Page 22 of Shadows of Eternity

Fangs?She stared at him for stretched seconds before asking, “Is this a joke? If it is, it’s in very poor taste.”

“I wish it was.”

“But … ”

“The man was a vampire,” he said flatly. “And now I am, too.”

Leia shook her head. “There’s no such thing.”

“I’m afraid there is.”

“I don’t believe you.” It couldn’t be true. There was no such thing as vampires. Everybody knew that. She heard Janae’svoice in the back of her mind, telling her there was something off about Rohan. Lord, what if she’d been right all along?

“I can prove it, if you like.”

Her voice shaky, she said, “All right. Go ahead.”

Between one breath and the next, he let her see him as he really was. With his eyes blazing red and his fangs extended, he let his preternatural power wash over her.

Leia stared at him, shivering as the atmosphere in the room changed. She remembered the other night when she’d thought his eyes looked red. Good Lord, he reallywasa vampire. But that was impossible. Such things didn’t exist. She had to be dreaming again. Speechless, frozen with fear and disbelief, she could only sit there, mute and helpless, wondering if she was about to die.

Retracting his fangs and suppressing his preternatural power, except for letting a little of it tamp down her fear to ease her panic, he said, quietly, “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Leia wrapped her arms around her middle. She didn’t know what to say, what to think, what to do. Vampires were myths, legends. Yet she had no doubt he was exactly what he’d said he was. A vampire. She shuddered. He had held her in his arms, kissed her, and she had reveled in it. She knew she should run screaming from the room, but she couldn’t seem to move. Shocked didn’t begin to cover what she was feeling. Surprisingly, she was no longer afraid, which seemed odd. Still, he had never hurt her, she thought, and then she frowned. It explained so much—why she’d never seen him eat, never seen him drink anything but wine … but vampires existed on blood.

Eyes wide, she lifted a hand to her neck. “Have you … Did you ever … ?”

“Drink from you? Yes.”

“Why don’t I remember?”

“Because I wiped the memory from your mind.”

Good Lord, what else had he done to her that she couldn’t remember?

“Dammit, I never seduced you! I admit I took a little blood from time to time, but I never took advantage of you … that way.”

She wanted to believe him, but how could she? Their whole relationship had been built on a lie. “Vampire.” She swallowed the bubble of hysterical laughter that rose in her throat. She had been worried that he was married, but this was much, much worse.

“Leia.”

“I think you should leave now.”

“I don’t suppose there’s any chance of seeing you again?”

“No,” she said tonelessly. “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

Rohan nodded. “You’re probably right.” Rising, he took a step toward her, only to stop abruptly when she flinched. “I enjoyed the time we spent together,” he said. “I wish … hell, it doesn’t matter now.”

Trapping her gaze with his, he spoke to her mind, easing her innate fear, assuring her that he had never hurt her, that there was no need to panic, no need to tell the world, or run into the night screaming for help. No one would believe her, anyway.

Leia sat there quietly for several minutes after Rohan left. Gradually, as her mind cleared a little, the meaning behind his words hit her with the force of a sledgehammer while a distant part of her mind wondered how she had stayed so calm until now.

Huddled in a corner of the sofa, she began to shake violently from head to foot.It can’t be true. It couldn’t be true.The words of denial played over and over again in her mind.There’s no such thing. There’s no such thing.

She tried to tell herself she had imagined the red glow in his eyes, the fangs, the strange power that had possessed her, thatlingered still. She knew somehow that it had been that power that had kept her sitting quietly instead of going into hysterics while he spoke to her. The same power that held her immobile now.

She sat there a long time, her mind blank save for one word that repeated itself over and over again.Vampire.He’d been right about one thing, she mused. No one would ever believe her.

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