Stealing Fire (Bad Boys Of The Underworld Book 5) (11 page)

How had she gotten to the room?
She remembered Lucian carrying her into the hospital, but everything after that was black.

“Was he a vampire too?” she croaked out.

She mentally frowned.
Of all the questions to ask, that was the most important?

“Yes.”

Apparently Lucian wasn’t in a talkative mood.

“So this was all some sort of misunderstanding then?”

“That’s an understatement,” grumbled Lucian as he paced to the other side of her room.

“You’re upset.”
Shouldn’t she be the one angry and storming around the room?
Assuming her legs would even hold her at this point.

He stopped his pacing in the far corner of the room. “It’s been a long night.”

She snorted. “Tell me about it.”

His brows knotted together. “How are you feeling? You still look pale.”

“Easy there on the compliments. Girl could get an inflated ego around you.”

“Do you want me to honestly tell you how I see you?”

His voice was so stark. So intense.

Ella took a deep gulp. The pain of the small action snapped some sense into her. “Probably best if you don’t.” For a moment, neither spoke. She was so rarely alone with him. When he’d first taken her, she was much too afraid to say anything to him. Then he would only be around when Cade or Dean was there. She didn’t really know how to act around him.

He’d saved her life. He’d risked her life. He promised he would keep her safe, yet here she was in the ICU, hooked up to all kinds of tubes and needles.

He stood as far away from her as the room would allow. His entire body was tense and his face was drawn in what looked like a mixture of exhaustion and frustration.

“What were you tonight?” she blurted out. She regretted it instantly. She didn’t want to know. It was one thing to see him appear out of thin air. Seeing him as a literal monster was too much.

His azure eyes pierced her from across the room. “The same thing I always am. Myotis.”

“So, is that your true face? You’re just pretending to be handsome all the time?” A corner of his mouth twitched up and a blush crept up her cheeks at the slip. “Like you didn’t already know,” she muttered.

“I’m not pretending anything. Both faces are part of me. During the day, I appear human. During the night, a monster. I didn’t want you to have to see that side.”

“That explains the curfew.” She eyed all six and a half feet of him. “But I’ve seen you at night before. Right now, you look pretty human.”

“I’m in a lot of pain right now. It takes effort to maintain this form.”

“So Dean and Cade look the same as you?”

“Give or take a few details. Hair is a bit different. Even in myotis form, Dean’s skin is darker and he’s bald.”

“What about the eyes? Yours were black. Like, no whites at all. Just black.”

“All of us have black eyes when we turn. Vampire eyes turn black when they are about to feed or mate. Werewolves’ glow a golden color. Demon eyes burn red. Some powerful sorceresses will have glowing blue eyes.”

Ella held up a hand. “Whoa. Hold up there. Are you kidding me?”

“It’s a big world out there. There are creatures beyond your wildest imagination.”

“
You
are beyond my wildest imagination,” she muttered.

He’d mentioned the other species before. He’d told her about the vampire war and about angels, but she’d brushed it aside. Stories from a disturbed mind.

She couldn’t brush this aside anymore. There really were shape shifters and vampires. Angels and demons. Witches and sorceresses.

And where did she fit in in all this? She couldn’t move things with her mind. She wasn’t super strong, and she couldn’t change forms. And judging from the pain in her neck, she still healed just as slow as she normally did.

But she wasn’t human.

Ella winced and studied the IV bag dropping liquid into her arm. “Is there painkiller in that?”

“Go back to sleep. I’ll make sure you’re suitably drugged up.” He strode to the door but stopped just as he touched the knob. “And thanks for not screaming bloody murder when you woke up.”

Ella shrugged her good shoulder. “It wouldn’t make a difference. You’d still drag me back with you.”

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E
lla stared out at the sea of pines, following the slow descent of a falling brown needle with her eyes. The sun was starting to hang low in the sky, but she didn’t want to go back in. It wasn’t as if she needed to be hidden at night anymore. She already knew the big secret.

She was as free as she could be in her prison.

It was all too much for her to take. She couldn’t handle another day of trying not to smile at Cade’s jokes and going into high alert whenever Lucian walked into the room.

Every time she started to feel remotely comfortable, she would be jerked back into reality and see something that would remind her she that if she tried to leave, her throat would get ripped out by a vampire.

The hospital only kept her for the one night. The wound in her neck was severe enough to cause pain pretty much any time she twitched, but it was healing quickly. In a few days she could probably start hiking again, but she couldn’t muster any enthusiasm.

It was all an illusion. She might be allowed to go outside, but only under guard. Those guards might pretend to be her friends and they might be able to make her laugh as though nothing was wrong, but they
weren’t
friends.

She was the only one in this godforsaken house who was on her side. She just had to remember that.

Sticks crunched behind her and she turned to see Cade walk to the front of the house. A few seconds later, Lucian’s black pickup drove into view.

Ella gulped and looked back down to the forest floor.
What was he doing driving? Couldn’t he just pop up wherever he wanted?

The last thing she wanted was another uncomfortable silence between Lucian and her.

Cade and Dean had no problem treating her like a normal person. Lucian just seemed to stare at her as though she were some strange alien. To be fair, they still hadn’t figured out what she was. Obviously she didn’t change forms whenever the sun set, but the evidence kept mounting that she wasn’t completely human.

If only she could call Dad and ask him.

More leaves rustled as something ran straight for her. Ella whipped her head around, jumping up and preparing to run, belatedly remembering her sore neck.

She stared in shock at the blur of red speeding toward her. “Reno?” she breathed. The dog stopped just short of slamming into her, jumping on his hind legs and ramming his front paws into her stomach to greet her.

“Oh my God. Reno!” Ella wrapped her arms around the squirmy dog. His tongue covered her face as his tail whipped anything in the vicinity.

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L
ucian stood back, silently watching the reunion. Ella’s entire face lit up, beaming from the inside out. She picked up a stick from the brush and threw it, sending the dog scrambling to catch it.

Except the dog never brought the stick back. It picked it up, whipped around to show Ella he had it, and then flopped onto the dirt to devour his prize.

Ella turned her smile on him and he felt his entire world melt away. She’d smiled around him before, but never like this.

Her skin seemed to glow. Her eyes were the same dark brown, but that darkness held an otherworldly shine now. The sun caught the reds and golds hidden in her hair, making it look better than anything he’d ever seen in a hair product commercial.

She was a fucking knockout and she was walking right toward him.

She
never
walked toward him. She walked around him or anywhere but where he was. She wasn’t even walking anymore. She was running.

A second later, her arms wrapped around his neck, her curvy body pressed completely against his. Her breasts against his chest. Her hips against his.

He didn’t know what was happening, but he didn’t question it. His arms went around her as he took in her feminine scent and soaked in the feel of her body.

How many times had he imagined having her crushed up against him? Under him?

Still holding his neck, Ella leaned back and stared into his eyes. “Lucian, you have no idea how much this means to me.”

He tried to memorize every nook and cranny of her perfect face. He needed to file this memory away somewhere he’d never lose it. “I have an idea,” he murmured.

She shook her head. “No, you don’t. Ray and Dad...they can take care of themselves. I kept thinking of Reno. All alone in his crate and not knowing where I was. This is amazing.”

“Well, don’t get too attached. He has an appointment tomorrow night to have his manhood, um, removed.”

She grinned at him, obviously enjoying his discomfort. She looked back to the dog for a second. “It’s for the best. Besides, this has helped me to realize something about you.”

He took advantage of her bared neck to lean forward. He wanted to rub his lips along the sensitive skin and feel her shudder under his touch. “What was this realization?”

“You’re going to let me go.”

He lifted his head as she turned back to him. “Me giving you a dog isn’t me saying you can leave.”

“No. But it shows that you truly care about my happiness. One day you’ll care enough about me to let me go.”

He didn’t know whether he should be happy about her faith in him or horrified at the idea of not having her within reaching distance. “Tell me something, Ella. Do you hate me?”

She stiffened at the question, her happy glow smothered by a frown. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “There are times, like this, when you seem so normal. More like a friend than crazy kidnapper.” The questioning tone in her voice kept him from celebrating. “But then I think of my first night here. Seeing Dad so ill and terrified. How far you went to make sure I stayed.

“I’ll never be able to forget that night. No matter how many dogs you save for me, I don’t think I can ever forgive you.”

Lucian nodded. It wasn’t the answer he wanted, but it was the one he expected. “Then I guess I’ll have to take full advantage of this moment then.”

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant, but he covered it with his before any words came out.

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E
lla gasped at the contact but didn’t pull back. Maybe she would’ve if he’d been rough or forceful. But his lips just touched hers, a feather-light caress. It was so different from everything she’d come to expect from him.

So instead of pushing him away, she stood on her toes and kissed him back. Her fingers curled in the soft fabric of his sweater. She increased the intensity of the kiss, and he responded with a growl, pulling her closer. He tasted like darkness and heat mixed together, and she wanted to drown in it.

A simple kiss shouldn’t affect her so much. She’d been on dates. Knew the ropes, danced the dance.

But she’d never been kissed like
this
.

Lucian was obviously experienced and definitely attractive enough to have his fair share of girls, but he kissed her as if she were the first woman he’d ever touched. The outright admiration fueled her, and she tentatively touched her tongue to his lips.