Forever Valentine (3 page)

Depressing thoughts bothered her more and more often these days. Part of it was seeing her friends’ happiness and wondering how she might find just a small portion of the same before her short time on earth was up.

They sat quietly for a while in companionable silence while the night wore on. Jena thought of the miserable date she’d just ended and the rotten luck she had with men and with Valentine’s Day in particular. She’d never had a successful date on a Valentine’s Day and thought the holiday was vastly overrated. Jena sighed as she sipped her wine.

“This whole Valentine’s thing is for suckers.”

Ian chuckled as he poured more wine for them both.

“I knew a man once who guarded Valentine in Rome, a thousand years before I was born. Valentine was a humble priest when the emperor outlawed marriage among his young soldiers. Seems he thought single men made better soldiers with no one at home to worry about. Valentine was imprisoned and killed for the crime of marrying off youngsters who had every reason in the world not to marry. Romantic fool that he was, he claimed the only true reason to wed was love.”

“You’re talking about Saint Valentine?” Again Jena was fascinated by the idea that this man had walked the earth for centuries and had known others who were even more ancient.

Ian nodded. “Legend has it he wrote the first Valentine note to the daughter of his jailer, a blind girl who befriended him. When she opened his note, God granted her a miracle and she could suddenly see. He’d signed the note simply, ‘Your Valentine’.”

“That’s such a beautiful story.”

“My friend often said Valentine would have been tickled to see what’s become of his name and his legend. He was a pious man for all that he enjoyed seeing young love in bloom.”

“When did he live?"

Ian shrugged. “Oh, somewhere around 270 A.D., I think.”

Jena was stunned by the idea. “Just how old are you, Ian?” Her whispered words reached out through the darkness.

Ian dreaded the question. At no time since his conversion had he felt the weight of his years more acutely than when sitting across from this young, vital woman. But yet, something inside him longed to be open with her, when he hadn’t talked of his past with anyone in decades…perhaps centuries.

“Not quite that old, Jena. I was born in 1232, or thereabouts. Back then, the common folk didn’t keep such rigorous track of the years as we do now.” He waited, but Jena was silent, which surprised him. She didn’t ask questions about his life, she merely waited, as if prepared to accept whatever he chose to share. Somehow that made it easier. “The Crusades were mostly over by then, but I only realize that now, by virtue of being able to look back at what seemed so important to me at the time, through the lens of history. Even though I knew it was foolhardy, I trained as a knight and followed King Louis—the ninth one—to lay siege to Tunis. Got sick as a dog from some gut rot that was going around.” Ian sipped at his wine, remembering. “Louis actually died from it. To this day, I still think it was sabotage, but we couldn’t prove anything.”

“So you were still…human then.”

Ian’s eyes challenged her. “Mortal, you mean? Oh, yes, very much. I didn’t run into Dom until a year or two later. 1271 was the year I followed Marco Polo and his father to China.”

“You’re kidding.”

Ian chuckled. Somehow it felt right to be telling her these things that he hadn’t thought of in decades. “Afraid not. I was part of their traveling party. After the failed siege at Tunis, I went to Rome to seek the wisdom of a priest I’d met in my travels who lived there in service to the Pope. He knew the Polos and suggested to them that I might be handy to have along as added protection, I guess. Father Augustus counseled me to meditate on the long journey. He told me I would find my answer in the East. Or that’s what he claimed God had told him. He was a funny old man that way, but back in those days I was inclined to believe when a holy man told me God spoke to him on a regular basis.” Ian shrugged. “Regardless, off I went on the Silk Road to China. And there I met Domitian, the vampire who gave me the blessing and curse of immortality.”

“But why?”

Ian sighed heavily. “Who’s to say? Perhaps he was lonely. Dom had traveled the earth since before the time of Christ. He’s the one who knew Valentine. He once told me he’d been a Praetorian Guard during the reign of at least three Caesars. We had Rome in common, though the Rome I knew was much different from the city in which he’d been born.”

Ian put his half-full glass on the table, his gaze meeting hers. “As to why he changed me? Treachery. Pure and simple. There were factions that didn’t want the Polos to succeed in their business venture, both rivals from their own land and isolationists and political maneuverers in the lands through which we traveled. Some were more violent than others and as a knight, it was my job to organize a defense and repulse any attacks. It’s what got me killed—or as close as I’ve come in my long life.

“I’d already become friends with Dom. We met him on the Road and he invited us to stay at his compound while we rested for the next leg of the journey. We’d been staying with him for a few days when the attack came—raiders from the East trying to stop us before we could make it through to the Khan—but we repulsed them. I was gravely wounded in the fighting, though, and taken within Dom’s private home to be treated, but I was too far gone. When Dom saw me, he decided to save me in his own way and made me what I am.”

“He gave you his blood.” Her tone was solemn, her eyes filled with compassion that was almost his undoing. Ian couldn’t believe he’d told her so much of the past he usually kept well buried. He sighed and picked up the glass once more, twirling it by the stem between his agitated fingers.

“Forgive me. I didn’t mean to dwell on things better left forgotten.”

“What happened to Dom?” Her soft voice tempted him.

“I don’t know, actually. He taught me all I needed to know about my new life. When the Polos continued on their way, I stayed with Dom in his compound. I stayed there for quite a while, in fact, until Dom decided to pick up stakes and move on. When he left, I did too, though traveling was a lot tougher in those days for our kind.”

“I bet.” Jena chuckled just slightly as she sipped at her wine. “I’m glad he saved you, Ian.” Her tender tone nearly stopped his heart.

Ian paused, considering his words before speaking. “There are times I wished he’d let me die over the years, but just now, being here with you, it all seems worthwhile.”

Jena blushed, her vital young blood heating her cheeks and making him salivate in anticipation. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

“I say that only to you, Jena, because it’s true.” He reached across the small table to grasp her hand, stilling her nervous movements.

Chapter Three

Jena thought absently how different this little tête-à-tête with Ian was when compared to the disastrous date she’d had earlier that night with Dick. For one thing, when Ian grasped her hand, her womb clenched in anticipation and excitement instead of dread. Ian was a man well out of her league and much too dangerous to her heart. How could she even entertain the idea of flirting with him when there was no way she could survive any closer encounter with him without badly bruising—if not breaking—her fragile, mortal heart?

She knew it was highly unlikely Ian would magically discover she was the one woman in all the world meant just for him. Sure, just that had happened to a few of her best friends, but what were the odds of Jena being yet another match for one of these amazing vampire studs? Not likely. Not likely at all.

Still, just looking into Ian’s eyes was a pleasure she would remember all her life. When he left, she would pull out the memory of this night and warm herself with the echoes of the fire she saw in his burning gaze. His hand tightened on hers and her nerves erupted. He was getting too close. It was time to pull back in the name of self-preservation.

“Don’t think you’re going to sweet talk your way into a blood donation, Ian. I’ve been bitten once, and that was enough.”

Ian sat back, breaking the contact and pulling his hand away from hers. She missed his touch immediately. His gaze was still hot though, burning over her skin as he considered her.

“Sebastian told me about it, you know.”

Oh, God.
Jena took a sip of her wine, hoping to cool the flush of embarrassment she knew must be staining her cheeks.

“You mean you guys bite and tell? Have you no shame?” She hoped he would go with the humor and drop the subject, but somehow she suspected he wouldn’t let her off that easy.

“Sebastian drank from you in front of witnesses, and he was half out of his mind with worry, knowing he had to change Christy quickly in order to save her life, but he made a point to tell me he thought there was something odd about your blood.”

“Odd? I don’t think I like the sound of that.”

“Special then,” he conceded. “He said your essence gave him more energy than it should have, though he couldn’t be sure with all the turmoil of the moment. Still, when things had settled down, he remembered it and thought it significant enough to call and tell me. He thought I should know when I was assigned to watch you.”

“So why are you telling me this? Is this some elaborate way of asking for a taste? If so, I’m not buying it. I refuse to give another vampire cheap thrills and a meal.”

Jena blushed furiously as she remembered the way Sebastian had fed from her, his astounding mental powers taking over her body and giving her an orgasm unequalled in her experience. In public! In front of her friends. And with all their clothes still on and his hands around her, but only to hold her upright, not in any place the least bit provocative. The man was dangerous.

And she’d bet Ian was downright lethal.

“First of all, you could never be cheap, Jena, and you’d get as much—if not more—out of it as I would.” His gaze burned a path over her pebbled nipples as if he knew just how much his sexy, low voice turned her on. And he probably did too, the rat.

“Second, I really am curious enough to ask. Sebastian is relatively young compared to me and I truly wonder if what he sensed was accurate or just a product of the tense situation you were all in at the time. Third, I’ve observed you for the past weeks and have some theories of my own I’d like to test. Tasting your blood would go a long way toward helping me secure your future safety.”

She would have questioned him on that point, but he just kept talking in his commanding way, not letting her get a word in edgewise.

“And lastly,” his voice dropped even lower, sexier, “you know as well as I do that I could seduce you into baring your neck—and anything else I asked for. But I’m man enough to give you the choice. I don’t want it if you don’t want to give it. I’m old fashioned like that.” He shrugged and tossed off the last of his wine, replacing the glass on the small table.

Holy crap.

The man was walking, talking sex on a stick. And he was thirsting for her. Or her blood, at least. With it, if he was anything like his friend, he would give her intense sexual satisfaction, but somehow she didn’t think Ian would be satisfied with just giving her a mental orgasm. No, Ian would want more. He’d want skin on skin, body on body, all out, messy sex.

And she was practically salivating at the thought of it. Her womb clenched and her panties grew embarrassingly damp.

“So you want to bite me?” She had to get control of this conversation back somehow.

“In a word? Yes.” Ian’s eyes bored into hers. “And I want to fuck you.”

Jena twirled her nearly empty glass, trying to buy time while her thoughts were in turmoil. She fought down the gulp of panic that wanted to sound from her suddenly parched throat.

“You know, that’s not very romantic.”

Ian stood and swept her up into his arms. She thumped into him, out of breath from his amazingly fast and forceful action. His arms came around her waist as she looked helplessly up into his exotic, mysterious eyes.

“I can be romantic.” He tucked one of her hands up around his neck, taking the other lightly in his as he began shuffling her around the dim room in a slow dance.

“Ian, there’s no music.” How had she ended up next to his hard body, nestled so close against his muscular chest and rippling abs? He was like a drug, lulling her into compliance.

“I can fix that.” Ian pointed one finger at her small stereo, switching it on with his mind and turning the dial to a slow jazz station. In seconds, soft, sexy sounds emanated from the small stereo unit and he took up the rhythm with his feet once more.

“Telekinesis too?” she asked, a bit in awe of this amazing man who held her so close to his perfect body.

Ian shrugged and she felt the slide of his solid muscles over bone under her hands. He was like Michelangelo’s David, he was so hard, yet so beautifully formed.

“Over the years, my powers have increased. The telepathy and telekinetic abilities are something that grow over time along with the other psi abilities.”

“You guys are amazing.”

“Not quite so amazing as you,
cara
. Have you always been telepathic?” He steered her around the small room expertly to the low, erotic tones of the jazz music, his body in perfect alignment with hers. She felt his every word deep in her veins, pulsing through her body.

“My mother could always pick up on my thoughts, even as a baby, she said. Some of my earliest memories are of her speaking to me in my mind.” She remembered those times in her youth fondly as Ian held her close. Something about his hold was so protective while at the same time, provocative.

“And your father?”

Jena shook her head. “He didn’t have the ability and he didn’t quite believe my mother and I did either, no matter how many times we did something unexplainable in front of him. He was a hard case.”

“He’s gone then?”

The soft ache she’d had since her father died ceased to hurt quite as much while Ian held her safe in his strong arms. “He died in a car wreck about ten years ago. It’s why I decided to go into medicine.”

“And your blood anomalies had no influence on your choice?”