Undeniable (5 page)

She wondered if the entire night had been nothing more than
the beginning of an erotic dream. Shadows didn’t feel like this. She didn’t act
like this. Her stomach fluttered.

It had to be a dream.

One she intended to enjoy as long as it lasted.

She closed her eyes and let the dream unfold.

Cocooned in heat, she burrowed closer, ran her hands over
the massive shoulders of the stranger holding her in his arms and weaved her
fingers through the long silken strands of his hair before clutching his head
to hers. It no longer mattered what was happening or who held her. She’d never
felt so needy.

Every nerve ending seemed to scream for attention. Her core
pulsed in time with her heart, her labia contracted and flared in anticipation.
Her body hungered for and accepted this stranger who must have been lurking in
the dark, watching, waiting to seize what she’d refused all others.

“Diana?”

The fear in Terry’s voice sliced through the haze of desire
engulfing Diana. She sucked in a breath, filling her lungs with her captor’s
sweet breath. The possibility that she was wrong, that this was no dream and
she might lose her virginity in the woods with a strange man who, for all she
knew, could be a peeping Tom or serial killer sent ice through her veins and a
scream into the stranger’s mouth.

He abruptly broke off the kiss. She expected to feel the
ground strike her back, expected him to quickly drop his pants and take what
she had worked so hard to preserve. Instead, he tenderly covered her mouth with
his fingers.

His face still hid in a shadow darker than she thought
possible, but she knew his eyes were intently focused on hers. A sense of calm
filled her. She closed her mouth. He pressed his forehead to hers, brushed his
lips between her brows so softly she barely felt them, lowered her back to her
feet then brushed his fingertips over her eyes. Against her will, her lids
lowered. When she raised them, her phantom was gone.

Shaking uncontrollably, she scanned the shadows lurking
between the trees and searched for one blacker than normal. A tiny mewl nearly
sent her sprinting back through the hemlocks. Clenching the muscles in her legs
to fight if necessary, she turned, looked down at the base of the tree that she
would have run into if the shadow hadn’t blocked her way and watched in awe as
a kitten too young to be away from its mother’s teat scooted forward on its
rear end.

If she didn’t know any better, she’d swear the ink-black
shadow on the ground pushed it toward her. She peered into the shadow, willing
herself to see more, but failed to make out anything in the murky blackness.
“Who’s there?” she asked, her voice cracking.

The kitten stopped moving. The shadow shrank back and joined
those between the trees. Part of her grandmother’s prediction, the part she’d
refused to dwell on all these years, the part that warned her soul mate would
be an abomination in her father’s eyes, replayed in her mind and sent chills
down her spine.

Just as she thought of reaching into the shadow and trying
to make out the features of his face with her hands, her phantom lover flew
straight up into a forty foot tall pine tree. Tilting her head back, Diana
watched in awe when it burst free a few feet from the top, sending a shower of
pine needles down upon her before sweeping across the ebony sky.

A rustle in the woods jerked her attention back to the base
of the tree.

Another shadow hovered beside it, pulsing like a giant beast
drawing in one large draft of air after another before charging.

Never taking her eyes off the shadow, somehow aware that she
would not survive this phantom’s embrace, she lowered her trembling hands until
her fingers grazed fur, then grabbed the kitten, spun around, and with a burst
of adrenaline-fed speed, ran. Once again blackness engulfed Diana.

* * * * *

“Honestly, Nana, I ran into a tree. Other than knocking
myself out and having a sick dream, nothing happened last night.” Diana
listened while her grandmother rambled on about visions and dreams. “Nana…Nana,
can I call you later? I’ve gotta get some ice on this bump…love you too.” She
closed her cell phone, then sank back against the soft cushions lining her
window seat.

“Not a dream,” she mumbled to herself, then smirked and
rolled her eyes. “I think I know the difference between reality and a dream.”

Last night, when the moon held domain over the world and its
eerie light cast shadows that trembled and swayed, when fanciful dreams
converged with childhood beliefs that still lurked within, she’d believed in
her dark phantom.

But this morning, when dawn shed her radiant light and
revealed that a tree was just a tree and a dream was just a dream, when her
brilliance cast the stars from the sky like so many unfulfilled wishes, Diana
could not…would not accept that his caress, his kiss, his dark embrace ever
existed. To do so would mean that she was just as delusional as her father.

She shuddered, recalling that in her dream, for one
terrifying moment, she’d actually believed in her father’s creatures of the
night.

Leaning her cheek against the warm glass of her window,
Diana watched her father drop a handful of pink daisies down the ornamental
well he’d bought a year after her mother left. Blowing a kiss after them, he
sat on the ground, leaned back against the well, then started to read.

Every morning he sat at her mother’s makeshift memorial and
read the news, the latest novel, or excerpts from Diana’s childhood diaries. No
one had been able to convince her father that the woman he’d loved had turned
her back on them both.

Running her fingers through the soft fur of the kitten
sleeping on her lap, Diana wondered if her mother really was dead, if her
spirit hovered beside her father.

She doubted it. She’d spent too many nights and mornings
crying for her mother during those first few months, shed too many tears when
her mother failed to reappear. No, if her mother was dead, her spirit would
have found its way back, even for a moment, to soothe the child she claimed to
have loved.

She wished she had the nerve to pound on the window and
scream down at her father that his daughter was still here, his daughter never
left. His daughter could use a little of his love. She blinked away the tears
she refused to shed.

When he spoke of her mother, when he insisted only death
could keep her away, Diana’s heart broke that he hadn’t seen what a child
barely old enough to read had seen.

Part of her agreed that only death would keep a mother from
her child, but part of her remembered the odd emptiness in her mother’s eyes
when she had tucked her in that last time. Diana had told everyone who’d
entered the house the next day that something had been wrong with her mother’s
eyes, that they’d grown distant a moment before she’d silently strode out the
door without turning on Diana’s Little Mermaid nightlight. No one had
understood that her mother would never leave her in the dark.

Her hand instinctively rose to clutch the locket her mother
had given her that night. They had talked about her father’s vampires. Her
mother had laughed softly and promised that vampires only dwelt in the minds of
those who never grew up, those who never accepted a nightmare was nothing more
than a nightmare.

Touching the tender bump on her forehead, Diana told herself
that a shadow was nothing more than a shadow.

She stood up. Could a prediction be nothing more than the
ramblings of another damaged mind in her family? Her grandmother had sworn on
the phone that Diana’s soul mate had found her last night. Other than her
phantom lover, no one she might consider even dating had entered her life.

What if she’d missed him?

* * * * *

Three nights after the encounter at the lake, Sebastian
spent his second night in Cabana’s, a small waterfront club in Lake George
Village. He missed the tranquility of Mina’s Cove and his fellow creatures of
the night, missed chatting with them as they strolled down Main Street. There,
the scent of a multitude of flowers tickled their heightened sense of smell.
There, only the sound of the breeze rustling through the leaves and hushed
voices met ears more sensitive than a human’s.

Here, the stench of ammonia, sour beer and myriad perfumes
and colognes mingled with the smoke billowing in from the crowded deck. Here,
music blared and people yelled to be heard.

He had foolishly thought nothing could be worse than
maintaining his shadow form while pitching from side to side in the backseat of
Diana’s ‘76 Camaro as she sped around each curve they encountered on the trip
here, but a faulty air conditioning system in a club crammed with humans proved
him wrong. Every foul odor wafting up from the sweat-covered bodies clung to
the oppressive air filling the club and seemed to converge on the corner where
he’d spent the last three hours. His stomach roiled.

Normally, he merely closed his mind to an offensive sense,
but while stalking Diana he had to keep all of them on alert. The past few
nights had proven that the hunter’s daughter held some kind of power over his
kind. Why else would he find it so hard to maintain control three nights after
the effects of Damien’s attack had worn off?

Although the room already vibrated in time with the bass,
the DJ cranked the music up another notch. Those people more interested in
socializing than dancing raised their voices accordingly. Only the melodic
sound of Diana’s laughter penetrated the din and soothed the pounding ache in
Sebastian’s head. He honed his sense of smell on her scent and wondered how it
remained fresh and enticing in this inferno.

His eyes focused on Diana. Her skin glistened as she gyrated
in time with the music beside her latest partner. From the moment she’d stepped
onto the dance floor, he’d envied the men she blessed with a dance. Recognizing
the lust in their eyes, he tore each and every one from her spell. Lost in the
music, Diana seemed unconcerned when each partner stopped dancing and strode
away.

Sebastian smirked. So many stunned faces, so many men
wondering how they ended up on the far side of the club dancing with someone
else.

His eyes strayed to her hips. For three nights he’d watched
them writhe as she brought herself to orgasm in her bed. Temptation sizzled
beneath his skin and blurred his vision until Diana’s gaze swept over the faces
of the men surrounding the dance floor. A young man stumbled from the crowd and
joined her.

Sebastian tensed when she met the man’s heated gaze with a
welcoming smile. Diana seduced, teased and flirted like the woman his mother
had described. He sensed the fire coursing through her veins every night,
watched her bring herself to orgasm when she finally slid into bed and caught
glimpses of her erotic dreams as she slept. Her constant state of arousal ate
away at his control.

As far as he was concerned, they should be following and
watching Diana’s grandmother. A woman with the power to harness such a sensual
being could easily weave a spell around one of their vamps.

With nerves raw from fighting his own desires and those of
the men around Diana, he watched her enter the dark alcove housing the
restrooms. A man twice her size and at least four beers past drunk followed.

A few minutes later, Sebastian drew in a deep breath and
cursed. Fear now marred her scent. It took only a few seconds to transform into
mist and weave through the crowd, but his senses told him even that was too
long. He merged his mind with hers so that he could hear what she heard, see
what she saw and feel what she felt. Immediately, he felt the sweat drenching
the drunk’s shirt seep through Diana’s halter and coat her skin, felt her
breasts and stomach shrink away. Their minds were so connected that he tasted
bile when, no matter how far she turned her head, the drunk’s rancid breath
managed to creep up her nose.

“Get your hands off me, you asshole!”

The man imprisoned Diana’s wrists above her head with his
left hand and groped one of her breasts with the other. “Come on, baby. I saw
the way you looked at me while you were dancing.”

“I’m warning you, back off!” Diana’s voice revealed none of
the fear that trickled from her mind into Sebastian’s.

When the man’s fingers squeezed and twisted Diana’s nipple
until she yelped, Sebastian cast caution aside and flung a lanky teen out of
his way. He entered the alcove and merged with a shadow just in time to see the
man land on the floor.

Keening like a wounded goat, the man clutched his nose and
drew his body into the fetal position. Blood poured from between the man’s
fingers. Sebastian stared at Diana in awe. If he hadn’t seen through her eyes
how quickly she’d taken the drunk down, he wouldn’t have believed it. The man
topped her by at least a foot and had muscles even Sebastian found impressive.

“Why’d you give me that look if you weren’t interested,” the
man yelled from behind his hand. “You crazy bitch!”

“I’m crazy? I’m crazy?” She kicked him soundly in his ass.

Grinning, Sebastian leaned against the wall and crossed his
arms over his chest. He recalled the kickboxing trophies he’d seen in her room,
and the thought of her muscular legs wrapped around his hips sent all his blood
straight to the erection he’d been carrying around since that first night by
the lake.

His gaze followed taut muscles up her legs to the hem of her
skirt, continued on past her exposed stomach, then came to an abrupt stop.

Diana cupped her left breast with both hands. The pain in
her eyes filled him with rage. Her lower lip quivered as she turned her face to
the wall.

“All I did was glance around at the club. What am I supposed
to do? Close my eyes when I dance?”

Her voice, strangled by the sobs she fought so hard to
suppress, nipped at his heart and released the beast that dwelt in them all,
that fed his rage and demanded he rip open the man’s throat. Shocked that his
body shook with a need to avenge the woman he intended to destroy, he dug his
nails into his palms and forced the beast back into submission. A rustle of
movement caught his eye.