He frowned. “Sadly, yes.”
Two hundred vampires in New Orleans. That’s what Abe Lincoln had said. In a city of four hundred thousand.
Sadness tugged at my heart and my gut. How distressing for Dante to be witnessing the extinction of his people. “Why do all babies born in our situation come out human?”
“Human DNA is obviously dominant. We don’t really know why.”
“Wow.” Stupid, but I had no idea what to say. “And you never knew about the blood bond.”
“No. Not until Bill researched it. It does explain what has happened between us, though. It also explains how the interbreeding started.”
“Why didn’t it continue happening, then? The blood bond, I mean.”
“Once humans sufficiently outnumbered vampires, maybe it wasn’t necessary.”
“Why is it happening now?”
“I wish I knew. Remember that music we heard in the bar that night? That Lucy and River and no one else heard?”
“Yeah. I still hear it when we’re together.”
“It’s the blood bond, according to Bill.”
I smiled weakly. “I really just wanted it to be from our love being so strong.”
He touched my cheek gently. “I will always believe that’s part of it, no matter what Bill’s research says.”
I walked into his arms. “Do you miss being able to smell other people?”
He chuckled into my hair. “Not at all. You’re the only person I want to smell for the rest of my life.”
Then I jerked backward. “But before… Did all the vampires in a blood bond lose their smell?”
“Yeah. Another thing that led to our demise. Back then, a vampire without the ability to smell a human coming after him was very vulnerable.”
“Why would we do that to you?”
“I honestly don’t believe it was intentional. Humans as a species were reacting to their survival instinct. Just a part of evolution. Survival of the fittest. They were eliminating a potential threat to their survival. Vampires were, in essence, predators of humans and animals at that time. They took blood for survival. Humans found a way to counteract that. Like I said, this all most likely happened before either humans or vampires were self-aware.”
“Doesn’t it seem strange that it’s happening now? To us?”
He sighed. “Yes. Very strange. But Erin, I’m not sorry it’s happening.”
Neither am I.
I wanted to say those words. Wanted to with my whole heart and soul.
But they didn’t come out.
Chapter Five
Dante
Her lack of agreement didn’t go unnoticed. I found it odd, especially after how upset she’d been when she thought I was saying our love was the result of some outside force. Still, I held on to her, embracing her warmth, all the while knowing time was what she needed.
Time to accept all of me.
Patience was a virtue. I didn’t have a lot of it, but I needed it now. I’d find it, and I’d give her the time she needed. I had no other choice if I wanted this to work. Forcing her into anything was not an option.
In the meantime, she would allow me to feed, and we would make love and take each other to new heights.
Also in the meantime, I would ramp up my work on finding who had been taking her blood.
No one would take what was mine.
Never again.
I pulled away slightly. “You need to sleep now.”
“I should. But I’m off tonight, remember? We have a date to go to the Quarter?”
I shook my head. “I’ve changed my mind about that.”
“Why?”
“It’s not safe for you.”
“How can you say that? You’ll be with me.”
“I will. And I will die protecting you if I have to. I could fend off three, maybe four strong males. But I don’t know what these Claiborne vamps are after.”
“They just want blood. That’s what Abe Lincoln says.”
“Abe Lincoln, or Red Rover, or whoever he is, isn’t exactly a reliable source.”
River had said the Claiborne vamps were a gang of thugs, and Bea had told us they ran drugs for a female boss. No way was Erin going near any of them.
“Can we go anyway? We’ll go to Bourbon Street or Royal, where it’s always bustling. I could use a night out, Dante. Even if it’s just dinner or something else quiet.”
Though it went against my instinct, I couldn’t deny her a night out. I kissed her forehead. “All right, baby. You try to get some sleep now, okay?”
I couldn’t leave Erin while she was sleeping, not when we still didn’t know who’d been stealing her blood. If only I had the Vampyre Texts with me to do some research. Had Bill gotten the translation for me yet? I punched his number into my still-new phone.
“Hi, Dante,” he said.
“Hi, Bill. How is that translation on the Texts coming?”
“I haven’t heard. I’ll check into it.”
“Good. I need to do some research on this blood bond.”
“There’s nothing in the Texts about a blood bond. I’ve read the parts I’m having translated.”
“Have you? Because you told me the Texts were taught through symbolry and example.”
“True. All the necessary components are passed down that way.”
“Why? Why not just read them?”
“We’ve always done it this way.”
“Then how do you know you get everything accurately? Stories change as they’re handed down.”
“I don’t know, Dante. This is how we’ve always done it.”
“Then I’m ready. Teach me.”
“I’ve been looking into that. I’m not sure I can.”
“What?”
“To understand the symbolry, you need a young mind.”
“Are you saying I’m too fucking old?”
“I’m only saying that—”
I ended the call. Hanging up was childish, and it would no doubt piss him off, but I was sick to death of his antics. Since I’d returned, he’d been hedging about teaching me what I needed to know. Why? I still wasn’t sure, but the grandfather I remembered would never have kept necessary information from me.
I did a quick search to find a linguist who could translate Old French. I was about to send an email when—
What was I thinking? I couldn’t give a sacred vampire document to just anyone. I needed a vampire linguist. My only choices were to wait for Bill’s linguist to complete the project—and I honestly wasn’t sure there even was a Bill’s linguist—or learn Old French and read them myself. I’d studied French for two years in high school. How difficult could it be?
Again I searched.
Nothing.
Since Old French was no longer spoken, apparently no one was around to teach it. But if I studied Latin along with today’s French, maybe I’d get the gist of what I needed and might be able to make sense of the Texts. I did some more searches. Apparently the ancestor of Old French was not Latin but something known as Vulgar Latin, a spoken form that evolved during the Roman Empire and differed from the literary Classical Latin that was still taught today.
So much for that idea. However, I did find some tables that showed some of the differences between Old French and modern French.
Since I hadn’t yet gotten a job—I really needed to get on that—I had the time to study. I’d begin with French. I quickly found an online course and enrolled, and, keeping a printout of the tables nearby, glided through the first ten lessons. My memory from high school French was better than I’d anticipated.
I fixed myself a small snack in Erin’s kitchen and then went back upstairs and lay down next to her.
Now all I had to do was get my hands on Bill’s Vampyre Texts. Without him knowing.
That would be complicated, but I had no choice.
That’s how we’ve always done it.
Bill’s words played over and over in my mind.
Why had i
t always been done through symbolry and example, and why had no one questioned the approach? If no one had actually read the Texts, how did anyone know the material taught was accurate? Why hadn’t they been translated long before now? They’d obviously been translated previously. The Texts had been around for millennia, according to what I’d been taught. Old French didn’t exist when the Texts originated. Who had written them? What was their original importance?
I’d never known Bill to take a dogmatic approach to anything, which is why his stance confounded me.
That’s how we’ve always done it.
In other words, don’t question it.
Pure dogma. Bill had changed in ten years. I’d known it since I’d returned. But why?
Were the Texts a bible of sorts? Was it a religious document rather than a historical one?
We’d always been told it was history with some philosophy, but why such a sacred approach?
That’s how we’ve always done it.
Not anymore.
I was going to read the Vampyre Texts from beginning to end. If there was anything about a blood bond in the pages of that tome, I would find it.
Chapter Six
Erin
“Bonjour, ma petite.”
I opened my eyes. Dante lay next to me, propped up on one arm, his other hand stroking my cheek.
“Tu es belle quand tu dors.”
French. I recognized the language, but I didn’t understand most of it. Bonjour meant hello or good day. Belle meant beauty or beautiful. Thank you, Beauty and the Beast. I’d taken Spanish for a year in high school, and in nursing school, I hadn’t been required to take a language.
“French?” I said.
“Oui.”
“It’s a beautiful language, but I don’t speak it. English please.” I smiled.
“I said, ‘you’re beautiful when you sleep.’”
I smiled, my insides melting into a puddle of sop. “That’s sweet. Why are you speaking French today?”
“I studied it in high school, and I found an online course. I need to translate some stuff.”
“Oh? What?”
“Just some things I found at Bill’s. It’s in Old French, and I think I can do it if I brush up on my French.”
“What kind of things? Documents?”
“Yeah, more or less. I’m trying to find out more about what’s happening between us. The blood bond.”
“But you said it hadn’t happened in a long time.”
“Not that has been documented. At least not that I know of. I may be chasing a phantom, but I have to try.”
She nodded. “I get it. Will you share with me what you find out?”
“Of course. This affects you as much as it affects me.”
I yawned and stretched. “Are we still on for tonight?”
“Yes, love. But we’re staying in well-lit areas.”
“Fine with me. I just want a nice meal and some time with you.” I got out of bed and smiled. “I need a shower. Care to join me?”
His eyes darkened. He didn’t need to feed yet. No, this was pure lust in his smoky eyes. He wanted me. On a platter.
I was only too willing to serve myself up.
I walked swiftly to the bathroom and started the shower. We were already naked. When the water was good and steamy, I stepped in, Dante behind me. I turned.
His fangs were out, and my God, he was sex on a stick. I’d never known elongated canine teeth could be so enticing.
“I want you, Erin.” His low voice came out with a growl.
I bit my lower lip, the throbbing between my legs already intense. One look from him, one simple touch, and I was jelly.
He turned me around so I was facing the wall, and with no preliminaries, thrust into me from behind, a low moan caressing the back of my neck.
Then chills as he scraped his teeth along the sensitive skin of my shoulder.
Bite me.
The words formed but didn’t emerge.
“I don’t need blood, baby. I just need you.” He plunged into me even harder.
He hadn’t read my mind. He knew it instinctively. We were just so in tune with each other that he knew what I was thinking and feeling. Amazing.
He slammed into me again and again, all the while holding one arm around my waist so I wouldn’t go crashing against the wall. Always thinking of me, of my safety.
Then my thoughts took a backseat to the incredible orgasm that began to roll through me. The warm water from the showerhead pelted us as I cried out in rapture, in complete euphoria. Colors and vibrations dazzled around me, and he thrust, and he thrust, and he thrust…
And—
“God, Erin! So good. I love you, Erin. I love you so fucking much.”
He held himself inside me, and as I continued to fly, each spasm of his cock took me higher and higher into the clouds.
When our respective climaxes subsided in tandem, we stood, joined, letting the shower massage and cleanse us. He lowered his head and kissed my neck. A sweet and tender kiss, his fangs scraping my skin gently. Then he slowly turned me around and clasped me to him, our wet bodies touching everywhere.
“I needed that,” he said.
“So did I,” I murmured against his shoulder.
“No, I mean I really needed that.”
I pulled away slightly. “You think I didn’t?”
He regarded me, his eyes still smoldering. “I think you haven’t quite accepted everything between us yet.”
I sighed. I couldn’t fault his observation. In the heat of our passion, I accepted him without question. But back on earth?
Not quite.
“I’m trying, Dante.”
“I know, love. I’m not rushing you. No pressure.” He grabbed my shower pouf from its hook, squeezed some shower gel onto it, and began rubbing it over my shoulders.
I closed my eyes, inhaling the moist steam. He was so patient with me, and I appreciated it so much. I needed his patience.
But I also knew one thing.
His patience wouldn’t last forever.
Dante ordered a bottle of Champagne at dinner.
“Are we celebrating something?” I asked.
“Just us. That’s worth a celebration. Don’t you think?”
I smiled. “Sure. I suppose.”
The server poured two flutes and left the rest of the bottle in an ice bucket.
Dante picked up his glass. “A nous.”
There he went with the French again. “To us?”
“Very good. I’ll have you speaking French in no time.”
I laughed. “I doubt that. Are you French?”
He nodded. “Gabriel is a French name. It’s pronounced ga-bree-elle in French. Bill’s real name is Guillaume, which is French for William. My grandmother’s name was Marcheline, and my mother’s name was Vivienne.”
Chapter Seven
Dante
Saying my mother’s name made me pause. I barely remembered her, rarely thought about her. Now, with Em’s pregnancy, my mother had been more on my mind.
“Beautiful,” Erin said. “What was your father’s name?”
“Julian. His name was Julian.”
“Is that French?”
“No. Julian is Roman, and his twin brother’s name was Braedon, which is Irish. I guess my grandparents got tired of French names.”
“So Braedon was River’s father, then?”
“Yeah.”
“Does he have any brothers or sisters?”
I shook my head. “His mother died after conceiving her second child. From an ectopic pregnancy.”
“Oh, no. I’m so sorry.”
“It is what it is. Pregnancy is still very difficult for vampire women.”
She clasped her hand to her mouth.
“What?”
“I’m sorry. You must be worried about your sister.”
Em’s pregnancy wasn’t something I could discuss with Erin out of respect for my sister’s privacy, but I hated keepin
g it from her, especially because the baby Em carried was Erin’s niece or nephew. But it wasn’t my news to tell. Emilia had to tell Jay before any of us could say anything.
My neck chilled, and something tugged at me. The urge to tell Erin everything. The truth.
Was it part of the blood bond? I had no idea. But I’d find out as soon as I could, as soon as I could read the Texts.
Erin took a sip of her Champagne. “It’s delicious. The bubbles tickle my nose.”
“You’re cute.” I smiled.
“So are you. And I mean that in a totally masculine Alpha way.”
I let out a laugh. Being with her made me so happy. Almost made me forget how much I’d been through, how much lay ahead of me.
She was still out there. She had let me go, but she’d been so obsessed with me and my blood. Surely she wouldn’t give me up that easily.
You’re right. I won’t.
Damn it! Not tonight. She would not ruin my night out with the woman of my dreams.
Not the woman of your dreams. The woman of your nightmares.
I stood abruptly.
“Dante?”
“Sorry, love. Just need to use the restroom.” I walked swiftly toward the back of the restaurant, only to be guided toward the other side by a busboy.
I raced into the bathroom and grabbed on to a sink, my breath coming in rapid pants. I looked in the mirror. Drips of perspiration slid down my forehead. I grabbed a paper towel from the dispenser and wiped my face. Then I wet it with cold water and slid it over my skin again.
She was in my head. I fought her off most of the time, but she was always there. She had fed from me, forced me to feed from her.
What did that mean? What did it mean for the blood bond with Erin?
What had she done to my blood to change the Rh factor? And what did that mean for me? For Erin? For the rest of my family?
No one else was in the bathroom, thankfully, so I looked at my reflection in the mirror and spoke aloud.
“You will not control me.”
I already control you.
“You do not!” I grasped the edge of the sink once more. The edges of my irises were indeed lighter, and my gums itched as my fangs began to descend.
Unhinged: Blood Bond: Parts 4, 5 & 6 (Volume 2) Page 11