Kiss Across Deserts
Page 13
She gripped the sheet convulsively, as the climax built higher and higher. Alex didn’t relent. He didn’t slow down. He didn’t stop.
Her climax hit with the power of a thunderclap. She strained and her scream seemed to tear at the back of her throat. The pleasure gripped her for long moments as she vibrated tautly.
Alex gripped her hip and she felt him shift inside her, a small thrust. He gave a choked sound and his head pressed against her shoulder. He had climaxed just from being inside her.
They came to rest again and he made no move to withdraw from her. Sydney listened to her heart beat slowly while he stroked the flesh just under her breast, making shredded nerves twitch. Then he kissed her, this time just under her ear. “I think I lied to you, Sydney.” His voice was very low.
“You did? When?”
“This isn’t revenge sex. Not any more, if it ever was.”
Her heart lifted. “I don’t think it’s just sex.”
His response was slow coming, and it was low and heartfelt. “No, it’s not.”
* * * * *
When he came out of the en suite, Sydney was asleep on the bed, her wet hair lying tangled on the sheet. She was gloriously naked. His dressing gown was lying over the arm of the chair in the corner, and the sheet was on the floor at the foot of the bed, but she had chosen neither of them. Even in sleep, her nipples were sharply defined. Beckoning.
And reddened.
Frowning, Alex stepped closer and leaned down to look at them. The same roughened, chapped skin appeared on her face, especially around her full lips.
He straightened up with a snap, bringing his hand to his face and feeling the coarse bristles under his fingers. That sort of abuse could be easily remedied.
He turned and went back into the en suite. There was a hand razor and cream in the far back of the cabinet that he had used when he was first growing out the beard. Once the beard had been full and properly trimmed, he had been able to shut down his heart, which supplied the faux metabolism vampires needed to grow out hair or fingernails. He had also been able to halt the incessant feedings needed to keep such a metabolism burning.
Now he hauled the razor out, wet his beard, covered it in the cream and set to work shaving it all away. He didn’t regret the loss in the slightest, not if it spared Sydney’s delicate skin.
He had finished and was wiping away the last traces of the cream, studying his newly bared face in the mirror when the realization struck him with enough force to make him gasp and lower the towel.
His beard was gone. Just like in the photos of Sydney’s accident.
And the accident was now in the past.
Did he somehow…in some way he was still to discover…did he go back to the past?
Had he been at the accident after all?
Chapter Nine
Sydney woke when Alex shook her. He was standing over her, fully dressed in a shirt, trousers and shoes. “It’s six in the morning. I didn’t know if you wanted to go to work today, although you’re still entitled to sick leave after the accident.”
She sat up, thrusting the sheet and quilt aside. “Your beard! You shaved it off!”
Alex gave one of those sideways smiles of his and kissed her lightly on the mouth. “I want to go on kissing you,” he said, then touched his finger to the flesh around her mouth. She winced, for his touch made her skin burn. “I don’t want to do that to you every time. It was an easy choice.”
Then he stood back and unhooked a bathrobe from the back of the door. “There’s breakfast, if you want it, although I warn you I am not the world’s greatest cook.”
“You had to compensate for your other gifts,” she said. “Cooking is a good one to concede.”
Alex frowned, as he held out the robe and let her slip into it.
She looked at him over her shoulder and patted the mattress.
His gaze skittered away, then came back to her. The little half smile was back.
“Are you blushing, Doctor Karim?” she teased.
He shook his head. “I don’t blush. I’ll be in the kitchen when you’re ready to eat.”
* * * * *
The heavenly smell of coffee told her where the kitchen was and when she found it, Alex was sitting at the counter, a nearly-empty coffee cup in front of him and a tablet in the other hand, with a news video running, the host exclaiming over the smog levels this week.
He looked up. “I hope you don’t mind. I’ve already eaten. I was starving.”
“That doesn’t surprise me,” she said and slid onto the stool next to him. There was a plate with waffles and a small beaker with syrup. Drying on the dish rack was a matching plate and knife and fork.
“They’re frozen,” he said apologetically. “Not only am I a lousy cook, I wasn’t expecting company. I usually go out to eat.”
“But you make the best tea I’ve ever tasted.”
“Oh, that.” He smiled. “I learned that when I was very young. I suppose it stayed with me.”
She took an enormous bite of the waffle, her stomach clamping painfully with hunger, then chewed and swallowed hastily. “I’m so hungry, it tastes like gourmet standard to me.”
He got up and poured her a coffee from the machine and sat back down again.
“You know I take it black?” she asked curiously.
“Every time I’ve visited your office, there was an unfinished cup of black coffee on your desk. At least one. Which is just as well, because I don’t have cream, either.”
She sipped the coffee and sighed. “So how young were you when you learned to boil tea?”
“Tall enough to carry a bucket of water without tripping over it.” He glanced at her. “We had a community well.”
“I see.” The glimpse of another culture, one that was unknown to her, was intriguing.
“It was the job of each child as they grew big enough to haul water and boil tea. Once my younger brother was deemed tall enough by my father, then the chore became his.”
She was startled. “I don’t think you’ve ever mentioned your family to me before. Do you have a large family?”
Alex put his cup down. “Five brothers. Three sisters. We were a small family compared to our neighbors.”
“Wow…” Sydney breathed, then remembered to keep eating. “Do you stay in touch? I realize they’re probably still in the Middle East, but…”
Alex shook his head. “None are left,” he said quietly.
Sydney put her fork down, feeling sick and stupid. “I’m sorry, I didn’t think…was it because of the troubles there?”
“In a way.” He swirled the coffee around in the bottom of his cup, sipped, then grimaced. “Cold,” he muttered and pushed it aside.
Sydney made herself keep eating, even though she felt gauche and awkward. But Alex kept looking down into his cup, like he was caught up in memories.
“You miss them, don’t you?” she asked.
He looked at her. “I haven’t, not for the longest time, but it suddenly just came sweeping back over me. I can barely remember their faces anymore.” He looked incredibly sad. “Life moves on, doesn’t it?”
“Not that I’ve found,” Sydney said, a bit too sharply. “History keeps dogging me until I trip and fall flat on my face.” She sought for a change of subject for this was edging into dangerous territory. “I think you must be older than I first thought you to be, Alex. Not that I mind bedding an older man in the slightest,” she added quickly.
“Sometimes I feel older than God,” he said softly, then he straightened up. “But not today. Today I feel like I’m…thirty-eight.”
“Thirty-eight?” That made him not too terribly much older than her. Six years was nothing. “You’re nearly forty and you haven’t had a passel of children yet to make up for your lost family?” As soon as she had said it, she wanted to take it back. Alex flinched, like she had hit him and in a way, she had. She reached for his hand. “Alex, I’m sorry. That was incredibly thoughtless of me.”
At her.
There was a roaring sound in her ears, muffling everything. Sick horror burst through her. History keeps dogging me, she thought bitterly. She pushed her plate away from her, barely seeing it. She slid off the stool, staggering a bit.
“Sydney?” Alex’s voice came from far away. “What is it?”
“Where’s my bag?” She could barely form the words. She remembered dropping it when she had come in yesterday. On the table…it’s on the table where we— She shut off the thought quickly.
“You can’t leave!” Alex said. “Not wearing a dressing gown. Sydney!” He was following her from the kitchen and she hurried her pace. Panic was booming in her belly, making her feel nauseous. She just had to hold it together until she was out of here.
Her bag was where she had dropped it, on the end of the little table. She snatched it up and searched for her keys.
Alex grabbed her arm. “Sydney, what is going on? What’s wrong?”
She wrenched her arm out of his grip. “Don’t touch me.” She kept her voice low so it wouldn’t shake. She found her keys and yanked them out thankfully.
Alex pushed his hands into his pockets. “At least let me go and get you some clothes and bring them back here. You can’t roam around Los Angeles in a housecoat.”
“They wear bikinis on Rodeo Drive. I don’t think anyone will even blink at me.” She pulled at the door, then tried to turn the knob. It turned freely, but the door still didn’t budge.
Alex reached over her shoulder and slid back an old-fashioned bolt at the top of the door. “Will you please tell me what is wrong?” he asked.
She shook her head. If she started explaining, she’d start crying. There was no way she was going to let him see her cry.
He touched her wrist, the lightest and most non-threatening touch. “When will I see you again?”
She shook her head and opened the door. “We can’t. I can’t…. I don’t want to see you again, Alex.” Then she was finally through the door and outside. She ran to her car, and drove away doing well above the speed limit. She didn’t slow down until she was miles away, but by then she had to because she couldn’t see properly through her tears.
* * * * *
Rafe stopped by later that day. When Alex opened the door, he actually stepped back in surprise. “Rafe…” Hundreds of things occurred to him that he might say, but he said none of them.
Rafe’s face was drawn, his expression stoically neutral. “I wanted to tell you that the police have officially lost interest in you. Someone stole their photos and videos, so they can’t pursue that line of enquiry.”
“Did you steal them?” Alex asked.
“Are you accusing me of breaking the law?” Rafe asked, his tone curious.
“You used to run rigged dice games, didn’t you?”
Rafe scowled. “That wasn’t my choice,” he said harshly. “I didn’t have a childhood of privilege and wealth like you.”
Alex gripped the door handle compulsively. Rafe was still angry. His fury was flickering in his eyes, even though his calm expression didn’t change.
Impulsively, Alex reached out and cupped Rafe’s cheek, his fingers in his hair. “I’m sorry I hurt you,” he said quietly. “None of this has worked out the way I would have liked it.”
“Did you get the blonde?” Rafe asked harshly, shrugging off his hand and stepping back.
“I…in a way, I suppose.”
“Then stop complaining,” Rafe said flatly. “I’ll send you my bill.” He walked away before Alex could respond and Alex watched him leave, his chest aching. Then he closed the door and leaned against it.
He pushed his hands through his hair. Then he held them out in front of him. They were shaking. Adrenaline was breaking through, not a good thing for vampires. He needed to feed, on top of everything else.
He pushed himself upright. Feed, he told himself. Then focus on the next task. That was how he had gotten through so many days, one after another. It was how he would get through the next millennia.
The thought was bitter.
* * * * *
Because Bruce trotted to the door with an eager whining sound, Sydney knew it was Alex before she opened it.
Alex was once more the urbane doctor, in a pristine suit. He was still clean shaven, but his eyes looked shadowed. Guilt touched her, but she kept her chin up.
Alex held up a large shopping bag with a logo she recognized from Rodeo Drive. “Replacements for your clothes I ruined.”
She took the bag. “Thank you.” And before she could change her mind, she closed the door…or started to.
Alex spread his hand against it and pushed back, holding it open. “I want to know what happened, Sydney. I can’t think of anything that I did that would justify you running away from me like I was a murderer. I think…I hope you think that I at least deserve an explanation.”
She let the door swing open again, turned and walked back to the coffee table and picked up the bundle of photos there. She came back to the door and held them out to him. “You go first, Alex. Explain that.”
Alex took the photos and she held the door open while he shuffled through them. She didn’t bother looking at them herself. The images were burned into her brain. The one that kept flashing into her mind was from the middle of the pack. Alex, standing in his front doorway and Rayner De Leon, his pet judge and acting lawyer, standing on the step. The photo had been taken from an angle, so both faces were clear. But the part of the image that kept drawing her gaze, that kept recurring in her thoughts, was Alex’s hand around the other man’s neck. It was more than a gesture of friendship. It was intimate.
Alex’s jaw flexed as he squared the stack up and held them back out to her. “You’ve been following me?” he asked quietly.
“Clintock was,” Sydney snapped. “He was following his nose, because he didn’t like the way things wouldn’t add up. He brought the photos to me, as a courtesy.” She tossed them onto the top of the bookcase by the door. “He thought I should know,” she added bitterly.
Alex sighed.
“You aren’t even going to try to explain it away, are you?”
He looked at her, his gaze steady. “The photos are date stamped. You know as well as I do they were taken yesterday.”
“He’s the one who dumped you, isn’t he?” Sydney asked. She could feel her anger starting to boil over and a small voice, a sane voice, whispered in her mind. Why are you so angry? You want him out of your life. This is the perfect excuse.
But the anger and hurt were bubbling over like some noxious mix, with rancid fumes. Driving her. “He’s the one you love,” she spat at him.
Alex jerked, like she had slapped him. “I don’t know,” he said calmly. “But it doesn’t matter, anyway.”
Something in her shifted and melted at his truly weary tone. She wanted to hold him. She wanted to kiss him, to take away that wretched look in his eyes. But she couldn’t do that. She gripped the door once more. “Don’t ever come here again,” she told him. “Don’t come to the office. Don’t call me.”
She shut the door. It was one of the hardest things she had ever done.
* * * * *
The room Alex found himself in was vast, the roof soaring far overhead. Large black and white tiles covered the floor, but there was no furniture. Just the endless floor. Along every wall were old-fashioned bookcases, filled with books that looked just as old. It was big and echoing, but it was a strangely comforting room. He decided he liked it and wanted to explore farther and as he had learned from b
efore, his body obeyed his thought and moved forward, even though he really couldn’t look down and see his body at all.
As he floated down the length of the room, he saw ahead of him a figure in green. It seemed to be far away, but it rapidly drew closer and closer until he could see it was a girl, perhaps twelve years old, wearing a knee-length green coat. She had coppery brown curly hair and vivid gray eyes that reminded him sharply of Taylor…
“Marit!” he said, or perhaps he just thought it.
Marit smiled at him. “We found each other, Uncle Alex. I’m so glad.”
“But why are you here?”
“I’m not really here. Neither are you.” She gave him a small smile. “I came here to warn you.”
“Warn? About what?” Fear touched him.
“I can’t tell you too much,” she said, and sounded a little sad. “Far and Athair have told you all about the dangers of changing the past, so all I can do is tell you to watch out.”
“I’m in danger?” Alex asked.
“Just watch out,” she said cryptically and turned as if she was going to walk away again.
“Is this the past?” Alex asked her.
“This is nowhere,” Marit said over her shoulder. She was moving farther and farther away. Becoming smaller. “Remember, you can’t tell anyone about me. You’ll change the future if you do!”
And she was gone.
* * * * *
Alex blinked his gaze back into focus, looking around his living room with bleary eyes. Then slowly, he got up, his muscles protesting over the exercise. He staggered into the bedroom and on into the en suite and turned the shower on, making the water very hot.
He could remember nearly all of the vision or whatever it was he had seen. Marit, but years older than he knew her now. But where was it, that place where they had met? He knew it. It tugged on his memory, not like the demanding false memory that beguiled and teased, but a genuine memory.
After ten minutes, he straightened up, the water bouncing off the top of his head, instead of on his back where he had aimed it. He smacked the tiles. “Alice in Wonderland,” he breathed to himself. The long hall with the table and the bottle with the tag that said “drink me.” It was one of Marit’s favorite books and Alex had read it to her so many times he could almost recite it. Except the hall in Wonderland hadn’t been lined with books.