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“Bite me,” she croaked.
Tim stilled. He looked back at her. “What was that?”
“Bite me,” she repeated, the words a little stronger this time.
His eyes flared.
“She wants you to bite her,” Frida said, as if Tim hadn’t heard.
“What?” Cesar jumped forward. “You can’t do that. Look what your bite did to her in the first place.”
Tim regarded her with calmness, but his handsome features were strained. “Her body is telling her what she needs.”
“It doesn’t make sense!” Cesar said.
Lee grabbed Cesar’s arm. “He’s right. It’s the calling. It’s telling her what she needs. You have to trust the calling.”
“Get the needle and the vial,” Tim said, not breaking their gaze, “and give us privacy.”
“Tim…” Cesar took another step forward.
“Come,” Frida said, taking Cesar’s arm and leading him from the room.
When they were alone, Tim nuzzled her neck. “Tell me again. Tell me what to do.”
“Bite…”
Looking at her, he nodded even as his jaw set into a hard line. “I’ve got you, baby girl. Hold onto me.”
His eyes turned a darker shade with a tinge of red that infiltrated the pupil. Sharp fangs extended over his bottom lip. He pulled her deeper into his lap and carefully tilted her head back over his arm.
Slowly, he brought his mouth to her neck. When his teeth pressed on the marks, she shivered. The points indented her flesh, but Tim didn’t break the skin. He was hesitating. With her last strength, she arched her neck up, taking the choice from his hands. The minute his incisors cut through the wounds, they sank low.
It was sweet salvation. Relief washed through her. Most of the burning in her veins subsided. The pain abated. The change was so instant, her body convulsed with the burst of life that flowed through her once more.
Tim wasn’t drinking. He didn’t suck or make the soft, sensual swallowing noises that he had the first time. He held still, and when her body went limp in his arms, he withdrew from her gently before studying her face.
“Fuck,” he said, his voice holding a note of wonder.
“What is it?” she asked, her own voice back to normal.
“It worked.”
A knock sounded on the door, and Frida entered. “I’ve got the vial—” She stopped in her tracks. “My goodness. The change … it’s remarkable.”
“Not now,” Tim said. “Give us another minute.”
“Call me when you’re ready.” Frida retreated and closed the door without another word.
“Touch me, Tim.”
“I am touching you, baby girl.”
“I need your skin. It cools me.”
He got to his feet, holding her in his arms. After leaving her on one side of the bed, he stripped the wet sheets and moved her to the dry part. He pulled off his own clothes and then her wet ones before covering her with his body.
“Like this?” he asked.
“Yes.” She sighed. “I was hot.”
He held her close, kissing her neck and brushing his lips over the small holes he’d reopened with his teeth. “How do you feel?”
“Alive.”
“We’ll figure this out. I promise.”
She snuggled against him, his heat wrapping around her as she drifted off to sleep.
When Maya woke up in the middle of the night, Tim was gone. Her naked body was covered with a sheet. The curtains billowed in the breeze and the sound of the ocean washed through the open doors. She didn’t have to see him to know he was there, outside, on the balcony. She could feel his presence. Somehow, they were connected.
She threw off the sheet and padded to the sliding doors. Tim was staring out over the dark ocean with his elbows braced on the rail, wearing a T-shirt and sweatpants. His head hung low between his tense shoulders.
“Tim?”
At the sound of her voice, he straightened and turned. His face was in the shadows, hiding his expression from her, but he opened his arms.
She walked into his embrace, putting her head on his shoulder. “Why are you out here?”
He tightened his arms around her. “I thought I’d lost you. For a minute, I thought I’d go crazy and lose my mind.” He pulled away and held her at arm’s length. “If anything happens to you, I’m as good as dead.”
“Don’t talk like that. No one is worth dying over.”
It was Darren’s words, not hers. Maybe she didn’t believe them, at least not as much as before, but those words had kept her going. That was what she offered Tim.
His fingers dug into her biceps. “You have no idea, do you? You’re part of me now. We’re bonded, as much in soul as in body. Seeing you like that…”
“I looked pretty bad, huh?”
He took a shaky breath and closed his eyes briefly. “I’m sorry for what I did to you.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know,” he said with frustration. “It looked like the mark I gave you became infected and poisoned your system, but then, when I bit you again, it all vanished. Your complexion returned to normal, your fever broke, and the marks seemed healed again.” He brushed a thumb over the signature he’d left on her vein, immediately stroking her desire to life. She moaned, but he only sighed.
