Love is Darkness (A Valerie Dearborn Novel) (13 page)

In that moment, she would have left it all behind.

“That is deeply
unamusing
. Does it really matter, Val? Why threaten to come after us? You haven't before. You don't want to know what we—screw it. I’m outta here.”

He’s going to leave!

“
Jack,” she
said,
voice stricken. What the hell had happened to make him so antagonistic? His eyes dropped to her lips and his gaze fixed on her mouth. It made her stomach tighten.

“You want fun, not family. You have
never
chosen us.”

She'd done it; pushed him too far, made him lose control a little and that was even more tempting than anything else. Val had imagined him taking her in a darkened fury more times that she liked to count.

He never touched her but part of her kept hoping he would. That the emotional outburst would turn physical. As though he could read her mind, his lips curved into a half smile that was more sneer than happy.

“You have a good night, Val. We'll let you know when we get back.” He stood and she stepped back. He was a full head taller than her and so imposing it was instinctual to move out of his way.

With quiet despair, she kept her mouth closed. She wouldn't do anything, dammit. Wouldn't wish him well, wouldn't say goodbye and sure as hell wouldn't apologize. All she was doing was living her life. He'd rejected
her.
What did he have to be
pissy
about?

But there was another reason she didn't want to say goodbye to him. She didn't want to jinx it. If things were an emotional mess she knew he'd survive. It was a stupid and irrational way to behave. Crap, it was probably just an excuse to not fix things. But she did believe it, at least a little bit. Happy people died. If he had unfinished business and anger, he'd come back to her.

Anger socked her in the throat and she reached out her hand to his chest, pushing him back down to the bar stool so that they were the same height. He let her, she knew that. Jack could have stopped her, or even resisted a little, but he wasn’t.

“We are not done. So what? You had a few days off and thought you'd come to see how I was doing? You don't have a Google account?”

“I see how you are doing. Moving a bit fast, aren't we? Helpful tip, hard to get is
actually
a turn on.”

Val threw her head back and laughed, her heart breaking with each forced sound. “Please!
Please
, tell me that you are chastising me for flirting with that guy?

“His tongue was down your throat. Maybe I'm a prig, but that's not flirting.”

“You are such a jackass. You are not my father. You just want to keep me in a cocoon. I'm twenty one now. Stop checking on me
like
this.” Even as she said the words she wanted to take them back.
Do check up on me,
she wanted to tell him.
Or else I know I'll never see you again and I like knowing that you will at some point show up
. But she kept her mouth shut.

“Your father worries about you,” Jack's deep voice became husky with sincerity.

“Then where is he? Life is fleeting and where is he?”

Jack shook his head and she could feel his disgust. “He saves people. We save people. You go have a drink and screw your English boy-toy. Christ, Val.” He didn't look back at her, staring resolutely towards the door, and she knew he was dying to get away from her.

Val wanted to slap him. He always made her feel guilty and small. Grabbing the envelope from him, she stalked away.

Ian was waiting for her, clearly with questions about the man she'd talked to at the bar.
No more questions
. She went back to Ian and grabbed him by his shirt, pulling him in for another kiss. He looked surprised as she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him hard. He pulled back a little and gentled the kiss. A brush of lips over hers, instead of the bruising grind she'd greeted him with. Relaxing, she forced each contracted muscle to not tense over Jack. The kiss was slow and had the excitement of newness. When she came up for air, Jack was gone.

************

Jack left the pub, his blood boiling as usual. What a spoiled brat! He walked silently through Hampstead to the Northern Line tube stop. The flight left at six am, back to America.
Not soon enough.
He'd done what he was supposed to do and given her the information. He'd checked on her and seen her. Val was fine. Shit, she was better than fine: she was going to slut her way through London for the next year. Maybe he'd leave that part out when he saw Nate.

He got to Heathrow at one in the morning. He checked in and sat down in a chair, his back to the wall, so that he could see everyone as they came towards the gate. Closing his eyes, he tried to sleep.

Someone in his line of work could sleep anywhere, under any circumstances. He rested his head back against the chair, crossed his arms, and sprawled his legs. He tried to think of nothing. Clear his mind and sleep but he kept seeing her in his mind. She was gorgeous.
So fucking gorgeous.
Not in an obvious way. She was probably considered pretty by others, but to him she was like an inferno.

Tonight, she'd worn jeans that looked like they had been painted on they were so tight. Jack remembered the flash of generous cleavage as she'd leaned over him, daring him to look at her. He scrubbed his hand over his jaw, wanting distance from the memory of her body.

Who was he kidding? He was too tired and too lonely to fight his memories tonight anyway. Thoughts of her hand on his thigh. Her breath in his ear, made him hard. More memories came to him unbidden, her straddling him, her-

Christ.

He thought of the night before she left for college.
 
Just once, he'd wanted to give in to her. After all those years of her looking at him with adoration and lust, while he feigned ignorance.

Why was it so hard to keep her away and not want her? Just last week a vampire had attacked him outside of his home. That was not the life for Valerie. She'd been through enough and worked hard to be on her own.

In a way, maybe he was her weakness too. So he kept himself away from her. Now he saw her as little as possible. It was too painful. Especially after he'd held her, kissed her, felt her shudder in climax against him. God, he wanted her so much. But, he wanted revenge... and they both knew that he wanted revenge just a little bit more than he wanted her.

And yet, in his weaker moments and in his dreams, he'd thought of her thighs over him. Val on top of him, clasping his hands, but gripping him, pulling him up and towards her
—
 
this
is not restful
. He loved that hair of hers, so thick and rich. A hundred browns.
Dark hair that glinted in the sun.

Her eyes drew him too. He could look into those dark eyes forever. See
himself
reflected in them, chocolate brown with gold flecks. When he looked into her eyes, he knew she loved him back. Or at least she had. She appeared to have no trouble moving on now. What a cluster fuck they were in.

He tried to push these thoughts away, focus on the mission in Africa but instead he dwelled on Val and Nate. The man wouldn't even try with her. He claimed that he didn't want to draw attention to her. Whenever Jack had to go see Val, Nate made sure he was somewhere on the other side of the world drawing attention to himself.
Usually, pissing on Lucas's doorstep.
Since half the world was his doorstep they had gotten away with it. They planned each attack thoroughly, planned with contingencies and they had succeeded and lived this long because of their caution.

The mere thought of Val trying to do what they did made his blood run cold. She wasn't calm enough or methodical enough to keep herself safe. She acted first and thought later. So why did he always taunt her, want to convince her to stay with them?

With him?

Because he was a selfish bastard and he wanted to know that he meant something to her. He needed to know that if they died someone would think of him and remember him as family or as
hers
.

He needed another drink. Jack didn't drink very often but he was in the airport and it was almost daylight. He was safe for today. So he'd drink and torture himself with memories of all the times he'd let her go.

Chapter 6

London, England

Two months ago

Valerie sat alone at a small square table that had a nice view of the High Street. Her three hour long Monday class was over and she'd decided that staying conscious during an incredibly boring lecture on Ptolemaic History deserved, maybe even
required
, a nice lunch as a reward.

Cafe Rouge was near her dorm. It was a chain restaurant that Val feared she liked more than it deserved. Everything was black, white, or red and pictures of burlesque dancers, cats and bicycles decorated the walls. The decorations were meant to be French, but Valerie suspected that the decorator thought this was how people expected a French cafe to look, rather than how one actually did.

The waiter, a stinky and authentic French import, was busy talking at the bar and had been ignoring Valerie's bring-me-my-check-or-die stare for at least five minutes. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out her wallet, deciding the flash of cash might help speed things up.

As she righted herself, she saw a man sitting at her table across from her as though he’d been there the whole time.

Oh shit!
Her bag dropped to the floor in shock.

“Lucas,” Val said in a hush, like saying his name too loudly would give him power—or wake her up from a dream. What could he want? She lifted her hand, nervously tucking a strand of long brown hair behind her ear.

His eyes—a blue so Arctic and cold that it could give freezer burn—
 
followed the movement, shifting ever so slightly to watch her hand before dipping down infinitesimally, and she just
knew
he was looking at the pulse of her wrist. Was that the equivalent of a guy checking her out? Scoping out her pulse? She was
fucked.

“It’s daytime!” she said, like it wouldn’t have occurred to him that he could burst into flame at any moment.

“A benefit of my longevity,” He said quietly.

“Can other vampires come out during the day?” She looked around the restaurant as though she might see a huge group of vampires dining on blood pudding and eyeing the patrons hungrily.

“No.”

How old is this guy?

Hastily, she looked away from his face, not wanting to be caught by his gaze
—
 
again
. Everything she knew about him rushed through her mind like a tidal wave. Ever since he’d saved her she’d tried to learn about him. She didn’t know
much,
just that he was rumored to be well over a thousand years old. And back in his mortal days he’d been a warrior. He was intensely private and no one knew anything about him.