Enlightened (Love and Light Series) (25 page)

“I’ve been told that normal vampire bonds don’t happen without blood exchange, but that feeling I—we had on Davis Street was the start of ours. Explain how that could happen, and now that we’ve shared blood, what will happen?”

“Like I told you, it’s not supposed to happen without blood, but there’s a legend Calisto told me about Light Walkers.”

“Jyotika?”

He nodded. “Supposedly, they’re metaphysical healers—more than and different from a tribal healer.” He sat up a little taller, leaning on his elbow. “While a tribe healer can help your body heal, a light walker is supposed to change your energy. I think the Cherokee’s nunne’hi tales are based on the same people.”

She snugged the covers around her neck and supported her head with her arms and hands. He sank back down into the pillows, sliding one arm under her neck, while his other hand gripped her hip under the covers and dragged her to him.

“But she can’t do it alone, according to the legends. She needs a vampire to bond with, and they don’t get a choice about it.” He let that sink in.

Her bare stomach touched his. It dawned on her that she hadn’t felt the buzzing sensation in her spine for a while.
When had it stopped?
She couldn’t remember feeling it at all since she woke up with Wolf’s blood in her mouth at the base of the mountain.

“So, it just happens when a light walker and a vampire get close enough to each other?”

Wolf’s eyes narrowed. “No, not just any vampire.”

She nestled into his chest. “Not just any.” She rubbed her cheek against his chest. “Then, you and I were supposed to meet.”

He rested his chin on her crown. “Something like that.” He moved, lifting her chin so she looked into his eyes. “Maybe. Or maybe we’re just the right fit, and if we happened to meet, then the bond would take effect.” He studied her deep blue eyes, her full, pink lips, and the small cleft of an imperfection in her upturned nose. “Maybe, if you hadn’t been on that street at just the right time, this never would have happened.”

“I find that hard to believe,” she said. “We were bound to run into each other at some point. You’re part of Rachel’s family, and her family is my family.”

Wolf let her chin drop and collapsed onto his back, shoving his hands behind his head, staring at the night sky. “You’re probably right. What does that mean? We were meant to be?”

Loti didn’t like the change in his tone. She curled up like an unborn child, pulling her knees in protectively and tucked her hands deeper under her head. For just a few moments, she’d felt safe, but she should have known it wasn’t permanent.
Nothing is.

Wolf’s head snapped around, his eyes full of frustration, his mouth hard. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. This
is permanent.
”

“How permanent?” She shrunk back a little.

“’til death-do-us-part permanent. Vampire bonds become permanent with enough blood exchange, and it’s only when the bond becomes unbreakable that the pair can read each other’s thoughts.” His tone grew angrier with each word.

Loti whispered, “You just fed from me for the first time.” She curled tighter into herself, her gaze fixed on Wolf’s chest so she didn’t have to look at the hardened lines of his face. She couldn’t stand it. David would get angry like this, and it broke her heart. Cool knuckles brushed her cheek, and she realized they were wet. Looking back up at Wolf, his face soft and blurry now, she unclenched. It had been such a long time since she and David had made love. She forgot how sex opened her up. The week after his diagnosis, they’d made slow, sad love, and she had cried herself to sleep in his arms.

“You’re thinking about your husband.” Wolf’s fingers traced her jaw, and his thumb stroked her bottom lip. “And it hurts.”

She shook her head. “I’m sorry, Wolf. I don’t mean—”

“You don’t need to apologize.”

 Turning around, she cuddled her backside against him, and his body molded to hers as she lifted her arm, letting him slide his top arm around her waist. Tucking his hand under her side, she squeezed his arm with hers. His arms were solid enough, his chest wide enough to keep the whole world out, and she rested her head on the arm he slipped under it.
I could stay here forever
.

“You can.”

She jumped. This bond was going to take some getting used to. She wasn’t sure she wanted it, but then again, she craved it—she was starved for it.
I’m so sick of being alone
. A lump welled in her throat.

“You’re not alone.”

And like he was Aladdin speaking the magic words, the floodgates of her heart opened. They both made room for the waves of pain and grief that rushed like water through sand, carving out more space inside of her, inside of him. It was then she realized she was able to feel what he was feeling: his confusion, his awe, his tenderness. She let the breath out of her lungs, startled at all of those feelings dwelling side by side—her grief for David, her feelings for Wolf, Wolf’s feelings for her. Grief waned and fire-spitting anger rushed in to fill the vacuum. She gritted her teeth against the vicious flames eating at her soul.

“Don’t fight it. Fighting makes it worse. Just breathe. Do what you were doing—make room for it,” Wolf whispered in her ear.

She nodded, watching their heart chakra as the anger burned itself out and a slow, soul-killing wad of guilt expanded in its place. She gagged on it. Wolf grimaced and slid the arm under her neck across her chest, till his elbow wrapped around her neck. Gripping hard over her breast and under her armpit, he whispered fiercely into her ear, “There’s something you need to say.” His voice vibrated inside her chest and up her throat, trying to shake the wad loose.

No. Stop. I can’t speak it

He kissed the dip in her shoulder.
Then show me.

Loti grabbed his hand over her chest, digging her fingers into his and led Wolf down the rabbit hole to the buried memory.

“Loti, I need you to make up your mind.”

David lay in their bed under the Amish quilt Katie Brown had gifted to them at their wedding. His hair was gone and there were bluish-purple circles under his eyes. The cancer was merciless, cruel, and killing him painfully.

“Now?”

She handed him the cup of ice water, and David hurled it across the room, water splashing on the bedspread, ice cubes skittering across the floor.

“Damn it, Loti. Yes! NOW. I told you what I want. I’ve been telling you and telling you. Its time. I’m DONE.”

Loti ran into the bathroom, grabbed a towel, and paused to steady her shaking hands. When she returned, her hair covered the side of her face closest to David as she dabbed at the water, trying not to push the water in, flexing her jaw.

“Leave the damn water alone and answer me for Christ’s sake,” David snarled.

Her heart clenched in a gush of adrenaline. Even drained, weak, close to death, he could still scare her.

“I can’t, David.” Her voice was strangled. She threw the towel at his face. “Jesus, you’re asking too much.” Her arms clutched her stomach. David closed his eyes and sank bonelessly into the bed, not bothering to move the pink fleur-de-lis towel.

“That’s your answer then. I have to do it alone.” He took a slow, difficult breath. “Then that’s what I have to do.” He reached for the brown dopp kit on his night stand, and Loti slumped to the edge of the bed, shaking her head. Her hand circled his wrist before he could pick it up.

“No, David. That’s not my answer. I just . . . I don’t know how to do this.”

“You think it’s easy for me? Leaving you? You are the only reason I’ve put up with this . . . why I’ve fought so hard, but it’s too much. You have to let me go.”

 She hated herself for making him beg. She hated him for asking this. Eyes burning, she stared up at the ceiling, nodding, chin quivering.

“You’re done.”

David nodded once. “No more.”

Her face still tilted to the ceiling, still nodding, she managed, “Okay.”

“Now. Please.”

The tears spilled as she turned to him. His eyes clouded over as he sat up, cupping her cheek with his hand. Lowering her eyes to her hand covering his, she swallowed before looking back into his eyes. She rose from the bed and walked around to her side, and as if settling herself for an afternoon of quiet reading, she arranged the pillows. Climbing in, she leaned her side against them, drawing her knees up and tucking her feet behind her. He never took his grateful eyes off her sad ones until she was settled. He slid over to her, lowering his bald head to her lap, tucking a hand under her thigh. His thin fingers grasped the soft inside, while she stroked his stubbled cheek over and over until his eyes closed.

She told herself, I won’t cry anymore. She absorbed his thin face, memorizing the little bump in the middle of the bridge of his nose, the crooked turn of his top lip, and then she let her eyes unfocus, his face blurring. She felt the struggle inside of him: the cancer, the anemic flow of his energy. Where was it?

But she knew. She needed to open the door, the way she opened a channel to fix an imbalance as her healer had taught her.

Just open the door, Loti, and he’ll find it.

There. Here, David.

Thank you, my dear, sweet, beautiful wife. I have loved you since the day we met—no matter what anyone might tell you, I’ve always loved you, and I’m so grateful you chose to love me back. Goodbye, Loti.

Goodbye, David.

And his soul flowed from his body like mist rising over a summer meadow. Softly, quietly, it rose into the ether. For a moment, she flashed on what she thought was their last love-making, but it was indistinct, covered in the gauzy film of guilt. Like sunlight melting the morning mist, he was gone
.

Wolf lay sleeping beside her while she read
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
It was one of the many books on his bookshelves, and she’d never read it. Being underground messed with her circadian rhythms and she couldn’t sleep. Wolf had cooked for her earlier, dismissing her protests that she could do it herself. This time he made curried lentil soup—her favorite.

“How’d you know?” Her mouth watered.

He paused his stirring. “I don’t know.”

He also brought cranberry chipotle cheddar to grate over top, and the pièce de résistance was a crusty French baguette with rosemary infused olive oil for dipping—Margarite’s idea. Still, Loti could only manage a small cup and a few bites of bread, her stomach resisting that little bit of nourishment.

“Does anyone know where we are?” She’d asked.

He’d said Katie and Calisto agreed it would be best if the two of them stayed here. Someone out there still wanted something from her, and she’d be safer recuperating in his lair; where, besides the wards, the iron ore helped block any magic.

“Rachel just reinforced the existing wards, so no one should be able to find you here.”

“What about Patrick?”

Wolf tossed the dirty dishes in the sink. “Katie’s working on it.” He scrubbed a cup. “Korinna is going to stop by tomorrow night with fresh supplies.” Wiping his hands on a white dish towel, he turned around. “You can send a message to Rachel if you want.”

They talked in front of the fire and even went above ground for a little while where Wolf showed her how the cave was ventilated and where the chimney was.

A Whip-poor-will took up guard duty in the tree by the chimney and called faintly down the chimney shaft. It wasn’t annoying, yet. She reached for the ever-present carton of coconut water Wolf insisted on, and her bare hip brushed against Wolf’s hot side. She paused, hand hanging midair. Lowering the book, she touched his side. He was burning up. Fumbling to her knees, she leaned over him, pressing the back of her hand to his forehead. He definitely had a fever. Perplexed, she rested her cheek on his chest just to be sure.