Old Sins, Long Shadow

by PG Forte

  Conrad sighed in faint relief. “Very well then. Spread your legs a little more and you shall have me.”

  Damian complied quickly, releasing his breath at the same time in a deep, shaky sigh. Conrad took comfort in the lack of hesitation, although he could not help but reflect that it was probably the speediest, most obedient response he’d had from him in well over a century. Placing a hand on either cheek, he spread Damian’s buttocks. The muscles beneath his hands trembled at his touch. He leaned in, using his tongue to lave the crease and rim the puckered hole. Mine.

  “Still, I would advise you to try and learn some patience, mi amor,” he murmured teasingly. “If I thought it would do any good. You’d do well to remember I am your sire. And, if at any point I am in the mood to torture you, then torture is exactly what you’ll receive.”

  In truth, however, his own body was pushing him just as hard tonight. All too soon, they were both trembling with need. Conrad tugged at Damian’s hips, wordlessly urging him to get his knees beneath him. Once he had him in position, Conrad held his breath and pushed, entering Damian slowly, carefully, just until his head made the breach. Then he thrust swiftly home.

  Damian shuddered beneath him, his breath coming in great, gulping sobs. Tears tracked his face. Conrad paused, leaning in to kiss the traces away, to bite tenderly at his neck, giving them both a moment to savor the sweet sensations. He still had no idea what Damian was thinking, but he himself was overcome with certainty. It was as though his whole tilted world had somehow righted itself. Even though Damian’s body had him gripped in a strangling, hot embrace, for the first time in as long as he could remember, he finally felt like he could breathe.

  After a moment, his body demanded he move. He straightened up and began to thrust—deep, hard, fast. His motions quickly drove Damian back to the precipice’s edge. A fact he was only distantly aware of as he struggled, mostly in vain, to maintain his own control. It was a losing battle, however. All it took was the first fluttering spasms of Damian’s muscles around him and he broke, falling headlong into bliss.

  Never again, Damian, he thought as he collapsed on top of him. This distance between them had been insupportable. He could not allow such a thing to occur again. Never, never keep yourself from me again.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  What miracle is this, Damian wondered, as he lay shattered and barely conscious on the floor beneath Conrad. His brain swarmed with conjecture. How had it happened? What had he finally done right? Whatever it was, he had to figure it out soon—so he could be sure to repeat it. Often.

  Conrad settled himself beside him, but Damian could not yet bring himself to look into his face. He stared instead at the beloved, bronze torso; so close, so gorgeously muscled, so long denied him. Was it really within his right to touch it now? Unable to resist the attempt, he stretched out a hesitant hand then froze in mid-reach when Conrad chuckled softly.

  “What were you thinking?” he asked, his voice tinged with amusement.

  Damian slowly withdrew his hand. He schooled his features to reveal nothing of his need and gazed at Conrad inquiringly. “Why, what do you mean?”

  “A duel? You could not actually have hoped to win?”

  Given Conrad’s recent debilitated state, the possibility had not seemed that farfetched. Still, Damian doubted such a reminder would be well received. He shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose I felt I had to do something to get your attention.”

  “Well, in that you certainly succeeded.” Conrad leaned in and swiped his lips across Damian’s—one hot, branding kiss, far too brief. “Now that you have captured it, however, I do wonder what you intend to do with my attention?”

  Another question to which Damian had no reply. Hold it, keep it, use it to force you to take me back? All of that was true and what he wished he might say in answer, but none of it was anything he dared give voice to. A heavy silence settled between them broken at last by Conrad’s sigh.

  “You know, the night you came back to me— Or, rather, I should say, the night you first arrived here, at this house, when the twins were just infants, newly home from the hospital, you said we would never again be lovers. Do you recall it?”

  Damian nodded. “I was hurt. Angry. Surely you can understand how I felt? A hundred years had passed without any word from you. Suddenly, I’m told you wish to see me, yet when I come in answer to your summons, all you can talk about is this girl you’ve loved and lost. And then you ask me to risk my life to help you raise her children.”

  Conrad nodded. “It was too much to ask. I know that. But, what else could I have done? You don’t think I should have tried to raise them on my own, do you?”

  “Don’t be absurd,” Damian scoffed. “You needed me, Conrad.” He dared not ever let him forget that—it was the only hold he had on him. “You could never have succeeded without me. Although, I have always wondered what you thought you would have done if I had turned you down. To whom else would you have appealed? What other names were on your list?”

  “What are you talking about?” Conrad frowned impatiently. “List? I had no list. I’d thought of contacting no one but you. Did I not tell you so at the time?”

  Damian’s jaw dropped open. It took him a moment to find his tongue. “You were that sure of me?” Why was he even surprised? One hundred and thirteen years they’d been apart. Had Conrad known the entire time he need do no more than snap his fingers to bring Damian running to crouch at his heel? All those lonely, lonely years and never so much as a single word…

  “Sure of you?” Conrad’s scowl grew darker. “My dear, I was sure of nothing. It had been over a hundred years since I’d heard from you as well. For all I knew, you’d show up here merely for the pleasure of telling me to go to hell—assuming you came at all. I half expected you would simply pretend you’d never received my message.”

  A rueful smile curved Damian’s lips as he confessed, “If you must know, I’d thought about doing both.”

  Conrad sighed. “So there you have it. It didn’t matter though. I lost nothing in the asking. Without your help, I knew it was unlikely I’d survive very long. At the very least, I thought perhaps this way I’d get the chance to see your pretty face one last time.”

  Tears blurred Damian’s vision. Too overcome to speak, he ducked his head. More silence followed.

  “Do you know what it was that made me fall so quickly in love with Desert Rose—that is to say, the twins’ mother?”

  “I know who she is,” Damian assured him. She was just about the last person he wanted to talk about right now.

  “She reminded me of you.”

  “What?” Damian stared at him, appalled. “That silly little slut?”

  Conrad’s eyes flashed with anger. “Take care how you speak of her!”

  Damian ducked his head again. “My apologies. I meant no disrespect—to you or to the lady. I quite realize she was the great love of your life. It’s just… Oh, Conrad, really! You tell me some…some little girl reminds you of me. How am I supposed to take that? Should I be flattered by the inference? Or insulted?”

  A snarl left Conrad’s lips. He lunged for Damian and pinned him to the floor. Damian stifled a cry of horror as he felt Conrad’s teeth graze his shoulder. No, not again.

  But, Conrad merely nipped him playfully, then left a trail of equally harmless bites all the way up to his ear. “Pay attention!” he said in a voice that held more than a hint of laughter. “I did not say she resembled you physically, although your coloring is quite similar, as you may have gleaned from seeing her children. It was her spirit to which I was referring. Both of you—brave, reckless, maddeningly impossible to control no matter how hard I tried.”

  “How was she brave?” Damian asked, absently rubbing his shoulder where the tingling warmth of Conrad’s bite still lingered. “What did she risk after all? I doubt you would have ever bitten her.”

  “Oh, you are a girl!” Conrad scoffed. “I could not possibly have hurt you.” He brush
ed Damian’s hand aside and applied his lips in a gentle caress. “There. Better now?”

  Damian nodded.

  “You’re right of course,” Conrad sighed after he’d pushed himself away and they both sat up. “I wouldn’t have bitten her. She was human, after all, and—as you say—little more than a girl. But I risked nothing to be with her, either. There were no midnight runs for the border. No angry mobs to escape. No vengeful archduke swearing he’d have my head on a pike because I’d stolen his favorite courtier’s heart and transformed the boy into a bloodsucking demon.”

  Damian smiled fondly at the memories. “His Excellency’s arrogance was such that the mere fact I preferred someone else was proof enough I was possessed of a demon. However, I still maintain the bloodsucking charge was sheer conjecture.”

  Conrad’s lips twitched slightly in an answering smile. “Perhaps.”

  “In all fairness though, Conrad, you must admit your relationship with the lady was not completely without risk. It almost got you killed, not so long ago, did it not?”

  “That’s very true.” His face grim, Conrad traced his fingers over the scars on Damian’s neck. “Did I ever even thank you for saving my life that night?”

  Damian shook his head. “Oh, please don’t. I quite enjoy being able to think of you as being in my debt. It’s such a novelty, you see. Do let me bask in the feeling a little while longer.”

  Another silence fell between them. Damian steeled himself to speak. Now was the perfect time to suggest a way in which Conrad might consider discharging his debt—by giving Damian a second chance.

  Conrad cleared his throat and the moment was lost. “Yes, well, I think there’s still a point here that you’re missing.”

  Somehow, Damian really doubted it. “Is there?”

  “However much I loved Desert Rose, it was not possible for her to have been ‘the great love of my life’ as you have termed it.”

  “No?”

  “No. If anyone was that, it was you.”

  Was? The single word echoed in Damian’s mind. His heart stalled. Had Conrad meant to use the past tense? Was this his way of making plain to Damian how very much he’d thrown away? As if he needed any further clarification!

  This time, Damian knew he had to speak. He had to know if there was any chance for him at all. He opened his mouth, but once again Conrad forestalled him.

  “I want you back, Damian.” Conrad’s voice shook with suppressed emotion. “I don’t know what tonight has meant to you. Maybe it’s meant nothing at all. Perhaps you’ve changed your mind about us not being lovers anymore, or perhaps you were merely indulging me—as a whim, or to honor our wager, or for old time’s sake. Whatever the reason, it doesn’t matter. I want you back.”

  “Conrad, I…”

  “Wait. Let me finish, please. I’ve no idea what it will take for that to happen, what you need, or what I must do, but whatever it is—”

  “There’s nothing.” Damian pressed his fingers to Conrad’s lips, interrupting the flow of words. He shook his head. “You need do nothing. I want that too.” Surprise filled Conrad’s eyes along with a tiny bit of hope. Damian nodded, smiling through his tears. “I want that too.”

  Conrad dragged Damian back against him and held him tight, but there was still much that needed to be said—and this time Damian would have his say.

  “I never stopped loving you,” he blurted. “Never. Not when I left, or in all the years I was gone. I know I said I did. I said so many things, but none of them were true. And even before that night, all those awful days and weeks that led up to it, when it seemed as though everything between us was destined to go wrong—”

  “Years,” Conrad corrected grimly. “Decades.”

  “Is that how it seemed to you?” Perhaps, after all, this had not been the best time to bring up his past mistakes.

  Conrad sighed. He released Damian and leaned back on his elbows, his gaze pensive. “Let me guess. Perhaps you were just trying to get my attention then as well?”

  “Sí,” Damian replied, surprised to find he meant it. “I think I was. After four hundred years, so much had changed between us. I didn’t feel like you were even aware of my existence anymore—not really. Most of the time, it seemed I was simply there. Something you kept on hand for convenience’s sake. Like a piece of furniture.”

  “Furniture? Really? Is that what you thought?”

  Damian shrugged. “Oh, I suppose you might’ve still found me useful, upon occasion—a pleasant-enough diversion when nothing more entertaining presented itself. But those occasions seemed to grow ever more infrequent. After awhile I grew tired of being treated…well, in the way one might treat an old shoe.”

  “Oh, now it’s a shoe?” Conrad’s voice was laced with disbelief. “Even better. Damian, you cannot seriously be suggesting my treatment of you was ever on par with…with the care I’d have given to a piece of my wardrobe?”

  “Well, no, not exactly.”

  “Not exactly?”

  “It’s an analogy, Conrad, but a good one, I think. Only consider: I was comfortable. I was convenient. I was something that might suit your purposes, when the need arose. But it was obvious you’d never again see me in the way you once had, the way I wanted you to. As something fresh and fashionable and, and…”

  “Shiny?”

  “New,” Damian corrected angrily. “Exciting. Young.”

  Conrad rolled his eyes. “Well, my dear, perhaps you would have been better served if you’d just tried fencing with me instead?”

  “Don’t make me laugh,” Damian replied bitterly. “Fencing? Why, if I’d have dared issue you a challenge in those days, you’d have run me through without a second thought.”

  Conrad’s face darkened. He sat up quickly. For a moment, Damian feared he’d gone too far. Then Conrad pulled him close. “You’re probably right,” he murmured as he pressed a kiss to Damian’s head. “Forgive me?”

  Damian pulled back, alarmed by the shakiness in Conrad’s voice.

  Tears glimmered in Conrad’s eyes. He smiled sadly. “For all that I failed you, I never stopped loving you either, you know.”

  “Oh, querido, don’t. You never failed me. Never. I swear I didn’t mean it like that.” Overcome with remorse, Damian threw himself back into Conrad’s arms, kissing him fiercely, desperate with the need to make things right between them. “There’s nothing to forgive. Nothing at all.”

  The force of his assault knocked them both flat on the floor once again, teeth clashing, lips splitting open with the impact. Damian tasted blood on his tongue. Conrad’s blood. His fangs descended in an instant. Without stopping to consider how his actions might be received, Damian turned his head and sank his teeth into Conrad’s neck. Conrad gasped and stiffened. Damian shuddered, shocked by his own actions. Dios. This time, for a certainty, he’d gone too far.

  Rather than push him away, however, Conrad folded his arms around him and held him close, crooning softly, “Oh, Damian. Damian, mi amor, I’ve missed you so.”

  In the end, it was Damian who pulled back, fearful of taking too much of Conrad’s precious blood and anxious for a taste of something else. He slipped out of Conrad’s arms and slid slowly down the length of his body to kneel between his legs. Hungrily, he eyed Conrad’s cock. It was flushed, swollen, heavily corded with veins—just as he’d remembered. He raised his gaze to Conrad’s face, seeking permission. “May I?”

  A faint smile curved Conrad’s lips. “As you’ve pointed out, caro, I am deeply in your debt. How could I deny you anything?”

  Damian smiled as well. “You make a very good point.” A knock at the door interrupted any further response.

  Conrad’s smile faded. He closed his eyes in irritation and growled angrily, “Not now!”

  “Conrad?” Julie’s voice quivered with fright. “Conrad, open the door. Please. It’s important.”

  “Go away, Julie. We’re busy. Whatever it is, I will speak with you about it later.”

&
nbsp; Damian shifted restlessly. “Something’s wrong.”

  Conrad grimaced. “Yes. We’ve been in here so long, she probably thinks I’ve killed you.” Raising his voice again, he called through the door. “I give you my word I have not harmed your uncle in any way. We’ll both be out in a little while and you may verify his condition for yourself.”

  “Conrad, please! It-it’s Marc. Something’s happened to him.”

  Conrad froze. His eyes met Damian’s and he saw the same nameless fear he felt reflected back at him. Without a word, Damian stood and held out a hand to help him up. Usually, Conrad would have scorned to accept his aid. Tonight, he had more important matters than his image with which to be concerned. He took Damian’s hand, and allowed him to haul him to his feet.

  They dressed quickly, with Damian taking a moment to clean away the evidence of their lovemaking while Conrad headed for the door.

  “All right, Julie,” he said as he pulled the door wide. “Here I am. What is it that’s so important it couldn’t wait until I’d finished exercising?” He stopped, startled to find not just Julie waiting for him, but Drew as well, his face pale, guarded, void of expression. Conrad cursed himself for his carelessness in referring to Damian as Julie’s uncle. This was a complication he had not foreseen and one he did not wish to have to deal with, but then Julie launched herself into his arms and her obvious misery wiped any other consideration from his mind.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong,” she said, her voice quavering. “But it’s something terrible and it has to do with Marc. I can feel it.”

  Conrad glanced sternly at Drew over Julie’s head and demanded, “Tell me.”

  “This letter was delivered to the club tonight,” Drew replied. His hand shook violently as he extended it to reluctantly offer Conrad a plain white envelope bearing his name. “According to one of the bartenders, Marc received a similar letter earlier his evening. He left right after he read it and he hasn’t been back since.”

  Conrad tore the envelope open, guts twisting as he recognized the handwriting, mind reeling as dread, rage and hatred vied for supremacy.