Darkened Days

by C. L. Quinn

  Well, Henri would be wondering why she hadn’t come home. She might as well head back. Home. As if she had one anymore. That basement would never be home. Henri’s beautiful smile and sparkling eyes came to mind. Oh, Henri. He would never be home for her either.

  At that moment she realized what she needed to do. She had to go. She wasn’t happy here. It wasn’t fair to lead Henri on either. He didn’t deserve such cruel treatment. If she stayed, he would never move on.

  Where would she go? Not back to Wilkes-Barre. It should be America, though. Familiar territory, she knew the language. She could build a new secret life there easier than anywhere else.

  Almost at vampire speed, she blew out of the alley and had to force herself to slow down. Her breathing was erratic and her chest hurt. It was too overwhelming with the loss of everything familiar, the loss of family, the loss of innocence. The loss of dreams never to be realized. And tonight, she didn’t want to try to fake it with Henri and the others. Tonight, she couldn’t go back to the lair.

  Turning away from the busy street, she headed out of the lights and then ran as fast as she could until she hit a row of townhouses. Many were dark since it was late. For the next hour, Starla just wandered around, stopped in a pretty little park, the town’s attempt at a green space. Then, aware she needed to find shelter, she chose an apartment at random and hit the door chime. A few minutes later, a coarse voice barked roughly on the other side of the door.

  “Qui est la?”

  “A stranded girl. Please, I need help.”

  Some mumbling, then an elderly woman opened the door, looked out cautiously, and sniffed as she verified it was only a young girl alone.

  Starla pushed in, compelled her to find out if she lived alone so that no one would disturb her the next day. Then commanded the woman to sleep until she woke her. She found an interior room in the small apartment, a bathroom with no window, pulled some blankets off a bed and curled up on the floor. As she fell asleep, she realized how easily she adjusted to sleeping on cold floors.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Eillia pushed herself up out of her chair carefully. Even vampire strength wasn’t much help for maneuvering her expanded girth. As she reached her goal of getting back on her feet, she pressed against her sore back with one hand and let the other rest on her rounded belly. It seemed ridiculous that a vampire had to suffer the same complications in pregnancy a human did. Her body was stronger, faster, and healthier than any human. And she was immortal. Yet here she was with sore feet and a backache from carrying the additional weight of her son.

  She smiled. She didn’t mind at all. He was worth every complication or pain. It just seemed wrong that her genetically superior body couldn’t just glide through this normal biological process. As she moved out onto the balcony for some fresh air, she felt hands slide around her from behind. Daniel. Her man. Her baby’s father. She lowered her head and smiled deeper, slipping her fingers around his wrists. Her mate.

  “Baby, could you massage my back? He’s lays heavy tonight,” Eillia asked.

  The huge man pulled her against him and sat down in one of the big chairs on the covered balcony after helping her down first.

  “Lean forward, sweetie,” he said. Eillia did so and moaned as his hands kneaded her sore muscles. He had to watch himself when he did this, his vampire strength still new to him. He had only been vampire for about six weeks and was still learning how to deal with the enormous physiological changes. He was much bigger than before.

  Humans changed by vampires were always larger than they were as humans. He was changed by a first blood vampire. First bloods were born vampire. Stronger, faster, and even bigger than those who were “made.” And humans changed by first bloods were stronger than normal conversions. Bigger yet. Eillia had been impressed by Daniel’s size after he completed the conversion.

  His new life still seemed unreal. Eillia converted him after letting him settle into the vampire household to adjust to her friends and family. Some of whom had tried to kill him at one time.

  She wanted him to get acquainted with the unique lifestyle that came with being vampire. He needed to be fully indoctrinated and prepared for how he would have to live if he chose to stay with her and become vampire.

  As if he had any choice. He’d loved her from the second he saw her. He’d held her in his arms, dead, shot to death by his team of mercenary soldiers at the end of a career he couldn’t continue. Of course, he had no idea the bullets wouldn’t kill her, so he’d hugged her body before burying her in a hidden grave. He still couldn’t believe they’d found each other a year later through so much pain and loss.

  Not for the first time, he paused to wonder how, out of all the bad things he’d done in his life, he was rewarded with her. God knows he didn’t deserve her. Or this beautiful child they’d made. The boy grew steadily inside the warm safe womb of his vampire mother. He would join them all in about three months as only the third first blood vampire child born in four centuries.

  He’d known she was on this balcony before he came to her tonight. She was always on the balcony. And she had known he was there before she heard or saw him. They were linked now, their spirits an intricate chain woven together by love and destiny. Eillia told him the universe meant them to be together two months ago when she’d followed him to Bali to tell him they were to have a child.

  “Do you believe me, Daniel? Do you believe in fate?” She’d asked.

  He had dropped on his knees and kissed her belly that was only slightly curved then.

  “I believe anything you tell me,” he’d told her then. “I think you have a direct line to infinity, because I can’t believe you forgive me and love me. So, yes, I believe somehow, because of all we’ve been through together. I believe in fate. And miracles.”

  It had been followed by a marathon round of sex. He’d grinned at her and told her he was grateful she was letting him remember their incredible orgasms together. Unlike the days last winter in Alaska when she would attack him sexually, to both their satisfactions, feel regret, then use her vampire skill of compulsion to make him forget. It had been hard for her to accept that she was falling in love again.

  Now, two months later, Daniel was a new vampire, with a wedding just last week and a child growing bigger and stronger each day.

  With the softest kiss on her neck, Daniel leaned forward to slip his hands under her lightweight cotton shirt to massage her belly. Just to feel her skin under his fingers. That was one of the things he’d discovered these past two months…he could never touch her enough.

  Eillia laid her head back against his.

  “Ummm,” she groaned in pleasure.

  A voice called from the doorway of their rooms.

  “Is everyone decent in there?”

  Daniel groaned this time. Just when he was going to get serious and take Eillia’s mind off the growing child.

  “Koen,” he said quietly, and stood.

  “Yeah,” he called out, “As decent as we’ll ever be.”

  Pushing out of the comfortable lounge chair, Eillia took the offered hand and followed Daniel back into the room.

  An enormous man filled the room and made its considerable size seem small.

  “The baby bed arrived,” Koen said, pointing to a big box he’d dropped on the floor. Then he came forward very quickly to span Eillia’s stomach with his large hands. When he dropped on the floor to lay his ear against her belly, Daniel had to force himself to stay still. Eillia and Koen were both first blood vampires, and had been together for over a thousand years, more family than friends after all that time. It still didn’t sit well with Daniel’s gut that he was so familiar with his woman. Bas, the other vampire in the household that was already married to a first blood, actually Koen’s daughter, had clapped Daniel on the shoulder weeks ago and told him it was his vampire DNA that got so pissed at the idea of any male touching his woman. Daniel knew it was a little more than that. Eillia’s history with the magnificent vamp
ire was a problem for him. They’d had centuries of memories together.

  Because of her empathic abilities, Eillia knew this. She told him, and showed him, every night that it was he who had her heart, not Koen, who was very like a brother to her. Daniel believed her assurances, but it was still difficult to maintain a civil tongue when the big guy was so physical with her. In Koen’s defense, first blood vampires were extraordinarily physical. They loved and fought harder than anyone he’d ever known. And that included a large number of highly motivated mercenary soldiers.

  He stood back quietly to respect his wife’s love for the big vampire at her feet.

  She was breathing too hard. Starla shook her head at her hypersensitivity about her human emotional problems. They didn’t matter anymore. She was a hot, strong, supernatural vampire. Who she was before was irrelevant. Nothing could change the fact that now she lived by night, couldn’t see her family again, had sex with strangers, and consumed human blood to live. She’d joked to Henri that they were monsters. What she didn’t tell him was that she half believed it was true.

  Alone, miles from the warehouse she’d been living in, she dropped on a concrete block placed in an empty parking lot. With a hand on her chest, she calmed her quickened breath. Everyone in the warehouse would laugh at her. They weren’t exactly sensitive types. Somewhere in her memory, she knew that was common for youth. Even humans. It didn’t make it hurt less when they laughed at her.

  She was weaker. She knew it. And smaller than the others. Big deal. Like she’d always wanted to be the biggest and strongest girl in town. She wouldn’t have minded smartest.

  Behind her, a sign in a darkened grocery shop’s window blinked at her. The distraction made her laugh. She had to be the world’s fucking wussiest vampire ever!

  Wandering over to the entrance, she released the locks, disengaged the alarm, and walked into the store at normal human speed. It had been a long time since she’d done something so ordinary. Being closed up with no air running, it was too warm, so she stripped off her shirt and let it drop on the floor as she continued down a long aisle. It left her with the low slung skirt riding just below her hipbone and a skimpy black bra that had seen better days.

  As if in welcome, her favorite cereals stared at her unblinkingly from their spots on the shelf. God, it was before she’d left Alaska that she’d had a bowl full of the sweetened oat cereal with marshmallows. Suddenly, there was nothing else on this earth she wanted more. Speeding through the aisles, she collected a bowl that was technically a mixing bowl, perfect size for a vampire, a large spoon, and a gallon of milk. She perched on top of a long counter and emptied most of the box of cereal into the bowl and covered it with milk.

  Damn, she’d forgotten how good it was. With a mouth full of the cereal, she rolled her eyes and said out loud, “Best food ever.”

  A voice out of the darkness startled her.

  “Well, I see you would be a cheap date.”

  And he stepped into the ambient light from the back room behind the counter.

  With the spoon en route between the bowl and her mouth, Starla stopped and looked at him. What the fuck was he doing here? She shoved the spoon in her mouth, her eyes followed him as he continued forward.

  Jacob watched the young vampire shovel the cereal into her mouth with moans of almost orgasmic intensity. In the dim light, with knee high boots, a skirt that barely covered anything, and breasts that pushed so high in her insufficient bra that the nipples peeked over the top, and the face of an angel, she was about the sexiest thing he’d ever seen in his life. He remembered too well the sweet innocent girl he’d first met at Koen’s villa. And the hard super-sexed vampire he’d met at the club a few hours ago. He was having trouble reconciling the images.

  This girl sitting here crunching down sugary cereal knocked him off balance.

  Starla landed her huge dark eyes on his face, assessed the grin, and decided he was an asshole.

  “I said, what are you doing here? I came here to be alone. Do me the favor of jetting the fuck out of here.”

  “Doesn’t work for me, sorry. I’m not through with our conversation from last night.”

  Starla sat the bowl carefully aside and stood up, towering above the tall vampire from her vantage point on the counter. The height felt good, and although it was a false sense of power, she’d take it.

  “Get out. We have nothing to say to each other. Tell Eillia I don’t need her interference now. The time to speak with me would have been before I got trapped in her world of blood and semen.”

  Jacob lifted his head. What did she say? Blood and semen? An odd phrase. Were the young vamps sexually abusing her?

  “Starla, we are going to talk. Come down from there.”

  “Not happening until you leave.”

  “Not leaving, so you better get prepared to stand there until the store opens in the morning.”

  “What the fuck do you want? I’m not your concern!”

  “That isn’t entirely true. After your accident, you were dying, Starla. Eillia sent me to save you. I gave you my blood to help your body heal. You were comatose with little chance of pulling through.”

  “I remember you. I didn’t know why, but I do remember your face above me at one point.”

  “Good. So, as I waited to make sure you were going to live, I went to the hospital cafeteria to get something to eat. While I was gone, you were abducted. I assumed it was by the rogues you live with now. Been searching for you since. So, yeah, you are my concern. I was responsible for you. And I need to make sure you’re okay.” He paused. “Are you okay, Starla?”

  “Peachy. Stop worrying your little head and go home.”

  “See, now. I don’t think so. Something you said. Makes me suspicious that something isn’t right at Hogwarts. Are the kids playing too rough?”

  Starla felt her gut clench. “All dandy. You can go, Dumbledore.”

  He stared at her downcast eyes. She was barely breathing. There was no doubt she was extremely upset. What the hell?

  He dropped his eyes. Dropping his eyes to eye level was a bad idea. It brought her genital area into his direct line of sight. Her skirt had a ruffle along the bottom that turned up just at the right place to tease him. Didn’t help that he had found her enticing the first moment he saw her at the door at Koen’s villa. Funny, he always preferred striking, sexually aggressive mature women. She was out of his league. She was too young by centuries, and too innocent by about a thousand lovers. Too good for him. And she was Eillia’s friend. All reasons to stay away from her. He should send someone else to bring her back to the villa. He should leave now. Instead, he surged forward, wrapped his arms around her thighs, and lifted her off the counter.

  Her rage-filled shriek nearly split the eardrum in his right ear. It took a lot more than painful injury to phase him. Using his superior vampire strength, he contained her twisting body and flying fists long enough to carry her into an adjacent room that was probably the manager’s office. He dumped her on the carpeted floor quickly when he felt blunt human teeth rip into his hand.

  “What the fuck? You bit me!”

  Starla scrambled off the floor and faced him grinning.

  “Vampire. Look it up.”

  “Not the same thing. That fucking hurts!”

  “Poor baby. Like you haven’t been bitten before! I get bitten every time someone mounts me!”

  Jacob wasn’t missing the theme. She didn’t say “every time I have sex.” She said “every time someone mounts me.” It wasn’t entirely consensual. He knew it wasn’t rape, she was too strong to allow that, but they were using her for sex. That made it abusive. He was furious. No wonder she was so angry. She thought she’d been abandoned in a brutal world. So far, it had been true.

  Calmly, he pulled two chairs out and faced them toward each other. He sat in one and waited for her to take the other. She didn’t move.

  “Starla…”

  “Star. That’s what they call me. I haven�
��t been that mewling little virgin from Alaska for a long time now.”

  That sort of shocked him. “Virgin?”

  She snorted on a bitter laugh. “Close as. Might as well have been. Missionary style one or two times each with only two inexperienced boys. Vampire life changed that!”

  “Starla. Sorry, Star. Please sit down. I need to speak with you about your cadre of vamps. What they are doing is against protocol in the vampire community.”

  “You guys have rules? I’ve never heard of that.”

  “Informal. More a code of conduct. It’s to protect us all. You do know we live amongst our human brothers undetected, don’t you?”

  Jacob pushed the seat towards her with his foot. She looked at it as if he’d shoved a rotting corpse against her. But she pushed it back against the desk, slipped up to sit on the desktop, and rested her feet against the chair back.

  Jacob averted his eyes since her left foot was raised high and gave him a perfect shot beneath the skirt. She was not wearing underwear.

  Starla smiled and leaned toward him, both breasts in danger of complete escape from the stressed C cups.

  “Hm. Why aren’t you looking at me? Don’t you like what you see?”

  He kept his eyes averted until she laughed again.

  “Big, bad, old vampire…don’t you think you can handle me?” Her fingers wandered down to caress herself, just to get a rise out of him. It worked. He shook his head as he glanced there.

  His eyes shot back up to her face.

  “It’s Jacob. And I may have been around a lot longer than you, but don’t make the mistake that I’m too old or any less virile. I could teach you things. Do things to you that would make you scream for more. You think those boys know how to make love to a woman? One night in my bed and you would beg me to fuck you every night.” He released a long slow breath. “But I won’t.”