He holds the glass of wine out to me. “Try it. It’s really good.”
I take a sip of the rich red liquid. Suddenly, I think of blood. The thought of him drinking blood makes a shiver of revulsion go through me. I give the glass back to him. “Yeah, it’s good.”
He puts a hand out and touches my cheek gently. “You’ve been crying.”
I bite my lip. “It was a bit of a shock to find out you were a… vampire.”
“Hmmm… yes. Shall I tell you a secret?”
“What?” I whisper.
“I never wanted you to do it.” He hands me the glass of wine.
I take a sip. “Why not?”
He takes the glass back, refills it, then shrugs. “Because I was alive when they were sacrificing virgins to Pagan Gods believing it was for the greater good of their society, and I didn’t agree with that either. Besides, I’ve long wanted to stop my parents and sister, but they always had the right of our laws behind them so I had no means. Until now.”
“I love you, you know,” I blurt out.
He nods slowly and looks away. I don’t know why, but I feel as if he is dying right before my eyes. “I know that, Autumn, but you know we can’t be together, right?”
I try to not let him see how hurt I feel. “Why not?”
He smiles ruefully. “Because my kind are not only bloodthirsty, they are also vengeful and spiteful. They will not allow us to ride off into the sunset together while they decay slowly and horribly. In fact, once they know they have nothing to lose anymore, they may even try to force you to take part in the ritual. Done that way, you will certainly die a painful death.”
An icy finger runs down my spine. “What does the ritual entail?”
“Basically, I consume your blood,” he says impassively.
“That’s it?”
His lips twist. “As far as you’re concerned, yeah. The most important thing for rituals is timing. The ceremony can only be done when the alignment of stars is favorable. The next window of opportunity is in four days, and the one after that will be in twelve years. That is the reason my family was so anxious for me to tell you as soon as possible. None of it matters now, you will be gone before that.”
“Where will I go?”
“You are going to disappear without a trace. I have your new identity ready to go. Social Security number, passport, drivers license, bank account and credit cards.”
Even though I am in a strange state of disbelief and shock, I feel anger rise in me. At the thought of all these decisions being made for me as if my life was no longer my own. Other people were deciding everything for me. I snatch the bottle of wine by the neck, take a swig, and turn towards him.
“So you knew I was going to say no?”
“I would have been disappointed if you had said yes.”
“The decision is harder than you think. Every fiber in my body is screaming at me to save you. I have to fight with myself to say no.”
He looks down. “I have made sure you will be wealthy for the rest of your life. The hard part will be to never contact anyone from the past. Also really important: you must never again send your blood to any company promising to do a health check on you, or allow anyone to do a DNA test on you. The instant your details are uploaded onto anyone’s database they will be able to track you.”
I push my hair out of my face. “Where am I going?”
“Los Angeles.”
“Los… Ange… les,” I repeat slowly. “I’ve never been there.”
“You’ll be living in Los Angeles, the art city of America and with the greatest concentration of artists, but you’ll also own a pretty cottage five minutes from the beach in Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.”
I push my hands through my hair. “God, I feel so lost. I can’t take any of this in. I think I’m still in shock.”
“You have two days to get used to the idea and you must never leave this house until then.”
I swing my head towards him. “What about my work at the gallery?”
“You can never go back there, Autumn.”
“It’s not a coincidence that I came to work at Larry’s gallery, is it?”
“No. I arranged it.”
“So Larry lied to me.”
“No, he didn’t. We are able to subtly hypnotize humans and compel them to do certain things without them knowing why they are doing it. It’s a form of glamor. I put the desire to come to Hunter’s Cross into your head and put hiring you into Larry’s head.”
I remember the way Larry had literally run out of the restaurant that first night. He felt so bad he couldn’t even look me in the eye the next morning.
I stare into Rocco’s beautiful eyes. “Did you never feel anything at all for me?”
His jaws clench so hard a little muscle ticks in his cheek, and he speaks, his voice strained. “Yes, of course. It is only natural.”
His answer hurt me in a way I cannot describe. I swallow hard. “Do you still love Polly?”
He turns to look at me and smiles sadly. “Polly? It's been more than two hundred and fifty years since she was mine, Autumn. For many years I lived alone and without servants in our castle. Even as it began to crumble around me I spent the nights roaming the empty corridors like a madman. Even when bats and wolves came to live within the walls I didn’t want to leave, but in the end the worst of the pain was gone, and I left Bavaria never to return. Still, she will remain in my heart until the day I am no more because of how she changed me.”
And then I do something stupid. Something really, really stupid.
Chapter 58
Autumn
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X_ViIPA-Gc
-I’d do Anything For Love-
I put my wrist against his mouth, and softly say, “Go on, drink. Drink my blood.”
He leaps away from me so fast, he is a blur of movement. He stops about ten feet away, his face white and fierce, and his eyes blazing with… hunger. A hunger so feral it shocks me. He had described it, but I never imagined, never understood it could be like this. Blood lust is frightening.
He stood before me, a predator!
In a flash I feel ashamed of myself. He had turned away from his own nature because he wanted to be good, to be compassionate to my species. He chose to walk a difficult, lonely path untrodden by any of his kind. And what did I do? I gave in to a childish, petty impulse to provoke him and in doing that threw the great sacrifice he had made back in his face.
“Why did you do that?” he snarls.
I stand and take a step towards him.
Breathing hard, he takes a backward step. He is so furious I can barely recognize him. “Don’t come any closer,” he warns, his nostrils flaring.
“Rocco,” I whisper, full of remorse.
He puts a hand out, palm facing me. “Just stay there for a moment. Don’t move. Don’t say anything. Calm yourself. Your heart is beating too fast.”
It is true, in the strange silence of the room I can hear my heart racing. I freeze and try to compose myself, but I can see him losing the struggle to control himself. For hundreds of years he had held back the terrible need, and now it has come crashing into him. Reminding him it was never gone. It is as if I had put a syringe full of heroin in front of a junkie.
He takes a step towards me, but his eyes are glazed and unrecognizable. I feel a flash of fear. Instantly, I see a corresponding reaction in him. It makes his eyes glitter dangerously. He takes another step, but this time I face him bravely. I know he is not lost to me. He is mine. I will never be afraid of him. Not when I know I can reach into his head. We are connected. I didn’t have to look for him tonight. I knew exactly where he was. And I had painted the castle that was the symbol of his greatest pain.
I stare into his eyes and in my head, I whisper, Rocco.
He stops in astonishment.
I never take my eyes off him, even when they fill with hot tears.
I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. I know it was a te
rrible thing to do. Please forgive me. I wasn’t thinking. I’m just so confused and scared. I’ve just lost Sam and now I’m being told that being with you means helping your family carry on the monstrous practice of hunting down humans for eternity. It’s no excuse, I know, but I just wanted you to stop being so cold and horrible to me. If I have only got two days left with you, I want us to be as we were before. All I’m asking is for a few good memories. That’s all.
Tears roll down my face.
His clenched hands unclench. The molten fire in his eyes cool as his hunger fades. His breathing becomes calm and even. He runs his hands through his hair. “Don’t ever do that again.”
“I won’t,” I promise. Slowly, I walk up to and bury my face in his chest.
His hands claw into my hair. He breathes my scent in deeply, and rasps, “Truly, you play with fire, Autumn. You have no idea. No idea.”
“I didn’t understand,” I whisper. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay. I’d rather die than hurt you.”
I lift my head and his mouth crushes mine, and he kisses me, deeply, passionately, hungrily. And I know he doesn’t need to tell me he loves me. He loves me. A man has to love a woman to kiss like this. As if his heart is broken and the world has stopped turning. I fall into the familiar vortex of desire. I don’t really realize when he lifts me off my feet and carries me in his arms to his bedroom.
He puts me on the bed and looks down at me. “You are so beautiful, Autumn, and I will miss you when you go.”
Between my legs I am soaking wet. I reach out a hand and touch his leg. “Just today, can we not use the condom?”
He frowns. “No, what if you become pregnant?”
“Then I will take care of it. It will be part of you.”
“What if he is born with blood lust? You won’t know how to control it. Let my species die out, Autumn. It is right that we do. We have brought enough suffering and pain on this earth.”
Tears fill my eyes again. “Okay, we will use the condom.”
He begins to undress me. His movements are swift but gentle. My work blouse lands on the floor, my skirt is gently pulled out from under me. My bra and panties follow. Very gently he moves his palm over my hardened nipples. I gasp. The moonlight throws strange shadows on his face. I will always remember him as the man I found on the other side of midnight. An angel of the night.
I reach for the zip of his pants, but he catches my hand.
“No, not yet,” he says thickly, he begins to undress himself.
Chapter 59
Rocco
I rake her nipple with my teeth and she cries out. Then I spread her legs wide so she is completely exposed to me. Her little pussy quivers. I run my middle finger down her belly and over her clit then plunge my thick digit into her drenched pussy.
Her little hips writhe with anticipation.
I circle her swollen clit with my thumb and her body begins to buck. “Not so fast, baby,” I growl.
I need ownership of her. My intensity for her is like nothing I’ve ever known. It’s unquenchable.
I drop my weight on her trembling body, pinning her to the bed, trapping her underneath me. I want her under me forever. Lust ripples through me as I fist my cock. Then I bend my head and lap up her juices before I capture her mouth. As my slippery tongue thrusts into her mouth, I plunge deep into her tight pussy. She gasps at the intrusion, but as I continue to pump into her, mewling noises fall out of her mouth.
I withdraw and slam back in so brutally, she almost bangs her head against the headboard.
Bending forward, I capture her mouth and slip my tongue into it. She likes that. Likes sucking my tongue while I fuck her. While she sucks my tongue greedily I ram into her. It’s a hard, frenzied fuck. My hardness filling her over and over again while those mewling noises she makes that I love so much are echoing around us.
We come together. So hard, I see stars.
Autumn
He doesn’t say a word, but his eyes are full of lust and triumph. The possessive expression is beautiful. I never want it to change.
“I want to give you a blow-job,” I whisper huskily, as my deviant hands reach for his cock. It is so hard it jumps out into my hand.
I kneel at his feet and as I move my head closer, he stuffs the hard shaft into my mouth.
Then he rocks his hips a few inches at a time, feeling out my mouth and gauging the distance to my throat, so he doesn’t thrust into my gag reflex. There is still about three inches or so of his shaft outside my mouth.
Hearing his groans sends quivers of pleasure down my back as I kneel at his feet worshipping his cock. How strange, but it satisfies me in a way I would never have expected. The groans being torn out of his mouth are food for my heart and soul. With his fingers threaded through my hair, he gently pulls my head onto his cock further and further. Feeling him grow in my mouth makes me happy and excited beyond reason. Even once when I gag on his cock it makes me yearn for more.
I feel powerful and sexy. Deep in my heart, I know I belong to him, but I can see he is holding back. He doesn’t want to hurt me. He doesn’t want to come in my mouth. And I want him to. I want to push him over the edge, make him lose control and come in my mouth, and then I will know he belongs to me just as much as I belong to him.
I become lost in the act. I breathe in his scent, and taste his essence, as my whole focus goes on Rocco’s cock and the lusty animal sounds rising from his mouth. I forget everything except becoming that carnal, sensual woman that makes him explode deep inside my throat.
As I slide down his cock, my whole body trembles with desire. He must have felt it, because he slides out of my mouth. He puts a condom on, then picks me up, I wrap my arms and legs around him. My pussy is wet and throbbing.
He plunges his big hard shaft into me. “You’re so tight,” he rasps.
He always feels so big when he first enters my pussy. I take deep gasping breaths as I remember the exquisite torture of taking all of him.
He keeps me impaled on his cock as he walks us back to the wall, knowing that my clit and pussy would be stimulated with every step. He bends his head and swallows my whimpers and mewls of delight with a deep engulfing kiss.
Immediately I feel the need to climax consume me. I don't know how it is possible, but his cock seems to move even deeper inside me. My clit and pussy are being caressed simultaneously by his rock-hard cock. Each step sets off another round of excruciatingly pleasurable explosions inside me.
“I’m going to come,” I gasp.
“Not yet,” he instructs.
I don’t want to deny him, but the pleasure is unbearable, bordering on cruelty. I clench my teeth to try and hold back the flood of my orgasm, but it starts.
“I can’t hold back,” I gasp.
He pushes me hard against the wall of the bedroom and fucks me hard and deep as I continue to come for him. Each crest is more searing than the last. With the wall of the bedroom supporting me, one of his hands is free to slide into my hair and grab a fistful. He jerks my head backwards, exposing my neck. For a second I think he is going to use his teeth, but he growls against my skin, then sucks at it. He is marking me. Claiming my neck.
I feel my throat throb beneath his lips in this primal act of domination and submission. My exposed neck tells him that I trust him implicitly. My orgasm rocks my whole body as he continues to fuck me hard and deep.
"You're mine, you belong to me and you always will," he growls.
Yes, I am yours,” I hiss.
"Mine," he groans. “Mine.”
Chapter 60
Autumn
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0MdP8KeAII
-It Must Have Been Love-
I run a finger down the two faint reddish scars between Rocco’s shoulder blades, his skin is cool and smooth under my finger. His whole body is flawless, except for these two marks.
“What are these lines?” I ask softly.
He turns to face me. “They are a left
over from the days when we had wings of light.”
I sigh. I still can’t get over the fact that I have two days left with him and I will never see him again after that. “Rocco?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re not going to outlive me, are you?”
A ghost of a smile lifts his lips. “Probably not.”
“How long do you think you have?” I whisper. It makes me feel terrible, because I know it is my decision that is going to destroy him. His goodness, his beauty, his kindness. It doesn’t seem right.
“I don’t know, but our symptoms have become more pronounced, and the decomposition greatly accelerated. In my case, I can feel each attack becoming more painful and lasting longer.”
My eyes fill with tears and I dash them away. It’s almost impossible to believe that a being of such vitality and magnificence has so little time left. “I’m sorry, I’ve become such a crybaby. Ever since Sam was taken away from me I’ve become so emotional.”
“You cry because you have a soft heart. It is nothing to apologize for. But don’t pity me, Autumn. There are things worse than death.”
“But it is so unfair. You’ve tried so hard to be good,” I wail.
“It’s not unfair. I’ve lived for thousands of years, and I can tell you my sweetest and best victory was to conquer myself.”
“You know important people, right? Why can’t we ask them for help? This is big enough for the President of the United States to know.”
“Presidents can do nothing for us, Autumn. All political leaders are puppets who exist simply to absorb the anger and frustration of the populace for a given number of years. There are far more powerful hidden hands behind them directing the world. And those hands know about us, but they have no interest in our activities as they know we are not permitted to get involved in human evolution, and they are free to take humanity down any path they choose.”
The Other Side Of Midnight Page 21
