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“That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you. I didn’t want you to know what I’d let happen, that I wasn’t even trying to stop her anymore, just outrun her. I shouldn’t have lied to you. And it kills me that I hurt you in a misguided attempt to protect you, especially when it seems that isn’t doing any good. All I can say is that I panicked. I was ashamed. I was trying so hard to cover my tracks that I lost sight of what was important—you.”
“Why were you ashamed?” I asked.
He lifted my chin, meeting my eyes. “I was a coward. If this had happened to you, you would have stopped her. You would have gone after her with both barrels and talked her into submission. And when you left me in that hotel room, I was torn between wanting to drop to my knees, tell you everything, and beg your forgiveness and wanting you to leave, to get away so you would be far from Jeanine and her madness. I thought I’d feel better once you were home, but I was decimated. I sat in that hotel room for a week, unsure of what to do, where to go, how to feel, all the while hoping you would come back but knowing that you shouldn’t.”
“Technically, decimated means ‘the reduction of a military force by one-tenth,’” I pointed out.
“Mmm, I love it when you do that.” He sighed, pressing his face into my hair. “I haven’t had anyone to correct me or fill my head with useless trivia for months.”
“You poor soul,” I muttered, smiling despite myself. “Besides, I wouldn’t say you’re a coward. You pushed a tree on top of a guy for me.” I laced my arms around his waist and pulled him against me. “So, you were wrong.”
“I was absolutely, unequivocally, undeniably, one-hundred-percent wrong,” he agreed, accenting each word with a soft kiss on my throat.
“Which would mean …”
“That you were absolutely, unequivocally, undeniably, one-hundred-percent right,” he said, again with the kissing.
“You know, a woman waits her whole life to hear those words.” I sighed. I straightened, lifting my head. I looked up into his face and caught a flicker of uncertainty. “What? What’s with the face?”
“Well, I can believe Jeanine sent you letters,” he said. “And maybe even rubbing your house with exotic, unpleasant fruit. But the silver, that seems rather aggressive for her. She’s absolutely phobic of any sort of silver, claims she’s more sensitive to it than most vampires because of her delicate constitution. For her to send it to you, she must be getting desperate.”
“Either that, or I have another stalker,” I wisecracked. “Oh, crap. You said you’ve turned three people including me. Who was the third?” I poked him when he didn’t respond. “Total honesty.”
“It’s a much shorter story. I met Brandley in the 1950s in London. He was a young medical student, brilliant. He spent most of his time in a lab, studying vaccines. From the moment I met him, I could tell that he was very ill. There was a taint to his scent, an undercurrent of decay. Leukemia. But when I thought of what he could accomplish, how he could benefit mankind when he had unlimited time to conduct his research, I gave him a choice: impending natural death or everlasting life. He took it. I was so careful turning him, staying with him until he rose, coaching him through those first few days. And at first, it was wonderful to have a companion, someone to hunt with, to talk to. Like yours, Brandley’s learning curve was quite steep. He adjusted beautifully to his new life. But unlike you, Brandley had an enormous aptitude for cruelty. He had no interest in study or science when he could spend his nights drowning in the blood of his victims. I tried to teach him patience, pity for his food, but for him, the meal seemed incomplete if they survived.”
I chewed my lip. “Should we worry about Brandley coming after us, because I don’t want to go through this whole bratty demon stepchilde thing again.”
“Brandley’s dead. He was killed by an angry Welsh mob who objected to his tendency of feeding off their very young daughters.”
“Are you sure he’s dead?” I asked.
“Well, they cut his head off, so, yes.”
I was quiet for a long moment. “You have really, really bad luck when it comes to vampire children, don’t you? I mean, how could you have worked up the nerve to turn me? Because it could have gone just horribly, horribly wrong.”
“Who’s to say it hasn’t?” Gabriel muttered. “And stop using adverbs twice, it’s insulting.”
“Seriously, why would you put yourself through that when you’d had such terrible experiences as a sire?”
He kissed me, pressing his lips ever so softly against mine. “Because you were different. When I told you that your goodness and your innocence set you apart, I meant it. I’d had reservations when I turned Jeanine and some reluctance about turning Brandley. But when I saw you, bleeding and dying, I knew without a doubt that you deserved a second chance, that you would make the most of your vampire life, without cruelty, without being petty or selfish. You’re the best part of me, Jane, the gift I could give the world to make up for past wrongs.”
“That’s either incredibly beautiful or a lot of pressure to put on me.”
Gabriel snorted. “I love you.”
“I love you, too. Idiot.”
“Agreed.” He sighed. “I’ve never had a lover I’ve met as a human and known as a vampire. I’ve never made love to someone I sired. I didn’t count on my feelings of love and concern and responsibility twisting into such a confusing mess.”
“So, I’m your first?”
He seemed startled by the question. “Yes! The last thing on my mind was sex with Jeanine, and, well, Brandley was a man.”
“So, you’ve never …”
“No!”
I threw up my hands. “Hey, vampires are hypersexual creatures. Our boundaries are not like those of humans. And then, of course, there’s all that tension between you and Dick. You can’t really blame me for thinking—”>“She wanted to be turned?”
