Her eyes widened as she noticed the blood-soaked sheets, Aaron’s bare, bronze-colored skin, and the beautiful, blonde woman writhing beneath him as Aaron sucked blood from her neck. Rose quickly spun around, averting her gaze from the provocative scene, blushing as she heard Kara chuckling beside her.
The moans soon quietened and silenced, as if the woman’s voice had been drained, and then, Rose heard the creaking of the mattress as someone climbed off of it and the soft padding of footsteps as someone approached.
“What’s her problem?” asked a low, thickly accented voice behind her.
“Apparently, extreme nakedness makes her uncomfortable,” Kara said.
“Very funny,” Rose muttered sarcastically, blushing at Kara’s teasing.
Aaron frowned at Kara as he began to pull a pair of black, skinny jeans over his fully-nude lower half. “What the hell is extreme nakedness?” he asked.
Rose stared into the dark tunnel as she listened to the shuffling of clothing behind her. She didn’t plan on turning around until she was absolutely sure that a certain part of Aaron’s body was fully covered. “Why do all of you vampires like to walk around naked so much?” she grumbled under her breath.
“Well, first, let me remind you that you are a vampire, too, which is a fact that you would do well to remember,” Aaron began. He grasped Rose’s shoulder and spun her around, forcing her to face him. “But to answer your question, I would imagine that it has something to do with the fact that most of us come from time periods in human society that were far less prudish than your own.”
“Rose isn’t prudish,” Kara said, smiling. “She’s just a little shy.”
Rose stared at Aaron, thankful to see that a gray, V-neck T-shirt and a pair of black jeans covered his previously naked body. He looked surprisingly clean of blood with the exception of the few drops that stained his lips. Rose shifted her weight to one side, peering past Aaron, over at the motionless woman lying on the blood-soaked bed. “She’s not dead, is she?” Rose asked worriedly.
Aaron scowled disapprovingly at Rose. “Would it matter if she was?”
Rose narrowed her eyes at him. “Yes,” she said irritably.
Kara moved closer to Rose, and there was something about the way she squared her shoulders and the way she stepped forward, standing just slightly in front of Rose, that seemed protective. Aaron seemed to notice this, his head tilting to the side as he watched Kara’s unusual behavior. He raised an eyebrow.
“Her heart is still beating,” Kara told Rose softly. “Don’t you hear it?”
Rose glanced again at the woman, noticing the slow, steady rising and falling of the woman’s chest. The woman’s face had fallen to the side, her eyes closed, her long, blonde hair lying messily over her face, and as Rose watched her chest, she listened to her heartbeat, noticing how slow and quiet it sounded.
“I drained her,” Aaron said, as if he knew what Rose was thinking. “Vampires don’t die from blood loss, but we do lose consciousness. Our heart rate slows, and if we’re completely drained, it might even stop. But we do not die.”
“Right,” Rose said, frowning at him. “And why did you drain her?”
His dark eyes narrowed at her. “Because I was hungry.”
“She’ll be fine once she feeds,” Kara murmured to Rose.
Aaron looked at Kara again, his eyebrows lifting, as if he were surprised by Kara’s behavior, for some reason. “Yes, and while we’re on the topic, why are you still standing here?” he asked Kara impatiently. “You need to take whatever-her-name-is up to her room and get her some blood before you leave.”
Kara straightened. “Of course. I just…”
“Whatever-her-name-is?” Rose repeated, interrupting them. She raked Aaron with a disapproving look. “You had sex with the woman and fed from her, and you don’t even know her name?” Her frown deepened. “And why don’t you give her some blood? You’re the one who took all of her blood, after all.”
Kara immediately shifted her body in front of Rose, shielding her.
Aaron stared at Rose, his eyes widening, as if she’d just confessed that she was secretly the Loch Ness monster. But then, his dark gaze shifted toward Kara. “Would you quit doing that?” he snapped. “I am not going to kill her.”
Kara frowned. “Stop doing what?”
He raised an eyebrow and waved his hand at her, gesturing at where she stood—between Aaron and Rose, as if she were shielding Rose from an attack.
Kara glanced behind her. “Oh,” she said when she saw Rose standing there. She stepped to the side, ducking her head, as if she were embarrassed.
Rose blinked as she watched the interaction, stunned both by Kara’s protectiveness and by the fact that Kara was actually embarrassed about something.
“Go,” Aaron snarled at Kara. “Now.”
Kara pursed her lips. “Are you sure you don’t need me to…”
“To what?” Aaron interrupted. “Annoy me every time she opens her mouth? No. I told you where I wanted you tonight. Are you defying my orders?”
“Of course not,” Kara sighed. “I just… I swore to protect her.”
Aaron rolled his eyes. He breathed out slowly and directed his impatient glare at Rose. “You have way too many concerned lovers,” he complained.
“What?” Rose sputtered, her eyes widening. “Kara’s not my…lover.”
Aaron ignored her, shifting his dark, angry gaze back toward Kara. He stepped forward, closer to her. “For the last time,” he growled, “no harm will come to your girlfriend. And you can relay that message to the Greek as well.”
“But I’m not her girlfriend,” Rose said again, watching as Aaron and Kara stared each other down. She sighed, “Why isn’t anyone listening to me?”
Kara turned toward Rose. “Are you sure you’re comfortable with this?”
Aaron’s glare turned murderous, but that didn’t deter Kara. She ignored him, lifting her chin and rolling her shoulders back. Her piercing, icy blue eyes softened with concern as she watched Rose, as she waited for Rose’s answer.
“I’m fine,” Rose assured her.
Kara nodded. Then, she walked over to the bed. She gathered the woman’s long, nude body into her arms and carried the woman out of the room.
For a few moments, Aaron and Rose just stood there.
Then, finally, Rose broke the silence. “So, why am I here?”
Aaron crossed his arms. He stared at her with steely, black eyes. “Maybe I plan to seduce you,” he said matter-of-factly. “You are in my room, after all.”
“I doubt that,” Rose said, “but for the record, I have a boyfriend.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” Aaron asked.
Rose frowned at him. “Um…well, I don’t sleep with other people,” she said slowly. She started to add that, technically, she hadn’t slept with Kallias yet either, but she didn’t really feel like having the virgin conversation with Aaron.
“Except Kara,” Aaron stated, as if there were no question about it.
Her frown deepened. “I haven’t slept with Kara.”
“Really?” Aaron said, lifting his eyebrows. He shrugged nonchalantly. “Huh. With the way you two were eye-fucking each other, I just assumed.”
Rose blinked in shock. “Eye—what? What does that even mean?”
Aaron turned around and walked toward the wall of computer screens. “Let me check the cameras one more time, and then, we can head up.”
“Head up to…where?” Rose repeated bewilderedly.
“To the cemetery,” Aaron said as he typed. He cast a quick glance back at her and added in explanation, “I didn’t really bring you here to seduce you.”
Rose flashed a sarcastic smile. “I assumed you didn’t.”
He returned his gaze to the multitude of computer screens that covered his wall, the different views of the Tomb of the Blood switching and changing as he clicked the mouse. “Last night, you helped Kara guard the cemetery,” he said as h
e continued clicking. “You will help me guard the cemetery tonight.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You are guarding the cemetery? I’m impressed,” she said caustically. “I figured you were too prissy to do your own dirty work.”
Aaron straightened, his hands freezing above the keyboard. For nearly a full minute, he didn’t move or speak. Then, finally, he finished typing what he’d been typing into the computer and turned back toward her. He leaned against the desk and crossed his arms, watching her with narrowed, black eyes. “I do usually order other people to do it,” he said, his voice clipped. “There is a weekly rotation for it. But I can’t trust anyone anymore. There are traitors at the Tomb of Blood, and I can’t allow people I don’t trust to guard our entrance.”
Rose frowned at him. “And you trust…me?”
“I wouldn’t have asked for your help, if I didn’t,” Aaron stated.
“But why?” Rose asked bewilderedly. “You just met me.”
“Because your decisions are not motivated by fear. If they were, you wouldn’t say half the shit you say,” Aaron said. He pushed away from the desk and walked past her. “I can’t trust people whose decisions are motivated by fear.”
“Oh,” Rose said, still confused.
“Come,” Aaron called from the tunnel. “It’s nightfall.”
16
The Beginnings of War
“So,” Rose said awkwardly, breaking the silence, “where are you from?”
Aaron hadn’t said a word since they’d left his room. Currently, he leaned against the side of an old crypt, his arms crossed across his chest, his black eyes unreadable, as he stared at her. Rose shifted from one foot to the other, the snow and dirt slushing and crackling under her shoes, as she waited for Aaron to avert his cold, dark gaze from her. But he never did. He just continued to stare at her.
“Come on. We have to talk about something,” Rose sighed, glancing around at the eerily silent cemetery. The moonlight bathed the cemetery in a soft, pale blue, creating a creepy yet beautiful scene. “It’s as silent as a grave out here.”
Aaron didn’t even react. He just continued to stare at her.
She scowled. “Get it? As silent as a grave? It’s a play on words…”
“I’m over four thousand years old, Rose,” he said suddenly, his thickly accented voice harshly punctuating the silence. “I know what word play is.”
Rose gasped, clasping her hand over her heart, “He speaks!”
His lips twitched. “Where do you think I’m from?”
She shrugged. “Aaron is a Hebrew name. Are you Jewish?”
“I’m much older than that,” Aaron corrected, still staring at her. “I believe my descendants would have been Jewish, though…if they had survived.”
He had said that last part so quietly that Rose wasn’t sure if he’d meant for her to hear it. But she did hear it, and her eyes widened at the revelation.
“What happened?” she blurted before she could stop herself.
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t know what you’re referring to.”
“You had children,” Rose stated, “but something happened to them.”
“I never said that,” Aaron said coldly.
“You look too young to have children,” Rose commented.
He snorted at that. “I was nineteen when I died. In my village, boys were considered men at the age of thirteen. I was plenty old enough to have children.”
“Hmm,” she said thoughtfully. “In my culture, boys are still making ‘that’s-what-she-said’ jokes at thirteen. But then again, Erik is thirteen hundred years old, and he still makes those jokes. So, maybe that’s not much of a tell, after all.”
“I have no interest in discussing my children with you,” Aaron stated.
Rose lifted her eyebrows. “Then, you did have children.”
A low, terrifying growl sounded from Aaron’s throat, the sound so powerful that the crypt seemed to shake behind him. He stepped forward so quickly and so threateningly that Rose instinctually stumbled backward, falling against the tall, creepy angel statue behind her. Aaron cornered her against it.
“Since you’re so curious, allow me to tell you something about myself,” he snarled, his curly, black hair falling over his face as he leaned closer. “I don’t answer questions.” He enunciated the words slowly, harshly. “I give orders.”
“Really?” Rose asked sharply. “I would’ve assumed that a megalomaniac like you would enjoy talking about yourself.” She lifted an eyebrow. “Unless, of course, the information isn’t exactly complimentary to your ego. Is that what it is, Aaron? Did you fail your children somehow? Was it your fault they died?”
His reaction was so quick that even with her sensitive, vampire eyesight, she still didn’t notice that he’d moved until his hand was already around her neck. “If you were anyone else,” he growled, “I would tear off your head right now.”
Rose felt her heart pounding throughout her entire body, rapidly and harshly, adrenaline-filled terror coursing through her. Her lungs refused to inflate and deflate, burning from the lack of oxygen. “What’s different about me?”
He stared down at her for a moment, his head tilting to the side, as if he found her behavior intriguing somehow. “You’re too valuable to me,” he said.
Rose blinked in shock. When he finally released her and stepped back, she raised her hand to touch her sore, bruised neck. She watched him with a frown as he leaned against the wall again, as if she’d never asked that question, as if he’d never attacked her. “What do you mean by that? How am I valuable?”
“You are powerful,” Aaron said, not even a hint of emotion in his voice. “In four thousand years, I have never encountered anyone as powerful as you.”
“You don’t even know what kind of power I have,” Rose reminded him.
He laughed, “That’s where you’re wrong. I know more about you than you think I do.” He smiled. “Theron wasn’t the only person with an interest in you, Rose, and he wasn’t the only one stalking you. I know all about your power.”
Her blood ran cold. “Then,” she stammered, inhaling sharply. “Then, you already know. You know what I am. You just…pretended not to know.”
“The morgue—the one Theron took you to, the place where he tortured you—it’s not even there anymore. It collapsed…as if it’d been torn down by a storm. Every vampire inside burned. There is only one kind of power that could cause that kind of damage,” Aaron said. “How could you think I wouldn’t know?”
“I was told that you’ve killed people like me,” Rose told him.
“And yet, you still came,” Aaron said. “See, that is why I need you.”
She frowned at him. “I don’t understand.”
“You were terrified just now,” Aaron stated, an amused smile curving at his lips, “when I attacked you. I could smell the adrenaline in your blood.”
“There are several emotions that can trigger an adrenaline rush, actually,” Rose informed him. “Anger is one of them, and I was pretty freaking angry.”
“Yes, you were,” Aaron agreed, “but you were also terrified.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Fine. Maybe I was. What is your point?”
“You are unfazed by fear. You act on your will, rather than out of fear. Do you know how rare that is?” Aaron asked. “Most of my followers are only loyal to me because they are afraid of me. Kara is the only one who is different.”
Rose nodded, remembering what Erik had said about Vikings—that they valued strength in their leaders, that they valued leaders that protected their people at all costs. Aaron fit that bill. “She is loyal because she respects you.”
“Kara can’t be intimidated,” Aaron explained. “She was a female warrior in a time of male warriors. She was a lesbian in a time period in which that was considered a sickness…a perversion. She loved Alana, of all people. If she could be intimidated, she never would have survived. That’s what makes her valuable.”
“That and
the fact that she does your dirty work,” Rose muttered.
“Yes, her skills are valuable as well,” he confirmed. “People ask why I trust her, why I keep her as my second-in-command, when I know that she lies to me, that she breaks the rules. Well, that is the reason. It’s because she is the only vampire in this colony that won’t turn on me at the first sight of danger.”
She nodded. “And you think that I’m like that, too?”
“Perhaps,” Aaron said, tilting his head curiously.
“What makes you think I would ever be loyal to you?” Rose asked.
Aaron shrugged. “Maybe I could earn your loyalty somehow.”
“I doubt it,” Rose said sharply. “Besides, what would it matter if you did? As soon as all of this is over, Kallias, Erik, and I will leave. You know that.”
“I know that Kallias will leave,” Aaron agreed, “and Erik will probably leave, too. But you don’t have to go with them. You could stay. You should stay.”
“I should?” she repeated, bristling. “Why should I?”
“I think that it would be good for you,” Aaron said.
Rose frowned at that. “How so?”
Aaron pushed away from the wall and approached her, his inky curls falling forward over his dark eyes as he leaned toward her, close enough to touch her. “You’re so repressed,” he growled softly. “You’re ashamed of what you are, afraid of it even. You’re terrified of your own power. You’re terrified of your hunger, your passion, your sexuality, your strength, your darkness. You repress yourself. You bury it all deep inside. And that is no way for an immortal to live.”
She lifted her chin, her eyes flashing. “Of course I am afraid of it. Of course I bury it,” she snapped. “Have you seen what happens when I don’t?”
“Yes,” Aaron said with a smile, “and it’s impressive.”
Rose shook her head, frustrated that he didn’t understand. “Why do you think that staying at the Tomb of Blood would change that?” she asked curiously.
“The vampires here embrace what they are,” Aaron told her. “You don’t have to pretend to be human when you’re here. You don’t have to pretend to be normal. You can embrace your hunger, your passion, your urges, your needs…”
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