Page 24 of The Love Bitten Series: Vol 2

With the punch she delivered—kudos to your consort, by the way—I figured you’d be a few minutes, so I followed her. Been running after her car from several feet away so she doesn’t spot the blur in her rearview mirror.

I owe you.

Not to worry, big brother. I’ll collect.

Rolling my eyes again, I teleported to the next intersection she would come to on Haven. My timing wasn’t the best, though, because she was only a few feet away. When Narkissa saw me, she screamed and swerved. I didn’t want her to get caught on a patch of ice hidden under all the snow, so I put my hand on the hood and stopped the Audi in its tracks.

3

NARKISSA

Ishook my head, unable to make sense of what had just happened. My brain couldn’t wrap around everything I had seen and heard over the past thirty or so minutes. I couldn’t help but wonder if Minerva had spiked the eggnog I’d drunk while we opened gifts before dinner. Or if the housekeeper had mixed up the chamomile tea with a hallucinogenic by mistake. Being drugged was the only reasonable explanation that I could come up with for the wild things that had happened.

“I don’t care what I saw. Vampires aren’t real,” I muttered to myself as I jammed my index finger against the button to undo my seat belt. Only it didn’t release, no matter how many times I pressed the darn thing. My heart already felt as though it was about to pound through my chest—which was no surprise since the hot, crazy guy I was running from had just appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the road and somehow stopped my freaking car with one hand! My pulse skyrocketed further when the driver’s side door of my car swung open, and Jareth crouched in the opening.

My reaction had nothing to do with my unexpected attraction to the ridiculously handsome man. Or at least that was what I told myself. There was no way in heck I was willing to admit that the thudding of my heart was because Jareth was the first guy I’d ever physically responded to. Sure, he was beyond gorgeous with his dark hair, bright blue eyes, and tall, muscular body. And he looked debonair in his black dress slacks and wool coat, especially while fighting. But he also had to be out of his mind if he believed all that crap he’d told me about vampires and the women who were destined to spend the rest of their very long lives with them. After all these years of wondering if something was wrong with me, I’d been betrayed by my own body.

“Are you okay?” Jareth asked as he leaned inside to fiddle with the buckle on my seat belt. His woodsy scent filled my nostrils, and I tried to jerk away from him. I was wedged between his hard body and the driver’s seat of my Audi, so I didn’t get far. “Don’t move, sweetheart. I need to check if you’re hurt first.”

“I guess it’s only fair for you to make sure I’m okay since any injuries I may have would be all your fault,” I grumbled. “How in the heck did you stop my car? I mean, I wasn’t going that fast because of the snow, and I hit the brakes as soon as I saw you. But you still shouldn’t have been able to do that.”

He jerked his thumb toward his broad chest with a sexy grin. “Vampire, remember?”

I pressed the back of my head against the seat’s headrest and squeezed my eyes shut. “Did you seriously chase me down by some miracle I don’t understand just to try to sell me on the garbage you were spewing back at the convenience store?”

“The only miracle around here is you.” His shoulder brushed against my nipples as he worked to free me from the seat belt, making them pebble. It was the barest of touches but still sent a zing of sensation directly to my core. “And every single thing I told you was true. You’ll never get any lies from me.”

“Uh-huh. Sure, I won’t,” I drawled, pushing against his chest when the buckle finally released.

He backed up, and I heaved a deep sigh of relief. I wouldn’t have been able to move him on my own, judging by the wall of muscle my palms had encountered. If he’d stayed close, I might’ve done something ridiculous like drag him all the way into the car with me so I could attack him...and not in the fending off a scary guy kind of way. Even with the space limitations in my Audi, I would’ve been all over him until I finally learned what the big deal was about kissing. And sex. Plus, orgasms if I was super lucky.

I scrambled out of the car, hoping the cold air would shock the outlandish thoughts out of my brain. Something was very wrong with me. I’d somehow gone from being a virgin with a libido that had never switched on to a woman who couldn’t stop thinking about sex. Maybe I was suffering from a disorder where a kidnap victim falls for their rescuer. Kind of like Stockholm syndrome but with one of the good guys instead.

When I rounded my car, my eyes widened when I saw a hand-shaped dent in the hood. Whirling around to gape at Jareth, I asked, “Psychedelic tea is a real thing, right?”

“Shit,” Jareth bit out, his bright blue eyes searching my face before scanning down my body. “Did you hit your head when I stopped the car?”

“No.” I batted his hands away when he pushed my hair off my forehead. “I don’t have a concussion or anything like that. I’m asking a perfectly reasonable question, considering the circumstances. Nothing that’s happened to me since I left my parents’ house makes any sense. I went into a convenience store and was carried into a back room, tied up, and my captors were talking about asking their master if they could taste my blood. Then they took another woman who got them to back off by flicking water at them, as if that makes any sense. When they chased us into the alley, you guys showed up out of nowhere, fought them, and the bad guys literally burst into flames and turned to ash. And to top that all off, you appeared out of thin air in the middle of the road and stopped my car by putting your hand on the hood. I have to either be dreaming because I’m still asleep on my parents’ couch, or I’m hallucinating because someone drugged me.”

“Master?” he echoed.

“That’s seriously what you took away from everything I just said?” I rolled my eyes when his only response was to nod and quirk a brow. “Yeah, they also spouted some mumbo-jumbo about him being happy that they captured two consorts in one night.”

“Capture, not kill. How odd,” he murmured.

“Gee, try not to be so happy I’m still alive,” I huffed, balling my hands into fists and planting them on my hips.

His gaze dropped to my hands, and his lips curved into a grin. “You have no idea how thrilled I am that they didn’t kill you, sweetheart. Even if it meant getting my jaw broken.”

I squinted at him through the snow, which was starting to get heavier. I felt a little guilty for punching him, but I wasn’t going to apologize for doing what was necessary to get away from him and all his crazy talk about my destiny as a vampire’s consort. I hadn’t bowed to my mother’s pressure to find some wealthy guy to marry like my sister had when she’d accepted Charles’s proposal. I’d been holding out for love, but if Jareth was right, then the choice was going to be taken away from me. I’d be stuck with whatever vampire fate had paired me with. “It doesn’t look broken.”

“Luckily, I’m a fast healer.” His grin made it obvious that he wasn’t mad about the punch, which only made me wonder more about his sanity because it had been one heck of a hit.

The wind picked up, and I wrapped my arms around my body and shivered.

“You’re cold?” he asked, his deep voice full of concern.

“Um, yeah.” I circled my hand in the air, more than a few big flakes of snow clinging to my skin as I brought my index finger and thumb close together. “The storm is this close to becoming a blizzard. Maybe if I was an immortal, cold-blooded creature like you, I’d be impervious to the weather. But I’m not. I’m just human. Of course, I’m cold.”

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