Authors: Emma Weylin
“I’ll live,” he rasped out with a chuckle. “I’m dead. The poison is a bitch and hurts like hell, but it can’t kill me.”
She glared in reaction to his humor. “That’s not funny.”
“Probably not,” he agreed and then looked at her without the benefit of his hood to cover his face.
Now she was seeing things. Her head was pounding, and she was pretty sure she’d broken something in her leg. Her mind was putting Vincent’s face on this man’s body. “I need a doctor,” she whispered.
“Give me a second,” he said between clenched teeth and then let out a howl of pain.
She whimpered at the sound. She’d heard it before, but again, she was sure it was a rattled brain playing tricks on her. “Stop. What are you doing?”
“Getting the poison out. I can’t heal you if I’m a mess.”
Bryna whimpered as pain stabbed through her leg, reminding her she’d broken it. She hated being in pain. She always felt like such a baby because she always cried. Her vision blurred and her head pounded. She slumped against the ground. “Vincent. I need you.”
*
Vincent stilled. He closed his eyes and forced his body to process the injuries and poison at a more rapid pace. When he was able to function at full capacity again, he was next to Bryna in a second.
“Shh, sunshine, I’m right here. Come on, let’s get you all fixed up.” The perk of being a defender of the universe was having awesome cosmic powers which included the ability to heal pretty women who’d already suffered enough pain. As gently as he could, he picked her up and carried her over to a mossy spot and leaned her up against a hollowed log.
“I hurt, Vincent,” she whispered. Tears leaked from her eyes. “I’m sorry I killed you.”
His head came up from examining her leg. Oh damn. Bad head wound. He was pretty sure she was talking to his younger self and not the man crouched down in front of her. “It’s all right, baby. Let’s get you fixed up, and then we can talk about it.”
She sniffled and wiped her face with the back of her hand. “Okay. When did you get the ability to heal?”
“Don’t you worry about that. Just sit still for me. I’ll make sure you’re okay.” She was going to kill him, he was sure of it. He laughed, a twisted sound. She’d already done that, but this time, he wasn’t sure he was going to survive it. He worked as quickly as he could to mend the fracture in her leg, and worked his way over her body to make sure he didn’t miss anything before he got to the concussion. It wasn’t as bad as he’d feared, but it was enough to leave her shaken and confused.
He scooped her up into his arms, and she promptly curled against him, tucking her head up under his chin. She let out a quiet sigh. “I know you’re Wraith, but just let me pretend for a few minutes, please?”
“Sure,” he whispered as he blinked dampness out of his eyes. Her body relaxed, and he let out a sigh of his own. He went around the battleground as he held her and managed to collect what they needed. Her pack. His sword. And then he headed back to the car. It might not work, but at least it was shelter from the gathering storm while he let the concussion heal as naturally as possible. It was a bad idea to mess with something like her brain if it wasn’t absolutely necessary.
He got her to the car, and thankfully a too-helpful police officer hadn’t found the demolished vehicle. The last thing he needed was to have to deal with the living authorities. It wasn’t that he couldn’t. It was that they were a pain in the ass.
He opened the back door and went to put her inside. She curled her hands in the fabric of his shirt. “Don’t leave me. Please.”
“Not leaving,” he said softly and gave himself a moment to rest his cheek against the top of her head. “I just need to get you and the car out of sight for a little while. I promise. I’m not leaving you to fight this alone.”
She nodded against his chest.
It was an odd feeling to have a difficult time extracting himself from her once he had her safely in the back seat. Not because she wouldn’t let go of him, but because he didn’t want to let go of her. He managed to do it, and then focused on rolling what was left of the car back into the forest brush. They were safer near where a pack of howlers were destroyed, but only for a while. They had enough time for Bryna to rest and recover some before the vampires would show up looking for their minions.
Once he had the car hidden, he crawled into the back seat with Bryna and hauled her up against him. She dutifully curled into his side just as a crack of lightning flashed through the sky. She jumped, and he held her a little tighter.
“Still afraid of storms?”
“No,” she whispered. She ducked her head against him. “Yes, but I’m getting better.”
He settled in and rested the side of his face on the top of her head. This brought the vivid memory of the first time they’d made love.
It was a day much like this one. Dark, dreary, and he’d run out of gas five miles up a ten mile road with only three houses on it, all with families who couldn’t be bothered to give him the time of day. He rolled the car off to the side of the road so they could wait out the storm. Bryna shook in the seat next to him, and jumped with each crack of lightning. He kissed her to distract her. One thing led to another. He’d been a clumsy idiot, but what kid wasn’t at that age? Bryna, though—she’d been amazing. She endured his stupidity, and somehow they muddled through the glorious first experience of sharing another person’s body. She’d had a perfect trust in him not to hurt her or mess her up. He knew she lied when she said it hadn’t hurt, but he was willing to let that one go. His tender ego hadn’t been able to handle the realities of making love for the first time. But he’d taken hold of the responsibility the connection the act made with both hands and held on tight. He’d made Bryna his, and he’d taken it to the grave with him.
His face twitched. Part of him was beginning to feel like he’d abandoned her when she’d needed him the most.
“Wraith?” she whispered.
“Yeah?” he said in a hoarse tone.
“Thanks for not dying on me back there.”
He laughed quietly. “I’m already dead. It’s kind of hard to do it again once you’ve already done it.”
“Oh, yeah.” She turned her face into him. “I forgot. Sorry.”
She jerked when the thunder crashed again, and his body took over. He tilted her face up to his. “Don’t be scared,” he whispered before his mouth closed over hers.
Bryna melted into his body as he tried to consume her. It was like a remembered fantasy in the early minutes before dawn, right when the wisps of a dream were at their best. His rough hands cupped her face, and their mouths moved together like they were made to be melded against one another.
Her arms came up between them and she pushed. Horror mingling with guilt showed on her face. “You’re Vincent’s friend.” She shoved back, making more space between them. “I’m sorry.” Her words wobbled between them.
“No,” he said and pulled his hood back over his head, concealing his face. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
“Don’t,” she whispered and looked outside at the wash of rain running down the side of the car and filtering in through the missing door. Tears sounded in her voice. “I-I can’t do this. I’m sorry. I don’t get that white-picket-fence happy ending, but it—the kiss—it was…nice.”
“But that’s bad?” Vincent asked, hearing the strain in his own voice. She got no happy ending. Her words, but should she get a horrible fate? It was what he’d thought she deserved for the last two hundred years, but now, looking at her, in the dim light of a day long gone, he began to think she deserved more than what she’d sentenced herself to live.
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “Yeah, I mean…Oh, hell. Um, just, thank you. We can’t do it again.”
“Why the hell not?”
She turned around in the seat and stared up at him. “Because you’re not Vincent.”
She didn’t just say that. It was okay for her to spread her legs for Darby to keep a few old people in their homes, but he wasn’t allowed to kiss her because…Wraith wasn’t Vincent. Oh damn. He was rapidly finding he didn’t give one damn that she’d betrayed him to his pain-filled death. No, because he was an idiot who couldn’t learn from his mistakes. But then, he’d always been a sucker about anything concerning Bryna. “Sunshine, I need for you to look at me.”
Her eyes narrowed and her delicate hands balled into fists. “Do not call me that.” She had tears running down her face again. “Just stay on your side of the car, and I’ll stay on mine, and you keep your lips and your endearments to yourself.”
“I’m confused,” he said, trying to keep the need out of his voice. “I have to do without now, because you liked it when I kissed you?”
“I’m sorry.” Her face went panicked as her hands reached for the waistband of his pants. “I, um, I didn’t mean to tease you. Is it bad? Maybe I can—”
“Don’t,” he nearly roared at her. In no way was he going to let her give him a blowjob because she felt guilty for leading him on, not when he’d been the one to do the leading. He did not want her offering herself up because he’d been stupid enough to kiss her. He couldn’t stand it anymore. He shoved his hood back and turned on the dome light. It flickered on and shone right on his face because of the odd angle the crushed-in roof had it at.
Her eyes went huge as she gasped and scooted back. He knew what he looked like. Almost everything they’d done to him vanished when his soul left the body now buried in the ground. Felix had said the soul carried some wounds no matter what body they had. The savage scar slashing down his face where the length of rod iron smashed into his skull, killing him, stayed with him, proving he had too much baggage to make it past the pearly gates. It started at his right temple, cut down his forehead, over the bridge of his nose, and gouged into his left cheek, stopping at the angle of his jaw. She studied his face, and she started moving backward, her hand groping for the door handle. Felix asked him if he wanted it removed, but Vincent opted to keep it. He’d wanted the reminder of Bryna.
“You’re a shape-shifter,” she accused. “This isn’t funny. I want to see what you really look like, please.”
“This is what I look like, sunshine,” he said in pained tones.
Her face contorted in agony and then anger. “You son of a bitch. I thought you died. I killed you. You’re supposed to be dead. You let me think I killed you.” She squeezed her eyes shut tight. “Get away from me.” She backed up against the door, popped it open, and fell out onto her back. She landed hard and yelped. She bolted up to her feet. “You’re not him. You’re not Vincent. I don’t know what you are, but you’re not him. You’re too cruel to be Vincent.” She turned and took off in a sprint.
She was much faster than he would have thought a human capable of. He was out of the car and after her a heartbeat later. He crashed into her, and they tumbled along the ground in the slimy mud. She kicked and screamed as they rolled out. They landed with him straddled over top of her and pinning her down, his body shielding her from the rain. “Damn it. I am Vincent.”
“You’re alive,” she gritted out between clenched teeth. “And Vincent was human. You’re not.” She struggled to get away from him.
He worked to keep her pinned without hurting her. He grunted when she bit him. “Bryna, you need to listen to me—”
He never got the words out. He was hit with a pulse of raw fear that sent him sailing ten feet back. The wind was knocked out of him, and she was running again. Damn it. He flashed. One moment he was lying sprawled out in the mud and the next he was in front of her. He caught her up in his arms and caged her against a tree trunk. “We can do this until we both run out of energy.”
She jerked, trying to get away from him. Her face was twisted in pain. “I don’t need to do anything for you. Vincent is dead. Whatever you are, you’re not him.”
He laughed the bitter sound. “Oh yeah, sunshine, I am the man you killed.”
The defiance drained right out of her. She sagged, and her body hung in the hold he had her in against the tree. “Oh my God. What did I do? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.” She drew in a ragged breath and sobbed. “I didn’t mean to kill you.”
She was making his brain twitch. He shifted his hold because he was sure he had to be hurting her. “What are you talking about?”
Bryna stared up at him. Her hand came up, and her finger skimmed along the length of his scar. Her body trembled before she turned her head. “I killed you.”
He rubbed at the back of his neck. “Yeah, we established that. Let’s go over what happened that night.”
“No. You help me live for the next week, and then I get to die in whatever way I want, remember?”
He felt a sharp pain in the general vicinity of where his heart should be, but right now he wasn’t sure he’d ever had one. He had the sick feeling Bryna really wanted to die. It was a mindfuck like he’d never experienced before. After all the years of wishing she’d suffered with her death, all he wanted was for her to stop hurting because of him. Rain sheeted down on them both. He was sure he was going to end up in hell, but not before he fixed her. This was why he’d been sent back. No being, no matter what they’d done, should have to suffer the way his Bryna was suffering. “Bryna, I was just being a bastard. You don’t actually get to die. You’re supposed to live.”
A pitiful sob tore from her. “But you’re dead. I killed you. Why should I get to live when you don’t?”
“I…” He stopped, not quite sure what to say. Maybe if he explained what was happening to him she’d stop trying to rip his stone heart out. “I’m in a limbo of sorts. I help keep innocent people safe and kill off bad things like vampires until I’m judged.”
She went perfectly still and refused to look at him. “I-I don’t know what to do with this. So you’re dead, but you’ve come back for the next week to keep me from dying?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Why?”
His jaw started to tick. “I already told you. I’m supposed to protect innocents.”
She jerked out of his hold and wrapped her arms around herself as she tried to get away from him, but kept inching back toward him with each crash of thunder. “And you said you kill bad things, too.”
He was going to find a way to kill Felix. He really was. This was the most fucked-up thing he’d ever seen, and he’d seen it all. How the hell could she think she was one of the bad things? “Yeah, baby, but I was sent to protect you, not kill you.”