Vacation With a Vampire...and Other Immortals

by Maggie Shayne

  “That fast?”

  “What’s to take time with?” she said, lifting the towel from her shoulders and using it to rub her hair. “It’s warm outside, so there’s not a lot to put on. Not to mention I’ve barely got any clothes to choose from, so making a selection won’t take long.”

  “Well, we can remedy that. I noticed a few colorful items washing up on the shore, near where the boat’s docked. Probably your clothes. Go on, get ready. I’ll be waiting downstairs.”

  He turned to go, leaving her to it. And he wondered why he’d proposed what could be construed, he supposed, as a romantic evening together. Why would he put himself through that, take that risk, just because she had stopped herself from invading his privacy? Was it really all that impressive that she had managed not to do something that almost anyone would see as rude and unacceptable?

  Given his experience with women in the past? Yes. It was that impressive.

  Chapter 8

  “Here we are.” He nodded toward a tipped-over log that lay on the beach, just where the palm trees met the sand.

  They were in a different spot from where she’d fallen asleep earlier. They’d circled the shoreline a little bit farther and come to a cozy cove where he’d built his own private dock.

  “You can sit right there,” he told her. “I’ve found that the log makes a comfortable back-rest.”

  But she didn’t sit. She was too busy staring at the small sailboat tied to the pier he’d built in a tiny inlet where the water was shallow and mostly still. It was a small sailboat with a large motor attached, though its sails were tightly furled at the moment. The name Santa Maria XIII was painted in a beautiful, old-world-style script across the stern. She wondered about that XIII, even as she experienced a pang of longing for her own lost vessel. The feeling faded, though, as she noticed colorful items littering the shoreline. Frowning, she pointed. “Are those…?”

  He smiled. “Your clothes and belongings have been washing up all evening. I spotted them earlier but wanted to check on you before coming down to gather them up.”

  “You spotted them…all the way from the house?”

  “The workshop.”

  “That’s a long way to see—especially in the dark. You must have very good eyesight.” Suddenly her theory was seeming less and less ridiculous. Could he really be…? She couldn’t even think the word.

  “Excellent, in fact—particularly my night vision,” he said.

  She tried to hide her look of…well, shock, she supposed. Her crazy supposition was seeming more and more possible. To avoid his probing eyes, she started forward toward the debris on the shoreline, but he held up a hand. “I’ll get them. You should rest.”

  “I’m fine at the moment, Diego. But thank you.” She walked with him, and as the frothy surf washed over their bare feet she bent and began gathering up items she’d thought were long gone. A bikini top, no bottom in sight. A pair of denim shorts. A couple of tank tops and a T-shirt. She picked them up one by one, wringing them out as best she could and then draping them over one arm. She located one tennis shoe. A lot of good that was going to do her, she thought, when she failed to find its mate.

  “It’s better than nothing, though,” he said, speaking as if in response to her thoughts. That was, of course, impossible.

  Or was it?

  When they’d picked up everything, she found herself closer to the little dock, and she studied his boat for a moment. “It’s small,” she said. “But nice.”

  “Wait until you see the new one,” he said proudly.

  “Don’t tell me. The Santa Maria…XIV?”

  He smiled, but didn’t confirm it.

  “Have there really been thirteen other boats, Diego, or does the number mean something else?”

  “I…are you sure you have all your clothes?”

  “Just how long have you been here, Diego?”

  He averted his eyes. “A long time.”

  “And you only go to the mainland…what did you tell me? Once a month?”

  “Once a season, if I can manage it. But if supplies get low, I sometimes have no choice.”

  “I see. And when was the last time you went? For supplies, I mean.”

  “Just this past April. I was—” He stopped there, then began again. “Or it might have been March. I don’t really keep track.”

  But she knew it had been April. April 10. The day she’d received her death sentence and gone to the shore to process the news. The day she’d met her guardian angel. And he’d been there, too. She knew it now for sure. She’d known it as soon as he’d said April, and he’d seen her know it, and then quickly tried to cover—to change his answer. But it was too late, and he knew it.

  “It was you I met, you I kissed that night, wasn’t it, Diego?”

  He met her eyes again, held them. “Don’t be ridiculous. How could it have been?”

  She shrugged. “I guess you must be…some kind of…supernatural being. You spoke to me mentally. You knew my name. You heard me crying out for help on the night of the storm. Didn’t you?”

  He lowered his head, saying nothing.

  “How would it hurt you to tell me the truth, Diego? I’m dying, remember?”

  He heaved a great sigh, then turned to focus on his small sailboat. “So what do you think of her?” he asked, changing the subject.

  “I think she shouldn’t be in the water. You don’t leave her there all the time, do you?”

  “Of course not. Only when a trip is imminent.” He looked at her. “I put her in earlier tonight.”

  She blinked, afraid to ask why, but he answered, anyway.

  “You’ll be well enough to leave soon.”

  Was it too soon for her to ask him to let her stay? No. No, it was the right time, but she hadn’t worked up enough courage to do it yet. Gnawing her lower lip and trying to compose a rational argument in her mind, she began walking through the warm sand, back toward the log where he’d suggested they sit. “I have a confession to make,” she said softly, hoping to work her way up to what she really wanted to talk about.

  “And what’s that?”

  She reached the log, curled her toes in the sand, then turned and sat down, getting comfortable and eyeing the horizon for the promised moonrise. Nothing in sight just yet, though. “I’m afraid I was a little nosy today. I kind of…looked around the house a little.”

  He nodded. “I know. You didn’t go into my bedroom, however.”

  She felt her eyes widen. “How did you know?”

  He shrugged. “Why didn’t you go into my bedroom, Anna?”

  She blinked, still blown away that he had known. “It would have been out of line,” she said softly. “An invasion of your privacy. I just… It was outside my comfort zone, I guess.”

  “But looking around the rest of the place wasn’t?”

  “No.” She lowered her eyes. “Maybe a little bit.”

  “So why did you?”

  “I was curious. About you.”

  “I see. And did your explorations sate that curiosity?”

  “No, not at all. If anything, they only sharpened it. The cornerstone of the cottage says 1965. How can that be, if you built it yourself?” She tipped her head to one side, waiting, expecting him to at least try to formulate an answer that made sense. But that wasn’t what he did at all.

  “I’m a very private man, Anna. That’s probably obvious to you.”

  She blinked. “Well, yes. I mean, you live all alone on a deserted island. Can’t get much more private than that. But…why? What made you want to live this way?”

  He looked away. “I can’t help but wonder what part of the word private you don’t understand?”

  “You’re being mean now.”

  He looked back at her. “Sorry.”

  “It was a woman, wasn’t it?”

  He rolled his eyes and walked closer, but passed her to bend down near the log. He pulled out a bottle of wine and two glasses, then filled one to the brim and ha
nded it to her.

  “Nice,” she said. “Aren’t you having any?”

  “Of course,” he said. And then he filled his own glass, sank into the sand beside her, leaned back against the log and pointed. “Look, here it comes.”

  She fell silent, though her questions were still screaming in her mind. She shut her lips tightly, determined to enjoy this night to the fullest. Relaxing there, she sipped the wine, which was delicious, and leaned back and watched the moon climb into the sky, lopsided and a bit less than half-formed, rising slowly above the water and sending a long beam outward, like a glowing arrow pointing straight from the moon to this very stretch of beach. Pointing right at her. At them.

  “That’s amazing. So beautiful,” she said.

  “I agree.”

  His words were soft and his eyes, she found when she looked his way, were on her. Not the moon.

  “Diego,” she whispered. “I won’t be here very long.”

  “I know.”

  “And I won’t snoop anymore.”

  “That’s good to hear.”

  “But I want…” She got lost in his eyes. There was a passion in them that was beyond anything she’d seen before. A desire she’d never seen focused on her. “I want you,” she whispered, even though it wasn’t what she had intended to say at all.

  “That would be a mistake,” he told her.

  She smiled broadly. “How could it be? I’ve got nothing to lose, Diego. I’m dying. And my guardian angel told me to do exactly what I wanted to do with the time I had left. And what I want to do right now is kiss you. And so I’m going to.”

  She leaned up, and he didn’t pull away. Her lips moved close to his, then, boldly, pressed against them. He remained motionless as she slid her hands over his shoulders and around to the back of his neck, then threaded her fingers into his hair and held him to her so she could press harder, kiss deeper.

  She felt him shudder, and then he gave in. He wound his arms around her waist and bent over her, pushing her back into the sand so that his body was angled over hers, and then he kissed her. He kissed her like she’d never been kissed before, and every single part of her came alive.

  “Diego,” she whispered. “Diego.”

  She arched upward against him, felt the hardness of his arousal pressing into her thigh. And then, to her stunned amazement, he rolled away, sitting up, blinking in the night as if his entire being were shattered.

  “Diego?” she asked.

  He said nothing. She sat up, as well, sliding a hand over his shoulders from behind.

  “Please, talk to me.”

  “There’s nothing to talk about. I can’t do this with you, Anna. I know where it’s going to end, and I don’t want to go there again.”

  She closed her eyes. “I want to stay here, Diego. I want to stay here, on the island with you, for whatever time I have left in this life. It can’t be more than a month—six weeks at the outside.”

  “No.” It sounded as if he had to force the word through a space too tight for it.

  “But…but I’m dying. I don’t have anything to go back to. I’ll stay out of your way, I’ll do whatever you need me to do, but please, don’t make me go back.”

  He rose to his feet, so that her hands fell from his broad shoulders. She stayed where she was. “You need to leave. And you’re obviously strong enough to do so. We’ll set sail tomorrow night at sundown.”

  “Diego, please!”

  “Don’t beg, Anna. It’s beneath you.”

  “I don’t have a damn thing to lose.”

  “There’s always your pride.”

  “You’re a hard, cold man, aren’t you?”

  He shrugged. “I’m going to my workshop for a few hours. I don’t want to be bothered.”

  “Fine. You go to your damn workshop, you selfish bastard.”

  He walked away, seemingly unperturbed by her parting shot. Anna sank to her knees in the sand and wept bitterly. And she wasn’t even sure why.

  Chapter 9

  She sat there in the sand, staring out at the half-moon and drinking the bottle of wine he’d left behind. When she was all cried out, she sat in silence for a while, trying to analyze just what was behind her roiling feelings. They were confused and tumultuous, far from the peaceful, blissful state she’d found while alone at sea.

  That state, she decided, had been one of calm acceptance. She knew she was dying. She had made a choice to spend her time on the sea, and she had been enjoying every moment of it.

  That was no longer the case, and she struggled to figure out why. Why, for example, wasn’t her dying request to Diego something entirely different? Why wasn’t she begging him to loan her his sailboat so that she could continue on the path she had chosen, to die at sea, maybe sail close to this island again when she sensed the time was near and just anchor offshore, so he could come get his boat when it was over?

  That request would have made more sense to her. To him, too, probably. But she had no desire to borrow his boat or head back out to sea. Her only wish was to stay here on this tiny chunk of paradise. And not alone, either. She wanted to stay here with him. There was something so…so compelling about him. Something that felt…intimately connected to her. She wanted to touch him, to be close to him all the time, and she barely knew the man. And yet it felt as if she knew him. It felt as if she’d known him all her life.

  And loved him even longer.

  She was no longer so much at peace with dying. Rather than that calm, blissful state of acceptance she’d felt before, there was now a sense of time running out. A sense of urgency to use what time was left to get closer to him, to this place.

  She closed her eyes, lowered her head and sighed. Maybe it was just the approach of her own end making her feel such a wild array of nonsensical emotions. Maybe everyone got all tied up in knots when they knew they were short on time. Of course they did. Why wouldn’t they?

  Okay, so she needed to get a handle on this. Probably apologize to him, and maybe try to explain what had led to her outburst. And then she would get back to the task at hand, convincing him to let her stay. Because no matter what he said, she had no intention of leaving. He would have to carry her bodily off this island if he wanted to get rid of her. Whether to tell him that, too, was still up in the air in her mind.

  She opened her eyes, feeling better, empowered, calm, resolved, and found herself focusing on a stain in the white sand.

  A red stain. Like blood.

  It was right beside the spot where Diego had been sitting, on the side of him that had been farthest from her. She frowned, bending closer, wondering if he’d been injured and unaware of it, or—

  And then she saw the wineglass, sitting empty on the log, and knew it wasn’t blood. That stain was wine. She bent closer, sniffed. Yes, it was wine. He’d poured himself a glass, but as her mind replayed the events of the past hour, she realized she had never actually seen him take a single sip of it.

  And in her mind she heard the actor Bela Lugosi in the role that had made him famous, saying, in his thick Romanian accent, “I never drink…wine.”

  “Oh, come on, Anna,” she said aloud. “Just cut it out, already.” And yet her eyes were glued to that stain in the sand.

  She shifted her gaze to look out at the moonlight beaming down on the water, as perfectly beautiful as if it were the backdrop on a movie set. And her mind kept on taunting her. He’s nocturnal. He said so himself. And you’ve certainly never seen him in the daylight.

  “He hasn’t seen me in the daylight, either,” she argued.

  No food in the house. And not just curtains on the windows, but heavy drapes, and window shades, and shutters to boot.

  “Just because he doesn’t like the sun, doesn’t mean…”

  You’ve got to get a look inside that bedroom.

  But then her thoughts ground to a sudden halt, as she heard him cry out in what sounded like pain. She was on her feet, turning toward the path back and even starting forward, befo
re she realized she hadn’t heard the shout with her ears.

  She’d heard it with her mind.

  And she felt it still, that sense of him, hurting and in distress, ringing in her head, a feeling, not a sound. She was compelled to go to him. She dropped her wineglass beside the empty bottle in the sand and ran.

  He’d been careless. Angry, frustrated, stupid and careless. Because he wanted so very badly to believe her when she told him she wanted to stay on this island…to stay with him. But he’d been told the same thing before. By a woman in the very same circumstances.

  He’d taken his angst out on his work, and now the circular saw lay on the floor, its teeth clinging to bits of his flesh, and his forearm was gushing blood at a pace that would kill him in very short order.

  “Oh, my God! Diego!”

  And then she was there on the floor beside him, and acting without any kind of hesitation or panic or delay. She looked around, assessed the situation and sprang into action, grabbing a box cutter from his workbench and quickly slicing the power cord off the saw. Kneeling beside him, she wrapped the cord around his arm, above the gash, then knotted it once, tightly. Getting up again, she grabbed a big screwdriver and laid the blade atop the cord, then knotted the cord again over the blade to create an instant tourniquet. She twisted the screwdriver, tightening the cord around his arm, and he couldn’t help but cry out in pain.

  She shot him a look—and he saw tears welling in her eyes. One spilled over and rolled slowly down her cheek. “Don’t die,” she said.

  He couldn’t look away. “I…tend to bleed like…like a hemophiliac,” he explained. “It’s not going to clot.”

  “I’m the same way,” she told him, wonder at that in her eyes, and then she pushed her questions aside. “I can stitch it up.”

  He shook his head. “The pain—I have a very low threshold for pain.”

  “Then what? We can’t just leave the tourniquet on indefinitely. You’ll lose your arm.”

  “What time is it?”

  “What earthly difference does that make?”

  “Please…”