Creature of Habit (Book 3) (2 page)

Grant walked around the desk and leaned over the keyboard. He entered in a series of keys, eyes flashing across the screen. He trailed his finger down the monitor, and Ryan's eyes rapidly followed his movements. "No one reported a piece of missing jewelry like this to the police. It's so unusual I'm sure someone would have noticed it missing."

I turned the piece over in my hand, looking at the intricate craftsmanship. "Look here, under the pin, there's a mark." The mark had dulled with age and the pin was heavily tarnished. I handed it over to Grant, hoping he could see it better with his enhanced eyesight.

"It looks like an H, etched into the silver." He tossed the brooch to Ryan, who flipped it over to look at the back.

"It's a needle in a haystack but,"—he paused, running his thumbnail over the marking—"at least we have a needle. It's better than nothing."

We all agreed and discussed how to best find the jeweler who created the brooch. “Can’t be that hard,” Genevieve said. "Grant, let me take the brooch downstairs to Amelia's desk. I may be able to find something." She snatched the pin out of his hand and disappeared.

"I’ll help," Ryan said, hopping up and following her.

He was barely out of the room when Grant moved quickly around the desk and plucked me from my spot. A second later I found myself nestled close to him on the couch. My head spun from the speed. I pushed my back against the side of the seat and spread my legs, inviting Grant to rest his head on my stomach. He settled in easily, reaching back for my hand, which I gave to him, while burying the other in his messy hair.

"Are you worried?" I asked him, trying to pull him away from his brooding. Although his hands had been connected to me every time we were near one another, his eyes had been distant and brooding. Focused on Olivia and Caleb.

He sighed and closed his eyes, as though he was afraid to admit it. I continued to stroke his hair, and eventually he confessed, "Less worried, more terrified."

My heart broke a little for this strong, powerful, incredible man lying across my body. He loved Olivia so much. I felt his thumb move slowly across my wrist as he took another deep breath. "I know you don’t feel it’s your place to share the others pasts, but this one time make an exception. Tell me about Olivia, something I don't know."

"Hmmm…" he murmured, "She's smart. And caring. More human than the rest of us put together."

I tugged his hair. "Something I don't know."

He looked up at me and said, "There’s nothing much to go on.”

“She told me you found her in a barn?”

“Yes, and took her back to the rest of the coven.”

“Weird,” I said.

“What?”

“Everyone else has this traumatic story. You were attacked at the work camp. Ryan and Sebastian…” I shuddered.

“Ryan told you?”

“Yes.” I waited for him to comment on that, but he said nothing. “But Olivia told me she has no recollection before coming to in that swamp and that your face was the first vision she had. How is that even possible?”

“Miles thinks she may have been disoriented from the visions.” He closed his eyes and nuzzled against my chest. “Add that in with whatever trauma she experienced when she died. Her mind may have just blocked it out in a desperate need for self-preservation.”

We sat quietly for a while. I was consumed by Olivia, her history, or lack thereof, and her current whereabouts. Grant was trying to distract himself with me because there was little he could do at the moment. He stroked my skin, in a comfortable, non-sexual way. The way two people act once they surpassed a level of intimacy.

I absently pulled and twisted Grant's thick hair in my fingers. I looked across his room, still fascinated by his history, the objects he chose to carry with him towards the future. I wondered what I would choose to remember my past life. Diplomas? DVD of my swim-meets?  I had journals and files full of pictures, everything electronic. Nothing seemed important enough, but at the same time everything held meaning. I had no idea how I would choose. I scanned the room, and my eyes landed on his shelves. I lingered over the baseball we'd discussed and then I saw the photo of Grant and his father. His hair was similar, thick and a little unruly but not as long. Otherwise he looked exactly the same.

"Why is your hair so long?" I asked him, breaking the quiet.

"What?" he asked, cracking his right eye, the other still firmly placed on my chest.

I sighed and pointed across the room. "In that picture with your father, your hair is shorter. Why is it so much longer now? I thought hair didn't continue to grow once you transformed."

He rolled over, his back to my stomach. “Our features freeze the way they are when we’re transformed. Sometimes it clears up imperfections—other time it accentuates them. I can't get it to do anything else." He explained, swiping a hand through it, anxiously, trying to make it conform.

“Can you not cut it?”

“Of course I can, but it won’t grow back. I’ve just learned to live with it this way, even though there are times it drives me batshit crazy.”

I considered this for a moment, my eyes shifting from the photograph to the man in front of me. “What attributes did the others have that stayed the same as before?”

“Hmm, well, Miles has several missing teeth. Elijah spent years scrapping around with gangs. He has several scars from bullet wounds. Ryan had his appendix out—performed by a shoddy, back alley doctor.” He shook his head at that. “You’ve seen Sebastian’s disfigurement. The way that vampire attacked him, cutting him over and over before he changed him. It was intentional to keep his face like that forever.”

I untangled his hand from his hair and rubbed it with my own to make it wild. "I like it this way. It suits you."

Growling, he flipped us so I was straddling his hips. I raised an eyebrow and smiled, proud I'd managed to distract him for a minute. He pulled my face to his and softly licked my lips. “Only you would love the thing about me that drives me batty.”

“Isn’t that what love is all about? Cherishing what the other thinks is a flaw? I’m quite sure there are some things about me you think are adorable that I can’t stand.”

“You have no flaws,” he whispered before kissing me hard. “Everything about you is a gift.”

I pressed into him, feeling the hard bulge in his pants. Taking his hands, I moved them to my shirt, encouraging him to remove it. His fingers worked quickly, and my mind shifted from the here and now to a place where my body took over. I had a fleeting thought, wondering again if he was sure about the compulsion thing. Was I really immune? Because his words made me want to rip off every stitch of clothing and let him have his way with me. Any way he wanted.

In a flash he positioned me so my butt hit the edge of the sofa. Seconds later I’d lost my pants. He buried his face between my legs and inhaled before kissing the sensitive skin closest to my panties.  My hands moved to his hair and I slid forward, lost in the moment.

“Grant,” I said, hooking my thumbs on my panties. I wanted them off. I wanted him closer. “Are you planning on teasing me all day?”

He stilled my hands and took control, removing the fabric for me. With both hands he pushed my thighs apart. “The longer you wait, the more aroused you get. The better you smell and”—he licked his lips—“the more delicious you taste.”

“Are you serious?”

“Positively,” he replied. “For you, a pheromone is something imperceptible. For me? It’s a whole other level.”

“Oh,” I replied, before he apparently decided it was time to stop messing around.  It was then that I realized what having a vampire lover could be all about. What it meant. What his precise touch, and for Grant in particular, with his extreme willpower and unparalleled control, meant for me.

I settled back against the couch, wove my fingers in his hair and succumbed to the moment.

~*~

"Why are you talking about hair and scars?" he asked curiously, brushing several stray pieces of my own behind my ear. We’d cleaned up and redressed. Was this our life now? Taking sex breaks and then just jumping back into the prior topic? I had no complaints.

I thought of Olivia and the two thick scars I saw on the insides of both arms and wondered aloud about them. “What were those from?” I asked.

“I don’t know.” Grant tensed, almost imperceptibly, but I felt it with his body so close to mine.

“Maybe that’s another clue,” I said, hopefully. “Maybe something else in her past can lead us to this—those scars on her arms were really unusual.”

He shrugged and stood, leaving me to go back to his newspapers and start his systematic process of research again. I followed him, walking over the papers and stopping before him.

“Amelia,” he said, frustration flaring on his face. “What are you doing?”

“What am I doing? I just gave you an idea—a lead. What you’ve been searching for and you just dismiss me.”

“I’m not dismissing you. I just don’t think it will lead anywhere.”

“Maybe we should ask Genevieve and Ryan what they think.”

“They’re busy.”

“I’m not busy,” Ryan said from the doorway, eyebrows furrowed. “Miles called and Genevieve took off, but I couldn’t help but overhear your discussion and uh, other stuff.” He held his hands up. My face caught fire. “You left the door open, not me.”

“Ryan,” Grant warned.

“I grew up in a carnival. Sex sounds are pretty much like background noise to me,” he said, not making it any better at all. “I think Amelia may be onto something. I never did hear what those scars were from either. But she showed up at the house with them when Grant found her, and they had to come from somewhere pre-change.”

“Right?” I said, excited to have a little support.

“Let me start looking,” Ryan said, moving to the computer.

Grant stepped in front of him and grabbed his arm. “Don’t.”

“Dude, you’re being weird. What’s going on?” Ryan asked, shaking free from his grip.

Grant glanced in my direction. The emotion in his eyes was one of deep concern. I stepped closer and took his hand. “I know you don’t like to tell other people’s stories. I respect that—I think we both do. But this is important. We need every piece of information we can get to find Olivia. Whatever it is, just tell us what’s going on so we can help.”

He tightened his jaw, working the muscle in the back. His eyes darted between us and he finally said, “You don’t need to search for the answer. I have it. I know how Olivia got those scars.”

Ryan frowned. “How?”

Grant’s fingers clenched tight around mine. “Because I was there. I know the truth about Olivia and her past. I’m the one that stole her memories.”

Chapter 3

Amelia

The room was so quiet the only sound was my small gasp at Grant’s revelation.  Ryan stood frozen, either stunned into silence or about to launch an attack. Grant simply looked dejected. A low growl came from Ryan, and I did the only thing I knew how. I jumped between them praying no one would hurt the human.

“Get out the way, Amelia,” Ryan said.

“Amelia.” I felt Grant’s hands on my waist. He would move me himself. 

“No! Beating Grant to a pulp is not going to find Olivia.” I pressed my hands against each of their hard chests. God, they could snap me in half if they wanted. “He has information. If he doesn’t give it freely, then you can beat the crap out of him, okay?”

Ryan conceded by giving me a sharp nod. I encouraged them to sit on opposite sides of the desk. I stood at the end of it where I could see everyone. “Grant, what do you know?”

He ran a hand through his hair. “I’ve never told anyone this story. It was something I promised myself I never would. It just didn’t feel right.”

“Well, I don’t think we ever expected to be in this situation either. Desperate times, man,” Ryan said.

Grant nodded. “It was the mid 40’s. The boys had just come to live with us, and Miles was committed to training them.  It was one of those times I took off. I never did well when Miles took in new people. It messed with my routines. It was best for me go off on my own for a while.”

“Where did you go?” I asked. “Was it one of your lapses?”

“No, not this time. I mostly just traveled, but instead of big cities or going overseas, I spent a great deal of time in the south. I’d slip in and out of small towns, but I had one habit that I picked up. I’d go in and out of the psych hospitals.”

“Why would you do that?” Ryan asked.

“His mother,” I replied. “You went because of your mom and the treatment she received.”

Grant nodded. “I felt this urge to go in and help. The places were an abomination. The staffing was inadequate and often brutal. Physical and sexual assault were common.  There wasn’t much I could do but I did have the gift of compulsion and I found myself using it on patients.”

“To cure them?” Ryan asked.

“Occasionally, if I could, but really I found my abilities were best used to comfort the patients. I’d convince them that the pain wasn’t so bad or at times that the voices couldn’t kill them. Whatever I could to give them a little relief.”

“That sounds pretty noble, Grant,” I said.

“It may sound that way but really it was a pathetic illusion to cover the truth. The sores and scabs where still there from the barbaric treatment they were subjected to daily. The images of demons lingered in their heads—just blocked by my will. If anything, it was a salve for my own guilt for allowing my mother to live in such conditions.” He took a deep breath. “At some point during my travels I found myself in Louisiana. They didn’t have mental hospitals as much as prisons. It was in one of these places that I found Olivia.”

“She was in a mental hospital?” Ryan asked.

“Yes. I’d just arrived at this one in particular. It looked nice from the outside and to be fair, the doctors felt like they were providing adequate care, but much of it was experimental and useless. I made my way down the halls—over the catatonic bodies and muttering idiots. I’d whisper hopes and dreams into their ears while making eye contact and”—he snapped his fingers—”they’d at least think they were in a better place. I was about to leave the facility when they brought in a new patient. The police carried her in, arms and legs bound. The scent of blood caught my attention. The cops were covered in injuries. When they walked past me, I smelled her instantly. She reeked of death and her eyes were the darkest shade of black. She was a fledgling and they were about to make a deathly mistake.”

“She was brought in as a vampire?” Ryan asked. “How did they even contain her?”

“To this day I have no idea how they managed to bring her in. She thrashed against them, but to their credit they bound her to the bed using chains and tightly woven cloth. I lurked in the shadows, listening to her parents cry in nearly incomprehensible Cajun. They thought she’d been possessed by the devil. To an extent they were right. Their daughter no longer existed and a demon had taken her place.”

I leaned on the desk, riveted by Grant’s story. A quick glance told me Ryan felt the same way. Unable to contain myself I asked, “What happened next?”

“The doctors left to fetch a priest and I slipped into the room. Remember, this was Louisiana. They were fiercely religious with a heavy dose of the occult. They thought she could be exorcised—even relished the idea. I knew it was far too late for that.” He stared at his hands. “A sheet of paper had been attached to the clipboard on the end of the bed, and I skimmed it. Olivia was her name, age sixteen. Sitting on her bedside, I pushed back that fiery red hair so I could see her face. The fledgling in her was starving, and she growled and snapped, trying to get through the gag shoved in her mouth.”

“I caught her eye and said, ‘
Little fledgling, calm down. I’m going to take care of you
.’ The compulsion was strong enough to make her still. I pushed harder. ‘
You’ll come with me and I’ll help you. I’ll feed you. Teach you. I’ll take you somewhere safe
.’”

“She nodded and indicated she wanted to speak. I cut the gag with my nails.
‘I dreamed of you
,’ she said, eyes roaming my face. ‘
God told me you would come
.’”

“She spoke in a jumble of Cajun and gibberish. Raving of religious symbolism. Speaking incessantly of the Virgin Mary. To be honest, I suspected I would have to extinguish her myself, but I had to get her away from the institution to do it. Keeping her there a minute longer was too risky.”

“What did you do?” I asked.

“It took all my strength but I penetrated her mind, instructing her to harm no one and to follow my every command. I released her from the bed and we slipped out the window. We traveled through the night to an abandoned barn. I tied her up again, fearful my compulsion would wear off. I brought her animals, deer and wild boar. She fell to her knees and blessed my feet. She quoted scripture, and there were times I’m certain she thought I was Jesus.”

“She told me that,” I interrupted. “That she thought you were a God. Jesus, in fact.”

Ryan rolled his eyes and muttered something about a massive ‘blanking’ ego. Grant inclined his head to the side. “Did she?”

“Yes.”

“Interesting. Once she’d fed and gotten used to the taste of animals she quieted some. I allowed her to clean herself in the river, although in her mind it was a baptism of sorts. A new life. Slowly, in that broken-down barn I helped her get her urges under control, but as she became more coherent I realized how damaged she truly was. The scars you mentioned, the ones on her arms?  She told me they came from the hospital—from when they strapped her to the table.
She proceeded to make a jerking motion with her body. The kind you would experience from electroshock.”

“Holy shit, Grant,” Ryan said.

“
When I asked if she’d been there before, a strange look crossed her face
.
She said, ‘
Many times. They wanted to take my dreams away, but you can’t take away the will of God
.’”

“I realized then that Olivia had spent her life in and out of the institution. The scars on her arms were from repeatedly being strapped to a table or bed. I have no idea if her visions before her transition were legitimate or just a manifestation of whatever mental illness she had. Regardless, I had a feeling that they’d certainly amplified after her change.”

“So Olivia did recall her past when you found her—however muddled the memories came out?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“And you knew how to locate her parents?”

“I did,” he admitted.

“Then what happened? Why didn’t you ever tell her?”

“Olivia had spent substantial time in the facility and her recollection of the atrocities committed to her physically and mentally were beyond horrific. If she was not damaged before she went into the hospital, there was little doubt she would have been when she left.” His eyes met Ryan’s. “She was a beautiful girl, even under those circumstances. The liberties taken against her would have been enough to send the strongest person into a psychotic break.”

“You wiped her memories,” Ryan said. “You took it all away.”

“Yes,” Grant admitted. “Olivia was given a second chance at life. I wanted it to be better than the first one.”

Tears sprung to my eyes and I blinked them back. The pain I felt for Olivia was barely overshadowed by the love I felt for Grant. He’d made an impossibly difficult choice for someone he barely knew—someone who became his best friend.  A decision that may have caused the trouble we struggled with now, decades later.

Ryan leaned back in his seat and asked, “So what does this all mean considering Caleb and Olivia’s kidnapping? Anything?”

“It may mean nothing,” Grant said.

“It’s a start,” Ryan said, standing.  He eyed Grant carefully and I realized the fight between them may not be over.

“Is there going to be an ass-kicking? Because if there is, I’m gonna leave, okay?” I shot Grant a sympathetic look. He smiled warily in return.

“Nope, not now,” Ryan said. “We need him too much to find Olivia. Plus, he’ll have to tell Elijah. And I don’t want to miss that.”

Ryan and Grant’s phones both chimed at the same time alerting them to a text message. They read the message at the same time and Ryan’s eyebrows lifted in curiosity while a crease appeared between Grant’s eyes.

“Who is it?” I asked.

“Genevieve,” Ryan replied.

“What does she want?”

“She doesn’t want anything—but The Council does,” Grant said.

“The Council?” I didn’t know much about the organizing force behind the vampire population. I’m not sure how much I wanted to know.

“They’ve sent a representative to follow up on everything going on,” Ryan said. “Last night was probably too much for them to ignore.”

I thought about last night. The fundraiser. The attack on me and Sebastian. Olivia’s disappearance. Grant and I…

My eyes met his. “Is this about us?” I whispered, as though someone could hear me.

“Me and you?” He shook his head. “I doubt it. I suspect this is about the camp we blew up in the mountains last night.”

“You blew up a camp!” I shouted. Okay, not so worried about being overheard. “When did you have time to do that?”

“She’ll have to stay here,” Ryan said. “What do you want to do?”

Grant grimaced. “I’ll call Judson.”

I sat up in my seat. “I’m right here you know? Do I really need a babysitter?”

Both men nodded and said, “Yes.”

“Fine,” I said, crossing my arms. “But make it the cat.”

Grant stiffened. “The cat?”

I nodded and repeated, “The cat.”