I met Nate’s gaze, gave a little nod, and parted my lips. A pinch at my gums and then my fangs darted out, and I slammed them into Eddie’s throat.
The kid tensed, gasped, fingers squeezing his glass so hard I thought it might shatter. His free hand moved in the air around us, like he didn’t know where to touch—which was probably best ’cause if he copped a feel, I’d tear off his balls. Blood swirled past my lips and my eyes nearly rolled back. Warm and living, not like the crap I’d had earlier. But I sucked lightly, keeping my wits, my focus, because for once in my life something wasn’t actually about me.
Nate moved almost in a daze, focus locked on Isabella’s throat. She hadn’t quite finished her whiskey when he reached her, wove his fingers in her hair and wrenched her head back. She let out a breathy sigh and I almost rolled my eyes. His mouth descended and she yelped, glass dropping from her hand and shattering. Cinnamon and whiskey peppered the air, along with the coppery tinge of blood. Crimson snaked down her nearly-bare shoulder but that was okay—it took time to get used to it, to drinking without making a mess.
He met my gaze over the ditzy girl’s shoulder, peering up through lustrous dark brown hair, and a fresh tingle ran down my spine, gooseflesh rising fast and hard—it was just about the most erotic thing I’d seen in a while.
We vampires have issues. I know this. Don’t judge.
Isabella had no such awareness as her boyfriend, her hands openly latching onto Nate as he drank, little squeaking noises leaving her lips. Her legs wavered—she was fading fast.
I took a final pull from Eddie and jerked my head back, pressing my thumb over the holes in his neck. “You’ll drain her. Take more from him.”
The kid started to protest—apparently possible homoerotic subtext wasn’t lost on him—but wasn’t getting a say in the matter, not if he wanted Isabella-Dearest to live. I passed Nate the boy and took the girl, pierced the inside of my mouth and dragged my tongue over her wound—cleaning up what was left and clotting the holes. I left her standing dazed against the wall under the stairs and went to monitor the boys.
There was no explaining how close you were coming to draining a human—not really. It was a trial and error sort of thing. Monitor their breathing, their heart rate. Learn to judge what your own appetite needed, and what humans based on size would provide. He wouldn’t know for a while, not without lots of practice, so when Eddie was getting a little peaked, I gestured and Nate gave him up. The regular doses of VBA blood had ensured he wasn’t starving, so he didn’t fight me pulling the plug.
I gave Eddie the same treatment as his girlfriend, sealing up the wounds, and tugged them each by the arm toward the elevator. “So you saw the way out, right?” They rocked on unsteady feet in the elevator, and I pulled an extra twenty out of the pocket sewed into the inside of my left boot, shoved it in Eddie’s hands. “Call a cab. Go home and rest. Hope you had lots of fun.”
“But—” Isabella started, but I hauled the elevator door down.
“Push that button,” I gestured through the grating, “when you’re about to get out and close the door again. That’ll send it back up here.” So if Nic or whoever decide to drop by, I’ll have extra warning. Not that I thought she would without calling, but still. I might need the time to put clothes on or something.
Or I might need to make a hasty exit if I soon told him everything and he decided to try to kill me again.
Chapter Nineteen
Everything
I retracted my fangs and watched Mutt and Jeff descend in the lift, the industrial elevator’s slow, shuddering pace noisy and familiar. Trepidation crept up, knotting a ball of worry in my gut. First feeding went well, but now something bad was bound to happen just to be par for the course around here. My flesh prickled, aware that he was watching me—staring at me—and I knew I had to say something soon.
“So. Uh.” I turned to face him. And yeah, he stared, gaze intense, looking through me, like through my brain into every thought and fear and worry from the past six years, laying it all wide open for me to see, to feel, too. “A lot of stuff has happened. It’s been half a dozen years. And I was going to start this off with, ‘You’re a vampire now’, but the fangs and blood probably clued you in. And you probably remember the drill there, from me, so I won’t repeat all our weaknesses. Everyone thinks you’re dead.” Well, some don’t, and I might be fucked, but we’ll talk that over later. “And you were kinda crazy.” I swallowed thickly, the choker at my throat confining and irritating, and I itched to drag it off. “But you’re better, and that’s good, and you can talk to Peter some more later. Um...let’s see.” There was a pretty big elephant in the room, so I avoided his gaze and started pacing.
Do you hate me? Do you want to stay? What’s your opinion on crazy angst sex? On a scale of one to Judas, precisely how betrayed are you feeling right now?
Fuck that—there wasn’t one elephant, there was a herd of them and they were about to stampede me. I stalked away with my back to him, paused in the living room, and stared at the wall like it might give me a real good idea or something.
“So...” Ask it, dumbass, and get it over with. “What do you remember?”
A beat of silence. Then, his voice thick and grave: “Everything.”
I winced. Shit. I tilted my head, glanced over my shoulder, and then slowly turned the rest of me to face him. My heart beat hard. Loudly. “Everything-everything?”
He moved fluidly with smooth steps toward me, expression dark and deliciously broody. “Everything.”
Oh boy. Smackdown, here we—
I was still backpedalling as he reached me, sank his hand into my hair, and kissed me.
That was the thing you never saw coming with the man. He’d give you nothing but a platonic look and then bam, hand raking through my hair, arm wrapped around my back, heat searing me through my clothes, mouth moving like he’d been starving all this time and only found relief against my lips.
And I met the kiss with everything I had in me to give. This was Nate. Nate I knew. Nate who knew me. I threw my arms around his neck and when he moved to lift me, I hopped up and helped; my back arched, knees braced at his hips. I slammed into the wall—we’d been moving, apparently, but I must’ve been unaware of it—and wrapped my legs around him. My heart was erratic, beating against my chest so loud I swore he heard it too. Brick bit my back, catching my hair and jerking it from my scalp, but I didn’t care. His hands worked at my corset, yanking it enough that I felt the lacing give at my back, loosening enough to slip his hand in the front.
Hips undulating against his, finding him obviously hard through layers of clothing, I tipped my head back, letting out a gasp as happy warm shivers rolled through me. The choker tore off and his lips were on my throat, moving lower, just as his hands moved down to slip between us and tear through another pair of panties. They were lacy boy shorts and as cute as I looked in them, I wouldn’t complain if he preferred me without.
I remembered the teasing comments before, crystal clear, while he had me up against the cabin wall. Remembered every delicious second of it—the culmination of plenty of sexual tension. But this wasn’t playful consummation—this was need and hunger. Like nothing before this moment had been real until just now, and he hadn’t seen me in years.
His mouth took mine again, hard, as my hands worked at shoving down his track pants, his boxer briefs. No precursor, no teasing—he drove in and lights played behind my eyes, my head tilting back to cry out.
He held still, buried in me to the hilt, ’til my blurry gaze returned to his, and I saw him there again—completely.
“I missed you,” he whispered.
It was almost too much to take emotionally, too much to feel, to face. But then he moved again, and again, that conscious moment of connection gone as we both faded into physical need. He shifted, angling one arm under my thigh to widen me, open me, and I reached a hand up to slide against the thick window frame beside us, giving me some extra balance. My othe
r hand tightened on his shoulder, nails raking through his skin. His lips moved down over my throat again—
And then I felt the prick of fangs.
If he remembered “everything”, he might remember up in the bedroom before, how I went still like I was frozen solid. He didn’t change his rhythm, didn’t tense, but whispered, “Can I?”
Whether he wanted permission from me specifically or he wondered if something dire would happen if he did, I didn’t know. Or care. Vampires didn’t feed from one another—it was weird and it was personal, and it wasn’t something we did.
“Yeah—” I barely got the word out when his fangs sank against my flesh.
My entire body heated, boiled, reached for him, my spine arching and lips parting in a cry. Lightheadness gripped me and for a moment I was floating, falling, spinning in the ether. It hit like a drug, an acid trip, the one thing guaranteed to get a vampire high—the connection of sharing blood.
“Harder,” I whispered and I honestly didn’t know what I meant, but he went for both, thrusting brutally into me and meeting every rock of my hips, fangs tearing deeper into my throat. It wasn’t the erotic pleasure-pain, wasn’t even about the sex—it was grounding. Connecting. Feeling him here, now, after all this fucking time—experiencing every stroke inside me, every pull of the blood from my veins, and knowing it was real.
He abandoned my throat, blood streaking down my cleavage where my breasts bounced in the loosened corset, and kissed me again, entering harder, deeper, and I drove against him, clit bumping him with every—
I shuddered, saw stars. My nails bit into him hard enough to draw blood, the high going on and on and on until I slumped against the wall, crumpling with my head on his shoulder, heart still jackhammering in my chest, sounding in my ears. And he was right there with me, hitting with rapid succession before groaning his release.
Oh my god. And that was without magic.
My forehead rested on his shoulder and I’d been breathing, even though I didn’t require oxygen, acting like a damn human even though as a mortal I’d never experienced this, never felt this, so it wasn’t like I was going back on old habits. Arms around me, he shifted, walking us back until we hit the couch and fell. Sank. The cushions were thick and soft, welcoming arms. His weight over me felt good, right, achingly familiar. I had my legs wrapped around him still and belatedly realized my heels were likely digging in his ass, so I shifted them down a bit. My fucked up shoulder would’ve probably been in agony if I wasn’t soaked in vampire endorphins.
His head rested in the hollow of my neck between my head and shoulder, sweat-slicked skin meeting mine, and I felt his heart beat against me. It was only a brief moment, however, because he shifted onto his elbow, still over me—confining me—gaze finding my eyes, face inches from mine. His breath was a warm spot on my lips. A soft, tender kiss touched down, just brief before he whispered, “I love you.”
I’d never felt so...fucking cracked open in my life. Not even the night before I turned him, not with anyone, not ever. And I just wanted to run. To push him off me and run downstairs, hop in a car, and disappear, I was just so fucking scared.
Jesus Christ, I fucking missed you. My lips trembled. “I love you too.”
“Aw, how romantic.”
Ice blasted through my veins, freezing me from head to toe so suddenly I swore the sweat dried on me instantly. We both looked to the hall entrance, to the petite woman with hair in blonde layered waves around her shoulders, cold eyes on us, delicate chin lifted in some way that struck me as both self-righteous and jealous—I all but expected a sneer to touch her lips.
But Mishka Thiering smiled instead, her gaze on Nate. “Hello, lover.”
Chapter Twenty
The Bitch Is Back
My first thought was: Holy fucking shit, I bought her apartment block, had the earth blessed, salted, and concrete poured over it so no one could ever raise her lying bitch face again.
And then I saw the lines around her eyes, her lips. The way her body filled out the dark violet babydoll blouse topping a long white peasant skirt—thicker in the waist and hips, breasts heavier and a bit lower. They didn’t raise my twenty-four-year-old former friend from the dead.
They didn’t need to. She never died.
My next thought: Where the fuck is the nearest gun?
Easy answer. Remington 742 under the sofa, but it would take some manoeuvering to get. Next option was the Jericho under the coffee table in a holster, .45 hollow point rounds. One and a half feet away. Doable. Sucker was loaded and ready, bullet in the chamber—like I kept all my emergency weapons.
I tensed in preparation.
A hell of a lot of shit must’ve been going through Nate’s brain right about then. Maybe he thought he was crazy still. Or dreaming. Or in hell. I’d probably lean toward the latter if I were him. He swallowed tightly and shifted, never taking his eyes off of her. Tucked his sweatpants back up in one swift movement, grabbed the back of the couch and rose. I eased my thighs shut ’cause I have some dignity, thankyouverymuch, and smoothed my skirt down. Flexed my fingers. I didn’t look at the table, no, but I studied it in my peripheral vision, going over the plan a couple of times before putting it into action.
And since I was generally pretty good at distracting my opponent with irritating snark: “You know, out of everyone in this room who is supposed to be dead, Nate came out on top of the ‘still pretty’ pile, at least. Your thirties are not being kind to you, honey.”
Her gaze shifted to me. “I’m marvelling at how much I haven’t missed you, Zara. And not killing your target?” She shook her head. “You’re going soft in your old age—”
I darted, reached, hand locking on the grip of the gun, and I jerked it up, levelling it with—
Energy struck me, fucking witch magic throwing me back against the sofa, tipping the whole couch over, and slamming me into the wall with enough force to rattle my bones. Then she had the fucking gall to drop me back down on my feet gently with a condescending little smile.
“I just need to speak to my husband for a moment, if you don’t mind.”
Oh, no, she did not bring up the H-word after all the shit she pulled. As her attention moved back to Nate, who was staring dumbfounded, silent, watching her like a rattler about to strike, I bolted forward again, ready to put a fucking bullet in her skull—where one should have been these past six years away.
This time there was no pointed but detached magic to meet me; instead I got hit with the full force of her fury, throwing me in the air, across the room, against the metal blinds over the windows—
And through the metal blinds.
Thin steel gave with a screech, glass shattered, and I was airborne. Sky above me was navy velvet pricked with stars, the smashed window to my apartment yawned light through teeth of broken blinds. I sailed down, down, too stunned to even correct myself because Mishka Thiering was alive and just threw me out my goddamn window.
Which, come to think of it, was exactly what she did the last time I saw her.
I hit the pavement in a heap, shards of glass and slices of broken blinds cutting into me, and I just stared there at the fucking sky, half expecting I was about to wake up from the shittiest nightmare ever.
I blinked. Looked at the window. Didn’t see anyone checking on me. So either he wasn’t bothering—and this is the guy who searched for me for four months—or she attacked him. Or he attacked her. No matter who was attacking, there was a fucking fight in my apartment and I wasn’t about to miss it.
I stood, heels of my boots firm on the ground, and gave myself a shake so loose broken glass fell. I bled from dozens of places, glass glittering in my skin, and thank god my damn skirt had been down when I landed. I had nowhere to tuck the gun. No holster, no pockets, nothing but my cleavage and that seemed like a bad idea, so I did what you should never try at home, kids, and pinched the trigger guard between my teeth. I took a running leap for the same drainage pipe I’d grabbed a few days before and
scampered up, boots scraping, knees scraping, grabbed the windowsill, hopped up with my gun in hand—
There was no fight.
I stood crouched in the broken, jagged window for a moment, staring. He stood basically where we’d fed on the humans, apparently not attacking her, and Mish was a foot away, lips moving softly. Just as I strained to hear, she stopped, leaned forward and up on her tiptoes, said something with her mouth by his ear, and rocked back down on her heels again. She had to’ve seen me there in her peripheral vision but she didn’t acknowledge me, didn’t glance in my direction, just strolled back to the elevator and descended a moment later.
Holy fuck. I needed better security.
Also: he left me out there.
I dropped from the window frame, boots striking the floor and cracking broken glass with enough noise and force to wake the dead. Assuming, of course, any of the dead were actually dead, which I seriously fucking doubted at the moment.
I stalked across the floor, matted hair swinging painfully against my cut up back. Nate met my gaze and I glared, not saying a goddamn word as I stomped past him for the loft stairs, jerked my head away when his lips parted to say something. Did I want to know what the fucking bitch wanted? Sure. Did I want to hear it? No. I wanted a spa day. I wanted to relax for two goddamn seconds after the hell that had been the past few days.
And did I mention he left me out there?
My feet thudded up the stairs, rattling the metal support beneath. At the top, the bedroom door swung open violently, banging the wall behind it. I slammed the Jericho on the dresser top—should have fucking shot her anyway, and then him, and then her some more—and I stormed into the bathroom. Well, I was going to sit in my goddamn Jacuzzi tub and get all the glass out of me and then I was chartering a jet to some tropical paradise and he and the missus could have lots of nice little cozy conversations all day long without me.
Exhumed Page 13