the doors when we sleep.”
“What? Why?”
“You up and left, with the sun still high in the sky.” Constantine tutted.
“I did?”
“It was in your sleep. Do you remember what you were dreaming of?” I whispered.
He sat up abruptly. “No. You, I think. And Willoughby. It’s all a blur.”
“Do you remember the secret?” Constantine asked.
Alex’s expression went from alert to slack and back again in the blink of an eye. “Secret? What are you talking about?”
I glared at Constantine. Alex was in shock; we shouldn’t be grilling him until he got his bearings. “You mentioned a secret when you were mumbling,” I told Alex. “It was probably nothing. Dreams don’t always make sense.” I leaned over and touched my lips to his.
“Yes. I remember now. It was… It was the vampire council, and they were asking who knew I was a vampire. I told them it was a secret and nobody knew. I was terrified.”
No. He’d been smiling at the time. Conspiratorially. Had he just lied to me in my face, or did he actually remember wrong? Something in my chest tightened, liquefying my insides. My gut was telling me not to trust him.
He took both my hands in his, and drew circles with his thumbs on my knuckles. His touch sent an unpleasant tingle spreading up my arms. “I’m sorry I worried you. I guess my subconscious made me want to distance myself from you, to protect you.”
I don’t need to breathe, but I felt suffocated by his proximity. I forced a smile. “All’s well that ends well. And now we know Ruby’s potion has started working, so that’s something.”
Also, I was now certain he was lying. Asking him about it wouldn’t help, when the lie had spilled out so easily, so I had to watch him and pray he had good reason to keep the truth from me.
Alex grinned, our previous discussion already forgotten. “Does that mean we can have a picnic?”
“It still wears off too fast, but in a couple of days…”
“Good.” He pulled me to him for a kiss that lasted a couple seconds more than was appropriate in front of company. By the time we parted, Constantine was no longer in the basement.
Chapter Fifteen
We were in the kitchen, having a civilized meal with my parents, and all I could think about was how Alex had lied. I couldn’t fathom the reason. What could have been so bad about his dream that he was afraid to share it with me?
I tried to make sense of what I’d seen in the clearing, but something kept nudging at the back of my mind.
He’d been walking, not wandering. He’d meant to go to that specific spot. Sure, it was possible he remembered it from our search for Willoughby the night before. He was a cop, and trained to be perceptive and remember details. But had one short jaunt through the woods been sufficient for him to memorize the path? Even the stupid log he’d sat on? He hadn’t stumbled once.
I needed to look up how sleepwalking worked. Maybe he was actually seeing the scenery around him, and I was just driving myself crazy for no reason.
“Want some more pasta salad?”
“Huh? Yeah, thanks.” I lifted my plate for Alex to serve me two more heaps of the yummy combination of pasta, smocked tuna, corn, carrot, dill, and capers—with enough mayo to clog the arteries of the humans at the table.
He studied my face. “Are you all right? You haven’t said a word since we sat down.”
Dad piped in, always to the rescue even after all the years I wasn’t around to be his little girl. “She’s probably still excited about walking in the sun. It’s been a while.”
It really had, and I didn’t even have time to enjoy its warm caress on my face. Not with Alex being a weird robot from planet Weirdo.
The thought I couldn’t quite form glided just past the edge of my conscious mind. I tried to snatch it, but it swam away, fast as lightning. Stupid thought.
“Yeah, everything’s been so overwhelming.” I smiled at Alex and gave his hand a light squeeze, before turning my full attention to the food. “This is really good.”
Mom beamed. “I knew you’d like it. And I have ice cream for after.”
It was a lucky thing we couldn’t gain weight after our death. Not so lucky that we couldn’t lose any, but oh well.
“Are you going to look for that man again tonight?” Mom always had a way of making things sound normal. The homicidal vampire who’d turned me and left Alex for dead was now ‘that man.’ Just as Ádísa was ‘that horrible woman,’ and I was still alive.
Alex’s fork hovered in front of his mouth for a second too long. He didn’t like the idea. Maybe a confrontation with Willoughby scared him. Maybe that was what the dream and his irregular behavior had been about.
Sadly, I was sure he’d been enjoying himself at that clearing.
Worse, I was afraid whatever he kept from me was sinister. Something he wanted to keep to himself, not to protect me from.
My phone rang in my pocket. I was entirely too willing to let it go to voicemail, but it might be something important. I pulled it out. Constantine’s home number.
“Everything okay?” It would be Sheena. I couldn’t imagine Wesley or any of the vampettes calling me instead of Constantine.
“Here yes. There…not so sure.” I coul
d picture one perfectly shaped black eyebrow arched in reproach.
“We’re managing.” I pushed my chair back. “I’ll be right back,” I said to my table companions, and went to the living room. The more distance between me and the other vampires, the better the chances they wouldn’t listen in on my conversation. They both supposedly had better manners than that, but I wanted to keep my ass covered in any case.
“Alex is being weird,” I whispered in the receiver, once I was reasonably sure of my privacy.
“Maybe he’s sniffed out Willoughby,” Sheena said. “Wesley told me to call you. He tried tall-blond-and gorgeous, but the call wouldn’t go through. We got word your maker is there, and planning something nasty.” She pronounced the word as nay-stee, pouring gallons of distaste into it.
I knew she used theatrics to cover her fear of him. He’d threatened to kill her more than once, after all.
“Do we know specifics?” I asked. “Like maybe where he’s staying?”
“Do you want his bank account number too? No, we don’t know specifics. We just know there have been sightings of a tall, dark, and handsome vampire terrorizing that area. Resident vampires have taken it upon themselves to clean after him, but nobody wants to go up against him.”
One sentence had spawned a myriad questions. I decided to start with what I deemed as most important. “Terrorizing? There have been more attacks than the one we know of? Are the victims dead?”
“Don’t know who you know of.”
“A young redheaded woman.”
Sheena blew out her breath noisily. “Hon, he’s attacked three young women, and they’re all redheads. Good news is they’re alive, and the vampires of the area have made sure they don’t remember their attacker.”
So much for the red hair being a coincidence. It’s impossible for us to get migraines, but I swore a spot behind my left eye throbbed. I pressed the heel of my hand against my temple, willing away the phantom pain. “Why?”