Forbidden Blood (Vampire Venators Romance Series) (8 page)

Amber shut the water off and stepped out of the shower. Her head spun. She closed her eyes and waited for it to clear. It had done that from time to time last night too. Was it the vampire trying to control her?

She shuddered at the thought. She didn’t like the idea that someone could control her and make her do things against her will. She unravelled the bandage on her hand. The cut across her palm was still raw and it was bleeding in places again. She washed it in the sink and then looked for a new bandage, finding some in the cupboard in the black sink cabinet. She carefully wound it around her hand, tight enough that it would stop the bleeding, and pinned it.

The vampire had wanted her to taste her blood but she hadn’t been tempted this time. Was his hold over her fading?

The sound of a door closing made her look up at herself in the mirror. Kearn.

She clawed her hair back into a neat ponytail, slipped the robe on, and tied it.

Kearn was in the kitchen when she walked out of the bedroom. He glanced over at her, his green eyes as impassive as ever. Not even the sight of her in his bathrobe fresh from the shower provoked a reaction. He crossed the room and held two large black paper bags out to her. There was a store name she didn’t recognise written on the side in a white cursive font. She peered inside the first one at the clothes. The second had a cardboard shoebox in it.

“What is it?” She looked at Kearn.

“Your outfit for tonight.” He dropped another similar bag on the couch facing the window and she looked in it too. Her own clothes. He had taken them to a store and, judging by the bags, it had been somewhere expensive.

Kearn held a small brown bag out to her.

“What’s this?” She took it from him.

“Breakfast,” he said without any trace of emotion, his eyes not leaving hers. “Coffee and pastries. I asked the woman what you might like.”

Amber frowned. What she might like? As though a stranger would know such a thing. Couldn’t he have judged for himself? Maybe he didn’t know what food tasted like. Maybe vampires didn’t eat anything other than blood.

Maybe he just didn’t eat pastries. She had known men in her past that didn’t touch sweet things. He could be like them.

“What about you?” She placed the clothes bags down on the couch beside the other one and eyed him closely, studying his face.

“I ate when I was out.”

Amber stared at him. He stared back, colder than ever. He really wasn’t very talkative. The effort of trying to make conversation with him was exhausting.

Kearn walked around her and along the length of the couch beside the wall to the far end of it. He leaned over and paused with his hand just above his gun. He kept his back to her as he picked it up.

“Do not ever touch it again,” he said and went into his bedroom, closing the door.

A few minutes later the shower was running and Amber was still standing in the middle of his apartment feeling guilty for snooping and wondering how the hell he had known she had touched the gun. It had been in exactly the same place as he had left it.

He was an enigma.

He had no food, a lot of money, and treated her coldly even though she was helping him. She looked at the clothing and the food that he had bought. She couldn’t figure him out at all. She had never met anyone so distant either. Was it his work? Maybe he was just unused to company. He hadn’t been that at ease with his brother too.

Maybe he wasn’t human.

She couldn’t push that thought away. Whenever she gave it a chance, it came back.

Amber walked over to the kitchen island and placed the brown paper bag down on the granite top. She sat on one of the black and wood stools that followed the curve of the island, and opened the bag, removing the white paper cup of coffee. She took off the lid and scooped up some of the foam with her finger. Cappuccino. Just the fix she had needed.

There were a lot of different pastries in the bag. Covering his bets?

The bedroom door opened and Amber looked over her shoulder at Kearn. He rubbed a brown towel against his wet hair. Water dripped from the ends of the long silver strands and rolled down the bare strip of chest and stomach visible between the two sides of his black shirt. His body was delicious. Just what she wanted to eat for breakfast. His muscles shifted and bunched with each move he made as he dried his hair, a feast for her eyes only. She stared, unashamed of what she was doing. If he was going to put it out there, then she wasn’t going to shy away.

Kearn tossed the towel back into his bedroom, ran his fingers through his hair, and then walked over to the jacket on the couch. He picked it up and placed it over the back of the couch facing the window. Amber sipped her coffee and kept watching him, or at least his body. He ruined her fun by buttoning his shirt and tucking it into his black trousers.

He came over to her and looked at the paper bag. She took another sip of her coffee and drank her fill of his face, putting to memory the curve of his lips as they parted and the way a line formed between his dark silver eyebrows when he frowned. He was undeniably good looking and was starting to creep back into sexy territory.

“Want one?” Amber offered the bag, part of her doing so out of politeness and the other part wanting to test him.

His green eyes shifted from the contents of the bag to her hand that was holding it. Blood was seeping into the bandage again.

“Take it if you want it,” she said and his eyes met hers, incredulous and searching. It was the first sign of something other than cold calculation in them today. He almost looked shocked.

“No, thank you.” Kearn pushed the bag back at her. “You should dress. We need to arrive at the club before everyone else so we do not look as though we are together.”

She took a long leisurely sip of her cappuccino, unwilling to be rushed by him, and then slipped down off the stool.

When he had said they would go to a club, she had expected them to be together the whole time. The thought of being alone when the vampire could be stalking her was frightening but she had promised to play bait for him. She picked up the bags of clothes from the couch. What sort of bait did Kearn have in mind? The clothes would give her a hint.

She walked into his bedroom, kicked the door closed, put her coffee and pastries down on the side cupboard and dumped the bags on the bed.

Refusing to hurry, she ate a croissant and drank half of her coffee, and then devoured another pastry.

Amber pulled the large shoebox out of the first bag and opened it.

She tipped the contents of the other bag out on the bed beside it.

Her eyes widened.

“What the hell!”

CHAPTER 6

K
earn stopped putting on his shoe the moment the wave of anger washed through the apartment. Amber wasn’t happy about something. He couldn’t think what it would be. He had seen humans enjoying coffee and sweet things, and the woman at the boutique had assured him the clothes would suit her.

He looked at the door, shrugged it off, and finished putting on his leather shoe. He picked up his jacket, considered bringing it with him to the club, and then thought the better of it. He didn’t want to look too formal.

The door to his bedroom swung open with force and Amber came out.

Kearn only meant to glance at her but it became a stare when he saw her. A strange gut wrenching jolt rocked him, and it wasn’t just his desire for her blood this time.

She looked incredible.

He couldn’t help himself. His gaze started at her feet, roaming up the length of the black leather knee-high heeled boots, over the sheer tights that barely hid her slender thighs, to the short black layered skirt that wouldn’t have a chance at covering her backside if she bent over, and finally to the black leather corset. Her cleavage, pushed up and on display, was temptation in its most alluring form, but he forced his eyes to keep moving upwards. She stepped towards him and placed her hands on her hips.

Soft waves of brown hair caressed her shoulders.

A thick black velvet choker with a silver cross on it ringed her neck. The cross didn’t bother him, or any of his kind, but he couldn’t stop staring at it and the sublime curve of her throat. He resisted his desire to lick his lips and swallowed to wet his dry throat. It burned and he fought the terrible hunger that had been rising since he had awoken this afternoon. Her blood was weaker within him now, but his thirst wasn’t abating as he had expected. It gnawed at him, making his insides twist and spasm, and he placed his hand on his stomach. He couldn’t take it. His fangs extended behind his closed lips and his mouth watered. He kept his feet planted to the wooden floor, refusing to give in to the urge to cross the room, drag her soft body flush against his, and sink his fangs hard into her throat. The battle raged inside him and her blood spoke of her growing confusion over his silence and staring. It took every ounce of his will to force his fangs away but he managed it and clawed back control.

When his gaze finally found her face, another jolt hit him, this time in his chest and worrying.

She was beautiful.

The make-up the lady in the boutique had recommended when he had described her enhanced her natural beauty until he couldn’t tear his eyes away from her. The dark brown around her hazel eyes turned them pale and mysterious, and the red lipstick tempted him to take hold of her and kiss her until she was moaning for more. Begging him to bite her.

Kearn ripped his eyes away and fixed them on the window, shaking off his desire. She was bait. That was all. This was business. His gaze crept back to her.

Amber held her arms out and glared at him. It didn’t suit her.

Neither did the rage emanating from her.

“I look like a slut!”

Kearn couldn’t resist the excuse to peruse her again. She looked more attractive than he had imagined she would. A perfect lure for his hunt.

“I think you look good.” It wasn’t a lie or at all difficult for him to say, not even when she was human.

She blushed and cast her gaze at the floor. Her teeth teased her red lips, nibbling in a way that increased the dry burning feeling in his throat.

He instinctively took a step towards her and her eyes met his, her pupils wide and dark. She had looked at him like that when he had come out of the shower. Her scent said that she wasn’t here purely for protection. She was attracted to him. He looked at the windows. She shouldn’t be. There was a whisper in her blood sometimes that said she knew what he was. Why hadn’t she confronted him about it yet? Was she going to keep pretending that he was human?

Was it such a terrible thing that he was a vampire?

Was it such a terrible thing that she was human? She was stunning, a perfect rose in form and fragrance, and the hunger inside him wasn’t all about her blood. He could deny it all he wanted, could lie to convince himself that she was human and therefore beneath him, but every fibre of his body was burning for her touch.

He took another step towards her and then got the better of himself. This was business.

“I need you to fit in tonight and women at the club often wear such clothing. It is important that the man can find you and that you attract attention,” he said.

She huffed. “Do the women also wrap themselves around poles?”

His eyebrow rose. Compared to her conservative black suit, he supposed it was somewhat revealing, but he couldn’t allow her to go into the club looking out of place. She needed to look as though she wanted some action, and she needed flesh on show for the vampires to smell her.

He took a discreet breath of her scent. His fangs itched and hunger tightened his stomach again. Drinking her blood had been more than a mistake. He’d had two blood packs this evening and they had done nothing to quench his growing thirst for her.

“It is not that sort of club.” He pointed towards the door, eager to escape the confines of his apartment and breathe the fresh night air. “Shall we go?”

Amber was almost past him when she stopped and her gaze flicked warily to his chest.

“No gun?”

Her nerves rose, speaking to him and increasing his hunger. Nothing made a vampire thirsty like fear.

“I will not need it.”

“But if that man comes—”

“I can handle him without it.”

She still hesitated. Her fingers went to the bandage on her hand and she picked at it again.

“How? Doesn’t the gun have special bullets?”

Kearn laughed. It had been so long since he had laughed that it sounded strange and alien to his ears. Confusion replaced the fear in Amber’s eyes.

“No,” he said. “The bullets are normal.”

“But they kill vampires…” She trailed off when he raised his hand.

“The bullets only slow vampires down.” He held his right hand out to her. The silver marks on his arm began to shine pale blue as the power activated, starting at his fingertips and slowly creeping up his arm in a cold wave that whispered dark hungry things to him. The glow lit her face, reflecting in her eyes. This was more than she needed to know, but he needed her to see it so she could no longer deny his difference to her. Not human. A beast who thirsted for her blood and had dreamt of her all day. “This kills vampires.”

He closed his fist when the power urged him to feed it and the marks deactivated, leaving his vision dampened and his arm aching.

“Now, are you coming?” He walked to the door and opened it for her.

She nodded and walked past him, not waiting for him to lock the door. She walked down the hall, giving him an enticing rear view of her. Her hips swayed with each step. He raked his eyes over her, frowning when he reached her boots and their tall heels. His gut tightened again, warm hunger sparking into life and mingling with his need for blood. Lust. He was familiar enough with the feeling to recognise it when it was throwing his mind into disarray. It wouldn’t do. He couldn’t be distracted tonight.

Amber was bait.

Beautiful bait.

He followed her down the stairs, allowing his feelings some freedom. It was strange to feel anything positive. Had he grown so used to only negative emotions that positive ones like desire or need born of beauty rather than blood were a foreign thing?