Belonging (22 page)

“He said they’d spent time on the streets together. Nothing between them other than friendship, not that
he
didn’t wish for more I could tell. He saved her life when he caught a group of guys trying to rape her. She’d been beaten up pretty good and stabbed in the stomach by the time he came across her. He took her to the hospital, saved her life. Apparently the doctors said a couple minutes later and she would have bled out.”

“Fuuuuck.”

Shame washed over her like a tidal wave. Of all people, she did not want Damian to know this. She’d made a horribly bad decision and trusted the wrong people. She was eighteen and drugged out of her mind when that incident happened. And Smitty didn’t catch them quite in time as she’d led him to later believe.

At first, she honestly couldn’t remember what’d happened that night, but a couple months later, she thought she was dying with the worst abdominal pain of her life and ended up at the same emergency room again. Ectopic pregnancy. She lost the baby along with a fallopian tube. The doctors told her the remaining one had been severely damaged from the previous stabbing and her chances of getting pregnant would be pretty much nil.

For the second time in two months, she’d almost died. After that incident, she didn’t touch even as much as a cigarette and vowed to drag herself out of the sinkhole she was trapped in. And she’d succeeded. She’d had three jobs at one point early on, but had gotten her GED and enrolled in college. Life was still hard, but it was on her terms.
She
owned her life, not the other way around.

The next thing she heard brought her out of her musing.

“…sister,” Damian said.

“You haven’t told her about Kate? No offense, my lord, but when do you plan on doing that? She deserves to know she has other family out there.”

“I know,” she heard him reply in a resigned voice.

She had a sister? And Damian knew but didn’t tell her? What the hell else was he keeping from her?

Crushing devastation almost brought her to her knees. This man called himself her mate, told her repeatedly to trust him…that he’d never hurt her. He couldn’t have hurt her more if he’d reached into her chest cavity and crushed her heart in his hand while she watched.

She was destroyed. He said he loved her, for Christ’s sake. Yet he went behind her back snooping into her life and lied to her about family. Did he know about her witch blood, but kept that from her too? Given his background, quite possibly yes.

Bitter tears sprang against her wishes, which she viciously wiped away. He did not deserve her tears, or anything else from her for that matter. She was so fucking out of here.

She fled back up to the bedroom, quickly dressed in her dirty clothes from the day before and quietly headed for the front door. She didn’t know where she would go in Boston without any cash or how she’d get back to Milwaukee, but she’d figure it out. She’d always been resourceful. Damian was the worst liar of all and she was the worst kind of fool. He was the first man she’d actually allowed herself to envision a future with and she’d bought his lies like a foolish, lovesick girl.

She felt her heart physically shattering into a million pieces as she walked through the front door and pushed the button, calling the elevator to their floor. Her hands were empty, as they’d left Milwaukee with nothing but the clothes on her back.

A sudden voice behind her made her jump five feet in the air and she spun around, ready to fight. Her heart raced as two massive vampires, almost as large as Damian, stood on either side of the penthouse door.

“Where can we accompany you, ma’am?” Lefty said. Her eyes flitted back and forth between them, confused. Thank God they weren’t there to harm her. But it would be a cold day in hell before they accompanied her anywhere either.

“I’m fine, thank you. Just going out for some fresh air.”

“I don’t mind keeping you company then. I’m Sebastian, ma’am,” he said as he held out his hand. So lefty now had a name. She tentatively shook it, unsure how she should handle this.

“I’m sure you don’t, Sebastian. But I don’t need company. Thanks for the offer. I’ll be right back up.” Liar, liar pants on fire, Analise. If he knew she was untruthful he didn’t say anything, only smiled kindly.

“In any case, I’m afraid you are to be accompanied at all times, ma’am. We’re your new security team.”

What. The. Hell? Security team?

“What are you talking about?” She was utterly confused now. Just then the front door opened and Damian stood there, taking up the entire doorframe with his massive body. Her breath caught as she drank him in. He was devastatingly beautiful in his faded blue jeans and tight gray T-shirt, which looked far better on him that it had her.
He may be a sex God, but he’s a liar, Analise. Stop letting your lady parts short out your common sense.

“Going somewhere, Analise?” His face told two different stories. His eyes had you believing he was confused, while his lips showed his smugness.

Mother. Fucker.

“Yes. Away from you. Asshole.” She turned to stab the elevator button once again.
Why wasn’t the damn thing here yet?
She squealed as tight arms surrounded her, carrying her back into the apartment.

“Put. Me. Down. Now,” she huffed. Her legs were flailing and she tried to connect with any body part of his she could. He made an
oomph
noise when the heels she wore caught his shin. Well, that was one use for a pair of eight hundred-dollar shoes. Self-defense. Since she had been flashed here barefoot, and her only shoe choices were various forms of high heels, she’d had no choice but to don a pair in her escape. Correction…
attempted
escape.

“Analise. Calm the fuck down. What is going on here? Why are you trying to leave?”

By this time, he’d turned her in his arms and effectively stopped her flailing by pressing her back into the closest wall. His legs held hers immobile. Fighting against him was a losing battle, so she let her body go limp. She’d fight this battle with words instead.

“Oh, I don’t know, Damian. Why don’t you hire your little private detective to find out for you? He seems pretty good at uncovering ghosts people have buried deep in their closets.”

A look of surprise crossed his face so fast she would have missed it if she hadn’t been paying attention. But she was. She was paying attention to every little nuance as Damian tried to lie his way out of this too.

“Christ,” he uttered under his breath as his eyes darted away from hers.

“That’s what I thought. Now let me go,” she demanded.

“How much did you hear?” Was this guy serious? How much
didn’t
she hear was the real question?

“Enough to know that you’re a liar, just like everyone else that’s been in my life. Except you’re the worst kind of liar, Damian. You made me believe I could trust you. You made me believe you wouldn’t hurt me. You made me believe you actually
loved
me. I may not know a lot about relationships, but I do know you don’t go behind someone’s back and snoop into their past if you claim to fucking love them.” Her voice broke.

Don’t you cry, Analise. He’s not worth it.
The problem was she didn’t believe the lies her own mind tried to tell her this time. Damian
was
worth every tear in her body.

“You’re right,” he whispered

She was stunned silent. “What?” He wasn’t trying to build more lies on top of lies to justify his actions?

“You’re right, Analise. I went behind your back and it was wrong of me.” He paused, blowing out a deep breath. “Can we do this somewhere other than pressed up against the kitchen wall? Please give me a chance to explain.” She could see remorse, regret, and guilt swimming in his onyx eyes and that was the only reason the next clipped word came out of her mouth.

“Fine.” She had to be out of her ever-loving mind. Once a liar, always a liar.

He tentatively let her go, ready to catch her again if she tried to bolt. She considered it, but now that she’d been caught, getting out of Damian’s apartment wouldn’t be so easy. So she might as well listen to him while plotting her next move. Damian snuck her a knowing glance as he firmly grabbed her hand, leading her to the couch. At least he had enough sense to keep his trap shut.

Once they sat, she tried to pull her hand away, but Damian simply held on tighter. “Not letting you go, kitten.”

Kitten?
He didn’t know how close to the truth he was. She smiled, feeling its bitterness. “You’re about to get your eyes scratched out with my claws.” She may look under control on the surface, but beneath her anger churned as hot as a sleeping volcano. One wrong word and she would spew fire and ash all over the place. It wouldn’t be pretty. In fact, it would be downright fugly.

They sat in momentary silence, eyes locked in a battle of wills. The question was…could anyone really come out victorious?

C
hapter
31

Mike

As suspected, his calls all went unanswered. Because she hadn’t set up a voice mailbox, he couldn’t even leave a damn message, so he’d resorted to texting. That was an hour ago and although she’d read every one of them, he didn’t get one reply. He’d text her every ten minutes for the next three fucking months if he had to.

6:15 a.m.: How r u today, Giselle?

6:22 a.m.: When r u coming to see me again?

6:31 a.m.: I dreamt of u last night.

6:45 a.m.: U looked edible yesterday, btw. Nice boots.

6:52 a.m.: I can’t get the taste of u out of my mouth.

7:02 a.m.: Giselle, pls.

7:19 a.m.: Ur driving me out of my effing mind woman.

His doorbell rang. Who the hell was here? The only people that visited him these days were Jake and the bloodsuckers. And he doubted either was at the door at this time of the morning.

He was so concentrated on his phone, the lack of response bubbles mocking him, he threw open the door without checking the peephole first and was stunned silent at the beauty in front of him.

Today Giselle was dressed in tight black leather pants that left nothing to the imagination. She wore high-heeled patent red leather pumps and you could barely see her first two toes. He didn’t know the name for those particular type of shoes, but who fucking cared. He would bow at the feet of the man or woman who’d invented them. She wore an off the shoulder sheer red blouse, with the sexiest red push-up bra he’d ever seen. It molded her boobs perfectly.

The sun hit her at the perfect angle, looking as if it was radiating out of her body instead of a bright ball of gas in the sky. Anger emanated from her in waves and she looked like either the angel of death or the devil incarnate.

His erection strained in his jeans. It took every ounce of willpower he possessed not to haul her inside, throw her up against the wall and ravage her. That hadn’t worked out so well yesterday and would probably go over like a lead balloon today, given how pissed she looked. He tried to discretely adjust himself, but Giselle’s eyes flicked toward his hands as he shimmied. Busted.

He cleared his throat. “Good morning, Giselle.”

“How the fuck did you get my phone number?” She hadn’t bothered moving from the spot to which she now seemed rooted.

“Would you like to come in or do you want to do this in plain view of the neighborhood? I’m cool either way, but Mrs. Hansen, my neighbor across the street is the neighborhood busy body. She regularly sits in her front window with binoculars to spy on everyone. You wouldn’t believe some of the shit she’s seen, especially with my neighbor to the left. Mark. He’s twenty-two and apparently likes to host orgies and doesn’t bother closing his blinds. Not that I care, mind you. What one does in the privacy of their own home should remain in the privacy of their own home. As long as I don’t see naked people stumbling out of his house, I could care less. I’ve since had to tell Mark to close his damn blinds. I—”

She shoved her way past him into the house. Guess she decided to take this inside. He smiled inwardly. Steps one and two successful. She was here and inside.

“Jesus, do you ever shut up?”

“I just didn’t want anything between us to be fodder for neighborhood gossip.” True. Partially.

“Let me make one thing clear, Detective. There
is
nothing between us.” She tried to sound convincing but fell as flat as a pancake. He decided now was not the time to goad her, pointing out she needed to brush up on her acting skills. That would likely earn him a swift kick to the family jewels.

“To what do I owe today’s honor, Giselle?” He didn’t really care how or why she was here, just that she was.

“We need to find a missing person. Frankie Durillo. You know Dev opened up a new club downtown a few weeks ago. Dragonfly.” Yes, he knew and he also knew what happened below Dragonfly as well. And as much as he disliked Devon and the other bloodsuckers, he had to reluctantly admit that providing a safe place for vampires to feed with willing participants was a good fucking idea. Apparently the lords owned quite a few of these feeding places all over the country. It was another one of the many reasons that he was starting to doubt his whole hatred of vampires and open himself up to the possibility of at least considering something more with Giselle. Something that didn’t require a facemask and boxing gloves like their usual verbal spars.

“…could be dead.” He’d just caught the tail end of what she’s said.

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

She sighed heavily, rolling her eyes for the full effect. “What were you dreaming of, Detective? Spanking the wank?”

He smirked and let his eyes shine with undisguised lust. “No, doll, I was imagining you wearing nothing but your thigh-high black boots on your knees in front of me, sucking my cock dry.” He hadn’t been thinking of that at all, but now that the image was in his head, fuck if he was going to be able to get it out. Guess that barb backfired.