A Vampire's Christmas Carol (7 page)

“Most vampires do go dark.  They can’t resist the call of the blood. They…they lose themselves in the dark hunger that burns within them. The hunger for blood. For power.”

Great news.

“I don’t want that to be you. It doesn’t
have
to be you.” Her fingers tightened around his. “That’s what this night is about. You’re getting a second chance. You can see the world differently.
You
can be different tonight.” 

He didn’t feel different. His tongue slid over his fangs. “I want your blood again.”

Her breath caught.

“I can hear your heart pounding,” Ben continued. Because he did hear it. Calling to him. Tempting him. “I want to put my mouth on your throat, and I want to damn well devour you.”

She should have backed away from him. Simone didn’t. She inched closer.  “Then why aren’t you? Why aren’t you biting me right now?”

“Because I don’t want to hurt you.” Not ever. His hand turned so that he was the one holding her. “If you stay with me,
I
can change.” Hell, did that sound like begging?

“I-I can’t stay…”

No.
Fear clawed him from the inside. “You came back to me. You want me—dammit, I proved how much we both need each other back at that cabin.”

“I’ve always wanted you,” she said as her gaze held his. “Vampire or man, I want you.”

“Then stay
.
” He would make her stay. “You want me to be some kind of better vamp?  Some fucking good guy? Then you stay with me, and I’ll change.”

“It’s not that easy.”

Bull. “It’s as easy as we want it to be.” 

She looked away from him. Gazed into the darkness. 

A strange awareness rose over his skin.  He almost felt as if…as if Simone were staring
at
someone. But when he followed her gaze and peered into the darkness, Ben couldn’t see anyone.

He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her closer to him.

“My hour is almost up.” Her voice sounded so sad.

An hour? “Screw that.
Stay.
We can have forever.
”

“Ben…”

“I’ll get you a Christmas tree.” Those stupid words just burst from him. But he would. If the tree made her happy, he’d get one. He’d get her a thousand Christmas trees, and he’d string lights on every single one. “We can decorate the tree like we did before.
Everything
can be like it was before. You’ll be with me, and I’ll be—”

“I love you.”

His throat seemed to close up on him.

“I do.”  She smiled, and the sight twisted his heart. “I wasn’t away from you because my feelings changed. I was away because my feelings stayed the same.”

That made zero sense to him.

“I love you,” Simone whispered, “and I would do anything for you.”

The snow started to fall again.

“You have worth to me,” she said, gazing up at him with eyes that swam with tears. He hated the sight of her tears. They broke him.

Her hand stroked his cheek. “You always will have worth to me, and for you, I’d even go into the darkness.”

She rose onto her toes then. Simone pressed her lips to his.  He kissed her back. Desperate, greedy. Ben had never thought he’d get to hold her again. To have her in his arms once more was better than heaven, it was—

She vanished.

The snow fell harder, and Simone, she was just—gone.

“Simone?” He spun around in the snow.  There were no sign of her footprints. Had she flown away? Moving at that angel speed of hers? He looked up, gazing frantically into the sky that no longer shone with stars. Snow fell down onto him. “
Simone!”

But she didn’t answer him.  The cold crept into his bones. Rage bled through his pores. She had left…again?  After such a short time? She’d come back, she’d screwed with his head, and she’d just flown away?

“No, angel,” he vowed as he stared up at that dark sky. “You don’t escape.”  Even if he had to fight his way up to heaven, he wasn’t letting her go.

Simone had made a fatal mistake. She’d come back. She’d reminded him of everything that he’d lost on that New York street. He wouldn’t lose her again.

I can’t.

He also wasn’t going to just stand there on that long, snow-filled road all night. He glanced to the left once more. Then to the right.

Just as he took one step, a growl rose in the darkness. Ben tensed even as his fangs automatically lengthened in his mouth. The fang extension was a vamp’s fight-and-kill instinct, a natural reaction to danger.

A dark form emerged from the falling snow. Black, sleek, the animal came toward Ben with its head positioned low to the ground. But as the beast drew closer, that head lifted, revealing a mouth packed with long, sharp teeth.

That’s not a damn dog.
The beast leaned back on its hind legs as it prepared to launch toward Ben.

It’s a panther.
A black panther on a snow-filled night. A black panther who was hurtling toward him right then in a blur of speed.  Ben lifted his hands, more than ready to fight the beast but—

But he wasn’t staring at a beast any longer.

Mid-attack, the panther shifted. Its body stretched.  The fur vanished and skin appeared.  Bones popped and snapped and Ben soon found himself staring at a man.

The man’s bright green eyes assessed him. “Hi, asshole,” the guy said, his voice rumbling and sounding like a growl. “Remember me?” 

Ben’s gaze locked on the guy’s face. He studied that face and let his brows rise.
The panther from the cemetery.
“The last time I saw a panther shifter, the cat ran away from me.”

The man smiled and waved his hand. The snow stopped falling. “I wasn’t running from you. I was so happy you’d killed those bastards…I was starting
my
life. I was running toward my future, not from you.”

Ben didn’t relax his guard. Not for a moment.  “I’m supposed to believe that crap?  You and your shifter buddies were a pack.” At least, he’d thought they were. They’d sure all attacked together. “You were fighting with them.”

“It’s not easy to kill an alpha shifter. Even if the prick is crazy as all hell.”  The man smiled. He had thick, dark hair and eerily bright green eyes.  Ben had never seen eyes shine quite the way this shifter’s did.

The guy was also stark naked.

“You freed me from him,” the shifter said. “So now, I owe you.”

“Great,” Ben snapped. Cause that was what he wanted. A cat saying he was grateful. “How about you put on some clothes and we’ll call it even?”

The man waved his hand again, and clothes just—appeared. Jeans. A t-shirt.  A t-shirt? In the winter?

“I don’t get cold,” the guy told him. “Shifters usually run hot.”

Wonderful for them.  Ben shouldered past the guy.

“Ah, at least you’re going in the right direction…”

The cat was following him. No, not following him. The cat shifter was right
beside
Ben now. The guy moved fast.

“I’m Jamison,” the fellow said.

Ben whirled toward him. “Fuck off,
Jamison
.”

Jamison’s green eyes narrowed. “I’m your last visitor for the night.”

This was so screwed. “I don’t want you.” Ben grabbed the shifter by the t-shirt. “I want Simone back. Bring
her
back
.
” She was the only visitor he cared about.

“Ah, enjoyed that little meet-and-greet, did you?”  Humor flashed in the shifter’s eyes. “But that angel is smokin’, so I don’t blame you a single bit for wanting to tap that ass.”

Ben slammed his head into the shifter’s nose. There was a savagely satisfying crunch of sound. Blood spurted. The shifter howled.

“Don’t fucking talk about her,” Ben snarled at him. He was more than ready to let his own beast out. “She’s the woman I’m going to—”

“What? Marry?” The shifter pressed a hand to his bleeding nose. Then, not even pausing for a second, he snapped the broken nose back into place. “Sorry, man, but I don’t see that in your future.” 

“Oh, you don’t?”  It took every bit of his self-control not to grab the guy and re-break his nose just for the hell of it. “Then what do you see?”

Jamison flashed a broad smile. One that showed way too many sharp teeth. “I thought you’d never ask.” His hand slapped down on Ben’s shoulder. “The future…that’s what I’m all about tonight. Your future and that sweet-ass angel’s future.”

Ben’s back teeth ground together.

Jamison pushed him forward. They started plodding through the thick snow.  “She wasn’t just
your
angel,” Jamison told him as if confiding a big secret. “It’s not like a one angel per person deal. They watch over a lot of folks at the same time.”

Ben hadn’t known that. Mostly because he didn’t know anything about angels. 

“I was her charge, too.” Jamison stopped, staring straight ahead. “I used to think death would be my way out.  The alpha was so freaking twisted. He cut on us just as much as he did his prey.”  Jamison’s hand rubbed over his chest. “But then, maybe we
were
his prey.” His hand dropped.

Ben’s head tilted as he considered the shifter. The guy’s nose wasn’t bleeding anymore. It wasn’t even swollen. 

“We heal fast,” Jamison said, obviously reading the question on his face. “Almost as fast as vampires do. That’s why I didn’t scar, no matter how many times the alpha took the skin right from my body.”

Fuck. 

“The past can be hell, and the future…” Jamison exhaled on a rough sigh. “Sometimes, it can be a nightmare, too.”

“I’m supposed to believe that you’re about to show me the future?”

“I’m going to show you the future that
could
be,” Jamison said carefully. “The real future is what you make it…or haven’t you realized the point of this shit-forsaken night yet?”

Ben blinked.

“And it’s not like I’m doing it on my own. We’ve got a special magic working for you. Courtesy of our angel girl.” Jamison’s gaze hardened. “For the record, I don’t think you’re worth what she’s done, even if you did save my hide ten years ago.”

What she’s done…
“What do you mean?” Ben demanded.

“I mean I’d let you rot.” Jamison stalked forward. “If I had been given the choice between—”

“What has she done?” Ben caught the shifter’s shoulder and whirled the guy around.

And he heard a scream. A loud, desperate scream. 

“There it is,” Jamison drawled. “Right on time.” He gazed at Ben. “Do you even react when you hear screams anymore? Or do you just not care?”

Ben threw him back and ran toward that sound. As he raced ahead, Ben realized that he could smell…blood…in the air.  The scent was too tempting for a vampire.  Ben rushed through the trees.  He shoved the branches out of his way and he found—

Blood in the snow.

A boy, broken on the ground.

Ben stumbled to a stop. He knew that boy. It was the kid that Simone had shown him in the alley. Cale. The boy’s torn, old shoes had fallen off his feet.  They lay several feet away in the snow.

“Told you,” Jamison said as he slowly approached. The guy seemed to be taking his time. “The future can be a nightmare.”

Ben swallowed and managed to ask, “Is this…is this what will really happen in the boy’s future?” 

“It’s the future planned now, what
can
happen.”  Jamison’s voice held sadness as he said, “He tried to run, but he wasn’t fast enough.” 

Ben leaned over the boy. The kid’s eyes stared sightlessly ahead.  Two deep puncture wounds lined the boy’s throat. The kid had screamed—and now Ben knew why the scream had been cut off so abruptly. A vampire had fed on the boy, and when the vamp finished his meal, he’d backed away.

You let him scream, didn’t you?

Then the vamp had broken the boy’s neck.

“He won’t rise, so you don’t have to worry about that,” Jamison told him, voice cold and hard. “He’s just going to get buried by the snow out here. It will be days before anyone finds the body.”

Ben’s gaze snapped toward the shifter.

“The snow plow will eventually come through.” Jamison shrugged. “That’s the way it is for some people. They die, and no one even notices.”

Ben was noticing. The poor kid. Broken in the snow.  He turned his head and looked back down at the boy.  Just a teen.  In someone else’s cast-off clothes. No socks on his feet.

“If he’d stayed in the alley, he would have survived the night,” Jamison said.  “I thought you might like to know that bit…”

Ben’s shoulders tensed.

“The restaurant over there had a broken back window. Cale lived in that alley because he could sneak in the restaurant on cold nights. He could fill his belly and stay warm. But the boy was too afraid you might come back, so he ran tonight.” 

“I
wasn’t
the vampire who did this.”

“No, you weren’t. There’s another vamp in town, and you didn’t even notice him.  Seems like that happens with you a lot. The whole not-noticing-routine.” 

“This future sucks.” Ben’s hands were hard fists.  The kid’s eyes were so blank.  Ben swallowed and asked, “What was his full name?” Simone had just called him Cale. 

“Why? It’s not like knowing will change anything.” The shifter’s hand pushed into Ben’s back. “There’s more to see.  We don’t have all night to stare at the dead.”

Ben knocked his hand aside. “We’re not just leaving him in the snow.”  

“Sure we are.” That hand came right back to his shoulder.

Ben shoved it off again.  “No, we’re not.” Ben looked down at the ground. “He’s—”

  
Gone.

“We’re looking at the future, vamp.  He’s not dead. Not yet.” Jamison propelled him forward once more. “Let’s see what else is waiting for you.”

Ben didn’t want to go anywhere. “Unless it involves Simone, I don’t want to see the future that’s coming.”

Jamison stopped shoving him. “This night isn’t about her.”

“Yeah, well, guess what? I’m changing the rules. From now on…
it’s about her.
” Because she was alive somewhere in this world. Maybe in heaven.
But she was alive
. “I don’t go anywhere, I don’t see anything, unless it’s about her.” 

Jamison tilted his head back and stared up at the sky.