Blood Curse (12 page)

"No, Aria,” he growled. “No . . . no . . . NO!!!” His shout was as mighty as a lion's roar before he disappeared from the room in a blur of motion, leaving her in his bed, naked and burning with shame, although she didn't know why she felt ashamed.

She loved him, she realized suddenly, as pain held her fragile heart in a vice. He was a vampire and she knew very little about him, but she loved him. Her brain could scream at her all it wanted about how stupid she was to even consider loving him, but she couldn't deny what she felt inside. She wanted this man, and the voice in her head had told her sharing his blood was the way to be with him forever. But, obviously, he didn't want to share the rest of his life with her.

Aria buried herself under the sheets and cried into the pillows, her heart aching for Rialto's love and her body aching for his blood.

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Aria woke to find herself still naked, wrapped up in the sheets from Rialto's bed. She didn't have to peek out from beneath the covers to know she was alone. Groaning, she sat up in bed and willed herself not to cry. The pillowcases were still slightly damp with the tears she'd shed the night before after Rialto practically vanished right before her eyes.

"I never could pick them right,” she mumbled to herself while finger-combing her mass of unruly hair.

As the events of the previous two days came rushing back, she shook her head in disbelief. “I slept with a vampire,” she said to herself, needing to speak the words aloud in order to emphasize just how serious an action she'd taken the night before. When she was with Rialto, he was just a man, nothing mystical or supernatural. But when she was away from him, she was able to look at the situation from a different perspective and she instantly realized her mistake. She couldn't have a relationship with a vampire. It couldn't possibly work, so why were her feelings for a stranger so strong?

Because he wasn't a stranger, she conceded. He'd dreamt about her since her birth, and for whatever reason she'd had her fair share of dreams about him. They were linked somehow.

Watch out for the vampire.

Her mother's words rang through her , reminding her how reckless she'd been. Her mother had always had a way of knowing things . . . which made it all the more surprising she'd been murdered. She should have seen her killer coming from a mile away. Mary Ayers had been an excellent judge of character and had the uncanny knack for sensing trouble brewing. She'd even woken in the night screaming the moment Aria's father had been murdered. If her mother had managed to come back in a dream to warn her about the vampire, she'd do well to listen.

Still, his rejection hurt. Aria looked at the clock sitting on the nightstand and saw it was nearly noon. She wondered where Rialto had escaped to. He was probably sleeping now, possibly in another room at the same hotel or maybe he'd needed to get completely away from her.

She walked over to the small bathroom, trying to ignore the dull throbbing between her legs which served as a reminder of the passion the night before, a reminder of just how long it had been since she'd trusted anyone enough to allow them inside. And no, it wasn't just her body that Rialto had entered, but her heart and soul as well.

"Leave it to me to fall for a frigging vampire who I barely even know,” Aria grumbled to herself before she looked into the bathroom mirror and gasped, shocked by her own reflection. She raised her hand to her face and ran her fingers over the newly darkened skin. It looked as though she had been in a tanning bed, her skin now slightly darker than it reached in midsummer. “What in the world?"

She continued to stare at herself in wonder, trying to figure out how she'd darkened so dramatically overnight. All she had done was sleep and have sex with Rialto. And . . . she had tasted his blood. She gasped, recalling that part of the evening. Heat grew inside her as she remembered its taste as it spilled over her tongue, the way it seemed to empower her more with every sip.

She ran her fingers over her neck while she looked at it in the mirror, but if Rialto had bitten her, there was no evidence to be found there. The healing properties in Rialto's saliva would have erased any punctures. But she remembered the feel of his teeth scraping over her neck before he'd fled. She'd drunk from him, and he had quite possibly drunk from her. Was that why her skin was darker?

Oh, dear god, had Rialto turned her into a vampire

Aria ran back into the room and pulled on her clothes, then paused just as she started to run outside. If she was a vampire, could she handle the sun? Rialto said the UV rays would destroy them. She thought about sticking her hand out a window just to see, but fear stopped her. She didn't feel any different except, maybe, a bit stronger, and that wasn't by any large degree. She ran back to the bathroom mirror and checked her teeth. No fangs. Of course, Rialto didn't have visible fangs most of the time either.

"So you drank his blood, hmm?"

Aria jumped at the sound of Seta's voice and whirled around to find the elegant beauty standing just beyond the bathroom's entrance, a knowing smile plastered to her face. Realization slowly dawned. “It was you I heard last night!"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"It is your destiny to be one of us, to be with my son.” Seta walked to where Aria stood and held her chin with the tips of her long fingers. “This is the real you, Aria. The blood has revealed the way you are meant to be seen by the world. You are so beautiful when you don't try to hide from what you are."

"I'm not hiding."

"I'm a witch, Aria. You may lie to yourself, but I see the truth. I have seen images of your past. I know your mother encouraged you to stay out of the sun and cover yourself in excessive amounts of sunscreen in order to appear white."

"I had to,” Aria explained, coming to her mother's defense. “In the town we lived in, racism was so bad it was easier to pretend we were both white."

"And why didn't that change when you came to Baltimore? You should not be ashamed of what you are."

"I'm not ashamed,” Aria stated as she exited the bathroom to sit on the bed. “It's just that, well, the areas I've lived in haven't been ideal for someone like me. Passing myself off as white was just easier than dealing with the scorn of being biracial."

Seta gently shook her head. “But it was wrong. I don't blame you. I have already seen your past, and I know you were taught to hide this very special part of yourself. In fact, it probably saved your life while you lived in that dreadful little town. Now, however, it is time to accept who and what you are. Your destiny is beckoning."

Aria eyed her skeptically. “And just what is my destiny?"

"You are to join with my son and save the world."

Aria started to laugh, then bit her tongue to stop the sound from emerging when she saw the seriousness in Seta's eyes. “How could I help save the world, and what would I be saving it from?"

Seta flinched and turned her head toward the door. She muttered something too low for Aria to hear and wrung her hands nervously.

"What is it, Seta?” Aria asked in concern.

Seta frowned as she returned her attention to Aria. “It's Rialto. The stubborn fool knows I'm talking to you, and he is rushing over here right now, in broad daylight."

"In daylight!” Aria's chest contracted, and her heart felt as if it would burst with panic. “Won't daylight kill him?"

"It could, but he's moving quickly and he's protected himself. He stayed at your apartment last night instead of renting another room here."

"Why would he risk being out in daylight?” Aria asked, too concerned with his safety to care that he'd stayed in her home without her permission.

"Because he doesn't want you to know the things I want to tell you, so I must be quick. He's almost here.” She spoke rapidly. “Aria, Rialto feels strongly for you and wants to protect you from your destiny, but it isn't necessary. You were meant to be one of —"

The door slammed open before Seta could finish her sentence. Rialto appeared in the doorway, wearing the same clothes he'd worn the day before, and his head was bowed down like a bull about to charge. “That's enough, Mother."

He looked awful, yet Aria couldn't help the rush of heat that overtook her as she watched him enter the room and shut the door. His clothes were wrinkled, his body rigid, and his dark, angry eyes were red-rimmed as if he hadn't rested in days. And he smelled overwhelmingly of coconut.

"I see you found Aria's supply of sunscreen,” Seta commented. Then, to Aria's mortification, she said, “Did I not teach you better manners than to run out on a woman after sleeping with her?"

The tense silence that filled the room fueled Aria's anxiety. She wanted to run to Rialto, despite the tactless way he'd left her before, but as he glared at his mother, the burning fury in his eyes warned her to stay back. He had yet to even acknowledge her presence and she had the feeling he didn't intend to.

"What I do and who I do it with doesn't concern you, Mother."

"In this case it concerns all of us."

He snorted. “Says an old story."

"It's true, Rialto. Stop fighting your fate."

"I will not be with her in that way!” Rialto accentuated his declaration by pointing a finger straight at Aria. “Once we find her mother's killer, I'll make sure I never see her again."

Aria gasped at the same time Seta's face reddened in anger. Rialto still wouldn't look at her, as though she were too unworthy for that much of a gesture. If he didn't want her, he could have said so, but to dismiss her so thoughtlessly in front of another person was a complete humiliation. She searched her mind for some response, something that would let Rialto know that she didn't need him anyway, but she couldn't think of a lie. Her entire body shook with the pain of his confession. He'd only wanted her for one night of sex, and he'd even had to be coaxed into that. In that moment he made her feel lower than any man from her past had ever managed because her ancestry had nothing to do with his behavior. He'd known all along what she was. He simply didn't want
her
.

Aria stormed from the room before she did something she'd regret the rest of her life, like cry in front of the bastard.

"Are you satisfied now?” Rialto asked his mother as the door slammed shut. Aria's pain washed over him, but he resisted the urge to chase after her.

"
Satisfied?
How dare you hurt her like that! Have I not raised you better?"

"You didn't start raising me until I was twenty-nine years old,” he stated, knowing the comment would hurt his mother deeply. It was unfair and despicable for him to purposely hurt her, and maybe even childish, but she'd forced him to hurt Aria without a second thought. He couldn't stop himself from lashing out. “I'm sorry if I haven't been a good little vampire."

"How could you say such a hurtful thing? You know I was always there watching over you.” Her face fell and her eyes were haunted with pain. Rialto almost apologized. Almost. His own pain was still too raw to forgive so quickly.

"How could you force me to do what I just did?"

"I didn't—"

"You would have told her that crap about fate and gotten her hopes up that we could be together. She's in love with me. Damn it to hell, she's tasted my blood!"

"I know."

He studied her through narrowed eyes. “How do you know what happened between us? I know she wouldn't tell you. Dammit! You were listening in, weren't you?"

"Don't make it sound as if I'm some kind of voyeur. It's not like I was watching the two of you."

Rialto roared a string of obscenities and stormed past his mother, slamming the bathroom door closed behind him. He bent over the sink and turned on the taps, then stared at his youthful reflection in the mirror. What he wouldn't give to be normal. Or dead. Physically, he had been twenty-nine years old for more than a century and a half. Inside, he didn't know what he was, but he was definitely too old to worry about his mother catching him in the sack with a woman. Unfortunately, his mother, the vampire witch, was always in his damn head, feeling what he felt. Privacy was a word unknown by the woman. Had she felt the intensity of the sensations which had steamrolled through him the night before? He cringed at the thought.

He grabbed a rag and began washing the sunscreen off his face and hands. The tropical coconut smell tormented him, reminding him of the way Aria had smelled as she writhed beneath him not that many hours ago. He never should have given in to his desire, never should have allowed himself to be in a position to hurt her.

She was perfection. Her smell, the silky smoothness of her unblemished skin, the passion that blazed in her eyes. The pure, intoxicating flavor of her blood.

He'd only suckled a few precious drops before her essence slammed into him, overwhelming him with its strength. He had been tempted to sate his appetite by plunging his teeth deep into her flesh, drinking from her until she ran dry, but thankfully, an image of Antonia flashed through his mind, reminding him of why he couldn't take all her blood. He cared too much for her to let her die, so if he'd taken too much blood he would have attempted to change her over, and that in itself would be her destruction.

So he'd run. He had been dressed and out of the room before he could process what he was doing, fear taking over his body and sending him fleeing into the night. But, he hadn't had many night hours left, and hunger had gnawed at his insides, sending his body into violent tremors. He'd physically ached for another taste of Aria's blood, but he hadn't allowed himself to go back to her. The hunger had grown until he couldn't think of anything but fulfilling his thirst, so he'd run to an area of town known for its abundant supply of prostitutes.

He'd grabbed one without looking and took her behind a Dumpster in a nearby alley. For a moment he'd been tempted to sate his other desires with her, but he'd known she wouldn't satisfy him. In nearly two centuries of living he had bedded many women, but he'd never felt anything as earth shattering and explosive as what he'd felt with Aria. So he'd only drunk from the prostitute, hoping to ease the hunger inside him that had become a deafening roar in his ears, blocking out everything else around him. But the hunger hadn't gone away.