His to Protect (4 page)

Chapter Four

Tyler startled awake as Logan groaned
loudly. He seemed to be in terrible pain.

"Tyler?" Logan asked breathlessly
as he tried to sit up. "Where are we?"

"At Adrian's place," Tyler said as
he moved closer to the bed. "
It's
okay, Logan.
Lie back down. Don't push yourself." Tyler leaned closer, trying to assess
if Logan's color was healthy for a vampire or not. "Are you hungry?"

His best friend licked his lips, but shook
his head in seeming embarrassment.

"Why are we here?"

"We're staying with Adrian while he
figures out what happened."

"Adrian?" Logan shook his head as
if trying to clear it. "Who's he?"

"Do you remember what happened four
nights ago?" Tyler asked. Right at this very moment he'd rather ask
questions than answer them.

"Four?" Logan glanced around the
room apparently finding nothing familiar. "What time is it?" He
reached up to rub a hand over his eyes, still looking very tired.

"Judging by the fact that you're awake,
I'd guess it's about sundown."

"Sundown?"
Logan asked frantically as he tried to get off the bed. Tyler moved
to stand in his way, refusing to let him up. The guy was still as white as new
snow. Chances were he'd fall on his face long before he reached the door.

"Tyler, I need to get home. William
will be…" Logan's words trailed off and a sob escaped his throat. Tears
filled his eyes as he apparently remembered part of the discussion they'd had
last night and the night before and the night before that.

"
It's
okay,
Logan. You're safe now. No one's going to hurt you."

"William?"

"He didn't make it," Tyler said
quietly as Logan moved back onto the bed and curled into himself, holding his
arms across his stomach as grief overwhelmed him once again. It seemed so cruel
that he was going through this experience every night.

"Oh, god, I failed him." Logan
dragged in a shuddering breath. "I promised to keep his secret and…and…and
I failed." He closed his eyes and dragged in another deep breath. "Somebody
killed him because he was a vampire, didn't they?"

"We believe so," Adrian said from
the doorway. "How are you feeling, Logan?"

It was obvious that he didn't remember
meeting this man. Hell, was Logan doomed to relive the same day over and over?
It was an exceedingly cruel outcome for a man who'd been so vibrant, so alive.

"I'm fine," Logan said primly.
Tyler no longer smiled at his friend's typical reaction. This was the fourth
time they'd been through this. It was painful to watch.

Logan had never been very comfortable around
good looking men but, with his emotions so close to the surface, he'd sounded
downright rude. Apparently Tyler wasn't the only one to notice. Logan tried a
small smile—that still came off as stiff and unfriendly—and tried to moderate
his tone. "I'm fine, thank you."

"I seriously doubt that," Adrian
said as he came into the room with a large mug full of coffee and handed it to
Tyler. He smiled his thanks and gratefully lifted the caffeine dose to his lips
to sip at the steaming brew. It was rather strange trying to sleep during the
day and be awake all night. Judging by how tired he was, he wasn't doing a very
good job of it.

Logan wrinkled his nose in distaste as he
glared at the mug in Tyler's hand. "What is that?"

Tyler glanced at Adrian before answering.
"Just coffee."
He was quite confused by his friend's
reaction. Logan was even more addicted to the beverage than Tyler was.

"Just coffee?
Coffee made from what? Ground up rabbit shit?"

"Logan!" Tyler said in the same
shocked tone of voice his mother might have used.

Adrian smiled tightly as Tyler tried to
figure out why his friend had been so rude. True he'd been through an awful
experience, but even in times of great stress, Logan had always been
polite—especially in front of strangers. At least tonight he was behaving
differently than he had in the past three nights.

"Are you hungry?" Adrian asked
without reacting to Logan's words or Tyler's tone.

Logan shook his head. "How can anyone
be hungry with that smell in the air? And, oh yuck, how could anyone drink it?"
He actually gagged as he watched Tyler lift the cup to his lips to take another
sip.

"I never realized," Adrian said
speculatively, watching Logan's reactions closely. Logan was obviously in a
strange mood because he raised an eyebrow aggressively as he waited for Adrian
to explain. "I never realized that a vampire's sense of smell changed so
quickly."

"Vampire?"
Logan asked, his gaze bouncing between Adrian and Tyler. "You're
a vampire?"

Tyler wasn't certain which one of them the
question was aimed at, but he chose to answer it anyway. Logan at least
deserved to hear such distressing news from a friend—even if this was the
fourth time he'd been told.

"You are, Logan. You're a vampire now."

Logan was silent as he absorbed that little
piece of life-altering news. After what felt like several minutes, but was
probably much shorter, he turned his gaze to Adrian. "William gave his
life to save me, didn't he?" he asked quietly, his lips quivering as tears
started to fall from his eyes. "Why did he do that?"

"You know why," Adrian said,
smiling sympathetically. "You gave your life to save his. Why would you
expect any less from him?"

"What happens now?" Logan asked,
shaking his head as if he couldn't quite believe everything he was being told.

"Until we can catch and stop whoever
killed William, I'd like for you to both stay with me."

"What about work?" Logan asked.

"I um…" Tyler said, hesitating.
This was one piece of information he truly didn't want to deliver.

"You um...what?"
Logan asked, his annoyance obviously rising once more.

"You resigned."

"What?" Logan screeched in a voice
so high pitched that it made Tyler's ears ring. Judging by Adrian's wince Tyler
wasn't the only one to feel pain. "Why would I do that?"

"Relax, Logan," Adrian
said,
his voice very stern, almost as if he were talking to
a recalcitrant child.

"Why the fuck should I relax?" He
turned angry eyes on Tyler. "You destroyed my career while I was sleeping!"

"That's not fair, Logan." Adrian's
tone of voice brooked no argument. "When you calm down you'll realize that
Tyler did the only thing for you that he could under the circumstances."

"But—"

Adrian cut him off before he could argue
further. "You can't go out in the sunlight. You know that. At least by
putting in your resignation Tyler made it possible for you to stay in town for
a few more years."

"He should have waited."

"For what?"
Adrian asked in a perfectly reasonable tone.
"For
you to not be a vampire?"

Logan shook his head, tears beginning to
stream down his face as he mumbled an apology. "What's wrong with me?"
he asked suddenly. It was clear that he realized this wasn't his normal
behavior, which in turn just seemed to make him angrier.

"It's mostly from the change,"
Adrian said, touching Tyler's shoulder comfortingly as he moved closer to look
at Logan's eyes. "I believe it's kind of like a hormone imbalance. Your
body is going through a rather traumatic experience, so it's reasonable to
assume it will affect your moods for a while, too."

"Vampire PMS?"
Logan asked in a sulky tone of voice.

"That would be my guess," Adrian
said with a soft laugh, still studying Logan's eyes the way a doctor might. "You're
probably hungry, as well. Tyler has agreed to be your donor, but until you've
figured out how to use your fangs correctly, I suggest you let him choose where
and how you bite him."

"What?" Logan asked in a small
voice.

"I…If you don't want…We can maybe find
you someone else," Tyler said unsteadily. "I just…It's important for us
to keep your condition quiet."

"Huh?" It apparently took a few
moments for Logan to understand that Tyler thought his offer to help was being
rejected.

"Tyler," Logan said in a pleading
tone, "it's not you." He blinked rapidly, trying to clear the tears,
but it was obvious that he could barely see them through the blur of salt
water. "I mean, thank you for volunteering. I'm very grateful. I just wish
I knew what I was doing. I lived with William for six years. Why didn't I ask
him about any of this?"

Logan dragged in a deep breath, and it
finally occurred to Tyler that even as a vampire Logan still seemed to need
oxygen.

"Adrian knows enough about vampires to
help us both get through this," Tyler said as he reached a hand out to his
best friend.

"I'm sorry," Logan said, obviously
very frustrated by the conflicting emotions running through him. He squeezed
Tyler's fingers lightly. "I've been emotional before, but this feels more
like an insane overload."

"You need to feed," Tyler said,
trying to be brave. This was the first time Logan had been fully awake and some
of the more horrific scenes from the movies were parading through Tyler's mind.

"But what if I hurt you?" his
friend asked very seriously. Tyler tried to hide his reaction. How many books,
movies, and television shows had he known where the vampire lost control and
killed accidentally? Hell, he wanted to help, but he'd rather not die in the
process.

"Unlikely," Adrian
said,
a small smile on his lips as he shook his head. "You
will find at least for the first fifty years or so that your strength is no
better than when you were a human."

"Oh." Perversely, Tyler found that
kind of disappointing. Surely there were some advantages to being a vampire.

"But I'll stay and supervise the first
few times." Adrian reached over and moved the hair out of Tyler's eyes. "Until
Logan learns how to bite into a major vein without doing damage, it's probably
best that I'm here to help if something goes wrong. Fortunately, despite the
initial pain," he said smiling, "it's also quite a pleasurable
experience for the donor."

"Pleasurable," Logan said as if he
wasn't quite certain what the word meant. But then he gasped in a shuddering
breath and turned worried eyes in Tyler's direction. "Tyler, we can find
another way. I don't want to make you uncomfortable."

Tyler smiled. Right now, Logan sounded like
the best friend Tyler knew. "That's okay," Tyler said, holding up his
fingers to show Logan the multitude of tiny little cuts. "They look worse
than they are."

Adrian grinned and shook his head.
Apparently Tyler had misunderstood what he meant.

"Maybe it's time you told him the
truth, Logan."

Tyler swallowed hard. "The truth about
what?" he asked worriedly.

"Oh hell," Logan said sounding
like a sulky child. "William and I were never more than friends, but well
after feeding him I um…jacked off a lot, especially in the early days." As
soon as the words left his mouth he blushed in embarrassment. Apparently his
forthright words weren't quite the explanation he'd had in mind. "Oh,
fuck, don't look at me like that."

Tyler wasn't aware of looking at Logan any
differently than he had a moment ago, but that didn't negate the fact that
Logan seemed as if he was going to fly off into a full-on temper
tantrum—behavior completely out of character for the calm teacher Tyler had
always known—until Adrian laughed softly.

"Behave, little vampire, or I'll put
you over my knee."

Surprisingly, Logan laughed at Adrian's
stern threat. "Considering all the crazy hormone-type changes I'm going
through that might actually be fun."

Adrian grinned. "Be careful what you
wish for, Logan. My brother Gavin is due here soon. He might actually oblige."

Tyler was still trying to stop his jaw from
falling open when Adrian thankfully changed the subject.

 
"It
would probably be best to avoid major arteries for the moment. At least until
Logan's ability to heal
wounds is
working correctly,
so maybe a thick muscle or somewhere fleshy. It'll take longer, but it will
help avoid doing damage to major veins or tendons."

"You want me to bite him on the ass?"
Logan asked with another childish giggle.

Tyler could feel his face reddening just at
the thought.

Logan wore a wicked grin and was clearly
tapping into the new vampire part of his psyche. He would never have suggested
something so outrageous a week ago.

"What do you say, Tyler? You always
said I was a pain in the ass. Want me to prove it?"

"I…I…um."
Tyler turned to Adrian, pleading with his eyes for help.