“Vanessa!” Lane crouched down beside me, fingering the sticky hair off my face, my lips; he held my hair back as my stomach rebelled again. “Baby, what’s wrong? I didn’t think you were that drunk to be this sick.”
I shook my head. “I wasn’t. I don’t know what’s wrong.” I leaned over and heaved again, but could get nothing up except bile. There was nothing left in me to get rid of, yet the spasms wouldn’t cease, and I retched again and again until my throat became raw and I was positive that if I threw up one more time, my stomach would surely leave my body. “Lane, help me up. I want to lie down.”
He picked me up, cradling me in his arms and placed me down on my bed. “Tell me. What can I do?”
I’d never experienced pain like that before. My stomach felt as if it were turned inside out. The sharp pains burned with wave after wave of agony.
“Just. I don’t know. Stay with me. I’m cold. So very cold.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Lane
Vanessa complained of being cold, but she was burning up. She’d latched on to the heavy pink comforter, clutching it up to her neck as she shivered. Drops of sweat beaded on her forehead and upper lip. Her precious lips were dry, showing signs of dehydration. I called Cian for help, and within a few seconds, he and Maggie stood by my side.
“Oh, my gods! What’s wrong with her,” Maggie said, taking her hand and touching V’s forehead. “She’s burning up.”
“I don’t know. She complained of a headache and came in here to grab some ibuprofen, and when she didn’t come back right away, I came looking for her and found her retching over the toilet.”
Chelle and Josh came into the room, followed by Gage and Elvis. “I’ll call my dad,” Chelle said.
“Yeah. Good. Call Grayson,” I said, not knowing what else to do.
A couple of minutes later, Grayson appeared in the bedroom. “What do we have here?” he asked, making his way through everyone to get to Vanessa’s side. “How long has she been like this?”
“Not long. Maybe fifteen minutes or so.”
“It came on all of a sudden?”
“Yeah. Is it the flu?”
“Could be. Flu symptoms can come on suddenly. But…” He looked back at everyone. “Could we get a little privacy?”
Everyone scattered, except for Maggie and me. “I’m staying,” Maggie said and looked at me. “You should leave.”
“No way.”
She’s mine.
There was no way in this world I was leaving Vanessa’s side while she was in this condition. Neither of them fought me on it, though I’d been prepared to confess our entire relationship if I needed to—not that we were keeping it a secret.
Grayson pried the blanket away from Vanessa’s fisted hand that had been holding the soft cloth closely to her. “No,” she groaned.
“It’s okay. I need to take a peek at your tummy, Vanessa. Then you can have it right back.”
He pressed down in several spots on her abdomen, and she moaned in agony each time.
“Has she been coughing or complaining of any aches and pains. Sore muscles?”
Maggie looked at me. “No,” I said. “Nothing at all. Not until just now. She complained about having a headache. And now she’s been doubled over with the stomach pain and throwing up.” I chewed at the skin beside my thumbnail. Something I hadn’t done since I was a teenager many, many years ago.
Grayson lifted her shirt to reveal large red blotches all over her abdomen, some starting to blister in spots. Her arms and legs were also starting to show some signs of redness. “I don’t think this is the flu,” he said. “Vanessa is a witch, correct?”
“Yes.” I nodded.
He glanced around her room. “Is anything missing?”
“Like what?” Maggie asked.
“I’m not sure. Something special to her? Articles of clothing, any of her potions or herbs?”
I looked around her room. I didn’t see anything out of place. Then, as if someone had blown air into Vanessa’s lungs, she inhaled, gasping for air, and sat up, coughing as if she’d been drowning.
“Easy. Lie down.” Grayson touched her forehead and eased her body back down on the bed. “Her fever has broken. Her temperature seems to be returning to normal. Rather quickly.”
Vanessa looked from me to Maggie to Grayson. “I don’t feel very well. My stomach hurts.”
“You had a very high fever a few minutes ago, but it seems to have gone down now. I’m going to examine you. Let me know where it hurts.” He pressed again at the various places on V’s stomach, and she cried out at almost every spot. He looked down her throat but didn’t seem to see anything out of the ordinary there.
“I’m so thirsty,” Vanessa said. “Can I have some water?”
“I’ll get it.” I sped to the bathroom, found a small glass, and filled it from the tap with cold water. “Here.” I helped her to sit up. She drank most of it quickly. She looked around her room, her eyes landing on the top of her bureau and then searching around the area before settling back on the dresser. “Where’s the rhodonite crystal?”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Vanessa
The crystal was missing, and there was only one conclusion to come to. My cousin had taken it when we’d come up to see my room. How had I not known?
“I believe…now, I’m not certain,” Grayson began, “but I think the crystal is making you sick. Or rather the lack of the crystal. I’ve studied a little about this, and I know ownership plays a large part in a crystal’s effectiveness, particularly if the stone was bonded to you during a ritualistic ceremony. It may be the crystal’s way of summoning you or alerting you that it was taken from you.”
The pains in my stomach were almost completely gone, and I looked at my arms and legs. The blotchiness had subsided. “Let me have another look at your abdomen,” Grayson said, and I laid back down and lifted my shirt. The blotches and blisters had disappeared, almost as if they’d never been there.
“I need to get up.” I shoved myself up from the bed and walked to the dresser. The crystals had been moved so that I didn’t notice the disappearance of the larger pink one in the middle right away. “If this is from the crystal, and it’s gone, why did all the pain and redness suddenly go away?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. Is there anyone in your family you could call and ask?”
My mom. “I’ll call my mom.”
We all gathered back in the living room with everyone else while I called my mother. The support from this family was amazing. I was suddenly so very honored that they all cared enough about me to be with me during this.
The call to my mom was short and to the point, and she’d cried. My mom didn’t cry easily, so I knew that this situation was serious.
“Vanessa, be careful. I’m so sorry. I’m calling Jillian’s mother as soon as we hang up. Maybe she can talk some sense into her child.”
I pushed the disconnect button on my phone, and everyone stared at me, waiting for me to tell them what my mother had said. I was almost too stunned to speak.
“Well?” Lane coaxed.
I walked over to where he stood by the credenza and picked up the glass of scotch he’d been nursing. Drinking the rest of the contents down, I placed the tumbler on the tray by the bottle and turned to face everyone. I swallowed. The guilt of what was taking place squeezed my heart. By bringing Jillian and Seth here, I’d brought danger to my friends. My family.
“It seems that my cousin has fallen victim to a warlock. A very powerful warlock.”
“I knew I didn’t like that guy,” Lane said smugly, but I let him enjoy his moment and stroked my hand down his arm. He’d tried to warn me; unfortunately, he’d been too late. I recounted the story of the rhodonite crystal and how my ancestors had separated it into three pieces centuries ago in order to keep it from falling into the wrong hands. How the other two stones were thought to be lost or hidden very well, inaccessible to present-day witches.
&n
bsp; “My mother told me that if the crystal leaves my home or my side for more than a couple of hours—or several miles, whichever comes first—then it cries out to its owner, the one it’s bonded with, making them violently sick.”
“And no one ever told you this?” Lane gave me an incredulous stare.
“My mom said it was recited to me during the ceremony, not in those exact words, but I honestly don’t remember much about that night except the newfound feelings I had about myself. It felt so great, that’s all I focused on.”
Lane draped his arm around me and kissed my forehead. “It’s okay. I didn’t mean to be a jerk,” he whispered.
I smiled at him. If he didn’t challenge me every once in a while, he wouldn’t be Lane, the guy I was falling hard for.
“Why did the pain stop?” Chelle asked. “I mean, it cried out to you but then stopped. You’re fine now.”
“That’s the worst part,” I said, taking another drink of scotch from the glass Lane had recently refilled. “If it stops calling to me, then it’s found its true sisters.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Lane asked.
“It means, the crystal has been reunited with the other two stones and no longer yearns for me. Seth must have the other two crystals. He must have twisted Jillian’s mind into thinking it would be a really great accomplishment for him and his powers to reunite all three stones of the rhodonite crystal back together. That is the only reason why the pain would have stopped.
“Vanessa, what exactly happens once the crystals are reunited?” Cian asked.
“The witch, or in this case, warlock—if he lives through the ritual of fusing the stones back together—releases an ancient evil that my great-great-great-great-grandmother and her two sisters destroyed years ago before they blew up the larger stone, splitting it into three pieces.”
“Oh. That’s all,” Lane said and downed the rest of the scotch I’d wanted.
“Well, we’ll just have to destroy the crystal again,” Cian said.
I shook my head. “We can’t.”
“Why not?” Gage asked.
“I’m not strong enough.”
“Well, what about your mother? Let’s fly her out here so she can help.”
I sucked my bottom lip in. “It would take three witches at the least, and anyway, my mother hasn’t practiced any witchcraft in years.”
“What about other relatives. Your grandmother? Aunt? What about the other witches in the ceremony?” Lane suggested.
“My grandmother passed away three years ago. The three of us were the only gifted ones at the ceremony. There are only two of us left now.”
“How can you have a ceremonial ritual with only three witches?” Lane asked.
“You don’t need many to perform rituals, Lane. A gathering of two is plenty.” The why of it was at the root of it all. The idea of wielding that much power had to be a sickness shared by many throughout history. Villains such as Hitler, or even the old master of hell himself, Lucifer. I shuddered at the thought. I had to find a way to stop Seth. But my powers alone were worthless against the fused crystal. I had to find a way to gain more power. But how? It wasn’t just mental strength that I needed; it would be physical strength, as well. My ancestors had called upon each other’s strength, giving them the power to destroy the crystal. But I needed to not only separate the crystal again but also destroy Seth. And I’d have to do that first. I needed physical strength to do that.
“I have to find a way to stop Seth. Stop the evil. There’s no telling what he’s capable of doing or what his intentions will be once he gains all that power.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Lane
“You can’t seriously be considering this?” I paced around the room and turned to the only person I thought could talk sense into Vanessa. “Maggie, you have to talk her out of this.”
“Don’t even try.” Vanessa raised her voice and scanned the room. “None of you have the right to tell me not to do this. That stone is my birthright. I need to get it back. If I don’t, I don’t think you’ll like what Seth might do to this world you’ve enjoyed for the past hundreds…” She paused and looked at Gage and Elvis. “…thousands of years. It will never be the same.”
“There’s got to be another way,” I said. “We need to talk. Come with me.” I grabbed her arm and tugged her to me, teleporting inside my bedroom.
“I told you not to do that. You can’t just grab me and take off.”
“Vanessa. Please. I…you and I…we’ve just begun, baby. If you do this, it could change everything. I don’t want to lose you when I’ve just found you.” I had an ache in my chest thinking about how it could all turn out. It hurt so fucking bad I wanted to scream.
“How? How would it change us, Lane?”
“There are a million and one reasons why I’d love for you to do this, but not like this. Not for this. You could still die fighting him.”
“I have to try. It’s my duty. I’ve checked into it. This will give me the strength I need.”
“Duty to whom? Not to me. Not to…to your ancestors.”
“To mankind,” she whispered. “To all the innocent people of this world. Vampires and humans alike. It was my crystal. It was my charge. My turn to keep it guarded. I failed. I have to make this right. Don’t you see that?”
I did, but I didn’t want to admit it. I didn’t like what she’d proposed. This plan of hers had too many flaws in it.
I stood, staring at the fish tank, watching the iridescent fish swim back and forth with no place to go, nowhere to explore. No purpose in life. The way I had been for the past two hundred years before Vanessa. The small world the fish lived in was so constricted. A prison. Like the life I would have if something happened to Vanessa. I decided right then to get rid of the tank. It served no purpose.
“If you do this, if I let you do this—”
“Let me? If you think—”
“Shhhh, shhhh. Wrong choice of words,” I said calmly. “If you do this, let me go with you.”
She turned her back to me without saying anything. I went to her, gently swiveled her around to face me. Our eyes locked, and I said it. It had been boiling up inside of me ever since I’d seen her hunched over that toilet. Ever since she’d been lying in that bed, practically dead from fever. No, that was a lie. Ever since I’d first heard her sing that night in her room when she didn’t know I’d been listening. Maybe even before that. “If I lose you, if you die, I don’t think I can go on. To face a future of eternal life without knowing what it would be like to live it with you would be torture for me. I love you, Vanessa. Please, let me help you with this.”
I swallowed, waiting for her reply. I didn’t want her to tell me she loved me, too. That wasn’t what I’d been looking for. I only wanted her to know how much she meant to me, what it would do to me if I lost her.
“You love me?” she asked so sweetly I chuckled.
“Yes. I do.”
Her lips curved up on one side of her mouth. “I love you, too.” My heart sang, flipped and did a triple salchow twirl as though it were an Olympic gold medalist.
And then, in the blink of an eye, she shattered me.
“And that’s why you can’t come with me. I would never forgive myself if something happened to you.”
“Oh my fucking gods, woman! You’re going to be the death of me anyway.”
Cian appeared in my room, along with Gage and Elvis. “We’ve been talking, and we’ve decided that your plan isn’t good enough, Vanessa.” We both stared at my brother.
She opened her mouth to protest, but Cian spoke first.
“You need us. All of us.” He nodded at me. “If you do this, we’re coming with you. End of discussion.”
I smiled as relief infused every pore of my body.
But then, there was still the other part of this whole plan that I didn’t feel comfortable about...
*****
“No second thoughts?” I asked Vanessa. She l
ay naked in my bed, as I rested on my knees between her legs, admiring her gorgeous body. There was only one way to do this that she’d accept, and really, I had no problem with it at all. Except I worried that I’d screw it up.
“Take me, Lane. Make vampire love to me.”
I kissed her.
I covered her lips with mine. Heat soared to my cock when my fingers drifted down between her thighs, finding her already wet. I thrust a finger inside of her, kissed my way down her stomach, needing to sample what she offered so sweetly to me. As I swirled my tongue around her clit, she thrust her hips forward, pressing herself to me. I sucked, then licked. I added another finger to play around inside. Her hands fisted in my hair, and she tugged me down as I drank her in once again. I loved the way she tasted. Always so pure.
I kissed my way up her torso. Lingering a bit at her breasts. My fangs dropped; I wanted to drink her blood so badly. I willed them back in as I made her nipples firm under my fingertips. I sat back on my knees again and pulled her up to sit while I straightened my legs out beside her. Grabbing her ass in both of my hands, I hoisted her up above my very hard cock, the tip skimming over her clit and her folds, making its way to the opening so slick and ready for me. She sank down on me, and I closed my eyes at the glorious sensation of being inside, of being surrounded by her soft, tight walls. I pushed her up and pulled her down. She kissed me. When I dipped my tongue into her mouth, she sucked on it then slipped hers into mine. I could hear the pounding of her heart, the flow of blood through her veins, and my fangs dropped again. Her tongue skimmed over them, and she released my lips, tilting her head, offering me the throbbing vein at her neck.
“I love you, Vanessa. I’ll love you for eternity,” I said and kissed her neck then sank my fangs into her. She gasped at the initial puncture, and I sucked gently. Then she moaned as the euphoric high took over. I sucked slowly at first, but as her gyrating became faster, I pumped my cock harder into her, and my sucking became stronger. I hadn’t had sex like this in years. I’d almost forgotten how close to heaven it took me.
Rocked by a Vampire: Billionaire, Rock Stars, Vampires (Immortal Hearts of San Francisco Book 3) Page 16
