Her Vampire Prince (Midnight Doms)

by Ines Johnson

  "Where is Cari?"

  The man stares into my eyes. His brown gaze is so like his sister’s. “A ghost. A white-haired ghost."

  There’s no more denying it. It's true. Domitia is alive and she has Cari.

  "Where would she be?" Gaius asks me. "Where would she take her?"

  "Somewhere I'll find them. She'll want me to see."

  Chapter 34

  Cari

  Pain.

  All I feel is pain. Pain in every part of my body. Pain even outside of my body. It’s in the air molecules pressing against my skin. It’s in every inhale. It’s in the dust mites that touch my lips, my fingertips, my hair.

  I’ve stopped blinking and just keep my eyes closed. I can’t stop twitching, the pain in my extremities won’t let up. I want to stop breathing. I want to stop existing if that means the pain will end. But the moments stretch on.

  Most of the time, the pain is constant. Like a flat line at the top of a mountain. And then it increases, taking me higher to a peak I never want to reach. But at the same time, I do want to reach it. Thinking that if I can just get past the next level, I can survive it.

  Each time I reach the next summit, I am even more wrong than the last time. The pain spikes unbearably higher. The new flat line takes even longer to level out. At some point it never does.

  There was a time I liked heights. A time I liked the adrenaline. But there is so much adrenaline in my blood right now I’m sure I’m bleeding it out. All that I want now is to be drained dry. No more fight. No more flight. Just an end.

  But it won’t end.

  Sharp teeth puncture my neck. They puncture my arms. They puncture my lower calves.

  “You do taste sweet, I’ll admit.”

  The vampire bite is not the orgasm Hadrian said it would be. There is a spark of pleasure at the first prick, but Domitia likes to chew her food.

  It hurts.

  Everything hurts.

  Why is she hurting me?

  "You are going to help me make him miserable," she says. Still in that thickly accented, pleasant tone. As if we were girlfriends talking about our Saturday night dates.

  I know she's talking about Hadrian. I don't want to make Hadrian miserable. I want to make him happy. I love him.

  I must say this out loud though I don't hear myself say it. There is only ringing in my ears. Ringing and her terrible voice.

  "Love is pain," she shouts.

  I wince, but that hurts. I try to shake my head, but the effort hurts. Even if I could, I know it won’t accomplish anything.

  "Happiness is a mirage. It never lasts. The only thing in life that does last is pain. You are brought into this world causing your mother pain. You are disappointed every day and sleep in pain. Pain is the truth.”

  No. What she’s saying is a lie. I can see that much through all this pain she is inflicting.

  Hadrian made me feel good. When he came into my life he brought pleasure. When I fell asleep in his arms I felt safe. His love, and my love for him, is the only truth I am certain of.

  “You were trying to give my Hadrian a lie. But now I'm back. I'll take care of his heart and make him miserable again."

  He isn't her Hadrian. He is my Hadrian. I want to fight for him. I need to fight for him. I need to fight for our love.

  But how, when I hurt so much? How, when I am bound by this mad woman? How, when all I want to do is skip to the end I know she has planned for me?

  I don't want to die. I want to live. I want to live with Hadrian. I need to live for him. I can't let her win.

  There is another impact on my body. I'm not sure where. I'm not sure with what. The pain is instant and it radiates everywhere.

  I think I scream. But I'm not sure. My ears still ring. My throat is so dry I feel like I've swallowed nails. All the pain she’s delivered to me welcomes this next bout of pain. All the prickles and stings and bites are making friends. They’re settling in to stay on my torn skin, inside the cracks of my bones. Great, come on in.

  Domitia doesn’t strike me again for a while. The pain rages on, but I reach a plateau. Breathing isn’t entirely impossible in this tiny sliver of relief. Blinking still won’t be possible, so I leave my eyes closed.

  I know that we are moving. I feel the wind on my face. I smell the air, earth, berries.

  I know the smell of these berries. They are old, and yet new. Berries from a far away land that are freshly planted in the Arizona soil. We are back at the vineyard. We are back at Hadrian's vineyard.

  No. I have to fight. I have to warn him. I have to get away.

  But I can't move a single limb. It feels as though everything in me is broken. Everything but my will and my heart.

  I will not give in to her. I will not let her win.

  My brain makes out a knocking sound. Followed by a gasp. It's a masculine gasp. I’ve never heard a man gasp in terror before.

  "Let me in, Viri, darling."

  "No." Viri's voice is a low whine, like a wounded animal.

  "Let. Me. In.” Domitia punctuates every word. “Or you'll be punished."

  There's another masculine whine. I crack open one eye and see Viri sink to his knees. The big man is near tears. His gaze is full of sorrow as he glances at me, and then down. He nods his head and we move across the threshold.

  I close my eyes again. The next time I come conscious I am surrounded by Hadrian's scent. I am in his room. I am in his bed.

  Domitia placed me here, in this place where I realized I wanted to experience my life more than I wanted to lose my life. She has placed me here to die.

  I know that I will. But I'm going to hold on for as long as it takes to see Hadrian, to let him know that he gave me back my life. To let him know what we had was love and I wouldn’t want to have lived my life without knowing him. That I would do it all again if it meant that I would have his love, even just for the short time that I have.

  Chapter 35

  Hadrian

  I tear at my hair, pulling clumps from the roots. I clench my hands into fists until my nails begin to crack and bleed. I throw back my head and let out a cry that silences all creatures of the night.

  I cannot find her.

  I have looked everywhere. Her home. The airfield where she took her dives. The two buildings where she took her walk across the sky. Her family's vineyard where I had to confront Marechal. Luckily, Gaius was able to divert Marechal's homicidal attentions against me by depositing her injured brother into her care.

  I am at the very end of my rope. I don't know where else to look. But I know Cari lives. I feel her inside me.

  She is the beat of my heart. She is the pulse in my veins. She is my breath, and the very fact that I am still breathing, I know that she is still on this plane of existence.

  I hear a phone ringing. It’s not mine. Mine has remained silent for the last few hours that I’ve been searching for my heart.

  Gaius pulls a device from his pocket and answers. I can hear the conversation from the other end. It's just two words. But those two worlds rock my world.

  "She's here."

  Gaius doesn't ask Viri which she. In this case, we both know his statement is plural. They are both there. Domitia has taken Cari back to my home.

  Why hadn't I thought of that first? I claim to know the madwoman so well. But after three days with Cari, I see that I don't know my former lover at all.

  No, I retract that title as I blur across the vineyard. Domitia was never my lover. She was my seducer first. She murdered the innocent youth that I was. Then she jailed my mind and caged my heart. I just didn’t realize that she fed me on a daily diet of torture and not love.

  Not five minutes later, I burst through the front door of my home to find Viri huddled in the corner. The cell phone is still in his ear. I realize now just how damaged she made my blood brother. How damaged she made us all.

  Viri is too broken to believe he could be loved. Gaius, the only one of us who saw her clearly, is too jaded to ever
consider love. Me? My vision, my mind is so twisted that I never knew what love was. But no longer.

  “I called for help,” says Viri.

  “You did.” I touch his shoulder briefly. “I’m here.”

  I leave him there. He’ll survive. Cari needs all of my attention.

  I follow Cari's scent to my bedroom. When I see her I nearly fall to my knees. My love, my heart, my soul, she is twisted as she lays on the bed.

  Her body is bent. Her limbs hang loose. Her face is black and blue.

  Murder is on my mind. Every torture technique I have ever learned springs into my vision. But I push it all aside when Cari opens her eyes and finds my gaze.

  I am on her. I am with her. I would take her pain if I could. Once again in less than twenty-four hours, I tear into my wrist and place my blood to her lips.

  Her lips are cracked, broken, bleeding. She tries to open her mouth, but I can see that that even small motion pains her. Death will not be good enough for Domitia.

  “Oh, this is all so touching. Like a sappy movie on that channel that does the silly holiday cards.”

  The voice is from my nightmares. I struggle with turning to face Domitia and staying with Cari. If Carignan doesn’t make it, I need for my face to be the last thing that she sees. I need for my declaration of love to be the last thing she hears. I need for my kiss to be on her lips before she takes her last breath.

  "She's going to die," says Domitia. "I made sure it'll be slow and painful so that we can both watch."

  I whip around to her at those words. There she stands. She is as thin and pale as a wraith. She’s dressed in black, which sets her porcelain skin in stark relief. Though she’s in dark clothing I see the dark spots of Cari’s blood all over her gown.

  "I even popped corn," she says. "A wondrous invention for watching entertainment. Want some?"

  Her thin fingers offer me a handful of the fluffy treat. “I’m going to kill you.”

  “Again?” She grins. “The pain, the shame of my death kept you alive all this time. And you’ve made something of yourself. I keep Serrano wines in my cellar, truly delicious work. You three should be thanking me for all your success.”

  Thanking her?

  “Though that’s not the reason I did it,” she continues. “I always intended to come back to you, darling. I always imagined the joy you’d feel after decades of thinking I was dead. All that pain bottled up for a big release.” Her face transforms as her gaze finds Cari. “And she ruined it.”

  I place myself in Domitia’s line of sight to block her view of Cari. Her gaze flicks back to me. I note, for the first time in hundreds of years, that her eyes are vacant black holes. How had I thought love shone through those void orbs?

  “I burned for you,” she says. She blinks and waggles her head, popcorn spills from her hands as she confesses. “Not to a crisp, obviously. I drank a witch’s potion to step into the sun. It only lasted for a moment. I did get a touch crusty on the edges though. I was curious what the burn would feel like. It was quite rousing. I had one of my human slaves toss a cloak over me after I dropped from your sightline. It took me an entire week to heal.”

  I am lightheaded at her revelations. Not only did she fake her death, but she’s also been watching me all these years. Taking joy in my pain.

  Gaius was right. It’s not just her who’s sick, I am a complete invalid. I never saw what a lie she was. Now I do. And I am also healed. The scales have fallen from my eyes and I see this creature for who and what she truly is.

  “At first I was quite heartbroken that you didn’t follow me out into the sun. But as I watched you burn on a daily basis for me, I knew that you truly loved me. It was so touching. I’d planned to come back to you a couple of months later, but when I saw how you grieved, it filled me with such love for you.”

  She says that four letter word and my stomach clenches. My chest hardens. My throat itches with bile.

  “I loved watching you in pain over my death. But I always planned to come back to you. I’ve checked on you over the decades. Each time I saw that you still grieved it made me so aroused. But now we can be together again, at last.”

  Domitia tosses more popped corn in her mouth. Much of it falls to the floor. I note the red stains on her hands, Cari’s blood.

  My vision goes red. But for some reason, my hands aren't on her neck. For some reason, I am not tearing her limb from limb.

  "Hadrian," Cari whispers.

  I turn away from Domitia. My heart flushes of its hatred of her the moment my back is to her. My mind is no longer on her. With the sight of my true love in my eyes, I am filled with nothing but love.

  Carignan lifts her mangled hand. I am on my knees, helping her bring her fingers to my face. I kiss each of her bruised knuckles gently.

  "You saved my life," says Cari.

  "You saved mine," I say. "You showed me what love truly is."

  "I did,” she agrees. She tries to grin but instead grimaces in pain.

  Anger and rage push against the love I feel for her. My fingers want to rip something, someone apart.

  “Don’t walk into the sun tomorrow,” says Cari. “I want you to live for me. Will you do that?”

  “No, he won’t,” says Domitia. “He’ll live for me because I know what he needs to keep him alive. He needs the pain. He craves it. Don’t you, darling? Right now, you feel the life coursing through your dead veins as you watch her die.”

  I don’t turn to Domitia. At the moment, I feel nothing for her. Not even hatred. She is no longer a factor. I keep my gaze trained on what’s important.

  Cari.

  More than anything I am determined that she will not die. If I am going to live, then so will she.

  A shadow moves in the dark hall. Domitia is too engrossed in the tragedy she’s created to notice. I’m too preoccupied with love and my new life’s mission to care.

  I tear open my shirt. I slice my nails through my chest. On the right side where my heart beats.

  I lift Cari’s head to my chest. She is unresponsive now. Still, I coax her to drink from me, to take everything I have in my heart.

  From behind me, I hear Domitia gasp. There’s not much that’s ever frightened a woman who gets off on pain. Except the possibility of losing some of her power.

  “Hello, dear,” says Frangelico in his smooth, unhurried voice.

  “Oh, Lucius, darling,” Domitia’s voice is wobbly with false certainty. “What a pleasant surprise.”

  “I got a call from your Virius,” says Frangelico. “He told me you were in town.”

  “Really? I’ll need to have a talk with my little Donkey Man.”

  “Let’s you and I chat first. You are in my territory, after all.”

  The sounds of battle that rage behind me do not sound pleasant. I ignore it as I focus all of my attention on Cari and getting her to drink. I would hate to defy her last wishes, but I will. If she doesn’t wake a vampire in the morning, then I will face the sun.

  Chapter 36

  Cari

  At least death is warm. I expected it to be cold with no blood running through my veins any longer. But my fingers aren’t numb. My legs are stiff. I feel… good.

  Well, my body feels good. It’s my heart that’s broken. I can’t open my eyes, not when I know that I will never see Hadrian again.

  I wonder if the warmth and toastiness I’m feeling is because I’ve landed in Hell. That wouldn’t be fair since I didn’t cause my death. I was murdered. I figure I should get a pass. Then I can see my parents.

  But I note that the temperature of the room isn’t warm. It’s comfortable. It’s just my skin that’s snug.

  No, wait. That’s not my skin. It feels more like a blanket. Like a warm comforter stretched along my body and tucked in at the edges.

  Hunh? Maybe this is heaven. I’m sure the devil wouldn’t take this type of care of one of his new inhabitants.

  If this is heaven, the air quality is pretty poor. I try to inhale. B
ut I can barely take in a breath.

  My lungs aren’t working correctly. No, they don’t seem to be working at all. I can breathe, but the air coming into my body feels hollow. Almost unnecessary.

  My stomach feels empty and I have no urge to fill it. Almost as if I don’t have need of food any longer.

  Lying down feels good. But I’m not tired. Definitely not sleepy. I feel like I could run a mile. And for some reason I’m sure I could do it in less than a minute.

  I hear a voice call my name. Immediately, I grimace. I know it's Hadrian. So why am I mad?

  I told him not to follow me in death. But did I really expect him to listen? He is so determined to be the boss of me. I suppose now I have to let him be. I have no idea what to do in death. I just hope we can still have sex.

  "Carignan."

  His voice is soft, like a whispered prayer. Any irritation I felt melts away. I know it’s sick, but I’m happy he followed me to the other side. A famous man once said that death could not part true love. That all it could do was delay it for a little while.

  Hadrian didn’t waste a moment to be with me in the next life. It’s romantic. It’s not stalking at all.

  I turn my head to the sound of my name. It’s not Hadrian that I see. It’s not his deep voice. It's deep, but there is no accent.

  "Carignan,” the man says again.

  He’s tall with gray hair. He has a big, barrel chest and a smile that makes me feel like a kid on Christmas morning.

  “Papa?”

  My dad is standing in front of me. There is light around him. He is whole, and healed, and healthy. He's not bleeding. His eyes are open. So are his arms.

  I run to him. I jump into his arms like I am a kid again. He folds me into his arms like I am still his little girl.

  “Papa, I'm so sorry,” I say. “I died. I didn’t mean to this time. I tried to live. I fought so hard to live.”

  My father smiles down at me. He lifts his hand to my face. This time it reaches my cheek. I feel the soft brush of his fingertips below my eyes as he brushes a tear away.