Fading Amber

by Jaime Reed

  Caleb scanned down the index card, grimaced, then handed it back. “Well, at least it doesn’t rhyme.”

  “Ha-ha. She’s out of control and I’m getting sick of the guessing game. I think my blackout has something to do with Tobias’s disappearance. He’s following me one minute, I blink, and then poof, he’s gone. I haven’t felt his presence all day. Have you?”

  He shook his head, then asked in a tone dripping with bitterness, “Do you miss him?”

  “I miss being able to make my own choices,” I answered just as tartly.

  “Sam, you’re still new to the whole Cambion process. You’re gonna feel like you’re not your own person, but you’re still you. Lilith is just along for the ride. Don’t let her drive.” His voice rolled around me, warm and potent. The sound along with his dominating presence made my eyelids droop. I wanted to kiss him so bad . . .

  I shook out of my daze and I was about to respond when a knock broke the silence. “Housekeeping,” a thickly accented voice called from the hallway outside.

  Caleb looked to me and then back to the door. “Sam, um, I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be here right now. I was about to eat before you got here.”

  “I don’t mind,” I insisted. “I could really use your input on this blackout thing. What did you order?”

  “Vietnamese,” he answered, then moved to the door.

  When the woman stepped into the room, it dawned on me that he wasn’t talking about Asian cuisine. She was a young, petite thing with black hair pulled into a bun on the back of her head. She wore the typical cleaning lady uniform, pristine white and starch-stiff with matching sneakers. It was easy to detect her shyness around males by the way her stare dropped to the floor and how she clutched the stack of folded towels to her chest like a shield.

  Caleb ushered her to the living room and bid her to sit. She readily obeyed, and I could tell her compliance wasn’t from her duties to serve the clientele. One look, one fleeting glimpse from the corner of her eye was all it took, and she was his.

  He knelt in front of her and eased loose the towels she held in a death grip. “It’s okay if you want to leave, Sam. I know how you get when this happens,” he warned from over his shoulder. “I already ordered before you came by. I wasn’t expecting you.”

  I squirmed in the seat across from them, certain that this type of room service was not mentioned in the hotel brochure. The comfort level had dropped by two hundred percent, and it didn’t help that Caleb regarded this poor woman as an item on a take-out menu.

  “Uh, Caleb, can I have a word with you for a second?” I stood up and marched to the small kitchenette area. Caleb followed, cursing under his breath.

  In the privacy of the kitchen, I rounded on him with clenched fists. “Have you lost your mind? Ruiz said you weren’t allowed to do this.”

  He leaned against the counter, clearly miffed that I interrupted his meal. “Ruiz isn’t here, and I can’t starve myself. That would cause more problems that neither of us are ready for. You of all people should know that.”

  “Then here . . .” I shook off my jacket and rolled up the sleeves of my sweater. “Feed from me. It’s safer.”

  His gaze traveled the length of my body, considering the option for just a second before he looked away. “No, it’s not. I shouldn’t have let you feed from me last night. I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. Capone wants to claim you as his, and so do I. Once I start, I won’t be able to stop, and I won’t risk going too far with you. We will bond on our own terms, no one else’s.”

  “Meanwhile, the cleaning staff is a free-for-all,” I argued.

  Caleb sighed irritably. “It’s different with strangers. I’m not connected to them, I’m not emotionally invested and none of them tempt me like you do. She’s not the first donor I’ve had today and she won’t be the last. I know what I’m doing.”

  There were more women? What the hell? “Look, I get that you’re hungry, but—”

  “I can’t have you, Sam, not in the way I need, so I have to settle for the next best thing. It’s enough for now.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest, standing my ground. “Fine. I’ll just stay here and make sure you don’t go overboard.”

  “Suit yourself, but I’m sensing a serious lack of trust in this relationship,” he said with a mock grin then left my side. He returned to the sitting area where the docile cleaning lady waited as instructed.

  He sat next to her on the sofa and gently pulled her closer to him. Whispering comforting words, he reached behind the woman’s neck, and her head tipped back in eager submission. I was quite familiar with that response. I’d felt the shivers whenever he looked at me, the way he would lure me closer to him. I recalled the heat of his mouth dance over my skin as he left sipping kisses on my throat.

  I shouldn’t have been watching this. It was wrong on so many levels, forcing me to reevaluate the dynamic of our fated union. Were we going to be one of those weird swinger couples that traded off spouses at dinner parties? I should’ve broken this up, cussed Caleb out, and told this woman to run for her life, but my feet remained planted where they were.

  Moreover, it looked really good, similar to watching someone eat a juicy burger with all the fixings and not offering me one bite. I just came back from dinner with Dad, but Lilith rolled and churned within like I hadn’t eaten in days.

  The maid returned the kiss, spine arching, head tilting back in a romance novel pose. Her fingers clawed at his shirt and hair, fighting to get closer. Her lips parted again and that silvery thread of light passed in to his mouth. The moment he breathed it in, an ice-cold splash hit my stomach, and my knees buckled. I braced the wall for support, hugged my waist, and tried to ignore the heavy breathing coming from the couch.

  “Caleb, that’s enough. Check her pulse.” I couldn’t believe I was actually coaching this madness. I was truly a sick individual, one who found a strange excitement by watching my boyfriend feed from another woman, a thrill that I was too ashamed to address. At the very core, our kind were incubi and succubi, and not even centuries of adaptation could dilute that dominant gene.

  He didn’t seem to hear me at first, but his fingers reached up and pressed the hollow dent near her throat. When he felt her heartbeat, his eyes flew open and purple heat shot in my direction. He stared at me with a blank expression, not really seeing me, but only the power lust that struck him blind. His hand slipped from the woman’s neck and she tumbled back to the sofa cushion in a boneless heap.

  Caleb rose to his feet and moved toward me, slow and deliberate. He never looked so dangerous, so wild, and the sudden tremor rocking my body wasn’t from fear, but anticipation. He continued to stare as if I were a sheet of glass, his intense gaze keeping me in place. Just when he was about to walk right into me, he stepped to the right toward the wet bar. Stunned, I watched him pull a small bottle of orange juice out of the minifridge, then he snatch the bottle of aspirin waiting on the countertop.

  Shaking the liquid in his hand, he returned to the couch where the woman lay sprawled on her back, gasping for air. He sat her up and handed her the juice and pills. He checked the pulse on her wrist while she chased each tablet with a swig of the drink. Between sips, she thanked him in both English and in her native language, her eyes glassy and on the brink of tears.

  The room fell into silence while he waited for her to regain her senses, but he and I knew the woman would never be the same after tonight. Part of her life, her history was now in Caleb’s possession. She would wake up tomorrow with a migraine from hell and spend the rest of her days chasing a high she could never catch again. We not only took lives, but we ruined them for those who survived our touch.

  When she was able to stand, he escorted her out and slipped a twenty-dollar bill into the front pocket of her smock. At least he was a good tipper.

  “Are you satisfied?” I asked when we were alone again.

  He leaned against the door with his eyes closed, still shaking
from the rush of the intake. He was virtually glowing with power. “Are you? I told you what I was going to do, but you insisted on staying. As usual, you never listen to me. It’s food, and a guy’s gotta eat.”

  “Yeah, but do you have to be all triple-X about it? You don’t have to feed directly.”

  Violet light slipped between his slightly parted lids. “Are you critiquing my table manners now?”

  “No, I’m just saying—”

  “What are you saying, Sam?” He pushed off the door and met me halfway to the center of the room. “We’re Cambions. We feed on human life. Nothing, not even our bonding will change that. There’s nothing personal about it, not on my end. I’m not cheating on you.”

  “Oh please, your fidelity is the last thing on my mind right now,” I lied. “Your food regimen; however, is another story. You know what will happen if you feed too much, too often, so why are you doing it?”

  “My stay in the hospital took a lot out of me, and I need to build up my strength and get back what I lost.”

  “At the risk of being caught by Ruiz? At the risk of turning into an incubus? And you talk about me needing to control my spirit. How about you put the leash back on yours.” I marched to the door, bumping his arm in the process.

  My hand held the doorknob when he called after me, “Sam, wait.”

  I spun around. “What?”

  He stepped forward and extended his hand with my shoulder bag dangling from his fingers. “Don’t forget this.”

  I snatched the bag from him and stormed out of the room, regretting ever coming there in the first place.

  5

  “Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty!” I collapsed on the floor and stared up at the ceiling, wheezing like an asthmatic.

  My stomach muscles burned and cramped, my sweaty T-shirt clung to my body, I smelled like complete ass, but I sure felt good. Exercise was a great outlet for aggression, and nothing served that purpose better than Tae Bo. I punched and kicked for over an hour, imagining the open air touching my fist was Caleb’s face.

  That little stunt in his room really ticked me off, which caused profuse swearing and excessive road rage during the drive home. Each mental replay of the incident made me angrier, but I couldn’t quite pinpoint why. I had two options: either curl into a ball and cry all night or invest that energy on something constructive, so I decided on a late night workout.

  Plus, Mia’s little comment about my spare tire struck a nerve. She was, as my guidance counselor would say, acting on her feelings, but the truth often came out through anger. All the same, it was time to push away from the dinner table and get my fitness on. Just because I was a preternatural man-magnet didn’t mean I could let myself go. I did, after all, have a boyfriend to look cute for. Or at least I thought I did.

  I opened the window to air out my room, which now had the dank odor of an old gym sock. While getting ready for a shower, everything around me went black. The power went out and all the faint background noises that came with electricity went with it, making the silence more acute. I could see the streetlights outside, so I knew only my house was affected. Normally, I would’ve freaked out, but since this was the third time tonight that this had happened, I was just annoyed.

  I flung my door open and yelled out into the hallway. “Mom!”

  “Sorry, honey! One second!” she called from the bottom floor.

  Staying close to the walls, I relied on memory and repetition to guide me downstairs. “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Just trying to get these lights to work. One of the bulbs is broken and now the whole thing won’t light up.” Mom stood at the front door holding a string of bulbs and a pair of binoculars in her hands.

  I groaned and met her by the door, knowing that this was the third stage of the holiday madness.

  Phase three: the lawn.

  Mom never did anything halfway, so if it blinked, chimed, or twinkled, it was probably in our yard, blinding those who drove by our house. Since she was going for something less gaudy this year, she had to downsize, which was driving her crazy. Her obsession with having the perfect holiday was interfering with me and a hot shower, and that just wasn’t going to fly. “Mom, you have got to stop doing this. Just let it go.”

  “Shh!” She stepped onto the porch, letting all the heat out of the house while spying on the neighbors across the street. Mom placed the binoculars in front of her eyes and scoped out the competition. “Look at them. They think they’re so much with their halogen lights and surround sound.”

  I followed her gaze to the yard across the street. Their landscape was always perfectly groomed and stayed green all year, and I had to admit that their display was quite impressive. Baby Jesus and the gang stood on the lawn under a soft glow from inside the manger. A pair of eight-foot angels guarded the scene, their halos blinking in time with the tune of Silent Night. “The Cunningham’s have a new theme this year, too,” I noted.

  “The nativity scene. How original,” Mom sneered. “All of a sudden they decide to get a new concept. Did they tap my phone or something?” She spied through the binoculars again. “They’re not gonna win. Not this year. Oh shoot, I think she saw me! Duck, honey!” Mom dipped behind the railing on the porch.

  Refusing to cater to the crazy, I waved to my neighbor like a sane person. “Hi, Mrs. Cunningham!”

  The slim brunette, wearing fuzzy earmuffs and a skin-tight snow suit that made her resemble a ski bunny, paused on her way to her car. She was what Mom often described as a trophy wife, due to being twenty years younger than Mr. Cunningham and having been under the knife more than a Butterball turkey. “Hello, Samara. Looks like you guys have power trouble. Are you all right?” she said.

  “Yeah, just a tripped wire. I just need to hit the fuse box.”

  She treaded across the lawn and moved in for a closer look. “Julie? Julie, is that you?”

  Swearing under her breath, Mom pulled out of her hiding place. “Debra, hi! How are you?” she yelled cheerfully.

  “Oh, I’m wonderful, thank you. I notice you have a new theme, too. Minimalism, I see. It’s cute, very practical for those on a budget,” Mrs. Cunningham said with a smile so wide I could see it from the street.

  “Yes, but less is more, you know.” Mom threw her head back and laughed, sounding super loud and extra fake. Waving back, she mumbled through grinning teeth, “I hate you.”

  “Um . . . yeah, I’m gonna go turn the lights back on.” I left Mom to her obsession and entered the kitchen. After clicking on the circuit breaker, the house came alive with a blast of music from the radio, blinking digital clocks, and the soft whirl of electrical appliances.

  With that accomplished, I returned upstairs and took a shower, where Caleb continued to intrude on my thoughts. I still couldn’t believe he fed off a woman with me right in the room. More to the point, I couldn’t believe I stuck around to watch. Neither of them were naked or anything, but the whole exchange was just as pervy as if they were.

  Maybe I was reading more into this than I should. Sucking the life force out of people didn’t have to mean anything personal. Caleb didn’t seem to have a problem turning his emotions on and off, so what was my issue? It was only food, right?

  I dried off and entered my room with a new resolution: to cut loose and stop sweating the little things. I was sick of being cautious and worried all the time, and it was the Cambion motto to celebrate life as long as we could.

  While digging in my drawer for some pajama bottoms, the lights went out again.

  “Mom!” I yelled.

  When I didn’t get an answer, I turned and noticed the hallway light leaking under my door. I looked to my night stand and saw the glowing red numbers on the alarm clock blinking in the dark. I opened the door and poked my head out to find all the lights on in the house except mine.

  Confused, I stepped back into my room and closed the door.

  The scream that followed didn’t travel far. Mom was probably still outside f
ighting with the lights and the neighbors. The radio in the kitchen blasted old Christmas tunes, which would likely drown out any noise I made. But I was pretty sure the lack of sound had to do with the leather-clad hand trapping my mouth.

  A hard body pressed against my back—I could tell by the woodsy cologne and the prickly stubble that grazed my cheek that it was definitely male. His hot breath covered my ear when he whispered, “Don’t be scared.”

  It’s pretty damn late for that, buddy! I thought as I tried to wiggle free. I gave him a good jab in the gut with my elbow and the heel of my foot struck his shin.

  “Samara! Stop! It’s me!”

  I kicked and squirmed in his hold. My teeth worked through his glove until I caught the fleshy meat of his hand, then bit down hard. He yelped and pulled his hand away, and I seized my moment of escape. I punched blindly in the dark, aiming for anything solid.

  “Mom! Get the gun!” I yelled and reached for the door, but a pair of strong arms trapped my waist again and pulled me back.

  I kept screaming and stomped the floor, hoping, praying that Mom could hear the noise. I kicked my feet up until they lay flat against the wood of the door, then pushed backward with all the strength I had in my legs.

  The force made him stumble, and he tripped over books and clutter scattering the floor. Being a slob had come in handy tonight, and my room was a death trap for those unfamiliar with the rugged terrain. What followed was a long, clumsy tumble to the floor and I fought my attacker all the way down. Hands and feet flew everywhere as we rolled on the carpet. My nails clawed at skin and hair, but as hard as I tried, he was just too strong.

  He rolled on top of me, straddled my hips, and pinned my arms over my head. “Stop! I’m not gonna hurt you. It’s me, Flower. I had to find you,” he said.

  I stopped struggling and searched for the face in the darkness. “What did you call me?” Only one person called me by that name, the only one who had eyes that shimmered like brass. The color began to change from bronze to gold, his emotions turning the dial on high. If I had any doubt who he was, Lilith’s reaction closed that deal. Instead of flips and jitters in my belly, she seemed to bristle with aggression. I could feel her rising to the surface, ready to attack as if all her past efforts to be with him meant nothing. My enemy was now hers, and for the life of me, I couldn’t understand why.