But it’d all been a lie. She did enjoy those things, but they also were a way to trick herself into believing she wasn’t desperately lonely. Not lonely for friends but for romance, for someone to hold her, for love.
She swallowed hard at the thought that she couldn’t have that with Campbell either, not if she valued her life. Not if she valued his.
When she returned to the balcony doors, he was gone. But then she noticed him atop the opposite building. His attention was focused on something she couldn’t see, and chills scurried down her arms at the thought of vampires prowling the streets right outside her home.
She sank into her chair just as he dropped out of sight on the other side of the building. He hadn’t even said goodbye. Well, what did she expect?
She sighed and closed her eyes. Without him to talk to, fatigue tugged at her with more insistence. She forced herself to stand and reached for the sliding glass door to close it. Campbell landed on her balcony, causing her to yelp in surprise.
“Sorry,” he said. “Thought I’d be back before you were.”
She glanced past him. “Where did you go?”
“To take care of some business.”
She noticed a rip in his shirt and figured that business had included a few fists being thrown.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She looked up and saw him watching her. “Yeah, just tired.”
He shifted as though he was going to leave again. “Go to bed. I have to get back to work anyway.”
“Okay.” She paused, wondering what else and how much to say. “I’ve enjoyed talking with you.”
His expression changed to one of disbelief, but he hid it quickly.
“Sorry if my chattering on has kept you from your work,” she said.
He smiled, making her go a little gooey inside. “We keep apologizing to each other.”
“Sorry.” The moment after she said it, she laughed. “I think I’m getting punchy.”
“Perhaps a little,” he said, teasing.
Maybe it was her fatigue, or maybe it was the way he was looking at her, but all kinds of images of the two of them together flooded her mind and caused her body to warm.
His eyes widened almost imperceptibly. She still didn’t believe vampires could read minds, but she suddenly realized that he could probably read every little change in her body. Heart rate, scent, temperature.
“You have another long day tomorrow,” he said as he shifted his gaze to somewhere beyond her. “Close and lock the door, and get some sleep.”
She wanted to ask if he would come back the next night, but that sounded too needy. So she just smiled and grasped the edge of the door. But she couldn’t close it when her eyes met his. He took a step toward her then stopped.
“Lock the door so I can go,” he said.
She knew he was watching out for her safety, but instinct told her there was more to his words. And she wanted to see what it was. With her heart beating fast, she stepped through the doorway onto the balcony.
“Olivia, stop,” he said as he took a step backward. “Go back inside.”
“I don’t want to.”
“You’re not safe out here. Please go back inside.”
“Kiss me and I will.”
She saw the war going on inside him reflected on his face.
“You don’t know what you’re saying,” he said.
“You’re wrong.”
He closed his eyes for a moment, but then he pulled her to him and lowered his mouth to hers. The intensity of the kiss, the hunger fueling it, stole her breath. A momentary shot of fear was swept aside by a swell of desire. She ran her hands up his back and let him deepen the kiss. Her body flooded with warmth in the same moment he growled and broke the kiss. He set her away from him.
“This is crazy,” he said.
She noticed he was breathing hard despite the fact he didn’t have to.
He wasn’t the only one whose lungs were working extra hard.
Before she could catch her breath and speak, he stepped toward the edge of the balcony and gripped the railing. “Good night, Olivia,” he said in a strangled voice without looking at her. And then he bounded over the side effortlessly and disappeared.
She gasped and peered over the edge. He stood on the street below staring up at her. What was she thinking, exposing herself like this? He could have killed her instead of kissing her until her knees went weak. He could still attack her before she got back inside. But he didn’t move. He simply looked up at her until she understood that he wasn’t going anywhere until she went inside and locked the door.
Though it was surprisingly hard to do so, she turned and went back inside, locking the balcony door behind her. And then to help keep her from retracing her steps back outside into vulnerable territory, she closed the blinds. She had to stop this before she got in over her head. Between now and the next time she saw him, if she ever saw him again, she had to figure out a way to think of him as nothing more than an unlikely friend. For both of their sakes, she had to chase away the wild attraction that only seemed to build with each moment they spent together. That had exploded with that kiss.
Oh, God, she’d kissed him, a vampire. She touched her lips, remembering the feel of his cool mouth on hers. She dropped her head back against the glass door and shook her head.
She tried focusing on the terror she’d felt when he’d attacked her, but that freaked her out so much now that she was alone in her apartment that she had to shove that memory away. Part of her wanted to talk to Mindy about this, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t tell anyone. No, it was best she had to keep it all to herself. She could relive the glances, the conversations, the sight of him and that kiss in every tiny detail. If no one else knew, no one could tell her what an idiot she was being, that she’d lost her mind.
A glance at the clock revealed it was almost one in the morning, and dawn was going to come way too soon. So she headed for the bedroom, changed into her pajamas and slid into bed. But no matter how tired she was, she couldn’t shut off her brain and fall asleep. She rolled onto her side and ran her hand down the other half of the mattress. For the first time since Jeremy’s death, she imagined another man lying there, pulling her close, kissing her. Another man’s skin touching hers as he slid inside her and made her gasp with pleasure.
She evidently fell asleep with that image playing in her mind, because she had dreams hot enough to burn the building down. Campbell’s gorgeous body spread out next to hers, moving along and within her, giving her a pleasure indescribable outside of the dream. When she woke to the barest hint of dawn, she was panting.
Embarrassed, she placed her hands over her burning cheeks and grasped on to every image before it faded away the way dreams tended to do. She closed her eyes and let herself float on the sensations those memories had caused. It took only moments for her to grow truly hot and bothered again. She really should go take a cold shower and get her mind on the day ahead instead of something that hadn’t really happened.
But it’d been so long since she’d felt like that, so long that she wasn’t going to deny herself. Pushing embarrassment away, she let her hand slide lower under the covers and finished what Campbell had started in her dream.
When she finally made her way on shaky legs to the bathroom, she flicked on the light and looked at herself in the mirror, wondering if she looked different.