Darkness Rises
Page 16

If he didn’t before, he did then as he moved forward, crowding her against the counter and pressing his large, muscular body into hers.
It felt so good. He felt so good. Tasted good. He even smelled good. Familiar. Bathed as he had been in the soap she used every day, the citrus aroma blending exquisitely with his own masculine scent.
As Etienne leaned into her, every muscle tightened, pleasure dancing through her everywhere they touched.
He slid his arms around her. Heat simmered inside her, preventing Krysta from pulling away. Her breasts pressed against his hard, muscled chest. His rippling abs melded to hers. Her hips settled against his arousal.
I have to stop, the voice of reason intruded. He’s a vampire.
His arms tightened as he continued to tease and tempt her with his tongue.
I don’t sleep with vampires. I hunt them. I destroy them. I loathe them. Damn, he can kiss. I want to tear his freaking clothes off.
Krysta almost moaned a protest when Etienne drew back. Peeling heavy lids open, she stared up at him and caught her breath.
His eyes glowed a brilliant amber. Sharp fangs peeked from between parted lips. And both totally turned her on because he looked like he wanted to devour every inch of her.
Damn.
A growl rumbled forth from deep in his throat as he lowered his head and stole another brief, hard kiss.
Oh, yeah.
Then he ruined it (and did her a favor, she would later grudgingly admit) by again withdrawing and taking three determined steps backward.
Her heart continued to pound. She noted with some chagrin that she was practically panting. And her body tingled everywhere.
That would bother her a lot more if she hadn’t noticed the large bulge straining against the front of his pants that told her more than words that he had been as affected as she had.
He cleared his throat. “I’m not a vampire.”
She blinked. “What?”
“I’m not a vampire.”
“Said the man with the glowing eyes and glinting fangs. Not to mention the super speed and strength.”
“Vampires are not the only preternatural beings who boast such characteristics.”
Oh, shit. There were other preternatural creatures out there?
He shook his head and motioned to the futon. “Will you sit with me so I might explain?”
Krysta nodded, a bit dazed, and followed him over to the futon.
They sat simultaneously and turned toward each other, knees touching.
She liked that their knees touched. Liked the casual contact as much as she had liked the kiss. And wondered where exactly along the way she had lost her damned mind.
Vampire. Vampire hunter. Remember? she mentally chided herself.
“I’m not vampire,” he repeated, stretching an arm along the back of the futon. “I’m immortal.”
Krysta stared at him. Weren’t all vampires mostly immortal? Unless slain, that is? They didn’t age or get sick, after all, and could withstand a lot of damage that would kill humans. “What’s the difference?”
“The difference is that vampires are human before their transformation. I and my immortal colleagues, on the other hand, were like you.”
Her heart, already misbehaving from their recent make-out session, began to beat a little faster. “I don’t know what you mean. I’m human.”
“No, you aren’t. Or rather I assume you aren’t because your brother isn’t. Is he your full brother or your half brother?”
“My full brother. And he’s human. We both are.”
“No, you aren’t. You’re different.”
How did he know that? She hadn’t said or done anything to reveal her peculiar gift. And tonight was the first night he’d had any direct contact with Sean.
Wasn’t it?
A gentle smile curled his lips. “Don’t look so panicked, Krysta. If with anyone, your secret is safe with me. I’m just like you. Or I was once. Born with special talents and abilities ordinary humans don’t posses. In centuries past, we called ourselves gifted ones.”
“Gifted ones,” she parroted. Other than her brother and her parents, she had never met another gifted one before.
“My brother,” Etienne continued, “was born with the ability to teleport. Yours was born with the ability to heal with his hands.”
“How do you know that?”
“I followed you home that first night and watched him heal the worst of your wounds with a touch.”
“What, like through the window?” she demanded. What the hell else had he watched, the perve.
His face creased with a disgruntled frown. “Yes, but I’m not a perv. I didn’t watch you shower or anything. I just needed to know who you were. You tried to kill me, remember, and thought me one of the vampires you hunt.”
She frowned. He had kind of nailed the perv thing right on the head. How had he known what she was thinking? Her face wasn’t that expressive, was it?
“My sister and I were both born with the ability to read others’ thoughts,” he admitted.
Her mind went blank, then filled with a maelstrom of reactions and concerns and freak-outs.
He could read her thoughts? He had been reading them all along?
Fury, alarm, and a ridiculous feeling of betrayal barreled through her. “You read my thoughts?” she came close to yelling. He must know, then, that he had intrigued her from the first night they had met. That she thought about him all the time. That she had, not five minutes ago, wanted nothing more than to strip him naked and roll around in bed with him.
The snake!
He held up both hands in a placating gesture. “Not all of them. Not even most of them. Just a few here and there.”
Her face must be turning as red as a raspberry because he seemed quite desperate to assuage her anger.
“Some gifted ones, like yourself, have a natural defense and are difficult to read,” he claimed.
“How difficult,” she snarled, ready to kick his ass if he gave the wrong answer.
“Very difficult,” he hurried to reassure her. “Extremely difficult. Sometimes I can’t read you at all. Other times I only catch a word or two.”
A word or two. That could be less incriminating, she supposed. Maybe her mind was closed enough that he didn’t know she was attracted to him.
“Well, no. I knew that,” he said.
Mouth falling open, she stared at him in dismay. Hell. Did she have no secrets from him?
“You have many secrets from me.”
“Stop reading my thoughts!”
“I’m sorry. It’s just . . . you’re broadcasting them rather loudly at the moment and . . . There is no reason to feel embarrassed, Krysta.”
“Easy for you to say! You weren’t caught mentally checking out my package!”
A startled laugh escaped him before he hastily quelled it. “You’re attracted to me. I know that. But I’m attracted to you, too. I have been ever since the first night I saw you when you stumbled out of that damned frat house, pretending to be drunk, turned your face up to the sky, and seemed to look right at me.”
Her mind quieted. “Really?”
“Yes. And now I can’t read what you’re thinking at all, so if that offends you . . . Well, I won’t apologize for it. You’re a strong, beautiful woman who knows her way around a blade. I find that”—he drew in a deep breath as his eyes traveled over her with a heat that scorched her—“incredibly appealing. But I will apologize for whatever discomfort it causes you.”
How the hell was she supposed to respond to that?
Best to just change the subject and try not to broadcast her thoughts, whatever the hell that meant. “Tell me again how immortals differ from vampires.”
He did, beginning with gifted ones and blowing her mind. She and her brother and parents had always known they were different. But they hadn’t known why. They hadn’t realized they possessed advanced DNA.
And she hadn’t known that vampirism was caused by a virus.
“So the virus causes brain damage and madness in humans, but not in gifted ones?”
“Correct. Our advanced DNA protects us.”
“Where does the DNA come from?”
“We don’t know.”
Recalling all of the times she had been splattered with vampire blood, the time one had bitten her, and the long, wet kiss she had just shared with Etienne, she asked uneasily, “How contagious is this virus?”
He smiled. “Fleeting contact with it won’t transform you. A few drops of vampire blood mingling with yours in a wound won’t infect you. And you can’t get it from a kiss. Or from sex.”
That was nice to know for future reference.
“You can only be transformed in two ways: By having most of your blood drained, then being infused with the blood of a vampire or immortal. Or by being fed from and exposed to the virus in small amounts repeatedly.” He frowned. “Have you ever been bitten by the vampires you hunt?” The idea seemed to upset him.
“Only once.” And it hadn’t been a vamp she had been hunting.
Darkness swept his visage as his brown eyes flashed bright amber once more. “Describe the vampire who bit you.”
Why should it thrill her that he wanted to hunt down the vamp who had sunk his filthy fangs into her?
“No need,” she assured him. “I killed him myself.”
A slow smile lit his face as he wagged his head back and forth.
“What?” she asked.
“I like you more with every tidbit I learn about you.”
She smiled. “You’re pretty likable yourself.”
“Now that you know I’m not a vampire?”
“You were likable even as a vampire. It was very annoying.”
He laughed, flashing those pearly fangs.
If he was infected with the same virus that vampires were, then he must need blood. She had even seen his brother bite his wrist and infuse him with her own eyes. “If you hunt vampires who prey upon humans, does that mean you don’t . . .”