Bite Me (9 page)

“Wait, are you calling yourself a skank?” Kerry asked. Leave it to her to sneak in a smart ass remark when we least expected it.

The entire table burst into gales of laughter. Even Ricki.

The evening continued on that vein. As midnight approached, I’m pretty sure we ran our waiter ragged. He seemed a little wide-eyed as our conversation continued to become raunchier and probably too loud. At one point I thought we were going to be asked to leave the restaurant. Somehow Ivie had found a video of goats screaming. Within minutes, we all had the video downloaded on our phones and were playing them at top volume. When we saw the manager approaching the table, we were like a bunch of twelve year old boys with porn, desperately trying to stop the video or hide our phones. By this time, we were so tipsy that it was a useless endeavor.

Fortunately the manager seemed amused by our antics rather than intent on kicking us out of his restaurant.

“Good evening, ladies. I’m David, the manager. I just wanted to come by and see how everything was tonight.”

We all nodded and assured him we were having a wonderful time. Shannon jumped as someone’s phone continued to play the sounds of screaming goats.

As he walked away, I looked at my friends. “I think it’s time to call it a night. I’m pretty sure our Adam Levine look-alike called the boss on us.”

There was a chorus of boos but they started pulling out their wallets and cell phones. Since we only got to do girls’ night with all of us once every few weeks, we usually took cabs to the restaurant. It wasn’t cheap, but neither was a DUI. I gave out tipsy hugs and kisses before I climbed into my cab. A couple of the other girls lived close enough to each other to share a cab, but since I downsized I lived a good fifteen minutes from all of them.

I paid for my cab and managed to make it up the stairs to my apartment. As I tried to fit my key into the lock, a long-fingered hand took it and opened the door. I shot a look over my shoulder, but I already knew who was there. I could smell his delicious scent before I looked. Conner met my eyes with an amused look of his own.

As he ushered me into the apartment, he asked, “How drunk are you exactly?”

He sounded as though he were suppressing a laugh. I gave him a haughty look down my nose, but I was pretty sure I ruined it by tripping and falling onto the couch.

His eyes twinkled, and his dimples popped out as he stared down at me. “I guess that’s my answer then.”

I leaned back against the couch cushions. “What are you doing here, Conner? I thought you weren’t coming by tonight.”

He stretched out onto the sofa next to me, his arms crossed behind his head. I tried not to drool and focused on what he was saying.

“I finished with my business early and decided to see if you made it home safely.”

I didn’t want to find that sweet, but I did. After two weeks of spending almost every night together, he constantly surprised me with his thoughtfulness and sweet gestures. I never thought a three hundred year old vampire would be such a gentleman. During the time he was born, women were little better than property. I’m sure some men of the time were nice to their women, but I doubted they were as considerate as Conner. The only problem was that I was beginning to feel a little like a shameful secret. I had never been to his home. He rarely wanted to go out in public. If he wasn’t so attentive and sweet I would have believed that I was a short-term fling for him. Hell, even though he was all those things, I was beginning to wonder exactly what his motives were.

I leaned my head back against the couch and cursed silently as the room started to spin.

“Thank you, Conner.” I stifled a sigh.

If I made any little noise he seemed to notice. It was both refreshing and annoying. The fact that he paid attention was wonderful, but I was a thinker, so I tended to mull things over. If I got too quiet or sighed while I was thinking, he noticed.

I still wasn’t sure what to think about him. Now that I was spending more time with Conner, I was beginning to realize that he wasn’t as transparent as I thought before. He had a fucking awesome poker face when he put his mind to it.

I realized I had been contemplating the back of my eyelids for a while and that Conner was silent. I opened my eyes and saw that he was watching me closely.

“What’s on your mind, Donna? I can practically see the wheels of your brain turning.”

“Do you want the honest answer or the tactful one?” I asked flippantly.

Conner just rested his elbow on the back of the couch, propping his head on his hand, and raised an eyebrow at me. I decided that meant he wanted an honest answer.

“I’m just thinking about you and your motives.”

His face started to shut down, but he fought it. I knew I had surprised him.

“What do you mean?” His accent was a bit stronger, which was both sexy and concerning. His accent thickened when we had sex or the few times I heard him get upset. I was pretty sure he wasn’t turned on at the moment, which meant he was getting annoyed.

“Well, I don’t know how things are in the vampire world but I do know how they are in my world. We’ve been having sex for two weeks, but we’ve only been out in public together twice. And I’ve never been to your home. Again, women like you may not be offended by that, but a modern human woman like me would wonder if you wanted to keep me on the down low. If that’s the case, you should also understand that the modern human woman won’t appreciate being treated like that. Especially me.”

Conner actually looked surprised at my words. “You think I’m ashamed of you?” His Scottish brogue was almost full force, and I was beginning to feel a little anxious.

“Never mind,” I muttered. “I didn’t want to upset you. Forget I said anything.”

“The hell I will,” he said.

Well now he was definitely pissed. Shit, damn, and motherfucking hell. I really didn’t want to argue. He asked me for honesty and now he was upset that he got it. “Seriously, forget I said anything. I really didn’t want to make you angry. You wanted honesty, which I gave you, but I also don’t want to fight.”

“We’re no’ fighting,” he stated, “and I’m not angry.” The fact that he sounded like he just gotten off the boat from Scotland did not help support his statement.

It was my turn to raise an eyebrow. “You certainly sound angry.”

Conner pinched the bridge of his nose as though I made his head hurt. I wondered inanely if vampires got headaches.

“Okay, I am angry but I don’t want to fight either,” he said. He removed his hand and pinned me with an intense look. “Do you really think I’m ashamed of you?”

I shrugged. “I’m not sure what to think, Conner. You come here, we have sex and sleep, and then you go. We’ve only gone out together twice and spent time at my place in two in a half weeks. As I said, I’m not sure how things are in the vampire world but I do know that behavior like that is usually a bad sign in my experience.”

Leaning closer, Conner laid a hand on my knee. “Donna, things are very complicated for me.”

I rolled my eyes. “Sure.”

Conner’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t,” he said, his voice deepening.

“Don’t what, Conner? Don’t tell you that I think that is bullshit?”

His face filled my vision suddenly. “Don’t speak to me like that.”

My heart rate doubled, but I stood my ground. I knew that if I backed down an inch I would lose more than the argument. I would lose my self-respect and probably his respect also.

“You can’t have it both ways, Conner. Either you want me to be honest with you or you want me to tell you what you want to hear.”

Everything inside me quailed as he just continued to stare at me with those bright blue eyes. I knew he was angry, but I had no clue what else he might be planning. Maybe he was thinking of sucking me dry and disposing of the body, I didn’t know, but it was more than a little frightening. Though we had been having sex, a lot of sex, over the last weeks, I still didn’t want him to bite me. Amazingly he seemed to respect that and didn’t push me.

Slowly, he sat back, out of my space. “You’re absolutely right. I told you to be honest with me and you were. But I need you to understand, Donna, that things are complicated. Please don’t misunderstand. Most vampires view humans only as food. Especially those who are my age. Rarely do they engage in relationships of any kind with humans. Those of us that are younger or newly made often continue their relationships for a time but it becomes difficult after more than a few years. How do you explain why you do not age to your siblings and parents when they are turning old and grey and you still look as you did decades ago?” He paused. “Some choose to plant false memories of themselves aging in their family’s mind, but many find it too difficult to see their relatives wither and die. It becomes easier to cut ties.”

I blinked at him. I realized that I might not know much about Conner, but I knew more than most.

“Why did you tell me?” I asked.

The corner of his mouth kicked up. “The answer to that question is complicated too.”

“Try to explain it to me then.”

He grinned. “I guess the best way to explain it would be for me to tell you that you’re special.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “Everybody’s special, Conner. Care to go into detail?”

“There are a lot of things I enjoy about you, Donna.”

My eyes rolled again. “Are you referring to sex?” I scoffed.

Conner shook his head. “No. I think you know as well as I do that there’s more between us than sex.”

I thought that but couldn’t help feeling relieved that he felt that way too. God now I felt like I was in high school and agonizing over every little word and action of the guy I was crushing on.

“Is there anything else we need to discuss?” he asked.

I decided to let the subject rest for the time being. Though I wasn’t crazy about all the secrecy, I was beginning to understand that Conner was keeping me separate from his normal life, not out of embarrassment, but with the intention of protecting me. It sounded like I would not enjoy meeting many of his fellow vampires if they viewed me as little better than a meal on heels.

“I have more questions, but they can wait until I’m sober,” I replied.

Conner laughed. “That would be my preference as well. Are you ready for bed?”

My buzz had faded from almost shitfaced to comfortably tipsy. I was ready to go into the bedroom, but not to sleep.

Conner’s expression grew hungry, and I realized that he could feel my lust. The bad girl in me really liked that look and encouraged me to tease him a little. I stood up and faced him. Slowly, I started to unbutton my shirt. I slid the material off my shoulders and let it drop to the floor behind me. I placed one foot on the coffee table in front of me and unzipped my high heeled boots. After I kicked it off, I repeated the same process with the other boot.

His eyes brightened, almost to the point that they glowed. I began to unbutton my jeans and started backing toward the short hall that led to the bedroom. Conner rose fluidly to his feet, stalking slowly toward me. Something in his expression excited me, but also caused a shiver of trepidation up my spine. He looked every inch the predator that I often forgot he was. Bad Girl Donna whispered for me to run, to see if he would chase me.

Without thinking it through, I whirled and dashed a few steps down the hall to my bedroom. I barely made it through the door when he was on me. His arms wrapped around me from behind, one of his hands cupping my chin to tilt my head back and to the side. Conner’s lips slid up my neck to my ear.

“You shouldn’t have done that, Donna. Never run from a vampire. Like any predator, if you run from one of us, we will chase you.” His voice was dark.

My heart started pounding as his other hand moved up my torso to cup my breast through my bra. I gasped when I felt the sharp scrape of his fangs on my neck. Since the first night we made love, he was careful not to get his teeth near my skin. I appreciated his restraint, but I had woken the beast within tonight, and he seemed hungry.

While he kissed my neck and scraped the skin with his teeth, Conner’s hands drifted down to my stomach and started pushing my jeans down. I helped him until I was standing with my back to him, clad only in my underwear. My bra loosened and the straps fell down my arms. I let it fall to the floor before I turned to face him.

When I saw his face, my knees weakened. His eyes were literally two burning orbs of blue and his fangs had lengthened so that they dented his bottom lip.

“Get on the bed.”

I shivered. His accent was back full force. I moved to the bed and lay back on the pillows. Never taking his eyes off me, Conner unbuttoned his shirt. He shrugged out of silky material before his hands went to his belt. A few seconds later he was naked. With his muscular body and thin white scars crisscrossing his torso, he looked every inch the Scottish warrior and hotter than any Magic Mike extra I could imagine. My nipples hardened.

Conner’s gaze moved to my breasts. He started to move toward me but stopped and took a deep breath. Somehow I knew he was hanging onto his control by a thin thread. I shivered again but this time in trepidation. Usually I loved when the man I was with lost control and things in the bedroom got wild. Conner was different. If he lost control, he could hurt me badly.

“Take off your underwear,” he said. His voice was deeper than usual.

I slid off my panties and tossed them over the side of the bed. Unsure of what to do with my hands, I put one above my head and rested the other on my thigh.

Conner studied me for a moment, and I squeezed my thighs together. I wasn’t sure what he was thinking, but he was by far the most creative lover I had ever had. Whatever he came up with, I was pretty sure I would thoroughly enjoy it.

“Put your hands behind your head, bend your knees, and spread your legs.”

Even though we had been lovers for a couple of weeks, I hesitated.

“Do it now, Donna.”

I brought my other hand behind my head and laced my fingers together. I bent my knees and moved my feet apart.

“Wider,” Conner growled.