Colton's Dilemma (Shadow Breeds) (11 page)

“I meant what I said, Hansen.  I’d like to sit and get to know each other for a little while if you don’t mind.  Maybe we could have some tea together.  Can you drink tea?” she said.

Hansen turned around and stared at her, “Yes I can drink tea.  But you don’t want to know me, Miss.”

“I don’t?  Why not?”

“Because I’m bad news, Miss.  I could kill you with one kiss in an instant.”

Tess moved to the couch, sat down and patted the seat next to her, “Then let’s agree – no kisses.  Okay?”

Tess’ heart warmed as she saw the corners of his pursed lips rise just slightly – probably the closest thing to a smile that he could muster.  Hansen stepped toward the kitchen, “I’ll make the tea,” he said as he stepped through the door.

He emerged a few minutes later carrying a silver tray with tea service for two.  He set it on the coffee table and started fussing with serving her
– trying to keep himself busy so that he didn’t have to sit and talk.

“Hansen, sit down, please?  I won’t bite if you won’t”

Hansen turned and slowly sat down as he mumbled, “I don’t bite.”

“So, you’re not a vampire?” Tess said.

Hansen shook his head, “I am not.”

“But you’re not human, correct?”

“I am not.”

“What are you?” Tess asked.

Hansen pursed his lips.  Tess could tell that she’d made him uncomfortable.  She quickly tried to back pedal, “You don’t have to answer that if you don’t want to.”

“It’s just that I don’t like to say it out loud.  I’ve never even said it to Master.”

“You call Colton, Master and Sir.  Is that because he created you?”

“Oh God no!  Master could never create something this evil, this horrible.  No, he is my Master because he is my teacher.  He has taught me how to control my ways, how to not be a danger to society.  Without him I cannot control my urges.  Without him I would become an insane killing monster.”

“And you’re afraid that if he has someone in his life, someone like me, that he won’t have a need to keep you around. That’s why you don’t like me,” Tess whispered.

Hansen’s guilty gaze turned briefly to Tess before he squeezed his eyes shut.

“Yes,” he whispered.

Tess placed her hand gently on his forearm, “You don’t have to worry, Hansen.  There’s more than enough room in Colton’s life and his heart for both of us.”

Hansen gasped, looked down at Tess’ hand – which she quickly pulled away – then up at her face.

“What is it?” she said.

“You asked me what I am.  I am what is called a Devourer.  That’s how I remain immortal.  I suck the life out of somebody with a kiss and use it to rejuvenate.  When you touched me just now, I sense an incredible life force in you, but there’s something else.  Something deeper, hidden beneath so many levels that I can’t quite reach it – but it felt like deception.”

“I’m not trying to deceive anyone,
Hansen.  I swear I’m not.”

Hansen looked into her eyes and saw nothing but truth in them….but still….

“Do not hurt Master Colton.  I fear he could not bear another heartbreak – it would kill him.”

“I have no intention of doing that,
Hansen.  I realize I’ve only known him briefly, but I feel a connection to him unlike anything I’ve ever felt in my life.  I truly feel like we are meant to be together.” 

Tess held her hand out to Hansen, “Would you like to try reading me again?  I’
m certain that it wasn’t deception that you felt.”

Hansen looked at her hand like it was diseased, “I cannot touch you again.  I am too hungry.  It’s past time for me to feed again.”

Tess put her hand back in her lap, “Oh.  How often do you need to feed?”

“Thanks
to Master Colton’s teachings, once a year.”

“But before you met Colton, you fed more. A lot more
,”  it was a statement, not a question.

“Yes, I did. I was never trained when I was turned.  I was created and then my maker abandoned me.  I am hungry all the time, I feel the need to feed every moment of every day.  Without training, I thought that I had to feed that hunger always, so I did.  Weekly, daily, hourly, I killed with reckless abandon, terrified of death and yet hating what I had become.  Master Colton changed all that for me.”

“How long had you been a Devourer when you met him?”

Hansen squeezed his eyes shut.  Tess could see the pain written all over his face as she waited for his answer, “Fifty years,” he whispered.

Tess gasped, she couldn’t help it.  “Fifty years?  Oh my God.  Hansen, how many people did you kill?”

He looked at her.  There was hatred in his eyes, but she knew that it was hatred at himself, not her, “I have no idea, a hundred-thousand?, Half a million?  A million? It could be just about anything.”

Tess started to reach for him but stopped herself, “I’m so sorry Hansen.”

“Don’t be.  I’ve learned to live with it.”

“How do you choose someone to, ummmm, feed off of now?”

Hansen smiled, actually smiled, “I find someone who is dying.  Someone who is suffering a horribly painful death – cancer, aids, dementia.  I find them and put them out of their misery.  I alleviate the pain.”
“And the effect of their life force isn’t diminished because they are close to the end of it?”

Hansen shook his head, “A life force is a life force, whether at the beginning of life, the middle or the end.  They all have the same effect on me.  That’s something else that Master Colton taught me.”

“So you went from being an evil monster to some sort of angel of mercy?  That’s quite an accomplishment.”

“I suppose you could look at it that way.  But I can never un-do what I did in those first fifty years.  That will haunt me until I take my last breath.”

“Do you have a girlfriend or a wife?”

Hansen laughed, “Me?  Who could put up with this life?  The
re are very few others of my kind, and they are vicious cruel.  And I can’t safely bed a human unless I’ve recently fed. I would have to find someone who was okay with only having sex one week or so a year.   So, to answer your question, no companion for me.”

Tess opened her mouth to ask him another question, but he held his hand up as his head turned towards the windows.  “Shhhh, we have company,” he whispered.

Tess looked towards the windows – not only was it pitch black outside, but the curtains were drawn as well.  “What is it?” she whispered.

“Wolves,” he whispered as he crept silently to the window to peak out.  Without turning to look at her he whispered, “Call him to you.”

“Call him to me? I don’t have his phone number.”

“Not with a phone.  The way you pulled him to you before.  With your mind, with your magic,” he said.

“I, I, I don’t know how I did that.”

Hansen finally broke his gaze from the window and looked at her, “You needed him, Tess.  You needed him desperately and that need pulled him to you,” his gaze returned to the window as he continued, “You need him to protect you now because there’s no way I can fight off eight wolves by myself.  We’re as good as dead if he doesn’t come now.”

“E,e,e,eight?” Tess mumbled as her heart began racing in her chest.  Terrified, she instinctively called out to Colton in her mind to come and save her, to keep her safe as he had been doing since she got here.

“At least eight, there could be more farther back in the woods,” Hansen whispered

“Oh God,” Tess groaned.

A rat scurried down the opposite wall of the dank alley as Colton drank from the vein of the inebriated man in his grasp.  The man’s arms hung limply at his sides as the hypnotic trance of the feeding took hold of him.  Suddenly both Colton and the man were shoved, hard, into the wall behind them.  Colton quickly released his fangs, licked the wounds to close them then shoved the man through the door, back into the dimly lit bar that he had come from to have his cigarette.  This time Colton didn’t need to look around to try to find out who had shoved him.  He had felt this twice before and knew it now.  This was Tess.  She was in danger and she needed him, she needed him now.  Without hesitation, he jumped into the sky and took flight – something he very rarely did for fear of being seen.  But it was faster than running – and it would give him the element of surprise over the wolves.  He covered the distance home in under two minutes then he circled, silently, over his home, surveying the area and assessing the situation.  His sharp vision picked up at least a dozen wolves slowly approaching his home, moving very slowly so that they didn’t trigger the motion sensors.  Clever little bastards, Colton thought.  Well, we just can’t have that he thought as he grabbed the tails of his overcoat and began spinning in a circle – creating a mini-tornado.  As he dropped lower in the sky, the wind began picking up things off of the ground: chairs, lawn ornaments, leaves, branches, and eventually, dogs.  There were a few yelps as they were flung through the air and then came into contact, hard contact with large objects: trees or the side of his house.  As this began outside, Hansen had sprung into action inside by moving Tess down to the basement and into the safe room.  Nobody could penetrate the safe room’s steel door or break the code on the lock.  And only two people knew the code - Colton and Hansen – or had the fingerprints or retina scans necessary to access the code key.   Tess only had a few minutes to marvel at the technology and complete supply of necessities in the room designed to keep human, life-sucker or vampire alive for months before she heard the door unlock and watched as it slowly slid open – revealing Colton, out of breath but otherwise unharmed, on the other side. 

“Are you two okay?” he gasped as his hand reached towards Tess.  She reached her shaking hand out to reach his.  He clasped it and q
uickly pulled her into his arms, hugging her tight and kissing her forehead.

“Are, are they gone?” Tess stammered.

“For now.  But they obviously know that you’re here.  This was an all-out attack.  I’m sure that they will be back. We’ll need to prepare,” he said as he looked over Tess’ head at Hansen.

Hansen nodded and moved past them towards the other side of the basement.  Tess watched as he stopped in front of the back wall, near a picture.   He pulled open the picture, revealing an electronic keypad behind it.  He punched in a code, put
his face near the retina scanner then stepped back as the wall shifted, opening to reveal a large room filled with every kind of weapon that you could think of – and some that probably hadn’t even been heard of yet.

“Holy shit!  I feel like I’m in the bat cave,”
Tess mumbled.

Colton chuckled as he kissed her forehead and pulled her towards the weapons room, “When you’ve been around as long as I have and see all the violence that I have, you tend to amass quite an arsenal.  Although I
haven’t had much chance to use it lately.”

“Why not?” she asked.

Colton slightly cleared his throat, ignored her question and busied himself searching the weapons.  Tess looked towards Hansen for the answer.  Hansen smiled slightly as he answered her question, “Master doesn’t want to sound egotistical – but he’s so strong that there are very few creatures that he can’t beat in hand to hand combat.  He just doesn’t need weapons anymore – and he’s been in exile since Lisette ruined him.”

“Oh,” Tess said as she slowly walked into the room to join Colton, “there’s nothing wrong with being strong, Colton
, or having to recover after having your heart broken.”

“I know,” he said as he strapped a holster around his left thigh.  He grabbed a 9mm gun off the wall, four ammo clips loaded with silver bullets and a wicked looking knife and tucked everything into the holster.  Next, he strapped on a shoulder holster and loaded it up with another gun and more sharp objects.  Then he grabbed a long black leather coat off of the wall, pulled it on and stuffed the inside pockets with more weapons. 
He turned to face her and her heart started pounding in her chest.  Her nipples strained against her blouse and her clit started throbbing, making her panties damp – dear God, he was testosterone on two legs – a mass of good looks, muscle and black leather.  She wanted to jump him right then and there – but with Hansen just two feet away she held back.  She tried to appear calm and collected, until Colton grabbed another leg holster off of the wall, shoved a small, lightweight 38 caliber pistol into it then knelt on the floor in front of Tess and slowly slid his hands up her left leg to push her skirt up until he revealed her thigh.  She visibly shivered and gasped, causing Colton to look up at her, first in surprise and then with a slight smirk as he realized what she was feeling.  He strapped on the holster, slowly, seductively, lowered her skirt back down her legs then locked eyes with her as he slowly stood up – his hands caressing gently up the sides of her body until they reached her face.  He cradled her face in his hands, leaned in for a kiss and whispered, “later,” just before his lips pressed against hers.  Her hands slid up his back to pull him tighter.  His hands worked around to gently grab a handful of her hair as his tongue danced against hers in a blaze of passion.  Dear God, she wished he would hike her skirt up and take her right there – at this moment she could care less if Hansen was in the room or not – that is, until Hansen cleared his throat.  Colton pulled back and his smile danced in his eyes as he gazed at Tess.  It was only then that Tess glanced over at Hansen.  He, too, was dressed in black leather and strapped with enough weapons for world war three.  “Wow, Hansen.  You look almost good enough to kiss too,” she said.