Christmas With a Vampire

by Merline Lovelace

  His hands clasped her face, pulled her mouth back to his. The sting of something sharp piercing her lip almost jerked her from the moment, but then his tongue lapped away the pain, and she could think of nothing but Drystan, his scent, his touch—she pulled her mouth from his, ran her tongue down his neck—his taste. She had never felt so alive, so in the human body she normally only occupied.

  She wanted to experience more, to feel more.

  She grasped his pants and shoved them out of her way. Drystan moved with her, as if he could read her mind, as if they shared the same thoughts. He stepped forward, while she clung to him, her fingers digging into his shoulders, her breasts pressed to his chest. The backs of her knees hit the couch and he slipped an arm behind her, lowered her onto the cushions.

  The leather clung to her heated skin, the smell of it mingling with Drystan’s scent, forming a masculine mix that Aimee pulled into her lungs, wished she could bottle and keep forever.

  She ran her hands up and down Drystan’s now bare back. He leaned down, skimmed her neck with his lips, his palms finding her breasts. She arched into his touch. Her breasts were heavy, and his touch cool—nothing could feel better.

  Except…he lay atop her, his weight pressing her deeper into the cushion. Her legs inched apart, his thigh falling between hers. Anticipation coiled inside her. Then his erection pressed against her. She tilted her hips, parted her thighs until the tip edged inside.

  Her breath caught in her throat. Then Drystan murmured against her ear and guided his erection inside her.

  Aimee’s back curved again, this time angling her pelvis toward Drystan, urging him to go deeper, faster inside her, but despite her almost frantic need, he moved slowly, letting her body stretch, letting her feel every inch as he edged inside her.

  His lips found her breasts; his tongue swirled the aching tips. Aimee’s hands dropped to her sides, pushed against the cushions. So many sensations were pulsing through her, she didn’t know what to do, how to react.

  “Relax, enjoy,” Drystan murmured. “Forget every thing.”

  All tension left her hands, arms, her mind leaving only the growing feeling of tautness spiraling inside her, where Drystan’s body met hers, slid in and out. Drystan nipped at her breast, pulled the nub in between his teeth and rolled his tongue around it. Aimee grabbed his sides, held on to the firm muscle. So much sensation… She shifted beneath him, ran her fingers over his chest, then leaned up, grabbed the skin on his neck between her teeth and nipped him back.

  Drystan stiffened, then a growl rolled from his throat, his pace quickened, his body moving in and out of Aimee’s until she felt her spirit slipping, leaving the human body assigned to her and floating overhead, hovering. This wasn’t supposed to happen. She was supposed to have given up this ability by turning away from her daimon self, but being with Drystan, experiencing his touch, accepting his darkness… Below her Drystan continued his movements; her body reacted by tightening around him. Aimee could feel the patter of her heart, his teeth grazing her skin. Her spirit was separate, but still connected—the best of both.

  His pace became even quicker now, and Aimee, not wanting to miss anything, forced her spirit back down to the couch, into her body where she could feel everything, miss nothing no matter how small. His hands slipped behind her buttocks, tipping her upward, increasing the depth of each thrust. Aimee’s breath came out of her chest in tiny pants and her body began to tighten on its own, without her control.

  She gripped Drystan’s sides, dug her nails into his flesh. His mouth dropped back to her neck, his lips caressed her skin. Even as he moved inside her, brought her body to the edge, he seemed tense, holding something, a piece of him back.

  “Let go,” she whispered, to herself and Drystan. He thrust again, and her body reacted, released and tightened and released again until she felt herself propelling upward, back out of her body, her spirit swirling overhead in a ka lei do scope of human and daimon senses—one almost indiscernible from the other.

  As she twirled there, caught in an eddy of emotion, she felt a sharp prick at her neck, the undeniable pain of something sharp sliding into her skin…her neck…her vein, and even before the next wave of euphoria hit, she knew what Drystan was, how he held such darkness.

  The man she had made love to, who made her feel both human and daimon, made her appreciate both, was not a dark daimon as she had feared, but he wasn’t human, either.

  No, he was the one being who could do the impossible—walk the earth alone, without even his own soul for company.

  He was a vampire.

  DRYSTAN HAD RESISTED as long as he could, denied the hunger that raged inside him, but at Aimee’s whispered words, her permission to release what he was hiding, to relax, be himself, the dam had broken. He’d punctured the skin of her throat, taken the first tiny sip of her blood and known he was lost. No matter if she followed through with her plans, married Ben or left him at the altar as Drystan prayed, Drystan would never be the same, his world would never be the same.

  Because this time, if…when…Aimee left him, he’d be alone, more alone than he’d ever been in his life.

  Aimee stirred beneath him, stiffened. For a second fear lanced through him, fear that his beguilement had failed, that she realized what was happening—what he was—that she would shove him away, look at him with disgust and dread. But as quickly as he had noticed her movement, she relaxed again, tilted her head farther to the side, baring more of her neck, ran her hand up his chest until her fingers brushed his throat, her nails scraped his skin.

  Her blood filled his mouth. Sweet but light, it crackled through his veins, through his heart, warmed him more than a roaring fire. His sex, spent just minutes earlier, began to stir, desire for this woman who wasn’t his, never could be, building again.

  He wanted her sexually, spiritually, completely. He drew another mouthful of her blood, let it slide down his throat. Aimee moved again, rubbing her breasts against his chest. Her fingers stroked the side of his neck, gentle, soothing, telling him everything was okay, would be okay, and for that moment Drystan let himself believe her. He shoved aside all doubt and hate, shoved aside everything except being with Aimee…being accepted, feeling loved.

  He swallowed hard at the last thought, but as Aimee’s fingers shifted from his neck to his side and the pressure changed from stroke to knead, as her breath fell faster from her lips, in sharp pants, he forgot his doubts and pain, was pulled back into what was happening.

  Her thighs parted beneath him. His lips still on her throat, her blood still winding through his body, he took her again, slipped inside the warm welcome of her body. She tightened around him; he groaned from the pleasure, his mouth pulling away from her neck as he did.

  Aimee moved again, her lips parting to let out a murmur of objection mixed with heavy gasps. She grasped his head, pressed his mouth back to her throat.

  He stared at the woman in his arms. She was enjoying his feeding, perhaps as much as he. The exchange didn’t repulse her, at least not now in the midst of their passion. He could relax, be with her in every way, not hide who or what he was…at least for right now.

  With the realization soaring through his body, he placed his mouth on her neck, let himself truly relax, enjoy the taste of her blood, the surge of energy he seemed to get as it trailed through his body. Her hands grasped at his chest and she quivered beneath him—as if the act of taking her blood alone was enough to bring her to the brink.

  And suddenly Drystan was there with her—just knowing she was getting such pleasure from him excited him more than any sex act alone ever had. He in creased his pace, his mouth never leaving her neck. Together their bodies began to shake, their muscles tensed, then relaxed and tensed again, until Drystan could hold on no longer and he exploded inside her. Her head flinging back, her back arching, Aimee clung to him as no one had ever clung to him before, and just for a second as her orgasm swept over her, Drystan felt something lift him up and away…away from
his body and any pain he had ever known.

  IT WAS DAWN and Aimee was alone, or might as well have been. Drystan, her vampire lover, was dead, and would stay that way, if the tales she had heard were true, for at least another eight hours, when the sun started to edge down past the horizon.

  She placed her palm over his bare chest. His heart, which she had heard beating only a few hours earlier, when she was pressed against him marveling at what had passed between them, was still, cold, lifeless—just like a corpse.

  He was a corpse.

  How did it feel to have your heart start and stop each day? To feel your life drain away over and over? That alone would pull most humans down into a dark mire of emotion, but Drystan…his darkness was deeper than that, reached farther back into his mortal life.

  Drystan, she realized, was the adopted son of Maureen Myhre—Aimee’s future brother-in-law. Which meant his stories at dinner were true, or at least true to Drystan. Who knew what the Myhres’ side of things might be?

  Aimee lay down, her cheek pressed against Drystan’s cold chest; a tear leaked from her eye, dropped onto his skin. Drystan’s reality was so much worse than Aimee had imagined—for him, for her, for the two of them.

  She stayed there another hour, just to think and to be with him. She’d betrayed Ben. She’d known she was doing so last night, when she gave in to the physical need to be with Drystan, but now alone in Drystan’s apartment, lying on the bed next to him, she realized how complete her betrayal had been. She had slept with another man; that alone would be un for givable in most human relationships. But Ben didn’t love her, he was marrying her for purely political reasons.

  He didn’t love her—but he had loved his brother.

  No matter Drystan’s doubts, Aimee was sure of it. So not only had she slept with another man, but that man was Ben’s brother, a brother he thought dead, for whose death he blamed himself.

  How would he react to knowing his brother was alive, that he could speak to him?

  She stroked Drystan’s cold chest. But she couldn’t tell Ben, couldn’t let him know Drystan’s secret—because that would mean betraying Drystan, too. Once again, intending to or not, she’d interfered with humans’ lives, stood on the brink of possibly destroying someone.

  Her mind whirling, she walked to the bedroom, but paused at the thresh old. A king-size bed complete with over size pillows and a down comforter dominated the room.

  A bed for a man who never slept.

  Why bother? Another wave of sadness swept over her. Maybe his way of clinging to his past humanity?

  Lore said vampires lost their humanity, their souls—that because of this they couldn’t enter a church or touch a cross. That would certainly explain the void she felt inside him.

  Aimee pulled the cover off Drystan’s bed, then walked back to the couch, the blue comforter trailing behind her. Care fully, she tucked it around him and brushed a bit of hair away from his brow.

  He was beautiful and…she leaned down, kissed his unmoving lips…he was Drystan. The lore was wrong; he had a soul. She wouldn’t feel like this if he didn’t.

  But he was still lost in his darkness, and as she had told him last night, no one else could save him from that. No matter how she felt, how much love she had to give, he had to save himself.

  So, Aimee, the daimon…human…she was un sure what she was anymore, couldn’t stay with him, had to leave, had to let him sort things out on his own. Had to, in the face of her own actions, sort things out for her own life.

  She had tried being daimon, then, having failed that, tried being human. Now it appeared she was failing there, too. She couldn’t tell Ben that Drystan lived, couldn’t choose Drystan over Ben.

  All she could do was run away from them all, leave them all behind and let them sort it out for them selves…but she knew deep in her heart she couldn’t do that, either.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  IT WAS DARK and cold. Normal for Drystan’s first waking moments, but this time his hands groped around him, searched for something…someone… For some reason this time he didn’t expect to be alone…but he was.

  He sat up, let his mind come to full aware ness.

  He was alone. Aimee had left. He should have expected that, but he hadn’t. Deep inside, even while in his vampiric coma, death, whatever this curse put him through each day, some bit of hope that this time he’d awake to a gentle touch, a smiling face, to Aimee, had stayed alive.

  He should have known better.

  He shoved aside the comforter that covered his chest and stood. He started to move toward his bedroom to retrieve clothing for the night ahead, but his feet tangled in the cover he’d just tossed aside. He stopped, stared down at it.

  A cover. He bent and retrieved the tangled mass. Something so simple, but it told him last night hadn’t been a dream and, more important, that Aimee hadn’t run from him in horror. No, after he’d passed into unconsciousness, she’d stayed at least long enough to find this comforter and tuck it around him.

  At least for a while he hadn’t been alone. That was worth something.

  He balled the covering in his hands, wished he’d known what she was doing at the time. If simply asleep, he might have felt her touch, realized she was close, but as a vampire after dawn he was dead to everything, literally.

  He strode to his bedroom, tossed the cover onto his bed and pulled slacks and a shirt from his closet.

  She hadn’t left scared. Had she even realized his state? He shoved his arms into sleeves and began shoving buttons through holes. No. She couldn’t have. If she had, she would have thought him dead, called 911.

  So, what did that mean? She’d tucked the blanket around him, but not tried to wake him, not got close enough to realize he was dead, albeit temporarily. Or maybe he looked more alive than he thought. He’d never actually seen a vampire after the day coma hit. Maybe the sight wasn’t as disturbing as the reality felt.

  Either way he had slipped by not beguiling her before the sun rose. He had used his powers some while he fed, but he’d still been drained from getting her to come to his apartment at all, and he’d seen Aimee’s resistance. He couldn’t count on the little power he’d used on her to keep her from realizing what had happened.

  He had to find her, see what she remembered.

  See which meant more—the comforter tucked with care around his body or the fact she was missing now.

  AIMEE PULLED BACK the heavy curtain and stared out into the street. It had been dark for hours. Drystan would be awake by now. Was he looking for her? What would she do if he came for her?

  “Aimee, would you like some brandy?” Maureen Myhre paused on her way through the living room. “I usually have a glass before bed.”

  Aimee dropped the curtain and studied the older woman. Was she the monster Drystan made her out to be? Aimee resisted the urge to reach out with her daimon powers and see. She already knew the answer; she’d analyzed Maureen and Ben when she first met them, before allowing herself to be brought into their world.

  Maureen Myhre was ambitious, blinded like so many humans by the drive to succeed. The carefully coiffed matriarch had for got ten exactly why she needed that success in the first place, for got ten about love, had let power over shadow it.

  She wasn’t evil. She was human.

  Aimee sighed. “No, I’m fine. Thanks.”

  Maureen took a step, then stopped. “Is everything okay? There isn’t something you need to tell me…someone from your past…a reason you asked to stay here until the wedding?”

  “I told you my lease was up.” Not a lie. Aimee never had a lease. It was up the day she moved in. The landlord just let her stay as she wanted.

  “Yes, it’s just…” Maureen placed pale hands on the back of the couch. Her arms were stiff, tension showing in her shoulders. “It was so sudden. You hadn’t mentioned…”

  “I’m not much of a planner.” Aimee tilted her head, smiled, a sad tilt of her lips, she knew, but all she could manage. �
��I hope that doesn’t bother you. A governor’s wife probably needs skills I don’t have.”

  With a flick of her wrist, Maureen brushed the comment aside. “You have other assets.” The line that had formed between her brows faded for a second, then reappeared. “So, no one from your past? Nothing you need to tell me before the big day?”

  Aimee’s hand found the curtain, held on to it for support. “No, no one from my past.”

  DRYSTAN WAS BACK at the Myhre house. He’d hoped he’d never have to return here. He had hoped he’d done enough to convince Aimee she didn’t belong with these people, but when he’d gone to the hospital looking for her, he’d learned she’d taken the rest of the week off—to prepare for her wedding.

  Then at her apartment, he’d discovered something even more disturbing. She had let the place go and was living with the Myhres permanently.

  Despite his best efforts. Despite their lovemaking and the feeling he’d had while with her last night, she was still going through with it. She was choosing the Myhres over him.

  And despite all that, here he was standing outside the Myhre house, hoping he’d see some sign that none of what he’d heard tonight was true. That Aimee would see him standing here and rush out, tell him all of it was lies.

  AIMEE’S FINGERS TIGHTENED around the draperies. Drystan was there—outside in the snow. He’d come. She’d hoped he would, that maybe, just maybe, enough had passed between them last night that he would come here to find her, that once here he would have no choice but to face the demons that haunted him, face his past and his adopted family.