Don't Forget Me (11 page)

“Where are you going?” she snapped, struggling to raise her eyelids but seeing nothing except a dense, sinister darkness as a chill snaked up her spine.

“Nowhere, Stella, I’m here to watch over you. Now rest.” He slowly raised her up from where she had slumped, one arm cradling her head, guiding it toward his, his breath catching as he stroked her face, his hand grazing her cheek, his fingers gently combing through her thick, silky hair.

“I thought you’d slipped away and left me for a second there, I couldn’t feel you close anymore,” she whispered, terrified at the mere thought.

“And where would I go, Stella? I’m nothing without you, just an empty shell,” he tried to reassure her, but felt his breath stick in his throat as a powerful craving for her flared deep inside his body.

“Jason, I’m so cold, please hold me tighter,” she implored, curling lovingly into his chest, running her fingers through the undulating folds of his shirt. With her eyes closed, it felt like the fabric of Donn’s shirt, but the thought dissolved as quickly as it arrived.

“I’m holding you as tight as I can, Stella, it’s just that I seem to have lost the ability to produce the heat I need to warm you.” He let the heady sweetness of her breath envelop him and mingle with his. He placed his hands behind her head and slowly approached her lips, desire flaring through him. Stella was immobile, her gaze fixed on his mouth. Suddenly Jason felt the desire for her blood erupt within him.

Then, drained by the effort it took to lock down his lust and desire, he bent his head swiftly to brush her lips with his own, but suddenly his mouth turned as dry as a bone, parched from the insane thirst he had for her blood. He clenched her more tightly to his chest, trying to stop himself from springing at her throat. His eyes burned red. Oblivious to Jason’s inner turmoil, Stella felt the burning tingle of his cold, immortal skin lessen as her eyes grew heavier and heavier under the effects of the chloroform.

“Tell me you love me, Jason, before sleep steals your voice away from me.”

He kissed her on the corner of her mouth. “I love you, Stella. I’ve never loved anyone like I love you, I love you more than life itself. Now go to sleep, angel,” he murmured as two solitary teardrops squeezed out of the corners of his eyes and rolled silently down his cheeks at the unbearable thought of spending the rest of his immortal life without her. They were tears of blood, tears of pain, and the tears of a now impossible love.

“Jason…” Stella murmured an instant before she let herself melt into his arms and roll off the edge of consciousness into a deep, compelling slumber. She had never felt so complete.

While all this was happening in the upper hallway, Ian had managed to wrench himself free of Aaron and sprint down the corridor below, the elf vampire hot on his heels. Closing the gap between them, Aaron grabbed the wolf from behind and immobilized him in a headlock.

“Taste of your own medicine, huh? Is this what you did to Stella, creep up behind her, you sadistic bully?” And he slammed Ian through the door of the rest room, hurling him against the back wall before turning to tear the stall doors off their hinges and pitch each one at him. Mad with fury, he grabbed Ian and threw him against the mirror, shattering it into a thousand glittering pieces.

“Get a thrill out of scaring people, do you, sicko? Are you scared now?” demanded Aaron, almost losing his cool completely, unable to mask his anger and contempt.

“You don’t scare me, half-vampire,” Ian sneered as his fingers found a jagged splinter of mirror on the floor and, folding them around it, he plunged it deep into Aaron’s arm. But Aaron just laughed as the wound swiftly healed itself.

“Strange, I thought I did, but then I forgot how stupid you are…” Aaron mocked as he then proceeded to finish the job he’d started.

Grabbing Ian’s shirt with both hands, he slammed him furiously against the stall partitions, repeating the action one stall at a time until he got to the end and the only thing left to hurl him against was the wall where the remaining shards of mirror still clung, the impact sending a cascade of silvery pieces flying into the air. But if Ian thought the worst was over, Aaron, not even winded, was only just warming up. Yanking him up again from the floor, he threw him violently back out into the hall, then straddled his prone body before the wolf even knew what had hit him. Reaching down to jerk Ian to his feet, Aaron spun him round to face the window then lifted him bodily and threw him out, his gaze following his trajectory down to the COM entrance. In a flash, he leaped out after him to land neatly next to the ball curled up on the ground that was Ian, who was gasping painfully for breath, his knees dragged up to his chest.

“Now, stay the hell away from the girl, you piece of shit. We’ll never let you have her so you might as well forget it. Now, get out of my sight before I change my mind about not killing you…” Aaron threatened, the hardness of his eyes only making his beautiful face more striking. Dismissing Ian contemptuously, he swiftly returned to Jason, relieved to find him still propped against the wall of the empty corridor, his arms wrapped protectively around an innocently sleeping Stella.

“Is everything ok?” he asked.

“What happened?” Jason asked, his dilated eyes fixed on Stella, his body still feeling an implacable thirst for her blood.

“Just discouraged the jerk from giving her any more trouble.” Aaron saw the fatigue etched on his friend’s face from the effort it was taking him to check his instincts, and his expression turning sympathetic as he remembered how he’d felt exactly the same with Charleen all those centuries ago.

“Why did you defend her? You don’t even know her…” Jason said, a puzzled frown wrinkling his forehead.

“She’s just like Charleen. Anyway, it only took me a minute with her to realize she is well worth it. Don’t thank me, the pleasure was all mine.”

“Why did you leave me alone with her when you knew I might’ve hurt her?” he asked uneasily, stroking her face tenderly.

“And did you?”

“No, obviously not. But now I don’t know if I’ll be able to tear myself away from her again.” He tightened his arms around her, flooded with emotion.

“Why, because it’s too hard emotionally, or because it’s too painful physically?” he asked, crouching down understandingly beside Jason, brushing Stella’s hair and body with his hand.

“Is there a difference?” Jason asked gloomily, tormented.

“No, not really, but both are rooted in the more sensitive, human side of you. You have to sever yourself from that side to block your feelings.” He saw Jason’s face darken as he gazed at Stella, saw his eyes grow bleak, how he pressed her to him fiercely and showered her forehead with loving kisses, and how his body started to quake at the thought of leaving her and the need to eradicate his feelings for her.

Then, ignoring Aaron’s advice, Jason said “I’m going to stay with her,” in a tone that brooked no argument.

“Jason, you’re not ready yet,” Aaron replied in a voice loaded with regret.

“How do you know?” he asked him tensely, his eyes narrowing in anger.

“Were you able to get close to her without having to muster every ounce of your strength to stop yourself from biting her?” he asked Jason, a serious look in his eyes.

“Aaron, she needs me, she begged me not to leave her!” Jason exclaimed impatiently, refusing to listen to anything but his heart.

“I know what it means to lose someone so important, Jason, all I’m asking is that you hold off right now. If you stay with her, you might do something terrible that you’ll regret for all eternity and, as you know, that’s a pretty long time for us,” Aaron concluded emphatically, turning his thoughts to Charleen as he rested his hands on Stella protectively.

During this time, the security guard had detained both Vuk and Nathan at Warren Towers and was interrogating them. Vuk’s patience had worn very thin.

“It was nothing… a private matter between friends, just a stupid argument,” said Nathan, trying to hide his nervousness with a scathing tone and a tight smile.

“If you’re not a student, what were you doing on campus?” the guard asked.

“Just visiting a friend, you know, until someone butted in that is…” he responded, directing a menacing glare at Vuk.

“So a girl’s the cause of it all… I should’ve known, but it’s still not a good enough reason, and, as you know, every action has its consequences. Vuk, give me your personal details, I’m afraid you’ll have to foot the bill for the damage in the cafeteria,” said the sympathetic guard sternly.

“Okay, sure, then can I go?” Vuk replied impatiently, reaching for his wallet to get his driver’s license.

“Sure,” the guard said as he typed in his details on the computer. “Now you, Nathan, stay away from here. I’m good at faces so there’ll be big trouble if I see you here again, unless you’re looking to enroll that is,” the guard added sarcastically, his tone resolute as he returned Vuk’s ID.

“Yessir,” Nathan said, seething inside.

In fact, no sooner were the two werewolves out of the guard’s office than they resumed their bickering.

“Keep out of it, Vuk, the girl’s not your business.”

“She certainly is my business” Vuk said, his nose wrinkling in contempt as he turned aggressive.

“Know something, Vuk, I can really relate to your interest in Stella, but what I don’t get is why you left her on her own with a couple of vampires?”

“What? There’s two of them? But I only saw one.”

“Well, dude, that means you missed the second one. But he was there, standing right next to you. I saw him trying to hide, but he couldn’t fool me. At first I thought he was hiding from you, but then I saw that he moved when she moved… so it didn’t take me long to figure that it wasn’t you he was trying to hide from, but the girl…”

“I need to find her fast.” Vuk mumbled to himself, his unease growing by the second.

“Yeah, good idea. Doesn’t seem safe to leave her in the hands of a couple of bloodsuckers for too long. Much better in our hands, right?”

“Better in
my
hands,” Vuk spat back at him, already pressing the speed dial on his cell phone and heading for COM. He heard someone answer it but then only silence.

“Hey, Stella, where are you?”

“She’s with me.”

“Who is this?”

“My name is J.”

“You’re not the vampire I entrusted her to before, are you?”

“No, not exactly, but Stella’s fine, she’s here safe with me.”

“Safe? Somehow, your canines make me think otherwise…”

“Oh, and I suppose yours are far less dangerous. You should watch your mouth when the full moon’s waxing… I sincerely hope you’re not thinking of keeping her with you tomorrow night.”

“Well I’m not about to leave her on her own, and for sure not with you seeing how nightfall inspires your type…”

“Could say the same about you, Vuk.”

“I might not know who you are yet, J., but I intend to find out very soon.”

“Well, let me assist you there, Vuk… I’m at COM and I’ll send Aaron to the main entrance to wait for you.”

Jason ended the call, his eyes staring into space, thinking he’d soon have to leave Stella again. Aaron noticed that he was becoming more and more instable.

“Jason, let me take her now.” Aaron broke into his thoughts, placing his arms around the girl, who reacted by trying to cling weakly to Jason’s shirt.

“She wants me!” exclaimed Jason, on the verge of losing his last shred of self-control, his strength ebbing, his confusion and nervousness growing.

“Calm down, J. She’s unconscious. It was just an instinctive reflex,” Aaron said, his feelings for the girl making him stiffen and hold her close as he felt Jason tighten his grip on her too.

“Hey, guys, hate to spoil the party but what’s going on?” Vuk asked, suddenly materializing in the corridor, his face registering alarm when he saw the two vampires both holding an unconscious Stella.

“Nothing, Vuk,” replied Aaron quickly, easing Stella gently but firmly out of Jason’s arms, trying to put a bit of distance between them.

“Your friend get a sudden frenzy of bloodlust, did he?” mocked Vuk, his eyes burning a fiery yellow as he saw Aaron gather Stella in his arms and walk toward him.

“Don’t toy with me, Vuk. Didn’t I tell you to wait at the main entrance for Aaron?” said Jason threateningly, standing up to lean back against the wall, his expression dark and dangerous.

“Yeah, but as he wasn’t there I thought I’d better come inside. Seems I was right, too.” He turned to look at Stella protectively as the vampire’s arms brought her closer to him with each step.

“So how’d you find us?” Jason asked darkly, pushing himself off the wall but pacing himself slowly as he approached Vuk.

“In case you hadn’t noticed, you’re not the only ones with a good sense of smell,” Vuk said wryly as Aaron carefully propped Stella in his arms.

“Here, Vuk. Now hold her tight and don’t let her out of your sight again.” Aaron gently stroked her hair, letting his fingers brush her face before finally parting from her.

“What happened to her?” Vuk asked, shocked and distressed, his hands clutching her tightly, his face filling with sadness as he saw her limp and lifeless body, the curtain of hair that fell around her face, the way her head hung loosely down.

“She was chloroformed but she’ll be okay, she’ll come to shortly,” Aaron explained, seeing a melancholy Jason stop next to Vuk, a flash of desire appearing in his dull, spent eyes as he gazed longingly at Stella.

“What do you want from her, J.?” asked Vuk, narrowing his eyes.

“The same thing as you, Vuk… to protect her,” Jason replied, and Vuk’s eyes widened as he realized J. must be none other than Jason Rees. Jason saw Vuk’s face, and so continued, “Look, if she says she saw me, just deny it, will you? Lie if you have to, I’d appreciate it.”

Vuk acquiesced, and Aaron and J. moved off down the corridor.

Stella opened her eyes in his arms a moment later.

“Vuk, he was here,” she croaked, her lips softly brushing his ear.

“Who, Stella? What are you talking about?” He looked at her sweetly, exhaling softly to mingle his breath with hers as he wrapped her reassuringly in his arms and feigned ignorance.