Destined For a Vampire (3 page)

Even though I was pretty sure I already had my answer, I wanted something more.

“What about a baby book or a photo album from when he was little?” Those were the kinds of things that almost every mother had.

I saw Denise’s back stiffen.

“I can look,” she replied vaguely.

After we finished canvassing Bo’s room, I followed Denise back out to the living room, to a shelving unit that held the television. At the bottom were two cabinet doors, which she opened. Inside were several photo albums. She pulled out the first one she came to and turned to hand it to me.

“You can look through this one. I’ll look through the rest.”

Taking the album from her, I turned to the couch and perched on the edge of a cushion. I ran my hand over the brown leather cover of the book then traced the gilded letters that read
Family Photos
with my fingertip
.
Beneath that, someone had used black permanent marker to pen numbers, obviously the year
.

The cover creaked as I opened it, a sure sign that the album was not viewed very frequently. I flipped page after shiny plastic page looking for any indication that Bo had been a part of the Bowman family before three years ago, but I found none. All the vacations and Christmases, the birthdays and picnics, were all devoid of Bo, of anyone other than Denise and her husband.

Though I was bothered more than I cared to admit, my heart broke a little for Bo. I wondered if he knew, if he’d somehow found out about the farce. But then I wondered how I could ever tell him if he hadn’t. It would break his heart. Bo genuinely loved his father, or at least he thought he did. It would hurt him to know that none of it was real. It would be like losing him all over again. Whether they were or not, to Bo the memories felt real, real enough to die for.

I closed the book and rested it in my lap, glancing over to watch Denise search for a lie, for something that wasn’t there, something that never had been.

Finally she looked up, tears in her eyes, and she said, “I’m so sorry, Ridley. I can’t even remember what he looks like.”

Standing, I carried the album back to the cabinet and put it back where it belonged. Gently, I took the other one from Denise’s fingers and put it away as well.

“It’s alright. I’ll find something else. I think you need some rest. I bet you’ve had a long night.”

Though she looked distraught, there was a confused blankness in her eyes that made me feel incredibly sorry for her. Someone had used—unthinkably, cruelly used and abused—her mind and her emotions in ways that no one deserved. It was a violation, an assault of the worst kind. She’d been tricked to love a son that wasn’t hers and, for a while, she’d grieved the loss him, all on top of the loss of her husband. Now, she was lost, confused, and hurting, and she didn’t even know why.

I said my goodbyes to Denise and left so she could go to bed, all the while my anger was mounting. Someone out there, some monster, was wreaking havoc on people’s lives and whoever it was had to be stopped, had to be punished.

I was behind the wheel, my Civic’s engine purring quietly in the morning fog, when an idea occurred to me. Quickly, I got out and ran back to the front door and knocked.

Once more, I thought I heard hushed voices and movement inside. Gingerly, I opened the screen door and leaned in closer, hoping to hear more clearly. More than anything, I could hear Denise’s voice as she spoke softly to someone. The voices quieted for a moment before someone other than Denise spoke in a tone loud enough for me to discern.

The voice was deeper than Denise’s, but still unmistakably feminine. It was hoarse and husky, bringing to mind images of Sharon Stone or some other sultry older woman.

I knocked again and waited, but there were no sounds to indicate that Denise might be coming to the door. The polite thing would’ve been to leave, to let Denise go to bed or tend to her secret visitor, but I wasn’t feeling particularly polite so I knocked again, this time snapping my knuckles harshly on the wood.

After another full minute or two, Denise finally answered the door. A lightly sweet, floral smell—rosy almost—drifted out through the open door.

My smile was bright with apology. “I’m sorry to bother you again, but—”

“Pardon?”

“I know you were getting ready for bed, but I wanted to…” I felt my smile fade as I trailed off. A spooky thread of apprehension slithered down my spine as I looked into Denise’s puzzled periwinkle eyes. It only took a couple of seconds for me to realize that she had no idea who I was.

Clearing my throat, I stumbled on. “I’m sorry to bother you. I think I have the wrong address.”

I smiled again, a quick twitch of my lips, before I turned and nearly ran off her porch.

Once inside my car again, I sat looking at the house, wondering whether or not I should have tried to get inside, to see who was in there with her. Obviously, it was a vampire. Someone had managed to completely erase me from her mind in a matter of minutes. They weren’t just trying to erase Bo; they were trying to erase all evidence that Bo ever existed, including those who knew and loved him—people like me.

If they (whoever “they” were) thought Bo was dead, they’d need to go back and clean up their mess, cover their tracks. I drew a small amount of comfort from that—the idea that if they thought Bo was truly dead, they might stop hunting him and trying to kill him. Right on the heels of that encouraging thought, however, was one a bit more troubling. What if
I
was a loose end that needed to be tied up as well?

Throwing the gear shift into reverse, I sped down the driveway and made my way to school. Hopefully it was true what they say: there’s safety in numbers.

********

That night, I lay in bed, once again thinking of Bo and all that I’d learned. I seemed always to think of Bo, to crave him, to need him like I needed food and water, like I needed any essentially sustaining things. It was getting harder and harder to drag myself through the days knowing that I probably wouldn’t see him, and it was getting harder and harder at night to believe that it really was him that I was smelling in my room. As time marched on, his presence was becoming more surreal, like my mind and my heart were colluding to play a cruel trick on me.

I clung to the story that Lucius told, if nothing else than as a possible explanation and confirmation that Bo was, in fact, alive. Tighter and tighter I held onto that as I felt him slipping through my fingers. I couldn’t—I just knew that I couldn’t—survive losing him again, even if I’d never really gotten him back in the first place. Hope was the only thing that had kept me living this long.

Besides, it was looking like Lucius was right. Evidently Denise was not Bo’s real mother, which made Lucius’s theory even more plausible. But how to set Bo free? What could I do to make things right in his life, to give our love a fighting chance?

I covered my face with my pillow. Sometimes I wondered how Bo could stay away, how, if he loved me as much as I loved him, he could go hours and hours without seeing me, talking to me, touching me. I would’ve given anything just to be close to him for five minutes, to feel his nearness, that familiar tug. I needed something to hold on to, something to get me through until...I don’t know when.

Suddenly, I was aggravated, aggravated by the whole situation—by Bo and his determination to protect me, his concern for my safety, his willpower to stay away from me. Angrily, I threw my pillow aside and stared furiously at the ceiling.

“Bo, if you can hear me,” I said, speaking aloud, wishing there was some way Bo might be near enough to hear me. I couldn’t tell anymore. I couldn’t feel much in life but for the agonizing hole in my heart that was ever widening. “I need to know you’re here, that you’re
anywhere.
Please. If you love me, I need to know that you’re still out there.”

I listened and I waited. I breathed in large gulps of air, testing every particle for the scent that haunted my every waking moment and most of my sleeping ones.

But there was nothing, nothing but the smell of the night air that hung outside my window.

Disappointment coursed through me. It was so poignant that I could almost taste it, bitter and thick.

Maybe I was kidding myself. Maybe I’d taken denial to a whole new, unhealthy level. Maybe I was delusional.

Unable to hold back the tears that seemed always to lurk on the horizon, a sob eeked out right before the first drop fell. I wondered if I’d ever have a dry pillow again. It seemed to be wet more often than not of late. I wondered, too, if I’d ever be whole, ever feel complete again. I doubted a positive outcome for either.

“Bo, please,” I whispered.

At times, I could remember with perfect clarity what his arms felt like around me, what his lips felt like against mine and it tore at my guts. If I could bear to give up my memories of Bo, I would pray for amnesia, anything to quiet the way my heart constantly throbbed for him. “If you hurt like I did, you wouldn’t do this to me, you
couldn’t
do this to me.”

My heart was breaking for the millionth time, something I didn’t think was possible when the pieces were already so small they were like sand or dust. But it could happen. It happened to me all the time anymore. It’s like my heart no longer knew any other mode than devastation and misery. My deluded hope was the only reason I got out of bed in the mornings, the hope that today might finally be the day that I got to see Bo.

I turned on my side and drew my legs up to my chest on the off chance that it might help hold me together, might keep me from falling apart. But it didn’t. I still felt like pieces of my insides were breaking off and forcing their way out through my stomach.

And then I felt it.

Before I even smelled anything, a ripple of recognition washed through my belly. I grew instantly quiet and turned my face toward the ceiling to inhale. Like the comfort of a cool breeze on a hot day, a citrusy smell tickled my nose and I felt the mattress dip at my back.

I turned over and reached out. Though I could see nothing more than the wall and the window beyond my bed, my fingers made contact with a familiar form, with an arm I felt like I knew as well as my own. I’d dreamed of it. I’d dreamed of every inch of Bo. Every tiny detail that I could remember, I’d rehearsed over and over and over in my mind. And now he was here.

CHAPTER TWO

Before I could even speak his name, I was in his arms. Relief and happiness like nothing I’d ever felt, like nothing I could describe, flooded every fiber of my being. It washed over me, washed through me, carrying away all the doubts, all the heartache, all the pain. It was true. It was real. Bo was alive and he’d come back to me.

“Where have you been?” I muttered, the words barely intelligible as they slipped past lips that were pressed to Bo’s neck.

“Not far,” he said quietly. “Never far.”

I felt tears of joy running down my cheeks. I’m sure he could feel them, too, the wetness against his naked skin.

His naked skin?
I thought.

The idea of Bo’s unclothed body so close to mine—in my bed, in the dark—

was like setting a match to dry grass, grass deprived too long of the nourishment of rain. Flames of desire tore through my body like brushfire, incinerating all thoughts, all feelings, but for my need of Bo.

Since he held no visible form, I closed my eyes and pictured him in my head.

Leaning back, I pressed my lips to his, using nothing more than my vivid memories to guide me. Unerringly, they found the smooth contours of his mouth.

Bo felt stiff, but I didn’t care. I’d dreamed of his lips, of his kiss and his touch, for what seemed like an eternity. I didn’t care about anything else, any consequences or repercussions, and I had no intention of giving up on the moment I’d waited for so long.

Determined, I kept my lips pressed to his until I felt them soften. It was nearly imperceptible at first, but it wasn’t lost on me. I saw my chance and I took it.

Pushing my fingers into his hair, I lay across Bo’s lap, pulling him down into a deeper kiss. His cool breath was brushing my cheek in short, heavy pants. It was then that I knew that he still felt it too, that he still wanted me as much as I wanted him. He was just resisting it. But I wasn’t going to let him. I needed this. I needed him, his passion. I needed him to lose himself to me the way I’d long ago lost myself to him.

Bo remained strong despite his rising desire. Though he was no longer so stiff, I could tell that he was holding back, clinging tightly to his control.

I ached to be closer to him. My body throbbed for his touch. I craved him on a cellular level that screamed from the tip of every nerve, from every square inch of my flesh. Some untouched, primal part of me begged for a completion that only Bo could give me. I didn’t know when I’d see him again; I just knew I had to get my fill of him tonight.

Determined to push him over the edge, I flicked my tongue across his lips and pressed my heavy breasts to his chest. I sensed the pause in him, like a gasp that I could feel rather than hear. He stopped breathing for a split second.

His struggle, his indecision, was a nearly palpable thing, as was his burning fervor. I knew the instant that the first teetering domino fell and Bo lost the battle.

But his loss was my victory. It meant I got what I wanted.

In the blink of an eye, Bo’s resistance gave way to a flood of emotion, bathing me in what I yearned for most: his passion. It exploded onto me and stole my breath, setting my blood on fire.

Without hesitation, without caution, Bo’s tongue stormed my mouth, slipping inside to lick and tease mine. Gripping my waist with his big hands, Bo lifted me, guiding my body until I was straddling him.

Roving my back and my hips, Bo’s hands brought to burning life everything they touched. As he gripped my ribs, his thumbs grazed the sides of my breasts, sending pulses of pleasure rocketing through my body to the place where our bodies touched most intimately.