1 Dicey Grenor (22 page)

“Heck
naw
. He spends a shitload of money here. Go get him.” He
crossed his ankles over the desk casually. “But Willow? Take one of the
bouncers with you. Not Punch. I need him tonight, but somebody else.”

“No can do.
Gotta
do this
alone.”

His eyes
penetrated mine, letting me know he knew what I was up to. Tonight’s plans for
Remi
did not include a third-party tagalong and Franco knew
it. “Isn’t your
maistre
going to have your head on a
stick for fucking that human?”

“Yep.”

 
He shook his head like I was up the creek
without a paddle and swiveled his chair around so that I faced his back. “Well,
be careful.”

I didn’t respond.
Just ran across town with the strength of ten horses, the speed of hurricane
winds. I had to get to him in a hurry. Just in case.

Wow. My eyes
popped when I saw his high-rise building.
Very ritzy.
Made me look at the address again to make sure I had the right place. Yep. This
was his residence all right.

I surveyed the
place to see what I was up against.
Cameras everywhere.
A concierge.
Valet. Two maintenance workers and three
guests…

Good thing I was
good and fast at climbing because I certainly wasn’t going through lobby
security. Didn’t have time to sign-in, get frisked, get approved, and get
escorted to the key-activated elevator before going to his door. So after one
last cursory look around to make sure no one was watching, I ran around back
and scaled the wall like a four-legged spider. Since I could enter a building
without personal invitation, just not individual apartments, I broke a hall
window on his floor and climbed in. Smart enough to know the break would set
off a silent alarm, I scaled the hall ceilings until I got to Aaron’s door to
avoid security cameras.

Dropping to the
floor like a thief in the night, I banged on the door like
Remi’s
life depended on it. If he didn’t answer, I was fresh out of ideas. I couldn’t
get inside without his invite and I wouldn’t know the first place to go look
for him. Didn’t even know if there was still
a him
to
look for.

No one answered
and there was no sound from inside.

I banged again,
risking waking his neighbors and getting caught because sometimes you
gotta
do what
ya
gotta
do.

Then it dawned on
me—maybe this was a good time to see how strong our bond was. Since he was the
first human I’d fed my blood, I wasn’t quite sure what we were capable of
metaphysically. What were our limitations? How strong would our blood
connection be now considering he had used most of its power to heal?

No more wasting
time. I owed it to him to at least try to find him psychically, use my blood in
his body like a tracking device.

But I could only
track him if he was still alive. His energy could only be picked up if blood
was flowing through his veins, if there was brain activity.

Closing my eyes to
concentrate, to alleviate tension from my body, I shut down my physical senses
and opened up the psychic ones.

Opening my mind, I
threw out a short psychic net to test the waters. Not like ringing a telephone.
More like my energy traveling through the walls, through space, searching for
his energy. It wasn’t the same connection Max and I shared, but I reached
Remi’s
energy source quickly because of his close
proximity.

The link to his
aura was stronger than I expected given how much time had passed since he’d had
my blood.
Alarmingly so.

My energy tickled
him lightly like a feather, awaiting access to his mind, seeking an opening as
though he were in a deep sleep and needed gentle prodding to wake. His
subconscious responded with despair and sadness and self-pity.

I pulled back
sharply before I got images to go with the emotions.
Didn’t
need his turmoil floating in my head too.
At least I knew he was alive.

Just as I heard
footsteps marching down the hall toward the window I had broken, he began
stirring inside.
Stumbling to the door.
Cracking it open.
Standing there in black
boxer briefs with thick, dark bed hair.

Given the way his
hand gripped a liquor bottle, I figured he’d been passed out drunk instead of
sleeping. Had I mentally awakened him or had he finally responded to my knocks?

And the bigger
question: Was this
Remi
or Aaron…or neither?

“Willow? What the
fuck are you doing here?”

Hmmm.
His slurred words took away from his vocal register so I still didn’t know who
he was. He recognized me at least…but didn’t they all? Bet that diary included
a description of me to go along with my name ever since they’d started switching
randomly. “Uh, can I come in?”

“You can’t be
here. Security has to call me when someone’s here.” He shook his head like he
was trying to shake off his buzz. Stepping into the hall, he looked both ways
through squinty eyes and said, “I must be dreaming.” He tried to put the bottle
to his lips a couple of times, missed,
then
used both
hands to help steady the bottle.

More footsteps and
mumbles were coming.
Staff had cleaned up the glass and were
now looking for what broke it. I’d bet an ass cheek they didn’t think a vampire
had climbed the high-rise and done it so they were probably baffled, looking
for an eagle or…miniature airplane.

But I needed to
get out of the hallway. I’d be a suspect for sure.

I snatched the
bottle from his grip before he could take another swig and caught him from
stumbling backwards with my other hand. Gripping his chin, I pulled him close
to my face. “This is not a dream. Aren’t you
gonna
invite me in?”

He blinked slowly
a few times and slurred his words, “
Youwannacomein
?”

“Yes.”

“Well,
comeonin
.”

I still didn’t
know who he was.
Didn’t matter.
I had plenty of time
to figure it out now that I knew he [they] were safe.

Letting go of his
face, I hooked my arms around his waist and carried him inside, kicking the
door shut. The feel of him in my arms and the grandness of his place
immediately caught my attention. In lieu of appreciating either, I found a
comfortable-looking oversized couch and plopped him on it. He looked over at me
through heavy lids when I sat next to him.

Dammit
. He was still gorgeous.
Still
insane.
And I still had no clue which personality was sitting next to
me. Setting the bottle on the coffee table, I offered to make him coffee.
Hopefully, I still remembered how.

“You have no idea
who I am
do
you?” he said. I shook my head. He barked
out a laugh. “Tonight’s Saturday night, isn’t it?
Remi’s
night.
His night for
the past few years…and now…”

I waited for him
to finish. When I realized he wasn’t going to, I spoke up.
“And
now what?”

“Now, we’re
totally fucked up.” He threw his head back on a pillow.

I stared at him
and started going through my checklist: he had nearly a full blown beard, was
making eye contact but not staring, wasn’t smoking and was making no moves to
jump my bones. Not
Remi
. Plus,
Remi
wouldn’t have spoken of himself in third person. On the other hand, he was
drinking and cursing and his hair wasn’t slicked back. Not Aaron either.

“I knew being
without medication would totally tank us. I told Aaron not to stop the goddamn
drugs. Now look at us. All mixed up.” He looked down at his wrist and rubbed
the scar with his thumb.

Bingo! Only one
suffered from that level of depression.

“I spent all
evening going through the journals catching up. Funny both
Remi
and Aaron are in love with you. Aaron just doesn’t know it yet. Not too bright.
Hell, neither
are
too bright if you ask me. Didn’t
take me long to figure out what you are.
Remi
says
you’re always cold…he never feels a heartbeat. Hell, just
lookatya
’!
Idiots can’t tell you’re not human.” He half laughed, half cried. “Reese is the
fucking
braniac
, but even I can figure that shit out.”

Okay. He had to
go, but I had to handle him delicately. “Emmanuel, it’s okay. Aaron’s going to
get back on his meds. I’ll make sure he does.”

“I sure hope so, ’cause
I can’t take this.
I
don’twannabehere
.”

Oh, hell yeah.
Aaron was getting back on his meds.
Taking care of Aaron was my
responsibility and obviously it was time I stepped up to help. And the first
way I needed to help was making sure Emmanuel didn’t attempt suicide while he
was occupying Aaron’s body.

Tears ran down his
face as he repeated how he didn’t want to be here over and over again.

Had
to put this poor bastard out of his misery.

Leaning towards
him, I placed my hands on both sides of his face, commanded his pupils to open
to me and whispered, “Emmanuel, I need to talk to Aaron, okay?”

He nodded. “You
gon
’ do that hypnosis thing?”

“Yes.”

“Well, can you make it where I don’t ever have to come
back?” He looked hopeful like a child telling Santa what he wanted for
Christmas.

Baffled me what was so darn depressing about his existence
that he couldn’t stand it for a few hours. But hey—I was no therapist.
Had no interest in counseling him.
“I’ll see what I can do.”
After rubbing away his tears, I said,
“Aaron? We need to talk.”

He blinked rapidly
then smiled. “Willow, what are you doing here?” Well, that didn’t take long.
Emmanuel had been eager to let the body go.

I smiled back then
told him what had happened since we’d last spoken.
Even told
him about finding Ivan’s body, left out Franco and Punch’s involvement.
Told him about my conversation with Emmanuel and encouraged him to seek medical
treatment so his personalities could be managed again.

He swooned as he
tried to rise from the couch which reminded me Emmanuel had been drinking all
evening. I told him to sit tight as I got up to fumble around in his decadent
kitchen to make coffee. The stainless steel appliances, granite countertops,
and brown-stained custom-built cabinets almost made me wish I ate food.
Almost.

He followed me to
the kitchen anyway, leaning against the island as I looked around for
everything I needed. I could tell he wanted to talk and judging by the sheepish
look on his face, he wanted to talk about sex.

“Sorry about what
happened last time we were together.” He started smoothing his hair down across
the top of his head. “It was so amazing. I couldn’t believe I shifted in the
middle of you and
Remi
making love. I’ve never done
that before. He wrote that he felt betrayed. I can’t have him upset with me,”
he said as I dumped coffee grounds into the filter.

“I’ll make it up
to him. He blames me not you.” He looked puzzled like why would it be my fault.
Ha!
Because he knows I forced the shift.
“Um…because I
didn’t tell you to stop.
Because I enjoyed being with you.”

He blushed. “So I
wasn’t disappointing? I didn’t know what I was doing.”

I smiled and
turned the coffeemaker on.

Men
and their delicate egos.
Aaron and his innocence.
“Being with you was absolutely heavenly. I think you knew exactly what you were
doing.”

He leaned down
towards his elbows on the island to hide his smile. “Too bad the only way I can
do it again is to shift when
Remi’s
in you. Interrupt
your lovemaking again. Betray him all over again.” He shook his head and blew
out a deep breath. After several quiet minutes, he said, “This is a mess. I
have to control my personalities. I can’t let them control me. I’ll make an
appointment first thing later this morning.”

I nodded.

The
sooner, the better.
Things were definitely better when they shifted upon
my command. This random shifting was too much, too unpredictable. Maybe once
Aaron got on his meds, I could go back to shifting him in while
Remi
and I fucked, without worrying about
Remi
shifting back like he did last time or any other
personality showing up when least expected like Mason and Emmanuel already had.

After handing him
a warm mug, I looked around to appreciate the glory of his penthouse, which
Remi
had severely understated as a condo when he had asked
me to move in.

Aaron sipped his
coffee as he showed me around. I awed over its grandeur. My motels had nothing
on this.

With all the
sculptures and paintings lying about haphazardly, there was no need for him to
tell me he was an artist, but he did anyway. And he definitely was not
starving. Between Daddy’s trust fund and Aaron’s talent, he was living well. No
studio apartment or bartending on the side for him.

His specialty was
landscaping: beaches, deserts, mountains, canyons…

Lost my train of
thought when I came across his collection of willow trees sketched in charcoal,
painted colorfully in abstract and realism, molded to different sizes, in
moonlight and sunshine, snow and rain. He said they were in homage to me.

Well, duh.

He’d gotten a
contract with a nationwide hotel chain to buy exclusive rights to his “Sleepy
Willow” collection. Ah, the irony.