Over the months, he’d experienced Anne’s many moods but this one wasn’t familiar. She must’ve had monthlies before, but she hadn’t fussed or seemed so delicate. Maybe the emotional upset intensified the experience or so Ned thought and offered what comfort he could. “Okay. Can I do anything? Or get you something?”
Her wild hair bounced as she nodded. “Thanks. I already took some ibuprofen. I know I promised to make something to eat, but I don’t feel much like cooking now.”
“So you want me to go pick up something? I’d be happy to,” Ned said. He loved Anne but her apartment always inspired a claustrophobic reaction. After the volatile scene earlier, he could use an infusion of clear, cold air and a few minutes under the open sky.
Anne shook her head. “No, I don’t want you to go. There’s soup in the cabinet and some stuff in the freezer. I think there’s boxed lasagna we could share and some grilled chicken breasts, unless you want soup.”
Ned didn’t want soup or any of the other things she offered. His culinary skills were better suited toward cooking fresh game over a campfire, but he’d do it for Anne. “Tell me what you want and I’ll get it heated,” he said. “I’m good with whatever you’d like.”
She chose soup and Ned managed to warm it. Anne came to the table so he served her a bowl with saltines on the side. Anne sat stared at the empty space in front of him. “Aren’t you eating any?”
He’d just learned to eat chicken and he didn’t do soup. And he didn’t even need to eat unless he craved something. “Naw, I’m good. I’m not hungry, honey.”
“If you wanted something else, you should’ve said so.” Damn, he’d swear her eyes brimmed with tears. “Anne, I would’ve if I did.”
Anne blinked and one tear rolled in slow motion down her cheek. “If you want to go get a hamburger or something, go ahead.”
She’d never seemed so vulnerable. “I don’t, honey. Is something else wrong? You’re awful upset.”
“I know,” she wailed and put down her spoon. “It’s just everything, the weather, and all the crazy stuff you said…”
“I thought we were going to forget all that.”
“I’m trying. It’s got me all worked up, Ned.”
Dealing with an emotionally wrought woman wasn’t part of his expertise. His long-ago wife, the sole other woman he’d been this close to, had been stoic and strong. Ned could count on one hand the times he’d comforted her. He’d soothed his children more often than he had Aiyana so he drew on those memories. In a gentle tone, he said, “Go ahead and eat. I bet you’ll feel better if you do.”
After a moment, she began to eat the soup and he watched, concerned and confused. Ned wanted to ease her anguish. Something he’d never ached to do this much for anyone. I really love her, but what future can we have if she goes crazy and cries when I tell her the truth? I don’t know but I’ll hang around to see.
Ned offered his presence as he sat with her at the table but he gave Anne the space she seemed to need, too. He said little because she appeared to be in a reflective mood. When she wanted to talk, he’d listen and if she wanted him to speak, he would. Unlike most modern people he observed he possessed the ability to be still. It served him well through the meal. Afterward Anne regained a little color in her cheeks and her face wasn’t as drawn. “Thanks, Ned,” she said. “The soup was just what I needed.”
“I’m glad. You want to watch a movie or some TV?”
Anne shook her head. “I don’t think so. I’d like to curl up in bed, I think.”
He could take a hint and he wasn’t offended. “Then I’ll take off and head home, I guess.”
She stretched out her hand to him. “No, I’d like you to stay. I don’t, well, we can’t make love, but would you hold me for a while?”
Her eyes met his, open and trusting. Blindsided by her mercurial mood swings, Ned sighed. Earlier, she’d said not to touch her but something had changed so he took Anne’s hand. “Sure, honey.”
“Then let’s go to my bed.”
He almost groaned. For a man who’d lived almost celibate for decades, Ned enjoyed their active sex life. To lie with Anne and be unable to succumb to desire challenged his self-control. He wanted to stroke her, lick her, kiss and touch her. His cock throbbed with want at the idea and he’d have to deny release or upset her. The woman doesn’t know what she’s asking of me and until now I never knew how much restraint I could have. As a warrior, he’d known discipline. He could do this, but he wouldn’t like it. “All right, Anne.”
Her bed teemed with pillows and a lace-trimmed comforter, which she turned down. Unlike his mattress, hers yielded to their bodies with soft decadence. The bedroom smelled of sweet potpourri and perfume. Worst of all for Ned, the bedroom lacked windows. He preferred to be able to look out, if not escape. For Anne’s sake, he accepted the situation and removed his boots. Anne curled up on one side of the bed so he lay down behind her. She wiggled tight until her back rested against him. Ned put one arm around her. Her taut muscles eased as she relaxed. “Can you pull the covers up?” she asked, so he did. “Thanks, that’s nice and cozy. Are you comfortable?”
Ned was anything but. Her proximity and warm body pressed against Ned stirred up every wanton desire possible. The soft lavender scent mingled with her natural body musk to rouse his senses. At this range, he heard the quiet swoosh of her blood through her arteries and veins. Her breath reminded him of wind rushing through the tall prairie grasses and her heartbeat thumped the rhythm of the drum. Temptation reared within, hard to deny, but Ned resisted. And he lied. “Yes. Are you?”
“Very.”
Good thing someone could be. “Feel any better?”
“A little bit. How’s your head?”
For a moment, he had no notion what she was talking about, then remembered how he’d felt before he took the blood. “Aw, it’s fine. I about forgot about it, with everything else and you not feeling so hot.”
Anne didn’t respond for a long minute. Maybe he shouldn’t have reminded her about ‘everything else’. “Ned?” she said after the silence. “Would you tell me a story about Pea’hocso?”
What in the hell? He’d told her he was a vampire as well as Pea’hocso. She refused to accept either and didn’t want to talk about the subject. Now she wanted to hear a tale? With a dick so stiff, the damn thing hurt, Ned wasn’t much into telling stories. He opened his mouth to refuse and then realized it might take his mind over his overwhelming desire. “Sure, if you want. What do you want to hear about?”
“You were told stories handed down, right?”
“Uh, yeah, pretty close.”
“So tell me about what it must’ve been like to be a wild Comanche warrior. I’ve studied it, I teach it, but the reality escapes me. I’ve watched you and I’ve learned so much more about how it would’ve been, but will you tell me?”
“All right, sure.” Ned thought back to the long ago, when he remained human and free. “I’ll tell you about a buffalo hunt, about the ta’siwoo. Will that work?”
“It’s perfect.”
“You teach this so you probably know most of this…”
“Tell me anyway.”
“Okay.” Ned gathered his memories, collected his thoughts, and began. Because he tended to think in Comanche, especially when he recalled the past, Ned spoke the way he recalled the elders had when they told stories and used a more formal cadence. “At the time before everything turned bad and the white men took over everything, the buffalo provided almost everything to the people. We, uh, they ate their meat, used their hides and robes to keep warm and for our lodges. The bones became knives or scrapers. There wasn’t any part of the animal that wasn’t put to use. A good buffalo hunt made the difference between going hungry and having plenty so it could mean life or death. One autumn, winter came early and the people weren’t prepared. Scouts went out, Pea’hocso with them to find the herd but they came back and hadn’t seen a single animal. They searched for three more days but foun
d nothing.”
“By then, Pea’hocso’s children cried with hunger and his wife, carrying another baby within her belly, lay on her buffalo hide and said little. So the people decided they must hold a Ta’siwoonubka.”
“That’s the buffalo dance, isn’t it? Sometimes called ‘the horn dance’ too?”
“Yes,” Ned said. Her question interrupted his flow, but he caught his breath and began again. “They gathered at the central fire and divided up, men and women. The dancers came from different sides to join. Usually there were eight drummers and singers who set the rhythms. At first the drum beat slowly, then the music stopped. People whooped and shouted, then the drums increased. Everyone went to the center, by the fire and then they danced back. The head man dancer sometimes would tap the ones watching and they had to dance too. Then they’d sing to call the buffalo. So this time, the people did the dance and then slept. And Pea’hocso dreamed of the buffalo herd. He saw it spread over the grasses and knew where they’d find them. In the morning, he rode out with the other warriors to hunt but when they wanted to go west, he insisted they turn south of the Red River. Pea’hocso rode out ahead of the rest of the party to scout buffalo. And he found the herd just as in his dream.”
He remembered it so well, even after more than a century. Frost rimmed the ground as he rode his horse over the open country. He called his paint stallion Sarii or ‘Dog’ because the animal’s back was as speckled as a pup. It’d been so cold the blue sky loomed above, deeper and brighter than usual. A few clouds drifted over the sun’s face and cast running shadows across the ground. Pea’hocso caught the scent of the herd more than a mile away. He recognized the gamey, thick smell, unique to tasiwoo and wanted to whoop with delight. He didn’t, though. Sound carried and he could spook the creatures. Instead, he sat astride Sarii and waited.
Even now, so long afterward, he hadn’t forgotten the magnificent sight of thousands of wooly buffalo grazing from one edge of the horizon to the other. Although he’d seen them before, many times, he would remember because this was the last time Pea’hocso saw such numbers. After this hunt, the white settlers encroached deeper into Comanche country and the blue-coated soldiers followed. So did the Texas Rangers, a group of white men, many no more than boys, who followed the Comanches to make war. None of the newcomers were like the first whites Pea’hocso saw. They’d been seasoned plainsmen and traders, men who knew the country almost as well as the people, the Comanche. The ones arriving weren’t prepared. They had no clue about the land or the weather, the snakes or the storms. But they were united in hating the people who’d been here forever.
But on the day he recalled, the white people, the list makers, were far from his thoughts. Pea’hocso watched the herd with quiet pleasure. His family would eat through the winter and be warm. When the others caught up to him, they paused as he did to savor the majesty of the great animals, then they rode into the midst of them. Buffalo scattered as the wild warriors chased them. Pea’hocso chose a magnificent animal, a bull. He fancied the meat, but wanted the massive head to make a buffalo horned headdress. Such were few and often reserved for leaders and shamans but if he could take down this animal, he would claim it.
Without fear, with daring and skill, Pea’hocso chased the bull away from the rest of the herd. He rode it down and came in close. He fired a rapid series of arrows from his bow and his aim proved deadly and he brought down the buffalo with an arrow through the heart, another through the lung. It ran farther before it slowed, then stopped and dropped to the ground. Whooping and shouting, Pea’hocso claimed it and when they returned to the village, they brought plenty of meat, hides, and more.
He ended up with the horned headdress he’d wanted, too. The leaders granted it to him for his courage and cunning. Aiyana made beadwork to decorate the forehead of the buffalo as it became headgear and Pea’hocso attached a pair of eagle feathers, one on either side of the bonnet. He wore it on special occasions but when he did, he could feel the power of the animal.
Ned told the story and relived it. Anne didn’t interrupt and he thought she listened with an avid ear. When he finished, he wished he still had the headdress and said so, without thinking. “Too bad I still don’t have it,” he said. “It’d be something worth keeping.”
Until Anne stirred, her body warm against his, he’d almost forgotten his desire. It surged back with force as a light laugh shook her. “Thank you, Ned. You made it sound like you were there. You tell a good story and now I’m so sleepy.”
Emotions raw from remembrance, Ned adjusted his position so he could rub her back with a gentle motion. “I was,” he said, voice quiet. “I was there.”
Anne exhaled as her breathing shifted into sleep mode. When she failed to respond, he realized she hadn’t heard what she said. He didn’t move, but held her into the night, remained in position until his limbs grew stiff as he remembered his long ago. He missed those times but he liked the present well enough and loved Anne.
If he weren’t a vampire, things would be as close to perfect as he’d ever known them.
Chapter Nine
Ned predicted a cold, snowy winter season. The signs were all present, thicker coats on fur bearing animals, cloud patterns, a heavy crop of nuts and when he’d cut through the skin of a ripe persimmon, he found a spoon, not a fork. All were signs of a hard winter coming. But Anne had laughed at him. “I think I’ll listen to the meteorologists on television,” she told Ned. “They’re calling for unseasonably warm weather.” After the blood drive, however, the weather turned chill and nasty.
Between the end of autumn and the first day of winter, snow, sleet, and freezing rain fell at various times over the Lawton area. On days when temperatures climbed out of the thirties, downpours drenched the region. Every night at the casino, Ned listened to the cacophony of sneezing, hacking, and sniffing. Almost everyone else came down with a cold, the flu, or suffered sinus trouble. Gary missed three nights, sick with bronchitis and returned still croupy. Since Ned never fell ill, he worked a lot of extra shifts, but in mid-December he decided to call in sick. He wasn’t, but the clouds moving in from the west were pregnant with snow and his bones told him it’d be a major blizzard. Ned planned to hunker down and wait out the storm but he needed two things first: some blood, and Anne.
When he got off work, around six on Friday morning, Ned noted the storm front to the west. Battleship gray, it appeared as tall as a mountain range, the clouds heavy laden. A rising wind rifled his hair and he sniffed, certain he could smell the coming snow. Ned scanned the parking lots, almost empty at the early hour and spotted a lone woman walking with hurried steps to her vehicle. He trailed her and caught up as she fumbled to unlock her Bronco.
“Ma’am?” he asked as he plastered a faux smile across his face.
She whirled, the keys caught between the fingers of her right hand. He’d seen the pose before, one meant to provide self-defense. “Yes?”
Ned assessed her. Medium-height, ash blonde hair, green eyes, and enough lines in her face he pegged her age as late forties. If he didn’t spook her, their encounter would be brief. “I work here and I think you might’ve dropped this.”
He dangled a player’s club card on a lanyard from one hand. She peered at it then pawed at her neck. Her fingers grasped a red cord and she pulled up her card. “No, no, I’ve got mine.”
“Let me see,” Ned said. His gaze intersected hers and locked. He leaned forward to inspect the thin plastic square and brushed her hair back from her throat. “I think it’s tangled.”
When she bent forward, pawing to get free, Ned nailed the traditional spot on her neck. He’d learned to drink with such finesse most of his donors never noticed and this one didn’t. Within a few moments, he’d taken his fill and straightened her lanyard. “Okay,” he said.
For the first time since he’d approached, she smiled, her edginess vanished. “Thanks, anyway,” she said. “And be careful. It sure looks like snow.”
“I will,” he p
romised. He headed for Anne’s apartment and by the time he parked, the first snowflakes sifted like powdered sugar over everything. A sharp wind blew with enough force to make the bare bushes on either side of the building’s entrance rattle with a skeletal sound. Ned used the key Anne had given him to enter and discovered her still asleep.
He tickled the bare foot dangled out from beneath the covers and she reacted with a shriek. Anne kicked with force until Ned laughed then she blinked up at him. In a drowsy voice, she asked, “What’re you doing here so early?”
He sat on the edge of the bed. “I came to kidnap you.”
Confusion wrinkled her forehead. “What?”
“It’s snowing and it’s going to be a major storm. I want to take you home with me. I’ve got the fireplace so we’ll stay warm and thanks to you, I’ve got plenty of food. I don’t want you snowed in alone, especially if the power goes out.”
Anne scooted until she had her back propped against the pillows. “Do you think it will?”
“I think it’s likely. Get your stuff, whatever you need for a few days and let’s go.”
Her hand cupped his cheek, warm against his ever-cold skin. “I teach three classes today, Ned. I’ll go afterward, I promise.”
“If you wait much longer, you won’t even be able to drive to the college. It’s really coming down and I wouldn’t doubt they’ll call off school. Don’t they do that, if it’s bad weather?” Ned knew in theory they did. He’d listened as many single mothers griped about their lack of childcare when the schools closed for snow.
“Well, yeah, sure … but is it really snowing so much?”
“Yes. I’ll go make coffee. Get dressed and ready.”
“Ned?”
He was halfway through the bedroom door but turned. “What?”
She beamed at him. “You’re the most romantic man, Ned. All right, I’ll call the dean and tell her I’m not coming and then you can kidnap me. Is it cold?”
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