by Tamsin Baker
“This being . . ?”
“Sex. At work. With colleagues. With you.”
He raised a brow, all cocky and self-assured. “Me? Why me specifically?”
Visions of Richard rose up before me. Sneering, taunting visions. His thin, bloodless lips spitting out that I was the problem, I was the reason he hated and hit and lost control. That if I dared find someone else, eventually the same spiral would occur, because that’s what girls like me drew out of a man.
Nausea surged up my throat and I fought to swallow it back down. “That’s not your concern.” My palms burned with the cut of my nails, my hands fisted so tightly the pain seeped up my arms. “Just know that this,” I unfurled a hand and waved it back and forth between us, “this will never happen again. Ever.”
I wrenched the door open and bolted. It was well into the lunch hour and whoever had made the noise that brought me to my senses—perhaps Brenda— was no longer around.
Lucky me.
I fled the building and sought the sanctuary of the restroom. I flipped the toilet lid closed and sank down, collapsing back against the sparkling, white-tiled wall. My breaths wrenched shallow and fast from deep in my chest. I blinked, rapid-fire, wishing away the tears. Once they started, they might never stop.
I tried so hard to be strong. To be that woman who was tough and resilient and uncaring. A warrior who took no shit from anyone, who triumphed against adversity to fight another day.
All my bravado, all that hot air and unproven strength left me like air trickling from a leaky balloon. It bled from every muscle, every cell, every thought that said I wasn’t the woman Richard scorned me to be.
I’d fought it—every day, in every part of my life, which threatened to cut me down and spit me out like worms from a rotting apple. But I was tired. So tired of living with this boulder strapped around my heart.
Sex made me forget. The bad sex, the battery-powered sex. Who the hell knew good sex would make me remember? Not only remember, but question and doubt every validation I reiterated, every day, every doubtful moment, before the negativity could settle in and fester.
I’d thought good sex was the answer. The way to make all the uncertainty drop away until I could believe in myself, in the idea that I deserved good as much as the next person.
I’d thought there was a way out of the spiral that made the men in my life want to hurt me, to make me suffer for whatever wrongdoing I’d imparted on their life.
I thought one day I’d be free from the past.
I was wrong.
Chapter 6
Gideon
The upside to working in your own private building is the peace and privacy. The downside to working on your own is . . . the peace and privacy. Silence yawned with the roar of an injured bear.
Thoughts of Tiff filled my head. Hot, cock-teasing thoughts, along with the memory of how good she felt until she wrenched herself away.
That was three sleepless nights ago.
The large clock on the lab wall said it was after nine pm. Brenda was long gone and hopefully the labs in the main building, particularly the specimen room, were unmanned.
I needed to oust thoughts of a certain blonde from my mind and remember why I’d been sent to Hagen Pharmaceuticals in the first place.
I left the lab’s light on and the half-finished results of a test I’d started three days earlier. If I was found where I shouldn’t be, the partially finished notes would provide my semi-believable excuse.
I’d already discovered who was working on the antidote. Mannie. A large, lurid specimen who needed a good lesson in hygiene, mainly of the podiatry variety. Although the man may exhibit questionable personal care, his office and lab were meticulous. I’d searched both once already, and come up empty.
So, I’d befriended the man. Not hard. He wasn’t inundated with company. A few strategically worded questions, and I discovered why my earlier searches had been fruitless. The serum antidote was stored in a second, higher security cold room.
I just needed to get in, get a sample and get out unnoticed.
Piece of cake.
The corridor glowed blue and I followed the security lights—and of course, the blue tiles—to the CDC lab. A vacant, void-like quality hung in the air. A quality that said I was alone.
Speed and stealth were what we did best, among other less savory pursuits. I reached the lab in barely two minutes and located the cold room soon after. It was then that I discovered yet another problem. I needed a code for the door, one that didn’t match the one I used for the central cold storage.
Breaking in the door, much as I could with little effort, wasn’t an option. No one could know the serum had been taken. Not if the mission was to succeed. Not if my race was to survive the genocide Hagen Pharmaceuticals had wittingly—or unwittingly—planned.
I had to find another way.
My senses pricked and I whirled around. A familiar, slim figure with rambling blonde curls was sneaking back down the corridor, no doubt in the hopes of avoiding me.
Not happening.
“Tiff.”
She froze. Her shoulders lifted then dropped in an overstated “I’d rather scoop out my eyeballs than see you again” way.
Slowly, she turned. “I didn’t realize anyone else stayed this late.”
Dark circles rimmed eyes that had lost the sparkle and fire I’d glimpsed, was it only days earlier?
I moved closer, for no other reason than I’d missed the scent of her, the connection I felt with every cell in my centuries old body. “I wanted to set up some samples for a new test.” Insight warred with conscience and I tamped the latter down. “Actually, maybe you can help.”
She stumbled backwards, headlight-wide eyes once again avoiding my gaze. “I’m busy.”
“Right now? I just need a couple of samples from the cold room, but my passcode won’t work.”
Her ramrod shoulders dropped. Marginally. “This room is restricted access, so only a few of us have the code.” She skirted past me before moving toward the door.
I averted my eyes even as my ears pricked. She swiped her keycard and typed in her code. I took note, ignoring the growing unease prickling my gut. Our survival trumped everything, including any allegiance I felt for my soon-to-be-mate.
“What do you need?”
“Strep pneumoniae.”
She reclosed the door and stepped away. “You won’t find that here. Streps are in the main storage.”
“Damn, I must have missed it. I’ll go back for another look.”
Again that relief. That relaxing of muscles and soft, almost imperceptible sigh. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”
She’d done that for the past three days, since our near-thing in the sterility room, and it was driving me crazy. “Have dinner with me.”
She stopped, but didn’t turn. “No.”
“Lunch?”
“No.”
“Coffee, then.”
“No. I told you.” She turned and waved her hand between us. “I don’t do this.”
“By ‘this’ you mean me?”
Her eyes dropped, but not before I picked their haunted depths. “Yes.”
“Why, Tiff?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.”
“It shouldn’t. We barely know each other.”
“I know enough.” Doubt pierced her expression, quickly followed by denial.
She wouldn’t discount the connection between us. Not when I sensed she felt it. Not when my whole mortality depended on it. “You can’t judge what and how something affects me any more than I can for you.” I stepped closer, inhaling air filled with her scent, then closer still, into her space, until my body responded to her heat, to the other half of what would make me whole. “I feel something when I’m with you, something I’d all but given up on feeling. If you don’t feel it too, tell me and I’ll let you be. But if you do feel it, all I ask is that you give this,” I mimicked her wave be
tween us, “give us a go.”
Her gaze widened again, her body swaying in tune with her indecision. And for a second, for one heady moment, I thought I’d dented her resolve. Then her expression slammed like a door in my face. “It’s still no.”
She turned, stalking with large, hurried steps towards her office at the far end of the corridor. “Don’t forget to check the main doors lock behind you on the way out.”
Then she was gone. Fleeing us. Me.
Again.
I didn’t follow. What was the point? Something was holding her back and she wasn’t ready to take a chance on us.
I’d soon change that. I had to. Only true sacrifice made in the name of true love could undo the curse. And I refused to remain cursed for another three centuries.
But before I could even contemplate úspory, our coupling, I had other, more pressing tasks to attend to. The task of fulfilling my destiny, and hers, would have to wait. And there was the little matter of how I had used her to gain the code to the cold store and the serum I needed. The knowledge slumped heavy in my chest, along with the knowledge that if she didn’t come to me willingly, soulmate or not, my transformation wouldn’t happen.
I needed time to convince her. And once upon a century, time was all I had. But since the discovery of the new, lethal Influenza A virus, and the world’s subsequent scramble to prevent its spreading, the clock hands moved double time, and the longer I waited, the more likely our race would slip into extinction.
Chapter 7
Tiffany
I was fighting a losing battle. I could feel it. The impulse. The temptation. The desire to throw all sense to the wind and say yes.
It was just dinner.
Just lunch.
Just coffee.
Just that.
Harmless.
It didn’t need to become more.
My shaking knuckles kneaded the pressure points either side of my skull in an attempt to stem a pounding that rivalled an elephant stampede. Avoiding Gideon was taking its toll. Physically. Emotionally. Stretching me like a rubber band, to the point of snapping.
I was better than that. Stronger. I didn’t need to give in to these urges and throw away three years of caution.
Yeah, right.
I’d be fooling myself if I believed any of it for a second.
Gideon made me feel something I couldn’t define. Something foreign. Something real. Was it hope?
I had no idea. What I did know, was how dangerous he was to my equilibrium. To my sanity.
Just fuck him and when he disappoints like every other Tom, Dick or asshole, you’ll exorcise him from your mind and move on.
It was food for thought.
Food for another day. Right now I needed out of the building. I had to head for home, away from temptation. My headache wouldn’t budge, but a date with a long, cool cider and a good book would cure that.
I grabbed my helmet and headed for the bicycle shed, inhaling a deep breath of fresh air and fresh perspective. The air was damp, cold. Cobweb clearing. The bike ride home always soothed, refreshing my mind and invigorating my soul. And hopefully somewhere on the way, I’d pedal Gideon right out of my brain.
*
So much for soothing. A flat frigging tire didn’t even come close.
Half a mile into my two mile ride home, I’d felt the jolt of every stone, every crack on the road. I’d stopped, confirmed the worst, and began the long trek back to the lab.
A hot bath, a good book and an even better bottle of berry cider had dropped from “certainty” through to “impossible” and straight to “not happening anytime soon.”
Of all the things I’d left behind when I left home, the taste for cider was one habit I couldn’t kick.
I trudged, each step feeding my temper, driving my mercury up and off the charts. Gideon fucking Fang. Somehow this was his fault. I’d ridden like a banshee, my only thoughts focused on increasing the distance between us.
I must have ridden over some nail, some glass, something that would have been noticeable if I hadn’t still been steaming after our encounter.
Head down, temper seething, I mentally measured my distance from the lab. Ten minutes, max, till I arrived. I’d dump my bike, Uber it home and worry about fixing the tire tomorrow.
A sharp horn shafted through my thoughts. My head jerked up.
Damn.
The man I’d been trying—quite ineffectively—to escape. All leather and chrome and sexy and panty melting.
Fuck.
I was struggling to see a way out of this that didn’t include getting into his pants—and out of mine. He cut the engine, lifted a denim-clad leg off the bike and joined me.
He spared me a glance. “Flat tires are the devil.”
Takes one to know one.
I didn’t comment. Maybe if I outright ignored him, he’d get the hint, wrap his Iron Man thighs back round his Harley and ride off, anywhere but in my vicinity.
“I think I saw a patch kit back at the lab if you need one.”
Guilt whirled hand-in-hand with resentment. He was just being nice, and I was being a bitch. But I didn’t want him to be nice. The nicer he was, the guiltier I felt for ignoring him. And that was all on him.
I hadn’t asked him to stop.
Bitch.
My inner manners-meter chanted the word in my ears.
Bitch, bitch, bitch.
“I’m a whiz at fixing tires.” He shot me a grin. A cheeky, lava-warm grin. One that curved his lips and made me question what wonders they could wield on the buzzing flesh between my thighs.
Fuck me.
Yep, that was the only answer. Fuck him until I’d been there, done that, and could move on without wondering what he’d be like. I’d know, and reality wouldn’t be half as good as the images whirling through my head. It never was.
Hagen Pharmaceuticals loomed up before us and I headed towards the bike shed. My body buzzed, hyperaware of his massive frame walking beside me.
I locked my bike and made for my office, his large, silent presence unnerving. I averted my gaze to the double sliding door entrance. Hopefully he’d get the hint and walk away.
The Harley’s kickstand scraped the ground and his boots crunched over the pathway until he was within touching distance. My keycard was already in my hand, raised toward the sensor.
His burly, broad shoulders dropped. He sighed. “When are you going to stop ignoring the elephant in the room, Tiff?”
That made me stop. No ignoring him now. My hand dropped from the door and I spun around. “You want elephant? How about this?” I inhaled, deep, until my lungs threatened to burst. Then I blurted out the words before sense could pull them back. “One night, one fuck. No repeats, no mentioning it, ever. Agree and it happens right here, right now. No rainchecks. No second chances. You only get one, and this is it.”
An entire movie of emotions trailed across his face, half of which I couldn’t decipher. It didn’t matter. This tryst, this little moment of madness, would be a one-off. I didn’t need to know what he thought or felt. I just needed his agreement and his cock.
We’d fuck, move on, and I’d live with the disappointment that even god-like men like Gideon couldn’t satisfy the need in me.
At least then I’d be able to return to Sammy and the roll of pleasure he’d delivered, unfailingly, till Gideon.
Chapter 8
Gideon
“Fuck me, Gideon.”
The words jarred. Coarse and at odds with what I wanted.
Tiff and I weren’t about fucking. We weren’t just about the most elemental need of man and woman. What sparked between us was so much more.
An ancient legend, which had yet to reveal its truth to me. The love in Tiff’s soul would call mine back. The act of giving, of sharing her body with mine, would make me whole again, free of the shackles binding me to an empty life and a future filled with blood-lust and madness. A future that awaited all vampires, care of one rogue gene, a cursed be
ginning, and a soulless existence. The Change. Zmena.
I wanted it all. To be saved, to be loved, to be real again.
What Tiff offered would be torture. A glimpse at what life could be, minus the rope to pull me from the spiral of my unchecked destiny.
Coupling without love wouldn’t give me what I needed, yet I still felt her pull. The need to join and feel how good it was to be with the one Fate had chosen for me. One chance? If this was it, then I’d take it. The memory would last until the madness stole it and then it would be too late.
She was the only one to save me, yet maybe, somehow, I could save her right back. Hurt haunted her eyes, a deep distrust born from betrayal. Perhaps loving her would spark the feelings we needed to make our love work, till death do we part.
Who knew the immortal would crave death? Only, it wasn’t death I craved. It was life before death. A meaning and fulfilment my existence lacked without my soul.
“Fuck me, Gideon.”
Liquid ocean-blue eyes pleaded. She rested her palm on my chest and I wondered if she’d notice the missing beat of my heart. A heart only she could make beat again.
I took her keycard, opened the door and pulled her inside. There were too many cameras in the hallway, so I let her lead me to her office. The door snapped shut, and before she could change her mind, I plastered my body to hers and claimed her lips.
They opened readily and I drank, exploring her mouth just as I intended to explore every inch of her delectable body.
Sweet. Satisfying. Like that first, succulent sip of water after days of withering thirst.
Her hands squeezed my ass. My cock throbbed, ravenous.
My hands dropped to her hips and I lifted her, groaning as she wrapped me between her delectable legs, pushing her sweet pussy hard against my aching erection.
Lust and need coursed through my body. My cock wanted inside, but my mind wanted more.
I strode to her desk, swept her folders and papers aside and dropped her down. She lifted her arms and I made easy work of her tee. Next, her slacks, and barely-there lace that made my mouth water.
I pushed her knees apart, nostrils flaring with her scent, musk and butter and sugar-sweet arousal. Plump, pink flesh glistened wet with her need, inviting me in.
