I Am Lightning (Laurel Defense Series) (9 page)

He chuckled but seemed to sober up.  “What do you feel for me, Abby?”

“I care about you a lot,” I said immediately and then softened my voice.  He needed to feel it too, not just hear it.  “I’m beginning to fall in love with you, which puts me in a very bad position if you start feeling the same
way, and in a worse situation if you don’t because I may have just made a fool of myself.”

“You didn’t… make a fool of yourself.  I’m in love with you, Abby.  From the moment I saw you.”

I took a deep breath filled with breakfast and Robert scents.  Delicious.  “Good.  Good.”  My body relaxed by degrees and I remained sitting on Robert’s lap while he ate.  Then he practically pushed me out so that I would finish my breakfast too.  But I wasn’t hungry anymore.  The butterflies in my stomach told me I was something else altogether.

I woke up startled, feeling cool air on my face.  Somehow I’d fallen asleep on top of Robert and under all the quilts.  I looked around trying to get my bearings and the house was dark.  Robert had taken off the quilts.  Earlier, after the very hearty late breakfast I’d made, I’d snuck back under them.  I’d used Robert’s prone body as a bed, snuggling between him and the sofa.  We spoke for a long time and enjoyed each other.  For once my sexual attraction to him had taken a backseat, and I got to know him better.  I loved talking with him.  He knew a lot, and was also a great active listener.  I could tell him anything and never felt like he was judging or picking apart anything I said.  I couldn’t believe I’d fallen asleep, but I felt so comfortable with him that maybe I shouldn’t have been as surprised as I was.

“Time for us to get up, I think,” Robert said, caressing my hair.  That’s how I’d fallen asleep so easily.  He’d been playing with my hair and it’d felt so good I’d closed my eyes.  I’d been a goner.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, wiping drool off my face and his shirt, feeling more than a little embarrassed.  “You must think I spend my days eating and sleeping.”

“I know you don’t.  This was a one-time thing.  Your house is too clean,” he smiled.  I could get used to those smiles. 
Hmm…

“Do you have a change of clothes?  You can just take a shower here,” I offered.  Why send him home if he had to come back and pick me up for work?

“I’ll go get it,” he said and sat us both up.

I was waiting near the guest bathroom at the top of the stairs with clean towels, a spare bottle of shampoo, and a brand new bar of soap – I hoped he didn’t mind the girlie scent – when he returned.  He took everything with a bow and a smile that made me wish I was going in the same shower with him.  So I turned hurriedly and got in my own shower.  Now was not the time for silliness.

I got dressed quickly in a black pants suit with a white shirt, put my hair up in a knot at my neck, and ran downstairs to make us something to eat before leaving.  Besides, I had to return the cooler and empty bags of blood to Isabelle, so I got that ready to go as well.  Robert had been waiting for me in the kitchen, looking very casual for work in jeans and a gray T-shirt.

“Don’t tell me you’re off tonight,” I said, whining a little.  I was mortified at the thought of making him drive me to work on his night off.

“No, I’m working,” he said and I relaxed.  “This is all I had in the car.  I have another suit in my locker.”

“Can’t you conjure something up to wear?”

“It takes a lot of magic that I’d rather save for something else,” he said.  I remembered he hadn’t been eating or feeding for a while.  That couldn’t have been good for his magical abilities.

I managed to actually make a couple of sandwiches for us before I got attacked by the counter, so to speak.  Robert’s arms circled my waist as he began kissing my bare neck.  His masculine scent now mingled with my soap and shampoo, and it did things to my libido.  I giggled, more because I was surprised by his embrace and I shouldn’t have been.  Hadn’t he done something very similar even before we knew
each other well?  Now that we had kissed he’d felt the same urge as me to continue with the kissing.

He turned me around and caressed my face, planting soft kisses on my cheeks.  I ran my hands over his shoulders, marveling that I was allowed to touch.  I pulled on him, wanting his lips on mine.  He didn’t give in to me.  Instead, Robert’s hands moved and snuck under my blazer.  He caressed my back and watched my face as he did so.  When his wandering fingers traced the openings for my wings I felt my eyes close as my body shook in pleasure.  That’s when I felt his lips graze mine.  My arms circled his neck, fusing our bodies as I tried to intensify the kiss.  I ran my tongue over his lips, asking for entrance.  And he pulled away.

“What’s wrong?”  I pulled him again and he let me, but wouldn’t give me back his mouth.  Then I thought better of it.  Maybe I had bad breath… even though I’d just brushed my teeth right after my shower.

Robert shook his head and smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes.  He kissed me again, a soft peck, then opened his mouth and licked my lips just like I’d done to him.  I met his tongue with mine and he moaned into my mouth.  He didn’t do anything until I did it first, and something told me that I was the one teaching him how to kiss me.  How to kiss period!  I didn’t want to stop kissing him to find out if I was right.  If anything I was enjoying teaching him.

I sighed when he ran another finger over my wing.  I slowly started to climb his large body, and he helped by holding me tighter the farther up I went.  Suddenly I was sitting on my counter, my legs wrapped around him, kissing him with all I had and shaking under his touch.  I felt his erection as he ground it into my pelvis, giving my body another kind of pleasure.  His body began the primal movement, the unconscious seeking, and my body reacted by opening more, lubricating the way.  Our scents mingled in my small kitchen, driving me wild with need and making him growl.

Our movements stopped as he opened for me to steal his energy.  I concentrated on it, letting it come into me, turning it into electricity, making it course through us like a current.  The pleasure built inside me and became so intense that it rocked me like a powerful orgasm when I released it.  I threw my head back and yelled into the room, losing my hold on Robert and hoping he wouldn’t let me fall from the counter.

I collapsed onto him, too weak yet to lift my head.  He caressed my back slowly in a soothing motion, taking deep breaths at my neck while I continued to whimper in his arms.

“Don’t bite me,” I said weakly, slurring my words.

He chuckled and it rumbled through his chest.  “That is the last thing I’m thinking about.”

“Good, good… so good,” I said, rubbing my cheek on his T-shirt as I nodded.  His chest rumbled with another chuckle.  I would have taken offense that he was laughing at me, but he seemed so happy, and his smiles were meant to be treasured.

“We should eat something before leaving,” he suggested, never moving, waiting for me to move away first.

I did move eventually, letting him help me get back on the ground.  He sat me down at the table and brought our sandwiches and sodas.  The soft smile on
his lips lingered even as he ate, and we couldn’t keep our eyes off each other.

“You should smile more,” I said watching as that soft smile widened.  He had mayo all over his lips.  I giggled.  He made me feel at least ten years younger.

“You make me smile,” he said and his fangs lengthened.  They’d been doing that on and off.  I could tell the fangs were bothering him again, even before he said, “How am I supposed to eat with these things?”  He growled and frowned, thoroughly angry.

I reached for his hand on the table, squeezing it gently.  “Just try it, they’re just teeth.”

Robert grumbled and kept on eating.  The fangs didn’t seem to hinder him much, and finally they retracted on their own.  I was so full of questions about him and vampirism that I thought I would burst, but I kept my urges in check and tried to think of something else.  Anything else.  He would tell me all about it when he was ready.  He didn’t seem ready just yet.

On our way out the door Robert got a call from Ifan asking where he was and whether he knew where I was, at which point Robert explained about my car and that we were commuting together.  We were about fifteen minutes late.  Ifan asked us to stop by Mark’s house because he was running late too and not picking up his phone.  Knowing Mark, he’d overslept.  I grabbed Mark’s house keys and we headed in that direction.

Mark’s house was a huge Victorian that had been in Laurel since the late 1890’s.  He kept it magnificent, with immaculate gray clapboard and purple trim and shutters.  It sounds weird, but only a house like his would have looked right in those colors.  The tower housed a breakfast nook on the first floor and his master bedroom on the second and third floors.  The house was huge, and had been meant for him to fill it up with a wife and kids, but Mark remained its sole lord and master.

“His car’s not here,” I commented getting out of Robert’s car and running to the front door through the drizzle and darkness, trying not to fall on the slippery carpet of leaves that covered the walkway.  Once inside I could immediately tell Mark wasn’t home at all.  There was nobody inside the house, not even a ghost.  I told Robert and we made our way to the Laurel Defense headquarters.

“That’s very unlike Mark,” commented Ifan when we told him what we’d found.  He was voicing my own thoughts.  I’d sent Mark a message using my personal cell, because he hadn’t answered my calls either.  Mark would rarely not answer my calls, and it was usually when he was sleeping.  But he’d received several calls already, enough to wake up even the most stubborn narcoleptic.

Brenton
walked with purpose into the office, followed closely by Tandy.  They both looked worried and soon all our coworkers were gathered around us in front of Ifan’s office.

“We found his Jeep,”
Brenton announced when he had everyone’s attention.

“Wait, what?!  You found Mark’s Jeep?” I asked, not following.

“I put a tracking spell on it some years ago,” Ifan explained as if it was the most normal thing in the world.  “Where is it?”

“Near Midnight.
  I think he went to the club last night,” Brenton said in a gruff manner.

Fear filled me as I looked at Ifan.  He returned my gaze, knowing what I was going to say before I
said it.  “Go, but don’t go inside the building,” Ifan said to me.

“How am I supposed to know what happened?!” I shrieked, letting my fear take over.  I wouldn’t forgive myself if something happened to Mark.  He must have gone back to the club to do more investigating, alone.  Shit, this was bad!  I couldn’t tell what type of elemental I’d found, but it could have been anything, and it hadn’t been anything good.

Ifan took a deep breath while looking at me, keeping his own temper in check.  I felt a warm hand take mine.  It was Rhiannon, offering me her support.  Every single one of my colleagues was going to help me find Mark.  They would not stop until we found him.

“
Brenton, Tandy, Robert,” Ifan called and went into his office.  My three colleagues followed, and Robert made sure to give me a quick look of reassurance before he left me.  He would find a way for me to get inside the club.  He would.

CHAPTER
8

Robert and I stood in the alley next to the club Midnight, both of us looking up at the now forbidding building.  My breath was coming out in visible puffs, even though I didn’t feel cold.  The rain-soaked alley was darker than the street and sent a chill through me that had nothing to do with the dreary weather.  Robert reached out and took my hand.  He was going to get me inside the club by influencing the humans.  It was a Sunday, so the place wasn’t as busy as it had been the night before.

“Are you ready?” Robert asked me, squeezing my hand.  We were both already dressed to go inside, he in his black jeans and T-shirt with a leather jacket, and me in my leather body suit with my hair down to hide the openings for my wings.  It probably wouldn’t matter that I was wearing the same outfit as the night before, and if it did, Robert would take care of any memories that needed to be erased.

I shook my head to answer his question, then nodded, then shook it.  I was supposed to go in there, guns blazing – figuratively speaking – and take down
the elemental in the ladies’ room.  Then we could let the rest of the team come in and start searching for Mark’s whereabouts.  We were almost convinced that Mark had disappeared directly from inside the club.

And by “we,” I mean everyone but me.

There was something off about that theory.  I didn’t think that going inside the building would net the desired results.  Mark wouldn’t have gone into the ladies’ room, for starters.  Unlike Robert, Mark couldn’t erase memories, so he couldn’t have snuck in without leaving a wake of upset women, and there was no evidence that there was an elemental in the men’s room.  Mark had disappeared, but from where?  I was more inclined to think he had been taken from outside the club than from inside.  A look down the dark alley gave me the creeps, big time.  Anything could be hiding down there.  I have slightly better night vision than a human, but it was simply impossible to see what was at the end of the alley.

Robert made a move to start walking out of the alley, but I stopped him.  “Hold on, okay?  Just give me two minutes.”  He agreed and I let go of his hand, needing to sort through all the energies inside the club.  I closed my eyes and pushed my senses forward, particularly the one that could tell me where to find a ready source of power.

Humans were small blips in my mind.  They didn’t have enough energy to power someone like me.  My colleagues surrounding the building were lit up like Christmas trees in my senses, since each one possessed their own core of energy, what all supernatural creatures needed to perform our magic.  Robert was well insulated beside me, so he read more as a void.  I also felt the energy of the elemental inside the building.  It was foul.  It had to be something like a violence or a grief elemental.  It didn’t make sense for there to be a grief elemental inside the club, so I was pretty sure it was the former.  Another chill raced down my spine at the thought of a violence elemental and what it could do.

I concentrated on its energy, trying to call out to it like I did with ghosts.  I was trying to get him to manifest outside, and maybe it would return to its master
and we could follow it.  There was one thing that we had all agreed upon: that elemental had been placed there by someone.  It didn’t just appear out of thin air.  It was the wrong place for it.

“Are you trying to draw it out?” Robert asked in a low voice.  He was trying not to break my concentration and at the same time confused at my sudden change of plan.

“I don’t want to engage it inside the ladies’ room.  It might attack a human,” I mumbled and resumed my work.

I felt the shadow shift.  It had felt my energy calling to it, like a moth to a street lamp.  I kept my eyes closed in order to be able to track it better.  I would have to rely on Robert to be my eyes, hoping he would alert me as soon as he saw the elemental come out of the building.

“Abby…” Robert warned me with his voice, putting a hand on my shoulder to bring me out of my small trance.

I opened my eyes and saw the shadow of the elemental emerging through the wall of the club.  What I hadn’t counted on was the second shadow coming out of the building on the other side of the alley, the one I hadn’t been monitoring because it never entered my mind that perhaps the club wasn’t the target, but the alley.

“There’s something in this alley that they’re protecting,” I muttered, looking this way and that.  I needed to get past the elementals and to the other side where the shadows were the most oppressive.

“Can you take care of them?  Can you banish them?” Robert asked, getting ready to cast a spell of his own.  I wasn’t sure what he was going to do about the elementals.  I
, on the other hand, was plenty sure that I could take two elementals at once.

“Don’t you want to send them to a better place?” I asked, gearing up to suck their energy.  I heard Robert chuckle and back away a couple of paces.  “I might need you afterwards if their energy is too polluted, okay?”

“I have you,” he said in his deep voice, and I was filled with courage and purpose: Banish the elementals and go see what was up at the end of the alley.  Piece of cake.

Sucking energy from another being isn’t something I do often, since it actually takes a lot of energy.  The irony isn’t lost on me, trust me.  That’s just the way all lightning sprites are.  However easy it is to steal little bits of energy here and there from a fellow supernatural, it isn’t easy to keep it up for long.

I began pulling at both elementals at once, holding my hands aimed at them, since it was the best way to guide the electricity back into me.  When their energy first hit me it nearly zapped me.  It was so dark and yucky.  And this is why I hate elementals.  Icky specters.  But I continued, taking deep breaths as I tried to ground the energy into the earth below me.  Something happened though.  I began taking in more than I could ground, the electricity suddenly flooding my body.  It was as if the elementals were feeding me on purpose.

Lightning blue sparks started coursing between the elementals and me.  What should have been an invisible process was suddenly lighting up the whole alley.  I felt both elementals push at me, getting closer physically, and feeding me more of what appeared to be never-ending energy.  I
yelled various curses, which did nothing to remedy the situation, nor did they make me feel better.  I tried to disengage, clearly heeding Robert’s pleas to get out of there, but it was impossible.  I didn’t have the elementals.  They had me.

I tried several times to disengage, even gathering enough energy to produce a lightning bolt to throw at the elementals.  It was of no use.  As soon as I tried to shoot it out of my body, the bolt came right back to me, pushing me back a few feet.  I tried to move my arms down or up, but I felt like something was holding my arms in their outstretched position in front of me.

The situation hit critical mass when the sustained bolts of lightning between the elementals and me started spewing plasma everywhere.  It got even worse when the whole atmosphere within the alley became so charged that I could see St. Elmo’s fire spikes coming from the Dumpster nearby.  I yelled at Robert to get the hell out of there.  I was afraid a spark of a St. Elmo’s fire would set him aflame.  I couldn’t bear the thought of him getting hurt. 

I unfurled my wings to see if I could escape by flying, but
I made a mistake.  I might have been able to rectify the situation and flown out of the alley had I continued concentrating.  But I turned to make sure Robert was out of harm’s way behind me, and that’s when both elementals rushed me.  The pain was immediate, and as I felt like I was being lifted off the ground – was it me flying? – I also felt a thousand acts of violence being performed on my body.  The scream that ripped through my throat startled even me, but then I knew no more.

The warmth of water trickling over me was not as soothing as it should have been.  All my body could register was pain.  It was so acute that I felt like throwing up and didn’t really care where it would land.  My stomach did it on its own and heaved, but nothing came out.  I tried to open my eyes, but then closed them again in a grimace.  It had been enough to catch Robert’s deep blue gaze on me.

“Robert it hurts,” I managed to say in a croak.  Even my throat hurt.  My head, my arms, my legs, my…
“My wings!”  My eyes flew open.  My wings hurt so bad, I was sure they weren’t there anymore.

“They will mend, I promise,” Robert said in as soothing a voice as he could manage, but I could hear his worry tingeing the words.

“Where am I?” I managed to ask as I opened my eyes.  I was in a bathtub in a strange bathroom.  I was naked and my arms were draped over the side.  Robert was kneeling on the floor outside of the bathtub, gently pouring warm water over me.

“You’re in my home.  I have to take care of you and this was the best place so I can watch over you during the day,” he explained.  His voice wasn’t soothing anymore, but deep and grave.  “I knew you wouldn’t let anybody but Mark look at your wings, but I hoped that you would let me.”

“Why am I in the tub?”

“You were caked in…” he swallowed before continuing, “blood.  The elementals attacked you and
I healed you.  You will not feel pain for much longer, I promise.”  Robert caressed my hair and then began washing it too.  His cool hands on my skin and hair were tender.  “Do you think you can sit up?  Your face is dirty.”

I managed to sit up with his help, noticing again how very naked I was in front of him.  He was trying his best, and even went so far as to pull a towel from the bar to help me cover up.  I felt my wings fully extended behind me, but I didn’t dare move them.  It was true what Robert had said that the pain was going away, but only from my body.  My wings still hurt. 
A lot.

As if reading my mind, Robert said, “I’ll have to try something else to repair your wings.  They don’t seem to respond the same way as your body did to the healing.”  He finished washing my face and then gave me an awkward look.  “I’ll turn so you can wash between your legs.”

I frowned and looked down at myself, opening my legs and running a hand.  There were only a few inches of soapy water in the tub, but it was enough.  As soon as I washed I saw blood stain the water.  The attack had gone deeper than I imagined.  How come I felt like nothing was wrong?  Other than my wings, that is.

“I’m done,” I said in a low voice, confused and a little scared.  I knew Robert wouldn’t hurt me.  I wasn’t scared of him.  I wasn’t even sure what questions I should be asking, though, and that was confusing.  The attack itself felt like it should be scary, but I couldn’t remember anything after I was lifted off the ground.

Robert returned to me and picked me up gently under my arms, like a little kid.  The towel dropped, of course, because I felt my muscles spasm with pain as soon as he lifted me.  Obviously the healing wasn’t done yet.  With vampire speed he grabbed another towel and covered me.

“Robert,” I took a deep breath, pushing through the pain so I could remain standing.  “I don’t mind if you see me naked, please.  Just hold me up.”  I could feel tears choking me.  I’d never felt so much pain scattered everywhere on my body.  It was as if my whole body was just one big giant stubbed toe.

“I’m sorry, I just…  Of course, of course,” he said and held me tight.  Then he thought better of it and lifted me out of the tub, sitting me on the toilet lid to towel me dry.  I watched him.  His face was full of worry and apprehension and… something else.  Like he was scared of touching my more intimate areas and couldn’t stay clinical through the process.  I didn’t detect desire, more like shyness.

That’s when I first saw my wings.  I’d had to move them so that they didn’t hit the toilet tank, so now they were well within my peripheral vision.  The membrane was ripped to shreds and I felt new tears start to pour.  I was leaking like a faucet.  I’d never seen my wings so damaged.  I couldn’t contain the sob that escaped me as Robert finished drying my feet.  He looked up from his task, covering me again with the damp towel before turning my face to look at him.

“I will mend them, okay?  Will you trust me?” he asked, his blue eyes looking sad.  I nodded and he helped me out of the bathroom and into his bedroom. 

He helped me lie down on my stomach then covered me as far as he could with a warm blanket.  His sheets smelled of detergent and faintly of him.  I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply, letting the scent soothe me.  I heard Robert moving around his room,
but my face was turned away from all his activity.  Besides, I felt sleepy, so I didn’t bother opening my eyes even when I heard him get closer.

“I’m going to put something on your wings to help them heal.  It might hurt where I touch you,” he announced.

“I’ll grin and bear it,” I said, because I would endure pretty much anything now so that my wings would be fine sooner rather than later.

Robert chuckled.  He started caring for my wings, letting me know when I was about to feel a touch or a tug.  He was trying to mend the ripped parts, bring them together.  It was painful, beyond painful.  It was excruciating, and I cried through the whole thing.  I may be a tough cookie, but… nah, I’m not really all that tough.

“Don’t retract them at all tonight, all right?  Sleep with your wings opened and try not to move them,” he advised me and stroked my hair softly.  I turned my face to look at him.  He was so beautiful and I felt so grateful.  My words faltered but he seemed to understand.  He helped me up a little bit to switch out the pillow I’d been using, which was now soaked with tears.