Release Me When the Sun Goes Down (23 page)

“
I still think this is foolhardy.”  Rob frowned, shoving his hands deep into his pockets. 

“I can’t stay here with him, you can see why, can’t you?”  Despite my bravado, we all knew Jakob could change his mind at any time, and there was nothing we could do about it.  Sharing a roof with him was almost as dangerous as sharing one with Lodinn.  “Now, I’ll take Rob and Lee with me, the rest of you stay here and try to go on like everything’s normal.”

“I’ll come with you.  It makes sense I’d go where you go,” Maggie offered, but I shook my head.

“I can’t guarantee your safety out there.”

“The house didn’t offer much protection to Marcus, did it?” she pointed out.  “As you said, he can get to any of us and I refuse to become a shut in.”

“Wait, shouldn’t I maybe come too then?” Jenessa chimed in and I had to wonder if she was
only offering to come with because that’s where all the eye candy would be.

“No, the whole point of you moving in was for the house protection.  I’d think if you were ready to leave it, you’d go to your own home.  But you don’t have to stay here if you don’t want to.”

“Maybe I will go on home,” Jenessa sighed.  “Chances are I’m not on his radar anyway.”

“What about Hanna?” Mason asked.

“She stays here, that’s non negotiable.”  I was willing to risk my own hide, but not hers, not when Lodinn seemed to take so much glee in debasing my sister.

“Then I guess I’m moving back in,” he decided.  “I’m not leaving her here with Jakob alone.”

“Thanks, Mason.  I know she doesn’t appreciate it right now, but I’m counting on a future when she will.”

“Me too, sis.”

It was quickly settled.  Rob, Lee and Maggie would come with me and Mason and Hanna would stay at the house with Jakob.  Jenessa waffled back and forth before confirming she would go back to her own apartment. 

Rob was quiet as we packed up our few belongings and hustled out to the car
.  Lee was tired, usually asleep at that hour, but Maggie seemed almost excited to be leaving the house.  She chattered along in the back seat next to me, speculating on what kind of accommodations we’d find at Jakob’s place.  Since I’d never seen more than his living room I wasn’t sure what we’d find, but knowing him, the place was bound to be fully furnished in opulent splendor. 

The two guards at the security station were easily bypassed.  They recognized me and Rob on sight and accepted my story that I was there to wait for Jakob since he hadn’t been back there since the night of the crash.  I was just glad I didn’t have to compel them to get to the elevators.  Maggie immediately disappeared in search of a room, and I heard her exclaim happily as she took her pick.  Lee dropped his pack into the first empty bedroom he found and collapsed on the bed. 

I found Jakob’s master suite easily enough, the massive bed and black satin sheets gave it away.  Apart from a longing look to the giant bathtub set right in the bedroom itself in front of the huge window, I turned my back on it.  I didn’t care where I ended up sleeping for the night as long as it wasn’t in his bed. 

“We should take these two here,” Rob said quietly, waving me down to a pair of rooms at the end of the long hall.  “They’re the only two that are next to each other so’s I can… do nothing if you get into trouble,” he frowned, tossing his duffel onto the bed with a scowl.

“Hey, we’re not going to get into trouble.  This is a secure building, remember?” I tried to soothe him but he pulled away from my touch. 

“Fat lot of good the security did, they let us
breeze on through without batting an eye.”

“Only because of who I am.  I seriously doubt they’d let any old vamp in.”  We both knew Lodinn could easily bypass that, but neither one of us said it out loud.  There was something else bothering him though, I could see it in the set of his jaw.  “What’s the matter?  You don’t
honestly think we should’ve stayed behind at the house with Jakob in it, do you?”

“No, I reckon you’re right.  Better the devil out there than the devil we know in this instance,” he said with a shake of the head. 

“What is it then?  Are you mad that I invited him inside in the first place?  What else could I do?”

“What else could you do?”
His eyes met mine and I shrank away from the anguish I saw there.  “You had no business stepping foot on that porch and confronting him like that.  Do you realize what you could’ve lost?  What you risked on Jakob’s whims?  You practically goaded him into compelling you to do as he wanted.”

“But he didn’t.”

“You didn’t see his eyes.  When he wrapped his hands ‘round your throat…”

I reached for his cheek, disappointed when he turned away from my touch.  “But he didn’t, Rob, and I had to make him see how futile it was to threaten me with compulsion once and for all.  He’s not all bad, you know.”  Just because I found
Jakob insufferable most of the time didn’t make him evil.

“It was a bloody terrible risk.  You didn’t have to do any of that.  You didn’t owe him Sanctuary.  You could’ve closed your door and let him clean up his own mess.  And to call attention to our… our bond… that was foolhardy at best.” 

“You’re wrong, I
absolutely
had to do those things.”

“Why?  Don’t you realize what you done?”

This time I didn’t let him turn away from my touch.  “I fought for what’s mine.”

Rob kissed me fast
and hard as if staking his claim over me.  I made a sound in the back of my throat and he shushed me with his possessive mouth even as his touch devastated my self control.  A zip, a strategic shift, and he surged into me, his low growl of satisfaction telling me he was just as lost as I was.  This time I pierced his flesh first as my legs wrapped around him, and he didn’t waste any time doing the same.  This was the exact opposite of the soft, torturously slow pace we set in his bedroom.  There was nothing soft or slow about the way he rammed into me again and again, and I reveled in it, his desperate need feeding my own.  Trapped between the hard wall and the press of his body, his hips tilted against mine in jolts of pleasure that curled my toes as I pulled him deeper and harder against me. 

It ripped through me in the space between one breath and the next, our bodies so attuned I felt him shudder and spasm within me as the first throb of my release hit.  I was drowning in him, breathing him in, tasting him, losing myself so completely I thought I might never be the same again and I never wanted it to end
. 

Gradually I became aware of the fact that we’d somehow made it to the bed, though I was still coiled tightly around him.  “We can’t keep doing this… it’s madness,” he breathed heavily, burying his head in my neck. 

“I’ll take that kind of madness any day,” I sighed, unwilling to give up the bliss yet.  “Jakob’s not here, Maggie already knows how we feel about each other and you trust Lee, don’t you?”

“I do, but we can’t be together openly like this, not
if we expect to live for very long.  There’s others in this building, I can feel them below us.”

“Nobody has to know what goes on behind closed doors.  Besides, you know they’re all assuming we’re doing this anyway, right?  You saw Jakob’s face when he found out I’d turned you.  Certain things are assumed between Sire and progeny.”

I could see him turning that over in his head.  “Still, I think we should keep our distance.”

I pulled back to stare at him in shock.  “You don’t mean that.  I know you want to be with me and we finally have our chance to be together.  Nobody has to know it’s more than physical between us.”

“Still, when we’re in public you ought not to treat me as more than your employee.”

Ugh
, were we back to that again?  “I think you have some sort of fetish for calling me miss.  That’s what this is, isn’t it?” I teased.  “Rob, everybody knows you’re more than an employee to me already.  At the very least they know we’re friends, and everyone knows I’ll do anything for my friends.”

“Anything?”  His brows rose as he leaned down and kissed my shoulder. 

“I’m open to suggestions,” I grinned back, flexing inner muscles that made the hunger come back into his gaze, but he tamped it down just as quickly.

“Then agree to keep it
simple between us in public.”

That didn’t sound too bad.  As long as he was done fighting me while we were in private.  “It’s not what I want, but I can understand what you’re saying.  If you want me to play it
cool while we’re in public that’s fine, for now.”

“This ain’t about what we want, it’s about staying alive long enough to get to where we can be with each other as we please.”

“Do you really think we’ll ever get there?”

“We have to.”  His face softened as he brushed his knuckles across my cheek with longing.  “Otherwise… what’s the point of all this then, yeah?”

I nodded, running my hands through my hair as I laid back against the pillow.  I felt awfully mussed, even though I couldn’t see myself in a mirror.  “Alright.  We’ll keep up the act – for now – whenever we’re out and about.  But when we’re alone…”

“Then there ain’t a power in the ‘verse can keep me from you.”

God, I loved that man. 

* * *

The sun felt warm on my limbs, lulling me into a drowsing state.  I knew I should go inside before I started to freckle, but it felt so pleasant, I couldn’t bring myself to move.  A figure stepped into the path of the sun, casting me in shadow and I opened my eyes to see a golden halo of hair set over broad shoulders.

Jakob?
  “Good afternoon, may I help you?” 
May I help you?  Why had I said that? What was I doing lying on a chaise lounge in the garden covered from head to toe in muslin and lace? What the heck was going on?

“I certainly hope so,” Jakob purred, his teeth dazzlingly white and I lifted my eyes to shield them from the glare. 

Why couldn’t I move or say what I wanted to?  It was almost like I was watching a movie, only trapped inside one of the actors.
  “I’m sorry, do I know you, sir?”

“No, but I am well acquainted with your husband.”

I felt her smile, instantly easing.  I had to think of her as a her and not me, since I didn’t feel at all like me whenever she spoke, despite the fact that we were both trapped in the same body.
  “Shall I send one of the servants to fetch him?”

“No, I think I can manage to get his attention on my own.” 
Jakob seized me by the throat, hard enough to make me gasp in surprise, only I couldn’t draw in any air.  Panic set in at once as my hands scrabbled ineffectively at his arm.  Where was my strength?  My training?  I flailed about kicking and scratching like a feral cat but it didn’t do a lick of good. 

“Lodinn!” he thundered.  “Come to me now and fight like a man and she may yet live!”

Lodinn?  This was about their stupid grudge match?  Wait… was this about when he killed her?  Did that mean he was about to kill me too?  Bright pinpricks of light swam in my peripheral vision as my body started to feel the lack of air. 
“Please…”
I gasped in little more than a croak.
  “Have mercy…”

When the pressure didn’t ease I thought at first that Jakob hadn’t heard my protests, but his expression told another story.  “I will show you the same mercy he gave our kind,” he growled, his face dark with fury as he gave me a terrible shake.  There was a crunching sound
.  It was loud, obliterating the birdsong, the breeze, and then all I could see was the sky.  My body went slack, or at least I thought it did.  I couldn’t feel the weight of it any longer. 

There was no pain, but I felt his cheek against mine, the curious sensation of his long hair falling across my field of vision as he bent his head to my neck.  Those golden strands cast shadows across the pale blue heavens that grew deeper and darker with every pull on my throat.  She couldn’t understand it, but I did.  She no longer felt the terror of strangulation, only a sad confusion that grew as she realized Lodinn had not come.  He’d abandoned her to this strange fate.  When the darkness came she welcomed it, slipping into oblivion without a fight. 

Wrenching free from her body, I hovered midair as Jakob howled his frustration into the tranquil afternoon sky.  I could see her clearly now, mahogany ringlets in disarray, her head lolling at an odd angle.  Her neck was brutally savaged, gaping and bloody but her beautiful face was a mask of perfect serenity in death. 

“That’s how he killed her.”  Lodinn’s voice came from beside me as everything around us froze and I found myself in my own body, in control of my own movements again.  He stared down at the pair, his face impassive. 

“How did you… is this a dream?”  It was perfectly rendered in startlingly crisp detail, from the scent of lilacs in the air to the blades of the grass under my bare feet. 

“It’s more nightmare than dream, but you can call it that, yeah,” he replied softly, approaching the pair at the chaise lounge.  “Do you know what that bastard did next?  I’ll spare you the mental picture, I wish like hell I could un-see it.” 

To my surprise the shine of tears appeared in his eyes and I tried not to guess what horrors he’d hidden from me.  Jakob had made it sound like he’d accidentally shot Lodinn’s wife while hunting him down, but there was nothing accidental about this.  If any of it was true.  Was Lodinn capable of such deceit?  The pain in his face told me no, until I realized a flaw in the scene.