Brian punched a button on the game controller, and the TV screen changed. BLACK TUESDAY flashed on the screen.
Guessing the conversation was over, Aedan got up, taking his can with him. “Guess I’m going to bed.”
“Later, man.”
Avatars spun on the TV screen as Aedan left the den for the quiet darkness of his room to worry over his own lady trouble.
Aedan held Dallas close in his arms, her naked body, still dewy with their lovemaking, pressed against his. He kissed her bare shoulder, and her long, blond hair tickled his nose.
“It’s all right, you know,” she said, covering his hand with hers. She pressed her bare, curvy buttocks into his groin.
“Mmm?” he murmured, sleepily. They’d nap and then make love again.
“That life changes.”
“No,” he argued, closing his eyes. “I want nothing to change. I want to lie here forever.” He stroked her breast. “I’m never going to let you go.”
She laughed and rolled over in his arms until they were nose to nose. “Life always changes, mon amour. It can never stay the same.”
He opened his eyes and saw that he was not looking into Dallas’s face, but Madeleine’s. He let go of her in surprise. “Madeleine.”
“You’ll not forget me.” Her tone was kind, rather than jealous or condemning.
“No, I never will.”
He felt her lips on his, and then she faded away into the darkness of his dreams.
The next morning when Aedan came downstairs around nine, Peigi was gone, and Brian was asleep on the couch in the den. Aedan shut the TV and game station off to give them both a rest and went into the kitchen to make himself a protein shake. Mark called just as he was loading the dirty dishes into the dishwasher. Mark was headed up to Christiana Hospital, hoping to speak to Jay’s latest victim. He promised to give Aedan a call later in the day.
Antsy and not sure how he was going to spend his day, Aedan headed to the gym. It was new in town; Tavia, owner of the vampire bar, had just opened it in the spring. He hit the elliptical for forty-five minutes, headphones in his ears, and then headed for the free weights.
Aedan wasn’t big on cardio. In fact, he hated it. He did it to keep his body in decent shape so he could deal with jackasses like the ones last night, and with more dangerous enemies. But he liked lifting weights. It gave him time to think, or not think, depending on what he needed. This morning, he just wanted to listen to his music. He was zoning out on the bench press, working his way through a set, when someone jerked one earbud out of his ear from behind.
It startled him more than anything else.
“What the hell?” Still holding the barbell over his head, he arched his neck. “Dallas?”
Chapter 12
“What are you doing here?” Aedan asked, surprised as hell to see her. “How did you find me?” He lowered the dumbbell to the safety rack and slid off the bench, coming to his feet. He grabbed the white towel next to his water bottle and wiped the back of his neck as he let his nerves settle. He didn’t like people sneaking up on him, and he didn’t like people in places they didn’t belong. Dallas didn’t belong in his gym. And she certainly didn’t belong in Clare Point.
She put one hand on her hip. She was wearing jeans, flip-flops, and a cute top. With her hair down, she was mesmerizingly beautiful. And obviously not happy with him. “You want to talk here or you want to go somewhere else?”
Petey Hill, one of the cops on the Clare Point force, was working out on an abs machine. And watching Aedan and Dallas pretty closely.
Problem? Petey telepathed, obviously amused. No problem, Officer, Aedan shot back, trying to sound casual and cool. He wasn’t feeling all that casual or cool right now. Dallas was one pissed off HF.
Other people were looking at them, other vampires. The gym was open to visitors in the summer, but there were only locals today. He saw Rob Hill jogging on a treadmill. Eva, a redhead like him, was working a leg press and making no attempt to pretend to be watching the CNN program on the TV over her head.
Tsk, tsk, she telepathed. Aren’t you already in enough trouble with the General Council? Wait ’til they hear Aedan’s got a hottie girlfriend. A hottie human girlfriend.
She’s not my girlfriend, he shot back. He looked at Dallas. “Somewhere else.” He grabbed his water bottle. Now that his initial surprise had passed, he wondered why she was here. Well, he probably knew, but he was still surprised to see her. Most women would have waited for the man to come to them. “Give me a few minutes to shower. I’ll meet you out front.”
“You try to slip out the back and get away from me, Aedan, I’ll find you,” Dallas warned.
For once, Aedan felt a little like the hunted. He took a quick shower and walked out through the main doors and onto the sidewalk, carrying a gym bag. Dallas was waiting for him. Pacing.
“You want to go get a cup of coffee?” he asked her. “There’s a little diner—”
“You probably don’t want me in an enclosed place right now,” she warned.
He didn’t know what to say. What had she seen in his head last night? Now he was curious. Wary . . . but still curious.
“How about if we grab a cup of coffee and take a walk on the boardwalk?” He motioned toward the bay. “It’s only two blocks.”
She nodded her consent. He threw his bag into his car. They stopped for the coffee and then walked the last block to the boardwalk in silence. By the time they got there, he was nearly bursting with curiosity.
“Okay. First, how did you find me?” he asked. They took the steps up to the wooden promenade that ran several blocks and started walking north. “I never told you where I lived.”
“You told me Clare Point. I asked at the diner.” She sipped from her cup.
“Someone told you where I lived?” he asked, incredulous.
They walked along the boardwalk, with closed stores on their left, the beach and the bay on their right. Most of the businesses weren’t open on weekdays yet. It was a warm day; the breeze was pleasant.
“I look innocent enough.” She gave him a fake smile.
He wondered which waitress it had been; there were no humans working in Clare Point. He was surprised, because Kahills were very private people, for obvious reasons. Vampires didn’t give intel on other vampires, especially not to humans. “Someone told you where I lived?” he repeated.
“Apparently I was convincing.”
He took a sip of coffee from the paper cup. He didn’t even like coffee. It had just been the first thing that had come to mind when she said she wanted to talk to him. “And you found me at the gym by . . .”
“Brian, at your house, told me where to find you. He said he was sorry we’d had a fight. Exactly what did you tell that kid?” she asked.
“I didn’t tell him anything about you,” Aedan defended himself. Brian had answered the door? The day was filled with one surprise after another. “So cut to the chase.”
She stopped, turning to him, coffee cup at her side. “You lied to me.”
“About what?”
She brushed a piece of hair from her mouth. The wind off the bay was whipping it in every direction. “About who you are.”
“I am a PI. Of sorts.” He ran his hand across his forehead. “Look, I don’t usually work in the U.S., so it’s complicated.”
“I’m not talking to you about being a PI.”
“Then, Dallas, I have no idea—”
“You should have told me you were a vampire.” Aedan did a double take. He wouldn’t have been more surprised if she’d turned into a water buffalo and charged off across the beach. “What?” he said under his breath.
She glanced around. There was no one around to hear them. The boardwalk was pretty much deserted. It would be crazy busy in six weeks, but it was dead on a Tuesday morning.
She looked up at him, her eyes teary. “You should have warned me you were a vampire.” She sniffed and looked away, wiping her nose with the back of
her hand. “I had a right to know, Aedan.”
So shocked he didn’t know what to say, he walked over to a wooden bench facing the water and sat down. She sat down beside him.
He wasn’t sure what to do. Deny it? That seemed silly, at this point. Last night she had obviously seen something in his head. Seen him in his true state, maybe?
“Dallas, I—”
“I don’t want your lies. Not even for my own good.” She looked at him. “Aedan, I know they exist. That you exist . . . I met one once. In a bar in Boston.” She pressed her lips together. “My . . . ability. It apparently opens me up to . . . I don’t know what you want to call them. Supernatural beings .” She met his gaze. “You should have told me.”
He set his paper cup near his foot. “How?” he asked, suddenly feeling very old and . . . very vulnerable. “How was I supposed to tell you? I’m not supposed to be with you, you know that, right?”
“I could guess,” she said softly.
He looked at her, not sure what to say next. Where to go from here. Did he just take her now and get the bloodletting over with? Obviously he couldn’t just let her walk around Rehoboth Beach knowing he was a vampire.
But Madeleine had known. The world had been different then: less modern, more superstitious. It had been a time when humans believed in vampires and werewolves and such.
“I didn’t mean to take advantage of you,” he said, surprised by the emotion that welled in his throat. He looked down at his hands, helpless, in his lap. “I guess there’s something about you that . . .”
He didn’t know how to explain it. The connection he felt to Madeleine through her. The guilt. The profound loneliness he sometimes felt, a loneliness that went to the depths of his very soul. And the ray of sunshine she seemed to be.
“I understand.”
“Understand?”
“What it’s like to be an outsider.” She slid her hand tentatively across the wooden bench seat and touched his hand.
He raised the wall in his head before her hand made contact with his, and when she looked into his eyes, she seemed grateful.
“I don’t think I would have even minded—your being a vampire—if you’d just told me.” She gave a little laugh and looked away. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation.”
He gazed out over the bay, taking her hand in his. “Me neither.” He frowned. His thoughts were bouncing all over the place. “So this vampire you met in a bar in Boston. He have a name?”
She chuckled. “Asher.”
“Rousseau,” he finished for her.
“You know him?” she asked.
He rubbed her hand between his. “It’s a relatively small world, the world of vampires.”
To his surprise, she laughed.
“I’m sorry Asher was the first of us you met. He’s not typical. Not a typical Kahill, at least.” He touched his chest. “I’m a Kahill. Originally, many centuries ago, from Ireland. The Rousseau brothers, they’re dangerous vampires.”
“Aren’t you all?” she asked quietly.
He took in her gaze. “You’re not afraid of me, are you?”
“You afraid of me?” she asked. “Of what I know about you? Of what I’ve seen? What I could potentially see?”
He sensed that while she might know that vampires existed, she probably didn’t know the details of that existence. Not the truth, at least. He doubted she knew he could erase her memory. Of course the longer they knew each other, the less likely it would be that he could erase all memory of himself from her mind. It worked best on short-term memory.
He gazed out onto the water again, thinking of a day he had spent with Madeleine on the shore. It had been a day of laughter and swimming naked and making love on a rocky beach.
Was that what this infatuation with Dallas was all about? Trying to relive his short, sweet time with Madeleine?
Except that Dallas wasn’t Madeleine. He knew that. And he knew he could never relive those days.
“Tell me what you saw last night . . . in my head.”
She sighed and sat back, but still allowed him to hold her hand. “This is not getting you out of trouble with me,” she warned. “You being all kind and sensitive.”
He didn’t say anything, and she went on. “The first time . . . I just saw lots of flashes of people, places. I knew something was different about you right away, from the overwhelming number of memories. And the clothing. People were wearing period clothing.”
“Maybe I’d just been to Colonial Williamsburg.”
She cut her eyes at him. “Authentic clothing. From different countries, different time periods. Not just you, but other people. Lots of other people. Which was odd.”
“That doesn’t make me a vampire.”
“It makes you something not human.”
“And last night?”
She hesitated. “I saw the man with the baseball bat. In that alley or somewhere. Somewhere close.” She bit down on her lower lip. “It was just a flash, but I saw you attack him. I saw your . . . your fangs.”
“And you weren’t afraid?”
“No, not really. Emotions come with the flashes. I already knew you were a good man. Mostly, I was just pissed.” She pulled her hand from his. “Because you lied to me.”
“I didn’t lie. I just didn’t fully disclose. And again, how was I supposed to tell you? Why would I? You think I can walk around telling every woman I meet, ‘Hi, I’m Aedan Brigid and by the way, I’m a vampire?’ ”
She looked away without answering.
“Do you think I can do that?” he repeated. “How many people would believe me?”
She smiled at that comment. “Not many I suppose.”
“Not many.” He smoothed the legs of his jeans.
“I can’t really go into the details, Dallas, but this is not just about me. It’s about my family and my responsibility to protect them. And to conceal their identities.”
Again, she didn’t respond.
“Look, if you want an apology, Dallas, I’m willing to give it. I just—”
“I’m a witch,” she interrupted him.
“What?” He stared at her.
She brushed a lock of hair off her cheek. “In the spirit of full disclosure, I need to be honest with you. I was keeping something from you, too. Probably for many of the same reasons. And that is . . . I’m a witch.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, scrutinizing her. “Because I’ve known some witches, and they were all hags with long, hooked noses and big, hairy warts on their chins.”
She rolled her eyes.
“I’m not kidding,” he said. “Where do you think stereotypes come from?”
He could tell she still wasn’t sure if he was kidding or not.
“There are different kinds of witches . . . apparently. I’m not even sure I’m a witch, per se.” She encircled her waist with her arms. “It’s just what people said. Back in Rhode Island.”
He sensed something tender about the subject, but decided not to push it right now. “Damned New Englanders,” he muttered.
She smiled, and they were silent for several minutes, both watching the incoming tide, both lost in their own thoughts.
“So what are we going to do?” he finally said, turning to her.
“Do?”
“You know, do? Are you going to break up with me?”
She frowned. “I wasn’t aware we were a couple going steady.”
It was his turn to smile. “You know what I mean. I really like you, Dallas. I like Kenzie. And you and I . . . I think we could both use a friend right now.”
“And there is the fact that the sex was mind-blowing.”
Now he was grinning. “Definitely.” He waited. “So, can I see you again?”
“I’ll have to think about it.” She rose. “I need to go. I’ve got errands to run and the fish guy to meet at the bar at two.”
He got up, getting that he wasn’t invited to walk her back to her car. “So can I come by the
bar? Tonight?”
“It’s a free country.”
“I mean, can I see you?”
She turned around, walking backwards so she could face him, the wind whipping at her long, blond hair. “No, what you mean is, can you have sex with me?”
He thought for a second. “Okay. Can I?”
She laughed and turned away. “You vampires are pretty ballsy.”
“I was going to say the same thing about you witches,” he called after her.
“I appreciate your stopping by,” Mary McCathal said, setting the teakettle full of water on the stove. “But I really am okay. Victor and I knew this was coming. I felt like we were ready.” She measured loose tea into a china teapot. “If you can ever really be ready,” she mused aloud.
“I know you’re okay.” Peigi took two mugs, one green, one yellow, off a mug tree on the counter and carried them to the small kitchen table. “That doesn’t mean you can’t use a friend.”
Mary turned to Peigi with a smile. “I also really appreciate your being willing to take Victor in. That was one part of the plan we weren’t sure about. I knew it would be better if he weren’t here with me, but I wasn’t sure who would be willing to let bygones be bygones and accept him into their house. People were pretty upset with us when we left. A lot of people are still upset.”
“They care about you.” Peigi pulled out a chair at the table and sat down. Mary’s kitchen was cozy and had always made Peigi feel good. Maybe the wallpaper was a little worn or the appliances were a little old, but Mary’s had always been a welcoming kitchen. Sitting here, Peigi realized how much she’d missed Mary while she was off on her adventure with Victor.
“That was Victor’s chair.” Mary’s voice turned nostalgic. “He always took that seat.”
“I’m sorry.” Peigi started to rise. “Should I—”
“Oh, don’t be silly.” Mary gave a wave. “I was just thinking. That was Victor’s chair. It’s funny how we get possessive of such things. Bobby always took this chair.” She rested her hand on the back of the chair across from Peigi and pulled it out to sit down. “Which I started sitting in after he was gone.” She looked across the table at Peigi. “Victor never knew that. That it was Bobby’s. I just . . . didn’t want to hurt his feelings. You know?”
Voracious - (Claire Point Vampire 5) Page 14
