Fateful (40 page)

On a sudden intake of air, she then noticed
his sapphire eyes as he looked into hers. Not only were his eyes no
longer silvery, but his complexion was back to normal too. “Are you
mortal now? What did that feel like?”

Ethan chuckled faintly. “I guess I’m mortal,
but I don’t feel any different … and I don’t think I can describe
what that felt like. It was a little painful, but then it wasn’t.
Being transformed into a vampire was much worse.” He placed his
hand over his chest to feel his heart beating and smiled. With
another chuckle, he wrapped his arms around her and tugged her down
for a hug. “You saved me, Danielle. In so many ways—you have saved
me.” After raking fingers through her hair, he rubbed her back.

A gentle hand came to her cheek and he found
her lips with his. Even with the moon reigning rather than the sun,
Danielle discovered she wasn’t overpowered by dark magic and parted
her lips to deepen the kiss. To her amazement, however, his kiss
still tasted sweet to her, and she wondered if he smelled the same.
Pulling away, Danielle pressed her nose to the skin below his ear,
and inhaled his delectable fragrance. Weird, he still smelled
delicious. “Ethan, how do you smell and taste the same? I thought
those were vampire traits.”

“I have no idea. Do you still get dizzy when
you look into my eyes?”

Worry filled her soul suddenly. “Do you still
recognize me?”

“Yes, I still know you … but are you muddled,
Danielle?” he repeated because she hadn’t answered the first
time.

“No, that’s gone.”

They laid there embracing for several long
moments, savoring the miracle. Danielle closed her eyes, and Ethan
traced his fingers around her face in the manner that she’d loved
from before.

Chapter
2
4

Escape

However, Danielle soon realized they had to
come back to reality at some point because this ordeal wasn’t
exactly over. “Ethan, how are we going to get out of here? We’re
mortals trapped in a vampire’s basement.”

“I’ve been thinking about this, and I may
have a plan.”

She waited while he appeared to be
calculating the finer details of it, but her patience was growing
thin again. “Tell me, please.”

“Hmm…” An impish grin touched his lips. “We
need to make them think you are dead.”

At that her eyes rounded.

“If they think I actually did kill you, then
they should let me leave. That’s what they wanted all along. They
wanted me to suffer alone—without you. They don’t want me dead.
I’ll tell them that I want to bury your body. They should let me
have at least that much.”

“Shouldn’t I look really pale if I’m dead?
How do we fake that?”

Ethan chortled as his lips pulled into an
almost evil smile. “The cement.”

“Oh!” Her eyes found a pile of the broken
debris. “The dust!” she said, catching on to his brilliance.

“Yes.” His laugh was slightly diabolical, but
she liked it.

However, her smile slipped when she thought
of something else. “But, won’t they sense that you’re mortal now,
and I’m not dead?”

“There is a small risk they could figure that
out, but I don’t think they will. They’ll wait until the sun is up
to check on us, and their powers will be weakened by then. There’s
a chance they won’t notice at all. Neither one of them strikes me
as very observant, and they’ll be distracted by the drama I display
as I mourn the loss of my love.” He winked at her.

Taking a glimmer of hope from the confidence
in his grin, she climbed off his chest and sat on the rug next to
him. “How much time do we have?”

“I don’t think we have much time. We need to
get started.” But he paused as the focus of his thoughts appeared
to have changed. He leaned up from the floor with a look of worry
in his eyes. “Danielle?”

“Yes.”

“Did I … hurt you?”

Looking down at her torn blouse she did
recall that while he’d damaged her clothes, he wasn’t the one who
hurt her physically. Rubbing at her sore arms while shaking her
head, she said, “No. I was bruised before they tossed me in
here.”

He ran long fingers through his golden hair
as anger replaced concern.

“Ethan, I provoked them.”

“You shouldn’t have,” he said as fury
continued to flicker in his gentle blue eyes. “I’ll deal with them
later. We need to get out of here alive first.”

The room became quiet as he studied her,
probably plotting how to make her look deceased. His words proved
she’d been right. “Dark circles under your eyes would help with the
con, any ideas for that?”

Danielle looked around the barren room, and
then her gaze dropped to the soles of her shoes. “Oh! I know!” She
rubbed her finger onto the dirty bottom of her shoe and then lifted
her blackened finger.

Ethan rewarded her ingenuity with a crooked
smile. “Perfect.”

After rubbing the street grime underneath her
eyes, she turned to him and asked, “How’s that?”

“Nice, you look sick already.” Rising from
the floor, he said, “Let’s work on your complexion.”

They walked over to one of Ethan’s dents and
started rubbing the cement dust all over her exposed skin. It gave
her a sickly look, as if she’d paled from having her blood
drained.

“You’re definitely starting to look like a
corpse now.”

“Well, thank you.”

He chuckled as he planned the next effect.
“Blood. We need to make it look like you have puncture wounds.” He
knelt over his blood that she’d spat onto the floor, and dipped his
finger into it to paint two dots on Danielle’s neck, letting some
of it drip from the spots.

“Do I look like a vampire victim?” she
asked.

“Yes.” After gulping, he added, “it’s
distressing to think I almost really did do that to you. The sight
of you now is nearly unbearable for me.”

“Good, so it’s convincing then?”

“Disturbingly so, yes,” he confirmed.

“And I do think the bloodstain on the floor
makes it look like a real murder scene, but…” She thought of her
torn blouse, if a piece of this were lying next to the blood, it
could add to the theatric backdrop. Danielle tore it further until
she’d ripped a section off and dropped it on the floor next to the
crimson stain.

“Nice touch.”

Beaming proudly at him, she attempted to keep
herself covered with her now partial top. A look of tortured regret
continued to strain his features. Part of that may have been due to
the fact that her bruised upper arm was now exposed.

Not saying anything about that, however,
Ethan took her by the hand and led her to the sofa. “Put your
sweater and jacket on, the layers should help to mask any
breathing, but try to take shallow breaths.”

As the glow of morning began filtering
through the skylight, Danielle glanced at the door nervously while
she worked the buttons closed on first her sweater and then her
jacket. They could be coming in any second now. Ethan sank down
onto the sofa and pulled her onto his lap. “The hardest part is
next, Danielle, you need to play dead, and I don’t know for how
long. I’m going to act deeply upset and devastated, but you can’t
respond to my acting. You must remain completely limp.”

Danielle swallowed, could she really do
this? Banishing the negative thoughts, she decided she
had
to do this. “My lifeless body is
in your hands,” she teased, in an attempt to lighten the intense
moment.

He didn’t smile at that but instead
focused in on one word. “Your
lifeless
body.” It wasn’t until his brows
furrowed and a tear dripped from his eye that she realized what he
was doing. Apparently forcing his thoughts to the dark possibility
he was able to bring on fake tears.

Jumping at a sudden sound coming from the
door, she clung to him.

“Go limp. Now!” he ordered.

Making her fingers release his shirt, she
next focused in on every other muscle she possessed and hung from
his arms, her head lulling back, her eyes sliding shut.

“I love you,” he whispered.

She didn’t have a chance to respond to that,
as she heard the door to the dungeon slide open.

By then Ethan had begun sobbing. “No … no …
I’m so sorry, Danielle.” Without showing it, Danielle marveled at
how well he could act.

Like a masterful illusionist, Ethan used
tricks of distraction as he rocked her back and forth, while he
wept and wailed over her “dead” body. She realized the movement
made it impossible to see her breathing, and the noise he was
making made it equally impossible to hear it. Ethan never stopped
rocking while he embraced her and stroked her hair.

Danielle focused on being as completely
motionless as she could, even paying close attention to her fingers
she didn’t allow a single twitch. It was difficult not reacting to
his emotional display, though. Ethan was so convincing she was
nearly persuaded to mourn her own death as she listened to him weep
and murmur about his intense loss.

When she heard Celeste’s smug, velvet voice,
she fought the reflex to flinch. “Ahhh, poor Ethan killed his
precious little pet.”

She heard the sound of Celeste’s heels
clicking against the floor as she walked further into the room, and
then the noise stopped before she spoke again, “Tsk tsk. Luke, did
you see this? He even ripped her clothes off. That’s brutal, Ethan,
I didn’t know you had it in you.”

Wanting to tense in response to
Celeste’s unkind words, Danielle forced her mind to focus….
Limp, Danielle, remain limp!
she
reminded herself.

“I hope you and the rest of the fools like
you will stop interfering with my hunting from now on. So, Ethan?”
The sound of Lucas’ voice was closer and Danielle nearly panicked
inside, fearing he would notice a flaw in their act. “How did she
taste? Your first mortal blood, was it worth the wait?”

Ethan didn’t answer. He just maintained his
award-winning act as before, actually sounding broken emotionally,
like someone having a nervous breakdown, and someone who needed to
be hospitalized for it.

“We may have pushed him completely off the
deep end with this one. I’m beginning to wonder if he’ll ever
recover.” There was no regret in Celeste’s mocking voice and it
seemed like she’d bought the ruse.

Danielle realized Ethan took this as his
chance to escape when he spoke. “May I leave to bury her … please?”
he requested with a trembling voice.

“What do you think? Should we let him bury
his dead girlfriend?” asked Celeste.

“I don’t care—I don’t want to deal with the
corpse,” was Lucas’ cold response.

“All right, Ethan, you may bury your dearest
love in the forest. Just do it far enough away from the house so we
don’t have to smell her rotting flesh,” was Celeste’s heartless
answer.

Not wasting a second, she felt Ethan stand,
shifting her limp body closer to his torso as he headed for the
door.

And they let him! Danielle couldn’t believe
it. They actually got away with it!

He scaled the stairs and exited the building,
keeping an incredible pace that would have made any mortal man
winded by now. But he is mortal now.... Despite her confusion,
Danielle remained lifeless, even knowing it was much harder for him
to carry her deadweight than if she’d clung to him, but by some
means he did it.

Listening as his shoes continued to pound the
earth she suspected they’d entered the forest when a breeze kissed
her face, when she heard the leaves rustling in the trees and
crunching under his feet, when she heard the birds chirping out
their cheerful song and when she smelled the plant life that added
a fresh tang to the crisp air.

“Stay limp,” he muttered in barely a
whisper.

Could they be watching? Of course they
could.

He strode through the woods for what felt
like two miles to her before he began to slow down. “Keep playing
dead, we’re almost there,” Ethan whispered.

How was he doing this without his vampire
strength? She was certain she had to weigh more to him now, but he
didn’t even sound out of breath when he certainly should have
been.

Finally Ethan stopped and twisted toward the
house probably trying to listen and check to make certain they
really were alone. Apparently he’d decided they were when he
suddenly dropped her feet to the ground and smashed her to his
chest in a relieved embrace. “I think we’re safe now.”

Danielle opened her eyes and hugged him back.
But he swiftly pulled away, grasped his cuff to pull his shirt
tight and began wiping the cement dust off her face with his
sleeve. “We need to get this washed off. I doubt it’s very good for
your skin or your health, for that matter.”

But she couldn’t stop thinking about his
extraordinary physical feat. “How did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Ethan, you just carried my deadweight
through the forest at such a … such a … such an immortal pace. Are
you mortal or not?”

“I don’t know, Danielle, maybe the magic
wears off gradually.” He’d pulled his cell phone from his pocket
and dialed a number. “Maybe it’s just adrenaline.”

“Or maybe you keep some of your vampire
traits in the same way you kept some of your mortal traits,” she
mused aloud.

But Ethan was clearly uninterested in this at
the moment, and his priorities appeared to be more focused on
getting them to safety. “Maybe,” he said, sounding distant and more
intent on the call he’d made. “Hello, Beon, this is Ethan. I have
an emergency.”

A pause.

“No, I never made it to Moldova.” Danielle
listened as Ethan explained what had happened before finishing
with, “We need to be picked up as quickly as possible, and have
Sophia draw a bath for Danielle.”