Deathless Love (20 page)

“Take my place,” Roxanna hissed at Fox, who obediently took the dagger from her hand and held it to Kate's throat, as if he'd never known her. “You,” she said to the other vampire, “hold him down. Fox, if he makes one move, any move at all, you kill the girl. Got it?”

“Got it,” Fox agreed.

“Fox,” Kate pleaded. “Foxy, it's me.”

The other vampire kicked the backs of Dom's knees so he knelt in front of Roxanna. She smiled a slow, dreadful smile. “Dominic DeParma,” she purred. “I've been looking all over for you.”

“I'm right here,” he drawled, looking at Roxanna, but keeping his attention on Fox and Kate in his periphery.

Roxanna put her high heeled boot on the middle of his chest and pressed him down on his back. “Hold him,” she ordered. She straddled Dom's chest and bit into his neck. Kate made some kind of involuntary noise and he looked over at her. They locked eyes. Hers were wide but completely lucid. This plan of his wasn't going that well. Sacrificing himself hadn't saved Kate or Fox. His only hope was that Stella would make a reappearance in time.

A knock sounded on the hotel door. “Security,” a male voice called.

Roxanna released her hold on his throat. “Take care of it,” she hissed at her minion, his blood dripping from her fangs. She bit into him again.

“Dom,” Kate whispered.

He blinked his acknowledgment.

“Remember what you showed me? With the drops of blood on my hand? It's your mind that controls what your body does, right? Your belief?”

He was getting lightheaded—Roxanna was drinking deeply. He didn't think she could drain him all at once, but there was a chance this was it for him. He blinked several times to keep Kate in focus. What had she been saying?

“Use your mind,” she was pleading with him. “Use it. Or talk to God the way you do. Anything,” Kate's voice broke and her eyes filled with tears.

The taste of blood was in his mouth. He closed his lips to create the suction and began to drink deeply, desperate for the nourishment after being drained.

“Dom!” Kate's voice was desperate, calling him back. Right. He was drinking Roxanna's blood. She was turning him, too. And Kate was telling him he had a choice, here. He closed his eyes and sent a spire of energy up to God. Up to the spiritual sun that he never saw anymore. And he held his intent firmly, asking for assistance from that higher realm:
I will remain the same
. This blood will remain inert.

There was a great convulsing. His body jerking and hopping on the floor. Roxanna was off of him now, standing over, watching with a look of satisfaction. He took it in without releasing his clear intention:
only my essence will remain
. He could almost feel the blood cells surging within him—there was a sense of chaos in them as matter and energy warred.

His body continued convulsing. He heard Kate softly sobbing. He sensed Stella was somewhere nearby. His vision had gone black, his head felt like it would split. He held his intent:
my true essence will remain.
The blood cells stilled. They held his intent. His vision slowly cleared. He sat up and vomited on the carpet next to him.

Roxanna laughed and waved her hand at Fox. “You can let her go. He's mine now,” she said with a wide smile. “You all are.”

He made a big deal about crawling up onto his hand and knees and hurling again, this time on the body of the vampire with a stake still in his chest. Then in one fluid movement, he grasped the stake, pulled it out and whirled, plunging it straight through Roxanna's back and into her heart. She never saw it coming.

Fox was on him again, fighting with an intensity and speed that made it difficult to defend himself. Stella materialized, fighting the other vampire. She finished him with a war-cry then captured Fox in a choke-hold.

“What do we do with him?” Stella's eyes were wide and pleading. She never, ever showed fear, but he could see it in her now. She didn't want to kill Fox. Neither of them did. And she was begging him to save him.

“Hold him tight,” he said grimly. He caught sight of the duct tape they'd used to bind Kate and he snatched it up. “I'll hold him, you wrap his wrists and ankles,” he instructed, taking over trying to contain the struggling vampire. Stella made quick work of it. They shoved Fox down in a chair.

“Unbind her,” he barked at Stella, indicating Kate.

He put his hands on Fox's shoulders. Then adjusted himself so he could put one hand on his chest and one hand behind, on his back. He felt a current of energy flow between the two hands. He sent up a spire again. The blackness parted this time and he felt a stream of light flowing down into the top of his head. Tears ran down his face at the grace of it. He made his request. His intention that Fox's essence be restored to him. He felt nothing change.
Oh God.
Why not? Was it too late? He tried again. He changed his intent—to clear Roxanna's blood and essence from Fox. This time he felt movement. That same sense of chaos he'd felt in his own body. A sickness in his belly. Fox convulsed under his hands. He held them steady, held his intent steady. After what felt like a long time but was probably more like ten minutes, he felt the energy smooth out again.

Fox was weeping. Sobbing actually. He didn't know how to verify that Fox was truly himself again, but there was no question in his mind that he was. He grasped Fox's head and pulled it against his chest, holding him tightly as he wept, stroking his head.

Stella and Kate were crying too. Kate knelt at Fox's feet and held his hands in her own while Stella cut the tape that bound him. They huddled together like that—the four of them all hugging and weeping. Then he scooped Kate up into his arms and carried her to the bed where he cradled her in his lap and rocked her like a baby. Not that she needed it—it was for his own comfort.

“
Mi dispiace, amore mio.
I brought this on you. I'm so sorry.”

Stella had dropped into Fox's lap, and they curled in together, giving and receiving the same comfort.

“You saved me,” Dom murmured. Then he couldn't help but smile. “You were brilliant. You saved us all.”

* * *

She slept the entire night in Dom's arms, with him alternately applying and removing ice packs to her face, staring at her bruises with grim concern. He had tried to take her to the hospital in case she needed x-rays or stitches, but she refused. They had argued back and forth about it.

In the end, he used his intuition to analyze her. He had just held her head in his two hands and closed his eyes. Then he had opened them and said there was no fracture to her orbital bone. Fox had murmured “are you okay?” to Dom afterward, but he had just shrugged with a little smile. “I guess so,” he'd said with a surprised tone.

Her face really did hurt, so after showering and eating breakfast, she took three ibuprofen and crawled back in bed next to her sleeping vampire to watch movies until he woke. When he did, he scooped her back into the circle of his arms and inspected her face with the same concern he'd shown all night. “How do you feel,
bambina
?”

She tried to smile, but winced at the pain. “Happy to be back in your bed.”

For some reason that put a wistful look on his face and he got up abruptly to use the restroom and take a shower. Upstairs, they found Stella, Fox and Randolph in the kitchen, eating a delicious stir-fry of chicken and vegetables over brown rice. Stella urged her and Dom to join them so they filled their  plates and sat down.

“So how did you do it?” Randolph asked Dom with a broad smile.

“Kate told me how,” Dom said softly, looking at her with a loving look. Then he shrugged. “I just refused to allow the change to happen. It was sheer will.”

Randolph looked at him like he didn't believe it. “And how'd you change Fox back?”

Dom considered for a moment. “These are things, Randolph, that there aren't good words to describe. It seemed to me that I felt into his body and then asked his cells to change back. Whether that's the reality of how it happened, I couldn't say. Perhaps it was just that I said a prayer and God answered.”

Randolph raised his eyebrows at that. “God, eh?” He shook his head like he didn't believe in any such thing.

“What I felt was that I was two people trapped in the same body,” Fox said. “My real self was still in there, thinking, seeing, but unable to act or speak for myself. And then there was the self that belonged to Roxanna. I couldn't break past that self.” He turned to Kate, “When I was holding the knife to your throat, the real me was still there, but I just couldn't stop myself from doing Roxanna's bidding. I couldn't stop myself from attacking Dom, and the whole time the real me was praying you two wouldn't drive a stake through my heart,” he said, looking ruefully from Stella to Dom.

Stella shook her head. “There's no way we would do that.”

He raised his eyebrows, challenging that statement. “You would have if you had to.”

“It would have killed us and you know it,” Stella said, dead serious.

“Of course I know it,” Fox said gently.

After dinner, Dom continued to treat her like a princess, running to the store to buy Godiva ice cream, which she ate in bed. She felt much better the next morning, but still didn't stray from Dom's house, still feeling like she needed to be close to him after the trauma of the recent events. When he woke he began making love to her reverentially, kissing along her neck down to her breast, which he teased with his lips and tongue until her nipple stood at attention. He continued to worship her body, leaving no part of her unkissed, caressing her until she felt as warm and fluid as melted butter. Only then did he enter her, still holding the same reverence, looking her straight in the eye with an intensity that burned into her soul. She almost didn't climax—it was too delicious and slow, but then his climax was so beautiful that she shuddered around him, feeling the spasm of her muscles drawing his seed deep within her. Afterward she felt as relaxed and warm and loved as she possibly could imagine feeling.

He got out of bed, showered and dressed and then sat in an armchair in his room and pulled her onto his lap. “Kate,” he said, sounding very serious. “You almost got killed because of me.”

She shook her head quickly. This wasn't the kind of thinking that was going to be helpful.

“No, listen. I told you before that vampires and mortal relationships don't mix. That's only become clearer to me. I'm bad for you, and you deserve so much better.”

What?
Panic filled her chest. What was he saying? “
No.
”

“Listen to me. You're young. Your whole life is ahead of you. You're going to want children some day, and a husband that will grow old and die with you. I can't give you any of that. All I have to offer you is danger and heartache.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “That's not true. I know we haven't been together that long, but—my time with you has been everything to me. You're my real-life fantasy.”

He shook his head. “Sex is sex. You'll find another spanko now that you know what to ask for. You don't need me for that.”

Fury rushed in her ears. “I see,” she said cuttingly. “So sex is just sex. And that's all I was to you?” Her raised voice sounded shrill to her. She struggled to get off his lap.

He pulled her easily back. “That's not what I meant and you know it. I love you, Kate Strand. I meant it when I said it. And that's why I can't do this to you.” She could feel his agitation growing and it only fueled her own.

“Do
what
? You can't do what? You can't make me happy by staying with me? You can't just let us enjoy what we have? You think you have the right to make decisions about
my
future without consulting me?” She was yelling now.

Dom just looked at her sadly, his jaw muscle twitching.

“Let me up,” she said in a deadly quiet tone. “
Now
.”

He complied.

She finished getting dressed and gathered up her things, making a big show of leaving the key to the Mini Cooper on the bureau.

Dom stood up as well. “No. That car is yours,” he said immediately. “You keep it.”

“I don't need your guilt presents,” she said bitterly.

“Keep. The Fucking. Car.” he said, picking up the key and pushing it into her hand.

“You can't make me!” she screamed, throwing the key across the room.

Dom turned away from her and she heard a half-snarl, a distinctly animal-like sound. He picked up the key and when he turned back she saw his fangs were partially elongated. She should be afraid, but she was too torn up to even care if she was in danger. In fact, she'd be perfectly happy if he just tore her to shreds, because that was what he'd just done to her heart.

He took her wrist and pressed the key into her hand, wrapping her fingers around it.

“Keep the fucking car,” he said again, fiercely. And then a bloody tear rolled down his cheek. “Please,” he added, vulnerability bleeding into his voice. He picked her up by the waist and sat her on the bureau. She tried to push him away, but of course, it was like moving stone.

“Fine!” she said, grinding her teeth.

“Thank you.”

He let her up and she slid off the bureau, swung the door open and walked out, slamming it behind her as hard as she could.

Chapter Twelve

He had to remove the statue of Kate. He used a dolly and carted it off to a corner of his studio, then covered it with a tarp so he didn't have to look at it. Somehow it still had a huge presence, even as a shapeless lump covered with a piece of canvas. He still felt her presence through the covering, as he did everywhere in his house.

The pain was so intense it was unbearable. Not only could he feel every last vibration of her pain, but his own blended with hers, creating a symphony of grief that was so overwhelming he could hardly function. He spent all his time at the club, revamping the accounting system, installing a new inventory method, reorganizing the staff schedule and changing up the entertainment.

He couldn't sleep during the days, and he couldn't sculpt, which left him doing desk and computer work until his eyes turned bloodshot with strain.