Undeniable (42 page)

When the hunter dropped down onto the pillows, Damien turned
to Angelina and opened his arms. Capturing her mouth, he supped on her sweet
taste like a man starved and entered her mind. Angelina pulled away.

“Don’t you dare, Damien. I’ll wait with yo…” her voice
trailed off as she succumbed and, collapsing in his arms, fell into a deep
sleep. The scent of her blood enflamed him. His fangs pierced his lip. His
erection throbbed. For years he’d dreamt of holding her again, of sinking his
teeth into her slender neck, his cock into her tight pussy. But Sebastian and
Diana needed him.

The elders had banned Ancient Bondings after they’d lost
countless vampires. Too many had seen soul mates where there were none. Too
many had erred in the binding of their wrists.

Yes, Dracula and Mina had survived. But only because they’d
had the angels on their side. They had told Mina to bind both wrists to her
lover at the same time, had explained that she would not survive if their
combined blood did not flow from Dracula back into her body and replenish every
ounce she lost. Had explained that even if she succeeded in bringing him back
to life, he’d succumb with her death.

What Damien had feared most when he’d first entered
Fentmore’s hospital and discovered Sebastian had erred was occurring. Diana’s
body, in its instinctive need to survive, had sucked the life from Sebastian
for too long. By the time Damien had bound their other wrists, Sebastian had
filled her mind with only one thought. Drink.

Now, his blood flowed from both his wrists into her body.

He laid Angelina on the couch and brushed her lips with his.
“Forgive me, Angel, but you wouldn’t understand what I have to do. I couldn’t
chance you interfering and there’s no time to explain.”

Rising, he went to the side of the bed and knelt. “Diana.”

When she didn’t stir, he pressed his forehead to hers and
merged their minds.
Diana. You must turn the tides of your blood. Send it
back.

Her fear and her will to survive took hold and strove to
push him from her mind. He felt and heard her body suck in more of Sebastian’s
blood, heard his stepson’s heart falter.

Diana!
He yelled into her mind
. Send it back. You’re
killing Sebastian. If he dies, you die. Send it back.

Bound this way, he knew she would balk at another’s kiss and
hoped it would snap her out of the feeding frenzy. He pulled her mouth from
Sebastian’s neck and crushed her lips with his, felt her heart and mind explode
with rage that he would dare take what belonged to her mate.

“Save him,” he begged, his voice ragged. “Give him life.”

The rush of her blood surging into Sebastian released the
tears searing Damien’s eyes. Diana’s melodic voice slipped into his mind, but
she spoke to another.

A thousand nights, a thousand dances. Give me my wishes.
Give me my stars.

Still merged with Diana, Damien saw a multitude of memories
rising in her mind like mist off a midsummer lake. Memories of Diana as a child,
a teen, a woman, memories of her dancing naked for the moon and saving the
stars she bargained for, stars she’d hoped would someday grant her every wish.
Her memories vanished in an explosion of light. Damien fell back, propelled
away from the bed by some unknown force.

Momentarily blinded, he rose up onto his knees and blinked
into the white curtain surrounding the bed, blinked until he realized Diana’s
moon had come through for her. Millions of stars rained down upon her and
Sebastian. As each touched their bodies, it shattered, then vanished. Seconds
later, the last star landed where Diana’s lips touched Sebastian’s. He couldn’t
be sure, but Damien thought this final star slipped between their lips.

At the sound of Sebastian and Diana’s hearts beating as one,
he wiped the tears from his eyes and approached the bed. Not wasting a moment,
he cut the sheets he’d tied around their bodies, then set to work, separating
their wrists and sealing the wounds that would always bear the scars of their
bonding.

Diana’s eyes fluttered open. Sebastian’s soon followed.
Damien watched silently as without a word they brought their lips together. He
drew in a deep breath, then hit the switch that would lower the bed to his
secret room before the sun rose.

He adjusted the cottage’s security system. No one would be
able to enter or exit without his help. He slid his hands beneath Angelina and
lifted her from the floor. Her eyes flew open.

“Damien, you’re really here. I thought it was another dream.
That I’d wake to find I was still on that horrible island.” Tears hovered over
her lashes.

He pressed his lips to her forehead, then laid her down on
the bed. Angelina’s eyes darted from the empty bed to the couch, then to the
floor. “Where’s Diana and—”

“In our secret room. You do remember the nights we spent
there, don’t you?”

Holding her gaze, he slid the tip of his finger between her
parted lips and felt himself grow hard as one of her fangs slit open his skin.
Turning his finger over, he watched her eyes dilate, knew she remembered, then
rested the cut on the center of her tongue.

Her first taste of his blood since their last night together
thirty years ago.

His own hunger tore at him when her hot mouth enveloped his
dripping finger and her tongue curled around it like a babe’s to a nipple. His
other hand removed her blood spattered sweater, the knowledge of her
thirty-year chill breaking his heart. “You won’t need this any longer,
Angelina.”

She blinked when his fingers grazed her breasts as he moved
to unbutton her shirt. “Frank—”

“Will not wake up until I want him to,” he said, freeing a
button with each word.

Angelina gasped as his hands swiftly removed her shirt and
bra. “He said you and he spent all day yesterday going over the map and
talking.”

“We did.” He pushed her shoulders until she fell back onto
the pillows.

“So you haven’t slept for—”

“Nearly thirty-six hours.” Her pants slid off to reveal a
scant lace thong. He frowned. “Tell me your psychic ability led you to dress
for today.”

“I’ve been dressing for you for thirty years.” Her voice
cracked.

He slid his finger beneath the thin strap on her hip.

“I’d understand if you were tired,” she whispered.

“I’m tired of waiting for this moment.” His finger followed
the line of the thong until it touched her soft curls. “So, you’ve been wearing
sexy underwear for thirty years? For me?”

Her eyes welled up. Her hand flew to her mouth, but failed
to stifle her sob.

He waggled his brows. “Oh Angel, you know I prefer you
naked.” He flicked his wrist, then tossed the tattered thong over his shoulder.
When she giggled, he let out a relieved sigh. That short sob had told him
exactly how unbearable their time apart had been for her. “Do you want to see
what I’ve been wearing while I waited for you?”

Angelina’s eyes rounded. “You didn’t. You said you’d never,
not even for me.”

She sat up and quickly unbuttoned his shirt. Pushing it off
his shoulders, she checked his arms, chest, and back, then frowned.

Damien rose to stand beside the bed and popped open the snap
on his jeans.

“No.” She knelt, her eyes twinkling. She moved closer to the
edge of the bed as he brought the zipper down. His hand stilled. Before her
eyes the bulge in his pants grew.

He regretted the delay this little show would cause on his
return into Angelina’s pussy and cursed himself for starting it. The firelight
caressed her skin and danced across her breasts and inner thighs. He envied it.

He noticed her eyes darken with desire, her thigh muscles
clench.

“Oh damn!” He quickly stripped and stood naked before her,
his hands on his hips.

Her wide eyed gaze first landed on his massive erection,
jutting straight out from a bed of black curls, then darted to the tattoo to
the right of them.

“Damien! My tattoo.” A heart with her name scrawled across
it and a silly lovebird atop it, just as she’d described when she’d thought
they would spend eternity together. She leaned closer, running her fingers over
her name. His cock twitched.

“A man, Angelina, just as you asked. I let a man sit between
my legs for hours. For you.”

“But, Olympia.”

“Never saw it. I haven’t touched another woman since you,
Angel. And no one has touched me.” He cupped her chin in his palm and tilted
her face up so she could look into his eyes. “As far as I’m concerned, we
completed our bonding. Our failure to go before the elders didn’t change the
fact that we bonded. You have always been my bonded mate.”

She rose up and wrapped her arms around his neck. “And you
mine, Damien. I never doubted that you were mine.”

A tear rolled down his cheek. His eyes closed. “But I betrayed
your trust.”

“No. I understand why you stayed away.” She wiped the tear
away, but another soon took its place. She pressed her lips to it.

“Our baby, Angel. I took our baby.”

Angelina’s lips stilled. “Our baby died, Damien,” she said
and squeezed her eyes shut.

The hissing and snapping of the fireplace was the only sound
in the room.

“We had to take him. He was one of us.” Damien cringed when
Angelina wrenched free of his arms.

She scrambled back across the bed to the far wall, shaking
her head. “You came to the hospital? You took my baby?”

“I—”

“But then you must have seen me. You must have seen I wasn’t
mad!”

“No, Angel, I never saw you. I didn’t even know about it
until the elders sent for me. They already had our baby and—”

“Why?” Tears filled her eyes. “Didn’t they know how I longed
to hold him, to look into his face and see you? Oh, God, why?”

“How could he have lived in your world? He would have been
treated like a freak.” He moved across the bed toward her, but stopped when she
held out her hand and violently shook her head.

“I was his mother. I would have protected him.” She spat
each word out, the pain of losing her baby as piercing as it had been that
night.

“Olympia told me she’d seen you. That you were crazy from
the hunger. If I had gone to you, I would have been bound by our laws to bring
you to Fentmore. I couldn’t take that chance. And I couldn’t trust your husband
to accept a vampire as his son with you not sane enough to help. So I brought
him into my home and raised him—”

“Tell me where he is, Damien,” she coldly demanded, “Tell me
where my son is!”

Before Angelina’s eyes the face of the man who’d been
willing to offer himself to the Slashers to save her life crumbled when he
opened his mouth to answer. She wanted to soothe him, wanted to cover her ears
with her hands and never hear what had happened to cause him such agony.

A torrent of tears flowed from his eyes. The more he tried
to explain, the more he sobbed. Her heart shattered for Damien, for the son she
now knew no longer lived.

She sat back and drew the sheets up to her breasts. Unable
to bear witness to Damien’s raw grief, she stared out into the room and caught
sight of her firstborn sleeping peacefully on the floor. He’d said he accepted
Damien as her soul mate, yet had not met her eyes the entire flight home. Her
son, the vampire hunter. Avoiding her eyes just like he had as a child when he
felt he’d done something unforgivable.

“Oh, God. Tell me it wasn’t Frank. Please, Damien, tell me
the vampire he’s been insisting was you wasn’t our son. Please!” For the first
time since she’d watched Damien walk away from her and Frank at the lake,
Angelina felt her sanity slip.

Damien wrapped his arms around her, pinning her arms when
she struck out at him, again and again.

“No! You’re lying!” she wailed, “Not Frank!”

He held her, his tears falling upon her cheeks, mingling
with hers. “He didn’t know. He didn’t know, Angelina,” he repeated, over and
over in her ear. “He had no idea he had caught his own brother.”

She buried her face in the crook of his neck and cried for
what felt like hours.

After a while, Damien loosened his grip and let out a sigh
of relief when she clung to him. He drew her onto his lap and ran his fingers
through her hair.

“Forgive him, Angel,” he said. “He was still that angry
little boy believing in monsters. But he’s changed these past hours. He’s come
to understand us, to see us as more than unfeeling monsters. And he’s terrified
you’ll never forgive him.”

“Did he have the name I chose,” she asked, her ragged breath
cutting into her words. “You remember. I told you I wanted our first son to
have your father’s name.”

Damien smiled. “Yes, my love. I insisted. And he had a happy
youth, Angelina. He grew to be a good man, one you’d be proud of.”

He cupped her cheeks in his hands and gazed intently into
her eyes. “And he knew you were his mother. I had to tell him you’d died in
childbirth, but I told him all about you, about how much we loved each other.
Then one day he came to me and asked me to describe you while he painted.”

“He was an artist?” Her breath hitched. “Like me?”

He leaned over and lifted his pants from the floor, then
took out his wallet. “He gave this to me. Kept a larger one for himself. I’ve
carried it with me since.”

He pressed a small portrait into her hand. Angelina gasped.
It was her. Every detail. Her eyes, her nose, even the shirt she’d worn their
last night together.

“And this I had done by another artist.”

She raised her eyes from her portrait.

Damien stared down at the one he clasped between trembling
fingers.

“Marek?”

He held the portrait to his heart before placing it in her
outstretched palm.

“Oh he’s beautiful!” She swiped at her tears before they
could fall onto the face of her son. “He looks just like you.”