The Darker Side of Me (Ravana Moon Book 1)

by S. L. Perrine

  “Our embrace became…sensual. I took her, with her permission of course. I can still feel the heat of her wrapped around me when I close my eyes. I fell head over heels, but she could never give herself to me fully. Not her heart. It had been shattered. After a few months I asked her father for her hand. She was with child and I wanted to take care of her and the baby.”

  “How?”

  “We can still reproduce. You’ve never…” He stopped short seeing the look on my face.

  “I don’t bleed. I think that’s an integral part of reproduction. For a female anyway.” I looked away from him and turned toward the record playing as a new song began. Beethoven. I recalled as it filled the room.

  “Ah, yes, well at the time she was human. So, there’s that.”

  “At the time?” I spun around to look at him. His slightly crooked nose didn’t make him unattractive by any means. His dark hair was long to his ears and collar, but not enough to pull back. His lips were red like he’d just fed, but it was his eyes I couldn’t get over. They were so much like my own. I turned back to the woman in the picture. My eyes looked back at me. Duller, but still the same shape, still green and full of life.

  “Yes. She changed, and was never the same.”

  “So, what happened?”

  “Well, her father gave me his blessing. He had no choice. Once he’d learned of the baby he insisted we be married right away. While she was shopping for a wedding gown a woman had entered the shop and told her she’d seen her lost love. By then he’d been gone five years. Well, she must have had a change of heart. She had no care for the child she carried, or for me. She went to find him.”

  “And?”

  “She caught up with him in a pub. It was night time, prime time for all creatures of the night. When she saw him sitting at the bar she lost her mind. She flung herself into the bar and began hitting him, not at her full strength, but enough that the rest of the bar had begun to worry for her sanity.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I was with her. I had to make sure she and my child were ok. When he turned away from the bar I saw his eyes and knew she wouldn’t be. However, before I could get near he’d flung her clear across the room. I scooped her up and took her to the hospital. She lay unconscious for days. A hit to the head. The baby was gone. Her body expelled it that very night. When her body healed, and she didn’t wake, I grew worried about her, and that’s when I turned her. I would have made her like me after the baby was born anyway. I knew she wanted children. Though when her heart stopped beating, I lost my mind. I couldn’t let her go.”

  “So, that’s why you changed me.”

  He just shook his head.

  “And the man I was heart-broken over?”

  “He was a vampire. He’d thrown you with all of his newborn strength and nearly killed you. He killed our child. When you didn’t wake, the physician said it was because you couldn’t bear to live with what you’d done. That more than likely you were aware of the loss of the child, and your subconscious was making you accountable. I couldn’t lose you too. Do you understand? I couldn’t.

  “You were a hunter. You knew the signs to look for, yet you went after him.”

  A sob made my chest heave and caught in my throat. I’d fought so hard to enjoy pain, that when my heart broke I barely felt it. Then it was as if all those years of learning to give into pain had never been. My body betrayed me, my legs fell out from under my weight. Strong arms grabbed onto me. He held me close. His nose taking in the scent of my hair. His hand moved in slow motions over my head, but all I could register was the tightening of my chest, the breaking, and tearing of the organ in my body that beat without reason. He should have let me die. He should have wanted to punish me for being so reckless, so selfish.

  Yet he held me. We were on the floor, me in his lap when I finally came to my senses. When the pain dulled enough I could feel the tears that rolled and had been rolling down my face. My shirt was soaked, my nose clogged, and my head was pounding. Still, the pain in my chest intensified every time I tried to speak, to move, to breathe. Another sob caught in my throat, and another and soon everything went black.

  I woke to the sound of music playing. Julie Andrews pelted in the interim and I forgot where I was until I opened my eyes. The air around me was thin. I could smell jasmine and vanilla, something I hadn’t caught before I’d blacked out. Then the sad truth of my existence came to me. Flashes of my life, not my life, but her life. Annabelle. The girl I used to be. I saw her pretty face. A slim nose, high cheekbones, and tanned skin. Her eyes a dull green and her hair mousy brown and lacking luster.

  Besides my cheekbones, that girl had disappeared. She had been completely erased and replaced. I stood from the leather sofa and found a mirror-like reflection from the inside surface of the windows. The sun had gone down, and the reflecting light from behind let me see myself as I was. Bright, red hair. Intense, green eyes. High cheekbones, but the color was gone. Instead of being tan from years of training out in the sun, I was pale from a century of hunting in the night. That girl from so long ago was a stranger to me. Even my name was leagues different. Given to me by a poor girl who’d deigned to help a monster gain her strength. I was no longer that girl, therefore I could no longer be who Emerick was waiting to return.

  Then, another face moved into my memories. The face of the love I had before he’d left me without a word. My breath hitched, my chest tightened as a dark-haired man flooded my mind. Seeing him made my chest tighten for another reason than the pain from finding out I had lost a child, and ultimately my life. This was a loss like no other. Even finding out about the child Emerick and I had made together and lost, this pain was more. I knew why I would risk the life I carried. I knew what Emerick was, and I despised him for it. I wasn’t planning on marrying him. I was secretly planning to end my life on the eve of our wedding. When I saw my lost love, the look in his eyes, and the elongated teeth in the corners of his mouth, I knew what he was as well. I also knew it could not possibly have been his fault that he didn’t know who I was, or that he hadn’t shown on our wedding day.

  Emerick found me staring at my reflection in the window with fresh tears on my face. I tried not to cringe when his arms came sound my shoulders. His forearm across my front. I leaned my chin down to rest on his arm and wondered if I would be able to beat him in a fight. I didn’t want him anywhere near me. Not me, not the girl who died. He was the ultimate monster, and because someone else was about to claim me, he intervened.

  “I’d love some wine.”

  “Sure. Are you hungry? I’ll make you some dinner,” he whispered in my ear and I felt a tingle of rage as his excitement pressed against me.

  I turned and stepped away feigning looking for a restroom, and noticing for the first time I was barefoot. “Sure, can I use your bathroom?” I looked at the floor and spotted my red-bottomed heels next to the wall under the place where the record player sat. Further inspection told me it was a console stereo. The speakers were covered with red velvet.

  “Right side of the room. If you walk all the way around, you’ll find me in the kitchen when you’re done.”

  “Thank you.” I tried to smile, but whatever it looked like I didn’t think he saw it. He blurred to the kitchen and I did the same to get to the bathroom. I closed and locked the door. Then rolled my eyes at myself for such a human thought.

  I didn’t need a mirror, which was good because there wasn’t one in the large room. A tiled shower sat at the far end. There was no door, just a short wall that would allow for someone of my height to be covered to my shoulders if someone were to walk in while in use. A toilet sat behind a door next to a long counter, complete with his and her sinks. The lights were dim, helping to relieve the headache brewing within me. Some vampires were bothered by bright lights. Now that I thought about it, I realized all the muted tones of his furniture and low lighting throughout. I thought it had something to do with alerting the public to his occupancy of the
abandoned Needle. However, in a closed in space, he wouldn’t need to resort to the same lighting. I made a mental note to file that away for later.

  I pulled my hair free of the band and braid reworking it up into a ponytail. Then I splashed cool water on my face, finding a hand towel hanging on a nearby rack and blotted my cheeks and forehead dry. I took two calming breaths and put on the tough exterior I’d always been able to command. He couldn’t think he could get reactions from me. I wouldn’t allow him to know the truth of our time together all those years ago. Nor would I consider what he’d done.

  Stepping from the bathroom I headed back to the living room in hopes of retrieving my shoes and sneaking out of his place, but I had one more thing to do. Just as I was about to confront him with his part of the deal, the elevator dinged.

  “Sounds like company, darlin’. Why don’t you welcome our guest and I’ll finish up our meal?” Emerick called from the kitchen and I could hear and smell the food simmering.

  When the doors chimed and opened, I wanted to run to him. I wanted him to take me in his arms and bring me home to my bed. I wanted to show him how much I remembered of who I had been, and I wanted him to finally take me the way I knew he could. The way I craved. The hard look in his eyes made me jump on the inside. I had a reason for being here. I needed to follow through. I resumed that icy exterior he had become so familiar with and glared at him.

  “What are you doing here?” I whispered, but I knew Emerick heard me the minute he’d stopped singing along with Julie.

  “Anabelle, is that our Liam come home at last?” Emerick knew it was him before the doors had opened.

  “Anabelle? Liam? What has he told you?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?” I turned my back to him, then went along with the ruse I’d initiated. “Yes, looks like it. Although, I’m thinking he’s looking for a fight. He’s armed.”

  “Red?” Massimo began following me.

  I wanted to stop, to turn to him, but I kept my eyes diverted from him. I needed to keep looking elsewhere, or I was going to fold. I couldn’t. Not until Emerick handed over what he promised. Then this would be done, and hopefully, we could be free of him forever.

  I barely listened as they spoke. When Massimo sat down, and the vial was produced I feigned disinterest, but was internally battling with myself. I wanted to get up and take the vial. To pull Massimo to the elevator and go back to the safety of the Tower. The fact that I could see Massimo’s balcony from the window I was in front of earlier, didn’t pass my attention. I’d make certain to cover all the windows on the west side of my apartment. Massimo’s were covered for obvious reasons.

  I watched Massimo out of the corner of my eye. He toyed with the vial, but it was within his grasp. Emerick wasn’t trying to keep it. I had to wonder if it was, in fact, the formula that would make Massimo more like me, or was it something that would kill him for good?

  Emerick sat a plate of food in front of me and I tried to eat. I caught the tell-tale sign of the Sai under Massimo’s jacket. On further inspection, I could see the outline of my sword at his thigh. If we needed to fight our way out, he surely was armed. More so than just the dagger I could see at his waist when he stepped from the elevator.

  Again, I stopped listening to the conversation. I barely focused on what I said as I stood from the table, wondering why I didn’t pay attention to where the vial had been placed. I grabbed my shoes from the floor, sliding them on and moved to the elevator. When Emerick made no move to follow us, I had to assume he was okay with my leaving, and I let go of the breath I took when the doors began to shut. I didn’t dare say anything until there was a block between us and Emerick.

  “Do you have it?”

  He looked at me sideways and a smile encompassed his lips. “You’re sly. You know that, right? Of all the things he could have done to you up there, and you were doing it to get what you wanted all this time. I should have known.”

  “But. Do…you have it?”

  “Yes, Ravana. I have it.” He produced the vial and then placed it back in his pocket. “We need to let Kelly and Delia analyze it. I won’t take something based on his word.”

  “I didn’t expect you to. I didn’t expect you to take it at all,” I told him, then quickened my pace. “We need to get the PCI out of my building. I know why they are there, and it’s not because they are worried for my safety.”

  “Then what?”

  I looked at him, wondering if he knew. If he could sense that my memories had returned completely. Or if he’d gotten all of his own. I’d have to put that aside for later. Right now, I needed to secure my home.

  Walking into the lobby I saw agents speaking to the desk clerk. He quickly saw me, since I left my glamour from hiding my identity. All of my employee’s and tenants know who I am, they just didn’t get to see me often. They didn’t know I was a paranormal creature, but they do know who I am just as everyone else…the red hair. It’s become my calling card.

  “Ms. Moon. I’m sorry. I don’t know who these people are. They’ve insisted on having access to all of the floors.”

  “It’s okay, Gerald. I’ll handle it from here,” I said to calm the boy who worked the weekday night shift. He was a college student and used the time to study and complete his class work since it was so quiet in the evening. I turned to the agent and insisted he take me to his superior officer.

  When we got to Massimo’s level the man ushered me into the weapons room. Of course, I knew that was what they were after. Too bad I carried it on my person at all times. When I walked into the main room of the apartment turned armory I wasn’t surprised to find a tall brunette with a scowl on her face looming over my shelves.

  “Sharon.”

  The woman looked up at me and seemed to register that I was, in fact, standing in front of her. “Ravana. Goodness. We thought you’d been killed. We were so worried.”

  “No, you didn’t. You know better than anyone, that’s a feat not easily accomplished. Now, you can see I’m fine. Though I can’t for the life of me figure out how searching in here for me is a necessity.”

  “We were just curious if you’d been robbed of anything. We have to consider all possibilities. You know this.”

  “What I know, is you covet what I have. I can assure you I wouldn’t leave it lying around in storerooms like it were rubbish for anyone to grab. Now, get out,” I shouted.

  “Fine. If you know what we are after, then maybe you will consent to tell me where it is?”

  “I keep it close at all times. Don’t worry your pretty little head about it. You’ll never get your hands on it. Nobody will. Now…” I pointed to the door and Sharon nodded to her agents.

  I waited until the last agents filled out of my building before asking Massimo to follow me to my apartment. Once upstairs I searched for Delia. Massimo stopped in the living room. I looked back at him and he gave me an odd look.

  “What?”

  “I don’t think they need me to find them.”

  “You hear them?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “No.” I worried for a moment. “I drank wine and ate food at his place. Do you think…?”

  “Shhh. Don’t think about it. Whatever effects it had will wear off. As soon as you do an infusion. Although, drinking it will get it to help faster.”

  I winced and looked away. “Where are they?”

  He looked off for a moment. As if he could see them through the walls as well as hear them. “Library. I’ll wait here.” Massimo sat on the sofa and placed his feet on the coffee table crossing his ankles and splayed his arms across the back of the cushions.

  “Wimp.”

  I moved through the apartment, still unable to hear the girls. Once I came to the heavy iron door, I found it more difficult to move than usual. However, all of that went away once I got a full view of Kelly and Delia.

  The Keepers were up against the middle bookshelf. Delia was holding a shelf above her head, her face pointed upwar
d. He breasts were bare except for one, which was covered by one of Kelly’s delicate hands. Delia’s shirt lay on the floor and when I looked down at Kelly I could see the woman had Delia’s skirt up around her waist. Kelly was tongue deep in Delia’s sex, and moaning inaudibly as she explored my keeper. Kelly was completely clothed.

  When I cleared my throat and the girls sprang to attention, I could see Kelly’s shirt had been unbuttoned and her bra removed.

  “Oh…oh my god.” Delia blushed pulling her skirt down and moved to cover her breasts with her arms. Kelly closed and buttoned the middle of her shirt and bent down to retrieve Delia’s for her.

  “I’d like to speak with you both. In the living room. Once you’ve dressed.” I took deliberate steps backward letting the door close as I retreated.

  Once back in the living room, I couldn’t help the devilish smile I could feel forming on my face.

  “That good, huh?” He winked at me and I swatted at him.

  “You could have warned me.”

  “Oh, it was that good. Damn. I should have gone too.”

  “No, you should not.”

  His look became somber. I knew what he was about to say, but before he could, the two women emerged from the library.

  Delia had a look of complete embarrassment. “Ravana, I am so sorry. I…”

  “I really don’t want to talk about that. I want to know why you called the PCI and not the Order when you thought I was missing?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t think anyone at the Order would take me seriously. I just knew you never went out during the day. When you didn’t return, I thought something horrible had happened to you.”

  “Fair enough. In the future, give me time to return. My Keeper should have known this valuable information that everyone else already knows. I can’t be killed. Many have tried, none have been successful. Even me.” I turned and headed into the kitchen. I pulled a blood bag from the fridge and emptied the contents into a glass. Once heated in the microwave I drank it down and waited while all eyes were on me.

  “I had an unfortunate encounter. I’m checking a hunch Massimo and I had.” Once I could hear the people roaming through the lower apartments I knew it had worked. “All good.”