Page 63 of Vanessa’s Bravery

In the interior of the car it was stifling hot. She reached for the temperature dial on the dashboard and turned it all the way down, then hit the air conditioning button. Cool air blasted toward her, but it wasn’t enough to cool down the car.

Ethan glanced at her, and pressed the back of his fingers to her left cheek. “Fuck, you’re burning up. Are you going into heat?”

Vanessa didn’t answer. Instead, she lowered the window, hoping the cool night air would help. It didn’t. She had to admit it. She was going into heat, and there was nothing she could do to alleviate her condition.

“I’m gonna drive you straight to Cole’s.”

“No!” Vanessa protested, clamping her hand over his wrist to prevent him from turning the steering wheel to make a turn. “I don’t want his pity.”

“Damn it, Nessie, you need sex now. So if you don’t want me to bring you to Cole, then I’m bringing you to Vera’s. She can give you one of her clients.”

“I’m not gonna have sex with anybody else.” She wanted only Cole’s hands on her, his cocks inside her. She didn’t want mindless sex with a stranger just because she was in heat. She would get through this.

“Nessie, be reasonable. You have to have sex.”

“No, I can get through this. Just take me home. Please. It’ll pass,” she lied, even though she knew that it was only going to get worse over the next few hours, until she would reach the peak of this cycle, and her feverish state would break. She would survive the pain.

Ethan looked at her, but he continued driving toward home. “Maybe call him, and try to explain things to him over the phone. He’ll have to listen.”

“He’s made his choice. I’m not gonna turn into some crazy stalker and hound him about changing his mind about me. It would only prove his point.”

“What point?”

“That he has reason to be afraid of vampires.”

“Are you saying you think he’s afraid of you?”

“You didn’t see how he looked at me.” She turned her head away and looked out at the houses they were passing. “As if I was an apex-predator. And he was the prey. And he hasn’t even seen me in my vampire form.” She whipped her head back to her brother. “What then? What happens when he sees me with glowing red eyes, my fingers turning into claws, my fangs extended? He’ll run. Or worse, he’ll grab a stake and kill me.”

“It’s never gonna come to that,” Ethan insisted. “Just look at it this way. It’s not easy for a man to accept that the woman he loves is stronger and more powerful than him. He’s not used to that. I mean he’s a big guy, and probably never had to be afraid of anybody. And suddenly you tell him that you’re stronger than him, when he thought he had to protect you. That could confuse anyone.”

“He didn’t look confused. He looked betrayed.” And hurt.

Ethan pulled up in front of their parents’ house and turned to look at her. “You need to talk to him.”

“I can’t. It won’t change anything. I can’t force somebody to love me. That’s not how it works.”

“But he needs to see your side, and he can only see that if you talk to him.”

More tears rose to the surface, and ran down her cheeks in a steady stream. Through her blurry vision, she looked at her brother and shook her head. “No. It’s over.” She reached for the door handle and opened the car door.

Vanessa hurried up the stairs to the entrance door, wanting nothing more than to crawl into a corner and stay there until she couldn’t feel anything anymore. Her hand shook when she unlocked the front door and opened it. Inside, it was quiet. Upstairs, in her room, she switched on the lights and headed straight for the shower, undressing on the way and leaving her clothes where they fell on the floor. She turned on the water in the shower, and stepped into the spray of the cold water, hoping it would cool down her body and distract her from the pain in her heart and her body. The pain of losing Cole.

30

Cole slammed his fist against the wall in his bedroom, anger and betrayal surging through him, the pain so severe, as if somebody was ramming a burning poker through his heart. He’d never thought that he was capable of such deep emotions, not after all the years of schooling himself not to hope for something that was unattainable. He’d never allowed himself to hope for real love, even less for finding his soulmate. But his heart had betrayed him. It should have warned him that Vanessa was too good to be true. It should have stopped him from falling so completely and hopelessly in love with a dangerous and violent creature: Vanessa. A vampire.

But every time she appeared in his mind, he didn’t see the vampire, he didn’t see the evil and violent creature. He only saw the woman. The lover. The temptress. He tried to force himself to imagine her with glowing red eyes and extended fangs like the creature her brother and his colleagues had brought to Scanguards. But whenever he tried, all he could see was the warm glow in her eyes, her soft lips, her tender kisses. How could a vampire do that? How could a vampire kiss so tenderly?

Fuck! He recalled how she’d taken his hard-on into her mouth, sucking him with such skill and such tenderness and passion, when she could have sliced his cock off in a second. She’d never hurt him physically, even though she could have. On the contrary, she’d saved his life, she’d killed for him.

Even when he’d demanded to leave Scanguards, she’d stepped aside and let him pass, when she could have lashed out at him because he’d rejected her.

Cole plopped down on the edge of his bed, running a hand through his hair. What had he done? He’d seen red the moment she’d told him that she was a vampire. His only thought had been the vampire who’d nearly killed him, the trauma of it still haunting him. He hadn’t been able to process anything else. His instinct had kicked in. Fight or flight? Knowing how strong his attacker had been, and therefore how strong Vanessa had to be, he’d opted for flight.

But now, safe in his four walls, the adrenaline shooting through his veins had simmered down, and the analytical side of his brain was working again. Like a film, every interaction he’d ever had with Vanessa played back in front of his inner eye, and he was able to assess everything that had happened between them. He had to admit that there hadn’t been any moment when he’d felt any danger emanating from Vanessa. Even when she’d let him leave Scanguards earlier, he hadn’t seen a single flicker of violence or danger directed toward him. She’d simply moved aside and let him go. Any other woman would have yelled at him for leaving her. But Vanessa had accepted it without lashing out at him. Of a vampire, he would have never expected such self-control. Such poise. Such grace.

Didn’t that prove that she wasn’t a violent creature? That there was humanity in her? Maybe more humanity than in some humans. Or why else would she patrol night after night, looking out for the less fortunate, the hookers, the druggies, the homeless? Or had that all been a lie?