As I’d stared out the window and watched her go, I’d damned her to the blackest recesses of hell. Raged and burned with fury over her recklessness. Had wondered what the fuck had she been thinking, testing me like that. Baiting me. Tried to figure out where her sudden death wish had come from.
But when I’d let myself picture chasing her car down and ripping the steel and iron apart with my bare hands, it hadn’t been so I could extinguish my rage through the forfeit of her life. Instead, I’d imagined myself wresting the clothes from her strong, warm body and sinking my rigid cock into her molten heat until I reached the end of her, until she knew we were one and the same, that we existed because of each other, for each other. That without her there was no me; that without me, there was no Olivia.
Which is why it was a good thing I hadn’t pulled her from that vehicle and fucked her into submission. Olivia wasn’t ready for that, for all it would have meant. And so against all of my preternatural instincts, I’d let her go. She’d needed to leave, as much as I’d needed her to go. Because that stuff about our lives being irrevocably linked? She wasn’t ready to acknowledge the truth of our connection, to admit she could no more deny me than she could deny her heart to beat. She wasn’t prepared to step into the brutality of my world and accept it as her own.
But she would be, someday. And when she was, I’d be waiting for her.
In the meantime, I’d just have to follow her whereabouts through the tracking device on my car. If she got anywhere near the airport though, all bets were off. There was patience, and then there was madness and there was no way I was letting her off this rock. Somehow, deep inside, I knew if she left Ireland, I’d lose her forever. There was something strange and unexplainable going on, something neither of us could name that existed between us and I believed our physical proximity was the key to unlocking it. She’d lived her entire life never tapping in to who she was—who she’d been. I was afraid if she left, she’d lose that knowledge and we’d lose our connection. I wasn’t about to stalk her ever movement, but I couldn’t let her board a plane. I’d let her leave my house; I couldn’t let her leave my life.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Olivia
As miserable and heartsick as I’d been when I’d driven away from William, I’d had to pull the car over to the side of the road every few minutes. Between my tears and the rain, after having driven only a handful of miles I hadn’t been able to see out the windshield anymore. When the first raindrops had started falling, I’d struggled for twenty minutes to get the top up on the convertible, vocally cursing the asshole who’d thought it would be funny to give me this god-forsaken car instead of the Land Rover.
Realizing I wouldn’t be able to make it to Dublin in the shape I was in, I’d pulled up Google Maps on my phone and picked the closet mid-sized town. Hoping it had a hotel or b&b—somewhere I could stay the night—I’d cried some more when I saw there was a five-star manor house resort only eight kilometers away. My relief overtaking my good sense, I hadn’t thought to call ahead before pulling into the long, winding drive. I’d almost cried tears of gratitude when the receptionist had told me they’d had two rooms left—a suite and two-bedroom cottage. When it had turned out the cottage was booked for a family in two days, I’d opted for the suite which was available for a four-day stretch.
I hadn’t known how long I intended to stay, but having options available had made me feel somewhat in control of my life for the first time in hours.
That had been four days ago and I still didn’t know what I was going to do with myself. I supposed I could go back to Dublin and resume working on my novel, but the idea of writing anything filled me with dread, the story I’d built and refined in my head over many months paling in comparison to the drama I was living out in real life.
As I sat with a map of Ireland spread out before me, I stared at it blankly. Blinking, I realized I’d been looking at the same point on the map for over twenty minutes. A large, green swath of land about an hour from where I currently sat. William’s land. I was drawn to it like a moth to flame. No matter which way my eyes roamed, they always came to rest on that one square inch of the map. Briefly, I debated giving up entirely and heading back to the U.S.—running from my past and hiding from my future. With my novel effectively dead before I could even breathe life into it, I had no reason to stay in Ireland. No reason except the man I was inexplicably tied to. No reason except the thought of leaving made me physically ill. No reason except William and I were connected in a way that could never be broken; had a bond that had been forged in blood and death and the span of ages.
And that’s when I knew. I was in love with William Macauley and I would accept anything—be anyone he needed me to be—if it meant being together.
Two evenings later on a crisp, frigid night dotted with frosty landscapes while stars twinkled bright in a blue-black sky, I maneuvered the convertible down the drive leading to the castle. The gates had been flung wide when I’d pulled up and I’d breathed a sigh of relief and reprieve. I’d never been good at begging and hadn’t looked forward to having to cajole my way onto the property from some nameless, faceless voice coming at me through a speaker. In my head, I’d imagined them looking at me through the security camera, pity and mock concern etched on their brow.
I knocked on the heavy oak door and waited for someone to answer, but after several seconds I didn’t hear any noise on the other side to indicate someone would be coming. I banged the bulky wrought iron knocker against the wood again and waited. And waited some more. Looking down at my watch, I guessed I’d been standing here for at least five minutes. I looked up to where I’d glimpsed the security camera when I’d arrived with William that first time over a week ago and saw the red light blinking back at me. Damn, is that all it had been? It felt like eons since that fateful night. I felt like I’d aged years in the days between then and now. Even my bones felt old. Tentatively I waved up at the camera, hoping whoever was monitoring the feed would recognize me and …what? Come let me in? Tell me to back away from the door? Kick me off the property? When it looked like no one was coming to greet me, I considered my next course of action.
I had William’s phone number. I could text him and ask him to come home so we could talk, but what if he ignored me? I could ring him, but he could just as easily send the call to voicemail and I’d be in the same position.
I’d done a lot of soul searching these past few days and now that I was here, I was not going to be deterred. I knew what I wanted. Now I just had to hope William wanted the same thing, but the only way I could know that was if I spoke to him. Squaring my shoulders and strengthening my spine, I jangled the unwieldy handle, testing to see if the door was locked. To my shock, it clicked effortlessly and the door swung open. I took a few quick, covert glances around and stepped over the threshold.
Chapter Twenty-Five
William
“Hello Olivia,” I said as she stepped into the darkened foyer.
Hearing my voice, she jumped with fright. Her hand pressed against her chest, she looked around the space wildly, trying to locate me in the gloom.
“Here—” I stepped from the shadows and switched on the overhead light “—that’s better.”
We stared at each other for several long moments and a million thoughts raced through my mind. Everything I wanted to tell her, everything she needed to know. Before I could say a word, she rushed forward with her own declaration.
“What we had wasn’t just about fucking,” she professed, her voice pitched high and her eyes gone wide with surprise at her words.
When she recovered from her exclamation, her eyes flicked between mine searching for a reaction, but my face remained fixed, implacable, as I let her words thaw the sliver of ice in my soul that over the last week had grown into an impenetrable fortress around my heart. I felt a flicker of warmth at my core and all of my defenses melt at the feet of this beautiful, wondrous woman. She was my damnation and my salvation all rolled
into one exquisite package.
Finally—finally!—I looked back at her with the face of a man who loves a woman, not an unyielding piece of marble who has never known joy and heartbreak and regret.
“No, it wasn’t,” I conceded quietly, sadly, the emotions I’d so painstakingly kept in check for days let loose. “I loved you with everything I have, all that I am.”
“Then why would you say those mean, vile things to me? Why would you reduce what we have into something strangers who meet at a bar do? I thought you had feelings for me.”
I stepped forward and she stepped back, a metaphor for our relationship, and I didn’t like it. Hadn’t I proven she didn’t need to fear me? In the moment of my greatest weakness, the vilest temptation—when she pushed me to the brink; when she stood on the edge of that cliff next to me and said “jump”—I’d held myself in check. Just barely, but I’d done it. So her skittering away from me now was like a poison knife to the heart.
I turned her question back on her. “Why would you say the things you said? Why would you taunt me? Did you want to see me break?”
Her shoulders slumped in defeat. A sob wrenching loose, she confessed she didn’t know any more than I did why each of us had tried to tear the other down. Except I did know. I’d been hurting and I’d lashed out; I’d wanted her to suffer the way she’d made me suffer.
“I don’t know William.” She wrapped her arms protectively around her rib cage and shivered. “I think deep down I wanted to push you. I wanted to prove to you—to both of us really—that you didn’t need to kill.”
“It could have gone incredibly wrong, Olivia. You must know that.”
“But it didn’t!” she rushed in. “You didn’t hurt me.”
“Didn’t I?”
“Not like that,” the breathed out. “I know you wanted to—I saw it in your eyes—but you didn’t.”
“I almost did,” I admitted to her. And then, “I wanted to. My god how I wanted to. You’ll never know how close I came.”
“But that’s just it,” she said taking two steps toward me. “You came close, but that’s it. You didn’t step over that line. You proved you can control your monster.”
“Olivia,” I said, my tone exasperated. “There is a vast difference between not murdering the woman you love in the heat of the moment and hunting to satisfy my needs. I thought you coming here tonight meant you understood.”
“I’m trying,” she whispered, dropping her gaze.
Despite her height and strength, she suddenly seemed very small and fragile. When she looked up, tears pooled in emerald orbs I knew every fleck of. She blinked and they fell, cascaded down her cheeks and neck to soak the scarf wrapped around her neck. It was the first time I’d noticed the accessory. Had she worn it to keep me from staring at her there? So as not to tempt me with the thing she knew I craved beyond all else?
“I want to William. I really do.”
“But you’re not there yet.” It wasn’t a question. “You’re still conflicted. About me. About us.”
“I thought I was there. I want to be there,” she added more emphatically. “I don’t want to be conflicted.”
I wanted to go to her and take her in my arms, but I knew if I did we’d never have this discussion. Every time we were near each other, our explosive chemistry took over all good sense and we ended up naked, our limbs entwined, as we gave in to desire and passion.
When I didn’t move, moved to stand directly in front of me. Placing her hand on my chest, she inched it up, slowly, her fingers leaving a red-hot wake as they moved, until she reached my neck and then continued, her palm resting against my cheek. “Let me love you William.”
This woman was temptation personified. I was a junkie and she was my fix. I wanted to fill my veins full of her wonder and never leave the haze of her power, but there were things that needed to be said. Important things.
Swallowing down a trickle of venom, I took her hand from my cheek and holding it, stepped away from her, out of the circle of lust she’d wrapped around us with her words.
“I’ve learned to accept who I am. Just as I’ve come to accept who you are as well. I’m not conflicted about what I feel for you or about what’s between us. I cannot cheapen that by being with you when you can’t feel the same for me.”
“I’m not conflicted at all about what is between you and me,” she countered fervently. “I know who I was to you and I know what I feel for you now. That’s not the issue at all. I’m not hiding from this. I want all of this! I want you.” She flung her hands wide to encompass everything around us.
“To want this you have to willingly accept even those things about me which you find abhorrent. I don’t think you’re at a place yet—either emotionally or intellectually—where you can promise that.”
“I can,” she whispered, much less assured than she’d been even just seconds ago.
“No, Olivia, you can’t.”
“I want to.”
“I know mo grá. And someday you might even get there.” I folded her into my embrace and kissed the top of her head, inhaled her scent and memorized it.
She started crying and I had to steel my resolve. I wasn’t doing this because I wanted to. I was doing this because if she came back to me when she wasn’t ready, we’d only find ourselves here again and I didn’t think I could handle it. And I knew if she wasn’t steadfast in her commitment to what a life with me entailed—everything it entailed—and she made her choice now, I knew she’d always wonder if it’d been the right one. I didn’t want to push her away, but I didn’t want to pressure her either. I was afraid no matter which choice I made it would be the wrong one. But I’d committed to this course of action and for both our sakes I needed to see it through. Olivia and I would be together someday. I had to believe that. It just couldn’t be now.
Setting her away from me, I captured her gaze and held it.
“Don’t do this William,” she begged.
“I’m doing it for you.”
“I don’t want you to do it for me.”
“Someday you’ll thank me.”
“Someday I’ll curse you.”
Her words cut me to the quick but I wouldn’t be dissuaded. “That’s why I’m doing it. When I see you again, it’ll be because you know for sure. That you’ve come to me with no doubt in your mind that this is the life you want, the life you need. If you stayed, I know you’d come to despise me.”
“I despise you now.”
“I’m sorry, Olivia. It has to be this way.”
Furiously brushing the tears from her eyes, she stood proud and tall. “You’re going to regret this.”
I took a step back, then another. And before I could stop myself, I turned and walked away, her words ringing loudly in my ears.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Olivia
The next two weeks were pure hell. I couldn’t stop thinking about everything that’d happened since I met William, the staggering ways in which my life had been turned upside down. Even if I’d wanted to sever ties with him—and I didn’t—there was no way I could go back to being the woman I’d been before. I knew too much now. Knew what it was like to have experienced an extraordinary, inexplicable love. My life, for better or worse, was forever altered beyond comprehension.
I wandered the countryside during the day, visiting historic monuments and villages, and at night I buckled down to write. As much as I’d given up on the book I’d signed on for, I had a contract and needed to do my job. Unfortunately, no matter how hard I tried, the story wouldn’t come. I’d start a sentence only to stop midway through, my thoughts taking meandering detours that eventually led my mind back to William and my own unfinished story. After three unsuccessful attempts at the same paragraph, I closed the document and opened my email.
To: Heather Jones
From: Olivia Donnelly
Subject: I’m stuck
I can’t write. Try as I might, my mind is otherwise occupied. I know it’s so unl
ike me, but that man I met? I love him. I’m *in* love with him. I can’t stop thinking about him. We’re so different—we value different things—but I know he’s the man for me. I just need to find a way to reconcile myself to some startling truths. - O
I couldn’t divulge what was really going on in my life, but I could tell my best friend how I felt about William, and hopefully she’d give me advice that would help ease my path. Unfortunately, Heather had other ideas.
To: Olivia Donnelly
From: Heather Jones
Subject: You’re NOT stuck
Don’t worry about the book. The words will come when they need to. You have plenty of time. Now, about this man … why do YOU have to reconcile yourself to whatever these startling truths are? Why isn’t HE reconciling himself? And why are you being so vague? - H
I smiled, a feeling of warmth suffusing my battered soul. No matter what, Heather would always defend me and always look out for me. I could trust her to get right to the point and ask the hard questions. It was easy for her to do that though, when she had a secure, happy—traditional—marriage. She saw things in black and white because she didn’t live in the gray areas, the shadows.
To: Heather Jones
From: Olivia Donnelly
Subject: Calm Down Mama Bear
Resurrection_Part One of the Macauley Vampire Trilogy Page 16