Wanton With a Vampire (4 page)

Alek knew he was in for a lecture from Ivy,
but he didn’t give a damn what she said. Trish was staying with
him. His deplorable behavior during dinner had played a big role in
her distraction when she’d left the restaurant. He’d also known
about the broken heel on her shoe, and he should have walked her to
her car. There was no getting around the fact that if he hadn’t
been thinking with his stupid dick, Trish wouldn’t be in a hospital
bed.

Now that Trish had some psychic ability, his
family might change their stance on her being involved with one of
them. Of course, since he wasn’t the type of man to have anything
more than casual affairs, he still needed to keep his distance from
her. Nothing good could come from him sleeping with Trish. Maybe if
he told himself that enough times he’d start believing it.

“You’d better start believing it,” Ivy said
when they got to a small waiting area with vending machines.

Apparently, like the other men in his family,
he projected his thoughts very well, which meant Ivy could read
most of them— a fact he often forgot.

“I’m just trying to do the right thing,” he
said in a tired voice, rubbing his chin with one hand.

“Then encourage Trish to go home with me. I
can help her with what she’s going through,” Ivy said.

Alek knew she was right, but he couldn’t do
it. A big part of his inability to allow anyone else to take care
of Trish was guilt, but he wasn’t stupid enough to believe that was
all of it. “No,” he said and didn’t miss the fact that he sounded
like a petulant child. “She’ll be more comfortable in her own home,
and she’ll be closer to her friends there, as well.”

“And closer to you?” Ivy asked with her arms
crossed in front of her chest. “I saw the way you looked at her at
the restaurant. She doesn’t need that right now.”

“What do you think I’m going to do, Ivy? Do
you think I’m going to seduce her while she’s recovering from being
hit by a car?” Christ, he was getting hard from the mention of
seducing Trish, making him realize Ivy might be right about it
being a mistake for him to stay with Trish. Even after admitting
that to himself, he wasn’t going to let her leave with Ivy.

“While Trish is trying to understand her
newly discovered talents, it would be best if she stayed away from
any of the unattached males in your family. You all have a bad
history of assuming a woman who displays psychic abilities is yours
for the taking,” Ivy reminded him.

Something in Ivy’s tone put him on alert.
“Has someone been harassing you?”

“No, but that’s only because they’re afraid
of your brother,” Ivy said with a snort.

Alek’s oldest brother, Roman, was head of the
Draksel family and could be more than a little scary when he wanted
to. Actually, he was pretty scary when he wasn’t trying to be.
Roman had recently discovered that Ivy was his granddaughter from
his first marriage. He’d thought his first wife had died while she
was pregnant. Instead, she’d been taken from him and had given
birth to a daughter Roman had never met. The female children, a
phenomenon they hadn’t believed possible until recently, didn’t
live nearly as long as the males, so Roman had missed out on many
granddaughters. To say he was overprotective of his newly
discovered granddaughters would be a huge understatement.

“You have my word that Trish will be under my
protection. I won’t try to seduce her, nor will I allow anyone else
to do so while she’s recovering. I admit that I very much want to
seduce her, but I am capable of behaving myself, despite what my
behavior last night may suggest. We only have a few unattached
males in the area, and I don’t believe any of them will be a
problem. Isaiah is avoiding women as much as he can. Drew is still
in love with your sister, much to Aiden’s annoyance. As for
Nathaniel, he treats Trish like a little sister. That just leaves
me, and I’ll keep my hands to myself while she’s recovering.”

Ivy had to notice that he hadn’t promised to
keep his hands to himself after Trish recovered, but she still gave
a reluctant nod. “Fine, but it’s her choice.”

Trish was staring intently at the call button
on her bed when they got back to her room. Alek knew she was
avoiding looking anywhere she might see ghosts or visions, or
whatever it was she was seeing. The lost expression in her eyes
tugged at Alek’s heart.

“I wish my mom was here,” she said with a
shaky smile. “Although, it is nice that you both want to take care
of me,” she hastily added before meeting Alek’s eyes. “I’d like to
go home, if your offer to stay with me is still good.”

“Of course,” he said solemnly.

Ivy wasn’t happy about the situation, and she
was making no effort to hide her feelings. “I’ll come by to talk to
you about what’s going on with this new ability you’ve picked up. I
have to check my calendar to see when I have time.”

“It’ll be just like my childhood,” Trish
said, but as soon as the words left her mouth, her brow furrowed in
concentration.

“What is it?” Ivy asked.

Trish shook her head. “I’m not sure. Until I
said that, I didn’t even remember going to therapy as a young
child. Now, it’s like this hazy memory that I can’t seem to grab
hold of.”

Ivy squeezed her hand. “Try not to worry
about it.”

Soon after, the doctor came in to confirm
that Trish would not be left alone before leaving her with a nurse
to handle the discharge papers and instructions.

Much to Trish’s obvious annoyance, the
hospital insisted that she be taken out to the curb in a
wheelchair. When Alek pulled up to the pickup area, Trish’s
expression was a charming cross between annoyed and
embarrassed.

The young nurse leaned forward to speak
quietly to Trish while Alek parked the car. Of course, with the
windows open, he heard her. “Your fiancé has been worried about
you. Some of the other nurses were heartbroken when he said you
were engaged.”

Trish snorted to cover her laugh. “Yes, he’s
something else.”

Alek was glad she didn’t correct the nurse.
He’d made up the story so he wouldn’t have to keep using mind
control to convince everyone it was okay for him to be in Trish’s
room. That sort of thing took a lot of energy, which meant he
needed to feed on the energy of humans more frequently. While he
had no problem doing that under normal circumstances, he didn’t
want to be forced to wander around the hospital looking for someone
he could safely take energy from. If he was being honest with
himself, he also liked the idea of everyone believing Trish was
his, even if it was only for a little while.

Trish was loaded into Alek’s car, where she
promptly closed her eyes, probably to avoid seeing any of the
things that shouldn’t be there.

“Don’t worry, honey,” Alek said as he
squeezed her thigh in an effort to offer physical comfort. “I’ll
have you home in no time.”

“Alek?” Her voice was so soft, the roar of
the engine nearly drowned it out.

“What is it, honey?” he asked.

“Do you think this is the head injury and not
some psychic ability?” she asked, sounding hopeful.

Alek let out a sigh. “I wish I could say yes,
because I know how much you want to hear that. I know this is
scaring you, and I want to tell you it will all go away in a day or
two.”

“But you’d be lying,” she finished for
him.

“Yeah,” he said before giving her thigh a
squeeze.

“Wanna hear something crazy?” she asked with
the first genuine smile he’d seen that day. She didn’t wait for his
answer. “I was jealous of my friends for being different. I felt
like I was being left behind. Now, I’m kind of wishing I could go
back to what I had before.”

What could he say to that? Her reaction was
perfectly normal. Hell, she wasn’t freaking out, so she was
handling things better than most people would. “Are you having
second thoughts about not going home with Ivy?”

Trish laughed. “Absolutely not! I need to
feel as normal as possible. Well, I guess this will be normal for
me from now on, so I may as well get used to it. No, I’m not just
going to get used to it. I’m going to find a way to make this work
for me.”

“You’re incredible,” Alek said in awe.
“Anyone else would be complaining about how bad they have it. You
are already trying to figure out how this is going to be a good
change in your life.”

“I died, Alek,” she said, cringing when she
heard her own words. “Okay, that sounds really bad. Maybe I won’t
use that phrase again. Still, my point is that I spent a lot of
time worrying about stupid stuff. Scary psychic stuff or not, I
don’t want to waste any more of my life.”

The first thing Trish did when they walked in
the front door of the condo was close all the blinds. No way did
she want to see what was outside, or what used to be outside. Alek
was silently watching her like he wasn’t quite sure what he should
be doing, but who could really blame him for being uncomfortable
around a crazy woman?

Trish wanted to laugh because she was kind of
wishing she was crazy. Unfortunately, she knew no medication was
going to make the things she saw go away.

“Are you hungry?” Alek asked.

According to the clock, it was a little past
noon, so she should be hungry, but she wasn’t yet. Shaking her head
turned out to be a huge mistake, and Trish closed her eyes tightly
as if she could block out the pain.

“Do you need a pain pill?” he asked and
started to rummage through the bag they’d gotten from the hospital.
She’d need to fill a prescription, but the hospital had taken pity
on her and sent her home with five pills so she wouldn’t have to
venture into the pharmacy right away.

“Yes,” she admitted, even though she hated
taking pain medicine.

“I’ll fix you something to eat, and then you
can take a pain pill,” he said decisively.

“I’m really not hungry,” she insisted as she
settled onto the sofa, cuddling one of the throw pillows.

“You didn’t eat a thing at the restaurant
last night,” he argued. “All you did was push a salad around your
plate. You did the same with your breakfast at the hospital this
morning, and these pills say you shouldn’t take them on an empty
stomach. I’ll be back with food in a few minutes.”

When Alek disappeared into the kitchen, Trish
once again marveled at the fact that the kitchen was closed off
from the rest of the condo. Most condos had open kitchens, but not
this one.

“Now, I’ve really gone insane,” she muttered
to herself. “Only a crazy woman thinks about the design of a condo
when a sexy man is in her kitchen cooking for her. Lyd would be
picturing him in there cooking naked. Of course, that could damage
essential parts, and I don’t own an apron. Maybe he could cook
shirtless.”

Her insane musings inspired her to text
Lydia.

Why is it considered so sexy for a man to
cook naked? Wouldn’t his dangly parts get injured that way?

Lydia’s response came back quickly.

LMAO! What pain meds are you on?

Trish smiled because Lydia was right to be
surprised. It was an out of character question, and her next text
was even more out of character.

I guess it’s safer while his parts are
dangly. A man is much more likely to get injured if they’re not
dangly while he cooks naked in the kitchen.

Lydia’s response was a little delayed.

OMG! I almost peed myself. Is there a naked
man cooking in the kitchen of my condo? If there is, I demand to be
invited over to watch since it’s still my kitchen.

Trish responded.

Sadly, there is no naked man in the kitchen.
Just wanted to let you know I’m home safe and sound. Can you let
Caitlin know? I’m not sure I’m up to being harassed by her
today.

Most people felt Caitlin was a little bitchy,
but Trish understood that a lot of it was a coping mechanism
Caitlin had developed to keep people from getting close. For years,
Caitlin had been trying to keep her empath abilities from
surfacing. Now, the bitchiness was just part of Caitlin’s
personality, and for some crazy reason, it was worse when Caitlin
was worried.

Lydia responded after a short delay, probably
because she knew it was pretty unlikely Trish would make it an
entire night without a visit from Caitlin.

Sure thing, sweetie. Take care and call me if
you need anything.

She set her phone on the coffee table just
before Alek came out with a grilled cheese sandwich and a glass of
water.

“You didn’t have many beverage options,” he
explained. “I didn’t want to bring you anything with caffeine
because you need to take a nap.”

Rolling her eyes, Trish tried hard to avoid
snapping at Alek for being bossy. “I usually drink water. Thank you
for cooking for me.”

With a day’s growth of stubble and
finger-combed hair, Alek looked exhausted. After she’d eaten a
couple of bites of her sandwich, Alek finally handed her a pain
pill, which she reluctantly took.

“Alek, you’re ready to drop. How much sleep
did you get last night?”

His shrug was probably the only answer she
was going to get on the subject.

“Why don’t you go take a nap? You don’t have
to stay up and babysit me,” she assured him.

“I’ll get a little sleep when you’re ready
for your nap,” he said and sat across from her.

“I just took one of those stupid pills, so
I’m sure that won’t be long.” The pills made her sleepy, which was
one of the reasons she hated taking them. “I’ll be fine for a
little while on my own.”

“I’d rather stay here in case you need me,”
he insisted.

“What happened wasn’t your fault,” she
assured him.

“Not my fault?” he asked with a humorless
laugh. “You practically ran out of that restaurant because I was
acting like an ass, so I’d say that makes your accident my
fault.”