by Mark Tufo
Oh well.
She didn't need vamp baggage to slow her down, she had her own. The museum and statue would have to wait until tomorrow.
“Tell me where to go.”
◦ Chapter 4
Tamsin eyed the knife and the soft skin of her forearm with a sort of frightened resignation. This was going to hurt.
Cutting sharp and deep, she waited until the blood began to flow before prying open Drake's mouth and trying to dribble it in. Her body retained all its supernatural bells and whistles, as did any other body she jumped into. With the Prime this included super-fast healing, forcing Tamsin to reopen the cut several times. Not fun.
They were on the south side, near a rough area called Englewood, in somebody's bolt hole. Somebody very paranoid. A little one-room apartment reached through a false-front covered with graffiti and tattered adverts behind which stood a thick doorway of reinforced steel. The place was equipped with several other exits, rather like a fox's den. One in the bedroom and one in the bathroom. The doors led to dark burrows that must wind under the street. Every room was packed full of weapons spanning several centuries of human bloodlust at its finest: knives, crossbows, guns, rocket launchers.
'Who keeps rocket launchers?' She couldn't help thinking. 'And what do you fight with them?'
There were also several jumbo sacks of sea salt and others full of a gray substance in the bedroom. The sea salt was every spellcaster's friend. Salt provided unsurpassed protection from dark and often murderous summons. Only sea salt. Try it with the mined variety and you were a goner. The gray powder gave off a distinct paranormal glow and Tamsin did not want to go anywhere near it. Corpse powder most likely.
She put Drake in the main room on an overstuffed couch complete with throw pillows and a fluffy cashmere blanket. The paranoid someone at least liked to be comfortable.
Tamsin had taken the Hummer to get across town instead of walking to Drake's car a couple of streets away. They were covered in blood and that sort of thing draws attention. Even in Chicago. And, to be honest, she'd always wanted to drive a Hummer. Just because the Hummer was an obscenely long one full of dead vampires did not seem reason enough to pass up this opportunity. Luckily the driver left in such a hurry he didn't take the keys.
The limo also had the advantage of a top-of-the-line GPS. With the poison racing through his system, Drake was not totally coherent. He was able to give her an address and very little else. That was enough. The Hummer's navigation system did the rest and they were on their way.
She left the vehicle a couple of blocks from their destination for safety's sake. By then Drake was only barely conscious and she was forced to carry him the rest of the way. Angelique the vampire had a lot of strength. Drake, however, was a large man. Large and heavy. Tamsin was still a little out of breath.
She dribbled the thick, scarlet drops between his lips, trusting he would swallow on reflex and not just choke. That would be ironic. Before long the power of the blood manifested. He stirred a little, turning his head, unconsciously seeking the source of healing energy. His mouth brushed the sensitive skin of her inner arm and Tamsin's nerves jumped, buzzing as though a swarm of velvety bees had landed on the surface and begun dancing. The tenuous bond began to grow and spread, her vampire blood drawing them closer. At least in a paranormal sense.
Vampires, including Primes it seemed, were very attached to their blood. They felt it even inside someone else. Which was beyond strange, Tamsin thought with a shiver. Her body vibrated and the tickling, prickling, beguiling awareness of Drake grew. As he ingested more blood, the sensation increased, becoming more insistent, reaching out for her as she had reached to fill this body. The feeling flowed into her fingers, her toes, swelling her breasts. She felt hot, her face flushed. Restless hands seemed to be stroking her up and down. Looking at Drake's face, she saw his eyes were now open, the pupil's enormous as a cat's in the dark, staring directly at her, unblinking.
Healing energy surged through Drake. The sensation of Angelique's blood and the response from his body intertwined; coiling and writhing. He couldn't tell where one began and the other ended. He licked his lips. The thick, red flow did not taste like blood. The flavor was spicy, richer than mulled winter wine. He could feel it going straight to his head; burning the poison from the vamp's blade out of his system and perhaps replacing it with something far deadlier. The feelings rushing through him weren't real. They couldn't be. How could he be attracted to her? And he was attracted. There was no hiding the response from his body. He was swollen, straining towards the vampire.
Angelique Duprey? What the hell?
Every time he looked at that face he wanted to reach for a weapon, or run, or both. She was the one directly responsible for his shame and banishment from Fae. His exile to the Mortal World so long ago. She had followed him here. Unable to let the game just end. A world-class bitch; bitter as winter bark. The threat of her capricious, vicious nature made him careful never to get too close to mortals. People he liked too often ended up dead.
After everything she did to him, it had taken much of Drake's strength not to give in and allow the hate for her to consume him utterly. He had pursued the Prime for years as she tormented him. Tracking the string of bodies she left behind wherever she went – just as Angelique intended. 'Catch me if you can!' Not exclusively, not obsessively tracking her, he reminded himself (often); but the chase had always been there.
A pursuit he thought finally ended tonight when he lured her to the drowning pool with the spell from that wretched little sorcerer. And here she was a few hours later, only inches away.
She was Angelique.
Yet at the same time she wasn't.
His conscious mind knew that.
Drake reached up to touch her cheek. The cheek of that hated face. He couldn't stop himself.
What if, he thought, horribly, terribly, what if he was suffering from some sort of weird predator/prey psychosis? Like what hostages got sometimes. They ended up identifying with their captors. Angelique said she loved him. Many times, long, long ago. A love he had never been able to return. Such was the story of his life. Why she hated him. What Princess Angelique wanted, she took. Or destroyed. He had not died, or languished. Exiled to the mortal world, he'd carved out a place for himself in the supernatural substrata. Learned and adjusted and grown to love this place and its fragile people. She hated that even more. How dare he be happy?
He and Angelique. Hunter and hunted. Though right until the end with the Prime, he had never been sure exactly which of those he was at any given moment.
Was there something there? Something more calling out to him, or was this just the vampire blood speaking? Did he somehow, deep down, in a sick, twisted way want the Prime? Or did he want this lost, doomed girl?
Just as quickly his rational self intervened. This was not Angelique. Even though it was her body. Tamsin smelled different from the vampire. She smelled wonderful in fact. Like honey. Staring into her eyes, Drake's Fae nature began to look beyond the physical to her true form.
He had to find out. For his own peace of mind if nothing else. Let go the past and embrace the future.
Tamsin wasn't quite sure how it happened or when. Somehow they were kissing. His wide, sensuous mouth covering her own, his tongue seeking hers. Soft but insistent. His lips had blood on them. Her blood. She tasted herself and it excited her – or her body – at this point the divisions were becoming a little blurred. He pulled at her clothes, the few she had on, and almost unconsciously she observed herself attempting to unbuckle his Kevlar vest with little success. There were far too many fastenings. He swept her hands away and began undoing the hidden catches and straps to release the vest, tearing at his clothes.
Those moments it took him to undress allowed Tamsin time to think.
Throwing the vest off and practically ripping at his shirt and jeans, he reached for her.
Tamsin pulled away, holding him at arm's length.
“This is c
razy,” she panted.
The blood had burned away the poison and healed the wound. His Fae nature already held the ability to heal quickly and the vamp chemistry just ramped it up. Ramped it up quite a lot. He knew he was not fully in control.
“Absurd,” he whispered, his voice deep and husky.
“You hate Angelique or you wouldn't have murdered her,” she pointed out, very rationally she thought.
“I do,” he agreed, running his fingers through her hair.
“You hated her for a long time, right?”
“More than a century.”
"That's really twisted."
"Isn't it," he breathed, pressing closer.
Her hands moved of their own volition slipping along the skin through the tickling, teasing touch of his chest hair to stroke his chest and the thick, bunched muscles of his abdomen. “You don't even know me.”
“I don't.” He reached out to cup the back of her neck, his thumb stroking the impossibly soft skin of her throat, up and down.
“And I...I just met you.” She laid her forehead against his, closing her eyes, feeling the heat of his skin.
He inhaled her sweet scent. She smelled nothing like Angelique. Nothing. “That's right. You did.”
Tamsin pushed him away so she could look into his eyes. He needed to see how serious she was. Surely her expression showed she thought they were being ridiculous? “We have to stop.”
He nodded, “Absolutely.” And crushed her to him so forcefully, he squeezed her breath out in a little gasping moan.
◦ Chapter 5
With Angelique's strength she could have thrown him across the room if she didn't want him to touch her. But she did. So much. This wasn't only the vamp's super sense telling her everything about Drake tasted and smelled so right. These sensations bubbling and boiling through her were entirely human. An instinctive, primal response.
And most of all, she didn't want to resist.
To be a woman again. If only for a short time.
Before she turned to dust, Tamsin had over-analyzed so many areas of her life. Self-doubt, self-loathing. She had it all. Then she died. And learned a valuable lesson. There was only this time and this place. Carpe Diem. Seize the day, the hour, the moment. Right now, here with Drake, the temptation of being able to forget the curse of her wretched existence was too beguiling.
Tamsin let go and opened herself to the big man with dark eyes.
Drake felt Angelique's body go suddenly soft, that was the best way to describe it. A delicious sensation as the tension left her, replaced by voluptuous surrender. By desire.
For him.
She was soon naked except for the motorcycle boots. Which proved just too much trouble to take off. Though it was the Prime's body, in his mind's eye, the image of Tamsin as she was when she was human began to take form. He gasped as he saw her, felt her in his arms.
Angelique's thin contours melted away along with his doubts and all he saw was Tamsin.
She had been a tiny thing, just over five feet. Long, tangled blond hair, eyes gray as the North Sea of Fae, a little crooked nose, her mouth a round bow, breasts so full they spilled over both his palms. She had such small hands. It was those hands he felt sliding over his thighs to stroke him, taking hold of the desire knocking at his belly. This was the woman he felt behind that light, silvery laugh. The emotional truth hit him just as swift and sharp as the vampire's strike.
His need for Tamsin, the real woman there in Angelique's body, surged. It was as if these feelings had been there, just under the surface of his skin. Waiting for this moment. He could not get close enough, kiss her deeply enough. Grasping the round cheeks of her hips and pulling her to him, he let his fingers play over her skin, touching stroking, slipping between her thighs soft and warm. Holding her tightly, he easily reversed their positions until she lay on the couch, the hills and valleys of her body beneath him. Running his tongue and lips across her skin, teasing and tickling her with his touch, mouthing her breasts as she moaned.
He pleasured himself and her.
His kisses were effervescent, sparkling. Tamsin's nerves jumped. No, they danced in response. A wild, crazy dance of anticipation. She reached around to grip his hips, moving her hands restlessly over the tight muscles bunched there. He had a band of sharp-edged tattoos running all the way around his waist and down onto his hips, she saw. They looked like daggers. Between two points, his desire pressed forward, rising up between the cut lines of his groin and abdomen. The indescribable sensation of velvet softness and iron strength exciting her as he pressed against her belly.
They fell to the floor, needing more room. He pulled one of the sofa cushions down and placed it under her head, bringing her mouth closer, her eyes never leaving his face even when he kissed her. He stared right back, drinking her in, savoring her flavor.
She wanted him inside her as badly as he desired to fill her. She held on, moving him back and forth between her thighs, her fingertips caressing. Touching herself and then rubbing the thick musk of her excitement onto him.
She raised her hips ever so slightly and Drake knew what she wanted. She moved her hands to hold his hips as he sought to part that soft valley. Tamsin gasped, moaning low and deeply, feeling him push his way inside her. The stinging pain, the delicious presage to entry, as he stretched the sensitive skin wide and wider still. Her muscles clenched around him and he groaned out her name, burying his face in her hair, nipping her neck and shoulders and finally, finding her mouth, thrust his tongue inside as he entered her fully.
She gasped, her body arching up to meet his, filled inch by inch with his hardness.
Together they danced to the rhythm of life. In tune, in balance with what is meant to be between a man and woman. Even a woman such as her. Everyone wants to be desired, no matter that they are only partly alive. And he did desire her. With his hands and mouth, his hips, he showed her how much he wanted her. How she excited him.
Holding him inside and out, she felt alive. Every breath, every sensation a gift. Tamsin would treasure these memories in the lonely, empty times that were sure to follow. It could not last. These bodies never did. Pushing that thought aside, she focused on the moment. Here and now. Drake and Tamsin.
They played with positions, back and front and in between. He was a tireless lover and, to Tamsin's delight, he liked to kiss – and kiss and kiss. Tamsin, too, loved kissing. How a man kissed told a woman so much about how he made love. Drake's kisses were passionate and generous, giving as well as taking. She breathed in his rich musky scent, feeling the slight scrape of stubble on her cheek, his sensuous mouth pressing on her own, his tongue seeking hers.
Later, on top, she rose up, looking down into his dark eyes, pushing back the thick hair tangled and mussed around his face. His lips were swollen from the passion of their kisses; his body shining with sweat. Leaning close, she kissed his throat, tickling him with her tongue, careful to keep the fangs from extending – though the temptation to bite was almost overwhelming. Her vampire senses hyped up the sensations of smell, touch and taste to almost overwhelming levels. She ran her tongue up to an ear lobe. He gasped as she pulled it into her mouth.
'Men and their ear lobes', she smiled to herself. She rubbed her hands along the hard planes of his stomach and chest, her hips never ceasing their motion, his manhood filling her so hard and strong it was almost painful.
Pressing her hips forward, she leaned back over his legs. He raised his head, watching as they moved in wonderful synchronicity. She clenched her muscles, clutching him fiercely. He reached out with one hand towards the silky flesh.
He caught his breath as he watched her face. Seeing the sensations and tension there building higher and higher. Her body completely open and vulnerable to him. Tamsin's muscles gripped him in their embrace of silken steel, tighter and tighter. Her thighs clenched as the feelings rose. Just before the wave crested, he grabbed her by the small of the back and suddenly she was under him. He held her down, thrusting
hard against her. She cried out, the bliss burning through her. Bliss that went on and on as she held him, digging her nails into his skin, unable to let go, drawing blood. She smelled it and the scent excited her even more. He pressed his lips to hers and she moaned in pleasure around his kisses as he subtly shifted his body and brought her to the peak again. He pushed his tongue into her mouth and she sucked on it desperately, though she could barely breath through her excitement. Slipping both hands beneath her, he pushed himself at a higher angle and electrified her. The feelings shook her from head to foot, coming so strongly she thought it might throw her out of Angelique's body completely.
An agony and ecstasy.
Drake's moans joined her own. He roared his passion, moving his hands onto her shoulders and gripping hard. Together they came, so delirious with pleasure that Tamsin seemed to transcend the boundaries of the room and enter some other plane entirely. The weightless feeling stayed with her even as Drake shifted his body, his chin resting on the top of her head. They lay together, both of them panting, hearts pounding, his arms around her in a fierce embrace.
She must have dozed off; she woke and felt Drake running the fingers of one hand through her hair, pulling at the tangles. She lay cradled on his other arm.
“Your shoulder must be so cramped.” Gently pulling away, she shifted her body around to the side, her back resting against his chest.
“Eat your hearts in front of you?” His voice was light and teasing.
She blushed. “Shut up. I was improvising. It's from some bad vampire movie.”
“No kidding!” He gave a deep-throated laugh and pulled her even closer, reveling in the feel of her soft skin, the rise and fall of her chest. He could still touch the real Tamsin, the soft, round contours of her little body. There was nothing of Angelique, either in her or in him at that moment.
"Tell me how it happened."
