by Aja James
“What about the Paladin?” Anastasia appreiated the urgency of intercepting the potential exchange, but she couldn’t stomach the thought that she’d be leaving a comrade behind. Pure or not.
“The Pure Ones are arranging their own search party. I have offered our aid, but I do not know if they will accept it. Meanwhile, Grace and Devlin are looking into the communication we received from the Shield. So far, it seems legit, but given the Consul’s firm denial, we have to assume it was fabricated. We need to find out by whom and how.”
Ana heaved a deep breath.
“Clear and out,” she said, confirming her instructions and cutting communication.
Just what they needed.
The truce between the New England vampire hive under Jade Cicada’s rule and the Pure Ones was fragile at best, despite some friendships, especially by Ryu, Ava and Inanna, that had been built over the past couple of years. The two forces had come to each other’s aid on more than one occasion, though Ana never understood why Jade decided to send the Chosen into battle alongside the Elite in the first place. She only knew that it had something to do with the Consul, Seth Tremaine.
Seth had been a resident of the Cove for several months shortly after the alliance began two years ago. He had been neither guest nor prisoner. And then he’d gone back to the Shield, leaving the Dark Queen visibly changed in his absence.
The fact was that Dark Ones in this modern age were no more “friends” of the Pure Ones as they’d been millennia ago before the Great War. Most vampires still thought of Pure Ones as inferior and resented them for dethroning the Dark Ones as the ultimate and rightful rulers of the earth.
Jade’s truce with the Pure Ones had not been well received by other powerful hives around the world, nor by the key constituents of her own hive. There were many who would seek to break the truce. There were others, still, who wanted to enslave the Pure Ones all over again, because they provided the strongest blood source for Dark Ones, and they were severely outnumbered as a population versus Dark Ones and humans.
The better to conquer and enslave.
Ana never involved herself in the politics of ruling. She didn’t particularly care about the truce either.
But she did respect a fellow warrior, so she sent a prayer to the Dark Goddess to protect the Paladin and keep him alive.
It was probably too late to keep him out of harm’s way.
*** *** *** ***
“Goodnight, Annie,” Clara whispered and placed a warm kiss on the little girl’s forehead.
An hour earlier, they’d devoured chicken tenders together, the three of them, around the small breakfast table.
As usual, Eli remained mostly silent while Clara chattered on, and Annie responded with her lively facial expressions, beaming grins, enthusiastic nodding and shaking of her head.
Both females couldn’t stop staring at Eli though, partly because they were happy he came back, and partly because he looked so different without his long, dark hair.
Annie seemed particularly forlorn, lamenting perhaps the loss of opportunity to braid the thick, smooth tresses.
As if he knew what she was missing and wanted to offer a small consolation, Eli had reached inside his trouser pocket to retrieve a wad of cash and change, as well as a small, intricately designed barrette in the shape of a blue bow, sparkling with clear gems. On the same cardboard holder was a tiny version of the bow on a butterfly clip.
He pushed the money across the table to Clara and handed the gift to Annie.
“Oh, Eli!” Clara enthused on Annie’s behalf while the girl grinned with rounded eyes and mouthed thank you to Eli. “It matches Annie’s sundress perfectly. You are so considerate!”
Eli felt that he was no such thing. It was the first time anyone had ever applied that adjective to his person, he was sure. But he wanted to do his part if he was to be here with them.
For how long, he didn’t know. He feared he didn’t have the right to stay, but he’d do what he could while he was here.
By the time they finished the late dinner, it was past Annie’s bedtime. She took her bath, and Clara helped her get ready for bed, at which point Annie pulled Eli into her little alcove with Clara and had them both sit on the narrow twin bed. She climbed into Eli’s lap like it was the most natural thing in the world to do and kept her small hand on his large wrist while Clara read Oh, the Places You’ll Go!, by Dr. Seuss, one of Annie’s favorites.
Goodnight, Mommy, Annie mouthed back presently.
She turned to Eli and looked at him expectantly.
He stared uneasily back at her, having no inkling what she wanted from him.
Goodnight, Eli, Annie silently said.
She leaned close to him and pecked his cheek, then pulled back and continued to gaze at him with those large, innocently hopeful, sapphire blue eyes.
Eli looked at Clara for help, and she gave him such a dazzling smile he forgot how to breathe.
“Good night, my girl,” he finally responded in his low, husky voice. “Rest well.”
Annie’s face lit up like the sunrise as she threw her arms around Eli’s neck and hugged him tightly for all she was worth.
An unknown emotion surged within Eli’s chest, warming him from the inside out. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, uncomfortable with the little girl’s show of affection.
He had a feeling he didn’t deserve it.
Would never deserve it.
But he would take it anyway. He wanted to soak it up endlessly.
He wanted to feel.
After Annie was properly tucked in, snuggled with her Pooh bear, the new barrette clutched in her hand, the little clip already adorning Miss Melanie’s hair beside her, she fell asleep almost the moment she closed her eyes.
Clara took Eli’s hand and led him to their own corner of the shared space.
She closed the French screens, sat on the bed and patted the place beside her for him to sit down too.
He hesitated briefly before doing so, perching himself on the edge, his palms on his knees, as if he were ready to bolt at any moment.
“I’m so happy you came home, Eli,” Clara said softly.
“This is your place, not mine,” he responded reflexively. “I don’t have a home. I had a place to live, but I don’t think it was my home.”
“This isn’t ‘my place,’ as you put it,” Clara said. “I only pay the rent here. I don’t own the property. But it’s home to me because I’ve been living here for the past seven years, ever since I left the orphanage to go to art school on scholarship. I have so many memories here, met so many fun and interesting people. And now, Annie lives here with me. So, it’s home.”
She took one of his large hands in her much smaller one and laced their fingers together.
“It can be your home too, Eli, if you want it to be.”
He looked down at their hands and shook his head.
“You don’t know me,” he rasped low. “You shouldn’t be so trusting of strangers.”
“My world has always been full of strangers,” she responded quietly. “Growing up at the orphanage, there’s a constant rotation of people. Visitors, new children, part-time staff members. Just when you make new friends with the other orphans, they leave to go into foster care or get adopted or something. And you have to start all over again. If I didn’t learn to trust my instincts and make friends with the right strangers, I would have been lonely all my life. My existence would have become unbearable.”
Involuntarily, he flinched at her words. They resonated with him.
Too much.
To distract himself from painful thoughts, he kept her talking, eager to know more of her.
“Have you always been an orphan?”
She quirked her lips in a wry smile. “At some point I must have had at least one parent, long enough to give birth to me, right? Honestly, I don’t remember anything from my past. I tried to investigate it as much as I could as a teenager, but I couldn’t find any records
or clues. The Little Flower Orphanage has been my home since I was three and a half years old.”
“Why weren’t you adopted?” He couldn’t understand why no family took her in. She must have looked something like Annie with her wide blue eyes and fiery copper hair. She must have looked like a big red heart full of passion and love.
She shrugged.
“I was put into foster care for almost a year. It didn’t take. The husband and wife were only using us children to get government stipends, and they didn’t spend a penny of it on us as far as I could tell. They were…bad people. I was lucky that I got to go back to the orphanage. But because of that experience, I started to dread going into foster care and meeting new families and potentially leaving the safety of the orphanage. So I started misbehaving to make sure no one took me in. And then, before I knew it, I was too old to adopt, and I just stayed on at the orphanage to help out, even earn a little spending money doing chores. It was home until I was ready to move out on my own.”
She glanced over at him through her eyelashes.
“What is it about you that makes me want to tell you things? I don’t usually like to talk about my past. In fact, I don’t think I’ve talked to anyone about this outside of the orphanage.”
His shoulders shifted slightly in a not-quite shrug.
“Maybe because I used to be a psychiatrist.”
She regarded him closely in surprise.
“Really?”
“I probably wasn’t a very good one. I only had one patient.”
She tilted her head at him.
“You’re not sure? And how is it that a vampire—if you don’t mind my calling you that—can be a psychiatrist in the first place? How did you even become a vampire?”
He inhaled and exhaled deeply.
“I don’t remember.”
“You don’t remember how you became a psychiatrist? Or how you became a vampire?”
“I don’t remember anything before the past three weeks.”
He looked into her eyes and held her inquisitive, consternated gaze.
“I don’t know who I am. I’m not sure I want to find out.”
She gazed deeply into his eyes for a long while.
Finally, she said, “Is your name really Eli?”
He shook his head. Whether he meant no, it wasn’t, or no, he didn’t know what his name was, she couldn’t tell.
She stared at him some more, then smiled, slow and warm, like a rising sun.
“Well, I like the name Eli. I think it suits you.”
He considered for a few moments.
Then—“I like it too.” Because it was the name she called him.
There was so much emotion in the way she said those three little letters. Sometimes teasing, sometimes wondering. Always with warmth and desire.
Every time she said Eli, what he heard was I want you. I need you. I like you.
Clara squeezed his hand and cupped his jaw.
“Pleasure making your acquaintance, Eli,” she smiled into his eyes.
You please me, he heard in the name she called him.
“Thank you for saving me and Annie. For helping with my art class. For the wonderful art supplies. And most of all, thank you for being here with me. I love…”
His heart stuttered at that word, and he held his breath to hear the rest of what she might say.
“…having you,” she finished quietly.
She gazed deeply into his eyes and whispered, “I want to have all of you, Eli. May I?”
I want you, I want you, I want you, her breathless utterance of his name said.
He stared at her for the longest time without replying.
At last, his head inclined just a fraction, so subtle was the movement she might have missed it.
In wordless understanding, Eli ducked into the bathroom to take a shower and brush his teeth while Clara prepared for bed, having washed up earlier. She turned off the lamp on her desk and got beneath the covers in her usual long T and sexy new undies, sans bra.
The loft was awash in darkness with only a faint glow from the moonlight that filtered through the semi-transparent curtains of the bedroom window when Eli came out of the bathroom.
Clara sat up in bed and blinked to adjust her eyes to the dark.
Heavens above, but he was beautiful.
Even though she couldn’t make out the details of his features, she could see his naked silhouette.
And he was.
Naked.
Very, very naked.
The moonlight cast his pale skin in a bluish white glow, accentuated by beads of moisture that sparkled as they clung to the smooth, hairless perfection. Polished like marble, yet supple, satiny to the touch. She could almost see the blood flowing in his veins, the waves of heat steaming from his body.
Her fingertips would always retain the feel of his skin beneath them. And now her lips clamored for the same privilege.
There was only the outline of his figure from head to toe.
The sharp angles of his face. The sleek, long column of his neck. The incredibly wide slopes of his shoulders, rounded with muscle and bone where they met his arms. The broad planes of his pectorals and the deep groove that bisected them. The cut ridges of his abdominals, serratus, obliques and lats, every muscle sharply defined, like satin stretched over tempered steel. The fundamentally masculine jut of his narrow hips, cut in stark relief by the tapering of his tight waist and long, strong legs.
Involuntarily, Clara licked her lips.
Her mouth was both dry and overflowing with saliva at the same time. Her breathing was like the engine of an old, beat-up car that needed its battery and spark plugs replaced—loud and intermittent, sputtering on false starts and sudden surges to compensate.
She wanted and wanted and wanted and wanted…
“I…need you, Clara,” Eli rasped low and deep, his words touching her in equally deep, dark places.
Yes, he most certainly did “need” her, she noticed.
It was impossible to miss—the long, thick, steely, vein-wrapped column of flesh that rose proud and bold from his hairless groin to his navel and beyond.
The plump, engorged head of his sex bobbed in greeting as her eyes fixated on it and she couldn’t look elsewhere to save her life.
She was going to have that?
Her vagina clenched and flooded with fluids just at the thought of being filled with his magnificent erection.
She was going to have him?
Clara tore her eyes from his gorgeous maleness by sheer force of will and looked back into his eyes, so dark now that she could no longer see the green.
Eli.
“I need you too, Eli,” she whispered, her words firm with absolute certainty despite the breathless softness of her voice.
He stood there at the foot of her bed for the longest time, unmoving. Until she began to fear he’d changed his mind.
But in the next blink, he was gone, evaporated into thin air.
Until a split second later, he was all around her, pressing her on her back into the mattress, his full weight on top of her, each of his hands grasping hers beside her head, trapping her beneath him.
Every bit as naked as he.
Chapter Eleven
A burst of breath left her as the heat of him singed her in the most delicious way from head to toe. Could he disappear clothes too? Because she no longer wore any, and she didn’t recall the action of taking them off.
Or perhaps her mind had been too boggled by lust to take notice.
His monstrous erection bore into her stomach as his thighs braced hers apart.
He bared his fangs, a flash of startling white in the blackness that surrounded them.
“You want this?” he growled at her, ending on a hiss. “I am not human. I don’t even know what I am. I have killed. And I will do it again without remorse. I know this about myself, but I don’t know my own name.”
Clara stared unblinkingly up at him, into Eli’s wild, double
-lidded, thickly fringed dark eyes. They pulled her into their bottomless wells of sadness and pain, and she went willingly.
She smiled.
“Your name is Eli. You kill to protect others,” she said softly, and knew without a doubt, deep in her soul, that it was truth.
She tugged gently at her left hand, and he loosened his grip slightly to let her free. She reached up and stroked the side of his face from his shaved scalp to his temple, his brow, his cheek, his jaw and chin.
She felt his chest expand against hers as he inhaled deeply, a shudder rippling through his entire body, and closed his eyes. The raw, naked look of both pain and pleasure on his face devastated and enslaved her.
Lust was not strong enough of an emotion to describe what she felt for him in this moment.
Obsession. Craving. Voracious hunger.
And a fierce, soul-deep need to protect him. Hold him.
Love him.
“I don’t care what you are, Eli,” she murmured, bringing his head down to rest his forehead against hers, their noses touching, their mouths mere centimeters apart.
“I only care that you’re here with me. And having you here makes me so, so happy. I’ve been searching for this feeling…this sense of wholeness, all my life. I feel it with you. I lov—”
He swallowed her words into his mouth as he took her lips roughly, slanting his own over hers in a scorching, devouring kiss.
Clara saw stars behind her eyelids from the explosion of passion that incinerated the air around and between their bodies.
Talk about zero to two hundred! She was dizzy and breathless from his sudden aggression, as if he’d finally broken loose of the invisible binds that had always held him back.
She looped her free arm around his neck and hung on for dear life as he plunged his tongue into her greedy mouth and sucked hers into his.
Oh God! She’d never kissed liked this before. As if their lives depended on it. As if the world could go up in flames around them and they wouldn’t break the seal of their mouths. As if they wanted to consume each other, gorge on each other’s flesh and blood until there was nothing left, then suck the bones dry and chew them to dust, swallowing and absorbing every last morsel.