Dark Needs at Night's Edge

15

He'd seen it. Somehow the vampire had gotten free.

When Conrad had begun yelling for her from all over the house, she'd evacuated from her studio to the bayou folly.

She planned to sleep out here, away from all the commotion. The crickets and owls were lulling, and a breeze blew. She couldn't feel it, but the cypress needles above her combed the wind, the sound sublime. She was just about to fall into reverie when he came upon her.

He stopped in his tracks, and his eyes briefly slid shut.

"What do you want?" Néomi murmured.

He wound around jutting cypress knees to reach her. "Are you injured?" he asked, crouching beside her, surveying her.

As much as she hated to admit it, his presence was comforting. "Don't be ridiculous, vampire. I can't be injured." Yet her essence was depleted—it always was. And she was shaken from the relived pain. Being stabbed in the heart tended to do that to a person.

Much less when the knife twists... She shuddered. How much longer can I continue to endure this?

"What the hell was that back there?" When she shurgged, he said, "You're even paler than before, fainter."

"Am I to expect more insults, Conrad? You should know that I'm not one of those women who will take disdain over nothing." Had she sounded as if she was trying to convince herself? "I'd rather not converse with you."

"I don't want to insult you." He couldn't take his gaze from her, as if fearing she'd disappear again.

"You didn't want to be around me earlier. Perhaps now I don't want your company."

He studied her face. "I think... I think that you do."

"Cocky now? Le dément reveals a brand-new personality." She didn't like that he was right, or that he knew he was right. Maybe she was as pathetic as he'd deemed her. "How did you get loose?"

"Pulled my shoulder out," he said, his tone indicating this wasn't even worth a mention.

She quirked a brow. Intense man. "Naturellement."

"Come inside with me."

"You're ready to let the lapdog inside? And here I didn't even beg at the door. Why do you even care what happens with me?"

"I just... do. So return with me," he said. She could tell he wanted to snatch her arm and drag her in. "Dawn's coming."

She feigned tapping her chin. "Hmm, I never would have suspected if not for that big orange ball rising."

"If you won't come inside, then I have no choice but to stay with you here."

"What about the sun? Are you crazed—strike that. Are you a fool?"

"Tell me what happened tonight or come inside. One of the two."

"Allez au diable."

"Then I'm staying with you." He sank beside her, flaunting that stubborn mien.

"Then I'll leave."

"And go where?" he asked. "Is this where you usually go when you're not with me?"

"No, I'm out here because you wouldn't stop shouting in my house!" she snapped, at the end of her patience. "I don't know why this happens. At the same time every month, I dance. I can't stop it, can't control it. And then once I've danced my heart out, I get to have it stabbed. Month after month."

"You said you were alone here."

"I am. I don't see Louis. I don't see the knife. I just can... I just feel it."

"I've heard of ghosts compelled to reenact certain aspects of their deaths."

"Well, now that I know I'm not alone in this, it's all better. You may go now. Adieu."

If Néomi had previously appeared breezy and confident, now she looked like a shaken girl, off by herself to lick her wounds.

But Conrad had believed what he'd said earlier. She wanted him near—even if she was prickly with him. Of course she'd still be angry with him about earlier, but he also thought she was upset that he'd seen that dance. He figured women were like that—whenever they showed a bit of vulnerability, they came out with claws bared.

"Come with me, Néomi."

Her delicate hand rose to her forehead. She seemed drained, her image flickering, her eyes weary and not as luminous.

The changes in the house, the music, and all of those ghostly surroundings had to have been fueled by her, by her very essence.

"Why should I?"

Because he needed to keep her close. Because what he'd just witnessed had done something to him. He was altered. This was more than his determination that she was his. It was more than his resolve to do something about it and more than his new need to protect her.

He felt as if some foreign emotion had wedged itself inside his chest, and now it was swinging punches, demanding more room.

But he only said, "Why not?"

She was obviously so tired, but she still jutted her dainty chin up. "You feel sorry for me now. You don't have to babysit me. I assure you that I've gotten through this by myself before."

"I know you have." Each month for eighty years, she'd relived her death—alone. Never again. "You would come inside for no other reason than to save me from incineration. Because, tantsija, I can be as stubborn as you."

"What does that word mean?"

"It means dancer."

As tendrils of sunlight began to reach them, she pursed her lips. "Oh, very well." She floated to her feet, then accompanied him back to the house.

Though she grumbled, he was able to lead her into his room. She was likely too tired to resist. Inside, she drifted straight to the bed, then curled on her side, hovering just above the mattress.

Earlier, he'd noticed that she floated over chairs as though sitting. Now he knew she slept on beds as well.

In seconds, she was asleep... .

During the long day as he watched over her, her image grew stronger, which satisfied him more than anything in recent memory.

He experienced needs unknown before, inexplicable urges... . He wanted to lie behind her. Wanted to tuck her small body into him. Again and again, he ran his hands over the outline of her hair, imagining what the glossy curls would feel like.

He had the overwhelming urge to buy this place, fix it, and keep her safe within it—but only if he could prevent her from having to dance as she had last night. His hands clenched as he thought of her, cursed to feel that pain over and over.

Conrad had the knowledge necessary to do some spells—mostly crude protection or camouflaging spells—but could rarely access it on demand. Whenever he wanted a certain memory, it proved infuriatingly elusive. If he was able to utilize at will all the knowledge he'd acquired, could he figure out how to protect her?

What if the answer was there, already within him, waiting to be retrieved? Nikolai had said Conrad could learn to do it.

He'd also said that there was only one thing that could compete with bloodlust—sex. And that there was only one thing that could compete with the overwhelming need to kill.

Now Conrad knew. The need to protect.

By dint of will, effort, and a rake he'd found in a ramshackle toolshed, Conrad had retrieved several of the newspapers on the drive that she'd been unable to reach. He intended to make a gift of them to his female.

Having no experience whatsoever with women and limited resources, this was the best he could come up with.

He'd just finished stacking up the papers in the room and settled in to wait for Néomi to wake when his brothers traced into the room.

Nikolai exhaled wearily to find him moving about freely. "How did you get loose?"

"Dislocated my shoulder."

Almost at the exact same time, all three raised their brows at the collection of papers. "You dislocated your shoulder to get to the newspapers on the road? You could have asked one of us if you wanted to read—"

"No. That's not it." Why not tell them? They already thought him mad. What if one of them has encountered a ghost? What if they believed him? "I got them for a female who lives here." He was sane enough to recognize how this sounded. "She likes to read them."

"The house is abandoned, Conrad." Nikolai pinched the bridge of his nose. "You know this."

He ran his palms over his pants. "I'm the only one who can see her. She's lying on this bed right now."

To a man, they got that anxious expression as though they were wondering whether madness was catching.

"If there is truly a ghost there, get her to move something," Murdoch said. "Can she make a door slam? Or rattle something in the attic?"

"Yes, she can move things with her mind."

Sebastian waved him on. "Then by all means... "

Conrad glanced from them to her, and back again. "She's... asleep." And he couldn't shake her to get her to wake.

"Of course she is," Sebastian muttered. He'd always been the most skeptical of the brothers. Conrad figured that even after three centuries, that hadn't changed.

"Damn it, I'm telling the truth."

"Yet you can't rouse her?"

Conrad considered explaining why she was so exhausted, but thought that would only make things worse.

Murdoch asked, "Why would we believe you're seeing a ghost rather than another hallucination? You're supposed to be bombarded with delusions."

"I was. Constantly. I'm not anymore. She's real." Right at her ear, he said, "Néomi, wake up!" No response. "Wake up!" he said louder, aware that he appeared to be yelling at the sheet.

Murdoch had a look on his face as if he couldn't decide whether to laugh or cry over Conrad's actions. Finally, he said, "Kristoff has given word that there will be a battle tonight. So we likely won't be returning for two days."

Nikolai added, "We'll leave you free run of the property. The refrigerator is filled with weeks' worth of bagged blood, and I'll get my wife to stop—"

"I'll manage on my own," Conrad said quickly.

"Very well."

Surprised by the concession, Conrad said, "Free me completely."

Nikolai's gaze went from the newspapers to Conrad's eyes, and he exhaled. "We can't. You've come too far to relapse. Soon I'm going to ask you to make a decision. A critical one—but you have to be stable."

Conrad gave a bitter laugh. "Since when do you ask me to make a decision instead of making it for me?"

Nikolai's expression was grave. "Since I lost my brother for three centuries."