Helena did some quick math. One meal a day, he'd said that first night. Three hundred and sixty five days in a year. He couldn't feed off of a single lover very often without making them anemic. How frequently could you give blood? No more than once a week, she figured. He'd had hundreds of lovers. Her expression must have been appalled, because he added, "My chemistry is radically different than yours. I can't pick up human diseases or pass them on. I can't get humans pregnant either."
As if that made it okay to be a huge man slut. She folded her arms. "You must have had some pretty open-minded girlfriends over the years."
"I've never been in a monogamous relationship." He widened his eyes at her in frustration. "Don't look at me like that. I'm not a complete dog. Some of my donors are one night stands, yes, but many are friends."
"Friends you suck on."
"Friends I've sucked on for years."
"But you never offered one of them a commitment, never tried to take it to the next level?"
"Never wanted to. I was waiting."
"For…?"
Leaning against the counter, he gave the wine in his glass a thoughtful swirl.
"Not everyone gets a dream. Some of us, I guess, are meant to go through this life without a destined mate. Mikhail doesn't have his yet, for instance. Maybe he never will. But ever since I was a kid I knew my bride was out there, somewhere, waiting for me. Maybe she was vamp, maybe human. Maybe she lived in Nepal, maybe down the block. Every woman I met, I asked myself, is she the one? The answer was always no. And I've never been one to settle."
Helena rubbed the gooseflesh off her arms. He sure could draw reactions from her, but they were always confused. She didn't know if that reasoning was noble and romantic or just some advanced form of commitment phobia. "When you came to my door…?"
"I knew. Even if Ma hadn't given me your name. I'd have known. Like I would know if a freight train ran me over."
"Why didn't I know?"
"Didn't you?"
"I don't know. It was more like you hypnotized me or something."
"I didn't. I haven't ever. Not with you." As he spoke, a dark flush crept across his cheekbones. "Not that I haven't been tempted."
"But you came here looking for love? How would you know it when you found it? Oh Alex. Love isn't a bolt from the blue. It takes practice, commitment, work. And when all is said and done, it's not worth it."
"You don't mean that."
"I do."
Helena's face was as set and grim as a hanging judge. Alex wanted to rip out Jeff's lungs. He tossed back the last of his wine, hiding his snarl in the glass as a tumult of Helena's bad memories washed over him.
It was time to stop talking about relationship stuff. He didn't think it was anything that needed lots of talk anyway. She was his. Sooner or later she'd realize it. That was the only way he could think and stay sane.
He cast around for some way to distract her. Maybe even make her smile. He loved her smile. Her real smile. She had a fake smile, but the real one wrinkled the bridge of her nose and made her eyes dance.
"You have a vampire kitchen, you know."
She blinked in surprise. "You mean I don't cook." Instead of smiling, she frowned suspiciously. "You think I should cook?"
Careful, Faustin. Here be dragons. He was going to tease her about her diet, but that was obviously a very bad idea. Fucking Jeff. It had something to do with him.
"No. But I think I should cook for you. I'd like to make dinner for you tonight before I leave, if you don't have plans, that is."
A very gratifying blush bloomed on her cheeks. His heart began to beat double time. It was saying hope, hope, hope. He knew she wanted him. She'd walked into his dream last night, or maybe it was the other way around, but whichever, it had been spectacular. It was the source of the tension that danced between them. But lust wasn't love. It wasn't even like. He knew that better than anyone.
"That's nice—but you don't have to."
"It would be fun. It's not something I ever get to do."
"You don't cook for your lovers?"
You are the only lover I've ever wanted to feed. But he couldn't say that without scaring her, or sounding like a jerk. Should he have fed his donors? He'd didn't know anyone who fed their donors. He gave them drinks at least, coffee in the morning. Sometimes. Christ, I am a jerk.
What he did say was true. "I never knew I could cook solid food before this morning." He laughed. "My luck may not hold, either. I'm not saying this is going to be great."
Still she looked suspicious. Talking with her was like negotiating a damn minefield.
"I'm staying in a hotel tonight, not matter what. Just so we're clear."
He watched her relax, and even though her smile was not big enough to wrinkle her nose, it was genuine. "Then let's have dinner."
Chapter 9
Helena drove him to the grocery store, thinking she knew nothing about vampires if a trip to Safeway could get one so excited. Alex commandeered a shopping cart in the parking lot and tried to ride it like a scooter all the way into the store. She felt oddly domestic as they passed through the sliding doors together, while he was as gleeful a kid with a pass to the country fair. And among the crowd of beleaguered Monday-night shoppers, he was the only one grinning.
"It's huge!" he said. "It's like a city of food."
"Don't you have grocery stores in New York?" She turned to glare at a woman who was staring at them and kept glaring until the woman turned her cart around and walked the opposite direction. Alex didn't look bad enough to cause a scare, but between his pink skin and manic grin, anyone would take a second glance at him. That didn't make it okay to stare, though.
Alex said, "We've got a few, I think, but they're smaller. Which way to the fruit and vegetables? You know, that's the section you never go to."
"You mean that place with all the nasty green things lying around?"
"That's the one."
Helena pointed to the opposite end of the store. Alex picked her up and dropped her into their cart, and started to push it at a dead run.
"Alex! Stop!" But of course he didn't and all she could do was squat down, grab the sides of the cart and hold on for dear life.
This was no way to keep people from staring.
They skidded around a paper towel display at high speed. The cart banked and she shrieked like a teenage girl as he pulled them out of the curve. They shot past the same old biddy who'd been staring at them before. Helena grinned and waved.
Alex tossed a loaf of French bread at Helena. And another. She caught them the best she could while laughing, then ducked a third. "Stop it! You're not going—" He silenced her by spinning the cart until tears of laughter streamed down her face.
Every aisle brought up a barrage of questions. "Do you like oysters? Radishes? Gingerbread?"
On the way to the produce section he dropped a pound cake in her lap. A bottle of cocktail sauce. An enormous plastic-wrapped fish.
All she could say about the fish was, "Why?"
"It's beautiful, that's why. What do you think we could do with it?"
Helena raised her brows at the fish and shrugged. Improvisation was way out of her league. She'd cooked for Jeff, following the strict meal plans from his training journals. He sent her to the grocery store with lists and for five years she dutifully produced grim, healthy meals for him. Chicken breasts by the hundreds, mounds of steamed vegetables and whole grains. He ate whatever she put in front of him, but he never liked her cooking. Neither did she. When they broke up she swore she'd never read the back of a package, consult a calorie chart or weigh a piece of food again. Her four food groups were fat, sugar, white flour and caffeine, and she ate things that gave her these four essential nutrients with as little trouble as possible to herself.