Knight Predator (11 page)

“Come in,” she said.

I went in and sat on the edge of the bed. She had schoolbooks resting on her knees and a pencil hanging out of her mouth.

“I’m studying for a test I have tomorrow,” she said.

“Oh. I suppose I’d better let you get back to it, then.”

“No. Stay.” She patted the bed.

I sat beside her, and she closed her books and put them on the floor.

She lay in my arms with a sigh.

“Where did you go?” I asked after a little while.

“I went to a friend’s house and we talked.” She looked up and caught my look of alarm. “Not about you specifically. I remember your rules. I’m not prepared to break them.”

I nodded, relaxed.

“You feel something for me as well, don’t you?”

I sighed.

“Don’t deny it,” she said. “Look at what we’re doing.”

“I just don’t have room in my life for romance,” I said. “Besides.

Think about what you’ve been doing for the past few days. I can smell it on you. You’ve had your fill of a few men. And women.”

“You can cheat on me but I can’t cheat on you?”

“Neither one of us is cheating on the other, and you know it. But how can you keep telling me how much you love me when you can go and do what you’re doing with other people? Say I wanted a relationship with you—what would you want me to think?”

She sat up and met my eyes. “I want you. I know you want me. I can see it in your eyes. I can see you’re jealous. Don’t try to hide it.

What I don’t understand is what’s wrong with me? Why won’t you take me? You’re not overwhelmed with things you
have
to do, you just go and do what you want. Why do you say you have no time for me? Is it because you’re really not interested or because you really have no time?”

I was silent for a moment. “I’m not lying to you. But that doesn’t really matter. You’re so young. You deserve a life with someone who really loves you and I can’t give you that. All I can give you is a meaningless existence.”

“I won’t give up on you. Never. You’re all I want. And meaningless?

Why are you so stalled in life? You’re so young, so strong and so beautiful. You’re rich. You could have it all if you wanted. Why aren’t you moving forward?”

Her eyes glinted with tears and pain as she gazed at me, studying me. Her hand almost unwillingly traced the line of my jaw.

“You’re so beautiful.” She sighed. “There’s so much I want to know about you. Like why you never come out during the day. Like why you always seem so sad. Like your family and your life. You, Crowley. I want to know all about you.”

“Honestly, there isn’t that much to know about me. You’ve pretty much seen all I have. You have some idea of what I’m like. I like darkness. It’s my best friend.”

She studied me for a moment or two. “It’ll all come with time.” She dropped her eyes and studied the cotton covering my stomach. “You asked me about fidelity. I believe in monogamy. I do. But it just makes me so crazy to know you love me and you’re perfectly prepared to go out and fuck anything in a skirt. If you can do that, I can do that.”

I narrowed my eyes. “Trust me, I don’t fuck everything in a skirt.

Haven’t you heard of safe sex? Don’t you practice it?”

“How I have sex is none of your concern, angel. And yes, of course I know how to take care of myself.”

We glared at each other for a moment, and then the fight went out of me.

“This is such a strange conversation,” I muttered.

“I know,” Bronwyn said, much to my surprise. “But nothing seems to work on you but oblique.”

I laughed.

We were quiet for a moment.

“You know,” she said. “Today’s my birthday.”

“Is it?” I asked, arching an eyebrow. “Why didn’t you mention it earlier?”

“It slipped my mind. I was more worried about you than anything else.”

“Don’t worry about me,” I said. “You’ll only get gray hair.”

She joined my soft laughter.

Her eyes flashed, and her beautiful face broke all of my resolution.

“How about a birthday kiss?” I asked, and claimed her lips in a deep and gentle kiss before she had a chance to protest.

Burning shock traveled up and down my body at the touch of her soft lips and her unmistakable response. When we broke, she lay on my chest, trying to catch her breath.

I was glad I was lying down. I knew that my knees wouldn’t support me if I was standing.

“Whoa,” she said, voice cracking. She cleared her throat. “Um

. . . that’s the best present I got all day.”

“Um,” I responded.

She gazed into my eyes. “Thank you, friend.”

“Ahem . . . you’re welcome,” I said, trying to muster a cocky grin and failing miserably.

“You know what I want to spend my night doing?” she asked, blushing.

“What?”

“Dancing with you.”

“I think that can be arranged,” I said, standing and holding out my hand.

She took it, and I led her downstairs. I put on the music, and we danced.

Around midnight we went back to her room, and I held her as she fell asleep, whispering sweet words of love to me that almost tore me apart.

When dawn forced me to my own bed, I brushed her forehead with my lips.

“Sleep well, beloved mortal,” I said and left her.

Life continued quietly for the next week. She had exams and studied for them under my watchful eye. I helped her as best I was able.

It was after midnight on a Thursday night. We went into the Test Tube Factory and found our usual table. Our waitress gave me her normal, hungry stare. Bronwyn glared at her, consistent as always, and then dragged me out onto the dance floor, more crowded than usual.

I was unable to stop a pair of young men cutting in and blocking me off from Bronwyn. She looked surprised but kept dancing. I allowed myself to be swept off the dance floor and went back to our table.

The waitress came over, and her eyes lit up when she saw I was alone. She leaned over me. “Want to have some fun?”

I smiled. I was hungry. I had not feasted. Bronwyn wanted to go out for a ride, and I had taken her. My stomach called for food.

I allowed her to take my hand and lead me out into the alleyway behind the club.

As soon as we were outside, she pushed me back against the wall and claimed my lips in a ravenous kiss, massaging my breasts and teasing my nipples as her thigh slipped between my legs.

I moaned in frustration, and it drove her wild. She loosened her dress and her beautiful breasts tumbled into my waiting hands. We sank to the ground as she pulled up her skirts, her hands roaming my bare skin beneath my shirt.

I pushed her onto her back and parted her legs. She moaned and tangled her hands in my hair as I kissed my way down the front of her body, studiously avoiding her breasts.

I kissed her parted thighs, senses filled with the sweet scent of her arousal.

She moaned softly.

I hated her and hated myself.

I sank my fangs, hard and fast, into her thigh, sighing as I was instantly filled with her life giving blood. I felt her slow and still, her passion ashes as she lost consciousness.

I pulled out and covered the fang marks with my blood, erasing them. I covered her breasts and left her there.

When I stood and turned, I saw Bronwyn.

This time she didn’t just look hurt. She had tears pouring down her face, and she looked devastated. She gave vent to a strangled, animal cry of pain and sprinted away from me. Despite my greater speed and strength, I couldn’t catch her, and she was lost as I burst out into the street, startling a few drunk patrons of Kings Cross.

My shoulders slumped as I gave up and walked back to my car.

The pain cut into me like a knife. I immersed myself in it as I viciously crushed the reason for it.

She was not there when I woke up the next evening, and I knew from bitter experience that she would stay away from me for a few days if I left her to her own devices.

I went out looking for her, and purely by chance I found her in the Kings Cross Hotel. I went out onto the dance floor and smoothly took her into my arms.

“Well, well, well, and how are we this evening, my succulent young charge?” My voice was just loud enough to carry over the noise in the hot and smelly nightclub. Her warm body settled against mine with the ease of gentle familiarity. I pulled her in close, relishing the chance to feel her warm, living body against my cold, dead one.

“Fuck, Crowley, what are you doing here?” Bronwyn was clearly drunk as a skunk, and her eyes were bloodshot as she shook her head to clear out some of the cobwebs.

Dawn was far too close for my liking. I had to get under cover in very short order, so my patience was just a tad strained.

“Brat. I was looking for you to take you home.” My eyes bored into hers, and she slipped closer into my cold embrace and held me tight as we whirled around the dance floor in time to the raucous music. Her face rested against my chest, and I felt the breath of her sigh against my skin. I winced as I took us through a pall of smoke and flashing lights.

“I don’t want to go home.” She glared at me, eyes unfocused, and hiccupped.

I wondered if she was going to throw up. I was quite sick of watching mortals do that. A drunken girl, younger than Bronwyn, brushed past us, spilling half of her precious drink. She glared at me and drew in breath to abuse me, but whatever she wanted to say died on her lips when she looked closer at my pale skin and burning eyes.

She scurried off to her equally drunk friends, holding themselves up on a small table close by.

“Untrue. Yes, yes you do. Remember our bargain? You do what I tell you to do when I tell you to do it.” My tone and fierce eyes allowed no room for argument. “Don’t you remember you have exams starting on Monday? You need to study.” In other words, I wanted my playmate around.

“Yes, Mum.” She looked down at my clean shirt and grumbled softly, forgetting how good my hearing was. She drew my disapproval with that remark. I was a vampire, an unwholesome creature of the night, not someone’s mama bear.

“You have your whole life ahead of you to do this sort of shit.

If you want to go out and get laid, I don’t care, but do it after your exams.” Actually, I was lying. I cared very deeply about who she was sleeping with. I took her hand and led her out of the club, trying to avoid the stranger’s fingers that always reached out to touch me.

Behind us, the girl who had spilled her drink and all her friends followed us with their jealous eyes. Although the club was packed almost to capacity, we managed to avoid being jostled, thanks to my silent signal to the drunken humans around us to watch where they were going. The song that had been playing finally finished in a crescendo of electronic squealing, and there was blessed silence for a second or so until another song, louder than the last, began. When we were outside in the relatively fresh air, I breathed a sigh of relief that my eardrums were no longer being perforated by bad music.

Bronwyn pulled me to a halt, moved around to stand in front of me, and forced me to look at her. “Why don’t you care? Why don’t you care about me?” Beseeching, teary green eyes stared up at me. “I love you.” The outside world slipped away from us. I wiped the tears from her eyes in the middle of the busy footpath as people bustled all around us.

“Actually, I think you’re drunk as all hell and a pole would look like a good score if it had the right pointy bits. Besides, I never said I didn’t care. I care a lot about making sure you’re all right.” There was no way in hell I was going to tell her I really hated it when she got laid. Coupled with that, why did she get all mushy on me when she was drunk?

“Why won’t you get it? I really do love you.” She pulled herself from my grip and turned away from me. I watched her in despair.

Why couldn’t she get past the ridiculous idea of loving me? If she really meant it, we were both in big trouble. If she was asking for sex, it wasn’t working, and wasn’t the best approach to use on an adult anyway. Perhaps it would be best to show her who I really was, to knock some of the sparkle off my armor, so she could see past beautiful features and arresting blue eyes to my true, dark nature.

I gently touched her shoulder, but she tore away from me and walked down the street. Heaving a deep sigh, I tried to calm my emotions, and quick as a flash I was standing in front of her. All around me the world awakened. I had to get back to my basement, safe from the morning sun, as fast as I could.

Blindly, she walked right into my chest and grunted. I caught her and spun around so I was by her side. I kept my arm around her shoulder, steering her toward my freshly washed car before she had a chance to realize what was really happening to her.

“Bronwyn.” My voice caressed her. “We have to talk, but we can’t do it here. I have to get home now. Come with me.”

She looked up at me, defiance in her eyes, and I willed her to see my unease. A war between curiosity and anger battled behind those normally calm green eyes. She was so close to telling me to fuck off again and meaning it, but the enamored part of her heart wouldn’t let her. Finally she heaved a deep sigh and waved a hand. “Fine.

Whatever.”

I took her hand, and we walked down the busy street for a short distance and then turned right down a dark side street. The pedestrian traffic was sparse because it was the street most murders were normally committed on. Bronwyn drew in close to me, tightening her hand in mine, drunkenness thrown off by the adrenalin in her system.

I sighed with relief when we made it back to the car. I had parked illegally, close to the club I had guessed she was at, in too much of a hurry to worry about the parking police. A sulky Bronwyn stood next to the passenger side door and waited for me to unlock it with uncharacteristically shaky fingers.

The hair on the back of my neck prickled as a deep man’s voice sounded behind us. “Well, well, well, if it isn’t the fucking bitch who keeps kicking over my bike.”

I turned.

Bronwyn’s eyes widened as she hid behind my back and fumbled with the car door, and climbed into the vehicle.