Taming the Vampire: A Paranormal Romance Novella (4 page)

She didn’t know what she was asking. It was
almost impossible for a vampire to have sex without biting, and
with a human—especially one who was part Fae—there was always the
risk of going too far, taking too much. And a warrior’s blood was
special, would taste like ambrosia.

Would Etienne tell her any of this? Or would
he just jump at the chance to have sex with a warrior? To taste a
warrior?

To taste Liz...

This time he couldn’t control it. His fangs
burst through his gums, and since there was no one around to hear,
he gave vent to his feelings with a low growl. He imagined Liz
beneath him, imagined covering her body with his as he thrust into
her, bit into her, made her his in all the ways a vampire could
claim a woman.

Then reality reasserted itself, and he smiled
grimly as he pictured Liz’s response. She was a warrior through and
through, and she’d die before surrendering to a vampire’s
desire.

Especially his.

Not that it mattered, of course. He didn’t
want Liz Marlowe. He’d been without a woman for too long, that was
all.

He dragged a hand through his hair as he
remembered the night they met. He’d almost lost his place in their
fight, watching her. All that violence and passion and fury,
focused until she was like a laser—precise, deadly, blinding.

Maybe that’s why their fight had ended with
no clear winner. Maybe at the crucial moment, the moment he should
have been able to overpower her, he’d simply been...blinded.

He stopped pacing. This was where Liz had
been standing when she made her ridiculous proposal. Remembering
the look on her face, he knew how hard it must have been for her to
come here.

He shouldn’t have said what he did. Shouldn’t
have gone out of his way to hurt her. It was just...she’d never
made a secret of how much she despised him, despised what he was.
In the end, he hadn’t been able to resist the chance to get a
little of his own back.

And by behaving with the maturity of a
twelve-year-old boy, he’d sent Liz rushing off to find some other
vampire to fulfill this ritual of hers. Any vampire but him.

He glanced at the clock. More than an hour
had passed since she’d left. Would she be home in bed, or on her
way north?

He stood still for a moment, and then reached
for the phone.

A sleepy voice answered after the fifth ring.
“Hello?”

“Celia.”

“Yes. Who—”

“It’s Jack Morgan. I need to know more about
this ritual.”

A short silence, and then Celia’s gasp
reverberated over the phone line. “Oh, my God. She actually
went
to you with that? She
told
you about
it?”

“Yeah,” Jack said. “She told me about
it.”

“Did you—I mean—are you going to do it?”

Jack had never heard a blush before, but he
heard Celia’s. “Right now I just need some information. I need to
know if it’s safe for Liz.”

“Safe for
Liz
? You’re the one who’ll
be weak as a kitten for an entire night. Of course it’s safe for
Liz. I don’t know what you—”

“Listen to me. If this mojo goes down and Liz
gets all this extra power, how will it affect her judgment? She’s
already amped up on absinthe. Will this make her feel invincible?
Is she going to go off half-cocked, thinking she’s Superman or
something?”

A low chuckle. “She does that already,
Jack.”

“This time it could get her killed. The
creature almost got her tonight.”

“I know. She stopped by for a few minutes, on
her way home. She told me about the Kraken, told me what we’re
facing...but she didn’t tell me she’d seen you.”

“Our conversation didn’t end on a good
note.”

“Is that a euphemism for one of you punching
the other one in the face?”

Jack sighed. “Just tell me what I need to
know. How strong would she be if we did this?”

“It’s a powerful alchemy. It would make Liz
stronger than just the sum of your individual powers. She really
would be invincible—or nearly, anyway.” Celia paused. “Liz said
she’s going on a trip tomorrow. Up north. Does that mean...is she
going to Etienne?”

Jack’s grip tightened on the phone. “Not if I
can help it. Look, Celia—don’t tell Liz I called. Okay?”

“Okay. But, Jack—”

“Everything’s going to be all right. I won’t
let anything happen to her.”

He made another call, and the phone rang
several times before it was answered. “I told you not to worry,”
Liz’s voice said grumpily. “I’m going to sleep, all right? I’ll
call you in the morning.”

“It’s not Celia.”

A long silence.

“You son of a bitch. I can’t believe you have
the gall to—”

“I’ll do it.”

“What?”

“I’ll do the ritual. Be your power source.
Get you all revved up to destroy the Kraken. Okay?”

Another silence. Jack wished she were there
in front of him, so he could read her heart beat, her facial
expressions, her scent.

“When?” she asked finally, and Jack was
surprised at the intensity of the relief that shot through him.

“Tomorrow night,” he said. “I’ll come to your
place after sunset.”

“Come after moonrise. The moon has to be
visible in the sky for the ritual to work.”

“It’s a date, then,” Jack said, a smile
twisting one corner of his mouth.

“Very funny. Look, Jack, we both know this
isn’t a date. We hate each other’s guts and that isn’t going to
change. Let’s just do what we have to and take care of
business.”

The girl was all romance.

“Fine by me, princess.”

By sunset the following day, Liz’s stomach
wound was practically healed. A night and a day of rest had done
the trick, and when she took off the bandages, a scar was all that
remained of the Kraken’s attack.

Her body was just fine. Her mind, on the
other hand, was in complete turmoil.

She told herself she was cleaning because she
was restless, not because Jack was coming over. She worked with
belligerent energy, wielding her dust cloth like a weapon,
attacking dust and dirt as if she were waging battle.

She paused when she came to her bedroom. In
spite of her determination not to think about tonight, images of
Jack flooded her mind, along with images of the last time she’d had
sex in this bed. Liz didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at the
memory.

It was the first time she’d brought a guy
home since she’d been called as a warrior. Kevin had been really
into her, and they’d both been turned on, and the excitement
between them had built until...well...she got carried away. She
forgot to hold back, and had gripped Kevin’s arms hard enough to
leave bruises—and to send him running for the door.

She’d left a message the next day to
apologize. He’d never called back.

Lesson learned: strong isn’t always sexy.
Since Kevin, she hadn’t even tried to date. She didn’t want to get
involved with another warrior, for fear of losing respect within
the clan, and as for human men…well, the prospect of inflicting
permanent damage in the throes of passion was something of a
deterrent.

Of course, she wouldn’t have to worry about
that with Jack...

Liz shook her head sharply. Even if Jack was
strong enough for her, even if she had been celibate way too long,
the basic facts remained: they hated each other, and tonight was
not about sex. It was about defeating the Kraken.

There was a knock at the front door.

Liz’s heart jumped in her chest. Her bed was
still unmade, and the room was still a pigsty.

She turned her back on the mess and shut the
door firmly behind her. There’d be no need to go in there, anyway.
This wasn’t some romantic tryst. The living room was good enough
for what was happening tonight.

She took a deep breath and went to open the
door.

Jack could see immediately that she’d
recovered from her wound. Her skin had color again, and there was
no sign of pain in her expression.

She wore no makeup, he noted. Not that she
needed it. Framed by her black silk hair, Liz Marlowe’s skin was as
flawless and finely textured as a rose, her cheeks faintly pink,
her lips full and sweet and—

Christ, just listen to him. He sounded like a
bad Victorian novel. Reminding himself what tonight was really
about, he followed the warrior into her living room.

“Got everything ready, I see,” he said,
nodding at the candles that made a circle about five feet in
diameter and the bier of herbs set in the center.

“That’s right,” she said shortly, not looking
at him. His vampire senses told him her heart rate was up, but he
couldn’t read her thoughts.

She sat down cross-legged on the floor,
tucking her bare feet under her and arranging her black cotton
skirt carefully over her knees.

“You’re wearing a skirt,” he heard himself
say. He’d never seen her in anything but jeans before.

She looked up at him for the first time, her
eyes wary.

“Yes,” she said. “I thought it would
be...easier. You know. For later.”

He swallowed. Her words brought images before
him, images he couldn’t suppress right away. His hands reaching for
her, reaching beneath her skirt, sliding up her strong, slender
thighs...

“Right. Very practical,” he said, his voice
sounding harsher than he meant it to.

Her mouth tightened. “I’m not any happier
about this than you are,” she snapped.

“I know,” he said as he sat down across from
her. “Let’s just get through it, okay? Tell me what you need me to
do.”

Her eyes met his briefly, and then she
nodded.

It was a simple enough ritual. Jack lit the
candles on his half of the circle while she lit hers, and they both
lit the herbs in the bier, sending a sweet aroma into the air that
mingled with the scent of the candles. Liz turned off all the
lamps, so the only light in the room came from the burning herbs
and candle flames. Then she sat down in the circle again and read
from a sheet of paper, her voice a little shaky at first but
growing stronger.

The chant was in Latin, which Jack had
learned in his youth. He could follow the words well enough, but he
didn’t bother after a few minutes. Instead, he found himself
staring at Liz as she stared down at the paper, a little frown line
between her brows.

Her soft black hair was tucked austerely
behind her ears. Every so often a lock of it would tumble free, and
she would smooth it back again.

She was wearing a white tee shirt. The lines
of her bra were visible beneath it. Once his eyes had traced the
outline of her breasts, he couldn’t seem to look anywhere else. Her
chest rose and fell with her breathing.

Here and there he caught phrases of the
ritual, and the words affected him strangely. “Light and dark
cannot exist without the other...male and female cannot exist
without the other...life and death cannot exist without the other.
They shall be joined, flesh to flesh, and their powers
unite...”

The air seemed colder suddenly, and then hot.
Liz stopped speaking and laid the paper down beside her. The first
part of the ritual was complete.

Silence fell, but there was a faint hum of
energy all around. Goosebumps shivered her skin and her scalp
prickled, as though each individual hair were trying to stand on
end.

“Do you feel that?” Liz whispered, looking up
at Jack. His eyes glittered in the candlelight. Against his black
shirt, his skin was as pale as marble.

“Yes,” he answered in a low voice. Something
in his face made her heart beat faster.

“Ground rules,” she said quickly, trying to
maintain her sense of control. “No kissing, obviously. Not that
either of us would want to. Minimal clothing removal, of course.
That’s why I wore the skirt. All you have to do is...you
know...unzip. No unnecessary touching. I’m sure you agree
that—”

“Enough, Liz,” Jack growled. “We both get it.
Trust me, I’m not going to touch you any more than I have to. Now
let’s get this done. You’ve got a date with the Kraken.”

Jack’s eyes still glittered, and he was
breathing, something vampires only did in times of stress. He
honestly seemed more disgusted by this whole situation than she
was.

Well, he’d made no secret about his feelings.
She ought to be relieved.

“You’re right,” she said.

She stood up without looking at him and
pulled up her skirt, hooking her thumbs under the waistband of her
underwear. They were plain white cotton, the most utilitarian pair
she owned. She slid them down to her ankles, stepped out of them,
and tossed them aside.

She risked a glance at Jack. His expression
was frozen as he stared at her.

“Your turn,” she snapped, feeling more
exposed than she ever had in her life, even though her skirt was
down again and he couldn’t really see anything.

Jack looked away from her and nodded. Sliding
back to lean against the couch, he reached for the fly on his
jeans.

Liz had never seen Jack Morgan look clumsy.
Not when he fought, and not when he’d stitched her up last night.
Now, for the first time, she saw his hands shaking.

She saw something else, too.

“You’ve got an erection,” she blurted out
before she could stop herself.

His hands stilled as he glared at her. “What
did you think was going to happen when you took off your damn
panties? What do you think we’re here for, anyway?”

When would she learn to keep her mouth shut?
“It’s just...I mean...I thought you hated me,” she finished
quickly.

His mouth twisted. “Don’t worry. Men can have
a physical reaction to a woman they hate. That’s just biology, Liz.
Don’t take it personally.”

She should have been insulted, since that was
obviously his intent. But she felt an odd rush of pleasure to find
that—physically, at least—she could inspire something other than
revulsion in Jack Morgan.