A Girls Guide to Vampires (41 page)

"Oh, it's in there?"

"Yes."

"Ah."

He pushed the box back under the bed, then grabbed my hips and pulled me onto his lap. "Joy, about what you said earlier—"

"Oh, my apology?
Yeah, I know I still owe it to you."

"No, about—"

I put my hand across his mouth. "Let me do this with style, will you? I really am sorry for what I said, Raphael. You're entitled to your privacy, and if you don't feel like you can trust me with something in your past, that's fine. It hurts me, but I'll live. I just want you to know that, despite the pain I feel because I know I'm not as important to you as you are to me, I will still be here for you. I love you, and that means I'm stuck with you no matter how badly you treat me."

I pulled my hand from his mouth and smiled at him, pleased I had gotten my groveling out of the way.

There was a decidedly disgruntled look on his handsome face. "That was an apology?"

"Sure was."

"Ah. Perhaps it is the latest rage in apologies—one that backhands the person
you're
apologizing to."

I nudged him on the shoulder.
"Stop being so argumentative.
You're supposed to accept it and tell me you love me and worship me and you'll never, ever keep anything from me again."

"I'm supposed to do that, am I?"

"Yes, you are."

He tipped me over onto my back and loomed over me. I smiled and looped my hands around his neck.

"And you came all this way just to apologize to me?"

He started nibbling on my neck, his hot breath starting familiar fires that had just been put out.

"Well, not just for that. Roxy and I had to talk to Dominic."

"Why?" he asked, his hands sliding up my dress to massage my breasts.

I squirmed and lifted my jaw to give him better access to all the sensitive neck spots, my hands tracing out the muscles in his back. "Roxy set it up. Dominic had something to tell us."

"Something about what?"
His tongue curled around the outer edges of my ear, his uneven breath doing more to me than the hot touch of his mouth.

"Something to help us.
Oh, God, Raphael, you can't do this again, we just got cleaned up!"

"Something to help you what?" he asked, sucking my earlobe into his mouth as he gently squeezed my breasts.

I nuzzled his cheek and tried to remember what I wasn't supposed to tell him. "We're trying to find out who killed Tanya."

He froze for a moment,
then
released my ear to look into my eyes. "Why?"

I traced my fingers across his silky eyebrows.
"Because you're a suspect.
So am I, although I don't think Inspector Bartos was serious about that. I
hope
he wasn't serious. But you… he doesn't seem very happy about you. And, Raphael, say what I will about you being pigheaded and stubborn, you're everything to me. I can't lose you. I won't let him take you from me. So if Roxy and I have to do a little detective work to prove you're innocent, we will."

He kissed me, hot and demanding. "You're the most amazing woman. I've never known anyone as giving as you." I opened my mouth to tell him that was the sort of thing I wanted to hear, but he silenced me with another hot kiss. "Regardless, I can't let you do this. I appreciate that you want to help me, but you don't have anything to worry about."

"But Inspector Bartos—"

"Leave the detecting to the police, Joy."

I pushed him back so I could sit up. "Look, I have enough on my plate right now, what with having to deal with Christian, I do not need you locked up in jail on a trumped up murder charge simply because I didn't make the effort to prove you're innocent."

He took hold of the back of my dress and kept me from getting off the bed. "You don't have to prove I'm innocent; the police know I am. What do you
mean,
you have to deal with Christian?"

I gave him a look of sheer disbelief. "Oh, sure, the police know you're innocent. That's why you're heading up their suspect list."

"What has Christian done? Why do you have to deal with him?"

"I don't want to talk about
Christian,
I want to talk about saving you, you arrogant, maddening man! Why I want to save your annoying, if extremely dishy, hide, I don't know, but I mean to, so you can just stop being all macho and ordering me around and—"

"Joy." He took my face in his hands and leveled a look at me that shriveled the words up on my lips. "You will not investigate this murder any further. The man who killed Tanya has not been apprehended, and until he is, you are not safe. Do you understand me?"

"Of course I understand you—you're being possessive and dominating—"

Raphael rolled his eyes, muttered something that sounded like an oath, and pulled me forward, his kiss hot enough to take the curl right out of my hair. "I'm telling you I love you, you foolish woman."

"You are?" I asked, breathless from the power of his kiss.

His eyes were things of beauty, gems of the brightest quality, clear and translucent and filled with love. Somehow his declaration took the sting out of his bossiness.

"I am. I love you and worship you, and after this is over, I'll never keep anything from you."

It was exactly what I wanted to hear, what I
needed
to hear. He was acknowledging my concerns and fears, and promised to answer all my questions…
after
it was over? I stopped him just a hairsbreadth from my lips. "What do you mean,
after
this is over? Raphael, you could be in jail then!"

His fingers curled into my hair, teasing my nape. "Baby, I won't go to jail."

"What's to keep you out this time?"

I regretted the words as soon as they left my lips. His fingers stop stroking my neck.

"
This time
?"
His gaze held mine. I stared at him, my heart tearing into a thousand pieces at the flicker of pain in his eyes, a layer of ice settling around me as he pushed me off his lap and cocked an eyebrow at me. "I see.
That's
the information you wanted from Dominic. Do you mind my asking how you expect to use what Dominic told you to prove who the murderer is?"

"That wasn't exactly the purpose of our meeting with him," I said miserably, tears starting at the back of my eyes. "I'm sorry, Raphael. I'm very sorry and ashamed of myself. I don't like poking into your
past,
I just want to help you. I want to keep you safe, and since you won't tell me what it is you are keeping from me, I thought if I knew
,
I'd be able to do whatever it takes to keep Inspector Bartos away from you."

He watched for a moment as tears streaked down my cheeks, then wrapped his arms around me and pulled me to his chest. I buried my face in his neck and watered his shirt. "Baby, I wish I could tell you everything," he said, his lips in my hair. "I wish I could, but it's not possible yet. You have to trust me just a little bit longer."

"I do trust you; it's you who doesn't trust me," I pointed out, sniffing and wiping the dampness of my tears off his neck.

He didn't say anything to that, just thumbed the tears off my cheeks and looked at me with eyes dark with longing, regret, and pain.

"What is the problem you're having with Christian?" he asked.

"You're changing the subject."

"I know I am. What is the problem you're having with Christian?"

"This hasn't resolved anything. Even if Roxy and I don't go after the murderer, I'll still be worried about you, and will continue to worry until Bartos has someone other than you under lock and key."

"If it will make you feel better, Joy, I will swear to you that he won't arrest me for Tanya's murder."

"How can you swear that?"

His eyes went darker.

I looked into them and saw the answer for myself. He was still keeping things from me, still hiding secrets that he wouldn't share, but that was no longer the issue it had been earlier. He loved me. I had to trust that in time, he would tell me everything.

"I should be going. I've got a lot to do, and I imagine you do as well." I got up from the bed and gathered my coat and purse.

He stopped me. "What is the problem with Christian?"

I thought about not telling him, but decided he would be safer knowing the truth. "Nothing's the problem with him, unless you count a nine-hundred-year-old vampire as a problem, unless you find the fact that your mind and body and soul can be invaded by him with the merest thought of his mind a problem.
Problem?
I don't know—is it a problem to have an immortal man with limitless power thinking you're the sole person in the entire history of time
who
can save him from eternal damnation?"

"Vampire?"
Raphael couldn't have looked more surprised than if I'd stripped off all my clothes and stood on my head. "You don't mean to tell me that you actually believe he's one of those creatures he writes about?"

"Oh, I don't just believe it, buster, I
know
."

Disbelief was rampant in his eyes.

"Don't you give me that look," I warned, pointing my finger at him. "Don't you give me that 'She's mad, I'll humor her because I'm a manly sort of man and she's my woman and thus I must put up with all of her foolishness and pretend it's not foolish at all even though inside I'm laughing so hard I could break my spleen' look! I am
not
mad, and I'm
not
imagining it."

"Joy," he sighed, taking my hands in his. I tried to take them back, but he was too strong. "I know you're upset about this murder and the fact that I've got a job to do—"

"What job?" I interrupted him, suspicious. "You mean something other than just your security work? Do you have another job?
A secret job?
Something
else
you aren't telling me?"

"—and I know you and Roxy are enamored with Christian because he writes books you enjoy, but, no matter what he tells you, there is no such thing as a vampire."

I turned my hands so I could pinch his wrists. "I used to think that too. I thought Roxy was nuts for wanting to come here, but then the visions started, and then he started making midnight visits to me in bed—"

"WHAT?"

"—and I have to tell you, being seduced long distance by someone's mind goes a long way into making a believer out of you."

Raphael stared at me for a minute, as though seeking the truth in my eyes, then let go of my hands so he could rub his jaw. "Joy, I don't know what you've experienced, but I do know it can't be real."

"It is real, Raphael. I didn't know it was him at first—I thought it might be Milos or someone—but then Christian admitted it when we were in his dungeon. Roxy heard him."

"He's bamming you, love."

"No, he's not. I know what I felt! He invaded my mind. He touched me, physically, only he wasn't in the same room."

Raphael's frown deepened. "Touched you how?"

I held his gaze.
"As a lover might."

The muscles in his jaw flexed. "He's drugged you. He's drugged you with something to make you see visions and believe he has supernatural powers."

"Oh, God, Raphael, he hasn't drugged me—"

"Baby, there's nothing you can say to make me believe that anyone is a vampire, least of all Christian. A parasite, a psychotic madman bent on seducing you, a poor fool who's deluded himself into believing his stories are real, yes, he's all that, but not a real vampire. They just… don't… exist."

"Well, we're going to have to agree to disagree here, because I know what I know." I stuffed my arms into my coat.

"Damn it, woman, there is no such thing as a vampire!" He grabbed my coat as I stepped into my shoes. I tried to walk past him, but he caught my chin in his hand and tipped my head back so he could fire those amber eyes at me. "This is not arrogance talking, this is not jealousy,
it
is simply a matter of facts."

I stared at him for a few seconds, wondering if he knew the danger he was putting himself in by being so blind.
So stubborn.
So determined to not need anyone's help.
"I don't blame you for not believing me. I didn't believe it at first either, not even when Christian invaded my head. But it is the truth, and pretending it's not won't make it go away."

"I don't need to pretend to make Christian go away," he growled, grabbing me and hauling me up against his chest. His eyes were dark with emotion, frustration and love and anger all mingled together.

"You're hurting me," I whispered against his lips. He gentled his hold on my neck, then dropped his hands from me altogether, stepping back to release me.

I looked at the man I loved with my heart and soul, and swore an oath that I would not let his stubbornness ruin our lives. He might not want me playing detective, he might not believe that Christian was who I knew he was, but I could,
and would
, do whatever it took to keep disaster from rolling over us. Slowly I gathered up my things.