Vampire for Christmas (5 page)

Sometimes
vampire abilities were a definite advantage too. He swept through
the book, turning each page and scanning it within a second, and
had finished it in under a few minutes. Nothing. He pulled the next
book to him, pushing the first aside at the same time, and repeated
the process.

By the
time the shower had turned off, he was on his fifteenth book and
was having more luck. This one mentioned slimy bastards at
least.

There
were many different ones.

Shannon’s
soft steps arrested his thoughts and he froze mid page turn. She
stopped on the threshold of the room behind him.

“
You study too much,” she said, her quiet voice curling warmly
in his ears and his heart. He smiled at the book.

“
You study too little.”

“
I guess that would make us perfect partners... in some
respects.” Her voice trembled and her heart did the same, skipping
a beat and then pumping hard. She had panicked herself. He decided
to be a gentleman and not pick her up on her words.

They were
perfect partners, and it was about time that she realised
it.

He turned
and looked over his shoulder at her, and froze again. She stood in
the open doorway, his black robe swamping her slender frame, the
collar of it turned up to cover her smooth creamy throat. Her
blonde hair hung in tangled wet threads from her ponytail, strands
of it caressing her cheeks. They coloured as he looked at her and
she averted her gaze but it snuck back to him.

What was
she wearing under there? Anything? Nothing? If his heart could
beat, it would have been pounding at that thought. It didn’t need
to beat in order for his blood to be going places where it
shouldn’t be. He cleared his throat and stood so his body got the
message that his brain was urgently firing at it. He was not going
to get aroused in front of her and embarrass himself.

“
It’s a little big,” she whispered and lifted the hem of the
black towel robe so it didn’t drag. She shuffled towards him, her
bare feet silent on the wooden floor. She peered at the books and
he got the distinct impression that she was avoiding looking at
him. “Did you find anything?”

He pulled
a chair out for her. “Maybe. First things first though.”

She gave
him a confused look but he didn’t pause to explain. He left the
room, bolted up the stairs, gathered her clothes and the medical
kit he kept in the bathroom, in the cabinet under the sink, and
came back down to her. He set the kit down on the table, ran into
the kitchen and down the stairs into the basement and tossed her
clothes into the washing machine. He paused now, looking at himself
and then back up at the door to the kitchen. He had to wash his
things too. He stripped off all of his clothes and put them into
the machine, and then turned it on. A quick rifle through the clean
pile of clothes on top of the dryer produced a pair of black sweat
pants. He tugged them on, and then hit the stairs again.

He had
only been gone a few minutes, but when he reached the study,
Shannon was muttering dark things at her left arm as she tried to
tend to it by herself. He stopped the moment her gaze settled on
him and instantly dropped to his bare chest.

Now was
not the time to be getting ideas.

He
repeated it like a mantra.

He was
going to tend to her, and then shower while she read the books. He
dragged a hand over his face. He could do this. He had fought
demons three times his size. Had tackled evil angels and things
straight out of Hell. He wasn’t going to let such a small task
defeat him. He swallowed when his gaze gravitated down to her arm.
Her right hand was paused against it. She had removed that side of
the bathrobe in order to get to her arm. The black towel fabric
covered her right side completely but barely clung to her left
breast, threatening to slip at any moment. The Devil only knew how
it was staying put. He shouldn’t have looked. Fire settled in his
belly, heating him through, sending all the wrong signals to his
groin.

He
cleared his throat.

Her gaze
didn’t leave his torso, not even when he crossed the room and sat
in the chair beside her.

“
Here, let me.” His words seemed to do the trick, jolting her
out of her thoughts. Her gaze rose to his, distant, pupils wide.
The signal they sent came through loud and clear, and at any other
time he might have obeyed the silent order it gave him, but not
tonight. Not when she was hurt and afraid. He would be a monster if
he took advantage of her like that.

Rafe made
quick work of the wound on her arm, cleaning it with too much
antiseptic before wrapping the crepe bandage firmly around it. He
didn’t pause to relish the feel of her soft warm skin beneath his
fingers or the way her gaze lingered on his face, her expression
open and inviting. The moment he was done with her wound, he stood
so quickly that the chair caught on the floor and toppled
backwards. Shannon gasped and clung to the robe, her eyes
wide.

Rafe
muttered his apology and something about her researching, and was
up the stairs before she could answer. He breathed hard when he
reached the safety of the landing, gripping the top pillar of the
banister and fighting for control. His fully extended fangs scraped
his lower lip. When had they come out? His stomach growled. He
wasn’t hungry. He had taken blood only a few nights ago. It growled
again, more urgently this time, and a dark craving swept through
him, bringing with it a vision of Shannon entwined in his arms, her
naked body against his and her throat beneath his lips.

He drew
in a sharp breath, forced his fangs to recede and pushed that image
away.

Maybe a
cold shower was in order.

Rafe went
into the bathroom, stripped his sweat pants off and walked straight
into the shower cubicle, not bothering the close the bathroom door.
He turned the water on as cold as it could get and stood under the
jet, letting it hit his face and cascade down his body. The wound
on the side of his head stung and ached, and his muscles cramped
and protested about the chill. He didn’t care. Until the hunger
burning inside him, the ardent desire to have Shannon as his woman,
passed, he would stand where he was. Even if the water froze
him.

The cold
eventually drove the images from his mind, replacing them with a
pulsing ache that emanated from the long cuts across the side of
his head. Rafe grabbed the shower gel and thoroughly cleaned
himself, paying close attention to the wounds. The soap stung but
he didn’t care. He had put himself through worse pain to get a
wound clean. Blood mixed with the water, and ran down his chest and
left arm in red rivulets. He stared at them, mesmerised and lost in
the temptation that flared back into life inside him. Shannon’s
blood. He could still see it on her arm, drops of it that had
escaped the cut and started to creep down towards her elbow. The
desire to lick them up, to wrap his lips around the wound and suck
deeply, crashed over him. His fangs extended again and he stepped
backwards, out of the jet of water. He raised his hand, swept his
fingers across the side of his head, and brought them
away.

Scarlet
bathed his fingertips. He licked his lips, swallowed to ease his
dry throat, and then closed his eyes and ran his tongue across the
blood. The taste was edgeless and flat, not the sweet metallic
sharp tang that he craved. The smell of Shannon’s blood had
promised him such a taste. She would be delicious, wonderful on his
tongue. Not like his dead blood.

Rafe
washed his hands and then the side of his head, and then turned off
the shower and stepped out of the cubicle. He grabbed one of the
small dark blue towels and pressed it against the wounds with one
hand while he used a larger towel to dry himself. His cock twitched
when he brushed it and he fought the images of Shannon that burst
back into his head. He was in control, and he was not about to
embarrass himself by walking downstairs and into the study with a
raging erection.

With
considerable effort, he forced his focus on to more important
matters. Research.

He pulled
his black sweat pants back on and walked downstairs, the small
towel still pressed to the side of his head. He would have to keep
it there for a while, until his healing ability had a chance to
kick in to high gear. Blood trickled over his ear, creeping around
the back of it and tickling. He wiped it up as he entered the
study. Shannon turned to face him, a large book on her lap, and
smiled.

“
I think I found our goo monster.”

“
What does it say?” Rafe noted that she had
pulled the collar of the black bathrobe up to cover her neck again,
and tried to hide the disappointment her lack of trust in him
caused. He would never harm her. She didn’t have to fear him. He
was in control. His fangs pushed. He held them back. He
was
in
control.

He sat
down on the seat to her right and she remained facing him, her eyes
pinned to the towel he was holding against his head.

“
Do you want me to look at it?” she said and placed the book
down on the table. He shook his head. He would lose what shred of
control he had if she started touching him. She had been through
enough tonight. She pointed at his neck. “You’re
bleeding.”

Rafe
touched his throat and his fingers came away bloodied. He swallowed
the temptation to lick them clean and wiped them on the towel
instead. Shannon would run a mile if he drank blood in front of
her, even his own. He didn’t want to scare her away.

“
It will be fine in a minute or two.” He pulled the book
towards him to distract him from the cool slide of blood beneath
the towel. His body was already healing. He would be able to ditch
the towel soon. His gaze scanned the book and the demon Shannon had
found. It sounded like their man. He read on and relief washed
through him when he found what he was looking for. He looked at
Shannon. “It isn’t toxic.”

“
I know.” She smiled. “Contrary to your belief, I can
read.”

“
I never said you could not read.”

She
leaned back in the chair, pulled the bathrobe tight around her and
cast her green gaze over the room. “I think you read too much.
Clearly you have too much time on your hands.”

“
Maybe I do...” He cocked his head to one side and narrowed his
eyes on her. “Maybe I need someone to help me fill the long hours
of night.”

She
turned her face away. “I thought hunting did that.”

“
Not every night.” He ran his eyes over her, head to toe and
back again. He could imagine so many ways that she could distract
him from books and research. So many sweet hot ways.

Shannon
toyed with the belt of the robe, flicking it back and forth, and
then pulled another book towards her. She idly turned a few pages,
sighed, and then turned the other way, looking towards the hall and
the front door. What was she looking at? Besides anything but him.
She swallowed and smiled.

“
Did you hire an emo to decorate your house?”

Rafe cast
his gaze over the black walls in the living room, the dark red
furniture, and the stone candle holders on the black marble
mantelpiece.

“
No. I sometimes wonder if it was the agency’s idea of a joke.”
He frowned at the decor and sighed.

“
Oh.” Shannon’s wide eyes lit on him for a moment and then
darted to the book. She flicked a few more pages and then frowned.
“It’s not a very funny joke.”

When they
had given him the keys to the house and he had first seen the
horrendous way that the agency had decorated it, he had been
tempted to change it, but he had never had the time. He had met
Shannon shortly afterwards and had realised that it would take more
than he was at that moment to protect her. He had focused on
training instead, and reading every book he could buy or
borrow.

All so he
could protect her.

Shannon
leaned forwards to look at the book and the right side of her robe
fell away from her neck, slipping down her shoulder. Rafe stared at
the pale column of her throat, his breathing turning sharp and
harsh as he fought the urge to pull her close and lick her
neck.

He forced
his eyes away and they caught on something that hit him hard in the
gut.

Scars.

On her
neck.

He had
never noticed marks there before, but then he couldn’t remember
ever seeing her neck. Someone had bitten her. He frowned at ragged
pink scars and heat burned in his chest, coiling into anger that
ran through his veins and seized control of him.

He
reached out to touch the scars.

Shannon
smacked his hand away and jolted backwards, out of his reach, her
chair scraping on the floor. She scowled at him, clinging to the
bathrobe and quickly covering her throat. There was a frightened
edge to her eyes. Fear that he might do that to her too, or that
his touch might comfort her and force her to confront the feelings
she denied so well?

“
Who did that to you?” Black rage curled through him and his
blood became flame as the desire to destroy swept over him. He
wanted to find whoever had hurt her and obliterate them. He wanted
them to suffer horror and pain one hundred times worse than they
had put her through. He wanted them to die for daring to harm his
beautiful Shannon.