Page 3 of The Darkness

She’d forgotten the way he made her feel. Although that wasn’t entirely true. The truth was she’d known she would be unable to get through the long years alone, with his memory haunting her at every step, so she’d built defensive walls around those memories. Now the walls were crumbling. She shook her head, forced herself to ignore the feelings, gather her self-control around her like a cloak.

She licked her lips. Opened her mouth. Closed it again.

He frowned, then lifted his head to scan the room behind her, and her hand tightened on the door, ready to slam it in his face if he made a move to enter.

“Invite me in,” he said.

She shook her head again.

He raised an eyebrow. “Can’t you speak? Somebody cut out your tongue?”

She swallowed, trying to ease the tightness in her throat. “What do you want, Darius?”

“At this moment, to come in and…” He paused, his eyes running over her body again. This time she was ready and steeled herself against any response. “…talk to you about old times.”

“I don’t remember the old times.”

“Really?” He sounded as though he didn’t believe her. “Well, we’ll talk about new times then.”

“I don’t want to talk about new times.”

“You might not, but I do.”

The sound of voices drifted down the corridor, and Gina jumped. She peered around Darius. A couple of girls were walking toward them—young, pretty, and vivacious. Their steps slowed as they caught sight of Darius. They whispered to each other as they stopped by the door of the next room along, taking too long fiddling with the key card, and casting sideways glances at his tall, indolent figure.

Gina glanced at his face. He was watching them, a speculative look in his eyes, and something hardened inside her. The two girls finally managed to open the door and disappeared inside with a last longing look in his direction.

He turned back to Gina. “Perhaps they would invite me in.”

“No doubt.”

He looked after them thoughtfully, eyeing the closed door. He licked his lips, and her eyes narrowed. “Do you really want me to eat the neighbors?” he asked.

“You wouldn’t.”

“Try me.” He smiled showing the tips of his fangs. “You know what I’m capable of. I could drain them dry and still come back to you for more.”

She shook her head. “What is it you want, Darius?” she asked again.

“Invite me in.”

She remembered then that he couldn’t enter without her invitation, couldn’t cross her threshold. If she closed the door on him, he could do nothing about it. Except go to the next room. She glanced at the closed door where the girls had disappeared. Did she believe he would coldly slaughter them?

She rejected the idea with her whole heart. If he hadn’t been able to kill a drug dealer and a pimp, he wasn’t going to kill two young girls just to teach her a lesson. However, he might very well go next door and have his way with them, and she wasn’t any happier about that. Less so, she realized with an unpleasant jolt. She knew he was quite capable of taking their blood, sating himself in their bodies, and wiping their minds of the whole thing. A vision of him flashed in her mind, his golden limbs tangled with theirs, and the thought of that happening made her want to go drain them herself. Or turn them into toads.

“You’re thinking too hard,” he said. “Just invite me in, sweetheart.”

Her eyes flicked to his face at the endearment, but she could read nothing from his expression. She gave him one last, long look, then shifted to the side. “Come in,” she muttered.

He smiled and stepped past her into the room.

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