Forget Me When the Sun Goes Down (Forged Bloodlines Book 11) (21 page)

Jakob looked longingly to the windows.  “I would like to look around the village some.”

“I don’t recommend that,” Bishop started to say, but Jakob cut him off, his voice taking on a wheedling cadence. 

“The people here do not know me, and I am not a vampire like the rest of you, so they will not fear me.” 

“Maeja sure knows you though,” I pointed out.  “All it takes is for her to spot you out the window and we risk losing everything.”

“I would be back before Maeja wakes, there is little danger in this.”

“I will go with him,” Nell volunteered.  “I will keep him safe.”

“Are you guys sure?” Bishop frowned, and I could tell he didn’t like the idea of us splitting up while we were vulnerable during the day.

“Yes, none will question him with me there.  If any asks, I will say he is my relation, it is not a lie.” 

“Right then, have a great trip down memory lane. I hope it sparks some more memories for you,” I said.  “I’ll just go up to my room now.  See you all tomorrow.”

I left Bishop and Mason talking defense strategy and how best to fortify the house in a worst case scenario.  I thought about going down again to ask them if they realistically thought it was a possibility, since we could’ve stayed in Vadheim until the next sunset, but realized they were having fun.  It was their version of hanging out together, having some bro time.  I left them to it, going up to lounge on my bed and look through my laptop. 

Though we didn’t have any internet, I thought I might spark a few more memories of my own if I took a look through my files.  Maybe I’d even find an online journal that could tell me more about my life.  Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything like that.  Mostly there were a lot of boring files labeled petitions, and a master list of lists, that corresponded to a group of excel spreadsheets.  

I had an entire folder labeled Operating Budget that I couldn’t make heads or tails of.  It had nothing to do with a household budget, and I couldn’t imagine why I’d possibly need to keep track of personnel rosters for a security staff.   According to the file dates, I hadn’t made any changes to them in over a year though, so whatever it was, it must not be all that important to me. 

The same held true of my email inbox.  I had over four thousand unread emails in there, but most of them were dated about a year ago, with just a few sent over the last few months from someone named Maggie, and a couple from a Leander.  Leander wrote to tell me about a new referendum being proposed to allow feeder bars like the Bird in Hand in the West.  Since I wasn’t sure what that meant, I skipped it over. 

The last one from Maggie talked about an upcoming wedding, which she was still no closer to picking a venue for, and could I please forward her the pictures from the chapel in Madrid I’d told her about?  I didn’t find any file folders with pictures on them, but I did find a folder in my email archive titled, Bishop.  There were emails in there going back for a couple of years, and I couldn’t resist going to the first one to read our exchanges. 

It was a little hard to follow, because apparently he preferred to write actual, physical letters and I’d write back via email, so I only got half the story unless he sent of a quick email response.  It made for interesting reading, though it was like experiencing a book where everything happened to someone else, and it didn’t trigger any more memories.  Still, it gave me a much better insight of some of our shared interests, as we talked about movies, books, and everything under the sun.  Apparently he’d sent me a first edition of Jane Austin books once.  And I’d sent him a case of scotch I’d gotten from someone named Mac.

The emails became much less frequent about a year ago as well.  Was that because we’d drifted apart, or because we’d been so close we hadn’t needed to email at all?

There was a light tap on my door, and I called out, “Yes?”

Bishop poked his head in, his eyes sweeping over the room with approval when he saw the window shutters closed up tight.  “I just wanted to make sure you have everything you need.” 

“Yep, I’m good.  Ah, come on in,” I said, and we traded awkward smiles as he shut the door behind him.  “Where will you end up sleeping?”

“I’m gonna bed down in the root cellar.”

Poor thing.  “Isn’t that kind of creepy?”

Bishop shrugged.  “It’s safe and it’s dark, pretty much the only thing a vampire needs.  It’s not like I’ll notice during the day.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to offer to let him share with me, but I didn’t want it to get any weirder than it was between us.  “Why not take the couch?”

“Because Nell gave her room up for Jakob, so she’ll be sleeping there.  She said there’s too much light that comes in on the first floor, so I can’t easily crash on the floor.  It’s fine though, like I said.  I won’t notice where I’m sleeping while I’m out.”

I nodded, again, feeling a pang to at least let him sleep on my floor, but instead I showed him what I’d been doing.  “I’ve been going through our emails.  Well, mine to you.  Apparently you prefer snail mail.”

“That does sound like me,” he grinned, taking a seat on the edge of the bed to scroll through the messages.  “I’ve always preferred taking my time with correspondence.”

“You can do that with email too, you know.”

“Ink and paper can make you a lot braver without the delete button so handy.”

I watched him reading through the emails, the way his lips quirked when he read something amusing, or how his brows drew together whenever I mentioned Rob in my emails.  “It’s strange, isn’t it?” I said after a few.  “It’s a weird thing, knowing we end up together, but not knowing much about what happened in between.” 

He looked over at me.  “Is weird good or bad?”

“It’s a good kind of weird, I think,” I smiled.  “Just odd knowing the facts, but not the emotions behind them.”

“Oh, I don’t know, I can’t complain about the emotions I’ve remembered so far,” he smiled back.  “It’s the facts that I find troubling.”

“How do you mean?”

“I’ve been talking to Mason, our past sounds complicated, even more than the short version he gave you on the plane.  I know the reason we haven’t been together this whole time is that I screwed things up, over something you had no control over.”

“What was it?”

“I found out you could compel other vampires, and I though that maybe you...”

My eyes stretched wider as I finally understood what came between us.  “You thought I’d compelled you into doing something you didn’t want to do?”

“I guess I wasn’t sure what to trust,” he sighed.  “I didn’t know how to recognize real love without adding some level of treachery to it.  It’s what I was used to.”

I leaned back against the headboard.  “Man, Carys really messed you up.  I guess it’s understandable that you reacted the way you did.”  I wasn’t sure how I felt about knowing Jakob had compelled me in the past either. 

“She messed with both of us.  That whole compulsion thing, that’s the reason for the, um... threesome.  She deliberately set out to hurt you by bedding the both of us.”

I put up my hand.  “We don’t need to talk about that, ever.”

“Sorry,” he said, clearing his throat.  “I just... I wanted you to know that I didn’t set out to hurt you that way on purpose.  It just sort of happened.”

“I wish I could remember,” I murmured.  “Not the stuff you screwed up,” I laughed when I saw the look on his face.  “I mean, how we got to here.  There are so many pieces missing, so many firsts.” 

“Oh, I gotcha.”  He relaxed, leaning back against the headboard beside me.  “Yeah, I wish I could remember the first time we met.”

“Our first date.  Our first kiss.” 

Bishop’s hand slid against mine, and I instinctively threaded my fingers through his.  We both looked down at our entwined hands.  I didn’t think I’d ever felt a connection like that through such a simple touch.  Or maybe I had?  Maybe it was why I felt so drawn to him, even though I’d only known him for a couple of nights. 

“This is crazy, right?” I said with a tiny laugh.

“What is?”

“This.”  I gestured between us.  “I don’t know you except for in bits and pieces.  I shouldn’t feel like this.”  I was getting all of the crazy infatuated feels mixed in with the deeper, caring moments that made me think he might be the one.  

“Like what?”

“Like... I feel it every time you look at me, even if I’m not facing you.  And your voice, I’m pretty sure you have a voice you use that’s just for me, because I haven’t heard you speak that way to anyone else.  And when you touch me...”

“Yes?” 
Yep, that voice was definitely just for me.
 

“I don’t want you to stop.”

“I don’t want to either.”  His hand slid up my arm, and I felt the urge to claw the shirt away from my shoulder when I couldn’t feel him on my skin anymore.

“I mean, I was just married yesterday and I’m already having all of these feelings.” 

His brows drew together at the mention of that.  “You were never married to Rob.”

“Yes, but I didn’t know that.  I thought he was the one I was supposed to be with.  Even then, there was something about you.”

“There’s no reason to feel guilty for feeling this way, we belong together.”

“But why?  Isn’t love something that evolves?  I don’t know you.”

“Yes, you do,” he smiled, and I shook my head. 

Just because Mason had told us we belonged together didn’t make it real.  Anything could’ve happened between the last time he’d seen us and now.  Everything he told us was through the filter of his experience, it didn’t tell me what was in my heart right before I lost my memory.  What if I let myself care about Bishop only to remember leaving him too?

“I only remember bits and pieces.”

“Your heart remembers me, even if your mind is still working on filling in the blanks.  It’s that way for me too, and I don’t care if I never get my memories back, I’ll still know I want to be with you now.  Do you want to be with me?”

Yes
, the little voice inside me responded immediately, but she’d been wrong before.  She’d wanted Rob too and look how that’d turned out.  But the way he was looking at me – Lord, beer me strength.  It sent a flash of heat pooling low in my belly without even touching me.  How could I say no to wanting that? 

“Could you maybe not look at me like that for a minute?  I’m kind of trying to respond in a way that I’m sure isn’t completely hormone driven.”

Bishop shook his head with a smile.  “I know how to fix this,” he said, angling his whole body toward me.

“How?”

“Kiss me.”

“How will that fix things?  We’ll still have all these holes in our memories.”

“Because everything you need to know about what’s between us is in what you feel when you kiss me.  If you only feel the physical stuff, then we’ll know it’s just a very intense attraction.  But if you feel more…” 

It wasn’t the worst idea in the world.  I remembered kissing him plenty, and I remembered what I felt at the time, but it wasn’t the same as feeling it now.  Plus there were worse things than having a guy kiss you into making up your mind.  And if it was lusty and nothing more, then I’d know it was all heat and no substance.  Okay, so maybe it was the
best
idea in the world, and I wasn’t saying that just because I wanted to kiss him so badly.  “Sure, I guess we can do that.”

Bishop picked up my hand and brought it to his lips, brushing them against the sensitive inside of my wrist.  That simple contact alone had me shaking like a leaf on the wind.  “Hey, it’s okay.  It’s just a kiss,” he smiled, pressing my hand over his heart to steady it. 

“I don’t know why I’m so nervous about this,” I admitted, my teeth scraping over my bottom lip as my gaze fell to his mouth.  “I have plenty of memories of us kissing, it should be no big deal.”

“No, this is our first kiss,” he said softly, leaning in to brush his mouth against mine.  Once… twice... electricity building between us, until I completely surrendered to the moment and my lips parted to accept him.  His tongue swept out to claim mine, the kiss building in intensity.  There were echoes of other past kisses swirling around in the back of my mind, but this was real and this was now.  It wasn’t just desire flaring between us, it was a spark that had a life of its own. 

Tongues sliding, hands grasping, teeth nibbling and biting, lips crashing together, every time he made a little groan I writhed against him, desperate for him to do it again.  Utterly swept away by the moment, I didn’t realize how completely ensnared I was until his mouth pulled away from mine. 

Bishop’s forehead pressed tightly against mine, “Please tell me you felt that too,” he said, his breathing harsh as he fought to regain control that I was only to happy to throw out the window. 

“Yeah-huh, I did,” I nodded, too overcome to come up with a coy response.  Somehow his arms had wrapped around me, pulling me closer until I’d wound up on his lap, and I hadn’t even noticed.  I realized I had a tight hold on his hair, and relaxed my grip, rubbing his scalp gently.  “Oh, sorry.”

“I don’t mind,” he smiled, pulling back enough to look into my eyes.  “Can we do that again?”

“Maybe just once more, to make sure it wasn’t a fluke.  But, um... maybe you should take your shirt off?  You know, for science.”

He lifted an eyebrow.  “Science?”

“Sure, you know, for research purposes.  It might spark a memory,” I said nodding earnestly.

“Well, you can’t argue with science.”  In the next instant I found myself gently set aside as he went up on his knees.  Bishop pulled his shirt off over his head, his muscles bunching and flexing in a beautiful symphony of movement until he knelt in front of me, half naked, like a perfect sculpture. 

Jiminy Christmas, he was beautiful.  My hand reached out to touch him, gliding over the dusting of hair across his chest, before resting on the tattoo just above his hip.  “What’s it mean?” I asked. 

“I have no idea,” he admitted with a shrug.  “Do you have any tattoos?”

“I... don’t know,” I realized.  “I haven’t checked.”  I could have a dozen of them on my back and not even know it.

“I’d be happy to do that for you,” he smiled, his eyes dropping to the buttons of my blouse.  “I lost my shirt, now it’s your turn.  You know, for science.”

“Right, fair is fair,” I nodded.  I wanted to do a sexy striptease for him, but it just wasn’t me.  Instead, my fingers fumbled at the buttons, until I seriously thought about tearing the darn thing off.

“Here, let me.”  His long fingers made short work of my buttons, his eyes intent on the task as he opened my shirt to reveal my simple white bra.  Why couldn’t I have been wearing a sexy red number?  There was a moment when he stared down at me, all exposed, but I didn’t have time to feel embarrassed, I was too drawn by the hunger I saw in his face. 

The shirt slipped from my shoulders in a whisper before he tossed it aside, leaning down to press a soft kiss to my shoulder.  “Beautiful,” he murmured against my skin, making my stomach flutter in anticipation. 

“You make me feel that way.”

Bishop leaned back, drawing my gaze up to his by a light touch to my chin.  “Oh no, it’s all on you, Anja.  Everything about you is beautiful, not just the skin you walk around in.  Your heart, your voice, your soul.  Though your skin is lovely too,” he smiled, fingertips ghosting down my back, sending another shiver along my spine.

The crazy thing was he meant every word, I could see it written all over his face.  There was no one else he’d rather be with, and he thought I was beautiful inside and out.  “You’re going to make me cry,” I blinked, as emotion made my voice thick.

“We can’t have that, can we?”  His fingers turned playful, tickling my sides in a sudden attack that made me squeal and thrash to escape them, a huge mischievous grin on his face. 

“Oh, you’re gonna get it!” I cried, fighting back for a few seconds, before I clamped my hands over his, falling back against the bed with him on top of me.  Only when I was pinned beneath him did his devilish attack stop, his fingers stilling as he looked down at me. 

“This...  This is what I remember,” he smiled.  “Not just the kissing or the sex.  I remember sharing laughter with you.  And I remember needing it.  I remember needing you.”

He was saying all the right things, and making me feel the right way, but could I trust it?  “But what if...?”

Disappointment flashed across his features, but it disappeared, replaced with a patient optimism.  Bishop slid to one side, propping himself up next to me, carefully tugging up my fallen bra strap.  “We’ll wait as long as you want to in order to feel safe.  We’ll wait until all of your memories come back if that’s what it takes.  I don’t need mine to know how much I want to be with you.  And we have forever to get back to where we belong.”

There is no forever, sunshine.  There’s just today, and I’m glad to have you in it
.  I wasn’t sure where the quote came from, but it popped into my head.  “It doesn’t matter,” I realized aloud as everything clicked into place.  “It doesn’t matter what we were to each other, what matters is today.  And today, I want to be with you, more than anything.”