Page 48 of Accidental Vampire

“Your maker?” I hope I remembered the right terminology. He nodded into my neck.

“He’s…”

“I know, you told me?” I filled in the details for him, just in case he didn’t think he could do it.

We hung on that for a moment, caught in this unmoving speck of time. I traced small circles on the back of his hand. I remembered first seeing him. Gorgeous and grieving. Pain so thick it perfumed the air.

He lost a lover and his maker. I didn’t know how those events were connected. Losing your maker must be monumental. How would I feel if I lost Lachlan? My breath caught in my chest.

“I’m his…” He expelled a pained breath and corrected him self. “I was his…” He still couldn’t finish the sentence.

Suddenly, he pulled away from me. The ache in my stomach rebounding instantly. He rolled me on to my back and adjusted the pillow under my head, like he wanted to make sure I was comfortable. Parting my knees, he moved his body between them. He ran his hand down my thigh, encouraging my legs to wind round his back. Now my breathing became ragged as I hooked my ankles around his waist, trapping him. He slid his hands under me, one to the small of my back, the other snaked up to my shoulder. He scooted down so his head could rest on my chest. Trapped. We were both trapped in each other’s bodies. I let my hands do what they wanted, nesting in his hair and rubbing his back in big circles. He sighed, and I felt all the tension leave his body. Finally.

A hug.

He had wanted a hug and couldn’t bring himself to ask for it. He was using me, he was using my body, our connection to soothe himself with such exquisite care, it made my head swim. I’ve had men use my body before, like a thing for their own pleasure. This was different. He wanted comfort. He knew I could give it. He just couldn’t ask for it, so he was commanding my body, my soul was following where he led.

“I was his Scion.” Lachlan’s soft words whispered across my heart. I remembered what Shaw said.“You can bond with your maker, become a Scion. Few people do it.”

“Why?”

“It…” he fought for the right words, “weaves too tight. It can make you one… being whole, complete, perfect.”

I thought about that. I thought about my own trauma and drama. Feeling so alone and lost in the world.

“So, he was your person?” I asked.

“I don’t know what that means. Warren is…” he gave a frustrated sigh, “Warren was everything. A lover can make you want to be a better person, and share things with. The scion bond… It…”

“Completes you?” I was going to ruin the moment with dumb movie quotes.

“You become all the things you love about them.”

“Oh.” I tried to picture what Lachlan might have been like without this grief crushing him. I caught glimpses of it in the soft smile on his lips when he thought no one was watching. Every day seemed to be a fight for him just to see the next day. My gut twisted when I realized we were the same in that. We were both fighting to survive. He battled grief. My enemy was money. It made us lose touch with meaning and even the simplest joys.

“And… He’s gone.”

I tried to imagine that kind of loss, and I couldn’t. I don’t think I have loved anyone like that. Monique would be the closest. She was the most important person in my life. But she didn’t complete me or make me feel whole or unbroken. What would that kind of grief be like?

“It’s like…” his words started to slur a little, sounding drowsy. “It feels like part of me, the good parts, the best parts, the parts he made, die every day. Over and over. I die every second of every day. For the last 50 years.”

My heart twisted at such unimaginable grief. I pulled him close, letting tears well in my eyes.

“Here…” I could feel his breath even out, his voice was barely a whisper, but I could feel it ring through my chest. “You. Only time it doesn’t hurt.”

THIRTY-TWO

LACHLAN

I sat in the common room trying to figure out money, of all things. I had credit cards, a wallet full of flat plastic slabs that got me anything I wanted out in the mortal world. At Ruelle, or other establishments attached to Veronica, no one ever presented me with a bill. Veronica might just do it to rub it under my nose about how naughty I was being. Even if I went into the territory of other families, the Legate of Venier didn’t pay. The Family paid for my apartment, for everything.

I had a safe full of cash. Two of them, at the apartment and my daylight rooms. I had watches too, a lot of them. Warren had been obsessed with clocks. He wore a diminutive pocket watch around his neck, said the ticking soothed him like a lover’s heart beat. I looked at the Patek on my wrist. Aurora had fetched it from my apartment. It was nothing special. Steel with a blue watch face. Truth be told, she’s the one who kept buying them and bringing them home for me. I’ve never had to reckon what my financial resources were.

I probably had enough cash for a Bond Price for Tiffany. Out of the five Families in New York, Koen was the only option. They were small and secretive. Veronica barely recognized them. Sending her to the west coast was the safest option.

If I could hide her for a few years… and successfully dodge the Scion situation…

There were too many problems to figure out all at once.

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