Doomsday Can Wait (7 page)

My chest began to burn as I held my breath, waiting for him to lean over and put his mouth beneath the slowly dying stream like a child with the garden hose on a hot summer day.

I drew in a lungful of air, wincing at the pain in my ribs. They'd heal, probably in the next few minutes, but right now—

"Ouch."

I should have kept my mouth shut. Jimmy's head jerked in my direction. The red light at the center of his eyes had faded, his fangs retracted. He would have looked exactly like the boy I'd loved, if not for the blood all over his face.

His mouth formed the word
Lizzy,
then he held out his red-slicked hands and cringed. Before I could say or do anything, he ran, straight past me and into the depths of the cave in a blur of speed that my eyes could barely track.

I forced myself to stand, retrieve the flashlight, and follow him. In the distance something large hit a water surface. I followed the scent of rain to another, smaller cavern, which contained a pond.

In the distance, thunder rumbled. Water trickled down the rock face, making gentle, peaceful music, in direct contrast to the sight of Jimmy bobbing in the center, scrubbing frantically at the blood on his face, his neck, and his hands.

I really wanted to jump in, too, but with Jimmy channeling Lady Macbeth, I figured I'd better wait, so I took a seat on the edge.

Jimmy went under, then he stayed there so long I nearly went in and hauled him out. At last he burst above the surface, flinging droplets every which way.

"What are you doing here?" He faced the rock wall, rubbing at his skin, even though I didn't see any more blood.

"What do you think?" I asked. "We're in a war, San-ducci, and I'm a little short on soldiers.'"

"I won't be any good to you."

"You looked pretty good a few minutes ago. I'd say you've still got it."

He shook his head, and his shoulders slumped. "I've been trying to beat the monster back. I thought I had it under control, then I saw that thing hit you and—"

"You saved me. What's so wrong about that?"

"I wanted to drink its blood, Lizzy."

"I know," I said softly.

"I can never leave here while I want that, and I'm starting to think that I'll never be able to
stop
wanting it."

"Maybe Sawyer—" I began.

Jimmy spun around. "No."

They never had gotten along. I'd never been sure why, though I had my theories.

"He knows things," I said.

"If I let him mess with my head, I'll end up crazier than I already am."

"I don't think he'd—"

"No, Lizzy."

Since I didn't know where Sawyer was anyway, I let it go.

Jimmy studied my face, then as if someone had cued the sound effects, one loud, earthshaking burst of thun-der rattled the earth. "You came here to kill me."

I hesitated, then told him the truth. "Maybe. I don't know."

"I've been feeding on people.'"

"No one's dead." I couldn't believe I was using Sum-mer's argument.

And speaking of Summer, where was she? I didn't have time to go on a fairy hunt right now. I had a very strong feeling that if I turned my back on Jimmy, he'd be gone.

"Yet," he said, taking my side of the argument.

"You said you'd been trying to control the—" I paused, uncertain what to call the part of him the strega had awoken.

"Monster. Beast. Vampire. Thing. Say it!" His voice bounced off the walls of the cavern, full of both anger and pain.

"Fine," I said. "How do you control your inner bloodsucker?"

"I don't know. Being near people . . ." He shrugged, his wet shirt clinging to his wet body. "It's too hard. I can hear your pulse, the blood streaming through your veins." He put his hands over his ears, then let them slowly fall back into the water. "It's deafening."

"So you came here because it's isolated?"

"Not isolated enough," he muttered. "But yeah. I'd been here before, searched these caves."

"For what?"

"The howler. Always bugged me that I never found him."

"He found you this time." Probably figured Jimmy was after him again and decided to end things once and for all.

Jimmy seemed calmer, so I emptied my pockets— cell phone, money, et cetera—then jumped into the pool, shoes and all. They were pretty much ruined anyway.

He tensed. "What are you doing?"

I didn't answer, just ducked beneath the water and began to scrub at my face, neck, hair, as he had.

When I came up, Jimmy sat on the edge of the pool. "You shouldn't have come after me," he said. "I didn't want you to see me like this."

"I already have."

He closed his eyes; his lips tightened. "How could you stand to be near me after what I did? How could you have—"

"Touched you?" I swam closer. "Made love to you?"

"Why did you?" he whispered.

I'd needed to drown out the bad memories with good ones. I'd hoped that he could get past all that had happened, all that he'd done, if I pretended that I'd gotten past it. But when I'd woken the morning after, Jimmy had been gone. One of the things Jimmy was very good at—besides sex—was leaving.

I didn't want to bring up the time I'd spent as Jimmy's captive in the Strega's lair. Those recollections would do neither one of us any good.

Instead, I set my hands on his knees. His eyes sprang open. As always, whenever we got near each other, we had a hard time thinking with our heads and ignoring other more interesting parts of our anatomy.

My palms slid over his thighs, the clenching muscles like stone against my fingertips. He smelled like rain, different yet still the same. I stepped between his legs, looked into his face. He tried to scoot back. Maybe get to his feet and run away again, I don't know. Off balance, he tipped forward, and all it took was a tiny tug for him to join me.

His body bumped mine, here and there, then here again as the water brought us together and apart.

He gained his feet; I did, too, so close my breasts slid across his chest. I lost my footing, nearly went under, and he grabbed me. We froze, but only for an instant. Then we were kissing as if we'd been separated for a de-cade.

I don't know what got into me. I hadn't planned to kiss him, to touch him. I hadn't had any sort of plan at all.

But once I did, it seemed right to show him that some things hadn't changed. That
this
hadn't changed. We only had to be near each other to want, only had to brush against each other to need.

Familiar yet forever exciting, his mouth met mine. Tongues touched, hands wandered. I shoved mine under what was left of his shirt, warmed my chilled fingers against him, learning again the contours of his skin.

His erection pressed into my stomach, warm where I was cold. The kiss melted toward more; his mouth traced my jaw, my neck; he mouthed first one nipple, then the other, through the gauze of my soaked shirt.

I couldn't help it, I lifted my feet, wrapped my thighs around his hips, and pressed us together through several layers of soaked clothing. The fit was close, but not quite there.

As if knowing what I wanted, needed, probably because he wanted it, too, he swung me around until my back was against the side of the pool, then ground us together, even as his mouth opened, taking more of me, his tongue pressing, laving, teasing.

I arched, gasping, begging. Against me he pulsed, the rhythmic beat calling my own. The cave echoed with the rasp of our breathing and the lap of the water upon the rock face, the two sounds syncopated, nearly as arousing as the heat of his body and the pulse of his heart.

He pressed his face to the curve of my neck. Inhaling deeply, as if he wanted to memorize my scent. Right now I probably smelled like—

Blood.

I stiffened, even as he licked my skin, grazed the damp flesh with his teeth, took a fold into his mouth and suckled.

Images flickered—other women in his arms, other men. The taste of the blood, the sexual pull of it. The desire to feed, to devour, to possess, the struggle not to kill.

I felt everything as if those feelings were mine. I tasted the blood; I wanted it, too. I wanted him to feed on me while he took me, hard against the wall, the orgasm made stronger by the draining of my life into his mouth.

I shuddered and pushed at his shoulders. Without any hesitation, he let me go.

"You saw?" he murmured.

My eyes narrowed. He'd done that on purpose.

"Did you think I'd be disgusted?" I asked. "That I wouldn't understand? That isn't you, Jimmy."

His lips curved into a humorless smile. "The Strega's dead. Who else could it be?"

"I felt your struggle. You didn't—" I paused. "Did you?"

"Didn't what?" He looked at me, one quick glance and then away. "Force them? I never have to force anyone. Once I drink from them a few times, they'll do anything I want."

"Excuse me?"

He hauled himself out of the pool; his clothes dripped enough water onto the dirt floor of the cave to create a puddle of mud. "Remember the Strega's harem?"

How could I forget? The women had behaved like something out of a sci-fi movie—robots on parade.

"The more a vampire feeds on someone, the more they're tied to him."

I sloshed to the side of the pool as my mind mulled over Jimmy's words. Was that why I couldn't seem to let him go? How many times had he fed on me in Manhat-tan? I couldn't remember.

Except I'd staked him in that glass tower, had planned to stake him again, until, at the death of the strega, Jimmy had snapped out of his evil twin persona. I wouldn't have been able to hurt him if he were capable of controlling me.

And the undeniable attraction I had for him dated from way back. Even when he'd broken my heart, walked out of my life, I'd never been able to forget him. That I couldn't now was just more of the same, not some new mind control brought about by his sinking his fangs into me one too many times.

I hoisted myself out of the water as a sudden thought drove out the others. "If vampires can control humans by feeding on them, that means they could take over the earth."

"I think that's what Daddy had planned."

"Why hasn't it happened already?" I asked. "I'm sure there are plenty of bloodsuckers out there; they're feeding at will, so how is it that the whole world isn't one big vampire harem?"

"Because most vampires kill. Once they start feeding, they can't stop. They don't want to."

"So what was wrong with the strega?"

"He was powerful enough to control himself."

I tilted my head. "So can you."

He threw up his hands; droplets of water smacked me in the face. "If that were true, Lizzy, I wouldn't be here."

"You aren't killing people, that's control. If you've managed to do that much in a month, eventually you'll be able to stop the vampire urges altogether."

"Maybe," he murmured. "But I can't take that chance. For all I know, the more I feed, the less human I'll get."

He could be right.

"These things take time," I said.

"We don't have time. You need me now."

"It appears we've been granted a reprieve."

He frowned. "What?"

"Did you ever hear the rumor that by killing the leader of the darkness we could end Doomsday?"

"You can't end it. Doomsday is inevitable."

"Fine." I said. "Then postpone it."

Jimmy shook his head, but he was thinking. "Reverse the prophecy, reverse the results. It makes sense." He smacked his hands together in frustration. "I should have thought of that."

"Wouldn't have mattered, I'd have killed the strega anyway."

He remained silent for several seconds, then, "What's it like out there?" He jerked his head toward the mouth of the cave.

"Calmer than it should be if chaos were reigning."

"All this means is that they'll have to kill you to start Doomsday all over again."

I shrugged. "They were trying to kill me anyway. They're trying to kill all of us."

Jimmy pressed his palms to his eyes. "I've got to get rid of this thing inside of me. You need help."

"What I need is you healthy, sane, at the top of your game."

"What if I never get there?"

I didn't answer. I couldn't leave him in this cave in-definitely; I probably shouldn't leave him here at all. But what was I going to do with him?

"Jimmy, I have to have the seers' contact information that you got from Ruthie."

"You mean the ones I stole out of her mind while she was sleeping?"

Besides being a dhampir, Jimmy was also a dream walker. He could slip into a person's dreams, steal their memories, their knowledge, their secrets, and leave no trace that he'd ever been there. That he'd been compelled to dream walk, along with everything else, didn't seem much comfort to him at all.

"If you hadn't," I said, "we'd be in trouble. I need that information."

Luckily he'd begun to remember things the Strega had made him forget soon after the miserable bastard had died.

"You couldn't just ask her when you 'see' her?" He made quotation marks in the air around the word
see.

"I haven't had a visit from Ruthie since I got home."

I left out the woman of smoke and the amulet. He had enough problems without mine.

Jimmy frowned. "How did you find me?"

"Summer saw you in Barnaby's Gap and here we are."

"Jesus." He rubbed his forehead. "You came together?"

"Yes."

He lowered his hand. "Where is she?"

"In the car, I think."

"Please tell me you haven't been comparing notes."

I wrinkled my nose. "We have better things to talk about than your sexual prowess, Sanducci. She is, after all, a DK. I'm a seer, and even though I killed the last leader of the darkness, that just means there's a new one on the way. We need to replenish the federation and quick."

"How?"

"I have no idea."

"Some of the kids Ruthie had at her place were probably future federation members. She always took on the problem kids, the ones with too much imagination, the ones who lied, the ones who had problems staying with families because weird things always happened around them. That kind of stuff usually translates to special powers."