Blake's Pursuit (17 page)

“Once we find Hannah, you can ask her why.”

“Hannah would never…”

A slow shake of his head silenced her.

“She’s been dating Ronny for several months. I can guarantee you that she allowed him to bite her. Maybe not right away, but eventually.” He paused for a moment. “A vampire’s bite is virtually painless. The host feels no more than a pinprick. But once a vampire draws on the human’s vein, the human will feel a sense of euphoria, of pleasure so intense it eclipses any orgasm. And if a vampire chooses to bite his lover during sex…”

He didn’t finish the sentence, and he didn’t have to. The look on his face told her everything she needed to know.

“That’s why a human will give her vampire lover permission to bite her,” he murmured. “So they can experience that ultimate ecstasy together. A special connection.”

Lilo pressed her hand to her chest. This was all too much. She couldn’t process all the information he’d given her. How could she know what was true and what wasn’t? She had no proof of anything. Only his words.

“I want to see.” The words were out before she realized she’d made the decision.

“See what?”

“You. I want to see the real you.” Then at least one question would be answered once and for all, and she could panic in earnest.

“I guess you have a right to it after all that’s happened.” He stood up and put several feet of distance between them. “I don’t want you to be scared of what you’re about to see. I’ll be in control of myself the entire time. I could never hurt you.”

Had Ronny said those words to Hannah, too? Had he, too, professed that he’d never hurt her, and then done it anyway?

She swallowed, bracing herself for what was about to happen. Her palms felt sweaty, and she rubbed them on her pants. Her heart was beating out of control, but there was nothing she could do to calm it down.

“I’m ready.”

Her eyes were trained on Blake’s face. At first nothing happened, then his eyes started to shimmer golden. It took several seconds before the golden hue turned orange, and then red, until his irises were finally glowing scarlet, like two alarm beacons.

She held her breath, as her gaze was drawn to his mouth. His lips parted slowly, revealing his pearly white teeth. He opened wider and exhaled visibly, while at the same time one canine to each side of his jaw lengthened into a razor-sharp fang.

“Oh my God,” she murmured to herself, her hands holding onto her thighs as if her life depended on it.

But evidently Blake wasn’t done, because he now lifted his arms and made her look at his hands, while his fingers turned into sharp claws, claws that could rip an elephant to shreds.

She gasped. He’d touched her with those hands, when he could have easily ripped her throat out with one single swipe. There was no denying it any longer. Blake was a vampire.

And she was caught in the middle of a battle in which the various sides hadn’t even been identified yet. She didn’t know who was good and who was bad. And she didn’t know whose side she would find herself on. If she lived long enough to take sides.

“Lilo, it’s still me,” Blake said softly. “I’m still the man who made love to you. The man whose touch you enjoyed, whose kisses you responded to. I’m still that man.”

She lifted her eyes to his face, and watched him turn back into a man. His eyes were of a vibrant blue again, and his teeth were a beautiful row of white perfection. Nothing gave away what lay hidden beneath that beautiful facade. Which made him even more dangerous.

She scraped together all her courage and lifted her chin. “What are you planning to do with me, now that I know?”

He tilted his head to the side. “Do with you?”

“Yes, now that I know your secret. Yours and Scanguards. How are you going to make sure I won’t talk?”

To her surprise, he let out a soft chuckle. “Oh, Lilo. You really think I’d have it in me to kill you?” He shook his head. “I could wipe your memory, of course.”

She jolted. “What?”

“It’s a skill every vampire possesses: to wipe a human’s memory of an event so the vampire’s secret remains hidden. I could do that. But I’m not going to. I want you to know the truth about what’s going on. I don’t want you to be in the dark any longer. You’re much more use in helping me in my search for Hannah if you know everything.”

“You’re truly looking for her?”

“From the moment I found out she disappeared, I’ve done everything in my power to find her. And I won’t rest until we’ve got her back, safe and sound,” he vowed.

“Why? She’s just a human. She can’t mean anything to you.”

“I don’t distinguish between human and vampire when I choose my friends. And Hannah is my friend.”

The sincerity in his voice was undeniable, as was the honest look in his eyes.

Slowly she nodded. “And once we find her. What then?”

“That’s up to you, Lilo. It’ll be your decision. To go home and pretend nothing has happened, or to accept this new world and make it yours. I already know what I would choose, if I had a say in it.” He ran a searing look over her that made her shiver involuntarily. “But whatever you decide in the end, you’ll be safe. Nobody will hurt you as long as my heart beats.”

Lilo could only stare at him in disbelief. Was she really listening to a vampire making her a promise, a promise she was inclined to believe? She searched his eyes to find the truth in them. Would he keep his word?

The chiming of a cell phone cut through the silence of the room. Blake pulled it from his pocket and looked at the display.

“Sorry, I have to take this.” He connected the call. “Wes?”

Lilo couldn’t hear Wesley’s words, only Blake’s reply. “We’ll be there shortly. Thanks.”

He disconnected the call and looked straight at her. “Wesley is calling a meeting at headquarters. He’s figured out what Ronny’s been up to.”

24

Blake slowed the Aston Martin and entered Scanguards’ well-lit underground parking garage, while tossing Lilo, who sat in the passenger seat, a quick glance.

“We’re here.”

She nodded. “Good.”

While she’d gotten in the car without protest, knowing he couldn’t leave her alone at his house, Lilo had carefully avoided touching him, always keeping distance between them. Her eyes had been vigilant at all times, watching him for a sign that he would pounce. Without a doubt, he’d rattled her with his confession, though he was pleased to see that she wasn’t hysterical and had accepted his revelations with stoic grace. And a pinch of apprehension, though not fear. Fear was too strong a word; he didn’t think that Lilo feared him. She was too smart and too brave for that.

But just because she didn’t fear him, didn’t mean that she welcomed him with open arms. How he could ever regain her trust, he didn’t know. But he was willing to try anything, because never making love to Lilo again wasn’t an option.

Blake pulled into his assigned parking spot, and switched off the engine. Lilo was already reaching for the door handle, but he put his hand on her forearm.

Lilo shrieked and whirled her head to him, shock lighting up her eyes.

“I didn’t mean to startle you.” He eased his hand off her arm, regretting the loss of physical contact. “When we’re in the office, I want you to stay close to me. Don’t wander off. The building is crawling with vampires, and without an employee badge they’ll assume you’re an intruder. I’m breaking a few rules by taking you inside. Some people won’t like that.”

“Okay.”

Blake got out of the car and watched Lilo do the same. At the elevator, he turned to Lilo, who’d followed him.

“Most of my colleagues are like tame lambs once you get to know them.”

“Well, excuse me if I take that with a grain of salt,” she said and tossed him a you’re-shitting-me look.

“Fine, maybe not like lambs, but real laid-back guys.”

She tilted her head to the side. She wasn’t buying it.

He shook his head. “Okay, you’ve got me. Every single one of my colleagues is an alpha. Including the female bodyguards.”

For the first time in the last half hour, Lilo’s face lit up with genuine interest. “Female bodyguards? Are they vampires?”

“Yes. Does that surprise you?”

The elevator doors opened and he ushered her in.

“I just thought… I mean you said vampires bond with human women to have children.” She suddenly froze. “You told me you were sterile. But you admitted that vampires can father children with human women. Does that mean you—”

“Lied about being sterile? No. I am sterile. For now. Every unbonded vampire is. Only once he’s blood-bonded is a vampire able to impregnate a woman—and then only his mate. Not that a bonded vampire would ever want to touch a woman other than his mate.”

“I understand.”

But he wasn’t done talking yet. This was his opportunity to tell her about his world. “Vampire males can of course also bond with vampire females. And have offspring.”

“You mean children born as vampires? But would they grow up?”

He understood where she was coming from. “Well, actually, they would still be hybrids, half vampire, half human.”

“I don’t get that. Where would they get their human part from, if not from their mother?”

“That’s where science comes in. By nature, vampire females have always been sterile, and they still are. But Maya, the wife of Scanguards’ second-in-command, Gabriel Giles, was a doctor before she was turned. And she’d made it her mission to find a way for vampire females to bear children. She succeeded.”

“How?”

“By implanting human stem cells into the vampire’s uterus so she could get pregnant and carry the child during pregnancy.”

“I’m surprised.”

“Why? Maya is a brilliant doctor.”

Lilo shook her head. “Not about that. But about the fact that a vampire female would go through so much trouble to have children.”

He smiled. “Vampire females are just like other women. Some of them want a family as badly as human women. They’re no different in that respect.”

“Mmm.” She nodded. “I think I would like to meet a female vampire. I can’t quite imagine what a woman like that must be like.”

“You met one the other night: Rose.”

“Your cousin?”

Blake made a grimace. Another lie he had to set straight. “Rose isn’t my cousin.”

Lilo’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“Rose is my grandmother,” he hastened to say.

“Grandmother?”

“My fourth great-grandmother to be exact. In 1814, when Rose was still human, she gave birth to my third great-grandmother. Rose was turned shortly after that and from then on watched over her human line from afar, until she had to reveal herself to me to save my life.”

Lilo stared at him in stunned silence. “Oh my God, she must be over two-hundred years old!”

Blake winked at her, smiling. “Granny doesn’t look it, does she?”

When Lilo chuckled unexpectedly, he added, “Don’t tell her I called her granny, or she’ll stake me.”

He noticed Lilo swallow hard. “So the legend is true: a stake through the heart will kill a vampire.”

He nodded slowly. Should he be careful about revealing how a vampire could be killed? What if she used this knowledge against him? But when he looked into her eyes he didn’t see a woman scheming, but he saw the writer in her, the person who wanted to understand the process.

“A stake isn’t the only thing that can kill us. Silver can do that, too.”

“How?”

He welcomed her eagerness to learn. It would only help her understand him better. “A silver bullet will burn a vampire from the inside. Shot into the brain or the heart, it’s fatal almost instantly, in other parts of the body it leads to the silver eating its way through flesh and bone. But if the bullet can be extracted in time, there’s a good chance of recovery. Given sufficient human blood and sleep, a vampire will heal in a few hours.”

“So when you get injured, you can heal yourself?”

He smiled. “Our bodies are made that way. Any injury will be healed during our restorative sleep cycle. Major injuries need human blood to help the healing process along.”

“So human blood is your cure-all?” There was no accusation in her tone. It was a simple question a researcher would ask.

“The same way vampire blood can heal a human, human blood can heal a vampire.”

Suddenly she shifted her eyes and stared at the shiny elevator wall. “A perfect symbiosis…”

He’d never thought of it this way, but now that she’d uttered the word, he couldn’t deny that the lives of the human and vampire races were
intertwined to the advantage of both. He didn’t get a chance to agree with Lilo though, because the elevator doors opened on the executive floor.

He stepped into the hallway, quickly ascertaining who was milling about, before looking over his shoulder at Lilo.

“If you can bear my touch at all, I’d like to take your hand. It’ll make it clear to everybody that you’re with me.

The faint smell of sex that still clung to her—as well as to him—would equally make it clear to any vampire or hybrid that Lilo was his. But he wanted to have a physical connection to Lilo, just in case one of the young pups they were likely to encounter didn’t have his hormones under control, and he needed to maneuver her out of a delicate situation quickly.

When Lilo finally slipped her hand into his, he released a silent sigh of relief. At least she wasn’t so disgusted with him that she couldn’t even hold his hand. It was a step in the right direction.

“The conference room is this way.”

“It looks like a real office,” she said, pointing at a niche with a photocopier.

“It
is
a real office.” He smiled at her. “We all take our work seriously. Without us, people die.”

She looked up at him then. “I’m beginning to understand that.”

“Hey, Blake, wait up!” At hearing Amaury’s voice, Blake stopped and turned, releasing Lilo’s hand in the process.

Amaury, one of Scanguards’ directors, marched toward him. As so often, he was dressed in a loose shirt and cargo pants. Built like a tank, the Frenchman with the long dark hair and the gravely voice was one of the strongest vampires he’d ever encountered.