“Eating me out of house and home again?” Gustav asked, as he mounted his short sword on the wall behind the couch. A deadly decoration.
“I wouldn’t be hungry if you hadn’t taken so long,” he said.
“Do you have any idea how long it’s been since I’ve had to deal with these bastards? I’m lucky Geoff still has his van. I’d like to see you dispose of two bodies in under an hour.” Gustav snorted as he removed his jacket, then walked past him, headed for his room.
Three solid seconds later, Gustav marched from his bedroom.
“Oh, come on. You put her in my bed?” he whispered harshly.
“Back off.”
Gustav let out an irritated sigh. “What happened tonight?”
“I don’t know.” Soren looked at the door she was hidden behind. “I just wasn’t thinking.”
Gustav crossed his arms, unmoving. “You’re always thinking. You’ve got it all planned out.”
“Not tonight,” he said, avoiding his friend’s steady stare.
“So when you said she’s mine up there, you were being literal.” Gustav still studied his face, his reactions.
“Yes. She knows what I am, what I took from her. I’m sure of it.” He could not let a human wander the world with knowledge of vampires. To do so meant the death of thousands of his kind. Their laws limited him to two simple choices. Keep her or kill her.
Gustav shrugged. “I could kill her if you want. Then it’s not a problem anymore.”
Soren glared at him.
Gustav’s jaw dropped. “You’re really keeping that bit of human.”
“I can’t explain it. It’s been so long since I’ve fed, and I want more,” he said, ignoring his friend’s shocked expression and going to the door. “I need to think. Watch her.”
He had enough to deal with right now, and explaining his thoughts and feelings to Gustav was not on his list.
“She better not wake up,” Gustav grumbled.
Holding the door open, he paused. “Warn your lord about the demons.”
“He knows,” Gustav said, and Soren shut the door behind him.
The sharpness of the door closing sounded somehow final. Halfway up the stairs he stopped, fighting the urge to return. He didn’t want to leave the human.
Faith. He didn’t want to leave Faith. The more he thought of her, the more anxious he became. What if she woke? She didn’t know Gustav, and might be frightened. If she became hysterical, his friend would probably shut her in the bathroom. It sounded completely preposterous, except for the fact that Gustav became irritable when something new was thrown his way, and tended to act on impulse.
He headed back down the stairs. She’d already faced two demons and his less than admirable attentions. One of Gustav’s tirades would scar her for life. He opened the bedroom door and Gustav looked up at him, a smile curving beneath his goatee.
“Back so soon?” Gustav said in mock innocence.
“Get out.”
“I see why you want to keep her, and why you crave her. She’s stunning.” His rich, mirthful laughter rang through the room.
Soren pulled the card key to Faith’s hotel room from her wallet and shoved it into his friend’s hand. “Go find her things.”
“With pleasure,” Gustav said with a cocky smile, and smacked the small wooden arms of the chair as he practically leaped out of it. “I can’t really blame you—”
“Out,” he snapped.
* * * *
The springs in the mattress creaked, bringing her slowly around. After prying her eyelids open one at a time, Faith looked around the room. She lay in bed, her head throbbed, and the dim light was bright enough to compound her headache with stinging darts of pain. She couldn’t see much, but from what she gathered, the only thing to see was an odd wooden chair with some kind of canvas holding it together.
Again, the springs in the mattress creaked, but this time she’d been awake enough to realize she hadn’t moved. Someone sat on the edge of the bed.
She tried to sit slowly, not liking the vulnerability of lying down in a strange place.
“You should lie back down,” a man said.
She sat anyway, and he covered her shoulder with a large hand, pressing her to the mattress.
“Listen, buddy, I want to sit up. So leave me alone and let me figure it out, or help me up,” she said, struggling against his hold.
The hand on her shoulder changed directions, and he gently pulled her to a sitting position. He might have moved slowly, but it felt like she’d been pitched forward. She had to squeeze her eyes shut to stop the room from spinning. Palms flat on the mattress, she braced herself, simply breathing.
“You passed out again. How are you feeling?” he asked.
When she looked up at the man, she recognized him instantly. He’d saved her life, and carried her down here after she’d passed out in the alley. She’d never passed out before. Yes, being robbed had been scary, but after he’d shown up, she didn’t fear for her safety. Except when…he’d bitten her. “You…you’re,” she said, her voice shaking even as she kicked the blankets at him and backed against the wall. “Get away from me.”
That sudden movement had been a very bad idea. She leaned back against the wall for balance and clutched her head with both hands.
“You hit your head pretty hard. Do you remember what happened to you?”
“I don’t have amnesia.” She snapped her mouth shut, holding back a whimper, then whispered, “A mild concussion, maybe.”
The volume of her words rattling around inside her head hurt badly. She wanted very much to lie down again and sleep for a whole day, but messing with her equilibrium to get her head to the pillow was something she dreaded at the moment. Stillness seemed to work the best right now. She opened her eyes enough to see him through her eyelashes. Satisfied that he hadn’t made a move toward her, she asked quietly, “Why am I here?”
“Because it’s safe here.”
“Where is here?” She gave it another go.
“A friend’s home.”
“Wow, are you cryptic.” She wasn’t getting any water out of this rock, and gave up.
“Habit,” he said, shrugging one shoulder as if apologizing.
“Well, it’s a bad one.” With her fingers, she searched out the sore spot on the back of her head. If there had been any doubt in her mind, the bump under her fingertips revealed that she had definitely hit her head. “Why didn’t you leave me in the alley?”
“Do you remember what happened?” His voice had changed with this question, and she swore she heard a touch of hope in his words.
“Boy, do I. You bit me. Bit me!” She’d gradually gotten louder, and had to catch herself. “You should have left me.”
“If you didn’t remember, I could have. But you know what I am,” he said, lowering his head. “Even if I had wanted to let you go, I couldn’t. There is no other choice. Now you will stay with me.”
Her mouth hung open in surprise for a moment before she snapped it shut. “I’m not staying with you.”
He leaned closer, gaze narrowing on her. “Leaving you to those two monsters would have been the only way to avoid me. And if I had, death and dismemberment would’ve been the very least of your worries. I say again,