Love Bites

“Well, yeah, but she directed me to the right ones.” His blue eyes softened and he flashed a smile full of love. Puppy love, far as Kellan was concerned. “She’s amazingly smart. She can find anything she sets her mind to in minutes. That’s what one of the other librarians told me while we were waiting for her.”

“And she didn’t think it odd that you were so curious about vamps?”

Luke glanced down at Sydney, who’d gone silent and still though her eyes remained wide open. “Well, no. Because she knows I have reason to be curious.”

A trail of heat blazed up Kellan’s spine. “Does she now?” he asked, very softly.

If his suspicions were correct, he’d fire up Luke’s fancy-ass computer and do a search on alternative ways to kill vampires other than staking and beheading. Because one way or another, he was bound and determined Luke would die tonight.

Painfully.

“What reason have you given her for your curiosity, Luke?”

Luke’s face said it all, though he compressed his lips into a thin line and said nothing.

Kellan’s hands flexed on Sydney’s, but he kept his touch easy. Oh, yes, tonight his best friend would die. Maybe he could lock him in the wine cellar and turn the temperature below zero. Perhaps making him into a vampire popsicle would work.

After he evacuated the wine, of course.

“Does that reason include your personal stake in vampirism, by chance, Luke?”

“Yeah, it does.”

Lucas turned away, then abruptly turned back. His face hardened into rigid planes that did nothing to diminish the love still glowing in his eyes. Damned besotted fool. “You’re not my father. I’ll make my own choices, asshole.”

Kellan released Sydney’s hands and sat back on his heels. The position left him close enough to grab her if she tried to bolt or, if need be, to act on his sudden urge to decapitate Luke with his bare hands.

“You told her we were vampires,” Kellan said, straining for patience.

“Not we.” Luke sent him a chilling smile. “You.”

Chapter Seven

Voices assaulted her. Male, female. Both spoke quietly, but the words echoed in Sydney’s head just the same. She clutched the sheets and tried to stem the shakes that were seizing her once again. Worst of all, neither of those voices belonged to Kellan.

“So you believe she’s a latent?”

“I believe it’s possible. From your research, you agree the signs are all there.”

“Well, she is demonstrating some of the most common ones. Several times she’s complained of the stench in here, but I smell little. And there is the issue of light.” Then came the sound of the drapes being yanked violently across the rod, filling the room with crisscrossing beams of sunlight.

Sydney pressed her face into the bedding, trying to hide. God, between Kellan’s cologne and the scents of sex and oddly enough, apples, she couldn’t think. Even her own perfume gagged her now. She sputtered and dragged the pillows over her head, pushing them against her ears as she moaned.

But Kellan didn’t come, as he’d come every time she’d cried out before.

Where was he? And who was this annoying nasally-toned female who discussed Sydney’s latency as if she were a particularly fascinating type of bug? She wanted to yell at them to shut up, but groaning seemed to be the extent of her abilities at the moment.

“Kellan? Where’s Kellan?”

They didn’t answer her, probably because the questions came out as breathy croaks. She knew she sounded pathetic, but he was the only thing keeping her from losing what was left of her mind. The last time she’d awakened, he’d kissed her gently and told her she was the most important thing in the world to him. Maybe that was stupid, but she’d liked hearing it just the same. She’d never been that important to anyone before. Not to her mother, who’d left her on her own when she was sixteen. Not to any of her ex-boyfriends, and certainly not to Tate. Even her best friend Jed traveled a lot and couldn’t be counted on to be there when she needed him.

Really, if she were honest, she’d never been anything but alone. But now there was Kellan. If he ever came back.

As a vicious tremor wracked her body, she thumped her head on her closed fists. Sometimes the pain was unspeakable. The pain, and the overwhelming, mind-numbing fear. Would she ever see her apartment again? Pastry ’n’ Joe? Would she even have a job to come back to? They must think she’d run off.

Hell, would she ever even summon the strength to rouse herself from this bed?

“Kellan!” The scream burst from her throat, unbidden.