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I have nightmares, little red hair. The only way to keep them at bay is to have you close beside me.Hesounded very earnest, i
Shea found herself smiling as she poured him another unit of blood. She was begi
He took the container from her hand, his fingers curling around the glass precisely over the spot where her fingers had been. He did things like that, intimate things that sent butterfly wings brushing deep within her. Not my heart, Shea. They did not get me in the heart, as they should have. It is here within my body— can you not hear it? Your heart beats with the same rhythm so that it matches mine.
“Were you a playboy before they buried you’?” she asked him, tossing a mischievous grin over her shoulder. Shea checked her gun to make certain it was clean and loaded. “You need to drink that, Jacques, not just hold it. And then go back to sleep. The more rest you get, the faster you’ll heal.”
You persist in being my doctor when I so need my lifemate to come and lie beside me.Again his voice was temptation itself.
“Drink, Jacques.” She tried to sound stern, but it was impossible when he was looking so desperate for her company.
I am desperate.
She couldn’t help but shake her head. “You’re outrageous.”
He made an attempt to raise the glass to his mouth, but his arm wobbled. Ica
“Am I supposed to believe you’?” She laughed aloud but crossed to his side. “You were strong enough to lift me off my feet with one hand when I found you. Don’t give me that poor-little-boy look, Jacques, because it won’t work.”
But it was working. He needed to feel her touch, the brush of her fingers in his hair, and she stroked his thick mane without conscious thought. Her fingers lingered as if she enjoyed the sensation as much as he did. Jacques took the gun from her hand and pulled her down beside him, as hungry for the feel of her warmth beside him as he was for the sustenance she provided. Her scent drifted to him—the forest, the flowers, and the night air itself. He wrapped an arm around her and held her to him. She relaxed, allowing her eyelashes to drift down.
Shea slept fitfully, her body cumbersome in the light of the day. Jacques lay beside her, motionless, his arm a heavy weight curved possessively around her waist. Several times she struggled to surface during the afternoon hours, but it was an impossibility. Once she heard a noise outside the cabin, and her heart pounded in alarm, but she was unable to summon up enough energy to do more than clutch the gun beneath the pillow tightly. She knew she was responsible for their safety, yet she couldn’t pry her eyes open or force herself to rise and check around the cabin to ensure no one was near.
The sun had long since sunk beneath the mountains before Shea managed to rouse herself. Hunger was a gnawing, relentless ache, but the thought of food made her stomach heave. She struggled to sit up, far weaker than she had ever been. She pushed a hand through her heavy fall of wine-red hair.
Jacques’ fingers circled her arm, slid the length from shoulder to wrist. She was small and delicate, yet she had such i
Jacques’ fist tangled in her thick, luxurious hair. She stirred things in him he had no name for. He would never endure closed-in places again, never endure being alone again. And he would never allow Shea to place herself at risk. Silently cursing his weakened body, he brought the silken strands of her hair to his face, inhaling her fragrance.
“I’m so tired, Jacques,” she confessed, swaying slightly as she sat on the side of the bed. She found it strange to have someone to talk to, to wake up and not be alone. Shea should have been uncomfortable in the situation—she had never shared her life with anyone—yet with Jacques there was a weird familiarity, as if she had known him forever.
Her life had always been one of isolation, a certain distance always present between herself and others. Jacques had no respect for that barrier, slipping in and out of her head as if he belonged there. His touch was possessive, even intimate. Shea was bewildered by her own feelings, by her acceptance of their strange affinity. She was excited at her rare scientific find, perhaps holding an answer to the terrible disease that branded those so afflicted as nosferatu,unclean. The undead. Her kind was condemned to a life of hiding and loathing, always living in fear of being discovered. It was important to find out whether they were a separate species or whether some rare genetic code had given them a need for blood to sustain their lives.
Shea studied Jacques’ worn but handsome face. He looked young, yet ageless. He looked tormented, as if he had suffered greatly, yet he looked like stone. She could see the power in him now; it clung like a second skin. Biting her lip, she drew away from him, her emerald eyes thoughtful. The strength and power in him was growing. His body might be mending slowly, but his unusual capabilities seemed to be recovering at a much faster rate. It occurred to her that she should be afraid of the creature now lying motionless in her bed. It was apparent that he could be extraordinarily dangerous, was capable of extreme violence. Especially with his mind so fractured, his rage so deep.
Jacques sighed. I do not like that you fear me, Shea.
“If you wouldn’t persist in reading my thoughts, Jacques,” she said gently, afraid she had hurt him, “then you wouldn’t have to see these things I worry about. You are capable of violence. You ca
She stood up with a return of her quick, restless energy, and he allowed her silken hair to slide through his fingers. With half-closed eyes, Jacques watched the transparent thoughts slipping across her expressive face. Shea was incapable of subterfuge. What she was, who she was, was an open book.
“I didn’t think things through, you know. I just rushed out and rescued you. I caused you great suffering.” Her large green eyes fastened on his face. Storm clouds gathered instantly when she felt his faint, mocking amusement echoing through her mind. “What? What’s so fu
For which I am grateful. And I am even more grateful that you rescued me. I did not like being imprisoned and in such pain.
“I guess I’m glad I rescued you, too, but the truth is, Jacques, I have watched you healing faster than is possible. You’re even more dangerous now. You are, aren’t you?” ‘ Never to you,he denied.