(Sam)
Why couldn’t I have just said a big resounding no when Jared had asked for me to feed off his energy? Then I wouldn’t be in this mess at all. I wouldn’t have kissed him again, I wouldn’t have teleported us both to the training arena so we would never have had a big blow out, and he wouldn’t hate me. Amazing how one little decision could have such an effect.
Right now, I really wasn’t impressed. I’d been in my apartment totally brassed off and thinking that I just needed to cool off, and the next thing I found myself at the bottom of the pool! Damn this teleporting shit. I didn’t bother getting out. I’d wanted to have a dip in the pool the minute I saw it. Only problem was that when I thought of the first time I saw it, I remembered how Jared had been swimming in it.
Tonight had been one of the worst nights ever. First I’d had my squad being absolute sods to the point that I’d had to send a blast of air at them to knock them off their feet. Then I’d had to see Victor again. Then I’d killed Victor. Then there’d been that horrible, indescribable agony while my body grieved. Then there’d been all that stuff with Jared. And now I was stuck worrying where this teleporting power was going to take me to next.
I definitely had to stop thinking about Jared in case it took me to him. That’d be bad.
So I thought about the pool. Technically I should then stay where I was. I enjoyed the feel of the water on my skin and how it lapped up against my body. I thought of how weird it had felt swimming just minutes ago, it had been my first time since becoming a vampire and God it was effortless. I didn’t struggle to stay fully afloat no matter how tired I was, I didn’t have to dig deep in myself for the energy to keep going after a few minutes, and nor did I have to wait long before my hair dried. Closing my eyes, I thought about how peaceful it was here in the water alone, and how relaxed my body was becoming, and how –
SPLASH!
I opened my eyes to find Max the Slap-head in the pool. He hollered a noise of exhilaration.
“I’ll say this only once,” I told him. “Fuck off.”
“Now, now,” he said, wagging a finger. “Sure you have your authority when it’s training time. But right now I’m on my own time. And I’m staying.”
“Tosser,” I cursed, too brassed off to take much notice of his bare chest. There had been a lot of bare chests going around tonight.
He came a little closer. “I heard what happened.”
I tensed. A lot had happened tonight so what exactly did he mean?
“Must have been a hard thing to do; killing your Sire.” There was a lot of sensitivity in his voice. I hadn’t thought of Slap-head as the type to have a sensitive side.
“Yeah well he was a dickhead.”
“I heard that too.” His smile was only small but it held all its usual cheekiness. “At the risk of sounding like a pervert, why are you fully clothed in the pool?”
“Ah you sound so disappointed. Had you been hoping that jumping in here would get you a better look at what lies beneath?”
“Oh I can see your assets just fine, don’t worry about it. In fact, with your wet clothes clinging to your skin it’s a really good view.”
I splashed a handful of water at him. He shook it off like a wet dog and then edged even closer, but not too close, which I appreciated.
“I wanted to ask you something.” His tone was serious now. “If you knew that rumours were getting spread round about someone...would you tell them?”
It couldn’t have been more obvious what he was getting at. “What have people been saying about me now?”
“The messengers get shot a lot,” he continued, ignoring me, “so if you were the messenger would you risk getting shot?”
“Slap-head, tell me now,” I ground out.
His eyebrows shot up and a smile crept onto his face. “I’m not telling you a thing until you drop the Slap-head thing. We’re not working now, it’s on my own time, and my name is Max.”
“Either get out of the bleeding pool and leave me in peace or cough up.”
“Is it really that hard for you to say my name? Does it make you shudder or something?” He was even closer to me now. “Or maybe I just make you nervous.”
“You make me want to slap you.”
“Alright, fair enough. People have been saying that something’s going on between you and Commander Michaels.”
I stiffened. Had someone been in the arena who we hadn’t noticed? I played it aloof. “And this rumour is based on...?”
He gave me an incredulous look as though he thought the answer was obvious. “Well, um, there’s how he looks at you. There’s how you look at him. There’s the fact that there’s that much sexual tension between you that it gets us all horny. I mean, come on, you guys can’t even work together.”
“Thanks for the heads-up about the rumour,” I said simply, still aloof.
“Well? Do you wish to confirm or deny these rumours?”
“You know what? No comment. And I’ll tell you why: you lot need to grasp the fact that I’m your superior, not your equal, not your mate. That means my business is my own.”
Max grinned. He’d taken that as a denial, by the looks of things. There was the smallest space between us now. I had to question why I was allowing him to get so close. It wasn’t like I had any intention of kissing him. But, contrary to what he believed, I wasn’t nervous around him. He was easy to be around because he didn’t want to play games or make bets or push on things. He just wanted to have a laugh.
“Okay,” he said. “But like I’ve said, we’re on our own time now. This is just one single person talking to another.”
“What does this single person want?”
He pursed his lips for a second. “Hmm. I guess what I want is to know if when we’re on our own time...we can cancel out each other’s single status.”
His cuteness and smooth voice and the way that he hadn’t come across all corny and pushy almost made me consider it. But I had plenty of reasons not to. “Mates is the best I can do. And by mates, I mean friends.”
Max nodded but didn’t lose his smile. “There’s one thing you’ll learn about me in training tomorrow.”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t give up easy.”
“I’m not playing hard to get,” I told him as he hopped out the pool. “Mates, that’s it.”
“I know you’re not playing. But babe, that just makes you even more of a challenge. You’ve no idea how much I like challenges. You might not have meant to, but you just turned me on big style.”
I had a feeling that he didn’t walk away with vampire speed because he was hoping I’d take a sneaky look at his arse as he strutted off. I didn’t look. I’d already gotten a good look at it at the try-out. It was a nice behind if ever there was one. Biteable.
You’ve just saved his life by saying no, I heard in my head. Jared.
My head immediately snapped up to look at his balcony. He wasn’t out, but I could see him at the window. Seconds later he was out of view, but I’d saw his expression long enough to notice that he was absolutely livid with me. That fact bothered me as I lay there that morning, trying desperately to get some sleep.
After my day’s sleep in the comfiest bed ever, I actually didn’t feel so bad. Yeah, I still felt crappy over everything that had happened with Jared. And I still had mixed feelings over burning alive my maker. But there were bigger problems – like the fact that The Hollow might be attacked soon and the squad had to be prepared. So although I was again a little tempted to hide away in my room, I ignored it.
I thought about trying to teleport to the office but immediately decided against it. God knows where I’d end up. It was odd. Usually when I absorbed someone’s power I could handle it just as easy as I handled my own because I knew exactly how to harness energy and channel it; that was all you needed in order to control and effectively use a power. But I couldn’t seem to grasp how to use this teleporting thing. Thankfully it would fade as soon as I used up all of the energy that Jared had passed on to me.