Twilight Illusions (17 page)

She laughed, ignoring the ball of knowledge that thudded into her stomach. “You're certifiable.”

He leaned closer, his dark eyes intense.

“Have you ever seen him in the daytime, Shannon? Have you ever seen him eat? Hmm? Is there a mirror anywhere in that entire place?”

“There's food in the house. I've eaten there—”

“But he hasn't.”

She shook her head. “And his schedule is only to keep up the image. It's a mystique, for the fans. That's all.”

“A vampire murdered your friend, Ms. Mallory. And if you're not careful, you'll suffer the same fate…or something worse.”

She frowned at him, her hand clenching reflexively on the pistol butt. She still pointed the weapon at him, too jumpy and nervous to relax her stance. “What do you mean, worse?”

He shrugged, got up and paced to the window. “I have a notion
Damien the Eternal
would have killed you by now, if that's what he wanted. I think he has other plans.” Bachman shoved his hands into his perfectly fitted trousers pockets and pretended to study the view.

“Spit it out, Bachman. What are you dancing around?”

He glanced over his shoulder at her. “I think he wants to make you one of them. Keep you for his own sick pleasures. Forever. Worse than hell, if you ask me. You'd be his prisoner for eternity.”

“How did you ever get so screwed up, Bachman?” She paced toward the door, then to her seat again, clutching the back of it with one hand, clutching her gun in the other. She stared at the floor, let the barrel drop along with her gaze. “Suppose I bought this line of crap? Wouldn't turning me into a vampire negate the whole plan? Wouldn't I be as strong as him then? How could he keep me prisoner?”

“You know precious little about the subject. Powers increase with age in these creatures. And he's so old we don't even have a handle on his origins yet. Marquand, we know about. Comes from France, transformed during the Revolution.”

She knew her eyes widened as her head came up again, knew she gasped. It was stupid, because she didn't really believe any of it. “You're telling me Eric is over two hundred years old?”

He looked at her as if she was an idiot. “That's young for them. The oldest one we have a file on is from Ancient Egypt, daughter of a pharaoh. And we suspect your Damien is even older than her.”

“You're nuts.” She strode over to where he stood, near the window. “Look, just what do you think you're getting from this visit? Why are you bothering to tell me all of this?”

His lids lowered to half-mast. “Why do you think?”

She frowned, took a single step backward. But his hands on her shoulders stopped her. “I like you, Mallory. I like your spunk. I even like the way you took my damned sidearm. Not to mention you're probably the sexiest damned female I've ever laid eyes on.”

Lies. All lies, and so obvious it was child's play to see it. He wanted something from her, and it damned well wasn't her body. She watched his eyes. “You don't even know me.”

“I know you're sick, dying maybe.”

Her eyes flew wide. Her chin went up. “How do you know that?”

“Your medical records. But you knew I had them. They were in the files you stole from my hotel room.”

Her medical records were in those files? But she hadn't seen them. Had Damien? Had he known all along about her health, and kept it from her? Why?

“You're a rare specimen, Shannon. You have a blood antigen and line of descent that makes you one of the few people in the world who can become one of them. Unfortunately, it also makes you sure to die young. They all do. But we're doing research at DPI, Shannon, research that might help you.”

Research. She'd read about their research in Marquand's notes. Tamara, strapped to a table in a hidden lab and tortured, until Eric Marquand had come to get her out. And then he'd been captured, drugged, nearly killed.

Maybe it wasn't all fiction after all.

“If you'd come with me, put yourself in my hands, we might be able to find a way to keep you alive. We might even find a cure—”

She pulled from his rough embrace. “Come with you where?”

“The facility in White Plains. It's a research center.”

White Plains. It was mentioned in Eric's file. God, could it all be true?

“You'd be safe there, Shannon, under constant guard. We have the best doctors and scientists in the field—”

“So, then I'd be
your
prisoner? Hell of a choice I'm left with, isn't it?”

“You wouldn't be a prisoner. You'd be protected. There's a difference.”

She was afraid of him all of a sudden. Afraid that he wouldn't take no for an answer. “Look, I'm all too aware how little time I have left. But I don't intend to spend it as someone's pet guinea pig. And I don't believe any of this farfetched crap about vampires. All I want to do is find Tawny's killer, and no matter what you say, I don't believe it was Damien.”

His gaze raked her face. “I'm sorry to hear that.”

There was a warning in his words. “Why? What are you going to do?”

He shook his head slowly. “You'll come with me, in the end. One way or another.”

She lifted the gun's muzzle. “You planning to try and force me?”

“Not yet. Not with those two still out there. I don't aspire to end up like some of our other researchers who've tried that tack. But I would advise you to stay away from him, Shannon.” He stepped past her, toward the door. “He's going down. I have no choice in the matter. He's a killer. And when it's over, I'll be seeing you again.” The hardness in his face eased just a little. “And no matter what you might think, Shannon, it's for your own good.”

She shook her head fast, following him to the door. “This is crazy. Bachman, he's not what you say he is. I swear—”

“You don't know.
I do.
” He opened the door. “I'm taking him out. There's no other way.”

She argued, but she was talking to an empty doorway. Bachman was gone, threats and all.

She blinked slowly, feeling as if she were immersed in a strange dream. She wanted to wake up, but couldn't. She didn't want to accept that all of this was real. Bachman really believed in it, along with an entire division of the U.S. government. So did Eric Marquand. And Damien? What did Damien believe?

 

He found her sitting on the floor of her shabby little office, facing the door, her gun in her hand. Her eyes were perfect ovals of confusion. And damp. The lump in Damien's throat couldn't be swallowed away.

“I thought we agreed you would wait until after the next performance to tempt fate, Shannon.”

He stepped inside. She stood. “I didn't think you'd find me so soon. You're too smart for me, I guess.”

Frowning at the paleness of her face, he took a step forward. His heart jelled when she took a step back. “You afraid of me now?” he asked softly. “What happened?”

She shook her head in denial, but he saw the fear in her eyes. “I'm not. I just want to be alone, that's all. Can't you just go? Please?”

Holding her jittery gaze with his own, Damien shook his head slowly. “I can't leave you here alone. You know that.”

She turned her back on him, and her hair flew with the abrupt motion. He wanted to touch it, bury his face in it, inhale its sweet fragrance. “I'm sick of you making all my decisions for me.”

“I haven't—”

“You have!” She paced away, still not facing him. “
You
decided I should stay with you after the fire.
You
decided how we should investigate the case.
You
decided to let me perform with you, but only to put me off. And now you're deciding not to let me take what amounts to my last chance at getting this bastard. Look, I've been too independent for too long to let someone take over now.” She stopped on the opposite end of the room, as far away from him as she could possibly get. “My life is my own. I say what I do and where I go. Right now, I want to be here, and I want to be alone.”

“Why?”

She shook her head and looked at the floor.

“Dammit, I'm not leaving here without an answer.” He strode across the room, and she cringed, sending a bolt of pain through his chest. He gripped her wrists, holding them to her sides. They stood facing each other, the window their backdrop.

She refused to answer, but the fear in her eyes was all the answer he needed. When she looked away from him, that fear increased. Her eyes widened and her skin went milky white. “My God…”

“What?” He stopped speaking when his gaze followed hers to the perfect image of her, reflected in the darkened window as clearly as if the glass were a black mirror. Though he stood beside her, his image wasn't there.

She met his gaze again, blinking, fear making her lips turn bluish and tremble as if she were freezing to death. “B-Bachman told me, but I…didn't believe…”

“Bachman. I should have known. He's been here, then?”

She nodded. What sense was there in lying to him? She searched his face, the same handsome face she'd found so beautiful before. “God, Damien, tell me it isn't true. This is all crazy, isn't it? It's a fantasy. It's a fairy tale.”

He hesitated. “Shannon…” He tried to form words, but none left his lips. What could he say?

“You can't even deny it?” Shock made her voice a whisper. “I'm having a breakdown, aren't I? This is only happening in my mind. You aren't even here—I'm all alone. Maybe you don't even exist, and I—”

“That's enough, Shannon!” He put one arm around her shoulders and turned her toward the door. “Come on, let's get out of here.”

She stiffened, resisting him. “I'm not going anywhere with you.”

“The hell you aren't.”

She snatched the gun from her waistband as she danced away, then leveled it at him. In a lightning-fast move, he took it from her, then crushed it to a small metal lump. He let it thud to the floor.

She shook her head too fast and stepped backward. Her pupils dilated, until the amber of her eyes was only a thin ring around them. He'd terrified her. He shouldn't have done that.

“I'd never hurt you, Shannon. You know that. You have to know that. I couldn't if I wanted to.” Still she stared, wide-eyed, pale. He could see the erratic pulse thudding in her neck. “I can't just leave you here for the murderer to find. And I damned well can't leave you to Bachman so he can fill your head with nightmares or, worse yet, take you off in chains to some maximum-security lab for what those bastards call research.” He saw her blink when he said that, and wondered if Bachman had suggested it already. “I only know about it because Eric warned me. Shannon, come with me. I'll try to explain—”

She lunged for the door, but he caught her around the waist and jerked her back. She ended up crushed to him, her heart pounding, her cheeks flushed. Her breaths came in short little puffs. She stared up at him, her lips trembling, and shook her head from side to side.

Having her this close to him stirred his senses to full alert. His heart raced in time with hers, and he spread his fingers over the small of her back. “Shannon…it kills me to see you so afraid of me. Don't you know that I could never hurt you? Don't you know…?” He whispered the words, and saw her eyes moisten. His head bent, and he took her mouth, took it with a frenzy that couldn't been tamed. His hands moved all over her, unable to touch enough of her at once. He traced her spine, kneaded her shoulders, sifted her hair, caressed the gentle curve of her neck.

Very slowly it dawned on him that she was not resisting. Her trembling hadn't stopped, but it had changed. Her hands rose, timidly, before locking around him. Her head tipped backward in response to the thrusting of his tongue, and she suckled him. His ardor flamed high. He pressed his hips forward, to show her, and her hand ran up over his shoulders and down again. When she arched against him, he cupped her round, firm buttocks, squeezed them, pulled her harder against him, and heard the soft moan she made.

Insane with wanting her, he moved her backward until she bumped the desk. With a sweep of his arm he cleared it, and then he lowered her onto its surface. Her breaths came fast and warm on his face. He ripped the front of her silk blouse open. Buttons flew. Her breasts hid behind the lacy fabric of a bra, but he tore that away, too, baring them to his hungry eyes. With a little growl, he bent to nurse at them, feeding a need that went beyond hunger, beyond lust. He sucked hard at one tight bud, feeling it stiffen and stand. He caught the peak between his white teeth, snapping them down on the crest again and again until she screamed his name and clutched his head in both hands. Then he repeated the torment on the other.

She was panting now, each inhale short and shallow, each exhale a whimper. He lifted his head, watching her face as his hands moved to her jeans, their button, their zipper. He shoved the denim down over her buttocks, running his palms over their smoothness as he did. He pushed them down her thighs and she kicked them from her feet.