Aidan inhaled deeply and looked up at the sky. This wasn’t his homeland, but it was his home. The vampire had been wrong about that. Aidan had grown to love San Francisco over the years. It was an interesting city with interesting people. True, he missed his own kind and the wildness of the Carpathian mountains and forests. He would give almost anything to touch the soil of his homeland. The ancient land of his people was forever in his heart, but this city had its own call, its diverse cultures melding and making for an incredible world to explore and enjoy.
Aidan used his keys to open the kitchen door. The house was quiet. Stefan and Marie were asleep in their room. Joshua slept fitfully, obviously uncomfortable at being so long separated from his sister, though Marie had allowed him to sleep in the little sitting room off their bedroom on the first floor. Stefan had kept his promise; the house was locked up tight, its iron grills shut over the windows to protect against invasion.
Aidan’s safeguards were holding strong. Spells that were ancient and strong, known only to a few of the oldest of his people, were woven into the doors’ intricate stained-glass windows. Gregori, the dark one, the most feared of the Carpathian hunters and their greatest healer, had taught him much—the safeguards, healing, even the ways to hunt the undead. Mikhail, their leader and Gregori’s only friend, had agreed to send Aidan to the United States as a hunter once it was known the betrayers had begun to branch out and seek other worlds for use as their killing fields. Gregori trained few hunters; he was a loner and avoided others as a rule.
Julian, Aidan’s twin brother, had tried to work with Gregori for a time, but he was too much like the dark one. A loner. He needed the highest peaks, the deepest forests. He needed to run with the wolf and soar with the eagles, just as Gregori had chosen to do. Theirs had not been the way of people, of cities, or even of their own kind.
Aidan moved through the spotless kitchen to the basement door. It suddenly occurred to him how good the kitchen always smelled, with its aromas of fresh-baked bread and spices. Marie, and her family before her, had always made his house a home. He had never really appreciated it before. Their loyalty had remained the wonder of his life, but he had never noticed the way they had made his heretofore bleak life bearable.
He breathed in the scent of his family. Warmth spread through his body, his heart. After centuries of a cold, barren existence, he wanted to fall to his knees in gratitude at the unexpected joy of family. He had never noticed the rustic efficiency of the basement before, either. It wasn’t simply a musty, underground space but a bright, expansive room boasting Stefan’s rich wood carvings and a well-organized array of tools. Work benches and tables were clean and orderly, garden tools gleamed with care, and to their left were countless bags of rich soil stacked carefully. Stefan. He owed the man so much.
Aidan himself had meticulously cut out the tunnel leading down to his hidden chamber after studying the rock forming the cliff and knowing that the secret chamber would be impossible to penetrate or detect so close to the large body of water. The undead might know he was sleeping close by, but they would never pinpoint his exact location.
Aidan had chosen the site of his home with care. As money was seldom an object when one lived for centuries, he had more than enough for several lifetimes. It was simply a matter of finding the right location and building to his specific needs. He wanted a few neighbors so that he blended in with his new society, but he needed space and privacy, grounds he could roam in and the freedom of the countryside in his own backyard. He needed the sea with its crashing waves and scents and mist that he could manipulate when necessary.
His property, overlooking the ocean on a bluff, was as close to perfect as he could find. He owned plenty of land around the house to use as a buffer between himself and the neighbors, yet there were other houses along the road. He had the privacy he needed if one of the betrayers found him and he had to fight without danger of someone coming upon them.
Setting up a new home in a new land had been one of the most difficult things he had ever done. But now, as he approached his sleeping chamber, that difficulty paled in comparison to what his brave Alexandria faced in her new life. She expected to die, even welcomed death, especially if it meant saving another—him. He had felt in her mind that she was not willing to prey on the human race for nourishment. She did not have a predatory nature or predatory instincts. And she feared she was vampire. No amount of explanation would overcome her distrust. Only time could do that, and he somehow had to buy himself enough of it with her to convince her that neither of them was vampire, neither of them a heartless killer. He needed the time to make her realize she belonged to him, with him, that they could never be apart.
He brought her out of the earth cradled in his arms. Stretching out on the bed, he motioned with one hand and closed the earth and trap door. She did not need to face the evidence of their unusual life all at once. She would awaken in a bed in a chamber. She would have enough to deal with without finding herself virtually buried in the earth itself.
He would have to work fast. The moment she was awake, he would have to seize her mind, before she became aware of what was happening and attempted to resist him. He did not want to start their relationship by forcing her to do something abhorrent to her; still, he had no choice but to replace her huge blood loss.
He took a breath, stroked back her hair, then opened his shirt.
Wake,
piccola.
Wake and take what you need to live. Drink what I freely offer. Do as I command.
Beneath his hand her heart stuttered, laboring to awaken as he bade even without sufficient blood to sustain life. His fingernail sliced his chest, and he pressed her mouth to the steady red stream.
He held her mind firmly as her body slowly warmed, as her heart and lungs found a rhythm. With the infusion of his blood, so much more powerful than most, her strength returned quickly. Without warning, she fought him, abruptly becoming aware of what was happening to her. With a small sigh, he allowed her to prevail, deliberately loosening his hold.
She dragged herself away from him, falling onto the floor, trying to spit the blood from her mouth, trying desperately to hate the taste of the sweet, hot fluid building strength in her.
“How could you?” She crawled away from the bed, scrambled to her feet, and pressed herself against the wall, wiping at her mouth over and over. Her eyes were wild with horror.
Aidan was forced to close the wound on his chest. He moved slowly to reduce her fear. Very carefully he sat up. “Be calm, Alexandria. You did not yet take in enough nourishment to restore your strength.”
“I can’t believe you did this. I’m supposed to be dead. You promised to take care of Joshua. What have you done?” She was gasping for breath, the wall holding her up. Her legs felt like rubber. He had lied to her.
Lied
.
“You chose life for me, Alexandria. And I cannot live without you. Our lives are bound together now. One cannot survive without the other.” He spoke gently, making no move to go to her. She looked as if she might bolt at the slightest provocation.
“I chose to save
your
life. We both knew what that meant.” She said it desperately, jamming a fist against her mouth to keep from screaming. She could not, would not, live like this.
“I knew what it meant,
cara
. You did not.”
“You’re a liar. How can I believe anything you say? You made me the same as you, and now you’re forcing me to live on blood. I won’t, Aidan. I don’t care what you do to me, but I won’t take someone’s blood.” She shuddered visibly and slid down the wall to the floor. She drew her knees up to her chest and rocked, trying to comfort herself.