Vampire for Christmas (8 page)

Except
here.

The last
time he had threatened to slit their throats in the night, they had
assigned him to work with Shannon. That time, it had gotten him
somewhere, and he was thankful for it. That time, their attempt to
reform him had actually worked.

“
You don’t kill anyone anymore and they released you so you
could work for them, so something they did must have had an
effect.” She stepped closer to him and her face became lost in his
shadow. He moved slightly so the moon bathed her in pale light
again. His angel.

“
I got bored of fighting them and thought that if they released
me, I could escape their mundane torture. I behaved for a while and
they decided I could be an agent. My plan backfired and I cannot
find the tracking device to remove it.”

“
That’s the only reason you’re still working for the
agency?”

“
No.” Rafe didn’t mean it to come out so short but it did. She
looked confused and he started walking again, brisker now. She
followed him, keeping pace with her gaze constantly fixed on his
face. He could feel her scrutinising him, and could almost hear the
gears in her brain hitting overdrive as she tried to figure out
what had changed him into the model agent he was
tonight.

“
Something they did must have worked. You’re still here, and
you’re the only demon on the force who takes his work
seriously.”

Rafe
stopped at the entrance to the cemetery. “I have to.”

“
Why?”

He stared
at the curved metalwork sign over the gate and the moon beyond. Did
he really want to finally put a voice to the words he had so often
stumbled on? If he said them now, would they scare her away, or
would she welcome them? Things had changed between them these past
two nights, but had they changed enough that she could accept his
feelings for her?

He
swallowed, dragged his courage up, and closed his eyes so he didn’t
have to see the horror in her eyes when he spoke.

“
To protect you.”

Those
three simple words were some of the hardest he had ever said. They
lay between them in the night, as open as his heart was to hers,
full of honesty and his feelings for her, laid bare like his soul
for her to accept or throw aside.

“
I don’t understand.”

Rafe
slowly opened his eyes and looked down into hers. He reached out
and stroked her cheek, and smiled softly when she didn’t smack his
hand away.

“
The agency did not change me, Shannon. You did.” He cupped her
cheek and held it, keeping her eyes on his. “From the moment I met
you, I knew that I had to protect you, even if it was from myself.
I stayed in this godforsaken town because of you, gave up trying to
leave the agency and did everything I could to improve what skills
I already had. Just so I could protect you. You are my
redemption.”

He
expected her to pull away but she didn’t. She hesitated and then
placed her hand over his where it rested against her cheek. The
feel of her touching him, holding his hand against her face, was
almost too much to bear, but it was the affection in her green eyes
that threatened to overwhelm him.

“
Rafe, I—” Shannon jerked to one side, away from his touch, and
he growled at the clear slime coating his hand and hers.

Not
now.

Not when
she had been about to put him out of his misery.

Rafe
turned and glared at the slimy demon standing a hundred foot away
along the road into town. He roared at it.

“
The Devil, I am going to kill you for that.”

****

Chapter 5

Shannon
couldn’t keep up. She did her best but she was no match for Rafe
when they were running. He streaked ahead of her, hot on the heels
of the demon. She had never seen such anger in his pale blue eyes
as she had when he had changed into his true appearance and roared
at the demon. Was that fury because he knew what she had been about
to say? The words fled her lips now, cowering in her heart as it
trembled in her throat, and she wasn’t sure if she would be able to
coax them out again for him. Part of her wanted to say them, needed
him to know how she felt about him, but the stronger part of her
was saying to keep quiet. She fought against it. Rafe needed to
hear her say it. She needed to say it.

He wasn’t
the only one who had changed over the past two years. Their
partnership had changed her too. It was part of the reason she
could put up decorations again and see a Christmas tree without
reliving the pain of her family’s deaths, instead remembering the
happy times they had spent together during the holiday season. He
had made her see that there were vampires out there who were
capable of doing great things and protecting humans. He had made
her see that a vampire could redeem himself and change his ways,
forsaking the need to kill for blood. There was a difference
between him and the vampire she had killed. Rafe had chosen to
redeem himself. The agency had tried and failed to reform him. In
the end, he had done it himself. The vampire she had killed had
left a trail of brutal murders for her to follow, and her partner
at the time had given him a chance to choose salvation and a
different life. The vampire had laughed at that, and she had killed
him because she had seen that nothing would change him, and she had
believed then that all vampires were the same.

And then
she had met Rafe.

She had
misjudged him from the start, and had grown frustrated each time he
had proven himself different to her cookie-cutter vampire. Each
mission they had completed together had changed her opinion of
vampires, so subtly that she hadn’t even noticed until last
Christmas.

She had
felt different then. Less pained by the sight of decorations, and
less angry around Rafe. A small part of her had started to look
forward to missions, to learning from things that he told her, even
though she pretended not to listen. Now, they were on their last
mission, and she didn’t want it to end. She wanted it to go on
forever.

She
didn’t want to leave him.

Rafe
chased the demon down an alley between a row of dark stores and she
lost sight of him.

Although,
he seemed quite intent on leaving her.

Shannon
tried to catch up and then yelped when slime struck the side of her
face. She turned in time to see the demon charging at her from a
side street and hit the tarmac, rolling to her feet a short
distance away. Rafe slammed to a halt beside her.

“
I had not expected him to backtrack.” He wiped the clear jelly
off her face and gave her an apologetic smile.

“
I hope you know how we kill it.”

“
Eyes.” Rafe bolted after the demon.

Eyes?

“
What about them?” Shannon gave chase, wheezing with each
stride and cursing vampire and demon stamina. Humans just weren’t
cut out for long distances and high speed. That was the exact
reason the agency had changed its policy and started pairing human
hunters with demonic allies.

“
Stab it in the eyes,” Rafe called back over his
shoulder.

She
winced when he leapt at the demon, tackled it around its broad
waist, and slid straight off, landing face first on the tarmac.
Shannon puffed to a halt beside him and grabbed the collar of his
long coat. She tugged. He just groaned.

“
You giving up?” She hauled him off the road. “Want me to
finish him off?”

“
No,” Rafe growled and got to his feet. He scowled down at his
slime-soaked black shirt. “That pleasure is going to be all
mine.”

He shot
off again, heading down a dark alley between two blocks of
stores.

Shannon
frowned after him and gripped her stake.

Not if
she had anything to do with it.

She
wanted to kill the demon just as much as he did. It had been her
moment that it had ruined.

She ran
towards the alley. There was a loud crash, the sound of trashcans
rattling, and then silence. She doubled her pace, hoping to find
the monster hurt and ready for her to kill. Instead, she found Rafe
sitting in a pile of garbage with a disgusted look on his face. The
demon was nowhere to be seen. She held her hand out to Rafe and
pulled him onto his feet again. He sighed and made a lot of fuss
about brushing the specks of rubbish off his jeans and
coat.

“
Are you sure you’re up for this?” Shannon touched his left
temple, her eyes fixed on the ragged cuts that ran into his short
dark hair. They were still healing. Her left shoulder ached,
reminding her that Rafe wasn’t the only one battling
injury.

When he
didn’t say anything, her gaze shifted to his and lingered for a
moment too long.

She had
never noticed how icy his eyes were when he was allowing his true
nature to show. The low light in the alley made his wide pupils a
stark contrast against the near-white of his irises. She had seen
them in full light sometimes and they held a hint of blue, but she
had never taken the time to really look at them. They seemed so
intense tonight, sharp and focused, and she knew he was trying to
figure her out. It was all there in them for her to read and she
realised that he was always like this with her. He wore his heart
on his sleeve for only her to see, and would open up and tell her
everything just in case she took the chance and let him in. It was
as though he hoped that by giving himself so freely and so openly
that she would be encouraged to do the same in return.

And part
of her was.

Only, the
other part of her still feared what would happen. It told her to
push him away and put him in his place at her feet.

He was a
vampire.

She was a
hunter.

They
should be fighting to the death, not fighting at each other’s
side.

Not
falling in love.

These
feelings were wrong.

Worse
than that. They were wrong but they felt so right. She had never
been as open with anyone as she had been with him, and each tiny
step she took towards accepting him into her life, she grew bolder
and opened up a little more to him.

Soon, she
would be wearing her heart on her sleeve too.

That
petrified her.

To think
that she could be so vulnerable again when she had worked so hard
to be strong, and that she had to trust him not to take what she
offered and break her with it. It frightened her, but she still
wanted to step into his arms and see where it would take
her.

At times
like this, when they were alone, when she let her guard down and
the barriers around her heart with it, she didn’t see him as a
vampire. She saw the man in him and how vulnerable he was. He stood
before her, his heart laid bare, his eyes locked with hers and
searching her innermost feelings, looking into every corner of her
soul in the hope that he would see what he was trying to
find.

The one
emotion she feared most of all.

Love.

Right
now, she wanted to give him that sliver of hope, wanted to hand it
to him on a silver platter and tell him that the feeling he wanted
to see glimmered in the recesses of her soul, hidden deep within
her so she didn’t have to admit to its existence.

But it
scared her.

If she
let him in, he would want to be all the way in. He wouldn’t settle
for anything less. He would want all of her, right down to her
core. He would possess her, wouldn’t stop until he had every last
part of her loving him and had made her completely his, ruining her
to anyone else. She would need him more than anything, and being
away from him would destroy her.

She
couldn’t put herself through that. She couldn’t bear the pain that
would tear her apart if she lost him. She couldn’t let him reach in
and take hold of her soul.

She
couldn’t.

Shannon
tore her eyes away from his. She tried to ignore how much it hurt
when he stepped back, out of reach of her touch, and the pain she
had seen in his eyes just a moment before she had looked
away.

She
closed her eyes.

What was
she doing? She was stronger than this. Not just physically. And she
was tired of making excuses and finding a reason not to face her
feelings for Rafe, or pretending that they weren’t real or didn’t
exist. She fought monsters for a living, killed demons and
protected people, yet she was afraid to face her
emotions.

“
Shannon,” Rafe whispered, a trace of pain lacing his
voice.

She met
his gaze again, hoping he would see in it that she hadn’t meant to
hurt him again, and that she wasn’t going to keep pushing him away.
She wasn’t going to keep taking things out on him. It wasn’t his
fault that she couldn’t admit her feelings. It wasn’t because he
was a vampire. Not anymore, at least. It was because she was afraid
of where it would take her and it was easier to keep her emotions
locked inside. The only thing stopping her from admitting her
feelings was herself.