Текст книги "About a Vampire"

Автор книги: Lynsay Sands

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Текущая страница: 17 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

Afterward, Holly had lied and claimed that her tummy was upset and that her own meal must have been off. James had been sweet and bundled her off to bed to recover, but she’d read the disappointment in his thoughts. And what disappointment there had been. Here he’d been really interested for the first time in a long time and she wasn’t up to it. It seemed that prior to her leaving on her “internship,” he’d been bored to tears with their routine sex. That he only bothered on Sundays as a rule because he hadn’t wanted to hurt her feelings or make her feel unwanted. Besides, he’d felt that for their marriage to work they should have sex at least once a week even if he had to imagine it was Elaine to get it up since Holly had gained those extra twenty pounds.

That last bit had left her gasping and in tears. Fortunately, James had put that down to her feeling unwell and had been even sweeter to her. But come Sunday, when he’d made the usual overtures, she hadn’t been able to forget his words and despite reading his mind and knowing he wasn’t imagining Elaine then, and that it was her new figure that interested him, Holly just hadn’t been able to get past her hurt and work up any interest herself.

She’d tried to fake it and pretend interest, hoping that some small response might follow as they proceeded, but had felt nothing but disappointment. She’d inhaled the citrusy tang of James’s aftershave, and found herself thinking she preferred Justin’s more woodsy scent. And why couldn’t he kiss her like Justin had? With passion and desperation instead of the wimpy nibbles he used. She wasn’t even sure James knew his tongue was good for more than pushing food around inside his mouth.

Despite her pretended interest, there had been no spark at all. In truth, there had never been much spark to begin with in her marriage bed, but Holly hadn’t known then what she was missing. Now that she had experienced the fireworks and passion Justin had produced in her with just a kiss, then in their shared dreams, she hadn’t been able to stand the lack of it with James.

Of course, he had picked up on her lack of enthusiasm and had backed off. While she’d lain awake, feeling guilty for wanting a man other than her husband, he’d gone down to play video games through the night.

After a week of reading his thoughts and finding out other little things she really wished she didn’t know, last Sunday had been a repeat of the previous. And this past week had been just more of the same. It wasn’t that James’s thoughts were deliberately cruel or unkind. It was stupid little things, like he suspected she was OCD because she was determined to keep the house clean. And he hated her meat loaf, which she’d always thought he liked . . . and her eggs were too runny, and her cookies were hard as rock . . .

Then there were bigger things, like while he appreciated that she’d worked while he finished his courses, James wished she’d hurry up and finish hers so that he wasn’t carrying the lion’s share of the burden when it came to supporting them. And why couldn’t she have waited until he was making better money to switch from full-time work to part-time and start back to her classes? He felt guilty for these thoughts. After all, they had agreed to do it this way when they’d decided to marry, but he was tired of living hand to mouth. James felt her having to wait a couple years to go back to school wouldn’t have been that big a deal, and they could live so much better now if she was still working full time.

Another big issue she’d discovered reading her husband’s mind was that her discomfort in social situations embarrassed him and made him feel put upon. He felt he couldn’t leave her alone at parties or she’d sit in a corner like a wallflower looking miserable. That had stung her and all Holly could think was that she hadn’t been socially awkward at the nightclub with Justin, Gia and the boys. But then they hadn’t spent the night giving her reproving looks, or censoring everything she said.

Holly had spent a lot of time the past two weeks thinking of her time with Justin and the others. Despite the situation, she’d laughed more and been more relaxed around them than she’d ever been in her life. She’d enjoyed her budding friendship with Gia, and had often found herself laughing at the twins’ teasing as they trained her. She’d even enjoyed Justin’s attempts to woo her. More than that she’d missed talking to the man. She kept recalling their chat on the way back from visiting his parents, and the others they’d had on their shared dream dates. They’d laughed a lot while bowling and then at the fair, at least they had before passion had overtaken them. She missed that laughter. She missed a lot of things. But mostly, she missed Justin . . . which made her feel guilty as hell and didn’t help anything.

It seemed clear to Holly that unless she wanted to lose her marriage, she needed to stop thinking about Justin, banish him from her mind. She also needed to get past letting James’s thoughts affect her. But it was hard. She knew she wasn’t perfect and shouldn’t think James would believe she was. She even had complaints of her own about him, but she still loved him, and she was quite sure he loved her despite the mild criticisms and complaints she’d read from his mind. But knowing he probably had complaints, that all husbands did, and actually knowing what those complaints were . . . well, it was two different things entirely. And Holly didn’t have a clue what to do about it.

At this rate, it was looking like Gia, Justin, and the others were right and she was going to lose her marriage and her childhood sweetheart and then what would she do?

An image of Justin’s laughing face came to mind and Holly forced it away. She couldn’t let him affect her decision. She would not leave James for Justin. That could not be the reason. And she couldn’t give up on her marriage this easily. Marriages took work. She needed to work at it. She would get past her memories of him, or find a way to block them. She had to.

“So?” Elaine said as Holly finally settled on what she would order and lowered her menu. “Tell us about New York.”

Seventeen

“Bill was really weird tonight.”

Holly watched the lights flickering past the car and shrugged with disinterest at James’s comment. In her opinion, everyone had been acting weird tonight: Bill, Elaine, the waiter. Dear God, they’d all acted like she was Marilyn Monroe or something, fawning and sucking up to her, and hugging her too long as they’d left. Someone should have warned her about that side effect of being an immortal. She supposed it was handy when it came to feeding, but she had bagged blood to work with. Having everyone practically drooling on her was just embarrassing really when she knew she was the same person she’d been just a couple weeks ago. It had been bad enough when Bill had flirted with her lightly, but then Elaine had started jokingly suggesting that they have an orgy . . . well, Holly had been glad when they’d finished eating and could leave. Fortunately, James had seemed just as eager to go home as her.

“Elaine was kind of acting strange too. I think she was actually hitting on you,” James said now.

“Jealous?” Holly muttered, glaring out the window now.

“What?” He laughed, but it didn’t sound like a natural laugh. “Did you just ask me if I was jealous? Why the hell would I be jealous of Elaine?”

Holly opened her mouth, and then closed it and shrugged. “She’s an attractive woman.”

“Maybe. I’ve never noticed,” he lied and Holly turned sharply to peer at him with disbelief.

“Really?” she asked dryly.

James shrugged, his attention firmly on the road ahead. “She’s not my type.”

“Oh, right, so you’ve never imagined it was her you were making love to on a Sunday night?”

“What?” he squawked with obvious alarm. “Where would you get something like that?”

“From you,” Holly snarled, suddenly furious. Between classes, work, and going out it had been a really long day for her, a long two weeks actually, and while she’d tried not to be hurt by all of his little thoughts this past week, she was. They had cut her to the quick and her self-esteem was now bleeding out and turning to red rage.

“Don’t be ridiculous, I would never say something like that,” he protested.

“No. But you sure thought it, James.”

“What, you can read minds now?” He laughed nervously and shook his head. “You’re just being paranoid.”

“Paranoid?” Holly asked in dulcet tones, her temper completely shredded. “Oh no, you don’t get to call me paranoid, James. You can think I’m OCD and socially awkward, and you can pretend it’s Elaine you’re banging to get it up, but you do not get to tell me I’m paranoid for knowing it.”

“What the hell?” He glanced to her with alarm and then back to the road. “Where are you getting this stuff?”

“From you, James,” she repeated grimly. “From your thoughts.”

Grinding his teeth, he tightened his hands on the steering wheel and shook his head. “That’s not—”

“Possible?” Holly finished for him.

“You can’t—”

“Read your mind?” she finished again, and then snorted grimly. “Actually I can. You see, I wasn’t away in New York at the start of the month. I was in Southern California, just outside Los Angeles, learning to be a vampire because I was stupid enough to run with scissors.”

“What?” he squawked turning to peer at her. Then shock turned to anger, and he growled, “You’ve lost your mind.”

“Really. Then what are these?” Holly asked, and opened her mouth to let her fangs slide out.

James stared, his anger slowly giving way to amazement and then fear. Before he could recover or respond, the sound of tearing metal hit her ears and Holly was thrown against the seat belt, then jerked back against the seat as they crashed into something. Even as they came to an abrupt halt, darkness was closing over Holly, dragging her into its soothing depths.

Something was dripping. That was the first thing Holly was aware of. It was followed by a damp sensation everywhere and pain. Lots of pain. Groaning, she opened her eyes and peered around, confused at first as to where she was and what had happened. A red light was glowing nearby, casting a nightmare vision across the interior of the car as it blinked on and off, briefly lighting up the man in the front seat next to her.

“James?” Holly murmured. She started to shift, to try to move closer to him, but sharp pain in her side made her halt and glance down. A tree branch had come through the windshield and impaled her, running through her right side and into the car seat.

“Nice,” she muttered, and then grimaced.

A moan from James drew her attention his way, and Holly frowned and reached her left hand out to touch his shoulder. He was slumped on the deflated airbag draped over the steering wheel. He moaned again at her touch, but didn’t respond otherwise and she glanced over him worriedly and then looked out at the front of the car.

They’d crossed into the oncoming lane and continued right off the road to crash into a tree, she saw. The driver’s side of the car looked like a squeeze-box. Her gaze dropped toward James’s legs then and alarm claimed her as she saw that the metal had been pressed in and crushed his legs. She couldn’t even see most of his legs from the seat down, but she could smell the blood and guessed that was the dripping she heard, it was running over the metal and dripping on the already soaked car carpet.

God, all she could smell was blood.

“James, can you hear me?” she asked, her voice surprisingly strong considering how much it hurt to even breathe.

James moaned again, and this time, started to rouse and try to sit up, but then he cried out in agony and fell back against the steering wheel, unconscious once more.

Cursing, Holly turned her attention to the tree limb pinning her to the seat. It was a smallish branch, about four or five inches in diameter would be her guess. Gritting her teeth, Holly grasped it about six inches in front of her chest and managed to snap it in two.

“Couldn’t have done that as a mortal,” she muttered to herself as she tried to work herself up for what came next.

“This is gonna hurt,” she grumbled, and then grabbed the end of the shaft now protruding from the right side of her stomach and yanked it out with one quick jerk and an agonized scream.

Holly sat clutching the stick and panting as she waited for the pain to ease. It was when she slowly became aware of liquid running down her stomach and soaking her pants that she dared to glance down and see that she was pretty much hemorrhaging blood.

“Crap,” she breathed, and then looked around for something to at least staunch some of the bleeding until her body could repair itself. Not spotting anything right away, Holly dropped the stick, popped open the glove compartment and retrieved the half roll of paper towels she’d placed in there just last week. Pulling off wads of “the quicker picker upper,” she quickly stuffed it into the hole in her stomach, wincing as she did.

“I’d never make it as a field medic,” she muttered to James’s unconscious form as she unrolled more paper towel to add to the first bunch. “I hope the nanos don’t think the paper towel is normal and try to turn me into a big roll of it or something.”

Holly laughed weakly at her own joke, and then shook her head as she pictured herself as a roll of paper towels with arms and legs.

“Must be delirious,” she decided.

When James moaned in response, Holly peered at him sharply, and then eased to the edge of her seat to brush the hair back from his face. She frowned at how pale he was. The man had lost a lot of blood, and he was still losing it. Holly was no doctor, but it seemed pretty obvious that his chances of surviving weren’t good if they didn’t get help soon.

She peered out the car windows, looking for that help. But of course they’d crashed in one of the few stretches of uninhabited road between the restaurant in San Francisco and their home in San Mateo. James would insist on using back roads instead of the freeway. Cursing again, she turned to peer at her husband, her mind working.

This wasn’t his fault; it was hers for arguing with him while he was driving. If she’d just kept her temper in reign and her mouth shut . . . How had she expected him to react when she’d flashed him her fangs? And she shouldn’t have been running with scissors in the first place. If not for that, Justin wouldn’t have turned her to save her life, and everything else that had happened, wouldn’t have, including her husband dying on a dark back road at the age of twenty-six.

“Screw that,” Holly spat, and without thinking about it, grabbed him by the hair with one hand and pulled him back to rest against the driver’s seat. At the same time, she raised her other hand to her face and ripped into her wrist. If Justin could turn her to save her life, she could turn James, Holly thought grimly as she quickly placed her gushing wrist against James’s gaping mouth. She wasn’t sure if it was her yanking on his hair, or what, but James woke up enough to open his eyes and peer at her dazedly. He then choked and tried to back away from her wrist, but she held him still.

“Swallow,” she ordered grimly. “We may be having problems, James, but I’m not going to have your death on my hands for the next millennia or however long I live, so swallow.”

Much to her relief he did.

Holly kept her wrist to his mouth until James passed out again, and then took it away to see that it had stopped bleeding. The nanos had sealed it, she noted and wondered if they were doing the same to her stomach. If so, she might be able to take the paper towel out now. But Holly had other matters to concern herself with just then, and so she left the paper towel and instead turned her attention to the metal crumpled around her husband’s legs. Holly eyed it briefly. She was obviously stronger now that Justin had turned her. She’d snapped that branch like a twig when she wouldn’t have been able to before the turn, but breaking a branch and unbending the metal from around James’s legs were not the same thing. However, she didn’t see much choice here.

Straightening, Holly opened her door and got out to walk around the car. When she reached the front, she braced both hands on the uncrumpled passenger side of the hood and shoved with all her might. Much to her amazement, the car rolled back under the effort. Her confidence getting a big boost from that success, Holly moved to examine the driver’s side door and then glanced into the car with surprise when James stirred. She’d thought he’d be down for the count, but he’d thrown himself back against the car seat, his face a rictus of agony. When he then began to moan in a loud voice, she quickly set to work on the door.

Holly didn’t know if the blood she’d given him had perked him up a bit, or if the turn itself was already causing him pain, but James was soon screaming his head off as she worked to free him. She withstood it for a good ten minutes, before she, who had never hit anyone in her life, stopped what she was doing and punched her husband, knocking him out. It wasn’t because his agonized screams were driving her crazy, which they were, but Holly just couldn’t bear that he was suffering such agony. His being unconscious, to her, seemed a kindness. Unfortunately, the pain didn’t let him stay under long and ten minutes later she was knocking him out again.

Sighing with relief when James fell silent again, Holly finished unbending the last of the metal pinning him in the car and then pulled her husband out of the front seat and set him on the grass at the roadside so that she could get a look at his legs. The damage was horrifying. His left leg had been nearly amputated with just a bit of tendon remaining attached at the knee. She was amazed that it had come with him when she’d pulled him out of the vehicle. His right leg was a little better. At least it was still fully attached, but it looked like someone had run it over with a lawn roller, crushing all the bones.

Mouth tightening, Holly pulled her jacket off and quickly wrapped it around both of his legs and then tied the sleeves together, hoping this way to keep from breaking the small tendon and bit of flesh that kept the lower left leg attached. She then scooped him into her arms and stood to peer up and down the road.

James had really picked a doozy when he’d chosen to use this back road. Not a single car had passed since their crash and while Holly was grateful no one had come along to see what she could do, she could use a car about now to stop and give them a lift.

Turning to the right, she started jogging up the street, hoping she’d find a busier road at the end of it and someone who could drive them home. She was nearly to a cross street as unlit as the one she was on when Holly noted the driveway on their right. Pausing, she turned to look around, relieved when she spotted the golden lights up ahead. It was a house, and someone was home. There was also a van in the driveway. Holly hurried up the driveway to the house and shifted James in her arms to hit the doorbell.

A moment later the door opened and an overweight man in a wife beater grinned out at her as he crumpled an empty beer can in his hand. “Well, hello little lady. What can I do for a pretty little thing like you?”

Holly didn’t waste time on niceties, she merely slipped into the man’s thoughts and took control of him. Within minutes he’d fetched his car keys and was opening the back door of his van for her. She immediately crawled inside with James and sat down cross-legged before arranging James half in her arms and half on the metal floor. Then she glanced to her chauffeur, Earl.

“Get in here, Earl, and close the door,” she instructed. Holly wasn’t sure if her control would hold if he was out of her sight, so didn’t risk sending him around the vehicle to get in. Instead, she made him climb through the van to the driver’s seat and gave him her address with instructions to drive there.

Once he’d started the engine and begun to back out of the driveway, Holly relaxed a little and grimaced as hunger immediately roared up inside her. It had been gnawing at her since the accident, but she’d managed to ignore it while she struggled to free her husband. Now though, she had nothing to distract her and it was making itself known, with a vengeance. Grinding her teeth together, she looked around the interior of the van. It looked like a serial killer’s holiday vehicle. Rope, duct tape, spades, and various implements that could have been used to torture someone hung from a pegboard strapped to one side wall, while a narrow cot was up against the other behind her.

Holly considered laying James on the bed and maybe snacking a bit on Earl, but then thought again. Feeding off the man driving the vehicle just didn’t seem like a good idea. And, she doubted this could be considered an emergency since it was only ten minutes to their home and the blood that waited in the fridge there. She could survive ten minutes. Besides, the bed didn’t look very clean. James was fine where he was, she decided, and glanced to their driver, slipping into his thoughts to make sure he stayed on course.

Ten minutes later the van pulled to a stop in their driveway. Holly had Earl get out and open the side door, and then gave him her keys to unlock the front door. Once he’d done that, she immediately scooped up James and slid out to hurry into the house with him. Unsure whether she’d need help or not, Holly had Earl close and lock the front door and then follow her as she carried James straight up to their bedroom. She ignored the man as she laid her husband on the bed, then straightened and rushed out of the room, barking, “Keep an eye on him.”

The laundry room had seemed a good place to keep the refrigerator of blood when they’d delivered it, but as she rushed down to the main floor, Holly thought the bedroom would have been handier. Rather than grab a couple bags and have to return later, she unplugged the refrigerator, picked it up and hurried back through the house with it.

She would plug it back in, in the bedroom and—

Holly’s thoughts died abruptly as she entered the bedroom and saw that James had Earl pinned to the bed and was tearing into his throat.

Cursing, she dropped the refrigerator and hurried forward.

“Bad! Bad James!” she yelled, smacking him in the back of the head.

When that had no effect, Holly caught him by the shoulders and pulled her husband off Earl. It was a lot harder than she’d expected. James was damned strong for a man whose legs were crushed and who’d probably lost more than half the blood in his body, if not almost all of it. Finally getting him off of Earl, Holly forced him onto his back and then knelt on his chest and caught at his arms to hold him down as he turned his attention to trying to bite her now. Not with fangs, she noted, he didn’t seem to have those yet, he was gnashing and biting at her with his mortal teeth, and growling like a dog as he did it.

Holly scowled at him briefly and then released one arm to punch him in the head again. Much to her relief, he went out like a light. Sighing, she sat back on his chest and then glanced around to check on Earl. She couldn’t tell how badly he was injured, but the man was lying unconscious on the floor, his neck bleeding.

“Now look what you’ve done,” she muttered, scowling at her unconscious husband. Shaking her head, Holly climbed off of him and went to plug in the refrigerator as she’d intended. She then opened the door, grabbed a bag and slapped it to her fangs as she counted the bags left inside the small appliance. She usually got deliveries on Monday night. James was at work then. This was Friday. More than half the blood she’d received on Monday was gone. Holly didn’t know how much blood was needed for a turn, but she was pretty sure it was more than what was in that refrigerator right now. In fact, she suspected she’d need that much to make up for the blood she’d lost herself.

She needed to call the blood bank and have a delivery made. Surely they would know how much blood a turn took, right? Holly straightened and turned, her gaze landing on Earl before it shifted back to James. She couldn’t go downstairs and look up the number to the blood bank and leave Earl here. What if James woke up again? He might attack the man and kill him this time.

Maybe she should tie James down. Would rope hold him or did she need something stronger?

Holly threw her hands up with exasperation. She didn’t know anything about anything. She was as useless as—

Pausing, abruptly, she rushed to the bedside table and pulled the drawer open to retrieve the small slip of paper inside. Unfolding it she peered at the two phone numbers Gia had written on it, one was hers, and one was Justin’s she saw. Who to call?

James groaned and started to stir, and Holly snatched the phone and climbed onto the bed and then onto her husband’s chest. Dropping to sit on him, she watched his face warily as she dialed the first number. If he even blinked she was knocking his ass out again.

“And you’d deserve it,” she told her unconscious husband. He was normally such a nice guy. Who would have thought he could turn into such an animal?

“I’d deserve what?” Gia laughed over the phone and Holly turned her attention to her call with relief.

“Gia, you said to call if I needed anything,” Holly reminded her quickly, her gaze narrowing on James as he shifted and moaned under her.

“Yes, I did,” the other woman agreed. “What do you need, piccola?”

“Help!” Holly hadn’t meant to scream the word, but James chose that moment to wake and rear up at her, his mouth going for her throat. Help came out a startled yelp just before the phone was knocked from her hand and she found herself wrestling with her less than rational husband.

Holly was sitting on the floor outside the closed bedroom door, dozing against the wall when the doorbell rang. Lifting her head, she peered up the hall to the window to see that dawn was just cresting on the horizon. Day had arrived to chase away the night.

The doorbell rang again and Holly sighed wearily and dragged herself to her feet. Honest to God, this had been the longest and worst night of her life so far. She added the “so far” part in the hopes of not tempting fate. That bitch did seem to like a challenge.

“And you are suffering the effects of blood loss and so exhausted that you’re not making any sense,” Holly told herself as she stumbled up the hall and started down the stairs.

“You’ve also apparently taken to talking to yourself,” she added with rebuke as she reached the main floor and staggered toward the front door. “But what the hell, there’s no one here to talk back but you. James just growls and poor Earl has been curled up in a corner of the bedroom whimpering since he woke up.”

Shaking her head, Holly grabbed the doorknob and—idiot that she was—opened the door without checking to see who it was first. She regretted that the moment her tired brain recognized the police uniforms the two men on her stoop wore. One had dark hair and one was blond. It was Blondie who started talking.

“Good morning, ma’am, we’re . . . er . . . are you okay?”

Holly glanced down at her torn and bloodstained clothes and then back to Blondie. Her voice was as dry as dust when she queried, “Is that what you knocked on my door to ask?”

Blondie blinked, as did his partner. Apparently they weren’t used to being questioned themselves. Their surprise was brief however and then their expressions both turned stern and kind of scowly.

“No, ma’am, we had a noise complaint,” Blondie said, and then completely blew the tough cop act by frowning with concern and reaching out with one hand as if he thought he might need to steady her. “Maybe you should sit down. You don’t look so good. You’re white as a sheet.”

“That’s because—” Holly paused abruptly. Blondie’s scent had just reached her nose and he smelled like pot roast on Sunday. Licking her lips, she murmured, “Actually I do feel rather faint. Maybe you should help me to the living room.”

They were very accommodating policemen. Concern clear on their expressions, both men stepped forward to help. As each took an arm and urged her toward the living room, Holly tried to work out the logistics of controlling them both while she fed off first one and then the other.

“Holly!”

Freezing, she turned and found she had to go up on her toes to see over the shoulders of the officers to get a look at who was at her door. Gia, she saw, and the other woman was eyeing her with rebuke. Grimacing, Holly threw up her hands and complained, “I’m hungry. I’ve been hungry for hours and everything hurts. I need it. This is an emergency.”

Gia frowned and closed the front door. “Hasn’t Mac delivered the blood yet?”

“No,” Holly said wearily, quite sure she was going to have to let the policemen go without even a nibble. That was so unfair. She really was in pain for want of blood, agony even, and she’d been that way all night. If this wasn’t an emergency, she didn’t know what was.

Gia clucked her tongue as she started forward. “All right. Make it quick though. I’ll see what’s taking Mac so long. I called the order in right after we got off the phone. It should have got here shortly after that,” she added irritably and then asked, “Can I use the house phone? I didn’t get the chance to charge my cell.”

“Of course.” Holly waved her into the living room and then followed, pulling the officers in behind her by their hands. They were both being incredibly docile about this. She was amazed they weren’t asking questions until she glanced at their faces and noted their blank expressions. Frowning, she glanced to Gia. “Are you controlling them?”

Gia nodded and gestured for her to get on with it as she pulled the phonebook out of the bookshelf next to the phone and began to rifle through it.

Sighing, Holly turned to her dinner and glanced from one man to the other. They were both pretty much the same height, which was just tall. Determination squaring her shoulders, she stepped in front of the blond, grabbed his shoulders and tried to get him to bend forward. He didn’t bend. Scowling, she placed her right foot against his knee and tried to climb him instead.