The Purity of Blood: Volume I (34 page)

I started to
walk around to the other side of the car, but he didn’t let go of my hand, and
pulling me back he wrapped his arms around me.

“Next time, we
take your car,” he said quietly into my hair as he held me in his arms.

“See, I knew you
liked my car better,” I whispered, my arms wrapped around his waist.

I breathed
deeply and wondered if this was bothering him.
 
When I tried to pull back, he didn’t let go.
 
Looking up into his eyes I could see he was
worried about me.
 
I think it was more
than just my driving though.

“Promise me you
won’t drive like a maniac again.
 
I
couldn’t handle it if something happened to you.
 
I can’t lose you,” and he pulled me
closer.
 

Was I his to lose?
 
I hoped so.

I nodded in
agreement as I snuggled inside his jacket.
 
Oh, I liked it here snuggled against his chest.

Finally, he let go and drove back into town at what must have
seemed like a snail’s pace for him.
 
I
actually hadn’t driven like that in years, but then again I hadn’t been behind
the wheel of a high performance sports car in as many years either.
 
It was fun, I’d almost forgotten how
much.
 
No, my hatchback didn’t handle
like that.
 
But on the bright side, she
did get better gas mileage.
 
Since I had
the feeling he wasn’t going to be giving me the keys to his car again any time
in the near future, I guess he had nothing to worry about.

As he pulled up behind Capen
Hall, I looked at my watch.

“Good.
 
It’s still kind of early.
 
I need to call my mother tonight.”
 
I hadn’t called her in a while and the daily
messages she was leaving on my voicemail were getting more and more insistent.

Daniel walked me
to the front door.
 
He hadn’t said much
since we’d gotten back into the car.
 
I
was sure it was my fault.
 
I’d probably
pushed him too far.
  
There were so many
parts of my life that I preferred people not know about.
 
This was why I’d never let people get too
close.
 
Because of how I’d been raised, I
always had to remember to curb my natural reactions to things.
 
If I didn’t, they’d get suspicious and form
questions about those parts of my life best left a mystery.
 
I’d been foolish tonight, but only time would
tell how much.

As we stood
under the light above the door, I knew.
 
I knew I was in love with him.
  
That whatever happened from this moment on in my life, that this would
never change.
  
I looked up and saw those
blue eyes piercing me.
 
With all my soul
I wanted to tell him what I’d just realized, but I couldn’t.
 
As much as I needed to know if he loved me, I
didn’t want the first time he said those words to me to be in response to my
saying them first.
 
I think he was scared
to, and I needed to know if he loved me enough to find the courage to tell me
on his own.
 
Unfortunately, there was
only one way to find out how he really felt about me.

How could I be
so completely in love with someone I didn’t even know existed a month ago?
 
Was it even possible to love someone with a
love strong enough to last a lifetime in such a short space of time?
  
All I knew was that if I didn’t see him
tomorrow, if I didn’t breathe in the scent of him, or feel those sky blue eyes
on me, or hear his laugh, I didn’t know what I’d do.
 
Suddenly, I found myself reaching out and
wrapping my arms around his waist, pulling him tightly to me.

“I know,” he whispered
as he kissed the top of my head.

As I clung to
him, I remembered that he could pick up on the emotional states of humans and
wondered what I was giving off in that moment.
 
Not that I cared.
 
What did it
really matter?

“So …
tomorrow.
 
How about I pick you up in the
morning and we find something fun to do.”

I took a step
back.

“Okay,” was all
I could think to say as I reached in for my keys and opened the door.

“I’ll be here at
ten.”

And we said goodnight.

I shouldn’t feel like this, I
thought as I trudged up the stairs.
 
It
shouldn’t feel like someone was ripping the heart out of my chest when we said
goodnight.
 
Part of it was knowing that I
wouldn’t see him for twelve hours, and part of it was knowing that he might
never kiss me the way I so desperately wanted him to.
 
Slowly, deeply and passionately, the way I’d
never been kissed before by anyone.
 

Could he?
 

He seemed to
want to, but I think he was too scared to try.
 
As if I would be too much temptation for him to resist.
 
I had a hard time believing I could be too
much temptation for anyone.
 
What was
I?
 
I wasn’t beautiful, but for some
unfathomable reason he seemed to find me so.
 
But still, I longed to hear him whisper my name in my ear as he softly
caressed my neck with his fingertips then gently kissed it.
 
I longed to feel the touch of his hands on
me.
 
But I knew, as much as I wanted it,
it wouldn’t happen.
 
He wouldn’t allow
it.
 
Two things stood in his way, his
nature as a vampire and his nature as a gentleman.

I changed and curled
up in bed.
 
Pulling the covers around me,
I picked up the phone and dialed home.

“Finally!” I
heard on the other end of the line.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hi to you,
too.
 
You need to return your messages,
young lady.
 
If you can’t seem to manage
that simple task, you can just pack up your things, come home and go back to
community college next semester.”

“Tell her I said
hi,” I heard my Dad say in the background.

“Your father is
very upset with you as well,” Mom snapped.
 
“Tell me you’ve at least been going to church.”

She went on for
a while.
 
In truth, I was letting her
talk herself out before summoning the courage to say anything.
 
I told her how my classes were going, and
about what my friends and I had been doing and spending time in the library.
 
Everything but the most important thing in my
life.
 
She asked me to come home next
weekend.
 
I tried to beg off, but she
insisted and I could hear my Dad in the background agreeing that he’d like to
see me as well.
 

“Tell her not to
worry about the money, I’ll give her gas money for the trip,” he added as
enticement.
 

I couldn’t
resist my Dad, so I agreed to come home Saturday morning and return on Sunday
night.
 
She made a counter offer,
insisting I come home Friday night, but I managed to talk her out of it when I
reminded her of the horrors of driving through the city during Friday rush
hour.
 
Thank God for my parents’ bad
driving experiences in New York City.
 

“So, I hope
you’re having a little fun while you’re up there studying,” she said almost
reluctantly.
 
“Have you done any work on
your genealogy?”

Finally, a
subject I could comfortably talk about.
 
“Yes, I actually found a great book in the library with tons of great
info on your family.
 
Ironic as it’s
actually a history book of another family.
 
But the author goes off on a tangent of the ancestry and descendants of
a Wells woman who married into his family.
 
Gives great details on how the family moved out to Ohio and all the
descendants out there.”

“Let me guess,
you want to go to Ohio over your summer vacation now,” she teased.

I smiled.
 
“Perhaps.
 
We’ll see.”
 
But of course I did.

I hung up a half hour later and turned off the light.

When I woke in the morning, I
again had that same nagging feeling that something within the confines of my
room had changed overnight, but this time it was worse.
 
I got up and checked the door. It was
locked.
 
I walked over and checked the
windows.
 
They were locked as well.
 
Yet, part of me knew without a doubt, that
someone had been in the room last night.
 
I could feel it, sense it somehow.
 
I wished Darcy had been here.
 
On
the nights she’d spent in her bed I’d never woken up with this feeling.
 

I lazily took a
shower, dressed and ate my fruit loops while watching some old cartoons on one
of the channels I got with the antenna.
 
When I looked at the clock it was almost ten so I quickly got dressed
and headed downstairs.
    

When I opened
the back door, Daniel’s car was already there.
  
Looking around, I spotted him standing on the footbridge across the
road.
 
It was a graceful wooden structure
spanning the thin waterway that ran parallel to the road behind Capen.
 
The campus’ only water feature, it started in
the pond behind the Student Union Building and terminated in the large lake
we’d walked around the night before.
 
Hearing my approach, he looked up as he started my way, a smile
spreading across his handsome face.

“I was just
watching the fish,” he said as we started towards his car.

“So what are we
doing today?” I asked while he slid into his seat beside me.

I watched his
eyes light up.
 

“I thought of a
good place to take you,” was all he’d say as we drove out of the parking lot
and headed up the mountain.

It meant that I trusted him that I didn’t ask any more
questions and even though I loved him, this bothered me.
 
It was so contrary to the nature that had
been beaten into me my whole life.
 
When
he glanced my way and saw me biting my lip to hold back my curiosity, he seemed
pleased.
 
In turn, I was rewarded with
his boyish smile.
 
Instantly melting like
a ridiculous school girl, I forgot what I wanted to ask him.
 

We talked as we drove, about
school and other things.
 
It all seemed
so trivial compared with what I really wanted to say,
I love you
.
 

We pulled down
the gravel road leading to his house and parked in the garage.
 
After we got out, he led me around the back
of the house and up a well-worn trail into the woods.

“So can you tell
me where we’re going yet?”
 
Lord, I was
happy.
 
I was actually giggling.

“Don’t worry,
you’ll like it,” was all he’d say.
 
Yes,
he was playfully enjoying my suspense.

About ten
minutes later we came out of the woods into the wreck of an old orchard that
hugged this slope of the mountain.
 
Shining in the sunlight, the ripe red apples covered the trees like
Christmas ornaments, dragging the branches down with their weight.

“It’s an old
orchard.
 
I happened upon it some time
back on one of my rambles through the woods.
 
We don’t eat, so they always go to spoil.
 
But I figured you’d eat some this year so
they won’t all go to waste.”
 

Then he pulled a
couple of bags out of his pocket and handed me one.
 
When I took it, I didn’t look into his
eyes.
 
I couldn’t believe how incredibly
thoughtful and sweet this was.
 
If I
looked up, he’d see the tremble in my lip, so instead as I took the bag I
clasped his hand and gave it a squeeze before I dropped it and started off
towards the trees.

While we picked the
apples, their sweet, fragrant aroma filled my nostrils like my favorite perfume.
 
I paused to inhale deeply, drinking in as much
of it as I could.
 
I think I was
subconsciously trying to make a memory.
 
I must have closed my eyes because when I opened them, I looked up to
see Daniel watching me.
 
From a few trees
away he smiled and looked away, obviously embarrassed that I’d caught him.

After a few
minutes, I picked what I thought looked like the perfect apple.
 
Perfectly round and ruby red, it was without even
the smallest hint of a blemish.
 
Instead
of putting it in my bag, I polished it on my shirt sleeve and sunk my teeth into
it.
 
It was delicious and forced me to
pause and savor the taste on my lips and tongue.
 
Turning around, I sat down in the tall grass
that covered the floor of the old orchard and looked down the hillside into the
valley below.
 
The view was beautiful, breathtaking
really.
 
From here I could see for miles,
ridge after ridge of leaves in every imaginable shade of green, gold and
red.