Melted By The Vampires: A Paranormal Menage Romance (13 page)

On my other side, Abbott took a second longer to respond than I thought he should have. “That’s right, brother. What else can we do but continue to fight them. You heard what the council said last night... best to just continue on with our defense strategy until one of us gets Harper pregnant and gains the increased strength that will come with that. Then, we’ll be able to take on Dedrick and all his scum, and we’ll be able to get rid of them all for good.”

Even before Abbott had finished speaking, even as the last word he’d said was still on his tongue, Dan had exploded in laughter. And
exploded
was just barely a strong enough word. He wasn’t even laughing or chuckling—he was howling. He sounded like an absolute maniac. Particularly since nothing Abbott had said had been even remotely funny. Roaring so hard he was actually shaking his side of the bed, Dan was kind of scaring me a little. Not least of all because I suddenly wondered if the punchline of whatever secret joke he was laughing about was that he knew that the idea of anyone getting me pregnant was ridiculous, since I was actually the only
in
fertile frozen woman in history. After all, Abbott had said the night before that Dan knew everything about my past and who I was, so it only stood to reason that he also knew I was infertile. Though, for that matter, it seemed like Abbott should know, too, since he’d said that
he
himself knew everything about me, and yet he was talking like he didn’t know I was infertile. Though maybe that was just because he needed to hide that little fact from Dan for some reason, if Dan happened to be in the dark about that.

I needed some serious answers from Abbott. Had needed them for hours, actually. But, like the night before, I knew I couldn’t say anything with Dan around. I’d told Abbott I was going to trust him until he explained, and I was going to continue to trust him. Not to mention that I wasn’t in any hurry at all to find out whether or not Dan really would kill me if he found out that I’d tried to come clean to Abbott. Even though
why
he’d do that, I still couldn’t fathom.

At present, it seemed that my best course of action was to just remain silent. Whatever it was that was making Dan crack up, whatever it was that had made some merriment bubble inside him simply explode, I didn’t want to say anything that would make all that mirth turn to anger on a dime, because, with a sudden chill dancing along my spine, I was developing a very strong feeling that it could. So, being that I was still tied up to the bedposts and unable to defend myself, not that I could against a vampire without my powers anyway, and also being that Abbott had expressed the night before that he couldn’t defend me, either, I kept my lips sealed while Dan continued to laugh. Beside me, Abbott just stared up at the ceiling until the volume of Dan’s laughter went down a few notches, which took at least half a minute. A very awkward, tension-filled, somehow creepy half a minute. Then, Abbott just looked at Dan with a look that almost resembled one of boredom, though whether he was really bored or just acting, I couldn’t tell.

“Care to clue Harper and me in on just what exactly has got you going?”

Dan glanced over at him, still laughing, though the volume of it was continuing to decrease. “What?”

With his face golden in the full sunlight now streaming in through the crack in the cream-colored curtains, Abbott returned his gaze to the ceiling. “Well, if you don’t care to tell us, that’s fine. You and I need to leave very soon anyway.”

“No, just repeat what you said again, Abbott. Please. I really didn’t hear you.”

Dan’s seriousness lasted until the word you, and then he cracked up again, laughing so hard I could see tears glinting in his icy blue eyes.

Still staring straight up at the ceiling, Abbott talked over the noise, his deep voice making it so that he didn’t even have to speak very loudly. “I think you heard me, Dan. And I’m not going to repeat myself. Answer me or don’t.”

Some subtle hint of steel that had crept into Abbott’s voice suddenly made me feel extraordinarily self-conscious and nervous to be tied up to a bed, unable to escape the room. And completely naked to boot. I could somehow just see myself being killed within the next minute, whether accidentally or on purpose, while two powerful vampires, also completely naked, battled around me or even right on top of me. Never mind not being able to use my powers; I wouldn’t even be able to shield my face with my hands.

However, Dan immediately sobered up, at least mostly. He looked over me to Abbott with just a faint stray chuckle rumbling in his muscular chest. “I’m sorry. You know I get carried away sometimes. I just like to laugh.”

“I’m well aware.”

“I’m really sorry, Abbott.”

“Well... fine, but we do need to get going.”

As if to make his point, Abbott got up and began throwing on his clothes.

Dan followed suit right away, whipping on his boxers with just the faintest hint of a chuckle. “You’re right. Let’s get going. And the only thing I was laughing about was that you know it’s going to be me who gets Harper pregnant. You just know it, Abbott. And it’s not funny... really it’s not... but I can tell you already know it. Even when you said, ‘continue on with our defense strategy until one of us gets Harper pregnant,’ I just knew that instead of
one of us
,
you
was just on the tip of your tongue.”

Already fully dressed, Abbott sat on the edge of the bed and began tying his heavy black boots with his back turned toward Dan and me. “Not true, Dan. But I’m glad to hear that your boundless optimism hasn’t diminished over all these hundreds of years.”

Dan pulled his navy blue t-shirt over his head, chuckling once again. “Come on. I’m not trying to be cocky, or get under your skin, or be hurtful or disrespectful to you in any way. Just get my logic. I’m really just trying to prepare you for the inevitable. See, we both know that I’m the fastest of the two of us. The fastest runner, the fastest at jumping to the top of all our tallest buildings... so it stands to reason that my little swimmers would be fastest, too, right? So, the way I see it, it’s kind of a done deal that I’ll get Harper pregnant first. Doesn’t even matter what order we make love to her in, or anything.”

Abbott had finished putting on his boots, and he now stood across the bed from Dan, raking his hands across his face. “I don’t think your logic is entirely correct or foolproof, being that it only takes one ‘swimmer’ to fertilize an egg, not to mention that I don’t think this is the time or the place to discuss these things, being that Harper is
right here
, and also—”

“No, you’re right. You’re totally right. This was just me getting too carried away with my sense of humor, once again. So, we’ll drop it. But right after I show Harper a little something. Then we’ll go.”

Before Abbott could even respond, Dan, who was now fully dressed as well, dashed over to my windows, flung the curtains open, and gestured to something outside. “Harper, have you seen that thick piece of steel that connects this building to the next one over? And can you see it now?”

I had, and I could, so I nodded.

“Okay, good. This steel beam is just for structural support until construction on the next building over gets finished, but right now, it’s going to serve a different purpose for us. It’s going to help me show you something, and it’ll just take a few seconds. Be right back. Just watch.”

Even before I could blink, Dan had opened the window and screen, and had leaped out onto the steel beam beyond. Extending from just below my window all the way to the roof of the unfinished thirty-nine story steel-and-glass building just across the way, a distance of maybe fifty feet or so, the massive beam was about a foot thick, though only wide enough for a person’s foot with maybe an inch or two to spare.

Against a backdrop of clear blue sky, Dan waved at me from the beam, his dark hair throwing auburn-toned sparks in the bright sun. “Back in a flash.”

I didn’t even see him jump, or fall, or anything. One second he was there, and then I’d blinked, and he was just gone. I just stared out the window for several seconds as Abbott talked on his phone to someone, saying something about how he and Dan would just be a minute, because Dan had to finish his show-off game of the day.

Then he paused, seemingly to listen, and in a voice so low I could barely hear him, he added something else. “No, we’ll talk more later, Noah. I haven’t even had a chance to talk to Harper yet. Bye.”

No sooner than he’d said
bye
, Dan came rocketing up through the air from somewhere, wherever he’d been, although I wasn’t even absolutely positive what I was seeing was him. What I was seeing was just some dark, streaking blur that had soared up and beyond the steel beam. But within a moment, this blur came to a dead stop in midair, then began to descend slowly, and I could see that it was clearly Dan.

Not too far outside my window, he landed on the steel beam on one foot, the other kind of dangling off of it, as if he wanted to show me that his landings didn’t even require two feet. “What was that? Ten seconds? Twenty? Something like that, and that was all the way down to the street and back up again. And not to brag, but that jump wasn’t even the extent of my abilities.”

Before I could respond, or even think of a response, he’d leaped back into my bedroom, where his phone was now going off again, along with Abbott’s.

Heaving a sigh, Abbott jammed his in his pocket without even looking at the screen, then leaned over to give me a quick kiss on the mouth. “I’m afraid we’ve got some real Saints trouble today. We’ll be back to see you as soon as we can.”

I nodded, knowing that by
we
, he really meant
he
would be back to see me as soon as he could.

“Come on, Dan. Let’s go.”

Abbott began striding out of my bedroom, followed by Dan. But me shrieking stopped them both dead in their tracks.

“Hey! What about the naked girl tied up to the bed? I realize the Saints problem may be urgent, but could anyone take five seconds to untie me before you both go?”

Abbott was at my side, unfastening one of the scarves restraining me, long before I’d finished speaking. “Jesus. Sorry, Harper. I’m so sorry. All his maniacal laughter this morning has got me a bit...”

Untying a tight knot, Abbott didn’t seem like he was going to finish the thought.

“It’s fine. You’re untying me now.”

“And I am, too. And I’m so sorry, too.”

Suddenly Dan was at my other side, untying my other wrist. “I was just preoccupied trying to show off for you, just because I think you’re so utterly gorgeous that you make me want to do crazy things to impress you, but my focus should have been more on you and your current predicament. I owe you a pickle-and-fried-chicken sandwich for this one. I’ll even add an extra dab of apple butter to it if you want.”

Now freed from my restraints, I sat up, covering myself with the blanket. And, in spite of myself, in spite of everything I’d been told, and had heard, and had thought about since the previous evening, I actually found myself cracking a little smile at Dan. For the life of me, I just could not seem to
not
smile at his little jokes sometimes.

“You know... until you mentioned apple butter, you actually came up with a good sandwich idea. That’s how my old favorite fast-food place used to make fried chicken sandwiches... with pickles.”

Following Abbott out the door by walking backward, Dan curved his lips in a sly half-grin that was absolutely devastating in its sexiness. “When we next meet, Miss North. I’ll bring one to you. Maybe I’ll bundle you up and take you outside on the steel beam for a winter picnic with a full view of the city.”

I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to eat thirty-nine stories above the ground. I honestly wasn’t sure that I’d even be able to breathe. Not that I thought it would ever be a wise idea to be up and out in the open with Dan at any time anyway. Just being that all smile-inducing jokes aside, apparently he might want to kill me at the drop of a hat. And all it would take would be the slightest little shove for him to send me hurtling to my death. Although, I reasoned, he could kill me just as quickly indoors with a single swipe of fangs to my throat if he really wanted to do it. At any rate, neither scenario seemed like a very pleasant way to die, to say the least.

To my extreme disappointment, I didn’t see him and Abbott for the rest of the day. Though, being specific, my disappointment was only about not seeing Abbott. I needed answers, and the longer I went without getting them, the more my anxiety began to feel like some breathing, living thing hell-bent on strangling me.

CHAPTER TEN

After pacing around the apartment for most of the afternoon with a tightness in my chest and throat that I knew wasn’t from asthma or any other medical condition, I called Maria to see what she was up to. “Think you might want to go out for a walk or a bite to eat? We could bring Claire, too, if you have her right now. Maybe show her those pretty Christmas lights they have up at the cafe.”

Brenda hadn’t been kidding when she’d told me that the cafe directly across the street was the primary hangout for former frozen women. Serving almost every American comfort food imaginable, and with tiny American flags decorating the cash register counter, it was really something like a haven for “ex-pats” who wanted to visit a little slice of home in their new vampire-inhabited city of New Detroit.

I was definitely up for a little slice of home, but unfortunately, Maria said that Claire was cutting a new tooth and had been fussy all day.

“I feel like she should really stay in, and I should stay with her. I’m going to see if I can get her to take a little catnap before dinner and bath-time here in a bit, because I think even ten minutes of rest might calm her nerves. Mine, too. But if you want to stop by—”

The sound of Maria’s voice had been cut off by a high-pitch wail.

“She just bonked herself in the face with a toy. Gotta go.”

I decided to go to the cafe by myself, have dinner, and bring Maria back some hot chocolate.

When I left the apartment building, the late-afternoon sky was a dark slate-gray, and a few snowflakes were swirling in a stiff breeze. I was just thankful that the city wasn’t buried in snow yet, since back in “my” day, Detroit usually was in December. Maria had told me that fortunately, since the nuclear disaster, the climate of the entire area had become slightly warmer year-round; not warm enough to drastically change the seasons, but enough so that winters weren’t quite as harsh as they used to be.

When I arrived at the cafe, some of the snowflakes that had fallen on its large white awning outside were already melting, dripping off the awning in a slushy soup. Inside, the place was packed, the large plate-glass front windows steamed up with the breath of so many people inside added to the hot plates of food coming out of the kitchen. On an antique jukebox adjacent to the cash register, some “oldies” song was playing, though it wasn’t
really
that old, at least not to us frozen women, since it had been made just a year or two before the nuclear disaster; so, to me and the others, it seemed like it was made only a few years back, not hundreds.

The song was something bouncy and upbeat with lyrics that went on about a “best day ever,” but the mood in the cafe didn’t exactly match. Dozens of women sat in booths and at tables with expressions that struck me as a little glum, or maybe tense somehow, or both. Even the two vampire women who were waitresses at the cafe looked a little down. This especially struck me as a little unusual, since normally these two women were just about the two perkiest women ever.

Since Maria was the only real, close friend I’d made in the city so far, I kind of didn’t know who else to sit with, or where else to sit. Our usual table was taken by two young women eating large plates of macaroni and cheese without looking like they were really enjoying it much.

Feeling something like the new girl at a high school, I shuffled through the main floor of the cafe, deciding that I’d take a little empty table near the back, rather than interrupt anyone I’d been introduced to by asking if I could sit with them.

But before I could reach the little table, a short young woman with vibrant red hair waved to me from a booth. “Harper! Hi!”

Her name was Katie, and like Maria, she had an outgoing, fairly indiscriminately friendly sort of personality. Not that I knew her that well, though. Maria had just introduced us briefly one day.

I made my way over to Katie’s booth, where she and a friend sat with large chef’s salads and glasses of iced tea. Soon I was sitting with them with a salad of my own, after Katie had introduced me to her friend, Megan, and had invited me to join them.

At first, in the glow of a strand of multicolored Christmas lights running along the wall next to our booth, the three of us just made small talk, discussing things like their kids, the weather, and what I thought of New Detroit so far.

But then, Katie took a sip of her iced tea, seeming to be studying me over the rim of the glass, set the glass down, and then did a little throat-clear that struck me as forced-casual for some reason. “So, Harper....”

I set my fork down, intent on what she was going to ask me or say.

But instead of finishing the thought, Katie just turned bright red, obscuring the light smattering of freckles on her cheeks. “Sorry. I was going to ask you something, but now I just feel like a big gossip or something, and I hate gossip.”

Now I was
really
interested in what she’d been going to ask me.

“No, don’t worry at all about seeming like a gossip. Just go ahead and ask me whatever you were going to ask me. As long as it’s nothing too personal, I’m kind of an open book, so I really don’t think I’ll mind whatever it is.”

Looking visibly relieved, Katie took another sip of her iced tea and once again set her glass on the table. “Okay, well... I just wondered if you’d heard about the...the
fight
or whatever it was today, and I just wondered if you knew anything about it. Everyone’s just kind of....” Katie shrugged, tucking a strand of her short red bob behind one ear. “I don’t know. Maybe just slightly worried. Or maybe just disappointed to hear about it or something. Abbott and Dan have always seemed so close, and they’ve always been so unified as leaders. My husband Matt is friends with them both, and he says he doesn’t remember them ever having a major altercation anytime in the past couple hundred years.”

My interest had turned to complete confusion. Other than their little tiff in my bedroom that morning, I wasn’t aware of Abbott and Dan having had any fight.

Feeling more than a bit stupid somehow, I shook my head. “I’m sorry, I... I really don’t know anything about any fight between Abbott and Dan. I’m feeling just... kind of clueless, I guess.”

Megan looked at me a bit skeptically, as if she wasn’t quite sure I was telling the truth. “So, the fight wasn’t over
you
or anything that you know of?”

I shook my head again. “No. I mean... I really don’t know. I really haven’t heard about any fight between Abbott and Dan today.”

Katie flamed red again. “I’m sorry, Harper. We’re being rude. Whatever happened between Abbott and Dan today is their business, and whatever you’ve heard or haven’t heard about it is yours. We’ll leave you in peace to eat now, because we’ve gotta get going to pick up our kids from the toddler tumble class down the street.”

Katie and Megan got out of the booth, and Katie said she was going to pay for my salad at the register. I said thanks but that she didn’t have to, but she insisted.

“Harper, please let me. You don’t know how many paper bills and gold coins I have floating around my purse from babysitting. And I don’t mean from
me
babysitting, but from the women who babysit my son. See, babysitters pay the parents around here for the privilege, and they’re pretty adamant about it. Just one of the perks of being a mom around here. You might suddenly find yourself pretty rich when
you
become a mom.”

Katie smiled at me, dimpling one of her full cheeks. I tried to smile in return, but it was difficult with a distinct ache in my chest. I’d never be joining the ranks of the well-paid moms in New Detroit.

Once Katie and Megan had left, I started in on my salad again, but I hadn’t even taken a bite when my phone went off. Thinking it might be Abbott, calling to arrange a meeting or something, I whipped my phone out of my pocket and answered without even looking at the screen, but it was Maria, even though I’d pretty much just talked to her. She said she was at my apartment and was getting no answer at the door, so she wondered where I was. I told her I was at the cafe, and I started to ask if anything was wrong, but she cut me off, saying she’d be there in five.

She actually made it over in only two or three minutes and sat down across from me, unwinding a thick, bright pink scarf from her neck. “So, Sylvia comes in a little bit ago, drops this necklace with square-cut emeralds the size of matchbooks on my kitchen table, and then insists that I go out to take a break from Claire’s teething. Which... bless her. All irritation from her forced babysitting payments to me aside, I really did need to get out of the apartment. And I’m honestly starting to kind of love Sylvia like an actual family member. She’s like the incredibly sweet, yet incredibly pushy, grandmother I never had. Oh, and also the very rich grandmother I never had. With my own grandmother, I had to do things like shovel her whole driveway to earn a single dollar. And even then, she withheld the dollar because she claimed that I hadn’t done the shoveling lines ‘straight enough,’ of all things. She then turned around and gave the neighbor kid a ten to ‘re-do’ the whole thing. She had her sweet moments, occasionally, and rest her soul, but my word, was she cheap. Can’t say that I ever remember her dumping ten grand in precious gems on my kitchen table.”

Finally pausing for a deep breath, Maria set her coat beside her, grabbed a laminated menu, and began scanning it.

I gently pulled the top of it down so I could see her face. “Hey. I know you’re probably hungry and want to order, but I’ve got to talk to you about something. There was some sort of a fight between Abbott and Dan today. Have you heard about it?”

Maria set her menu on the table with a sigh. “Well... I didn’t want to burst right out with it and alarm you or anything, but, yes. I’ve heard about it, and from a comment an acquaintance said to me in the elevator down in our building, the whole city’s heard about it by now. See... something really strange is going on between Abbott and Dan.”

I knew
that
. I just didn’t know what exactly that “strange” thing was.

*

I told Maria to tell me everything she knew, and she took a deep breath, leaning back in the booth, before speaking.

“Well, I’ll tell you right off the bat that I don’t know much. I was honestly hoping you could fill
me
in on a few details.”

“You might know more than I do. The first I heard about the fight was just a few minutes ago, from Katie.”

“Well, I only heard about it pretty recently, too. Noah called me real quick right before Sylvia showed up, and he said that Abbott and Dan had had some kind of a shoving match that had escalated into Dan taking a swing at Abbott, but he missed.”

“Well, did Noah say what started the whole thing?”

“Just that it was nothing major at all... just a disagreement about what area outside the city to sweep for spies first or something like that. So, so unusual for them to disagree at all, about anything, and even more so for it to come to shoves and attempted blows. So, needless to say, everyone around was a little surprised and worried, and Noah thought for a second that he might have to step in and try to break things up. But then, Abbott and Dan both seemed to realize what they were doing and think better of it, and they both kind of walked off and then apologized within a few minutes. Dan even admitted that he’d been acting like a ‘complete ass,’ Noah said he said. So... I guess it all got worked out, but I can tell people think there was more to the fight than simply a spy patrol disagreement, and
I
honestly think that. But not just because it’s so out of character for Abbott and Dan to fight. It’s Noah that makes me think something is really out of whack between Abbott and Dan lately.”

“How so?”

With another sigh, Maria turned her gaze to the twinkling multicolored lights along the wall for a moment before returning her gaze to my face. “Well, so, Noah has been Abbott and Dan’s right-hand-man for a really long time, but lately he’s been making a few cracks against Dan. And nothing serious... just a few comments here and there that make me think he doesn’t exactly like Dan anymore for some reason, but he’s refused to elaborate. Then, the past day or two, he’s had a few weird, secret calls and visits with Abbott, and again, he refuses to elaborate what they’re all about. So, obviously, all this makes me think he knows something about whatever is going on between Abbott and Dan. It’s just troubling and mysterious, because he won’t tell me, and it’s troubling on a different level, because with The Saints really... ‘acting up’ lately, for lack of a better term, now is so not the time to have some sort of a funny fracture between the city’s two leaders. Which is why everyone was a little rattled to hear about the fight today.”

“And people probably think it was over me, right?”

It had been pretty clear that at least Megan suspected that.

Pulling her dark, curly hair over one shoulder, Maria winced. “Well... yes. Some people think the fight could have been over you.”

“And people don’t think that maybe Abbott and Dan fighting not long after I arrived on the scene could just be a coincidence? Like, maybe there was already some bad blood, no pun intended, between them before I was even thawed?”

Maria stifled a giggle. “Oh, ‘bad blood.’ Vampires. I get it. But what do you mean? What do you think they might have been at odds about even before you were thawed?”