Ashes to Ashes-Blood Ties 3 (5 page)

Though I was tired, sleep did not come immediately. My brain swam with imagined horrors. I'd experienced firsthand just a taste of the Oracle's power. I'd seen what she'd done to Anne, the cheerful, eternally teenaged receptionist of the Movement. The Oracle had tormented her with a vision of her spine being shattered, then, years later, she'd made it come true. What had she made those poor vampires in the hospital wing see? It must have been agony for them.

Despite the fact their agenda and my continued existence were mutually exclusive, the vampires I'd met at Movement headquarters had been nice to me, especially Anne, who'd taken me to see the Oracle despite the restrictions against it. That had ended with a skirmish in which the Oracle had tossed Anne around like a rag doll, and tried to rip my head off my shoulders. We'd been relieved, afterward, to learn that Anne had survived her injuries. But in hindsight it seemed she'd been doomed from the start. Because of the Movement's strict policy against medical treatment for life-threatening injuries, Anne would have been slowly recuperating, with no help but her body's own healing ability. She would have been completely defenseless when the Oracle torched the place. I think Nathan was right. The Oracle didn't seem to do things willy-nilly.

I rolled onto my side. The bed seemed bigger and oddly empty, now that my sire had arrived. I ached to lie at his side, listening to his gentle snores and occasional nonsensical sleep babble. Now, that was for someone else.

It made me feel a bit better to review their icy behavior toward each other in the foyer. Maybe Max's idea of deliberately putting them in separate rooms wasn't so crazy, as neither seemed inclined to crawl into bed together today. How could Nathan have kept this from me? Despite the distance that always remained between us, I'd been honest with him, hadn't I? And I'd put my soul on the line in order to save him from the Soul Eater's torturous spell. In my mind, he owed it to me to be honest, even if it inconvenienced him a little.

I wish he had used that same, compassionate line of reasoning. Nathan had Bella. She was exotic and passionate and dangerous. She was so different from plain, white-bread me. With all the sex and romance, Nathan probably just didn't have time to think about me and how much I might be hurt.

Not for the first time, cold tears streamed down my cheeks over my sire. I'd nearly cried myself to sleep when there was a soft knock at my door. Probably Max coming to commiserate. I wiped my eyes hastily. If he could pretend not to be bothered, I

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certainly could do the same. I might even start to believe it.

"Come in," I said, hoping my voice sounded thick with sleep and not tears. The door eased open a crack and Nathan, not Max, slipped inside. I sat up, clutching the covers defensively to my chest as though he would be able to see through my T-shirt to my broken heart—had it been there. My actual heart was in my suitcase, removed from my chest by Cyrus, my first sire. "What are you doing here?" He held up his hands like someone anticipating an attack. "Please, just hear me out."

"Do you really think we have anything to say? After the way things went when I left?" I scoffed. "Or especially now?"

"I know. And I'm sorry. I should have been honest with you." His words further confirmed my fear.

I drew in a shaking breath, forcing myself not to break down in sobs. "That would have been nice."

"I can't apologize enough. I know that. And I know I've put you through hell." He looked down at his hands. "But I've missed you so much."

"It would appear otherwise." I would not let his wounded-little-boy demeanor soften my righteous anger.

For a second, he appeared taken aback. "I don't want to be separated from you like this again. You belong with me."

A sick feeling wound through my stomach, something like hope with reservation. Though I didn't speak, he came to the bed and sat down. "I've been selfish. I wanted to hang on to a past that I can't change. But I had no right to string you along the way I did. I swear, Carrie, if you come home, that will all change." I blinked back tears. Here were the words I'd longed to hear from him, and yet…

"What about Bella?"

Nathan frowned. "What about her?"

"I don't know if she'd be too keen on having me around. Maybe, if she were another vampire, she could understand, but she's a werewolf. They don't have any concept of the relationship between a sire and a fledgling."
Or how frustrating they can be
. A horrible scene played through my mind where Nathan replied, "You know, that makes sense. Good night," and returned to her.

Instead, he stared at me as though I'd lost my mind. "Carrie, Bella and I… I think there's been some miscommunication. We're not involved with each other."

"She was staying at the house," I stated stubbornly. "Why has she been there for a month then? Why didn't she go back to Spain?"

"She did," Nathan insisted. "She followed the Soul Eater to San Francisco, did recon, then went to Spain. She had to take commercial airlines because she couldn't contact the Movement. When she got to headquarters, she found it destroyed, and came back to Grand Rapids, because it was the only way she knew how to contact Max ."

"But you said she wasn't using my room…and you were shielding your thoughts the whole time." I was beginning to feel like a total ass, and I didn't like it. It would almost have been worth it to hear he
had
been sleeping with Bella, just to keep from realizing how crazy I'd been acting.

A slow smile spread across Nathan's gorgeous mouth. "You really thought I was cheating on you?"

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"It wouldn't have been cheating, since we don't have a relationship ." I looked down at my hands and found them twisting the bedspread. "Nathan, I don't want to be your fledgling. I want to be the woman you love. It's never going to happen as long as you can't let go of Marianne."

I thought he would flinch or turn away at her name, the way he used to, but he held my gaze, drawing me into his steel-gray eyes. "Marianne is gone. It makes me sick to say it, but in a way, everything turned out better for us the way it did. She wasn't the woman I married. She'd given up. I know I painted her as a saint, and I don't mean to. But something about the illness twisted her. She was often depressed, sometimes openly hateful. She blamed me, once, near the end."

"Oh, Nathan." I couldn't help interrupting. It was as if he hadn't heard me. "Even if she had lived—that is, if I hadn't done what I did to her—she would have died later. If I'd made her a vampire… well, she was too scarred. She still wouldn't have wanted to live."

"I could have given Marianne new life, could have protected her and cherished her for the rest of our time on earth, but I couldn't have given her her soul back. She'd lost that long before I killed her. The spell Bella did…that you did…it made me realize that. It sounds melodramatic, but really, you saved me."

Tentatively, I reached for his hand. I seriously expected to wake up when I touched him, but his fingers closed over mine, almost crushing, until he realized what he was doing and relaxed his grip.

"You're my fledgling. No matter what else happens between us, it's my blood in your veins. You're the only family I have. It's you I want to be with." He lifted my hand to his lips and pressed a soft kiss there.

My pulse pounded. "But not the way I want it to be. That's the part you keep glossing over."

A sad look came over his face, and his gaze dropped to our clasped hands. "If I told you now that I'm ready to… to love you, I would just be setting us up for disaster. The spell showed me the truth, but there are still parts I can't accept, even though I know them to be true. When the time comes that I can completely let it go—and it
will
come—it's not going to be some werewolf I choose. It's going to be you." Instantly, guilt crashed over me. Nathan had been soul-searching, and I'd been… whoring it up. "I have to tell you something."

A wary look crossed over his face, followed by an obviously forced smile. Trepidation vibrated down the blood tie. He thought I was going to reject him. He let go of my hand.

"Okay."

"Well, I thought you were… involved… with Bella." I closed my eyes and resisted the urge to slap my forehead with my palm. "Obviously, I jumped to a conclusion. A stupid, stupid conclusion."

He nodded, the oppressive fear of rejection letting up a bit. "And?"

"And?" I bit my lip, deciding the best way to do this was quickly. "I almost slept with Max."

I mentally counted to three, waiting for Nathan to explode. He did, but not as I expected. With a howl of laughter, he fell sideways off the bed.

"Nathan! It's not funny!" I pounded the mattress. "I almost slept with Max!" Peering over the edge of the bed, I saw Nathan wipe tears of laughter from his eyes. "Oh,

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I heard you. I bet it was dead romantic, too."

"Oh, shut up," I admonished with an involuntary laugh. "I can't believe I thought you slept with Bella."

"I can't believe you did, either. I can barely stand her. Do you know she chews her toenails? I mean, she doesn't clip them off like normal people, she puts her foot in her mouth and chews them!" He shuddered in disgust. "I thought you'd give me a little more credit."

Our laughter subsided into charged silence. Nathan sat up, resting his forearm on the bed as he studied me "Carrie, I don't want you to do anything you don't want to. If you don't want to come home, tell me."

Nome . Our home. My chest squeezed as though it would suddenly collapse. My mind raced for some proof that this was an elaborate trick to break my heart again. "I do want to come home. But I can't promise I'll wait for you. It's too unfair to ask that of me. So…

"

"So?" he asked, a reluctant smile quirking the corner of his mouth. I hated to kill the happy expression that might grow there. "So, I'll think about it." His smile held the promise of happiness. Realistic happiness, but still, more happiness than we'd had. "Carrie?"

The way he said my name, the way it sounded heavy and meaningful on his lips, gave me chills up my spine. "What?"

"I've been dying to kiss you."

At those words, the chills ran straight from my spine to my stomach, raced down my arms and pulled a soft, "Oh," from my throat. I swallowed thickly and nodded, wetting my lips, which had become suddenly parched in anticipation.

Wordlessly, he climbed into bed beside me and we kissed as though we'd never done it before. Not because it was clumsy and awkward, but because there was more to it on both ends than there ever bad been. There was a fierceness in him I'd never experienced before, not born of desperation, or fear of losing me, as when I'd first become his fledgling. It was something between determination-determination to let go and make this right—and confidence I would be there when all was said and done.

I wished I could be as sure as he was.

But my body was certain of what it wanted. No matter what had transpired between us, I needed him on a primal, visceral level. His blood was in me, making me a part of him. I couldn't seem to touch him enough, even as his mouth covered mine again and again, even as his hands found their way to my back, pulling me tight against him. I rose on my knees before him, and he mimicked my action, pulling his shirt off in the process. I actually moaned at just the sight of him, his pale skin pulled taut over hard muscle. The scars from the Soul Eater's spell still marred his chest and arms, and I wondered briefly at the power of a magic that could leave permanent marks on a vampire. But rational thought fled when he reached for me. Like always, Nathan could make the complications of the world disappear for me when I was in his arms. Not because I was an affected flower prone to swooning, but because everything about him—his body, his mind, his scent, his touch, his problems—everything was larger than life.

And you always get caught up in it, and you always fall, and he's never there to catch
you.

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I ignored that warning voice, ignored every thought in my self-righteous brain, because Nathan was touching me, so everything was all right.

He slipped my T-shirt over my head and bent his face to my neck. It was nearly impossible to stay upright with his skin rubbing on mine, his mouth burning a trail across my collarbones. It was too much sensation after being apart too long, and when I moaned, felt an echoing shudder in his body.

"I've missed this," he rasped, lifting my breasts in his hands to kiss the tops of them. "God, I've missed this. I've missed you."

I clutched his hair in my fingers and held his face close. He smelled wonderful, like the sandalwood of his soap and the heavy opiate smell of the incense he burned in the shop. I almost screamed in need when his hands slid to my back and curved over my buttocks, pulling my vulnerable, naked flesh forward to make contact with the rough denim of his jeans. I reached between us and fumbled with the button at his waistband, and he pushed my hands away. "Wait, wait. Slow down. We've got all day."

"I don't want to take all day," I panted, punctuating my statement with a firm tug at his jeans.

His eyes darkened and he stared down at me for a long, silent moment. "I'm so glad you said that."

In a few frantic seconds, he'd shucked his pants and pulled me to straddle him as he lay back on the bed. I gripped the base of his cock and squeezed, gliding my fingers up, over all the hard, straining length of him. He hissed and clutched at my thighs, and the desire I felt through the blood tie magnified my own. I rose above him and positioned him at my entrance. My flesh throbbed at the first touch of him; my body shuddered when he flexed his hips and slid inside.