Biting Bad (Chicagoland Vampires 8)

And now we were lovers. Confidants. Partners. I'd come to admit that he'd saved my life, not taken it away, and he'd accepted that I wasn't one to blindly follow orders. Our romance had not been simple, and it hadn't been easy. It still wasn't easy, as there was always some kind of supernatural drama interfering with our lives.

But perhaps that was the point? That plans, however well-intentioned, were ultimately irrelevant? That we had to learn to adapt, and the best-case scenario was finding a partner who was willing to adapt alongside us?

If I hadn't adapted, we might still be enemies. I might still be refusing his advice and counsel, and he might have picked a House consort to fulfill his needs. My Red Guard membership would be less about helping the Houses than spying on Ethan. We'd have been enemies, engaged in a private war against each other.

Instead, over the course of the last year, we'd joined forces. We fought together against factions that sought to tear apart the House. And even in this tiny, cold, and sparse room, I was home, because he was with me.

Ethan looked at me curiously. "Are you all right? You're making the room buzz."

"Just thinking," I said, smiling a little.

"About?"

"How much things change."

He walked toward me and pressed a hand to my cheek, smiling slyly. "You were thinking about us."

I nodded. "About what we were, and what we've become."

"And how I wooed you with my brilliance and sophistication?"

"Or your narcissism," I teased. "I'm going to change clothes."

Ethan lay down on the bed, one arm behind his head, ankles crossed. "All right," he said. "I'm ready."

"Dirty. Old. Man," I repeated. But he had a point. There was one small room, and not much privacy.

"I'm not going to strip for you," I said, turning to the bureau and flipping through a drawer. Everything in my current clothing rotation was upstairs. The bureau held the remainder - college and grad school T-shirts and slightly out-of-style numbers that I hoped would be more popular next year.

With minutes before the sun rose, I grabbed an old NYU T-shirt, pulled off my jeans and shirt, and slipped it on.

"That was hardly worth the cost of admission," Ethan commented.

"The cost of admission was free," I pointed out. "And I was changing for my benefit, not yours." I gestured grandly toward the room. "The stage is yours, my friend."

"I don't know what you expect me to do."

I sat down on the bed and mirrored his posture. "I expect you to take it off, and I expect you to shake it. In that order."

"Hmmph" was all he said. As I looked on, he stood up, pulled his shirt over head, and kicked off his shoes.

By my calculation, that left a Master vampire in the middle of my bedroom, shirtless and staring back at me with a predictably arched eyebrow.

"You aren't done," I pointed out, but with waning enthusiasm. Not for the subject - he was as hot as ever - but for consciousness. The sun was nearly on the rise, and sleepiness had begun to set in.

Either sensing my sudden exhaustion or faced with exhaustion of his own, he slipped off his trousers without a performance.

"Wait - I nearly forgot," he sleepily said. He walked to the bureau and picked up a blue velvet box I didn't recognize and hadn't realized was there.

"What's that?"

"The payment for dinner with your parents tomorrow."

"Dinner with my . . . Oh crap."

I'd totally forgotten about that, although in fairness the riots had provided a pretty good excuse.

"Are you sure leaving the House is a good idea? We all agree Cadogan's on the list."

"And we're having dinner with one of the most important men in the city," he said. "I'm not thrilled about the timing, but we agreed to go. Your father is clearly trying to mend fences. I'm not taking any position on that - it's between you and him - but we need friends, and we can't afford to be picky."

He sat down on the bed beside me, cradling the box in his hands. The opening of a velvet box usually led to something interesting, even if Ethan was going to have to make this "interesting" relatively quick. I could already feel the slow, flaming rise of the sun pulling on my eyelids like brass weights.

"Are you proposing?" I drowsily asked.

"When I propose, you'll know it."

My heart stuttered, pushing me awake again. "When? What do you mean 'when'?"

"I stand by my statement," Ethan said, opening the box and handing it over.

Inside sat a gleaming silver pendant shaped like a droplet, draped on a silver chain. Pressed into the back, like a jeweler's mark, was an elegant "C" surrounded by tiny but neat script: "Cadogan House, Chicago."

An immortal drop of blood, marked by our Cadogan membership. It was a perfect reminder of our origins, and our loyalties.

"It's beautiful," I said, wishing I could trace a finger across its curve, but loathe to mar the surface. "The House will like this very much."

"I hope so," Ethan said, closing the box and putting it on the nightstand. "Because they're going to have to wear them for a really long time."

Ah, vampire humor. Thank God it never got old, said no one ever.

"Bedtime?" I said, but I was already tucking into the sheets and flipping off the nightstand light.

Wordlessly, Ethan turned off the lights, and I shifted to make room. He climbed in beside me, and we spooned together to conserve precious space. Even so, Ethan's feet hung off the edge of the bed.

It was a small consolation that the sun would knock us unconscious, and we wouldn't much care how comfortable we were . . . or weren't. I moved closer into his arms and the warmth of his body, my eyes growing heavier as the sun began to rise, the stars faded, and daylight came again.

Chapter Eleven

MEET THE PARENTS

Eleven hours later, the sun fell, and I awoke sweaty in a tangle of arms and legs.

Not the good kind of tangle.

The two-adults-sleeping-in-a-twin-sized-bed kind of tangle.

I peeled myself from Ethan's grasp, but I lost my balance in the process and tumbled to the floor in a heap.

It was going to be one of those kinds of evenings.

Ethan peered over the edge of the bed. "Trouble, Sentinel?"

I growled at him. "I'm fine. At the risk of sounding insensitive, how long will the Grey House vampires be here?"

"Long enough for you to incur at least two or three more moderate injuries, probably." He sat up and flipped his legs over the bed, then offered me a hand.