The Bite Before Christmas

by Heidi Betts

Then he was lifting her, swinging her around, and sweeping an arm across his desk, sending boxes clattering to the floor. Thank goodness everyone else had already gone home, otherwise the noise would surely have brought their coworkers running and given them quite an eyeful.

  He laid her back across the flat surface, his mouth going immediately to her breasts. Pleasure shot through her and she wiggled against the glass, wanting more, wanting everything.

  She tore at his shirt, opening it the same way he’d opened hers—except for a few lost buttons—so that she could get to his magnificent chest. It was as warm and smooth as she’d imagined, her fingers tracing the hard planes of his pectorals, his rib cage, his abdomen. She teased his tiny male nipples, giving him a taste of the sweet torture he was working on her.

  And then she reached for his belt and zipper, pushing his pants and underwear down just far enough to free him to her touch.

  He groaned as her fingers closed around his engorged sex, squeezing, stroking.

  “Enough,” he panted, tearing his mouth from her breasts to part her legs and draw her closer. Grasping his throbbing cock, he lined himself up with her opening and pressed home.

  One long, hard thrust and he filled her, leaving them both gasping for breath. For a moment, neither of them moved, absorbing the sensations of their joined bodies, trying not to go off like rockets too soon.

  Sean kissed her neck, nibbled the lobe of her ear. “If I’d known you’d feel this good,” he whispered, “I’d have bent you over my desk a hell of a lot sooner.”

  She chuckled, the sound coming out breathless and strained. She’d only been hinting for him to do just that for going on two years now. Too bad it had taken a terminal illness and her emotional breakdown for him to open his eyes and see that she was more than willing and not the type to file a sexual harassment complaint. On the contrary; she’d wondered if she could report him for not sexually harassing her.

  But all she said now was, “You feel good, too.” Better than good. And better than in any of her many fantasies, which had been pretty darn amazing at times.

  “It’s about to get even better.”

  He drew her up, hands at her back under her blouse, his tongue sweeping inside her mouth to tangle with her own. She clutched his shoulders, rubbing her breasts against his chest, locking her ankles at his hips to hold him where she wanted him most.

  But that didn’t keep him from moving, from pulling back slightly and then sliding back in. Withdrawing even farther, then filling her again.

  Each movement sent frissions of pleasure radiating out in every direction, making her hungry for more and more and more. Harder, faster, deeper. Please.

  And he gave them to her, all of them.

  Their mingled moans and heaving breaths filled the room. The edge of the glass-topped desk cut into her bum, but she couldn’t have cared less. Especially when Sean canted her hips at such an angle that he began to hit her clit with his pelvis on every downward stroke.

  “Oh, my God,” she cried out as the pressure built, as ecstasy coursed through her with each thrust of his hard length into her body. “Yes. Oh, Sean…yes!”

  Orgasm washed over her in a flood so intense, her vision went black and she screamed his name. Her climax seemed to give him permission to find his own release as he drove into her one last time, burying himself to the hilt before stiffening with a shout and spilling himself inside her.

  TYPE B

  Vivian didn’t know how long she lay there beneath Sean, her bones liquid, her heart rate slowly returning to normal, her brain a well-shaken Etch-a-Sketch. And if it weren’t for the wall-to-ceiling windows lining his corner office on two sides, reflecting the end hours of a starless night sky, she wouldn’t have had a care in the world.

  Sean lifted his head, perspiration still dotting his brow. “Are you all right?”

  All right was the understatement of the century. She was so much better than all right, they hadn’t invented a word for it yet.

  She nodded, incapable of intelligent speech just yet.

  “Well, you can’t be comfortable,” he said, levering himself off of her to tug up his slacks and straighten his clothes.

  But, oh, if only he knew. Granted, her position on the glass-topped desk might best be described as contorted and better left to those with a bit of gymnastics training or pretzel DNA, but she’d never been so comfortable. He could have twisted her into a sailor’s knot, hung her by her ankles from the nearest chandelier, and she wouldn’t have minded a bit as long as he was about to join her and do those wonderful things to her that he did with his mouth and hands and the rest of his body.

  Just thinking about them made her hot and wet all over again.

  Still, she sat up and began to rearrange her own clothes. Her legs weren’t quite steady enough to hold her, so she used the edge of the desk to prop herself up.

  “I should get you home,” he murmured, coming to stand in front of her and wipe a smear of lipstick from her cheek with his thumb.

  She nodded dumbly. It was the last thing she wanted, even though she knew it was absolutely necessary.

  “I can drive myself,” she said, her voice a near-croak scraping up from her dry, ravaged throat. “My car is in the parking garage.”

  Sean unbuttoned the top two buttons of her blouse and re-buttoned them properly, an amused grin turning up one corner of his mouth. “I’ll have someone drop it off for you later. But for tonight, I insist on taking you home myself. Never let it be said that I seduce my assistants on my desk, then send them on their way without a backward glance.”

  His comment was meant to be funny, a little joke about the impulsiveness of their actions. To Vivian, though, it hit too close to home and made her stomach seize in pain—for so many reasons.

  That he might have had affairs with other of his female assistants before she came along…. That he’d finally made her dreams come true by making love to her, only to tell her on the same night that he was dying and would likely never see her again…. That he could be so sweet and witty and charming, even in the face of so much despair, when she felt like crumpling to the floor and sobbing her heart out.

  She swallowed hard, refusing to break down in front of him. Again. If he could be strong, then so could she.

  When he offered his hand, she took it, following him across the office.

  “What about your boxes?” she asked as she paused to retrieve her shoes. She didn’t bother with her discarded panties or pantyhose, instead slipping her shoes on bare feet.

  The underwear she balled up and held behind her back until she could stuff them into her purse. Better that than leaving them for the cleaning staff to find. She would die of embarrassment if that happened, even if they didn’t have her name embroidered at the crotch.

  “I’ll pick them up later. Or have them packed up and delivered. There isn’t much in them I’ll be needing, anyway.”

  His words made her chest tighten and tears prick behind her eyes. How was it possible that she could be having the best night of her life and the worst night of her life both at the exact same time?

  With her hand still clasped in his, she let him lead her out of the office and down the hall to the elevator. They walked out of the DNN building and to his car in silence, drove through downtown Boston traffic in silence, pulled up in front of her apartment without saying a word. Sean cut the engine and made a move to get out, but Vivian stopped him with a hand on his arm.

  “You don’t have to see me up,” she told him quietly. And wasn’t sure she could handle it if he did. Inside, she was shaking and didn’t know how much longer she could hold back a complete breakdown.

  “You’re sure?” He sounded reluctant to agree, as though his chivalrous side balked at putting a woman out of his car at the curb and letting her make her own way home.

  “I’m sure,” she answered, mortified when her voice wavered. She sniffed and did her best to tamp down the emotions threatening to burst free.

&nbs
p; As though he knew how close she was to losing it, he gave a curt nod, fingers flexing on the steering wheel. Her own fingers clutched the door handle, resisting the urge to yank it and bolt.

  “I’m so sorry, Sean,” she murmured, unable to remember if she’d said as much back at the office when he’d first told her about his illness. “I wish there was something I could do.”

  He gave a sharp, self-deprecating laugh. “Yeah. Me, too.”

  “If you need anything…” She trailed off, knowing the offer sounded feeble and predictable.

  “Thanks,” he muttered in return.

  Then he turned his head, meeting her gaze. Even in the dark of the car and the surrounding night edging its way toward dawn, she had no trouble seeing the warmth and sincerity in his greenish-brown eyes.

  “I’m going to miss you, Viv. You’ve been a great assistant, and an even better friend.”

  She sucked in a breath, her throat snapping closed as the tears behind her eyes broke free to roll down her cheeks. Her chest lifted and fell, lifted and fell, and she wondered if she was on the verge of a panic attack.

  It took all of her strength, every fiber of her being not to throw her arms around him. But if she did that, she knew she would never let go. She also knew that if she didn’t get out of the car right this second, she would do just that, which would only make the situation worse.

  So without a word, she leaned forward to press one last, heartfelt kiss to the corner of his mouth before springing the door, leaping out, and racing as fast as she could for the front of her building. She didn’t look back. Wouldn’t have been able to see anything through the flood of her tears even if she had.

  And then she was out of the cold night air, pulling herself up the stairs to her apartment, unlocking the door. Once inside, she collapsed in a heap on the carpeted floor, not bothering to kick off her shoes or coat or anything else. And there she remained, sobbing uncontrollably while the dark gave way to light, the light back to dark, and the world as she knew it ceased to exist.

  “Honey, you’ve got to hush. You’re going to make yourself sick if you keep this up.”

  Vivian lay curled up on the sofa, knees pulled to her chest, face buried in her folded arms. She hadn’t stopped sobbing since Sean had dropped her off two nights before. She was only even in her bathrobe now and on the couch instead of the floor because Angelina had come by, kicked in the door, and hauled her to her feet.

  The stripping and shower Angelina had forced on her hadn’t helped. The hot tea and then cocoa Angelina had attempted to pour down her throat by the gallon hadn’t helped. And the dose of plasma Angelina had insisted would make her feel better had only made her sick to her stomach.

  “He’s dying, Ang. I love him, have loved him since the moment I met him, and now he’s dying. I’ll never see him again.”

  Never see him, never touch him, never be touched by him. And even though she fought them, she couldn’t seem to clear her head of images of his imminent death. His cold, stiff, lifeless body laid out in a satin-lined coffin. That coffin being lowered into the ground. Worms and other assorted flesh-eating insects turning his beautiful form into a zombielike corpse.

  Her friend stroked a hand through her hair, stringy from being left to air dry after her involuntary dousing and damp again at the temples from her tears.

  “Maybe,” Angelina murmured softly. “Or maybe not. It all depends on how much you love him.”

  How much she loved him? She’d been carrying a torch for him for years. Taken a job she didn’t need and would never even have considered just to be near him. Showed up early, stayed late, sometimes staying at the office ’round the clock, if she couldn’t get home before sunrise.

  “I love him more than anything,” she asserted in a watery, hiccupping voice.

  “Then turn him, sweetie.”

  Vivian’s chest hitched as she lifted her head and tried to slow her tears. It was a testament to her grief that she hadn’t thought of it herself. The idea had never even crossed her mind.

  But…

  “No, I couldn’t,” she said with a shake of her head. “He wouldn’t want that.”

  “How do you know? Have you asked him?”

  Another shake. “I know him. He wouldn’t want to live like that. He’s too proud, too human.” And had made more than a few questionable remarks about vampires along the way.

  Another reason she hadn’t declared her undying love for him sooner—she hadn’t been sure how he would react to the knowledge that he was working with a vampire. And worse, one that had the hots for him. For all she knew, he might have fired her on the spot, then called security and had her escorted from the building.

  “You never know unless you try. And talking big is always easier before one is standing eye-to-eye with the great abyss. If this fellow of yours is truly dying, facing his own mortality, he may be more than willing to consider eternal life. At least talk to him about it.”

  Oh, how she wished she could. But that would mean admitting to him that she was a vampire, and she couldn’t stand the thought of having him look at her with horror or hatred or disdain. He would see it as a betrayal, the fact that she’d worked with him for so long and never told him the truth of who—what—she was.

  “I can’t,” she said miserably.

  Her wracking sobs had subsided into silent tears trailing down her face and the occasional hitch of her chest. She was sure she looked like something the cat had dragged in. Dragged in, batted around, chomped on, devoured, and then puked back up a few hours later.

  Angelina, on the other hand, looked model perfect, as always. She perched on the edge of the sofa in a soft, copper-colored knit dress that hugged her curves like a second skin. Her jewelry was expensive but tasteful, her shoes designer and high-heeled. Her raven hair fell sleek and straight to the middle of her back, framing high cheekbones and dark, doe-shaped eyes.

  If it hadn’t been for her friend’s pure heart and kind disposition, Vivian might have been jealous. Especially at moments like these when she didn’t stand a chance of holding her own next to the Italian beauty.

  “Suit yourself, darling,” Angelina told her, still stroking her hair like a mother comforting a child. “Just know that you have options. Choices. You and he both.”

  TYPE O

  Two days later, Vivian awoke in her own bed, under her own covers. The curtains were drawn to block out any sunlight, but even so, she knew it was nighttime; she could feel it.

  A glance at the digital clock glowing red on the bedside table told her it was a little after nine. Much later than she normally rose, but she’d had a rough couple of days. And it wasn’t like she had anywhere to go. Not anymore.

  Head throbbing, stomach queasy from being empty for so long, she pushed to her feet and forced herself across the room to the bathroom, then down the hall to the kitchen. She started a pot of coffee, not even sure she would be able to drink it, before going to the refrigerator and pulling out an unopened bottle of B-positive.

  The weakness in her limbs, dryness in her eyes and mouth, and throbbing in the gums around her elongated incisors all told her she needed to feed, but darned if she could work up the appetite for it.

  Fate was too cruel, she thought, twisting the cap off the bottle of synthetic plasma and bringing it reluctantly to her lips. Here she was, completely immortal, with no chance of dying in the near future unless she fell on a stake or opened her blinds at high noon. While across town, an all too mortal man was facing a certain death, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

  Well, she could, as Angelina had suggested before leaving her alone with her misery and heartbreak, but he wouldn’t thank her for it if she did.

  Tipping back the bottle of blood, she made herself swallow. Gulp after gulp, the thick metallic liquid slid down her throat. And it did make her feel better, relieving a bit of the dizziness and lethargy pulling at her.

  When the bottle was empty, she moved to the sink, gave the bottle a
quick rinse, and added it to the recycle bin. The coffee was almost ready now, and she would drink a cup of that, too. After all, in higher doses, caffeine had the same effect on vamps as it did on humans, and she could use a touch of artificial pick-me-up.

  She had a mug in one hand, creamer in the other, when a sound from the other room caught her attention. Her mind, sluggish as it was, raced to identify the noise.

  She lived alone, so it wasn’t a roommate. And she spent so much time at work that she didn’t even have a pet—though maybe she should consider getting one now that she was short on both a job and a romantic obsession.

  Could it be Angelina? Had she come back? Or perhaps she was still here and only Vivian’s scattered state had made her think her friend had left at all.

  The noise came again, lower and longer this time. It sounded like…was she imagining things?…a moan.

  Setting the mug and creamer on the counter, she started slowly for the living room, tugging the edges of her robe tighter together and retying the sash.

  The room was dark except for the glowing lights of the Christmas tree in the corner. She’d decorated it herself just after Thanksgiving, taking absurd pleasure in the placement of each ornament and every flosslike strand of tinsel.

  But she didn’t need light to see. Thanks to the vamp in her, her vision was twenty-twenty, and even better in the dark.

  The problem was, she didn’t see anything. Just her living room…thick mauve carpeting, rarely used fireplace, sofa and matching armchair, and the wall of windows lining the entire west side of her apartment.

  Yes, she knew it was odd—a vampire living in a penthouse, surrounded by glass that increased her chances of sun exposure by about eighty percent. But even though she had to keep the shades tightly drawn throughout the day, the view at night was spectacular.

  Living here also made her feel more normal, more a part of the human race instead of one that was thought to spend most of its time underground or sleeping in coffins.