“No, I didn’t report him. As far as our coven was concerned, he hadn’t done anything wrong. We were allowed to kill who we liked as long as it wasn’t each other and didn’t put the coven in danger. So I did what I could to distance myself from him. I took my own room, went out to hunt on my own or with other coven members, kept as far away from him as possible.”
“Why didn’t you leave, go somewhere else?”
“Because I hadn’t bothered to learn about other covens and I had no contacts. Who was to say I wouldn’t be worse off somewhere else?”
Ian could appreciate that. He’d had similar thoughts about his own situation.
“Anyway, then I met Lys, and things picked up considerably.” He slumped back against the headboard. “Wow, sorry if I just bombarded you with my life history.”
“I asked you to tell me.” Ian wasn’t sorry in the slightest. “And you helped prove my point that our situation is a thousand fucking miles away from what you had with Peter.” He held his hand up as Jesse began to protest. “Just hear me out.”
Jesse nodded, so Ian carried on.
“I wasn’t in a bad place when you turned me—I was actually happy with my lot, which pisses me off that it ended so abruptly, but I’m not so debilitated by grief that I can’t think properly. I’m not vulnerable; you can’t pressure me into something I don’t want by telling me it’s for my own good.”
“There’s more to it than that.”
Ian blew out a breath, frustrated that he wasn’t getting his point across. “I get that we have this connection, that drinking your blood bound us together in some supernatural magical way. But what I’m trying to say is that we had a connection before that. I know you felt it too.”
“I did.” Jesse smirked, and for the first time since they’d started this conversation, Ian sensed light at the end of the tunnel.
Fuelled by that dash of hope, Ian forged ahead. “So it’s not like you turning me has introduced feelings that weren’t there before, more like it’s adding to them.” He glanced at Jesse who still seemed conflicted, so he tried a different tack. “Did you know Peter at all before he turned you?”
Jesse frowned. “No. I thought he seemed familiar, but I’m pretty sure I’d have remembered meeting someone like him.” A slow grin spread across his face. “He dressed like you’d expect a vampire to in those times. But don’t mention that I told you. He gets very touchy about the subject, doesn’t deal well with embarrassment.”
Ian grinned back, delighted by the image of Peter in a long black cape swanning around everywhere. “My lips are sealed.” With the mood lightening, Ian shifted his leg a little so that it rested against Jesse’s. “Our situations are nothing alike.” He set their joined hands on Jesse’s thigh. “This connection we have hasn’t made me suddenly want to be with you, Jesse. I already wanted that.”
Their conversation had put a damper on his feelings from earlier, but he still wanted to be close to Jesse, still wanted to touch him.
“What do you say?” Ian took the plunge and scooted down the bed, using his newfound strength to take Jesse with him until they were lying flat. “I could get used to that,” he murmured, marvelling at how easy it was to manhandle Jesse now.
Jesse rolled onto his side to face him, mouth curling up at the edges. “Is that so?”
“Oh yeah.” Ian smiled, wanting to keep this teasing side of Jesse. “Now I can throw you around, the possibilities are endless.” Jesse laughed, his whole face alight with amusement, and Ian could easily see the carefree twenty-five-year-old he used to be. “I won’t age, will I?” Ian asked as the thought struck him.
“No.” Jesse stared back at him, a wary look in his eyes.
Ian knew where that conversation would lead, and he wasn’t ready to pick at that particular thread just yet. So much crap had been dumped on him in the past few hours, he needed a break from everything. It’d still be there later for him to angst over.
Rolling over to match Jesse, he said, “What happened to Peter and Lys, anyway?”
“They went to get some rest. Lys has a shift at the hospital later, and Peter... I’m not exactly sure what he’s doing. He works from home, so his office is here, but I don’t know what his latest project is. As long as he’s not reporting me to the VLCD or Raph, then I don’t care what he’s doing.
“What about tonight?” He must’ve been telegraphing his thoughts, because Jesse reached out and cupped his jaw.
“Lys is working tonight, and I don’t want to leave you on your own or send Peter. But Lys has tomorrow and Saturday night off, so one of us will go to the bar and check on Cate. I’m not quite sure what we’ll tell her—if anything—but we’ll definitely go see her.”
I guess that’s better than nothing.
“What about Blake?”
Jesse winced. “I don’t know. Once we tell him, the VLCD will know, so we need to have a plan in place and preferably have told Raph.”
“I thought we agreed I’d just tell them it was my idea to be changed.”
“As grateful as I am to you for agreeing to do that, there’s still a few things to iron out.”
“Such as?” It seemed straightforward to Ian. “Surely there’s some caveat that if a human asks for it, then the vampire isn’t at fault?”
