Eric paced the room yet again, pushing a hand through his hair, adding
to its disarray.
“Where is she?
I attune my mind to hers, and yet I feel nothing!
” “She’s probably managed to get some sleep. Do not disturb her.”
Eric shook his head.
“No. No, something is wrong. I feel it.”
Roland’s brows creased with worry, despite his feigned sigh of
exasperation.
“This ingenue of yours is becoming a bit of a bother. What trouble do
you suppose she’s got herself into this time?” ” Wish to God I knew.
” He turned, paced away toward the fireplace, spun on his heel and came
back. He stopped and met Roland’s gaze. ” I shouldn’t have let it
happen.
She was already in a fragile state of mind.
When she realized what she’d done in the cold light of day she likely
felt soiled, infected by my touch, made”— ” Shut up, unless you can
say something reasonably intelligent, Eric.
If she didn’t mind it last eve, she won’t mind it now.
You think the girl doesn’t know her own mind?
My interpretation of events is this: your blood, given her so many
years ago, altered her to some degree.
It sealed the bond between you, and made her feel a natural aversion to
sunlight, an abounding exuberance by night.
It is a logical guess, then, that she would not be as repulsed by the
taking of a few drops in a moment of passion, as a normal human
might.
” Eric sighed long and loud.
“She thinks herself in love with me. Did I tell you that?”
“Only a hundred or so times since we rose a mere hour ago, Eric.
not that I’m keeping count.
What’s so surprising in that?
You fancy yourself in love with her, do you not?
” “I don’t fancy myself anything. I do love her. With everything in
me.”
“Who’s to say she doesn’t feel the same?”
Eric closed his eyes slowly, and left them that way.
“I hope to God she doesn’t. It is enough that I will have to bear the
pain of our eventual separation. I wouldn’t wish such agony on her.”
He opened his eyes and met Roland’s frown.
“It is inevitable.”
“It is anything but that. She could be” — “Do not even think to
suggest it.”
Eric turned away from his friend, his gaze jumping around the room,
settling nowhere.
“This existence has been my curse. I wouldn’t wish it to be hers, as
well.”
Roland’s voice came low, more gruff.
“If it is the loneliness of which you speak, Eric, no one understands
better than I.”
“Your solitude is self-imposed. It’s as you want it. Mine is an
unending sentence of solitary confinement. I don’t interact because I
cannot trust in anyone—not with DPI always seeking a way to destroy
me.”
“My solitude” — Roland cut himself off, and simultaneously closed his
mind to Eric’s curiosity.
When he began his voice was steadier.
“Is not the matter we were discussing.
Your existence would not be lonely if you had someone with whom to
share it.
” Eric closed his eyes and shook his head.
“I have already considered this question, Roland.
I’ve made my decision.
” “The decision, my friend, is not yours to make.”
Anger flared within Eric.
His head came up, and he slowly turned to tell Roland exactly what he
thought of that remark, when the scent slowly twisted around his
mind.
He gripped it the way a drowning man would grip a lifeline, and he
concentrated, focusing his entire being on that one sensation coming to
him from Tamara.
The scent.
he frowned harder.
clean.
sterile.
Sickeningly familiar.
His eyes wide, he faced Roland.
“My God, she’s hospitalized!”
Eric lunged for the door, but Roland leapt into his path.
“A moment, Eric. You tend to lose all sense of caution where Tamara is
concerned.”
He reached for his satin cloak and flung it about his shoulders with a
long-practiced twist of his arms.
“I dare not imagine what sort of mess you’ll end in without me
along.”
“Fine.”
Eric paused as he reached for the door.
“roland, you can’t wear that to a hospital. You look as if you’ve
stepped out of the pages of that Stoker fellow’s book.”
“I have no intention of going inside. Can’t bear the places,
myself.”
True to his word, Roland lurked in the shadows outside while Eric
followed his sharpening sense of Tamara to the proper floor.
He took the stairs, and he sent the probing fingers of his mind out
ahead of him, ever on the alert for St Claire or Rogers.
Before long he caught a hint of their presence, very near Tamara’s,
though he felt it nowhere near as strongly as he felt hers.
He glanced up and down the fourth-floor corridor and quickly spotted
the room.
He’d have known it without help, but the burly man in the dark gray
suit posted outside her door made it obvious.
Eric didn’t recognize him, but knew at once he was DPI.
If he was going to see Tamara he’d need to find another way.
Already he felt reassured.
Her stamina reached from her mind to his, though he sensed she might
still be groggy.
She was well.
He felt it.
His relief was so great he very nearly didn’t notice the hinged metal
folder on the counter where nurses milled.
A strip of white tape across the front bore the words in black ink.
Dey, Tamara.
Eric stiffened.
He had to see that folder.
Only then would he know the extent of her injuries, and exactly what
had transpired to land her here.
He closed his eyes.
Roland?
Are you still out there?
Where else would I be?
came the bored reply.
/ could use a distraction.
Eric told him.
Done.
Eric waited for about thirty seconds, uncomfortably watching both
directions, half expecting St Claire to appear at any second.
Then a bloodcurdling scream came from a room in another corridor and
every nurse stampeded.
A male voice echoed through the halls.
“It was grinning at me—right through my window! I swear! And it, it
had fangs—and its eyes” — Eric grinned slightly, against his will.
He hurried to the desk and nipped open Tamara’s folder.
He didn’t need to scan it long.
According to the physician who’d examined her, Tamara had been rushed
in early this morning, unconscious and with vital signs that were
barely discernible.
She’d ingested a large amount of tranquilizers, combined with
alcohol.
According to the doctor’s examination, she had recently had sexual
intercourse.
He further noted the bruises on her torso, and con
cluded that she’d
been raped sometime the previous night.
The pills and alcohol had been, in his opinion, a suicide attempt.
The sheet swam before his eyes.
His stomach churned.
Had he been alone he’d have roared like a wounded lion.
As it was, he had to hold his anguish in check.
It wasn’t rape that had driven her over the edge, he alone knew that.
It was something far more damaging to the soul.
She’d made passionate love to a monster.
Hadn’t he known it would be more than she could face when the fire died
down?
Nearly blind with pain, he closed the folder and headed back the way
he’d come.
Roland had just leapt down from the ledge.
“Did you hear that fool bellow?”
He laughed hard.
“I haven’t had such fun in years.”
He halted his chuckles and cleared his throat.
“So, how did you find our girl? Did you see her?
Eric—my God, you look like hell.
What is it?
” Eric swallowed hard and forced the words to come.
It wasn’t easy.
His throat was so tight he could barely inhale, and when he did it
burned.
“I … couldn’t see her. A guard is posted outside her room. DPI.”
He spotted a bench nearby and went to it.
He needed to sit.
It was as if he’d been hit by a train.
“She tried to take her own life, roland.”
“What!”
Instantly Roland sat beside him, his arm at Eric’s back.
Eric barely felt it.
“I told you she’d regret what we—what I did to her, when she could
think clearly. But I had no idea it would repulse her so that she
couldn’t go on living!”
“You are wrong!”
The violence in Roland’s voice didn’t penetrate the wall of pain around
Eric.
“Sleeping pills mixed with alcohol.
It’s all on her charts.
” Roland gripped both of Eric’s shoulders and forced him to look him in
the eye.
“No. She wouldn’t do it.”
Eric shook his head.
“You barely knew her.”
“True, but I know the despondency it takes to drive one to that
extreme!
Eric, I’ve been witness to such, firsthand.
I’ve seen all the signs.
” His voice softened. ” I only wish I had known them in time.
” He shook himself then. ” Eric, do not accept less than her own words
to confirm this theory.
I know it to be wrong.
See her.
Talk to her.
” Eric shook his head for the hundredth time.
“I am the last person she would wish to see.”
“If so, she will tell you so and you will have your answer.
If not, you’d do her a grave injustice to leave her in that room with a
DPI guard preventing her leaving.
” Eric’s shoulders stiffened where before they’d been slumping.
“I suppose I could go in through the window.
But I fear St Claire and Rogers might be in the room with her.
” “Give me a moment,” Roland said, dropping his brutal grip from Eric’s
shoulders and rising to pace away.
“I’ll think of something.”
She blinked the haziness away slowly, and realized Claniel sat close to
her, holding her hand.
She wondered why she seemed to be in a hospital room, and bits of the
conversation she’d heard earlier began surfacing in her mind.
“You’re awake.”
Daniel leaned nearer.
“They said you’d be coming around soon. You shouldn’t have been out as
long as you were, but we all figured the rest would do you good, so we
let you be.”
It had done her good, she thought as her mind cleared more and more.
She felt the energy surge and longed to toss the covers back and go
outside.
She licked her parched lips.
“It’s night, isn’t it? My God, how long have I slept?”
“I found you in your bed this morning.”
He swallowed.
“I thought you were asleep at first, but then I saw the pills, and the
brandy.
” He repeatedly pushed one cool palm up over her forehead. “Baby, you
should have just told me. I wouldn’t have blamed you. It wasn’t your
fault.”
She sat up in bed so fast his hand fell away.
Fully now, she recalled the words she’d only dimly been aware of at the
time.
They all thought she’d tried to kill herself.
Moreover, they thought she’d been beaten and raped, by Eric, no less.
They’d seen the marks his unbridled passion had left on her throat.
“Daniel, I have to tell you what happened last night.”
“Don’t torture yourself, sweetheart. I already know.
I”— A sob rose in his throat, but he fought it down. ” I’ll kill him
for what he did to you.
Tam.
I swear to God, I will.
” “No!”
She came to her feet all at once.
“Daniel, you have to listen to me. Just…”
A wave of dizziness swamped her, and if Daniel hadn’t been there to
steady her she’d have sunk to the floor.
“Just listen to me, please.”
“All right. All right, honey, I’ll listen if you feel you need to talk
it out. Just get back into the bed first, okay?” She nodded, clinging
to his soft shoulders and easing herself back down. When she was once
again settled back against the pillows, she focused on staying calm. “
Where is Curtis?
” “Outside.
He walks the perimeter once very hour.
We’re not going to let Marquand get near you again, honey.
Don’t worry on that score.
” She rolled her eyes.
“Curt should hear this, too, but it can’t wait. You’ll tell him
everything I tell you. Promise?”
He nodded.
She cleared her throat and tried to summon courage enough to be honest
with him.
She should have been from the start.
“I’ve seen Eric Marquand several times since that night at the rink,”
she blurted at last.
Daniel opened his mouth but she held up two hands.
“Please, let me get through this before you say anything.”
She licked her lips.
“He’s taken me on a sleigh ride, and fed me hot cocoa and fine
cognac—in fact, the cognac I had last night was a gift from him. I’ve
been to his house, too. We sat before a fire and talked for hours.
He’s not a monster, Claniel. He’s a wonderful, caring man.”
“My God…”
“Last night after I left Hilary I had a flat tire. I had to pull off
an exit and was going to walk to a service station.
I was—” she closed her eyes at the memory “—attacked.
I fought him, but it was no use.
He was very strong.
I think he would’ve killed me when he’d finished.
But Eric came just in time.
” Her eyes opened now that she’d gotten past the most horrid memory of
last night. ” He pulled the man off me, and beat him unconscious.
He carried me to the car.<
br />
He covered me with his own coat, and then he drove.
He would have brought me directly home, but I asked him not to.
I needed time to calm myself.
” She reached for his hand. ” Daniel, Eric saved my life last night.
” Daniel stared at her for a long moment.
“But, how could… I don’t” — “He’s not the monster you keep telling
me he is,” she told him.
“He’s more human than a lot of men I know.”
For a moment Daniel appeared uncertain, but then his eyes narrowed.
“You can’t deny the marks he left on your throat. That’s proof of what
he is.”
She lowered her eyes.
“I won’t deny them, but I won’t lie about them, either. I’m not going
to tell you things that are none of your business, Daniel. But you
have to know that everything that happened between Eric and me last
night happened because I wanted it to happen. I wanted it, even
knowing what he is: He didn’t hurt me, and he never will.”
“Tamara, what are you saying? You admit he’s a vampire and still you
defend him?”
She met his gaze without flinching.
She would not be ashamed of her feelings for Eric.
But she thought she’d given her guardian enough shocks for one
evening.
“I’m saying that you don’t need to worry about me. No harm will ever
come to me with Eric around.”
She put a hand on his arm and squeezed.
“I want you to think about something, Daniel. For a long time you’ve
assumed that because his kind is different, they are inherently evil.
You’ve been wrong. You need to sit down and realize how bigoted that
mind-set is.”
He shook his head and got to his feet.
His eyes on her seemed to hold an unvoiced accusation.
“Haven’t Curtis and I warned you about the mind control he might
exercise over you? Haven’t I begged you to tell me if he tried to see
you again?
Tamara, you cannot believe his lies! He would kill me if he had an
opportunity, and you are just the one to give it to him! He’s using
you to get to me, Tamara. You’d have to be blind not to see that!”
She drew in a sharp breath at the fury in his voice, and in his face.
It was as if she’d betrayed him.
She’d never seen him so angry.
“Daniel, you’re wrong” — She was interrupted by a mechanical beep
coming from Daniel’s belt.
He pushed a button and it stopped instantly.
“I have to go. Curtis” — He bit his lip.
“Curtis what?”
Tamara felt a chill go up her spine.
At Twilight Page 17
