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"Does that upset you?" He must be shielding his mind from hers. Without his telepathic powers, he misinterpreted the cause of her tension.
"No. I don't care that you're over a century old. You don't even look thirty." Her face flared hot then cold as she realized what that meant for the future. "Actually, it does upset me. I bet you looked a lot like you do now, a hundred years ago."
He nodded. "Much the same."
"Uh-huh. And a hundred years from now, you'll still look pretty much like this?"
"Yes."
"You know what I'll look like a hundred years from now? I'll be dead."
"Rebecca— "
"Even twenty years from now, you'll look thirty, and I'll be pushing fifty. In forty years, I'll be seventy. You'll still be thirty. Do you see a problem with this? The lines in that famous poem are `Grow old along with me, the best is yet to be,' not `Watch me grow old, the good times are gone.'" She bowed her head, closer than she'd ever been to admitting defeat. "Maybe you're right. Maybe it is best if I go."
"Go? I never said anything about you going."
"Well I can't stay here. Don't you see what it would be like? Day after day, night after night, denying ourselves the most casual of touches, not even thinking of each other in case that triggers a vampire response. Celibacy is one thing, but you're asking for monasticism. I'm not cut out to be a saint. I know I can't do that. I don't see why we should suffer through the agony of trying." She pushed herself away from the table.
He also stood, and stepped forward as if to stop her from leaving the kitchen. "But given the other options— "
"I know which one I'll take." Despite everything he'd said, she couldn't believe in an all-powerful, irreversible curse. They could find a solution, but only if he believed it could be found. Stepping around the table, she caught him off guard, and pulled his head down for a heated kiss. She opened her heart, her soul, and her mind to him, pouring her love through the kiss, desperation shattering any thoughts of restraint.
He wrapped his arms around her, drawing her tight against him, even as his mouth claimed hers in searing response. He kissed her with all the hunger in his soul, trembling with the restrained passion he fought to contain. His mingled fear and desire coursed through her, scalding her thoughts with the heat of his emotion.
He jerked his head back, breaking the kiss and breaking their contact. She barely felt the cold air of the kitchen on her skin as he pushed her away, devastated by the chill left behind in her lonely, solitary thoughts.
"Damn it, Rebecca! You know better than to do that."
"Yes, I do. And so do you. But that wasn't enough, was it?" She advanced on him, forcing him to walk backwards across the kitchen as he tried to keep a space between them. "And knowledge will never be enough to keep us apart. Because what we feel for each other is too strong to be denied. You're the other half of my whole. We can not be separated. And any attempt to keep us apart is doomed to failure."
He rubbed a hand over his face. He was as physically perfect and healthy as ever, but his resigned expression and dull eyes made him seem old and broken. "You may be right. In which case, you'll have to leave."
"No!" Rebecca clenched her fists. Her strategy had backfired. Now she'd have to work doubly hard to convince him of her real intent.
"It's for your own good," he told her. The dreaded phrase snapped her already strained self-control.
"My own good?" She stalked across the kitchen, knocking the chairs out of her way. "And who are you to decide what is best for me? Who are you to decide what I should do? Is it because you don't think I'm a mature adult, capable of making reasoned decisions on my own? After all, you've had over a hundred years of accumulated wisdom and experience, compared to my few decades."
Desmond held out his hands, trying to placate her. At the same time, he backed away, glancing nervously from side to side. "Rebecca
. Darling. You're overwrought."
"Overwrought? Overwrought! Next you'll tell me I'm overreacting."
"But you are."
"Really?" She stopped and struck a casual pose, leaning back on her elbows against the counter. "Then by all means, enlighten me. Somehow I'd gotten the impression that you wanted me to rip out my heart and stomp it into the ground, on the theory that this would make me happy. But if I'm wrong, I'm willing to listen. So talk."
Desmond cleared his throat, unsure of what to say. She'd taken his words and twisted them, making them into something completely opposite of what he'd intended. Of course he only wanted her happiness. But she had to see that her only chance for happiness lay in being separate from him, no matter how much the separation hurt him.
She tapped her foot, reminding him that the time she was allowing him for explanations was fast running out.
"Can we start by listing what we agree on?" he asked hopefully. Maybe if he could figure out where her reasoning had jumped the track, he could get them back in accord.
"Sure. We agree that there are two possibilities for our future: stay together or split up."
"Rebecca, I'm not asking you to leave because I want to be rid of you. That's the farthest thing from my mind. I love you. I adore you. Which is why I can't risk your life this way. I would live with you for the rest of your life, if you would let me. But you're the one who insisted you couldn't do that."
