She’d never articulated it to herself, but she’d been waiting and saving herself for Zack, sure in the knowledge that her abstinence would be worth it.
Oh, I want you, she cried silently to him, massaging his sensational bottom, and squirreling herself against his cock.
Zack’s answer was to growl again, a low feral sound. His lips crushed hers, his tongue thrusting, thrusting, just like the sex act. Where the kiss had been gentle and controlled at first, it was clear off the rails now. His mouth started to rove, moving roughly, messily, thrillingly over her face, along her jaw, as his hips rocked and jerked in that explicit rhythm that met and matched hers.
It was like being a horny teenager all over again, but magnified to the n’th degree. Every part of her was hot. They were rubbing against each other like crazy animals, and Teresa was the one making moaning noises now, unable to contain herself as Zack’s hands went all over the place. Her breasts. Her thighs. The cleft of her bottom. He was surveying her physical geography, and he was impatient. His fingers wriggled between their bodies, tugging at her skirt and searching for access to her sex.
And all the while he was kissing, licking, tasting – and nibbling.
Nibbling? More than that – as his mouth reached her throat, she suddenly yelped and jerked beneath him.
Dear God, that is so hot! He’s biting my neck!
It was pure sex. Shocking and primal. Painful but in a way that made her hips lurch against him of their own accord, seeking the touch of his fingertips where they pressed against her panties.
Am I flying? Teresa thought. This is weird.
She wriggled and parted her legs, not sure where the pleasure was, only knowing that it was like melting, dissolving, expiring – coming?
And then …
The rail-backed kitchen chair was hard beneath her thighs, and the glass cool in her hand. Her heart was thudding and there was a silvery hum ringing in her ears. But despite this strange physical phenomenon and an accompanying sense of dislocation, she felt calm, almost serene. Apart from a vague prickle of curiosity. She’d been panicking and fretting about something, but it was OK now. Zack had come up with a solution, hadn’t he?
Looking up, she was surprised to see him standing by the sink. His mouth was uncharacteristically tense, his lips tightly pursed and his eyes looked huge and very dark. She felt a jolt of worry. Had her silly invitation distressed him?
‘Are you OK, Zack? You’re not sickening for something, are you? You don’t have to come to the wedding, you know. It’s wonderful of you to offer and God knows I appreciate it. But I’m a big girl. I think I’ll be OK.’
There was a long pause. Zack’s eyes seemed to skitter a bit, and he pressed his knuckle against his lips, as if pondering.
Teresa wondered what was the matter with Zach. He was not usually like this.
As she watched, Zack gave one long fluttering, almost slow-motion blink, squared his shoulders and lowered his hand to rest it on the forearm he had wrapped around him, reacquiring his stillness.
‘I’d like to go. I need to get out more.’ He gave her a cautious smile, his white teeth glinting. ‘It’ll be a change for me … all this studying and researching. I need to kick over the traces and have some fun.’
‘Um, yes, I suppose so.’
But later, when he’d returned to his books, his research and his computer, Teresa was left wondering about Zack’s sudden decision. Wondering about that, and a few other things.
Like, why were her lips so tender, as if she’d been kissed to within an inch of her life?
And what the hell was that bright-red mark on her neck?
2
‘Bloody fool! Bloody, bloody fool!’
Zachary Trevelyan fought the hysterical urge to laugh like a lunatic.
Of course, he was a bloody fool – he was a fool for blood. With an effort, he managed to control his mania but the irony still made him smile.
For decades he’d coped and adapted and made a semblance of a life for himself, without ever really fitting in. But ever since he’d seen a pretty brown-haired girl in a local street on a warm spring night, then followed her into a coffee house, it was no longer the placid existence he’d carefully nurtured.
And tonight he’d made it a hundred times more complicated. He might have gently tampered with Teresa’s perceptions, but it was only a matter of time before she cottoned on to the anomalies. And he couldn’t blank out his own memories of that kiss – or the natural and unnatural responses of his body.
In the sanctum of his workroom, he reached into the small beer fridge he kept there. It had never actually contained beer, although he did drink ale now and again. Instead the shelves were stacked with a row of small vacuum-sealed bottles. After flipping the top off one, he flung himself into his big leather wing-chair and took a long quenching drink.
His eyes fluttered closed as the rich familiar taste filled his mouth. The dangerous coppery flavour that defined him.
His roaring hunger calmed immediately. Heart, veins, cells, they all glowed and returned to equilibrium again. The acute stiffness in his penis transformed from pain into a potential source of pleasure. Taking another long drink from his bottle, he laid the fingers of his free hand across his groin.
That had been a close, close call in the kitchen. Flicking his tongue over his lips, he captured a drop of the red fluid there, and then, still lightly cupping his genitals, he passed it slowly over the biting edges of his upper teeth.
They were altered again, just as they’d been ten minutes ago. Kissing Teresa, he’d felt his fangs descend as the crimson madness of desire, so long and so carefully avoided, had gripped him like a stranglehold.
What the hell had possessed him? He’d been at risk of revealing himself since the very day she’d moved in, and he still couldn’t work out what had possessed him to ask her. But still he’d done it, wildly embracing the threat to his hard won peace of mind.
Oh, but the taste of her. The touch of her. She was everything he’d dreamt of, everything that had driven him time and again to red fits of frenzied masturbation. And all it had taken was the welling up of sympathy – his for her and hers for him – to tip him past the point of no return.
Zack remembered the first time he’d set eyes on Teresa.
Like any man, he’d first noticed her shiny teak-coloured hair, and her slender yet shapely figure as she’d strolled along, looking in shop windows. But then he’d watched, fascinated by an inner beauty, as she’d knelt down to talk to one of the homeless who sometimes bedded down for the night in the larger doorways. She’d stayed a while, actually talking to the man rather than just flinging the odd coin into his tin and scuttling away. Her face had been warm and animated and she’d stroked the mangy dog tied up to the man’s pack. Then, eventually, she’d straightened up, and left, turning back to wave – but not before slipping what looked like a couple of banknotes into his hand, with an encouraging squeeze.
Later, in the coffee house, he’d been compelled to approach her, and expecting wariness and suspicion, he’d been greeted by a sweet open smile and an easy invitation to share her table. She’d welcomed him, a pale and probably rather odd looking total stranger, and generously engaged him in conversation.
Sympathy again. Sympathy, from beauty, for an outcast? Was that it? Was that what had made her the one to change his long cultivated habits?
You’re a good woman, Teresa, and you’re kind. But would you still have sympathy for me, if you knew what I am?
Would you give yourself as freely as you were about to if you knew that your hypochondriac housemate was really a bloodsucking fiend?
‘It’s a bit hot in here … OK if I wind down the window?’
Not only was it warm in Zack’s beautiful classic Mercedes, it was also getting difficult to sit still. Breathing in the scents of polished leather and Zack himself was making her crazy. She loved his old-fashioned floral cologne, but in a confined space it was acting like a drug. She
kept drifting into a dreamy erotic fantasy.
Clenching her fingers on her bag with one hand, and a fold of her skirt with the other, she fought the pounding urge to slyly touch herself.
‘Of course … sorry. I always forget that other people are warmer-blooded than I am.’ Zack’s eyes were intent on the road. If she didn’t know better, Teresa would have said that he was avoiding looking at her. Maybe he was having wayward urges of his own?
But that was nonsense. Zack was always the perfect, controlled gentleman. Alas.
Reaching for the window winder, Teresa frowned. There was something up with Zack tonight. He was different. Odd. Not his usual still calm self at all. And his beautiful rosy mouth was twisted as if he were smiling at a particularly bitter joke. Teresa eyed his perfect profile, and suddenly, as if he sensed her puzzlement, he turned briefly towards her with a warmer, less ambiguous, smile.
A second later, he was all attention to the road again and it was Teresa’s turn to purse her lips, frustrated.
If you’re not interested that way, Zack, why have you made yourself look so sexy?
She’d never seen Zack look all grown up and groomed this way before. Instead of his usual dark jeans, and floppy shirts that looked as if they’d come out of a dressing up bag, he was wearing a proper suit and smart shirt for a change. They were both dark midnight blue, and looked stunning with his pale skin and black hair. The look was restrained and semi-formal, and made a naturally dramatic man look even more dramatic. He’d slicked back his wild curly hair too, and that only added to the effect of sombre gothic elegance.
A quip about Count Dracula rose to her lips but, before it could get there, her head swam strangely. Pressing a knuckle to her mouth, she held in another gasp, all the time grappling with the impression that she was floating upwards in the car as if it were a space capsule.
Frames from a movie flashed before her eyes. And she was the star, seeing it from the inside.
Zack was kissing her, touching her, and holding her against his rampant body. His mouth was at her throat. Pain spiked there, but it was a sweet pain that induced pleasure between her legs. And as the stinging ebbed, that pleasure grew, and Zack lifted his face to look at her.
His eyes weren’t periwinkle blue any more, but a wild and violent red – crimson to match the blood on his gleaming lips.
‘Are you all right, love?’
No, I’m all wrong.
That hadn’t been just a passing erotic fancy about Zack as a vampire. It had felt like a memory, not a fantasy. She could feel it in her sex.
She could feel it in her neck.
Her fingertips flew to the place where there had been a red mark. She’d dismissed it as a nervous blotch, but what if it’d been something else? And what if that slightly funny turn in the kitchen yesterday hadn’t been due to her just being hungry?
Get a grip, Teresa, she reprimanded herself. Zack is your friend, and your house buddy, and you fancy him, that’s all. There are no such things as vampires and you haven’t even kissed him, so how could he have given you a love-bite?
‘Teresa? Are you all right?’
His soft voice shocked her back into the real world of car journeys and impending weddings.
‘I’m fine, thanks … just woolgathering. Car trips get me that way.’
She glanced sideways again, and their glances clashed. Zack’s blue eyes looked cautious and wary in a way she’d never seen before.
‘We can stop for a while, if you like? There’s a service area coming up soon.’
He was trying to be kind, and the offer was tempting. The sudden change of atmosphere in the car – from dreamy sensuality to palpable tension – was uncomfortable. But they’d soon reach their destination anyway, and then they could both retreat to their separate rooms … and their own space again.
‘No. Thanks. Let’s push on, shall we?’
‘OK. Good idea.’ With a smooth change of gear, he put his foot down.
Teresa sucked in her breath again, and stole another sideways look. Zack seemed calm and unruffled again, totally focused on the road. If he’d sensed her inner madness he wasn’t showing it.
Turning to the window, and the darkness outside, Teresa squashed down her crazy notions – and thought of nothingness.
3
‘You’re kidding me … there’s only one bedroom? When I rang, you said there’d be two.’
‘I’m very sorry, Miss Johnson. I’m afraid there’s been an error. The hotel’s full for the wedding, and there’s only one room in your name.’
Teresa hardly heard the rest of the spiel about folding beds and extra bedding and a refund. Her attention was locked on Zack and the stormy expression in his eyes. She’d never, ever seen him look this troubled, and it didn’t surprise her when he took her by the arm and led her away from the reception desk.
‘Look … I don’t think it’s such a good idea that we share a room. Why don’t I leave you here and return again tomorrow night, in time for the wedding. It’ll be dusk again then … and, if I leave the car in the garage, I needn’t be out in daylight when I set off.’
For the first time ever since they’d met, Teresa felt annoyed with him. What on earth was the problem? They were friends. Surely even if they weren’t a couple they could manage to rub along together somehow in the same room for a couple of nights? For such an intelligent and normally equable man, he was being ridiculous.
‘Don’t be silly. We can manage. It’s not a problem.’ Suddenly, though, it did seem like a problem. Zack was as still and unmoving as ever, yet he was surrounded by a strange aura of energy. Anger? Apprehension? Something else entirely? Totally unnerved, she said the first thing that came into her head. ‘I won’t leap all over you, if that’s what you’re worried about. It’ll be strictly platonic’
Fingers like the prongs of an iron trap tightened on her arm. ‘It’s not you I’m worried about, Teresa.’ His voice was low, intense and unfamiliar. He released her arm, and automatically she rubbed it. ‘This just isn’t a good idea.’
‘Why not? You’re obviously not actually attracted to me or you’d love the idea of sharing a room!’
‘You are wrong there, Teresa … so very wrong.’
Zack pursed his lips, and looked as if he were about to elaborate, but from behind them the reception clerk asked, ‘Shall I call housekeeping about the extra bedding, Miss Johnson?’
Well? Teresa didn’t articulate the word, but Zack seemed to hear it. He closed his eyes for a moment, as if he were weighing up a thousand what-ifs in the space of a split second, then opened them again and nodded infinitesimally.
Her mind whirling, Teresa turned away from him and returned to the desk.
Up in the room, they stared at each other across their heap of luggage.
Teresa attempted a smile and, for a moment, Zack’s face was inscrutable – a beautiful, blank, unwritten page.
Was he going to explain? Tell her what he’d meant, down there in the lobby?
‘Zack, what did you mean downstairs … about me being wrong?’
He looked away, towards the bed, and then his eyes nicked instantly away from it, as if it were the sun and the sight of it burnt him.
‘You are wrong. I am attracted to you but it’s just not a good idea for me to follow up on it.’
For a moment, Teresa wanted to cavort around the room and shout, You do like me. I knew you did. I just knew.
‘But why isn’t it a good idea? You must have realised that I’m attracted to you too.’ The urge to dance turned into a strong compulsion to shake him for his obtuseness.
‘It’s not something I can easily explain, Teresa.’ There was wistfulness in his voice. She sensed some huge obstacle standing between them. It was hurting him, and it made her want to hug him, not for sex, just to comfort. ‘Please trust me …’ His shoulders lifted in a heavy, resigned shrug. ‘But I still want to be friends … more than anything. If you can accept that?’
There was such
yearning in his blue eyes that Teresa just melted.
‘Yes, of course.’ Still confused, but feeling better, she smiled. ‘We’re good, Zack, but don’t ever try to tell me that it’s us women who are the contrary ones. OK?’
Zack smiled back at her and the tension between them lifted.
‘OK. And don’t worry … I’m fine on the couch.’ He shrugged in the general direction of a rather inadequate-looking settee. ‘It looks perfectly comfortable.’
Teresa frowned. That was nonsense. The couch was a fussy, reproduction item, a triumph of style over practicality.
The bed, on the other hand, was deep, and well sprung and inviting – and it was more or less time to get into it. Zack’s photophobia had meant that they’d had to wait until dusk to set off and now it was past eleven. There was nothing Teresa wanted more than to just crawl under that duvet and sleep. She didn’t want to think about what amounted to their first ever argument. She just wanted to fall asleep, knowing that he really did care for her in his own weird way.
Then Zack shrugged out of his jacket and draped it over a chair back, and the sight of his lean body in that fine dark shirt woke her up again. All her good resolutions about boundaries and being ‘just friends’ melted like Scotch mist.
‘But … um … what about your bad circulation? Won’t you be cold just with blankets?’ She glanced at the undesirable sofa. ‘I could manage on the couch. I’m shorter. I’ll fit better.’
Zack’s whole demeanour seemed to lighten and he gave her an eloquently masculine look.
‘No way.’ He shook his dark head. ‘I’m an old-fashioned man, Teresa. A lady’s comfort must always come first.’
I’ll bet it does. The thought was involuntary. As was the image of Zack, kneeling between her outstretched thighs as she sat on that very sofa, his long red tongue licking, licking, licking.
The entire surface of her skin seemed to tremble. She felt out of control, yet suddenly energised. On impulse, she strode across the room, squeezed his hard muscular arm and kissed his cool cheek. ‘Thanks, Zack. You’re a very sweet man. I don’t deserve you.’ Right in his personal space, she felt bold and crazy. She sensed danger, but she hungered for the taste of it.
The Red Collection Page 34
