by Jill Myles
He gave me a skeptical look. “You won’t get caught by the police if he’s buried in a fiel—”
“No!” I buried my face in my hands. “Can you please just help me with this and not make it worse?”
“Whatever you want,” Zane said. His casual, easy look turned shuttered. “This road trip . . . is Noah going?” The jealousy had returned to his face, turning its beautiful planes hard.
That was a rapid topic change. “No,” I assured him. “We’re taking a little time off from each other.”
Silence.
The smile returned to his mouth, and he moved over to my side. “That,” he said, stroking my cheek tenderly, “is very good news. So you’ve finally made up your mind?” He dipped to press a light kiss on my mouth, his tongue whispering against my lips. “Glad you’ve come to your senses about that self-righteous asshole.”
I pulled away, frowning up at him. “Noah broke up with me.”
He shrugged, his grin displaying gleaming white fangs. “I don’t care, as long as this means you and I are exclusive. No more seeking him out for sex, and I won’t have to go hunting in bars for blood—”
“Whoa, there.” I pulled away from him, my eyes wide. “I’m not going to be your one and only blood supply.” That would mean dooming myself to only half the day again, and if my schedule was going to match Zane’s, that meant no daylight, no regular shopping hours . . . and no Noah. Ever. The Serim slept through the nighttime.
His mouth tightened slightly. “You just fed me and things were fine. Don’t tell me we’re going back to this.”
I thought hard, trying to come up with something that would appease him and still give me my freedom. “How about a test run? We stay exclusive for the next few weeks, I let you drink from me, and we’ll see how this road trip works out. I really need you for this.”
Looking mollified, he nudged the comatose guy with his foot. “Well, then, what are we going to do with this?”
“We’ll figure something out.” I decided to call Remy, who had the answer, even if it was an odd one.
“Bring him to my house,” she said. “Ethel is here and she’ll watch him for us.”
My brows furrowed as I tried to picture that. Her little old housekeeper would probably just dust around him. “You don’t think he needs medical attention? Won’t his body waste away and die in a few days if he doesn’t get anything to eat or drink?”
“If it gets to that point, I’ll have Ethel stage a break-in. She can hit him on the head with a vase and say he’s never regained consciousness. The hospital will take him from there. It’ll work. You’ll see.”
Was I the only one concerned about the fact he was in a coma?
Still, Remy’s idea was the most plausible plan we had. Zane and I took the pizza boy’s arms and tried to make it look like we were supporting a very drunk friend as we staggered down the halls of my apartment building and out to the parking garage nearby. A few of the neighbors gave us disapproving looks, but no one stopped us.
I drove the Ford Explorer—which I’d borrowed from Noah earlier this summer and had conveniently forgotten to give back—to Remy’s mansion across town. Our luggage and Coma Guy were stashed in the back, and Zane sat in front. He was unusually silent—no sharp observations or witty comebacks; the only sound was the faint sizzle of burning paper as he sucked on cigarette after cigarette.
I concentrated on driving, ignoring the fact that he seemed unusually pensive. The sooner we got to Remy’s house, the sooner we could get this show on the road. At the end of Remy’s winding driveway, I parked behind a gleaming new car: a gigantic, candy-red Hummer.
Remy came down the driveway as soon as she saw my headlights, and was at my window as soon as I put the car in park. “Hey! Do you like my new wheels?”
The monster vehicle was taller than I was; we’d need a stepladder to get into the thing. The tires looked like they could roll over small third-world countries. “It’s . . . nice. We could have gone in your BMW, though. Don’t these things guzzle gas?”
“Oh, pooh.” She waved a hand, dismissing my concerns. “We need something that screams ‘money’, and I didn’t want a limo dragging us around the country. You don’t think this says ‘road trip’ to you?”
Oh, it was saying something all right. Something like Please rob the overprivileged occupants of their wallets.
“So, is Zane coming?” She looked over and made a little pout when she saw him emerge from the Explorer, a new cigarette in his mouth. “I see he is.”
Zane slid around the front of the car and put an arm around my waist, giving Remy a casual smirk. “Anything Jackie wants, Jackie gets.”
Really? Jackie sure didn’t feel like that sometimes. If I got whatever I wanted, why did I feel like my life was out of control?
“Well,” Remy said with a drawl, “I invited a friend, too.” She linked her arm with mine and began pulling me toward her house.
“Who is this friend? Does he know about our problem with the pizza boy? Or the Itch?” Who was Remy trusting with our secrets?
“No, no, and you’ll see.” Remy beamed at me and strode through her massive front door. “Drake’s harmless and perfect for this trip.”
“Drake?” I raised an eyebrow at her. “That sounds like a porn star name.”
I should have guessed by the way she grinned. Sitting in Remy’s living room, pants unbuttoned, sat a greasy man of indeterminate age. A five-o’clock shadow covered his jaw, and a beer bottle hung from his hand. The hair on his head was slicked back—either from hair gel or the fact that he hadn’t washed it in several days—and curled against the collar of his open shirt. Multiple gold chains looped his neck.
“Hey.” He glanced over at me, and gave me a quick up-and-down look, his eyes settling at breast level. “You in the business, darlin’?”
“Uh, no.” I jerked Remy to one side. “Can we talk?”
She wiggled her fingers at Drake and pulled me into the kitchen. “Something wrong?”
“Yeah. Who is that creep on your sofa?”
Remy grinned. “He’s my costar in the movie we’ll be publicizing.”
I groaned and peeked into the living room, watching Zane drag the pizza guy in and dump him on the couch opposite Drake. To his credit, Drake didn’t freak out at the sight of my rather angry-looking boyfriend or the fact that he was dumping some unconscious guy there. He just took another swig of his beer and continued to flip the TV channel.
“You sure that you want to bring him along?” I asked.
Remy tucked a long strand of black hair behind her ear and shrugged. “He’s harmless. I think he fried his brains on X in the eighties. He’s got an enormous dick and he’s usually good to go several rounds, so if you and Zane are fighting, I’m sure he’d be more than happy to help you out.”
“Bite your tongue!”
Two porn stars, a sulking vampire, and me, crammed in a Hummer for the next week?
Fun.
CHAPTER FIVE
We weren’t on the road for more than a few minutes when Zane frowned at me. “We need to talk.”
I glanced up front. Remy had both of her hands on the steering wheel and was rocking her head to Green Day’s “American Idiot.” In the passenger seat, Drake leaned against his seat belt and snored, comatose at 3:00 a.m.
Zane and I shared the backseat, and it was just dark enough to allow us a tiny bit of privacy. Not enough for a quiet conversation, though, since I suspected Remy would listen in on anything we said, radio or no radio. That irritated me. Actually, a lot of stuff irritated me at the moment.
I leaned over to whisper in his ear. “Do we have to do this right now?” Damn, he smelled nice. A lock of his hair hung over his ear, and I reached up to touch it. Soft. I got all tingly just thinking about that brushing over my skin.
He slid down the seat—no safety belt for Zane—and moved against me. Desire shot through my nerve endings and I gave him a wary look, trying to scoot away from him. I did
n’t need him to turn me on in the car, not when we were just starting our trip. Nor did I trust the look in his eyes, which were quickly turning red with need.
“We need to talk about this road trip, Jackie.” Zane put his hand on my leg, and my senses immediately flared to life. “A road trip with two porn stars? Where the hell are we going?”
I had omitted a few of the details of our trip. No wonder he was so irritated at me. I flushed in the darkness and shifted in my seat, trying to resist the urge to put my hand over his where it rested on my knee, and then move it farther up my leg. Nope, wasn’t going to do that.
“To New Orleans,” I said. The moonlight hit the hard angles of his face just right, illuminating his unworldly beauty . . . and the gleam of red in his eyes. “I need to visit a succubus named Delilah.”
“New Orleans!” His voice rose. “Do you know how long it will take to get to New Orleans by taking the highway?”
“Twenty-six hours?” I said helpfully.
Zane swore, leaning away from me.
I felt his hand twitch against my leg, and against my will, I pried it off my leg. “Zane,” I said quietly. “Don’t touch me right now.”
Don’t touch me because I’m cursed. Don’t touch me or we’ll be making out in front of Remy and Drake, and I’ve no desire to have public sex.
Especially when the other two occupants of the car were porn stars.
It was the wrong thing to say to him. I knew it as soon as it slipped out of my mouth. Zane gave a low, ugly laugh and put his hand back on my knee, sliding it farther up my thigh. I sucked in a breath and just like that, the Itch flared into existence once more.
“Don’t touch you?” Zane leaned back in, whispering low against my ear. “Isn’t that what you wanted me for on this trip? To service you while you run off with your little friend?” There was a hard note to his voice.
“You don’t understand,” I said, squirming in my seat and trying to pull his hand away. Oh God, but I wished he’d move it higher even as I tried to pry it off me.
It was like he could read my mind. He ignored my feeble efforts to remove his hand and slid it all the way up to the apex of my thighs, rubbing his fingers against my throbbing cleft. “Don’t touch you like this?”
I could feel the heat of his skin even through my clothing. A small moan escaped me and my legs clamped around his hand. “Zane.”
“Isn’t this what you wanted, Princess?”
Bastard.
A rest stop sign whizzed past on the empty highway. “Stop the car, Remy,” I gritted out.
She turned down the radio, pretending to not be aware of what was happening in the backseat. “Do what?”
“I said, stop the car at the rest stop.” My voice had risen a strangled octave.
“You got it, chief,” she said, her playful words falling like rocks in the silent car.
Zane released me and leaned back, lighting up a cigarette.
I thought it would take forever for the Hummer to reach the rest stop, but we finally pulled in and parked at the curb. There was a public restroom with a side for men and a side for women. Picnic tables littered the empty grounds, and the only light came from the nearby snack machine, the glass covered with moths that swirled around it in the darkness. A half dozen truck rigs were parked in the lot, the drivers asleep inside.
Drake’s sleepy question rose above the low, heavy hum of an idling semi. “Where are we?”
“Restroom break,” Remy murmured. “Go back to sleep.” She looked in the rearview mirror at me. “You okay?”
“I’ll be fine in a minute,” I grabbed Zane’s hand and flung my door open. “Come on.”
I expected him to retort something at my strident tone, or at least to make some sort of sarcastic remark. But he simply followed as I headed for the women’s restroom, never letting go of his hand.
The bathroom was dingy, the counters coated with a layer of grime that only neglect could foster. Toilet paper streamed on the floor from under one of the stalls, but all the bathroom doors were ajar, which meant that we were alone.
Finally.
“What’s the meaning of this, Jackie?” Zane said, pulling his hand out of mine as I strode into the bathroom. A fleet of moths fluttered overhead by the fluorescent light.
I turned back to Zane and put my hands around his neck, dragging his face down to mine for a long kiss that I hoped communicated my urgency. “I need you,” I said softly.
His eyes darkened to a deep red and he stared down at me in surprise. “Your eyes. They’re blue—”
I put my hands on his hips and pulled him toward the counter, not caring anymore how dirty the bathroom was. My body was a tight, tingling mess of nerves, and only one thing could help me. My fingers went to the buttons on his shirt and began to undo them. “I have a bit of a problem, Zane.”
He chuckled, needing no encouragement to bend over me and nuzzle my earlobe. His weight pressed me against the bathroom counter. His hand reached between us, brushing against my erect nipples through my cotton T-shirt. “Doesn’t seem like much of a problem to me. I thought we were coming in here so we could solve both of our problems.”
“I’m cursed,” I said.
He paused, his hands falling from my skin. “Cursed? What do you mean, you’re cursed?”
I thought it was pretty obvious, but maybe it was just me. “My powers are out of control, and I need more sex, more often. If I don’t find a way to fix it, I’ll eventually die.”
“How long have you known?” Zane dragged his hand through his hair, moving away from me and pacing in front of the mirrors. They showed nothing but my unhappy face; Zane had no reflection.
“Since last night,” I said. “A demon told me I was cursed, but not directly.”
“How did the demon tell you?” He sounded puzzled.
I didn’t follow him. “Beg pardon?”
“You said that a demon indirectly told you that you were cursed. What did she do? Pass you a note after class?”
Jerk. “That’s not what I said. A demon told me that I was cursed. The curse is an indirect one.” Did he want it spelled out in crayon?
He looked at me with horror. “You’ve known since last night and you let me drink from you?” His shout was enough to blow my hair back off my forehead.
“Like I had a choice?” My own voice rose and I crossed my arms over my chest. “Noah is gone. You’re pushing me, and I don’t have any other options—”
His face grew cold. “So that’s what this is about?”
I could have kicked myself. “That’s not what I meant—”
“So it’s not that you wanted me? You’re just cursed and don’t have any other options?” A flicker of raw pain showed on his face, quickly masked again. “Were you ever planning on giving up Noah? Or on being my blood partner? Or was that just desperation talking?”
I had no answers for him, and the conversation was getting into too-sensitive territory. “You know what?” I willed my lower lip not to tremble, but it didn’t work. “Screw you. Not everything is about you, you know.” I jabbed my finger into my own chest, glaring at him through tears. “I am dying here. This curse is going to kill me unless I do something about it. So no, I can’t think about someone else right now. I have to think about me, and how I’m going to get through this. And if you can’t wait for me to come out the other side and get better, maybe it’s best that I find that out now.”
Zane raked a hand through his hair, staring at the ground. He looked up at me and took a step forward, back to my side. The pain in his face was gone, all smooth, self-possessed vampire once more. “I’m sorry, Princess,” he said huskily, running a hand up and down my arm to soothe me before reaching up to cup my face. He kissed my forehead, trying to comfort me. “We’ll figure everything out later. It’ll be okay. Do you know who did this to you?”
“No,” I said. “I haven’t done anything— or anyone—out of the ordinary.” His hands felt good on my arms, soothing. I
leaned into his touch. “Maybe I ate a cursed Taco Bell burrito or something.”
He chuckled at my joke, some of the tension leaving his face. “I sincerely doubt warlocks are working at Taco Bell, waiting to strike down any succubi that go through the drive-thru.”
“You don’t know how often I go through the drive-thru. So it was a warlock who did this to me?”
His face became shuttered, and distant. “I don’t know, Jackie. I don’t know anything about curses.” His gaze held me pinned in place as he stared down at me. “Are you telling me the truth? About the curse?”
“I am,” I said, somewhat mollified by the contrition in his voice. “Don’t look at me like that.”
A hint of a smile touched his face again. “Like what?”
“Like I’m dirty.”
“Baby,” he said tenderly, his hand brushing my hair off my cheek. “You’re not dirty. It’s just a little . . . overwhelming.”
“How do you think I feel? I’m the one that has to have sex every . . .” I checked my watch. “Twenty-three hours now, and it’s getting worse. I stole the pizza boy’s mind, too. My powers are going out of control and I don’t know how to stop it.”
“Is that why we’re on a road trip with the porn stars?” Zane continued to stroke my jaw, speaking in that soothing voice that made me weak in the knees.
“Remy needs to promote her movie, and I figured it’d be a distraction. Besides, she said she knows this Delilah chick, and I need her help.”
He sighed, pressing his forehead against mine. “What a mess.”
“That’s why I need you to come with me,” I said, touching his cheeks and pulling his mouth back down to mine again. He pulled away, instead pressing his mouth against my jaw and nuzzling my ear. Distracted by the sensation of his teeth nipping at my earlobe, I wrapped my arms around him. “I’ll go nuts if it’s just me and Remy on this trip.”
“Don’t forget Drake,” Zane said.
Ugh. I’d have preferred to forget about him altogether. “We could leave Drake by the side of the road,” I said. “Remy could always find someone new. Anyone new.”
