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My heartbeat quickened, and my cock hardened. The soft snore endeared me to him, and the protective hand on my arm made me soft in a way I wasn’t aware I could be. Had he slept like that all night? I might never know. I didn’t dare move for fear of waking him. Instead, I opened my eyes to drink in the sight before me.
His face was entirely different asleep. Relaxed, the lines in his brows eased by the night. His lips parted slightly, pink and without the disapproving purse he so often wore in my presence. Lazily, I stretched my senses out beyond the house to the land around us. Empty. Wolves farther out in the land tugged at the bond we all shared but not close enough to reach even my super-human ears.
The light leaking in the window danced over the lines of muscle down Vin’s back, illuminating his pale skin. Almost enough to feel the warmth there. An odd sensation struck me. I’d slept. More than a few hours, too, judging by the angle of rays on his skin.
Werewolves could go a long time without sleep. We healed too fast to suffer physical damage from the lack until it went on for weeks. Our bigger issues came in mental decline when we didn’t get enough. The longer we went, the more our brains suffered. Without rest and dreams to work out those things humans take for granted, our kind could be driven to madness. Most of my kind tried for five or six hours at least, but even with that in mind, I slept less than most wolves, only averaging a couple hours a night, sometimes less, too often tormented by dreams of the past or slivers of what was to come.
Foresight was a bitch. It never was enough to get a full view of what was coming, only enough to make me want to avoid it. But avoidance brought our fate faster.
“I can feel you thinking. Stop it.” Vin’s gruff voice cut through the silence like a knife, laced with sleep. It was a side of him I’d never witnessed. It warmed my chest.
“I can’t stop it.”
“Go back to sleep, wolf.” He closed his hand around my hip and dragged me to him, draping half his body over mine like he could trap me in place.
“Are you trying to suffocate me back to sleep?”
“If you don’t shut up, yes.” He pressed his face into my neck, hitting me in the chest again.
Fuck. I was too weak for this. I didn’t want to fall harder. I didn’t know how I’d survive it. “Do you need this much sleep?” I asked, realizing I had no idea what he needed.
“Vampires sleep daylight hours. Daywalkers require about as many hours as humans do. I don’t need to sleep sixteen hours in the summer like vampires do to counteract the drain of longer days. Nor do I get more energy in the winter. But I’d rather not sleep during the daylight.”
“So you need more than six hours? That’s more than double what I normally get.” And I felt good for it. More like myself than I had in years. Many years.
“No wonder you’re insufferable.”
“I’m fantastic. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I laughed into his skin, letting him luxuriate in the joy with me.
“We can agree to disagree about that one.”
I nudged him with my elbow, fighting his weight until he gave me enough space to turn toward him. “So insufferable you’re in my bed?”
“Yes.”
“So insufferable you want a relationship with me?”
“The Gods chose you, not me. I’m waiting for them to tell me exactly what my cock sees in you.”
I bit his chest, rather harder than I should have, but held back enough to not draw blood. It was too early to start in on all the blood lust.
He laughed, hardy and thick. “If it were merely my cock, I might have been able to ignore you until the next life, Dominic.”
I felt the sentiment to my bones. A pull I’d never be able to fight hard enough to forget him. “So you get immortality without all the hassle. It’s no wonder half of them hate you.”
“Only the European Council of Elders. They tolerate us here just fine because they see us as tools.” His fingers trailed over my rib cage, but his words gave me pause.
“Are you a tool?” I’d avoided him to the point that I didn’t even know what he did for a living. Orifhe worked. So many vampires were suspiciously rich.
He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he drew shapes on my skin with his fingertips. “Call me jaded, but after we were unceremoniously removed from Europe, helping any of them has put an unsavory taste in my mouth, and I prefer my livelihood not be dependent on people who see me as other.”
“So what do you do?”
“I’m a facilitator. I find things for people. Hard to find things. Books. Artifacts. Antiquities. Things of that nature. I have been used as a researcher and a guide for archaeologists. I have been retained by treasure hunters and collectors. It brings in all sorts. My age and memory are a benefit to things of old.”
If I had more space in my life, I would have been fascinated by his line of work. I probably would have asked to work for him in another life, one where I wasn’t ill-fated to be alpha. “Do you ever wish we hadn’t met in this life?”
“I used to, but not anymore. This life has altered you. I can feel it with each passing year, and I don’t want to miss it.”
