Today, Tomorrow and Always

by Bailey, Tessa

  Like a given. Something that couldn’t be ignored.

  Tucker’s thumb retreated and they walked for about a minute, stopping.

  She heard Tucker set down her suitcase on the concrete, a key sliding into a lock and a door opening. He pulled her inside, closing the door behind them and locking it twice, with two different sounds. Her nose wrinkled at the smell of aging carpet and faint cigarette smoke, but Tucker’s musk and mint scent was a balm over the unpleasantness.

  And his hand was still snug against her cheek.

  “All right.” He audibly struggled through a gulp. “We’ve got two full beds. Some pretty brutal turn-of-the-century décor. A television—”

  “What way are we facing?”

  His attention lingered on her face a moment, then he started again. “We just walked in and we’re facing the back of the room. The two beds are on the left. There’s a dresser on the right, ugly as hell, television on top. Bathroom straight ahead.” His voice changed directions. “There’s a window beside the door and it faces a rear parking lot.”

  Mary nodded. Thinking she’d asked enough of him for one day, she reluctantly started to let go of Tucker’s hand, but he tightened his grip and guided her forward. They ventured exactly ten steps, the air consistency telling her when they were passing objects, furniture, until finally a light switch clicked.

  “This is the bathroom. There’s a small bathtub on the right, toilet on the left. Someone has definitely been murdered in here.” His thumb brushed her cheek, just a graze, and he seemed to hold his breath afterward. “But you…you’re safe. You know that, don’t you, kid? I won’t let anything happen to you. While I’ve…while I’ve got you.”

  “I know,” she murmured, marveling over the fact that she’d gone from skittish to lulled in the space of minutes. “Tucker, why do you call me kid?”

  He started to chuckle, but cut himself off. Didn’t speak for several beats. “I call you kid to remind myself to stop noticing how pretty you are,” he said quietly. “That’s not for me to notice, Mary. You’re not mine to look at. Or touch. And it’s reminding me of that, too.”

  That fluttering that she’d experienced earlier moved up to her throat. Pretty. He’d called her pretty. No one had ever said that to her before. As someone who rarely ventured out into the real world or had any use for a mirror, her looks had always been inconsequential. But the fae valued beauty. The fact that she had fairy blood running through her veins was never more obvious than now. His compliment made her skin pulse, her radiance tripping and dancing drunkenly around her head. “Thank you,” she breathed. “Every time you call me kid, I’ll hear you calling me pretty, instead.”

  “Yeah.” He sounded so close, voice hushed, his breath stirring her hair. “Guess the nickname backfired, huh?”

  “Yes. It’s wonderful.” She flattened his rough palm against her cheek and rubbed against it, knowing on some level she shouldn’t be, not when she would marry another in a week’s time, but his touch felt incredible. She’d touched no one but her mother for almost a decade and Tilda’s embrace was perfunctory. Not permissive and exciting like Tucker’s. Maybe she just craved contact with another being. Maybe that’s what was drawing her to him so intensely? And if so, couldn’t she be forgiven for indulging that need just a little? “Tucker, what do you look like?”

  If she didn’t have her full face pressed to his hand, she would have missed the jolt that went through him. The shift in his energy signature. “Ah…” He took his hand away. “Nothing to write home about, Mary.”

  Her cheek was already cooling and she mourned the loss of heat. “What does that mean?”

  He laughed, his footsteps taking him away from her. “Let’s just say everyone looked shocked when you picked me out of a pack of slayers with zero body fat at Enders. I’m like…if a linebacker dressed like a pimp for Halloween.” He jingled his chains. “Except my shit is real.”

  His attitude confused her. Was he upset about the way he looked? He talked about his appearance so casually, but there was a thread of discomfiture to it. On one hand, he was casual about it. Flippant. On the other, not so much. But he must care if he’d noticed how others responded to her approaching him.

  Oh God. What if she said the wrong thing in response?

  “In school…” Tucker said, his strained tone giving her the impression he was trying to fill the sudden silence. “They used to say I had a face only a mother could love, but that didn’t turn out to be true, either.”

  “You feel beautiful,” Mary said, fingers curling on the bathroom doorjamb. “T-to me.”

  “I, uh…thanks.” Tucker was silent so long, she started to worry he’d left the room. “Why don’t you try and get some sleep, kid?” he said, finally, his voice low. “I’ll wake you up when the sun goes down.”

  Mary advanced into the room. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep in the daytime.”

  “Ah. Yeah.” He sounded chagrined. “Of course not. I’ll put on the television.”

  A few seconds later, the jingles and cheers of a game show filled the air, followed by bed springs creaking. She followed the noise, second-guessing herself all the way. He’d broken contact with her. Maybe he didn’t want it or it made him uncomfortable. But she didn’t want to lie down in this strange place and have her nerves come bowling back in. She’d felt so much better while holding Tucker’s hand, so she padded her way over to him and stretched out on the same bed where he sat back against the headboard.

  Slowly, she wound their fingers back together and gathered their joined hands to her cheek, falling asleep minutes later to the sound of a jackpot being struck.

  Chapter 6

  Tucker turned the cheap spoon over and over in his hand, willing the waitress to appear. Something to distract him so he wouldn’t stare at the vision sitting across from him. Mary was still slightly rumpled from sleep and kind of disoriented, because the second the sun had gone down, he’d woken her up, needing to get them out of the room. Off the bed. Pronto.

  Over the course of the day, she’d rolled closer and closer until she’d been lying with her head on his chest, her fist curled on his generous belly, a bare foot tucked between his knees.

  It was never like this. The thirst.

  His throat was dryer than unbuttered toast, his stomach yawning wide. Waiting.

  Usually he could go a week and a half without consuming blood. But there was something about Mary’s pulse that made him ravenous. It beat faster when they were touching, too, and that confused the shit out of Tucker. What did she want from him?

  Not sex. The idea was laughable. Because of her blindness, she didn’t realize they were on opposite ends of the hotness scale. That had to be the reason for the increased tempo of her pulse every time they were close. Lying in bed with her back in the motel room, it had been so tempting to pretend they were just a normal couple on a break from the ordinary. A man who would roll between his woman’s welcoming thighs upon waking, their eagerness to fuck spiking, leading to roughness. To gasps and nails marks and squeaking bed springs.

  God, he needed to stop.

  Those thoughts were dangerous to his peace of mind. They made him need too deeply. Made him uncomfortably hungry for something that couldn’t happen, as badly as his body seemed to require it. More than his body, though. It went deeper. Like an undiscovered part of his internal makeup. A new organ. And her name was written all over it.

  The buzz of Tucker’s cell phone diverted his attention. He took out the device, silencing it when he saw the king was calling. Jonas would have to wait, though. At least until Tucker could figure out how to explain how he’d ended up as Mary’s chauffeur, thus aiding the enemy.

  “What can I get you folks?” asked the waitress, sidling up to the table.

  With the practice of someone who worked night shifts at a roadside diner, she only spared Mary’s light-up crown the barest glance.

  “I don’t know.” A crease formed between Mary’s brows. “Wh
at’s good?”

  The waitress sighed wearily. “I don’t know, hon. Pie? Milkshakes?”

  Mary perked up. “Oh, I’ll have a milkshake, please. Strawberry.”

  “Nothing for me,” Tucker said, forcing his expression to remain stoic, even though it made him nothing short of wistful watching Mary get excited for a milkshake. “You ever had one?” he asked as the waitress walked away.

  “No. We don’t need to eat much. But when I do, I like sugar.” She tilted her head slightly. “Do you miss eating?”

  “You have no idea.” Her giggle made the corner of his mouth edge up. “Eating used to be my favorite pastime. If I had a soul, I would sell it for a meatball sub. Straight up.”

  Mary reared back. “You don’t think you have a soul?”

  He hedged, digging the spoon into the pad of his thumb. “Truthfully…I’m not sure. I’ve met a lot of vamps that were soulless. Others seem just a step away from humanity. All of their emotions were still there.”

  “Like you?”

  Tucker gave a jerky nod. “Actually, I have kind of a theory about it. Why some vampires are decent and others are…demonic.” He’d never talked about this out loud to anyone before and the actual words leaving his mouth sounded crazier than they did in his head. “I think it comes down to your actions, your intentions in the moment you’re Silenced. My friends, Jonas, Elias, Roksana, Ginny…they were all turned while trying to help someone else. Maybe there’s some small mercy that allows a person to retain their soul if their last moment was a good one.”

  “That’s a beautiful theory,” Mary whispered. “Your last moment as a human must have been extraordinary.”

  “Now,” he chuckled around the lump forming in his throat. “You already found a hole in the theory. My last night as a human, I organized an illegal street race. People died.”

  Her dark red brows pulled together. “Did you kill them?”

  “No. Two vampires…I was too far away to see what happened, but they caused a crash between the drivers. Drained three onlookers until there was nothing left.” Tucker pulled over the salt shaker, twisting it in imprecise circles. “None of them would have been there at all if it wasn’t for me.”

  A beat passed. “These vampires were the soulless kind?”

  He managed a tight nod. “That’s putting it mildly.”

  “Then they would have found another way to wreak havoc, Tucker.” She reached across the table, brushing his wrist with her cool fingertips. “What happened to the drivers?”

  “They lived.”

  “Really? Why?” Tucker didn’t answer, continuing to watch her pale fingers on his ruddy skin. He refused to get credit for leading the vamps away that night. There was no way he deserved an ounce of praise. Still, when he looked up at Mary she was smiling knowingly. As if his silence had been proof enough. “Your last moment was a good one, too,” she murmured.

  A paper straw was tossed down on the table between them, followed by a tall glass of blended ice cream. “Strawberry milkshake,” said the waitress, sliding Tucker a look. “Sure you don’t want anything, soldier?”

  “I’m sure,” he said, guiding the straw toward Mary’s seeking hand.

  The waitress left again.

  Mary ripped the straw out of the paper and used both hands to guide it into the milkshake, taking a long sip. Swallowing, she gasped and fell back against the seat. “Oh my goodness. It’s so g…” She snapped her mouth shut, cheeks deepening with color. “Terrible. It’s terrible.”

  Tucker grinned. “I see you right through you, kid. You don’t have to pretend you don’t like it for my sake.”

  She damn near gulped the entire thing down in one pull. “No, I’m serious. You would hate it.”

  “Lies. All lies.”

  Mary’s lips twitched, but slowly she sobered. “So. You work for the vampire king.”

  “That’s right.” Tucker slid the salt shaker back into place. “He was a pain in the ass before, but now he’s a royal pain in the ass.”

  She shook her head. “You don’t mean that. I can tell.”

  “Naw. I don’t. Jonas is good people.”

  A wrinkled formed on her forehead and he could almost hear what she was thinking. When she married Hadrian, she would inherit Jonas as an enemy—and this girl wasn’t the type to have a foe at all. Let alone end up on the dark side. And it was clearly bothering her. Just not enough to give up the chance of gaining her sight and righting things with Tilda. “How…did you meet him?”

  In spite of his troubling thoughts, Tucker smiled at the memory. “He got into the back of my Uber.”

  Mary’s nose twitched. “What’s an Uber?”

  His chest panged at the reminder of how little she knew of the world. If only he could have the privilege of showing her everything. He’d never ask for a single thing ever again. Not in his entire damn existence. “It’s a cab that you can order on your phone,” he explained gruffly. “And I’ll have you know I’m five-star rated.”

  “Wow,” she breathed, sipping her milkshake. “So you drive humans?”

  “Yes, ma’am, mostly drunk ones.”

  “You talk to them?”

  Even though Mary couldn’t see how vulnerable this discussion made him, he glanced away. “Sure. I…like talking to them. And every time one of them is brought home safe, I feel a little better about what happened. That night.” He’d gone too deep, so he hurried to lighten up the conversation. “When I’m just their driver and we’re talking about sports or good restaurants or cars, it’s kind of like being human again. For a few minutes.”

  Mary seemed to gather herself. “You miss being human so much?”

  It took him a moment to answer. “Yes.”

  “What do you miss the most?”

  “Besides meatballs?” They both laughed quietly. “I miss going home. Having a permanent place. Going to sleep in the same bed I had my whole life.” He ground a knuckle into the tabletop. “Can’t stay in one place too long when you never age.”

  “No.”

  Jesus, why was he being such a downer? Might be the fact that he’d spent the whole day with an incurable erection, but that was only the half of it. There was something about this girl that made it feel natural to spill his guts. Maybe it was the way she seemed to read him that made it pointless to do anything but be forthright. Whatever the reason, was this really how he wanted Mary to remember him when he dropped her off and turned tail? All doom and gloom and woe is me? “But hell,” he chuckled, forcing some buoyancy into his tone. “I’m not complaining. If I have to keep moving around, at least the work is honest.”

  Tucker’s sudden brightness didn’t appear to fool Mary, but she didn’t comment on it. “You mean driving the Uber?”

  “Yes. And the work I do for Jonas.” She shook her head slightly to indicate she had no idea what he meant. “We counsel new vampires. Try and teach them how to live as normal a life as possible. Sometimes we have to give them a place to stay, train them in how to feed without murdering anyone in cold blood. That kind of thing.”

  “That’s what you do for the new king?” she whispered, some of the color leaving her cheeks. “I had no idea. My mother said he had no use for the fae, but I never stopped to ask what he stood for beyond that. I really am joining the bad guys, aren’t I?”

  “You’ll never be bad, Mary. Your intentions are pure.”

  His words did nothing to ease her troubled expression. “When my father returned with the fae, she was never the same. I’ve been wanting to make this right my whole life.”

  “You’re not the one who made it wrong in the first place, kid.” He paused to stop his voice from vibrating. “But if you’ve set your mind to changing the situation with your family, you’ll see it through.”

  “What if I’ve just been waiting for any opportunity to fix the past for so long, I can’t see why this opportunity is the wrong one?”

  “I can’t answer that for you, Mary, but I believe one thing.” Wit
h a swallow, he curled his hand around her wrist and listened to her heartbeat pick up. “In my experience, there’ll be a moment when you know exactly what to do. Okay?”

  “Okay.” Her pulse thrummed beneath his fingertips. “I give you a five-star rating for advice.”

  A laugh caught him off guard. “That’s being generous.”

  “You never told me what happened when Jonas got into your car.”

  “Oh.” He pried his hand away from her before he could do something stupid. Like try to scent her blood through the delicate skin of her wrist and horrify the poor girl. “He, uh…he said he’d been watching me for a while and needed someone with my restraint. So I could instill it in others.” He cleared his throat hard, trying to dispel the hunger that wouldn’t leave him alone. How ironic that he was having a conversation about willpower while battling the most insane thirst of his life. “I don’t just drive humans for the banter. It helps me build resistance to their scent.” He nudged her foot under the table. “And the tips don’t hurt.”

  A smile bloomed across her face. “Good. You can pay for my milkshake.”

  Tucker grinned back in her direction and just kind of got lost there, somewhere among her freckles and lips that were probably strawberry flavored. Soft. Had she kissed a member of the opposite sex before? His gut didn’t seem to like that possibility at all. It churned loud enough that Mary raised an eyebrow. But whatever she was going to say fell on deaf ears, because a prickle of awareness danced up Tucker’s spine.

  Long before Tucker was Silenced, he’d had an odd knack for sensing when something was about to go wrong. It dated back all the way to childhood when he’d decided to walk to school one morning because his skin had prickled sharply when the bus turned the corner onto his road. Ten minutes later, he’d heard sirens in the distance. Once he arrived at school on foot, he was told the bus skidded on a patch of ice and slammed into a tree.

  Around the time he went through the nasty business of puberty, he’d experienced a tremor in his fingertips and the full-body shakes while playing baseball after school. The tremor had moved down to the soles of his feet. Seconds before a water main broke, he swore he could see straight through the soil and grass to the rupturing pipe, witnessing it shake.