Bodyguards (13 page)

She floated the petal to his lips
and brushed it along the curve of his mouth. A delicate shiver rocked his body,
and suddenly it was no longer enough to touch him by proxy. She dropped the
petal and leaned forward, her focus shifting to Brad. His eyes blinked open
just before she kissed him again. They were more beautiful than ever, blue in a
world of gray.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Channeling

One moment, Vivien was still in
control of her emotions—of her desire. The next, it was pouring out of her and
into that kiss, consuming her mind right along with her body. She could have
screamed when Brad wrenched himself away, panting, his eyes blazing with what
Vivien knew was the same need she felt.

“That’s...” He gulped. His hands
were tight on hers, and he was using his grip to hold her at bay. “That’s a
dangerous emotion to channel. It’s easy, too easy to lose your hold on it
and...and...”

Colors erupted from him the way
they did when he channeled, and rather than holding Vivien back, he pulled her
to him, twisting their bodies and laying her down on the grass and the bed of
fragrant petals he had rained upon her. If their kisses up until now had been
sweet and slow, this time he devoured her mouth.

His body was hard, solid on top of
hers, pressing against her breasts. Her nipples ached they were so tight, and
she knew he had to feel them against his chest, like she could feel his hardened
cock against her leg. She pushed back against his mouth, holding his face in
both her hands, kissing with her heart and soul, like she’d never kissed anyone
before. He kissed her back with the same intensity, giving her all that he was.

It wasn’t enough, though. Nothing
would be enough until they were joined as one. Her hands dropped to his
shoulders then his back, and she clutched his shirt, tugged it, pulled until it
was sliding up and over his head. The pendant he wore around his neck on a
silver chain swung free, the warmed metal brushing against her neck.

As their mouths came apart, he
pulled away from her. She tried to hold on to him, but he rolled off her and
lay next to her in the grass, gasping for breath.

“Let...let it go,” he said. “The
Quickening... Your emotions are... They’re echoing against mine. Feeding from
them. And mine are feeding from yours. It’s like...a feedback loop. If we don’t
stop...”

She had rolled onto her side,
pressing against the length of his body, and she could feel him tremble with
every word. As much as she wanted to kiss him again, touch him, all of him, his
words reached her consciousness, and she tried to make sense of them. They had
to be important for him to stop and say all this now. Only one thing seemed
clear, that filled her with a joy almost as deep as her desire.

“You...you want me,” she said in a
throaty voice, and it wasn’t a question. She could all but feel his need
radiating from him, echoing her own, like he had said. She could even see it,
that myriad of colors flowing from her into him and shooting right back at her.

He shifted against her, and she
couldn’t have said if he was trying to move away from her, or closer. It was
all she could do not to seek his lips again.

“I do, Vivien, by all the
Quickening, I really do. But not like that. Not when we’re both drunk off
channeling.”

With a grunt, he pushed himself
off her, lying on his back in the grass, severing all contact with her. He was
still shaking, his chest—his beautiful chest, strong, with well-defined abs and
a dusting of fine hair—heaving with his fast breaths. She started to follow,
but what he had said stilled her. Drunk? She wasn’t drunk. She felt fine.
Absolutely fine. She just wanted him, and he wanted her. What was wrong with
that?

But if he wanted her, why would he
stop her now? Why would he say these things?

Unless...unless they were true?

She rolled onto her back so she
couldn’t see him anymore and tried her best to calm her heartbeat along with
her thoughts. She was still pushing out her emotions like Brad had taught her,
although without a clear focus; she made a conscious effort to stop. She
struggled to let go, like she had struggled to channel her feelings, and after
a few moments colors flickered back into the world. The sky above her was blue
again beyond the shimmer of the shields. Her mind slowed down, and she took a
deep breath, held it in for a count of three, then let it out in a long, slow
sigh.

“Wow,” she murmured.

At her side, just an arm’s length
away, Brad chuckled breathlessly. “Not what you expected when you started
making that petal dance, was it?”

She rolled onto her stomach, her
head resting on her folded arms. “Not exactly,” she said, tongue in cheek. “You
could have warned me.”

He shifted onto his side, his
cheek propped up against his hand. His eyes were twinkling with mirth when he
said, “I’d never have guessed that was the feeling you were using.”

Vivien’s face felt very warm. Her
gaze broke away from his and drifted down to his bare chest. A small voice
inside her regretted that she hadn’t had a chance to touch it more, or taste
his skin, or...

She frowned, then sat up, her
desire suddenly drained out of her. “You’re bleeding,” she said, gesturing to
Brad’s arm.

“I what?” He raised his head and
looked at his bicep. “Oh. I guess I am, yes.” He sat up as well and reached for
his discarded shirt, which he used to wipe away the rivulet of blood trickling
from the corner of the long cut that curled around his arm. The cut seemed all
but healed, and it stood as a pink line against Brad’s tanned skin except for
the part that was bleeding.

“Is that where you were hurt last
night?” she asked, her heart in her throat.

“It is, yes.” He dabbed the shirt
against the cut, but the fabric was black and it was hard to tell if it was
still bleeding. “Aedan healed me, but he must have missed a spot.”

And their rolling around in the
grass must have reopened it, Vivien finished mentally. That, or the way she had
tugged the shirt off him. Guilt made her stomach lurch a little.

“When you say he healed you... Did
he use the Quickening?”

Brad shook his head. “Vampires
can’t channel. He healed me with his blood.”

She wasn’t sure she cared to know
about that; the less they talked about Aedan, the better, as far as she was
concerned. Besides, there was something else she wanted to know.

“But is it possible to use the
Quickening to heal someone?” she insisted.

“It is,” he said slowly. “Not
yourself. You can’t channel at yourself, not for healing and not for anything
else. But it’s possible to heal other people.”

Before she could ask whether he
would let her try, he added in a somewhat wry tone, “Given what just happened,
I don’t think it’d be a good idea for you to channel at me right now.”

Vivien wasn’t going to give up
that easily, though. “What if I use a different emotion? It wouldn’t...loop,
would it?”

“It depends. What emotion would
that be?”

Vivien felt a little uncomfortable
admitting it, but she felt even worse at the thought that he might bleed, be in
pain, because of her.

“Guilt,” she said, meeting his
eyes. “You got hurt fighting to defend me. It’s my fault—”

“Vivien, no.” He raised his hand
to press two fingers to her lips and silence her. “None of it is your fault. It
was my choice to fight.”

“It was mine, too,” she shot back,
pushing his hand away. “And still you apologized for me.”

A tense moment passed and ended in
Brad inclining his head. “I shouldn’t have,” he said, and in his eyes, she
could see the truth. He wasn’t just saying it to please her; he meant it.
“Sometimes it’s hard to reconcile what I feel as a QuickSilver guard and what I
learned growing up on Earth. I’m sorry.”

She accepted the apology with a
small nod. “Will you let me try to heal you, then? Please?”

He considered her gravely before
acquiescing. “This one is tricky,” he said, shifting closer to her, like he had
been when he had first instructed her. “You can’t really see the healing, just
the result, so you have to focus on something more abstract.”

“Like...you being well?” she
asked, trying to understand.

“Something like that. But don’t be
surprised if it doesn’t work. A lot of people can’t...”

He fell silent at the moment the
color drained out of everything around him. Of course, he’d be able to see
Vivien channel, like she could see the colors swirl around him when he did. She
tried to chase away stray thoughts and focused her guilt as one pinpoint-sharp
idea. Whatever he said, she did feel guilty for his injury, like she felt
guilty for Anabel being taken.

Colors rushed out of her, bursting
when until now they’d only been a trickle. She tried to focus on Brad being
well again, on his blood ceasing to flow from the cut, but she couldn’t tell if
it was working. Frowning, she focused more intently still, imagining smooth,
perfect skin instead of that long, pink scar. Under her very eyes, the scar
slowly faded, as though she were airbrushing it, until nothing was left on his
bicep but a trace of dry blood. This time, releasing the flow of her emotions
was a little easier. She drew in a deep breath when she finished, and she reached
for Brad’s arm with a shaky hand. She brushed her thumb against the blood, and
it flaked away, leaving nothing but smooth, warm skin under her fingers.

“Very good,” Brad said in a low,
rough voice. “Thank you.”

She looked at him. His face was
only inches away, his eyes darkened by dilated pupils. She couldn’t stop
stroking his arm.

“Is it...is it happening again?”
she asked, swallowing hard. “The loop thing?”

Brad’s hand rose to her face, and
he pressed the back of his fingers to her cheek. They felt cool...or was her
face too warm?

“No loop,” he said with a teasing
smile. “No Quickening. Maybe you could take a dip in the lake; it would cool
you down.”

Her fingers drifted over his
shoulder and down to his chest, emboldened by his light touch. She pressed her
hand over his heart; like she had expected, it was beating as fast as hers, as
though he’d been running at full speed.

“I’m not the only one who needs to
cool down,” she teased back. “Or maybe we could just kiss some more.”

Regret flashed through his eyes,
and she knew exactly what he would say. She didn’t want to hear it.

“You said I’m a princess or
something. Here’s what the princess decrees. You are not allowed to use the
word ‘proper’ again. Ever. Especially since you admitted you like me.”

“Love,” he murmured, still
stroking her cheek. “I admitted I love you.”

Vivien’s heart stammered. It’d
been a long time since anyone had said those words to her, and never on a first
date. She’d never kissed anyone on the first date, either. Certainly never touched
them like she was touching Brad, her fingers lightly playing along his chest
like they had a mind of their own. She’d definitely never slept with a man on
the first date, but it was useless to pretend she didn’t want that now, even
without the aphrodisiac of the Quickening flowing between them. And she’d never
said ‘I love you’ that fast, either. She wasn’t sure she could say it now, not
truthfully; she was attracted to him, more than she could express, but in truth
she barely knew Brad—like he barely knew her.

“That’s not true,” he said when
she raised that feeble protest. “I do know you. I knew you when you were four
and looked up at me and Aedan like we were your big brothers and wanted to do
everything like us. I knew you when you were nine and you did your end of year
presentation on Nelson Mandela by yourself because all your classmates wanted
to talk about singers or movie stars. When you were twelve and you participated
in your first fencing competition and wouldn’t stop smiling even when you finished
last. Fourteen and you were one point from losing in the regional final, and
you had a sprained ankle, but kept fighting until you won. Sixteen and you went
to your junior prom in a blue dress that made you look like a princess, and I
wanted to be your age and dance with you instead of being a chaperon. One year
later, your dress was still blue, and I wanted to kick your date in the teeth
when he wouldn’t keep his hands off you. Just last month I listened to you
debate with another student for ten minutes about self-sufficiency in the third
world in front of forty people, like you didn’t care you had an audience. I do
know you, Vivien. And I do love you. Even if I should never have told you.”

Vivien felt stunned. All these
years... She had seen Brad around, a student a few years older than she was,
and she’d always thought he was cute, like all her girlfriends did. She’d never
thought of him that way, though, not until they began running together, and
then she started falling, hard and fast.

“New rule,” she said, her words
wavering a little. “You’re not allowed either to say ‘shouldn’t.’ Not if it’s
about you, and me, and this.”

She leaned forward on the last
word, finding his mouth again. For a second or two, he remained still under her
touch, but when she caressed his lips, he angled his head to better deepen the
kiss. Humming softly, Vivien pressed against him until he reclined on the
grass. She lay down against his side, her body half on top of his, where she
could feel all of him, all of his warmth as they continued to kiss.

It started like their first kiss,
soft and sweet as they explored each other’s mouths, but soon heat sprang
between them again, and the kiss turned as fiery, as wild as when they had been
under the influence of the Quickening. Vivien’s hand roamed up and down Brad’s
chest, her fingertips sometimes brushing against his nipples, or sometimes
sliding under the edge of his pants before quickly retreating. Brad hummed
every so often when her fingers became adventurous, but his own remained tamely
tangled in Vivien’s hair, so still it was as if he were forcing himself not to
touch her anywhere else.

Through the haze of lust that
clouded her thoughts, an alarm echoed in Vivien’s mind, forcing her to pull
away from Brad’s mouth. He raised his head and followed her, but finally let
her break off the kiss.