Sunset Rising (Sunset Vampire Series, Book 5) (20 page)

“
What do you mean by ‘at
first’?”

She smiled, but she looked like a cat that
had just cornered the rabbit.

“
Within a couple of days,
Alton secured the use of a surveillance satellite orbiting
somewhere over the United States,” she said.

“
What the—?”

“
Tracking you was
relatively easy then,” she continued.

“
How the hell did Alton
manage to use an orbiting satellite?”

Her expression turned wry. “He’s remarkably
resourceful, you know,” she said. “In fact, he still surprises me,
from time to time.”

I shook my head.

She reached out and squeezed my hand to get
my attention. Her expression had turned serious again.

“
Don’t ever do something
like this to me again, Caleb,” she said in a hard tone. “If you
want to leave me, you better tell me up front first.”

“
But I wasn’t actually
leaving you,” I said.

She squeezed my hand firmly, using her tight
grip for emphasis, though not enough to cause me overt pain.

“
Never. Do. It. Again,”
she insisted. “Understood?”

I didn’t say anything, but merely
nodded.

“
Say it,” she
said.

“
Never again.”

She moved her face to within an inch of my
own. “Good,” she said. “And don’t ever forget.”

Maybe it was the way that she stared into my
eyes, or maybe it was the tone of her voice. Either way, for some
reason, I had the feeling that was to be my only warning.

I swallowed hard, but remained silent.

“
So, we’re good now?” I
asked.

She released my hand and reached up to
firmly grasp my chin instead.

“
Not even close,” she
said. “You still have fences to mend.”

“
With you?”

“
With me,” she said. “With
everybody, it seems. I can’t begin to tell you how pissed Paige and
Roman were.”

“
All right,” I said.
“Maybe I’ll start with you.”

“
Smart man,” she said
sardonically, releasing my chin and tapping me on the end of the
nose with her fingertip.

I reached out to take her hand in mine and
softly caressed the top of it with my thumb.

I missed her affection toward me. It felt
like a painful absence, in fact.

She gazed into my eyes with a curious
expression. “Yes?”

“
Please forgive me,” I
asked.

“
I’ll consider it,” she
said.

I gave her my best confident look, despite
how tired I felt. “I’m going to make this up to you. Actually, we
need to make this up to each other.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Perhaps,” she said. “But
we’re both going to have to work at it.”

“
Makes sense,” I
said.

She let go of my hand and motioned toward
the bathroom.

“
Go take a shower,” she
said. “You’re not going to bed smelling like you are right
now.”

“
Maybe a shower, but it’s
sort of late for bed now,” I said, glancing outside. “It’ll be dawn
soon.”

“
Shower,” she
ordered.

I knew better than to argue.

Afterward, as Kat took her shower, I lay
atop the bed amidst the sporadic flashes of lightning through the
window.

My mind felt so tired and numb that I
blankly stared at the ceiling with scarcely a thought firing in my
brain.

I awoke with a start, lying on my side and
not sure how long since I had dozed off.

I felt surprised that the room was
relatively dark, though some subtle glow of light emanated around
the edges of the nearby window.

As I rolled over onto my back, I stared up
at Katrina’s sedate-looking features. She was propped up on one
elbow, watching me.

“
Good morning,” I said.
“At least, I think it’s morning.”

That’s when I realized that someone had
secured a dark covering over the room’s windows, which made sense
given the vampire beside me.

“
It’s around ten o’clock,”
she said. “So, yes it’s morning.”

She gave me a quick kiss on the lips.

“
I’m sort of—”

“
Surprised that I’m in bed
with you?” she interjected.

“
Well, no,” I
replied.

Then I reconsidered my response. “Well,
actually, maybe a little. But I’m pretty happy about it.”

She tapped the tip of my nose with her
fingertip. “You drive me absolutely crazy sometimes, Caleb.”

“
You said that earlier,” I
said. “You know, they say it’s the ones you love the most who
stimulate the strongest emotions in you.”

“
I love you, and yet, I
still want to strangle you,” she said.

“
See? True love,” I
said.

“
You’re fortunate that
you’re so charming,” she said, caressing my face with her
fingertips.

I closed my eyes, appreciating her soothing
attention.

Her caressing moved to my neck, and then
down to my chest and across my abdomen.

Then her fingers moved much lower and she
kissed me; softly at first, and then much more passionately.

Then time stood still.

Chapter 16

Caleb

I was dozing again as one of Kat’s legs
lazily lay across mine. Her free arm was draped across my chest and
I felt her warm breath against my ear.

“
This is nice,” I said. It
was the first time we’d made love in many weeks.

“
Mmm,” she
murmured.

My stomach growled.

“
Hungry?” she
asked.

“
Yeah, but there’s not
much in the fridge,” I replied.

“
You were getting low on
cash,” she said.

I frowned. “Did you go through my
wallet?”

She patted my chest with her hand. “Of
course, I did. I rifled through most everything, in fact.”

“
So much for boundaries,”
I said.

“
Under the circumstances,
you expected less from me?” she asked. “But then, none of my
efforts actually told me what I really wanted to know.”

She reached up and lightly tapped my
forehead with her index finger. “There’s where all the really
interesting information is located. And I can’t rummage through
there like I can your pockets.”

“
What do you want to
know?”

“
Everything,” she said.
“No more secrets. Not anymore, my love.”

There was a hint of concern in the tone of
her voice; caring versus sounding intrusive or demanding. And yet
she had sorted through my belongings while I slept.

That aspect of it annoyed me.

“
I’ll try,” I
said.

“
And I’ll try harder to
listen,” she said. “I did a lot of thinking while you slept earlier
this morning.”

“
I wasn’t asleep for that
long.”

“
I’m a fast
thinker.”

“
What were you thinking
about?” I asked.

“
You.”

I gave her a wry look. “Let me guess…you’ve
thought about my recent behavior and now you think that I’m broken
and unreliable.”

Her expression turned serious. “Not broken
so much as wounded. Though not beyond saving, I hope.”

“
You mean not beyond
redemption.”

“
No, I mean not beyond
healing,” she clarified. “You are, as you said, human. It’s
possible that both Alton and I have laid more upon you than was
realistic for you. Each person has a different tolerance
level.”

I didn’t know exactly how to respond to her
concession, but I felt a lump harden in my throat, and I was happy
in that moment that I didn’t have to. It felt as if a great hurdle
had been overcome; one that I’d formerly felt was unassailable.

She finally understood a little of what I’d
been going through.

“
You don’t have to hold
everything inside of you until you break,” she said. “You don’t
have to do this alone anymore. If you’re willing to try again,
we’ll work on some adjustments—as well as concessions—for
you.”

“
What about Alton?” I
asked.

“
I’ll handle Alton,” she
said. “But you’ll still need to talk with him about this. He
deserves to hear everything from you.”

I dreaded that.

“
He’s not going to think
less of me, is he?”

“
I won’t lie to you; he’s
very disappointed right now,” she said. “But I think we can help
him to understand some of what you’ve been going
through.”

“
Oh,” I said. “I
see.”

“
He will come around,
Caleb,” she reassured me. “He cares about you; very much, in fact.
That’s another reason he’s so disappointed with you at the
moment.”

I sighed.
Fair enough.

“
Then there’s Paige,” I
ventured.

Paige had been so angry when she punched me
in the jaw. I felt lucky that my head stayed attached to my body,
in fact.

“
She practically took my
head off,” I said.

“
Hardly,” she said.
“Unlike you, I’ve actually seen her take someone’s head off
before.”

My eyes widened and a chill went through me
over her matter-of-fact tone.

“
Don’t dwell on Paige for
the time being,” she said. “She’s an altogether different creature,
and she has her own system for handling emotional
situations.”

That sounded far less reassuring to me.

Kat’s smartphone buzzed and the bed lurched
as she whipped around to snatch it from the nightstand.

“
A dark-haired woman in a
Jeep?” she asked.

I quickly rolled over. “She’s okay. Don’t
hurt her.”

Kat gave me a flat stare. “No, let her
continue.”

She calmly laid her phone down and gave me
an inquisitive look.

I shrugged. “Her name’s Bel. She’s a
waitress at Cooper’s Café. She’s been very welcoming to me since I
arrived here.”

Her brow arched.

“
It’s not what you’re
thinking—”

“
And precisely what am I
thinking?”

I gave her my best wan look. “You know
what…we’re not doing anything.”

“
I should hope not,
particularly for your sake,” she said. “That being said, why is she
coming here?”

“
Hey, I didn’t invite her
or anything.”

“
Well, she’s on her way
here now so you better get up and put some clothes on.”

I rolled out of bed and half-stumbled into
my only remaining fresh pair of jeans and T-shirt from my backpack
while Kat watched me with a dubious expression.

“
We’re just friendly
acquaintances,” I said.

She flung the sheets from over her and
stood, her nude body looking ravishing to me.

“
You’re, uh, going to put
some clothes on, too, right?” I asked.

She gave me a hard look and pointed out
toward the living room. “Go.”

I closed the bedroom door and hurried toward
the front door as I heard the sound of an engine outside.

I opened the door just as Bel stepped onto
the porch holding what looked like a foil-covered dish.

“
Hi, Caleb,” she said. “I
wasn’t sure if to stop or not when I saw the SUV parked out
front.”

“
Hi, Bel,” I said, opening
the front door. “Really, I’m glad you stopped by. Please come
in.”

She stepped inside. “I’m not interrupting or
anything am I?”

“
Not at all,” I said. “My
partner decided to join me here.”

“
Partner? Well, you left
the café last night in a hurry and forgot the dessert that came
with your meal. So, then I thought about how kind you were to step
in with—Anyway, I decided to bake this for you,” she said, handing
me the pie. “It’s just a small way to say thank you for your help
with Kevin.”

I peeked beneath the foil to see, and smell,
a fresh apple pie.

“
I love apple pie,” I
said. “Thanks so much. Won’t you come in?”

I shut the front door in time to turn around
and see Kat entering the room.

“
Um, hello. I’m
Bel.”

Kat crossed the distance between them to
extend her hand. “Katrina. I’m Caleb’s significant other; his
partner, as he just mentioned.”

The term mate had become so ingrained to me
that it sounded awkward for Kat to be classified in any other way.
However, no human that I’d ever heard of had used the term mate,
either.

“
Pleased to meet you,” Bel
said. “I hope that I haven’t intruded.”

“
You mentioned Caleb’s
help with something, I believe?” Kat prompted. “Kevin?”

“
Well, yes,” she said. “My
ex, Kevin, was being an ass, as usual, and Caleb kindly intervened
at the café last night.”

“
Ah. Well, Caleb is an
easy touch, and he’s all about knights in shining armor,” Kat
replied with a pointed look toward me.

I tried not to wince.

“
I’d better get going,”
Bel said, once again looking at me. “I just wanted to drop off this
pie for you.”

“
Thank you,” I said. “That
was very kind.”

She smiled at me. “You’re welcome. Perhaps
I’ll see you at the café again soon.”