The Last True Vampire (30 page)

A change in tactics was in order. Odds were, if Mikhail was missing, Ronan was already at his house, rallying the troops or whatever. She didn’t know if someone who valued his privacy as much as her vampire did would actually list his number in the phone book, but at this point she could only hope for a little luck to be thrown her way. She left her apartment and crossed the hall to Vanessa’s unit.

“Hey, Claire!” Vanessa greeted her brightly. Her posture was ramrod straight, her shoulders squared and tilted slightly back. “Bet you can’t guess what I’m wearing right now.”

Claire laughed. “I bet I can. And I have to say, it makes you look at least twelve.” Vanessa’s expression lit up, her proud grin more radiant than the sun. “Just remember, it’s okay to be ten. And do ten-year-old things. Don’t let that bra go to your head, young lady.” Claire gave herself a mental pat on the back for her matronly words. Despite her upbringing, maybe there was hope that she’d be an okay mom.

Vanessa giggled. “As if. And Claire, I’m almost eleven. So, what’s up?”

Claire shook herself from the nostalgia of Vanessa’s
Clueless
moment. “I need to use your phone and a phone book. Do you think your mom would mind?”

Vanessa’s expression deflated like an old balloon. “Mom’s sleeping. I doubt anything would wake her up right now.”

Translation: She’d swallowed a handful of pills and was down for the count. “Oh.” An awkward silence passed and Claire gave Vanessa a reassuring smile. “It’ll be okay, kiddo.
You’re
okay. That’s all that matters.” It was the sort of reassurance that didn’t require further explanation. Having lived through it herself, Claire knew that Vanessa was the type of girl who’d come out on the other side relatively unscathed.

“The phone’s on the kitchen counter. Phone book, too.” Vanessa didn’t respond to Claire’s reassurance, but she didn’t have to. They had an unspoken bond. Sort of like the one between Claire and Mikhail. A connection fused by something that she didn’t understand. But maybe she wasn’t meant to.

“Thanks.” She thumbed through the white pages, her finger tracing down the list of
A
names,
Argyle … Arinson … Aristov! Anya, Dimitri, John, Marcus … Mitchell. God damn it.
Switching to the yellow pages, she resumed her search, through listings for private security firms, talent agents, lawyers, investment bankers, doctors … anything that struck her as the sort of job that would support Mikhail’s lavish lifestyle. She let out a groan of frustration and ripped one of the pages in half, midturn. It was like looking for a needle in a stack of needles, covered by a haystack engulfed in flames.

God damn it
. Despair unlike anything she’d ever felt stabbed at her heart and Claire swallowed down the lump that rose in her throat. She
never
should have left him, and now she might never see Mikhail again.

CHAPTER

23

Mikhail flew through the dark alleys and empty streets to the address that Siobhan claimed Carrig had followed Claire to. It was a race against his enemies to find her and they’d had the advantage of daylight on their sides. He had to find her.

The connection between them burned bright, radiating from his chest outward like a beacon that called to him from the darkest abyss. He’d never felt it with such clarity and intensity, which meant that either Claire was in trouble or she’d finally quit blocking him. Which both excited and terrified him. He let it lead him, gave himself completely over to the instinct, and in a matter of seconds he was standing before an apartment building that made Siobhan’s abandoned and condemned building look like a palace in comparison.

His mate lived in such poverty?

His worry warred with the indignation that she would leave him to return to this life. No security. No protection. The very building looked like it might fall down around her head at any moment. Sounds reached his ears in a sensory overload that made Mikhail want to clutch at his skull. A party within, music blaring. The voices of too many humans living together in a single space mingled into one. White noise that assaulted him. Chaos to his superhuman senses. A surge of emotion crashed into him, nearly bringing Mikhail to his knees. Claire was inside. She was upset. Scared. He drew the dagger from its sheath and sped through the entrance and up the stairs to the second floor.

Her scent reached his nostrils and it only served to send him into a state of bloodlust that stole his ability to think clearly. There was something different … the bloom of fragrance somehow richer, more intense. His fangs throbbed in his gums as Mikhail stopped dead in front of a door marked 216. Claire was on the other side, and before he could lay his fist to the aged and battered wood it swung open to reveal the one thing he coveted. Longed for. Couldn’t live without.

“Mikhail.”

Her bemused expression belied the rush of relief that bathed him in warmth. She kept the door close to her body, blocking his view of the apartment.
Why?
Who was with her? Mikhail would kill any creature who dared to stand between them.

“Claire? Is everything okay?”

From behind her a quiet voice spoke, and Mikhail pushed against the door to reveal tucked behind Claire a young girl, her face a study in both bravery and fear. The juxtaposition made her appear feral. A tiny fox caught in a snare. Their eyes locked and a spasm of energy snapped out at Mikhail like a whip before drawing back. An extraordinary child born of an extraordinary mother?

The realization that he knew so little about his mate stabbed straight through his heart. Two helpless creatures to protect. Claire must have known that her daughter couldn’t be turned. That was why she’d left him. And where, Mikhail wondered, was the child’s father? Who else would he have to fight to ensure that Claire remained by his side?

She turned and whispered words of reassurance to the girl before slipping into the hallway and closing the door behind her. For a long moment, they stared at each other. Then Claire let out a strangled sob and threw herself into his arms. “Oh my god, Mikhail. I thought the Sortiari had you. When I saw them dragging you off into that alley…” Her words trailed off, muffled by his shirt.

There was much to discuss and not nearly enough time for everything that needed to be said. “We need to get inside.” He reached for the doorknob behind her and she stiffened.

“No. Not here.” She grabbed his hand and led him down the hallway, entering the apartment two doors down. Mikhail’s confusion increased with every passing moment. Who lived with her daughter in the other apartment? The girl’s father perhaps? Her scent was unlike Claire’s. Another curiosity. At the back of his mind the Collective pressed against his consciousness and he pushed back. He couldn’t afford to lose even an ounce of mental clarity right now.

Mikhail stepped into the apartment and his chest ached at what he saw. The entire living space was no bigger than his foyer. The walls were bare and the paint peeled from the drywall. Her furniture consisted of one battered couch and a threadbare recliner that reeked with layer upon layer of scents as though each had seen the use of multiple owners.

The refrigerator in the dilapidated kitchen made a knocking sound that grated on his ears and the faucet dripped in a steady rhythm. The carpeting was old and ragged, the cheap linoleum covering the floor stained and cut with deep grooves. He finished his assessment to find her gaze cast downward as though ashamed. “Not quite as swanky as your digs, huh?”

Gods, how he’d failed her. He’d thought only to satisfy his own selfish needs without a thought to hers. He would take care of Claire from this moment on. Her and her child. He’d take them both away from this existence. Claire was a queen. His queen. And it was high time she started living like one.

“You left because of the child.” A thought struck him. One that ignited his anger to flare brighter than his concern. “What of the father?”

Claire’s jaw slackened and a crease cut into her forehead. “The father?”

Gods, this was unbearable. Jealousy swelled inside of Mikhail, raging like an inferno at the thought of another man touching her. Burying his face between her silky thighs. Claire belonged to
him
. “The child’s father!” he railed. Fiery heat licked up his spine, and his fangs throbbed at they punched down from his gums. A haze of red clouded his vision as he advanced on Claire. She fell into retreat, her eyes wide, but he could do nothing to control the jealous rage that seized him. “Is he the reason you left me? Sneaking out of my bed as though what happened between us was a shameful thing you couldn’t wait to escape?” His voice boomed in the quiet apartment and Claire cringed. She stopped only when her back met the far wall and Mikhail crowded her until his nose was mere inches from her upturned face.

“The child’s father is an asshole!” Claire shouted back.

“Tell me, Claire.” Mikhail put his mouth to her ear. Her scent drove him mad and he wanted nothing more than to take her vein and fuck her until she never thought of another male save him ever again. “Why you choose to live in this hovel, work in that pathetic diner, over being with me?”

He’d come here tonight to make amends, to let her know that he wouldn’t pressure her into the transition. To bring her home where he could
protect
her. But all of his good intentions evaporated under the thought that she would cast him aside for another male. For this life of poverty and hardship. The Collective scratched at his mind, myriad voices that threatened to drown out his own thoughts. He wasn’t thinking straight. Couldn’t. Not when he needed to feed so desperately. Not when she was so close—

“If you’d shut up long enough to let me explain!” Claire’s eyes lit with an indignant spark and she clamped her jaw down tight. She let out a long sigh and knocked her head back against the wall with a frustrated groan. “You’re such a fool, Mikhail.”

His anger shattered with the sweet sorrow of her voice, the sight of her cheeks, flushed and warm, and the lush fullness of her lips that rested in a perpetual pout. Despite the anger that consumed them, the danger that pressed upon them, and despite the child down the hall and the male who might come between them, Mikhail’s need for Claire surpassed even common sense. He took her in his arms, kissing her, starved for the contact.

Claire cleaved to him, molding her body tight against his. He slanted his mouth over hers, deepening the kiss, and his fangs scraped against her bottom lip, coaxing drops of blood to the surface of her delicate skin. Mikhail groaned as the bloodlust held him in its grip, and he sank his fangs deeper into her bottom lip. The drops increased to four small trickles and he lapped at her mouth, ravenous as he kissed and fed from her.

“Oh, god, Mikhail.” Claire pulled away and clawed at his pants, tearing the button free before jerking down the zipper. “Take my throat. I want your bite.”

She was just as mindless with desire as he was and his cock jerked as she took it firmly in her grip. Like an animal he sank his fangs into the flesh that concealed her throbbing vein, and the bliss of feeding from her overtook him as the sweet nectar of Claire’s blood flowed freely over his tongue. Her back arched and she cried out as she stroked him from the base of his cock all the way up to the engorged head. With her free hand she shoved his pants down over his ass and dug her nails in as she squeezed his flesh. Mikhail pulled away with a low growl and laved the wounds he’d made. He stripped her shirt from her body and jerked the cups of her bra down off her breasts before burying his face against the satiny flesh.

“Yes!”

He sank his fangs into the swell of her breast and covered the pearled nipple with his mouth. Claire sobbed her pleasure and wound her fists into his hair as she held him against her. With a low growl Mikhail tore her bra away, discarding the fabric, and shoved the elastic waistband of her pants down over her ass as he suckled her. Her underwear came next and she kicked the restricting garments from her ankles. Mikhail cupped the globes of her ass in his palms and lifted her up against the wall. She wrapped her legs around his waist, hooking her ankles together as she thrust her hips toward him. A rich bloom of her floral scent swirled in his senses, the evidence of her arousal and need to couple with him as delicious and maddening as the blood he suckled from her breast.

“I need you to fuck me, Mikhail,” Claire said from between panting breaths. “Now.”

He pulled away without closing his bites. Blood trickled from the wounds, collecting at her nipple before forming a heavy crimson drop that he licked away with a flick of his tongue. Claire cried out, squirming in his grasp, and he watched again with fascination until another drop formed. This time he covered the stiff peak with his lips and sucked deeply.

“Oh, god.” Claire’s head thrashed from side to side as her hips undulated against him in a desperate frenzy. “Take me, Mikhail. Please.”

He took the heavy weight of his cock in his hand and guided it to her entrance. Her pussy was swollen, dripping with arousal, and he dragged the engorged head through her soaking lips. Claire let out a low moan and he repeated the action, lingering on her tight little clit. The sensation caused a shiver to ripple over him and Mikhail gnashed his teeth as he pressed into her with a forceful thrust.

*   *   *

“Ohhhhh…” The sound slid from between Claire’s lips with her breath as she came. Mikhail thrust hard with every deep contraction, intensifying her pleasure until her body became limp and liquid in his embrace. A couple of weeks apart from him had felt like an eternity and their argument, his crazy demands—not to mention that he’d known she was pregnant—vanished under the instinctual urge to join her body with his.

Through the blinding assault of ecstasy Claire’s gaze found Mikhail. His eyes flashed with silver, locked on her breasts. She looked down at the rivulet of blood that ran over her breast and dripped off of her nipple and her body clenched with renewed passion. He was fixated, seemingly entranced by the sight of it, and his obsession only spurred Claire to a higher state of mindless need.