The Vampire's Reflection (9 page)

Sarah frantically rushed to Charlotte again in the middle of the library floor. Clawing at her face, the Witch pried her jaw open to pop something inside. Charlotte instantly recognized it as one of her chocolate beads.

“Here,” Sarah’s words came out breathlessly. “Swallow that. It will at least give your blood a head start to replenish. If you
must
do this, at least be wise about it!”

Charlotte relaxed her shoulders a little as the chocolaty marble slid down the back of her throat. The eeriness from the outside seemed to seep in through the crack under the door, and she knew the peace was only very temporary. Sarah’s magic always did something to quell her addiction-related suffering. And while it calmed the beasts from the outside, it also did something to subdue her pain as well. The sweltering dimmed at the side of her neck, and it felt like she could breathe again, even if it was just for a moment. She fixed her eyes wide on the doors, waiting for
him
to come through.

Pulling her forehead from the polished wood, Sarah opened the doors just a crack to be sure. Charlotte had been their host, their carrier, for months, since she and Valek had found the coven’s hideout in the middle of Prague. That had been the agreement settled upon by Valek and the coven’s leader, Francis. But they weren’t allowed to feed from her anymore. They had learned to keep their bloodlust satiated until each found other victims. That’s the way it had been settled since they all moved in. But that did not change the fact that the smell of her blood still called to them. And even though they’d been out hunting all day for the light-magic blood that would satisfy their addictions to the sunlight, night was coming, and they still required something else. Something warm, and thick, and
mortal
. The thing that would keep them animated for eternity.

Sarah proceeded to open the library doors wider. The dust from the ransacked foyer settled in the overwhelming red and orange light of dusk. Charlotte watched frozen in the stillness as Sarah’s motions were slow, careful.

A single male emerged from the back. The group respectfully parted in two halves for him as he slowly pushed forward. His silhouette was tall, dark, and threatening, and seemed to overtake the others surrounding him. It was more than just his physicality. It was his very presence that seemed to carry so much power.

Charlotte felt her lip quiver, as her world sank into slow motion. She kept her gaze locked on his form as he slinked toward her, slick across the floorboards, as though his bottom half were serpentine. The scar on her neck singed again with the sight of him alone, though this time, the pain was much worse as he drew nearer. Seductive in each lick, the most intense it had been all evening. She winced, but she dared not move. Caught in his trance, she continued to watch Valek approach. Her mouth fell open as another lump formed in her throat. Instinctively, she willed him closer. Needing.

His hair hung long and dark in silken layers around his pearly face, luminous as the surface of the moon. All of his motions were graceful and fluid—hypnotizing. His broad shoulders rolled slightly back with each step as he crossed the threshold. She had been trapped in that house, day after day, it was true. However, now as he entered the study, she wanted nothing more than to be locked within his lean, muscular arms. He kept them well hidden behind a white linen shirt and black, seersucker vest with a garnet tie. A monster dressed as a gentleman. He continued to shield his glacier gaze under a bed of thick lashes. But when he finally lifted it to lock with Charlotte’s, she could see his eyes were deep and immersed in shiny ink. Black. It sent a new jolt of electricity up her spine and made her desire for him all the more desperate. She yearned to reach for him, but the pain at the side of her throat kept her joints and muscles leaden.

Valek lowered himself steadily to the floor in front of her, a smile playing around his full and perfect lips with the plunging Cupid’s bow. She saw his gaze flick to her scar—the door that marked one of the entryways to her pulse. He lifted his hand to trace the length of it with one of his graceful claws. Charlotte shivered again. Her toes curled.

“
Dobry vecer
.” Valek smiled his good evening at Charlotte.

Continuing to gaze, transfixed, at his mouth, she could not reply back to him. Addicted. Needing. She nearly forgot the other thirsty gazes watching from the doorway now. As far as she was concerned, they were the only two in the house. Perhaps they could be the only two in the entire Occult City. That’s what she wanted, so that’s what she told herself.

Sarah quickly closed and bolted the library doors again, shutting out the other undead gazes from the room, as if hearing Charlotte’s most recent thoughts. When he’d left her that morning, he’d promised he would only be an hour or so. What had taken him so long? Her fingers twitched for the top button of his shirt. A new desire started bubbling toward the back of her mind.

Valek chuckled darkly. “I needed to collect the others. Everyone was scattered out in the daylight. I apologize for taking longer than expected. I didn’t know they were going to take such advantage of the afternoon.”

Charlotte didn’t respond, continuing to fix her gaze on the fangs concealed behind his lips.

Valek frowned as he began to trace the area just under her eyes. They felt heavier to her as she started to notice them, too. She was tired from the harrowing pain that was now starting to return again, in soft waves that were growing more intense by the second. Her nightmares didn’t exactly allow her much rest. The visions from them began to resurface again, but she instantly shoved them away. The touch of his claws left a curious, electric prickle just under her skin, as Sarah’s had. She noticed a sudden sadness that painted a thick glaze over his eyes, but it simply wasn’t something for her to concentrate on now. Not now, when her own need had become so intense, wrapping her around in its dizzying and anguishing haze.

This wasn’t entirely his fault. Nights ago, she had egged him on—wanted him to do it the first time—wanted him to be the first one to do it. To feed on her. An act so disgustingly desirable. Beautiful. Seducing. This was her fault. She’d allowed her human desires to take over and get the better of her. Though how could either of them have predicted that it would affect her like
this
?

She’d developed something Valek had never seen before in all of his years of practice. There had been similar symptoms in extreme alcoholics and drug addicts, symptoms that existed even in the magical world. Addiction was everywhere. Living in the Occult, Valek told her he thought he’d seen it all, but never had he come across a human being who had become addicted to the bite of a Vampire. The roles and the needs were suddenly reversed. Mirrored. Perhaps, she thought, because Valek had never given another human being the possibility of surviving long enough to develop the same disease.

“Lottie.” The depth of his tone echoed down the hollow tunnel of her mind. She couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t find the muscles in her face that formed words so she could answer him. His mouth called to her, beckoned her toward it like she wanted to give away all of her life to it—a sacrifice, an offering. An obsession. He stroked affectionately underneath her chin and once across her left cheek. Her eyes didn’t even shift despite the cold feeling of his fingers.

“What’s happened to you?” His lovely, black eyes narrowed. Demonic eyes. She was trapped in their spell.

Once again, his words came at her through a tunnel. Words that her mind was unable to comprehend, though she heard them clearly—almost too clearly. She winced. Valek closed his mouth, not uttering anything further.

Unable to tear her gaze away from his lips, she felt the tug toward him strengthen. She shifted her weight onto her knees, reaching up to graze his pale mouth with her fingers. She began to pull his lips apart, but he stopped her, gently pushing her hand away from his face with his own.

Valek sighed, his sweet breath making the room tilt in the other direction. Maybe it wasn’t the bite she was addicted to. Maybe it was just
him
. Maybe the bite was the only way for her to be as close to him as humanly possible.

His freezing hand clutched her jaw as he turned her face to one side, exposing her bare neck to his mouth. This sent a new jolt of excitement through Charlotte’s entire body, making her nerve endings light like the live end of Sarah’s wand.

Valek shifted his weight to his knees, leaning forward so that his lips lightly grazed the skin just above her shoulder. A new wave shocked her system. His other hand moved to the top of her thigh, gripping it, so he could steady himself against her.

Valek sank his incisors deep into that scar—that entry to her whole life.

Charlotte gasped, eyelids flying open, as the ice picks pushed down into her warm flesh. Her blood was hot as it rolled out of her and seeped into a puddle at the hollow of her collarbone. She reached up, tugging hard at Valek’s long hair. So luxuriant, she wanted to swim in all its layers. A small moan slipped from her, the pain both satisfying and numbing. It was almost as if the entire room had disappeared out from underneath her, as if she was wading through a cool, black pool of nothing and the only thing she could feel was the sensation of Valek locked against her. She wanted to give it all to him. She lost feeling in her fingertips and in her toes.

She knew Valek reveled in it as well, as he pulled the life from her. This truly was the closest she could ever be to him. She knew that. When they were linked like this, it was almost as if she had a peek into
his
mind, as if she could physically feel for herself how her blood soothed and satisfied the squelching flames under
his
skin. When they were
this
together, their minds seemed to fuse into one.

His dead heart gave one gushing pound against her sternum as it soaked up her life like a sponge. He clung to her as he clung to life. Drums, whether it was her pulse or his new, temporary one—she couldn’t tell—pounded in both of their ears. They were entirely connected by the depth of his dark kiss.

Valek stopped just as she noted that her heartbeat had begun to slow. He backed away carefully, wiping his mouth. She watched his face, his breathing staggered, as if he wasn’t entirely ready to pull away from her yet. But there was some other emotion living in his eyes, too.

The wound at the side of her neck immediately began to sew itself back up from the weird biology of Valek’s saliva. The Vampire’s need for self-preservation, to keep the secret, carried right down to their biological make-up. No human could be privy to the existence of magic or the undead. No human except Charlotte, of course.

The blurriness about the room drifted back into coherency. Charlotte lay there in his arms for a few silent moments as her mind reeled from the experience. She breathed a slight sigh of relief as she the pain started to fade. All of her odd trepidations about him and her nightmare had disappeared, as well as the tense pounding in her head. The smell from Sarah’s sweet rolls no longer nauseated her, and in fact, she even sort of wanted one. Her stomach spoke on cue.

Valek’s hand tightened around hers. Somewhere in the distance of her mind, she heard his voice calling her name, though as she began to focus on the present, the sound reverberated louder in her consciousness. Finally, she shifted her gaze to his face, and there he was. In full focus, right there, holding her.

“Hello.” His lips contorted into an odd sort of sad smile.

Her gaze traced the contours of his face as she watched his irises shift back from black to their heart-stopping blue. “Hello,” she finally replied.

“Better?” His tone held that same disconcerting element that his eyes carried.

Charlotte frowned as she searched for what it was she wanted to say.
I’m sorry
was the first thing that came to mind.

He only smiled his reply to her thought. “Sarah. Do you have the tea?” Valek beckoned without so much as a glance in her direction.

Charlotte sat up slowly as Sarah began walking over to them. She had completely forgotten the Witch, who had been in the room with them the whole time.

“I have more than that, tonight.” Sarah proudly marched to the end table where she rested the silver tray. She picked up the small, ceramic saucer with the sweet rolls and held it out for Charlotte to take.

Chapter Six

Murderous

Lusian pushed away from the library doors and released an irritated breath. He could taste the scent of Charlotte’s blood hanging in the air; it had slipped under the crack between the door and the floorboards while Valek fed. The aroma was absolutely maddening. He dragged his nails through his hair, the pain of the thirst making it too unbearable to remain inside that house any longer. The smoldering at the back of his throat would not quit. He made a face as he struggled to swallow, his focus zipping about the foyer.

“I’m
thirsty
!” He slammed his fist against the library door. The truth was, it wasn’t just the thirst. His frustration was out of being here, in that house—in that godforsaken little village. He missed the city. The air filled with the perfume of thousands of warm humans. Out there in the middle of nothing and nowhere, there was only the smell of Charlotte. He couldn’t have her. It was enough to drive him to madness. He was sick of it. Sick of Valek thinking he was the leader around here and holding them all under his thumb. Sick of the way Charlotte played damsel in distress. He needed the streets back. Needed the night. Needed the pulses of five women around him at one time. He bit his lower lip and shook the fury away from his shoulders.

Jorge, who stood near the back of the group with his arms folded neatly over his chest, snorted. “We all are, Lusian. Patience. Valek will be done soon and then maybe he’ll let us back out to hunt our
own
human.”

“He takes
forever
with her!” Lusian began pacing back and forth in front of the library doors. His throat, drier than the deserts of South Africa, which he’d called home during his mortal lifetime, seemed to burn worse with every throb. He needed to swallow a living person’s warm mortality, experiencing it as it gushed over his tongue. He smacked his lips together, feverishly wiping at them with the back of his hand. “I can’t take this. I’m going hunting. Who’s coming with me?”