Blood Ecstasy (Blood Curse Series Book 8) (15 page)

Julien reached out his left hand, entreating Rebecca to take it. “I require a sensory impression from your mind,” he said bluntly. “Forgive me, but I need you to think about the last time you saw Trevor, your stalker; simply picture him in your mind.” When she opened her mouth to object, he pushed harder. “Rebecca, if you don’t assist me in this, I will simply have to dig deeper to sort through a maze of possible memories. By retrieving the memory I need, yourself, we will save a lot of time.”

Rebecca’s shoulders stiffened, but she didn’t shy away from the task. Her amazing topaz eyes glazed over with a hint of fear, or trepidation, and in that moment, she looked so incredibly vulnerable that Julien wanted to reach out and run his fingers through her hair, place both of his hands on her narrow shoulders, brush the underside of her jaw with a kiss.
 

He couldn’t help it…

But he did moderate it.
 

Rather than press his lips to her flawless skin, he brushed the pads of his fingers over her softly rounded jaw and caressed her cheek with his hand “
Ș
oarec micu
ț
, you are safe in my keeping. You know this, right?”
 

Rebecca tilted her head away from the intimacy of his touch, but she nodded.
 

“I require only three seconds.” He placed either hand on each side of her head, cupping her ears in his palms, and then he waited for her to retrieve the memory.

The Arizona desert.
 

Some sort of botanical garden and a rock-band concert.
 

A human male standing behind a tall, arid tree, waiting for Rebecca to walk past it. Her heart was thundering in her chest as she rounded the corner and saw him standing there, glowering at her with malice—

Julien cut off the memory abruptly.
 

That wouldn’t be helpful.

Not right now.
 

He needed to keep his wits. Stay focused on the apartment. Remain in the here and now.

“Got it,” he whispered.
 

He pulled every sensory detail he would need from Rebecca’s mind in the space of a heartbeat: Trevor’s eye color and the style of his hair; his height and his build; the sound of his voice and the pattern of his speech; the smell of his skin and the feel of his energy, even his body language.

His aura.
 

His countenance.
 

And his psychic stamp—the energetic imprint of his chaotic thoughts.
 

Julien stepped away and tried to conceal his fangs, waiting for the canines to retreat.
That son of a bitch
, he thought.
Trevor
had masturbated on Rebecca’s bed, and he had done it quite recently, probably on Sunday, the day Julien had met her. Despite his Herculean attempt at control, a feral snarl escaped his throat. He would stuff that maggot’s entrails down his sick, perverted throat and watch as he choked on his own intestines.
 

“Julien?” Rebecca’s voice cut through the growing red haze.

“He has been in your apartment, my love.” He took her by the hand and led her to the back patio doors. “Watch the glass.” He pointed at the scattered shards beneath their feet, just inches away from the latch. “Look at the trajectory of the scattered pieces: He broke in with his fist, and he probably used a glove. There are no traces of blood on the floor.” Julien shuddered inside at the thought of what would have happened if Rebecca had been there. The brute strength and
rage
it required to punch through that door…
 

The human was clearly insane.
 

He sniffed the air once more and nodded, and then he led her through the kitchen, toward the refrigerator, and pointed at the shards, beneath the kitchen counter. “He had some sort of hissy fit and started breaking dishes.” And then he slowly guided her, although he hated to do it, down the narrow hall to the master bedroom. Choosing the correct door, unerringly, he paused to modulate his voice. “He’s been sleeping in your room, rolling around in your bed.”

Rebecca bit down on her lower lip and grimaced. “Oh…shit.” She tried to force an insincere smile, to appear as if she wasn’t that rattled, but Julien saw right through it.
 

“Becca—”

“No,” she cut him off. “It’s okay.” She shrugged, feigning indifference, and paced around the room, checking the placement of various objects. “I knew he would find me sooner or later.”

“Becca.”

She hugged her arms to her chest and squeezed her sides, and then she barked a hollow laugh. “Who would’ve thought…you, taking me…might have saved my life.” A single tear welled up in her eye, and Julien crossed the room in two long strides.
 

“
Becca.
” He reached out to take her hand, but she flicked it away.
 

“No.
No
!” Her voice grew hoarse as she lost her control. “Damn it!” she blurted. “How?
Why
?” She threw both arms up in the air in frustration and gestured angrily as she spoke. “I did everything right. I did everything I knew how! I have spent the last five years of my life trying to avoid…exactly this…running from this…this monster, this idiot, this foul, disgusting trash. What more could I have done?”

Julien cursed beneath his breath in the old language, and he was just about to reach for her again when Rebecca saw the stains on her comforter.
 

She gagged, and her knees grew faint beneath her.
 

He caught her by the elbow and propped her back up. “Hey, now, baby; don’t start going to all the wrong places in your mind. You weren’t here; that’s all that matters.”

She pointed angrily at the bedspread and practically snarled. “Look at that! Look what he did!”

Julien tugged her beneath his strong, broad chest and whispered softly in her ear. “Sh. Sh. C’mon, now. You’re lookin’ at this glass as half empty, when I’m seeing it as damn near full.”

Rebecca sniffled into his shoulder and drew back to appraise his eyes. “How in the world could this glass be half full?”

He shrugged. “The way I look at it, baby, you
did
do everything right. You kept yourself safe for the last five years, and that’s no small accomplishment. And yeah, so he finally found you, but the way I see it—you zigged when he zagged. You weren’t here when he broke in.” He reached down to cup her chin in his hand and tilted her jaw upward so she had to maintain their gaze. “And then”—she tried to glance away, and he tightened his grip on her chin—“
and then
, the gods brought you to me. So the way I look at it, you handled it as long as you had to. And now? Now I’m about to handle it for you.
Now
, the nightmare is over.”

She shut her eyes, took a calming breath, and then opened them again, glancing askance at the comforter.

Julien sidestepped to block her view. “Baby, it’s just a piece of cloth with a little stuffing in it. You can buy as many comforters as you want, angel. Don’t go there.” He lowered his voice. “Hear me? Don’t do that to yourself.”

Rebecca nodded slowly.
 

She took several steps away from the bed and focused her gaze on the floor. And that’s when Julien noticed the sparks in her topaz eyes, that her dominant emotion wasn’t fear at all—it was fury.
 

As if she had heard his thoughts, she gritted her teeth and murmured, “I almost wish I
had
been here.” She curled her hand into a fist, unwittingly. “I wish I would’ve heard him break the glass in time to get my Glock and empty the whole damn clip into his sick, pathetic little head.”

Julien whistled low beneath his breath. “Ah…ah’ight.” He chuckled. “Well, I can still make that possible if you need the closure. String him up in the woods behind the house in Dark Moon Vale and let you use him for target practice. Your call, little mouse.”

Rebecca stared at him like he was an alien, and then she sighed. “No.
No.
I could never really do that, kill another person in cold blood. I would never be able to live with it. To live with myself.”

Julien nodded, understanding. “Well, if you change your mind before I end this, just let me know.”

Rebecca appraised him critically, seeming to replay his words in her mind, as her eyes swept over his features, his chest, and then his arms. It was like she was taking his measure for the very first time and only now beginning to truly see him for what he was, at least partly: a warrior, a possessive vampire, and a potential ally who was planning to wipe the floor with the bastard who had recently defiled her room. Someone more than capable of doing it.
 

She cleared her throat, as if testing her voice for metal. “The Curse,” she muttered, completely out of the blue. “You said that none of it works, none of it will work, unless I’m converted, first.”

Julien cocked a curious eyebrow and waited for her to continue.
 

She wrung her hands together and then abruptly stopped fidgeting, forcing herself to settle down, to project more bravery than she actually felt. “I don’t want to be this vulnerable, Julien. Not another day. Not another hour. Not when Trevor is still out there. Not—”

“Baby, I’ve got this. I’ve got
you
.”

Her lips tightened; she angled her jaw; and she shook her head in disgust. “No. That’s just it.
You’ve
got this, when I need to have it.”

Julien tilted his head to the side. “What are you saying, Rebecca?”

She looked away abruptly, and her lips began to quiver. It was almost as if she had extracted her last ounce of courage, and she wasn’t sure if she could muster any more. “Tomorrow.” The word was a mere whisper on her tongue. “We are going to meet with the women from my VOSU group, tomorrow, and then you…you are going to clean this nightmare up, right?”

Julien could hardly believe what he was hearing.

Finally, a modicum of trust.

“Absolutely,” he said.

“Well, you can’t be in two places at once, and it only takes a second… If you have to turn your back on me, if only for a minute—”

“
Whoa
. Squash that thought,” Julien cut in. “First and foremost, I’m not going to turn my back on you, Rebecca. And second, you’re not gonna be beside me when I handle this business.” He decided to share a little more than he had intended: “Look, I figured I’d call Saxson, bring him in on the gig: just to fill in the gaps…cover all bases.”

Rebecca nodded. “I get that, but you don’t understand, Julien: I can’t stand to live like this anymore, to be this afraid, to be this vulnerable, to be this…violated.” She looked so lost. “Convert me,” she blurted. “Tonight.”

The room grew silent, and if someone had dropped a pin, it would’ve reverberated like a bomb. “Come again?” he said.

Rebecca looked suddenly faint. “I don’t think I can say it twice. I’m terrified. But this Curse—there’s no way around it, right? And a bargain is a bargain.” Before he could answer, she creased her brows and pressed on. “I don’t want to be this vulnerable, and it’s going to happen anyway.
Convert me
.” She more or less mouthed the last words as opposed to speaking them aloud.

Julien retreated into silence, taking a moment to contemplate her request. He nodded, to indicate that he had heard her, and then he continued to consider her petition, seriously. In all truth, he was stunned by her various
layers: the complexity of her thoughts, the ever-changing nuances he saw in her eyes, and the depth of her conflicting emotions. One minute, she wanted to run; the next, she wanted to fight. One moment, she felt like a trapped, cornered animal; the next, she was ready to bite. One second, she was terrified; the next, she was brave.
 

And all of it was wrapped up in such confusion, such paradoxical hesitation, such raw, unmitigated determination—she was an enigma to be sure.
 

“Listen, angel,” he said, measuring each word carefully and basing his response on where he truly believed she was, in her heart. “I’ve heard you.
I have.
And I understand where you’re coming from. And if you still feel the same way in a couple of days, then I
will
convert you, no questions asked. But you need to hear me out.”

Rebecca’s features tightened, like she was bracing herself for disappointment—or maybe,
relief
.
 

Wow, what a paradox…

“Conversion is no walk in the park, angel. It may take hours. It may take a day. And either way, it’s going to take
everything
out of you…and out of me. If you change now, tonight, your body changes, your physiology changes—you will hear differently, you will see differently, you will feel everything in a different way. The entire world is going to come at you, at once, in high definition. That’s a lot to play off in front of your friends, and that’s only half the story. You will crave blood. You will feel off-balance, if only for a while, until you get used to the change. I don’t think you wanna do that now. Not here. Not the night before we set out to finish what we started. I think it will make you feel
less
stable, not more. And as for you and me? We still need a little time.”
 

What he didn’t tell her was what he’d seen in her eyes.

What he’d read in her soul.
 

Rebecca Johnston was a very similar creature to Julien Lacusta. She built up walls, barriers, and armor to shut out all the noise. Like Julien, she could deal with the present when she had to—she could even step boldly into the future—but she couldn’t run, far enough or fast enough, away from the past.
 

When Julien was tracking, time stood still, and the noise turned off.
 

There were no dimensions, no reason, no sentient thought: just a predator and his prey.

When Rebecca was fighting, defending other women, or championing a cause, she went to the same tranquil place: There was nothing else, no one else, just the victims and their plight.