Lucian had seen a lot of newly turned immortals down through the ages, and the majority didn’t take it as well as Leigh had... at least not if they were turned unwillingly. But she appeared to have accepted what she’d become, and seemed determined to just get on with learning all she could about her new status and how to function as an immortal.
A pang of guilt nipped at Lucian as he realized he’d been of little help so far. Tired and dismayed to find himself burdened with her, at first his only concern had been to find someone to dump her on. He’d answered as few questions as possible, even going so far as to call Marguerite long distance in Europe so he didn’t have to explain things to her himself.
Actually, he realized, every accusation Rachel had thrown at him over the last day had been true. Not that he’d admit that to her, he thought as he reached Leigh’s room and opened the door.
The two women were seated on the side of the bed. While Rachel was rubbing her back soothingly, Leigh had a blood bag stuck to her mouth, tears were streaming down her face, her eyes were red and puffy, and her nose swollen and still bloody. She looked just adorable to him.
Pushing that thought impatiently away, Lucian narrowed his eyes and concentrated on slipping into her thoughts... and concentrated... and concentrated... and—
“She didn’t bite the cleaning girl.”
Lucian blinked at that announcement and glanced down to find Rachel now standing at his side. He’d been concentrating so hard on Leigh, he hadn’t noticed when Rachel stood up and moved to join him by the door.
“I know,” he said calmly. “The cleaning woman explained everything.”
Rachel nodded and tilted her head, considering him with a solemn expression. “You still can’t read her.”
Lucian’s mouth tightened but he didn’t say anything. She was right, but he hadn’t yet had time to come to grips with the issue himself, and certainly didn’t want to discuss it with Rachel. Rather than address the subject, he asked, “How is she?”
For a moment he thought Rachel might ignore his question and pursue the matter of his not being able to read Leigh, but then she heaved a sigh and said, “She’s upset. I think she’s scared of herself now, of what she’ll do.”
Lucian relaxed a little and nodded. “I’ll talk to her.”
“You?” she asked with surprise, and he felt irritation flicker through him.
“I have been an immortal a long time, Rachel. I do know something of the matter.”
“Yes, but this isn’t—This is—” She grimaced, then simply said, “It’s not about how many pints of blood she’ll need a day, or what the change will do to her physically. It’s emotional stuff, Lucian, and somehow I don’t think that’s your strong suit.”
He glared at her for a moment, furious, mostly because she was correct. Emotional garbage wasn’t really where he was at his finest. However, he was the one who had brought her here, and he was the one who couldn’t read her. She might be his future life mate. It seemed to behoove him to learn how to deal with Leigh, and understand her emotional perspective so he could help her through this difficult landscape. Besides, how hard could it be?
“Etienne is down in the kitchen,” he announced meaningfully, then left her to make her exit and walked to the bed.
Lucian heard the door close softly as he paused in front of Leigh. His gaze slid over the two empty bags on the end of the bed beside her, and he found himself smiling faintly. Leigh was binging. Consuming bag after bag of blood, in the hopes she’d fill herself up so she couldn’t possibly be interested in biting again, he realized, then congratulated himself for being so insightful. Maybe this emotional stuff wasn’t as hard as he’d thought.
His gaze shifted back to her and he noted that she’d stopped crying. Thank God! He hated weeping women. There was nothing so difficult to deal with as a weeping woman. They didn’t listen, made no sense, and left a man feeling guilty and helpless. He hated that.
Feeling awkward just standing there, he settled himself on the bed where Rachel had previously sat, then turned to peer at Leigh. She met his gaze and they simply stared at each other as she continued to feed. Her eyes were huge and luminous after her tears, their color a beautiful golden brown now swirling with emotion. They were sad, but there was also shame, anger, hurt, and loneliness there. Lucian felt a twinge in his chest as he recognized the loneliness. It was something he often saw in his own eyes on looking in the mirror.
He reached out to pat her hand awkwardly, then cleared his throat before speaking, and still his voice came out gruff as he said, “It’s all right.”
When Leigh’s eyes widened over the shrinking blood bag in her mouth, he added, “You didn’t bite her. That was very strong of you. Not everyone could have resisted, but you did.”
Lucian patted her hand again and said reassuringly, “You did good. I should have warned you about the hunger. This was not your fault. It’s my fault for sleeping when you needed me.”
Feeling he’d said what needed to be said to soothe her, he would have stood then and left, but found his gaze sliding over her again. She was wearing the same god-awful outfit she’d had on earlier; the overlarge joggers and a t-shirt she was swimming in. His gaze paused on the writing on the front of the t-shirt and his eyes widened incredulously: I’M THE TEENAGE GIRL YOU HAD CYBER SEX WITH IN THE CHAT ROOM.
Lucian blinked several times, one part of his mind telling him that as she had no clothes of her own here, the t-shirt was borrowed, and probably from Etienne. He was the computer geek in the family. The other part of his mind was wallowing in wholly inappropriate ideas. He wasn’t sure what cyber sex was, but he did recall good old-fashioned sex, and while he hadn’t been moved to indulge in it in... well, a period too long for any self-respecting man to admit to—his mind had no problem throwing up image after image of himself naked and sweaty and entwined with an equally naked and sweaty Leigh.
Lucian closed his eyes and almost groaned aloud. He had a problem. He couldn’t read Leigh, couldn’t control her, and he was lusting after her. And that was rather startling. He was an old man. An old, old man, and she was so young compared to him. He didn’t look old, but he sure as hell felt old sometimes... most of the time. All right, all of the time. And she was like spring, fresh and sweet and innocent to the ways of the world, as proven by the bruised, wounded look in her big wet eyes.
“Dammit!” Leigh snapped, pulling the now empty blood bag away from her mouth.
Well, she was mostly sweet and innocent, Lucian corrected as he opened his eyes to find her leaning to the side to retrieve yet another bag of blood from the refrigerator.
“I could just kill Donny!” she growled.
Okay, forget the sweet and innocent, he thought. It was overrated anyway. She was still young, Lucian thought wryly as she continued her rant.
“I nearly bit that girl. Why couldn’t Donny have had a crush on someone else?”
Lucian stiffened. “A crush?”
“Well, why do you think he dragged me off the streets?” Leigh asked with exasperation. “He was rambling on about how he’d chosen me for his own, and we’d be together forever, eternally happy in our coffin built for two, blah blah blah. As if I’d want to be with any man forever.”
“You don’t?” Lucian asked with a frown.
“Hell no!” Leigh exclaimed firmly. “I’ve already been married once.”
Lucian’s eyebrows flew up. This was news to him.
“Three years of that was more than enough for several lifetimes,” she informed him grimly.
Lucian pondered that, then asked, “Not a happy marriage, I take it?”
Leigh snorted. “Not if you don’t like waking up bruised and battered every morning.”
“He beat you?” Lucian asked, eyes narrowing. If there was one thing he hated, it was bullies and cowards, and a man who beat a woman was the worst kind of cowardly bully. “Give me his name and I will hunt him down and kill him for you.”
Leigh paused and blinked at him in surprise, then shook her head. “Too late, he’s dead.” She smiled faintly and added, “Thanks for the offer, though.”
From her tone of voice and expression, Lucian knew she thought he’d been joking. He hadn’t, and opened his mouth to tell her so, but the sound of a throat being cleared drew his gaze to the door.
“Lucian, can I speak to you?” Rachel said, her eyes wide and eyebrows flying about in a manner that suggested to him she felt it was important. He glanced back to Leigh to find she’d popped a fresh bag of blood to her mouth. With no excuse to avoid it, he reluctantly joined Rachel by the door.
“You didn’t leave,” he accused her, and glared.
Rachel waved that away as unimportant and ushered him into the hall.
“You can’t tell her you were serious about killing her husband,” she said firmly as soon as the door was shut.
“Why?” Lucian asked with surprise.
“Because killing is wrong,” she said, as if speaking to a particularly dull-witted child.
Lucian snorted at the suggestion. “Rachel, once you’ve lived a couple hundred years, you’ll come to realize that some people just need killing. For those people, killing them isn’t wrong, it’s the not killing them and leaving them to hurt others that is.”
“Lucian—”
“Should we leave Morgan to go around ripping the throats out of unsuspecting mortals—like Leigh—willy-nilly?” he interrupted.
Rachel blinked, hesitated, then said, “No, of course not, but... ”
“But?” Lucian arched his eyebrows.
“But Morgan’s an immortal.”
“Ah.” He nodded with sudden understanding. “I see.”
“You see what?” Rachel sounded annoyed.
“You’re a racist.”
“What?” she cried with shock. “How could I be racist against immortals? I am one.”
“That may be, but if you believe it’s all right to kill off immortals who hurt and turn unwilling people, but not humans who hurt and kill... ” He shrugged. “Perhaps you haven’t fully embraced your new status.”
“That’s not it at all. It’s just... It’s not the same thing,” Rachel argued, but there was little heat behind her words, and he could see she was considering the matter. That was enough for him.
“Very well, I won’t tell Leigh that I wasn’t joking about killing her husband. He’s dead anyway, so it doesn’t matter. However,” Lucian added, his voice becoming irritated, “I would appreciate it if you’d stop reading my damned mind.”
“I—”
“Don’t even try to deny it, Rachel,” he interrupted. “The only way you could have known what I was about to say was if you’d been reading my thoughts.”
She shrugged, a guilty smile curving her lips, then tilted her head and asked, “Why can I read your mind all of a sudden, Lucian?” When he just frowned, she added, “I’ve never before been able to do it.”
He remained silent and avoided her gaze.
“Though, as I recall,” Rachel went on. “Etienne had a problem controlling his thoughts, too, when we were first together. It annoyed him no end that everyone could suddenly read his thoughts and he couldn’t block them as usual.”
Lucian’s mouth twitched.
“Is it something to do with the life mate thing?” she asked curiously.
“She isn’t my life mate,” he ground out stubbornly and Rachel shook her head with disgust.
“I know, you know it’s true. You just want private time to adjust. I can read your mind, remember?”
“And you’ve taken full advantage of that,” Lucian responded grimly. He’d been subconsciously aware of a ruffling of his thoughts several times earlier that morning and this afternoon while Rachel and Etienne were there, but was too distracted to pay it much attention. Now he realized that while he’d been fretting over Leigh, Rachel—and perhaps Etienne, too—had stolen in and been rifling through his thoughts like a couple of thieves.
“Yes, I have,” she said without shame. “And I’m glad I did.”
His gaze narrowed on her warily. “Why?”
Rachel hesitated, then chose to ignore the question and said instead, “She is your life mate, Lucian. Even you have acknowledged that in your subconscious, if not consciously.”
“That doesn’t mean I have to do anything about it,” he pointed out.
“No, I don’t suppose it does,” she agreed quietly. “You can ignore it and dump her on someone else to deal with and then avoid her, I suppose. But tell me one thing.”
“What?” Lucian asked warily.
“In all your years of living—and there have been many I know—how many other people, mortal or immortal, have you come across that you could not read or control?”
“Easily a hundred,” Lucian answered promptly.
Rachel’s eyes narrowed and he felt the ruffling in his head, then she said dryly, “I mean those who haven’t been insane.” She shook her head. “And don’t bother lying again. I already know that Leigh is the first sane woman you’ve met since the fall of Atlantis whom you couldn’t read or control.”
Lucian stared over her shoulder, not responding.
“Are you willing to wait several more millennia? Alone?”
Lucian frowned at the suggestion. In truth, he was already tired of living. When he was home alone, he was bored. When he was out working for the council, he was bored plus angered, depressed, exhausted, and saddened by the cruelty and uncaring he saw around him. People could treat other humans—whether mortal or immortal—worse than the cruelest master would treat a dog, and sometimes he just...
He ran a frustrated hand through his hair as he let those thoughts go. The truth was, ever since pulling Leigh out of the doorway in that kitchen in Kansas City, his life had been altered. He’d been annoyed, exasperated, curious, excited, and interested by turn. His life was actually more interesting at the moment than it had been in centuries, perhaps millenia. Had he not taken her from that house, he would now be in Kansas hunting Morgan. Once that was over, he’d be at home, watching all the latest releases on the movie channels, reading the latest releases of books, then dipping into old movies and old classics to fill time once those were caught up on... Or he’d sit alone in the dark, staring at the walls, trying not to think of the things he’d done and seen in his life.
But since arriving here with Leigh... well... he had done none of that. Between cleaning up after Julius and caring for Leigh during the turning, he hadn’t had time for anything else.