Redemption (The Penton Vampire Legacy) (30 page)

He nodded. “I got the bleeding stopped till we could get you to the clinic. You remember getting blood?”

She squinted. “Sorta. How much did I need?”

He held up two fingers. “Mel’s going to take a look at your neck in a little while.”

Krys had vague memories of Melissa helping clean her up and get her undressed. “I like Melissa,” she said. “She’s lonely, you know.”

“I know.” Aidan fidgeted with the cuff of his shirt, and Krys had the feeling he was trying to scrounge up the courage to say something.

“What is it?”

He leaned back on the sofa and looked at her. “Do you remember what I told you this morning before I left? That I’d take you home tonight?”

Krys stared at him. “Home?” Her heart starting doing that thumpy thing again and she wasn’t sure if it was out of fear or happiness or sadness.
Not true
.
Own your feelings. Admit what it is.

“Back to Georgia, or wherever you want to go.” His jaw tightened and he looked at the fire. “I shouldn’t have kept you here. I can’t stand it that Owen got within a mile of you.”

Hands splayed on her knees, Krys frowned and nodded. Now that he’d said it, she wasn’t surprised. She should have realized he’d find a way to blame himself. Well, she didn’t want his guilt, and she didn’t want to leave him. There. She’d owned it.

She put a hand on his arm. “Look, I’m not stupid. If I’d thought about it instead of bolting, I’d have realized it wasn’t safe. For God’s sake, Owen had just burned down the restaurant and killed all those people. Don’t hold yourself responsible because I acted like a fool.”

He shook his head and started to speak, but she put her fingers over his lips. “Let me say this before I lose my nerve. I ran because I was afraid, because I realized I didn’t
want
to leave, and it scared the crap out of me.” She looked at the floor, afraid to see his expression.

“You didn’t want to leave?” His voice was incredulous.

She shook her head and finally got the courage to look at him. “I want to stay here a while, like we agreed, only longer, maybe. I don’t want to go home—I don’t even know what home is anymore. Let me show Melissa how to run the clinic better and we’ll see how things go.” She held her breath, waiting for his reaction. But she’d made her decision. If he drove her away, she’d just come back.

Aidan was quiet for a long time, and she steeled herself for him to tell her to pack her bags. The irony of the whole situation wasn’t lost on her.

“You’ve surprised me,” he said finally. “I don’t get surprised very often.”

“Well, I’m going to surprise you again.” OK, this was it. “I promise to be careful, but if Owen grabs me again, I don’t want him being able to feed from me and make me think I want it.”

Aidan frowned. “I don’t understand.”

Damn if he wasn’t going to make her ask for it. “When he was feeding from me at first, all I could think was how good it felt, how I didn’t want him to stop, even though another part of
my mind realized that he was going to kill me. I didn’t
care
if he killed me, as long as he didn’t stop.” Krys crossed her arms, anger flaring at the memory. “If someone kills me, fine. But I’ll be damned if they should make me think I want it. You need to bond me.”

Aidan grew very still, very vampirelike.

When he didn’t say anything, she gritted her teeth and slid closer to him. “Look, I want to stay here a while, and this is the best way to keep me safe. It’s not that big a deal, right? I want this.”

Still he didn’t answer, and she shivered at the icy cast that had come over his eyes.

“You’re hungry,” she said. “Your eyes always turn light like that when you’re hungry.”

He gave her a small smile, a slight up-curve of the edges of his mouth. “There are all types of hunger, Krys.”

Heat crept up her face, and she tried to slow her racing heartbeat without much success. She cleared her throat, determined to plow through this awkwardness that she’d started. “Bonding,” she said. “Does it involve, uh, you know.” She waved her hands in the air. “Sex?” She kind of hoped it did.

Again that hint of a smile. “Not unless we want it to,” he said, his eyes still more icy than blue. “A regular bonding between a vampire and a familiar is a simple blood exchange. I take yours, and you take mine.”

Before she could catch herself, Krys wrinkled her nose at the words
blood exchange
.

Aidan smiled. “You probably won’t find it as horrible as you think, or so I’m told. But I’m not sure it’s a good idea.”

He might as well have slapped her.

“If you find it objectionable, then get someone else to bond me to. If you want me to stay here, you’ll do this.” The longer he remained quiet, the more stupid she felt.

Aidan stood up and reached out a hand. She looked at it for a few seconds and then stood on her own. She didn’t need his help. “Never mind. I’ll talk to Mirren.” Like Mirren was going to do anything without Aidan’s OK.

He made an exasperated noise that sounded like an honest-to-God growl. “No one else is going to touch you—
ever
. You got that?”

Her heart flip-flopped at the caveman thing. Who knew? After spending a lifetime trying not to be controlled by anyone, that little sound of possessiveness filled her with a desire so fierce that she clenched her fists to keep her hands from touching him.

He stroked a thumb over her cheek, and then slipped an arm around her waist, pulling her body against his. She thought he was going to bite her, and steeled herself for the stab of pain. Instead, he brushed his lips over hers, bringing a flash of memory, of pale blue eyes and lighter hair. She willed Owen’s face out of her mind.

Aidan’s kiss was gentle, tentative at first. He nipped lightly at her lower lip, and she opened her mouth to him, then slid her arms around his neck and grabbed a handful of that beautiful, thick hair.

He pulled away from the kiss, smoothing her damp curls away from her face. “Are you sure about this?”

She nodded, and he pulled her toward the sofa.

“No.” She walked toward the bed instead, trying not to think about what she was about to do, and she didn’t just mean the blood exchange. “Let’s do the bonding here. I want you to
replace the memories of him in my head, to remind me what it really feels like to want someone.”

Aidan’s eyes paled again as he stretched out beside her on top of the quilt. She reached for him, pulling him into another kiss. He ran a hand down her arm and then pulled it to his lips, kissing the back of her wrist and turning it over to expose the smooth skin of her forearm.

“No,” she said again, and turned her head to expose the other side of her neck, opposite where Owen had fed. Aidan paused, and she thought he was going to refuse. But finally, slowly, he smoothed her hair away, running his lips from her mouth to her jawline and down to her neck.

She closed her eyes and bathed in the softness of it; his hands roaming over her stomach, her breasts; the soft fall of his hair on her cheek; the smell of sandalwood; and the heat of his mouth on her. His tongue swiped a spot below her ear and the sharp prick of his fangs caused her to flinch momentarily, but the pain was quickly replaced by an overwhelming pleasure and heat building in a spot nowhere near her neck. She was floating, tethered to earth only by the soft pull of his mouth, and she wasn’t sure if she’d moaned aloud or only in her head.

It seemed no time had elapsed before he withdrew, leaving her empty and wanting. He rolled to his back, pulling her with him with one hand and reaching into his pocket with the other to pull out a small knife. Watching her with slightly unfocused eyes, he flicked it open and drew a short cut across the side of his own neck.

“Taste me.” His whisper sent shivers dancing over her skin, and Krys tried not to think about what she was doing as she stretched her body across his and laid her lips lightly to the cut. The taste was sweet, salty, warm—not the hard metallic
tang she expected. She drew on the cut and felt a sigh shudder through Aidan’s body. She continued until he stopped her a minute later.

“I can’t stop the bleeding like you can,” she murmured. She felt drunk, in a good kind of way.

“Watch the cut.” Even as he said the words, it slowly closed.

Krys began to move away, but Aidan held her next to him and turned his head to kiss her again. She didn’t have to see the color of his eyes. She could feel his desire pressing against her. She’d never known one person could want another so badly. She had his blood in her veins; now she wanted that velvet hardness inside her as well.

He groaned and wrenched away from her suddenly. The band tying back his hair had gotten lost somewhere along the way, and as he sat up, he gazed back at her through a tangle of chestnut waves. She shivered at the feral look of need on his face.

“It’s all right,” she said, reaching for him. “I want you to stay.”

He shook his head. “You don’t understand. I can’t make love to you again without it meaning something I can’t ask of you. God, I know that doesn’t make sense, but I can’t...I have to go.” He got up and walked to the door. He didn’t look back.

What the hell had just happened?

Aidan heard Mark open the back door a half hour before dawn. He’d been holed up in his basement den, thinking. Melissa would have called it brooding.

He had plenty to brood about. After he’d left Krys, the lieutenants had gathered and decided to use her idea. Their fams
would hunt during daylight hours, looking for Owen’s hiding places—but only those who volunteered.

Most of his brooding was about Krys, though. Whatever screwed-up DNA formed the vampire bonding mind-set, it was screaming at him. And even if he wanted what it was selling, Krys had almost died last night. She might want to have sex with him, but mating was part of the deal for him now that he’d had her blood, and she had no idea what she’d be signing on for. To her it was as simple as making love or voicing a commitment. How did he explain that he couldn’t touch her without wanting her, and that he couldn’t have her without its being long-term? Really long-term. There were no one-night stands or short-term affairs for mated males.

As soon as she realized what it meant, she’d reject him the way Abby had. He couldn’t do it again.

Head resting on the back of the sofa, Aidan shifted his gaze to the drop-staircase when it lowered and Mark’s boots clattered downward.

Mark collapsed in a nearby recliner, pulling a beer from each pocket, tossing one to Aidan and popping the tab on his own. “So, guess you know Melissa made me come over here.”

“Mel needs to get a hobby—one besides me.” Aidan popped his own beer and took a sip. “Man, this stuff’s foul.”

“Whiskey snob.”

They sat in silence, listening to the music.

“You need a happy meal before you go down for the day? I’m offering up a vein.”

A pillow went flying at Mark’s head hard enough to get an
oof
when it hit him, and Aidan laughed. Mark was a good friend. Smart, good instincts, and able to pull him out of his moods. “No, I’m good.”

“Is Krys going to stay?”

Aidan took the pillow back and stuck it behind his head. Wasn’t that the million-dollar question. “For a while, anyway. Says she wants to help Mel get the clinic up and running again. Make a database of treatments, shit like that. Good idea.”

Mark nodded. “Yeah, Mel could handle a lot of the stuff we’re likely to get, at least after this Owen problem goes away. She likes Krys, though. She’d really like her to stay.”

Aidan didn’t answer. They sat in silence for a few more minutes, till it was time for Aidan to crash.

“Find her a house,” he said, getting to his feet and opening the hatch to his subbasement suite.

Mark blinked. “You serious?”

Aidan pulled the sweater over his head and threw it across the sofa arm. “She’s bonded to me now, and God knows she gets what a mean-assed bastard Owen is. She might or might not stay, but it’s gotta be her choice. Get her wheels back, too.”

“Where you want her?”

Aidan shrugged. “Get the list of the renovated properties from Tim and find something she’d like. Better, take her to a few and let her pick.”

He wanted her with a desperation that scared him. But not by force. Either she’d stay and accept this life, or she’d decide that it was too much and leave him. And he’d have to live with it.