by Cat Marsters
Tears burned behind her eyes. Damn it, how had she managed to mess everything up so much? And with the one person who was trying to help her. How had she let the bloodlust overwhelm her so badly?
She sniffed, and for the first time since she’d woken up dead, let a tear fall.
“Paige?”
She furiously blinked away the tears and ignored Rafa’s smooth voice in the darkness. He lay behind her, holding her close against his body. He was warm, but he didn’t breathe, and it creeped her out.
“You’re crying. Did I hurt you?”
“What, you mean this time, or the time you ripped my throat out?”
His fingers traced the mark on her neck. “Have I said I’m sorry about that?”
“No, and don’t think I’ll forgive you for it any time soon, either.”
He sighed behind her. “Sweetheart --”
“And don’t you dare call me sweetheart.”
His fingers stroked her arm, and Paige willed herself not to respond. “Are you hungry?”
“No.”
“You need to feed.”
“I’m fine.”
His lips brushed the back of her neck, and then his weight moved away from her. “Nevertheless,” he said as he rolled to his feet and tapped the lights onto a low setting, “you need to feed.”
Paige made a face into the pillow and didn’t turn over. She heard him moving around, opening and closing doors, then liquid running, and the sharp, coppery scent of blood.
“Here.”
She opened her eyes to see him holding out a glass of the stuff. It smelled incredibly inviting.
“No, thank you.”
Rafa sighed again and sat down on the edge of the bed. He was still totally naked, and it disconcerted her more than a little. Only a thin sheet separated them.
“It’s not my blood.”
“I said --”
“And I say you need to feed. Look. I’ve been a vampire for fifteen hundred years. I’ve seen a lot of fledglings decide they can survive just fine without regular blood, and then they either starve to death or go mad from bloodlust and slaughter dozens of people.” He held the glass out again. “It’s your choice.”
She took it, sulkily. “Why should I believe you?”
He shrugged. “Absolutely no reason. But do you really want to ignore me and find out for yourself?”
Paige scowled, and sipped at the blood. It was cold. A few days ago it would have disgusted her, but now she was so thirsty she didn’t care.
Rafael watched her, his dark eyes giving nothing away. He wasn’t smiling or trying to charm her any more, which perversely convinced Paige that he was telling the truth.
“I can warm it up if you want,” he offered, and she made a face, because warming up the blood would make it far too real for her liking.
“Where’s it from?” she asked, before taking any more.
“Hospital. They throw out expired blood. Jamie gets pints of it for me.”
At the mention of Jamie’s name, Paige winced. Barely an hour after bumping uglies with him, she’d been tearing off her clothes for Rafael.
“Drink it all,” he said, still watching her with those dark eyes. “And listen to me.”
“I don’t --”
“ -- ever shut up, yes, I’ve noticed.” He gave her a brief smile, a flash of white in his dark face. “But this is important.”
She scowled.
“Blood is vital to you now. You can eat and drink whatever else you want, but without blood you will wither and die. You need it regularly. The older you get, the less you’ll need to feed, but right now you need it several times a day.”
“I --” Paige began, and he held up a hand to cut her off.
“Yes, I know. You didn’t have any for the first few days. Frankly, I’m amazed. You must be stronger than I realized.”
Paige gave him a smug look.
“But don’t forget that last night you came here, drank a gallon or two from me, and fucked me so long and hard I ache all over.” He rolled his shoulders, and his eyes glinted at her. “In a good way.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “You bit me too.”
“Mmm. Couldn’t resist, sorry.” He nudged aside the sheet covering her breasts and admired the puncture marks there. “You really are delicious.”
“You’re disgusting.”
He shrugged again. “Sticks and stones.” Noticing her glass was empty, he poured the contents of another blood bag into it. “Drink up.”
“I really don’t --”
“Just do it, Paige, please. If you get weak and die, Jamie really will kill me.”
That made her eyebrows go up. “You’re scared of Jamie?”
Rafa looked slightly defensive. “Scared is a strong word. I’m simply wary of the threat he poses.”
Paige ran her eyes over Rafa. It was no hardship. The man was built like a god. His skin was dark, his eyes darker. His muscles gleamed in the low lighting.
“Okay, Jamie is way buffer than I ever realized,” she said, which made Rafa smile, “but seriously, you outweigh him by like fifty pounds. And you’re a vampire. Why is he a threat?”
“Because of you,” Rafa said simply.
Paige opened her mouth, then closed it again.
“He would kill for you. He loves you more than I think you realize. If anything happened to you, he would track down the person responsible and end them.”
His voice was steady; he wasn’t explaining a threat or a fear, but simply how things were.
“That’s why I turned you,” he said. “I couldn’t let you die.”
“You could have tried not ripping my throat out,” Paige said. “It’s just a suggestion…”
She expected Rafa to smile. He didn’t.
“Last night… will not make Jamie happy.”
“You are scared of him.”
Rafa ignored that. “But he will understand… well, he might understand.”
Paige stared. “What, are you crazy? He’s going to kill us both! Rafa,” she put down the blood and faced him. “Last night I… before I came here, I… me and Jamie…”
“I know,” Rafa said. At her questioning look, he explained, “I have a very good sense of smell.”
Paige winced. “Ew.”
He shrugged. He was good at it.
“But look. I know you’re a morality-free zone, but Jamie isn’t. He’s gonna be really hurt if he finds out that we… It meant something to him, Rafa. It meant something to me. I can’t believe I…”
She closed her eyes. An hour after that magical time with Jamie she was opening her legs for Rafa. “God, I’m a slut.”
“No,” Rafa handed her blood back, “you’re a vampire.”
“Oh, and it’s supposed to be normal to just go around fucking people all the time?”
He gave her an old-fashioned look. “You have fangs and drink blood,” he said, “normality doesn’t really apply.”
“Ha ha.”
“It’s normal to need lots of blood,” Rafa told her. “And if you don’t get it, it’s normal to lose control. The older you get, the stronger you’ll be, and the less blood you’ll need.” He paused. “Piece of advice though? Take some with you when you travel. A ten-hour trek across the desert isn’t much fun without it.”
“I’ll remember that when I go back to Egypt. Oh, no wait, I can’t,” Paige glared at him, “because I’ll combust the moment I set foot on site.”
“Because I bit you,” Rafa said.
“Yes.”
“Because I needed blood.”
She shrugged.
“Because I was so hungry for it I lost control.”
Paige gave him a suspicious look.
“I hadn’t fed in a day or two,” Rafa said. “It’s not usually much of a problem, but… well, then I met you, and you were just too delicious…”
She rolled her eyes.
“My resistance was weakened,” Rafa said. “Blood hunger and lust, they’
re connected. They feed each other. It’s the same with anger.”
“That is such a load of --”
“So why were you fucking me last night?” Rafa said, and Paige opened her mouth.
Then she closed it.
Then she said, “I think you’d better explain.”
Chapter Four
Jamie didn’t sleep much.
Mad with frustration, he spent most of the night awake, thumping his pillow or himself. If it wasn’t bad enough that he’d upset her enough to drive her away, he’d sent her to Rafa, a man who’d been known to make nuns blush.
When he closed his eyes and remembered the feel of her body under his, her soft skin and hot pussy, it made him want to cry. All the years he’d been wanting her and doing nothing about it, and then this. One perfect night -- one perfect part of a night -- and then it all went belly-up.
By the time his alarm went off he was red-eyed with exhaustion. Showering, dressing, and riding to the office, he stumbled in to find Sofie canoodling with her elf boyfriend on the sofa.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” he snapped, throwing himself into his chair.
Sofie had the grace to blush. Finn, however, did not.
“Jamie! How are you?” He leapt to his feet and peered closer. “You look like hell.”
“Thanks,” Jamie said, stabbing the power switch on his computer.
“Was that rude?” Finn asked Sofie, who nodded. “Sorry. What’s up?”
“Nothing.”
They exchanged glances. Sofie sniffed. “Hey!” she cried.
“What?” Finn sniffed too. A wide grin came over his face. “Jamie! You finally got some!”
“Will you two stop doing that?” Jamie snapped. “It’s disgusting. Ordinary people don’t go around sniffing each other.”
“We’re not ordinary,” Sofie said. She stretched, and wandered over to her desk. “But if you finally, er, got some, Jamie, why are you so…” She waved her hand, looking for a suitable word.
“Mardy,” Finn supplied.
“You sound like my grandmother,” Jamie muttered. The phone rang, and he picked it up with a grumpy, “Sundown International.”
“Jamie.” It was Reaver, the demon hunter, and he sounded out of breath. This in itself was a bad sign. “The Skargko. It came from a nest.”
Jamie sat up straighter. “A nest? Are you sure?” Skargko nests were bad news. They could infest a city within weeks.
“Yes. We’re monitoring it now. We need backup. Echo’s with me. Send Rafa -- it’s in a warehouse. He’ll be fine if he brings the blacked-out car. And Sofie, too, if she doesn’t mind getting messy.”
“I don’t mind,” Sofie said. Jamie wasn’t surprised she’d heard. Her werewolf hearing was excellent. She was already kicking off her heels and reaching for the running shoes she kept under her desk. “Where is it?”
Jamie got directions and Sofie took off while he called Rafa.
“More Skargkos?”
“Yeah. You need to get the nest, or they’ll be everywhere. They lay hundreds of eggs at a time.”
Rafa swore, and Jamie heard footsteps as he ran through the mansion. “Right. Tell me where.”
Jamie did, and then he hesitated. “Is Paige okay?”
“She’s fine. How many demons are there?”
“I don’t know.” Jamie forced his mind back to the job. “Could be hundreds. Talk to Reaver.”
“Will do,” Rafa said, and then he was gone.
Jamie held the phone a second or two longer, then he replaced it carefully. Finn was watching him.
“Scary thing, sending your girlfriend out there to face monsters,” he said.
Jamie nodded. Poor Paige, she hadn’t a clue what kind of world she was getting herself involved with.
“These Sarky things,” Finn went on, “they don’t habitually wear a lot of silver, do they?”
“They don’t habitually wear a lot of anything,” Jamie said absently. “They’re barely sentient.”
“Good to know, good to know. Sofie’s usually all right if there’s no silver involved.”
There was a silence. Jamie kept trying not to think about Paige and monsters.
“Mind you, took her a while to heal when she got run through with that sword,” Finn said, almost conversationally. “It’s rough, you know. They can be undead but it still hurts. Makes a mess. Big scar. Not a particularly pleasant thing to watch, either, when it’s someone you love. Still hurts her sometimes -- Jamie?”
Jamie jammed his bike helmet on. “I have to go see Paige,” he said, and Finn grinned.
“Thought you might. I’ll hold the fort,” he said, his voice vanishing as Jamie ran down the stairs and outside.
Monsters. She was facing monsters and he’d just let her go. Just let her face Rafa all by herself. Jamie had a lot of respect for his boss, but at the end of the day he was a damn powerful vampire, and Paige didn’t know what the hell was going on in this scary new world. And now Rafa was off fighting demons, and she’d be all alone, and he…
He really just needed to see her.
Finding out the woman he loved had died and come back wasn’t a shock Jamie felt likely to recover from. The need to see her, touch her, prove to himself that she was okay and wasn’t going anywhere, was overwhelming.
His bike skidded to a halt in Rafa’s courtyard, and he keyed in a code on the door to let himself inside, where he stood and tried to calm himself. Rafa had housekeepers to keep the mansion in good repair, but it was too early for them to be in. The place was silent.
Most likely Paige would be asleep. He started up the stairs, quietly, thinking of surprising her. She’d be all warm and sleepy, soft creamy white skin and tousled hair, smiling up at him from tangled sheets.
Or maybe she hadn’t been to bed yet -- Rafa kept pretty strange hours. She’d probably be exhausted, having slept about as much as him last night. They needed to talk, but not if she was so tired. He’d help her to bed, give her some blood from Rafa’s stocks, make sure she knew he wasn’t mad with her.
He was confused, and hurt, but he wasn’t mad.
He pushed open one door, then another, but each room was empty and unslept in. They were pleasantly-appointed rooms, but not as large or decadent as the third one he entered, with sofas and weapons chests and a variety of swords hung on the wall. The bed was a huge four-poster, hung with heavy tapestries. Rafa’s room, for sure. There was even a fridge in one corner, with a discarded blood bag on it.
Jamie was about to leave and try the next room, when a movement on the bed caught his eye. When he saw what it was, he froze.
Paige shifted in her sleep, her skin as creamy and her hair as tousled as he’d imagined. There was a rosy, well-fed flush to her cheeks. The sheet had slipped away from her body and she lay there naked and lovely.
Lovely but for the bite marks on her breasts, thighs, and neck.
Jamie stood for a long moment, unable to breathe. Last night there’d been the healing scar on her neck, and a smaller bite on her thigh. He’d tried hard not to mind -- after all, the vampire who killed her had probably seduced her to do it.
But now…
Now…
She was lying in Rafa’s bed, in blood-smeared sheets, bitten and fucked. These weren’t feeding bites. These were sexual bites. And she was in Rafa’s bed.
He stared at the older bite on her thigh, and the realization came over him that it was exactly the same as the new ones.
He wasn’t aware of losing his balance and stumbling against the doorframe. He didn’t realize he’d dropped his helmet until the clatter resounded through the silent house, startling Paige into wakefulness. Her eyes snapped open, glowing greener than anything in nature, and her fangs gleamed.
Then she registered who was standing in the doorway, and her fangs vanished as an all-too-human look of horror came over her face.
“Jamie -- I can explain --”
“I bet,” he croaked, and turned out of the room, needing air.
“Jamie!” She came after him, still naked, still beautiful, and still covered in bites. He felt sick. How could he have been so stupid? Letting her go to him like that? Not even realizing --
Rafa was the vampire who bit her in Egypt. Not only bit her, but fucked her too. How else would he have been in a position to bite her thigh like that? He fucked her, killed her, and brought her back as a vampire.
Red rage boiled up inside Jamie.
“I can explain, Jamie -- look, I’m sorry --”
“Me too.”
“Don’t go.” She chased him down the stairs, across the marble lobby. “Jamie, please. Listen to me. I didn’t mean to --”
“But he did.”
“Jamie,” Paige cried. “Listen to me, please!”
But Jamie was already out the door, and Paige yelped and leapt back from the bright sunlight. As he gunned the bike into life and spun out of the courtyard, he was aware of her calling his name across a great distance.
He ignored it.
Paige slumped in the doorway, stunned to tears. Hating herself, because she never cried, she hauled herself to her feet and made her body climb the stairs in search of some clothes.
She couldn’t remember a time in her life when everything had gone so wrong, so fast. The last time she’d felt even close to this wretched had been when she’d been trying to organize her grandmother’s funeral and received the postcard from her mother which said, “Sorry babe, can’t make it, busy busy, have fun.” Finally realizing that her own mother was such a lowlife she wasn’t even going to attend her only parent’s funeral had been a pretty low moment for Paige.
But at least then she’d had Jamie. And now…
Paige flinched as she remembered his face, his tight voice, the anger that rolled off him in waves. She’d never seen him so angry, ever. Didn’t even know he was capable of it.
For an awful moment, she’d thought he was going to kill her.
She shook herself. This was Jamie. He’d never hurt her. He’d always be there for her. And as soon as she could get out of this bloody house and tell him just how damn important that made him, the better.
Get up, Paige, she told herself. Don’t lie around wallowing. It’s useless and stupid, and you don’t want to be either of those things.