Page 20 of A Vampire Bewitched
Sitting down again at the other end of the table, Nik told her the truth. “I’ve been watching you.”
She stopped stirring and her head snapped up. “Watching me? Here? When?”
Feeling not in the least bit uncomfortable at how this was going to sound, he told her, “I’ve been hanging around outside your house every night for the past week. Watching. Learning your habits…” he shrugged as he trailed off.
She stared at him a moment, then started stirring again. “Why?”
“I was trying to discern who you are, what you know…who you know…before I contacted you.” He looked at her, kind of surprised to find nothing but mild curiosity on her face instead of the expected outrage.
“So you’ve been sitting outside my house every night?”
He nodded, unashamed.
“And what did you find out?”
She seemed genuinely intrigued. He’d expected her to feel intruded upon, offended, creeped out, but he wasn’t sensing any of that.
“I found out that you work too much, and you come home too late every night. You run into the house, shower, eat, tea, TV and bed. Same time, same order. Every day.” He paused, uncertain if he should continue.Ah, what the hell.“You’re a vegetarian, or maybe just a healthy eater? You wear an old, blue, ratty robe…probably because it’s familiar and it comforts you. Just like the routine you keep.” Then he said quietly, “You don’t like the darkness.” He paused. “Last night I stayed here so long, I was still here when you got up to go jogging. You ran right past me.”
“I did?” She sounded horrified. “But, I thought you can’t go out in the day?”
“I can’t. Not the direct sun. But it hadn’t quite come up yet, and I’mreallyfast.” He grinned at her. “I hightailed it out of here as soon as you got to the road.”
She smiled slightly, a pensive look coming into her eyes just for a second before she seemed to catch herself. “Your stalking doesn’t seem to have given you any useful information about me, though,” she observed.
“On the contrary. I’ve learned all I needed to know.” Thankful she wasn’t freaking out on him again, he relaxed and sat back in his chair, stretching out one long leg.
Raising an eyebrow, he asked her, “One thing though…Marilyn Manson? Really?”
“I happen to like Marilyn,” she said indignantly, taking a sip of her tea. “Besides,” she murmured, “the music makes it go away.”
“Makes what go away, Emma?” he prompted softly.
Chapter 11
Emma looked down at her hands, wrapped around her warm teacup, and figured there was no dancing around the subject anymore.
But what if, in spite of his reassurances, he didn’t believe her? What if he thought she was crazy? The things that attacked her and her sister that night don’t exist in real life. She’d spent the last seven years convincing even herself they didn’t, that she’d made them up in her mind to deal with the trauma she’d been dealt. And she’d nearly succeeded.
Then again, vampires like him weren’t supposed to exist either. Yet there he was, sitting at her kitchen table, real as could be.
It was time to face reality. Much as she didn’t want to talk about it, if Nik was legit and she wanted to help her sister, there seemed to be no more avoiding it. So, after a long silence, she finally admitted, “The nightmares. The music chases away the nightmares.”
He sat very still. “What are the nightmares about, Em?”
Speaking very softly, like she was afraid they’d hear her, she stared out the window as she told him, “They’re always the same. I’m with Keira and we’re leaving the carnival. They hit all the little towns around here every summer, you know. It was a perfect summer night, and we’d had so much fun. We rode all the rides, played all the games, and ate every greasy thing we could find…and for once, no one had bothered us.” A wistful smile played around her mouth as she remembered the last time she’d been with her sister. “It was getting really late, so we'd decided to leave. We were chasing each other through the field, running to our car. We were laughing…”
She stopped talking, lost in the memories she’d tried so hard to forget, intentionally recalling the details for the first time in years. Her mind recoiled against the memories, trying to go back into self-preservation mode, but she struggled through it.
“Keira suddenly stopped running, and I turned around to see why. She wasn’t looking at me, but past me toward the tree line where our car was parked. She was white with terror. I thought maybe it was a bear or something; we have them around here sometimes. So I turned around to see for myself…”
Nik could feelher chaotic emotions, the main one being terror. It radiated from her across the space between them, and hit him right in the center of his chest.
The urge to go back in time and slowly, painfully, kill whatever it was that was making her feel so scared rushed through him without warning. He didn’t want her to be afraid. Ever. He tried to look away, knowing his eyes would be glowing, full of the primal need for revenge rolling through him. But he couldn’t tear them away from her face.
She paused, and tears ran down her cheeks as her hands started shaking again.
Nik’s fangs slid down and his lips pulled back in a sinister snarl, instinctually preparing for battle. Muscles tensed and thickened, squeezing a low growl from deep within his chest.
