Salvation of the Damned

by Theresa Meyers

  Eva might be confused on how she knew him, but Raphael knew only too well. While the scent of her blood had driven him across the globe to find her this night, the connection he’d recognized the moment he’d stared into those beautiful blue eyes had razored him to the core. More immortal than time, Eva—the soul that was Eva in this life—was none other than his beloved Isabeau come back to him.

  The realization had been both divine elation and ultimate torture. She was so close; he wanted to crush her to him. But in her fragile human form, she’d die, again. How could the universe be so cruel as to ask him to sacrifice the one soul with whom he shared a bond for the survival of his kind—not once, but twice in his interminable existence?

  How many millennia had he performed the steps of this dance to save his kind? And yet to save them all, he had sacrificed her before—and would again.

  But the very human urge to kiss her, to hold her against him and feel the heat of her body, warred with his need for survival. He’d vowed when he lost Isabeau he’d never allow himself to be seduced by the sacrifice again. He had ached for too many centuries and, even now, felt as if his stone-still heart had fractured and was beginning to crumble within his chest. Eva bit her lip; the rosy blush it caused made him ache and burn.

  “Why do I feel like I know you?” Her gaze raked over him, and he felt the temperature kick up a notch as she blushed.

  Raphael cleared his throat, trying to ease the discomfort and intense thirst and hunger she created in him. It was like offering up a prime rib to a starving man and asking him to ignore it. Had he not been on so important, so critical a mission, or damn it, had even a little more time, he would have given her the most incredible experience of her life, and drank enough to sample the elixir she so carelessly flaunted before him every time her skin became pink and flushed.

  He pinned his gaze on her, willing her to believe him. “We’ve met before. You just don’t remember me. But I could never forget you.”

  Eva leaned forward, her breath shallow, the shadowed valley between her breasts alive with her heat, her scent. Raphael gripped the edge of his seat so hard he punctured the leather with his fingertips.

  “Why don’t you come sit by me?” She rubbed her fingers across the surface of the seat by her, and the amplified rasping sound it made in his ultra-sensitive ears raked over him as though she brushed his skin.

  Damn them for making me choose. Wait—a mirthless chuckle rose in his chest and was instantly crushed—they were already damned, all of them. He most of all. He was the hunter, the finder, the seeker. The one to bring in the sacrifice to the slaughter.

  He shook the morose thought from his head. For just this moment, there could be just him and her. For whatever reason, the universe had returned Isabeau to him. He dared not question why.

  Raphael waited until he had himself under control before he shifted seats in the moving vehicle. The lights of the city, the jostle and noise of the drunken masses outside become nothing more than streaks of color. The heat radiating from her was like sitting out in the blazing sun, warming him like nothing else had in six thousand years.

  Looking into the pale blue of her eyes, he found his desire mirrored back to him. It wiped everything from his mind but her scent, her heat and the sparkling champagne-like essence that was uniquely Isabeau Montfort, now Evaline St. Croix.

  How could he have not known until now that she had been reborn? Only her scent had called to him once they approached the time of transformation. Had he known it was her he hunted, he might have refused. Refused and let all his kind die. Not likely. In his place Janus would have hunted her down.

  When he’d met Isabeau, she’d been a charming mortal plaything. At first their relationship had entertained him, but it quickly grew, consuming him as nothing had since his changing. All of it had come crashing down the night her scent began to change to that of the sacrifice. He’d known, just days before she died, that she was the one.

  It had made every minute all the more precious to know how quickly he would lose her. He’d tried to give her a lifetime of bliss in that few days. And he’d paid dearly for the next thousand years, hating his endless life and nearly losing his sanity.

  Next to him, Eva swallowed, and he watched the movement in her throat. Just. One. Taste. Need clawed, tore, leaving him to gather his shredded self-control together.

  “I’ve never met anyone like you.” The raw needy timbre of her voice echoed his own insatiable desire to have her.

  He smiled with difficulty. “And you likely never will.”

  Her pupils dilated, becoming wider, darker, sucking him in. “Would you think less of me if I told you how much I want you to kiss me?”

  Damn, it was a good thing he didn’t need to breathe. He wouldn’t have been able to. All the reserve inside him crumbled. Raphael stroked her face with the back of his fingers, exultant that for the moment, she was his and his alone.

  “Eva, my darling, you are the one I’ve waited for.”

  She blushed prettily, but all it did was inflame him further, making the desire to have her as his own, without sacrificing her, akin to physical pain, leagues beyond his deepest thirst.

  “How can you say that, when you don’t even know me?”

  “Because here—” he pointed to his chest, with its granite heart “—I know.”

  Her breathing changed, becoming fast little puffs, and her eyes half shuttered by the fringe of long dark lashes. He moved slowly, afraid to frighten her. Afraid to hurt her. Afraid he might give in to the need that sliced through him.

  But the moment their lips touched, he was the one carved in two. The fire of her split through him, branding him with her essence.

  Together they were ice and heat. No wonder there was steam. Her kiss became more insistent, demanding he open his mouth, the slick heat of her tongue pressing like a red-hot ember to his lips.

  But he didn’t dare.

  The venom that had flooded his system the moment he’d sniffed her out was already pulsing, aching for freedom under his marble-like skin. Vampires might be immune to nearly everything, but need was not one of them.

  And he needed her. Like the blood that sustained him, but more. The spark within her, the essence that was Isabeau, Eva, reached in like a blazing light in the darkness, making it easy to forget the monster he had been for too long.

  Perhaps death with her was better than an eternity of damnation? Perhaps if he changed her, she would bring that light with her. But could she transform him?

  Her long fingers threaded through his hair, fisting in the long strands, holding him there. He could not let the venom loose, but he could pleasure her all the same before she was no longer his.

  The thought struck deeper and sharper than any stake. All he had with her was this moment. And then this fragile bit of light would be lost to him again, perhaps this time, for all eternity.

  He carefully pulled her to him. His hand skimmed over the bare hot silk of her skin, following her spine. She shivered, and his heightened senses heard every tiny hair lift on her skin, felt the shift in the air as her body shuddered in his arms. The soft, wet lushness of her mouth pressed against his skin, firing him from the inside out.

  “Why won’t you kiss me?” Her whisper so alive with her heat, it formed a caress along his jaw and cheek, her hands branding his chest as they moved beneath his shirt.

  He chuckled, driven to focus on her, her pleasure, while he restrained the bloodlust beating inside him from harming her. “I am kissing you.” He caressed her shoulder and her head fell back, exposing the throbbing creamy pink skin of her neck, each pulse an invitation to indulge himself. He inhaled, immersing himself in her scent as he trailed kisses from the tip of her chin down to the pulse that screamed at him for release.

  Every hard fiber of his being fought for control. Alive and ultimately aware for the first time in eons.

  Eva moved closer, pressing herself still closer against the solidness of his chest and arms. H
is magical fingers released the zipper and miniscule hooks that fastened her gown and strapless black bra, slipping in between her and the fabric to caress her sides and trace the curve of her breasts.

  His cool touch, so smooth it felt like someone sliding cold satin over her bare skin, a direct contradiction to the liquid heat filling her, made Eva gasp, made her pulse and ache to feel his touch.

  “I need…” But he was already there, the pad of his thumb brushing against her tightened peaks before she had said the words. As if he had read her thoughts.

  Which made Eva’s imagination take flight, as he caressed and kneaded her buttocks with strong, sure hands, bringing her across him to straddle his lap. The heat of his tongue, warmer than his touch, swirling over her breast drew points of light shimmering from all parts of her to focus on the sensation. She growled, deep and low in her throat, unable to stop the intense pleasure he released in her.

  She rocked her hips back against him, aware of the hard ridge pressed intimately against her wet heat, then bent and bit at the skin of his neck.

  He bucked beneath her, blowing out a harsh, rattled sound. The sound of a man fighting for ultimate control. “Careful Eva. Otherwise you may end up not having a dress when we get to the party.”

  She wriggled over the ridge, pressing down on it to sooth the pulsing need. “And why would that be?”

  He locked his gaze with hers, his eyes hot molten gold. “I want to tear it off of you with my teeth. But I think I’d better not.”

  She licked her lips, smoothing the taste of him with her tongue. “Afraid I might bite you back?”

  He tensed beneath her. He’d nearly grazed her delicate skin with his venomous teeth when he’d laved her. So close to taking his fix from her rich offering, coursing in the little blue lines beneath her pale skin. He looked her in the eye, carefully pulling her dress back around her to cover the temptation. He forced himself to focus on his duty to bring her back as a mortal. “Have you not guessed what I am?”

  She seemed a bit put out that he’d pulled away from her. “You’re dressed like a vampire.”

  He paused, then did something he never intended to do. He let the venom flow, ache and fill his mouth with its almond-like flavor, then pulled back his lips in a slow smile that revealed his elongated fangs. “I’ve no need to wear a costume.”

  He expected her to scream, to possibly draw back. She gasped, but her eyes glittered, not with fear but with excitement.

  “I’ve always wondered if it were possible.” She reached forward, her fingers outstretched to stroke one of his teeth. He grasped her hand, holding her back.

  “It’s not the teeth that harm, it’s the venom. Best for you not to touch unless you are ready to exchange the life you know for one you don’t.”

  Eva tipped her chin upward, leveling her gaze at him. “How do you know I don’t?”

  How in the hell was he supposed to resist when she offered herself so prettily to him? Duty. But if he sacrificed her, she would be lost to him once more. There was no need to worry about damnation when he’d already experienced that hellish existence of living on without her.

  “You don’t know what it’s like. Difficult to want something you know nothing about.”

  “Then tell me. When were you changed, how did it happen? What does it feel like? How do you survive? All of it. I want to know.”

  Raphael wished he had the time to indulge her. There were so many things he wanted to say, to do with her.

  Janus’s voice intruded. Time is growing short. Where are you?

  Nearly at the gate.

  “You don’t really want a history lesson now.”

  Eva’s eyes narrowed. Determined. “I want to know.”

  Raphael sighed. It was only natural that, as brave as she was, she should be so curious. He would stick with the most critical facts, the things he had to tell her to help her understand, and skim the rest.

  “Vampires are a far older race than you imagine.”

  “Aren’t you immortal? That’s about as old as you can get.”

  He chuckled. “I suppose to you it might seem like it. But no, we’re not. Ten thousand years ago, in the time when men knew their gods, a wise man named Siphidius so honored the gods that they offered him eternal life. He took the gift, not realizing the bull-god who offered it would make him in his image, demanding blood sacrifice. The horns of the bull you see in Mesopotamia, in Crete? They are no more than the fangs we have in a different form. He drank the elixir of everlasting life, which we now know is the venom of all vampires.”

  She twisted her hair about her fingers, and he stared at the dark silken curl, wishing he could bury himself in her. Only her insistent curiosity and his duty to the others held him in check.

  “Then how can you not be immortal?”

  He leaned back, trying to distance himself from her so he wouldn’t be so affected by her mere presence—as if that could do him any good now that he’d tasted her skin and felt her flesh. “Like I said, we’re not. All gods have a breaking point. Over the centuries Siphidius became too great a king, wanting to conquer the world and become a god himself. It pissed off the gods, naturally. One doesn’t ever expect one’s creation to become an upstart, even though it happens all the time. So they sent a plague to kill the vampires, and it did kill almost all of them, save Janus.”

  Without being aware of what she was doing, she’d leaned in closer to him, her eyes bright and eager, curiosity getting the better of her. He wanted to grab her, but he dared not touch her again. Next time, he’d have no control.

  “And it’s come back?”

  “Every thousand years, it is the same. Without a remedy, we age our true years in forty-eight hours, turning many to nothing but bone dust—wiping out nearly the entire species, except for those few who remained latent carriers to all their spawn. Only a marginal number of us survive, but the disease still lingers.”

  “How awful!”

  Her face crumpled and a twinge of anger pierced his heart. Despite all the years, living forever wasn’t as blissful as it seemed to those who craved, yet feared it. Friends and loved ones died away and too soon, in mere decades, a newborn was left alone, with only others of his kind for companionship. Love with a mortal was out of the question, unless one didn’t plan to eat and was willing to suffer the all-too-brief existence of the relationship.

  But this was different. Far different. Eva, the soul of his Isabeau reborn, would claim his heart no matter how many millennia separated them. He was destined to be alone, knowing he could never be with the one soul who clearly completed him. “A cost for living as long as we do.”

  “But what about sunshine and stakes? Doesn’t that kill you?”

  “And I suppose you believe all that nonsense about holy water, crosses and garlic too?”

  Her eyes widened.

  “I thought so. You must forget what you think you know. Forget the silly fictional accounts you’ve been spoon-fed. We are dangerous, Eva. Much more so than you can possibly imagine. As much as I want you. I—”

  “You already have someone.”

  “No!”

  Her head tipped to the side. “Then what’s stopping you?”

  “My family. I need—they need you.”

  The dark blue ring around her pupils grew wider, taking over the paler blue. “You make it sound like I have the power of life and death. I’m nothing special.”

  He placed a hand on her, willing her to understand. “Oh, but you are, in ways you can’t even fathom. We’ve waited a thousand years for you, Eva.”

  The rosy color that he loved left, leaving her pale beneath her lightly bronzed skin. “But why?”

  “You are the only one who can save us.”

  Chapter Three

  “Me?” Eva laughed, hoping the nervous, strained edge of her forced humor didn’t betray her inner lack of confidence. What if this was what she was meant for? What if she were hoping it was so much, that she was fooling herself into be
lieving anything he said? “I’m an accountant. I crunch numbers. I don’t see myself in a crimson cape saving anybody one digit at a time.”

  The golden color of his eyes deepened, darkened as he scanned her features. “As much as I would like to simply tell you what you are—” he closed his eyes, took a deep breath and blew it out slowly “—I suppose the only way I can make you understand fully is to show you.”

  She didn’t move, but Eva felt herself grow emotionally smaller in defense as tension curled and eddied invisible, but palpable, in the air between them.

  She knew instinctively that whatever he was about to show her would change her life. And, as much as she craved a change, she also feared it. Although throwing this sexy-as-hell guy into the mix made it more like two parts craving and one part fear. Remembering the heat of his mouth, her breasts tightened and chafed under the fabric of her gown.

  Maybe it was closer to three parts wanting to tear into his clothes and feel every inch of him, and one part anxiety.

  The limo rolled to a stop at a driveway flanked by great columns of gray stone and a heavy, elaborately scrolled black wrought-iron gate. Through the tinted glass partition Eva saw the driver roll down his window, but couldn’t make out what he said into the security speaker.

  The massive gate opened silently on electric hinges, then the car moved smoothly up the driveway, shrouded from the moonlight by the arching branches of the towering live oaks overhead. The drive snaked in the slightly dappled darkness, past trees thick with hanging moss, and kudzu, which Eva knew overtook everything it could—nature reaching with tenacious fingers to reclaim her own.

  She shivered and rubbed her bare arms. Kudzu was nothing like what was happening to her tonight. Raphael wasn’t going to “claim” her. Not against her will anyway.

  Had it not all seemed so surreal already, and Raphael such a distraction on every level, Eva would have felt more on edge.