21 Shades of Night, page 231
She leaned over to touch the tartan.
“Did you wish to sip your brandy in here instead, lass?” Sutton asked, his deeply sensual voice startling her.
She whirled around, her heart beating hard, her skin tingling. Vampires could move like a whisper of mist, soundlessly at first, then morphing into something much more treacherous, and she’d do well to remember that. How in the hell was she to explain the reason she was snooping in his bedroom?
He set the glasses down on the dresser and approached her. In a thicker, more ancient Scottish brogue he said, “‘Tis ye, Elizabeth, whom I cherish dearly.”
He thought she was his Elizabeth? That’s why he wished to keep her safe... some mixed-up notion she was… what? A blood descendent and would be his all over again? No matter what, she couldn’t feed into his delusions. “You think I’m your Elizabeth?”
“Aye.”
“I’m not her. How long ago since you lost her, Ephraim?”
His dark eyes widened, and for a second, he didn’t say anything, but when he did, the only word he spoke was, “Ephraim?”
Surprised to see his disquieted reaction, she wracked her brain to come up with the reason, but she couldn’t see what the problem was with saying his name.
“You called me Ephraim,” he said again, his voice dark and husky.
Her body instantly chilled at the deep-seated look of desire in his eyes. And then she realized her damnable mistake. She’d gotten his name wrong. “My mistake. I’m sorry, Sutton. I’m awful with names. How long—”
His large hands took hold of hers and he drew her closer, sending her heart racing to the dangerous heat of the sun. “You’re my Elizabeth, even if you can’t fathom it. Let me love you as I once did.” He maneuvered her against the bed. “Let me prove to you how much I love you.”
Her body begged her to let him do it, but her mind screamed at her to keep her distance.
His gaze dropped to her lips.
The traitorous desire to know the truth beleaguered her—would she recognize his kiss that she envisioned he had shared with her before?
How much could a kiss hurt? One simple, little kiss?
Chapter 5
SUTTON’S VOICE SENSUOUSLY baited Alena to join him in the bed. Her skin prickled with a sense of discomfiture at being in the very place he desired to have her, yet a longing deep inside her clamored to be released—to join Sutton there, to feel the feelings she was fervently attempting to deny.
Even now, his eyes had turned to a smoky black, fathomless, centuries old, searching her soul, begging for her to remember him in a way she couldn’t possibly recall. Knowing how much he desired her wasn’t helping her concentration on her mission either.
Find out his secrets, then kill him.
The fact she had to keep repeating this to herself, meant she was losing sight of her assigned task. Thank God he didn’t pressure her to kiss him, because she wasn’t sure she could—well, would—have stopped him.
When she didn’t answer, the faintest of smiles curved his mouth. “Sharing drinks and a bit of conversation in my bedroom is a better idea than I’d come up with, I must admit.” He handed her a glass, way too big to serve brandy in.
She quashed her own craving to give in to the forbidden desire coursing through her and bluntly said, “We’ll sit in the living room.”
A hint of a smile registered in his eyes. “You wouldn’t want to get more comfortable in here?”
Immediately, she hit the release on her right wrist blade, feeling her words were not enough to convince him what she wanted, most likely because they had come out in way too breathy a manner, and her damned heart was beating double time. He had to have guessed she was fighting conflicting feelings she couldn’t even begin to comprehend.
He cocked a brow, his attention riveted to the shining knife at her wrist. “A ‘nay’ would have sufficed, lass.”
His humorous response helped to put her slightly more at ease.
He motioned to the hallway, then barely moved aside to let her pass. Unable to walk past him without brushing up against his firm chest, a shiver of need coursed through her to the core. Images of kissing his pebbled nipples nearly made her spill her drink. Retracting her blade, she took a sip of brandy. But the strong peach liquor cleared her sinuses in a hurry and burned her throat, forcing her to cough.
“Like the taste?” he asked behind her, way too close for it to be construed as anything but an intimate attempt at further seduction.
“It’s very good,” she responded hoarsely, a flash of memory filling her vision of Sutton wearing a kilt, offering her smuggled brandy as they sat amongst rowan trees dripping with berries alongside a stream. The brandy wasn’t the same flavor, but it stirred the memories just the same.
His words drew her from the dreamlike vision where she’d stopped still, unable to walk any further, lost in the memory not her own as he studied her quietly. “I have other liquors if this one doesn’t appeal. But it’s always been my favorite.” Softly almost to himself, although she heard, he added, “At one time, Elizabeth’s also.”
“It’s fine,” she said, her voice finally sounding more normal, and she entered the living room, trying not to think anything further about the vision. Yet with another sip, the vision returned.
“Ephraim,” she said, pointing to the wine flask as the breeze tugged at her hair, pulling strands loose to tickle her cheeks, “if anyone discovers you have smuggled more brandy into the Highlands…”
“Bonny lass, why I’ve orders to bring the devil’s brew to thirsty lads and lassies all over our great land.”
The summer’s day was warm and even the sun shone as Ephraim sat on the dew-kissed grass and motioned for her to join him. Tucking her feet under her long skirts, she settled beside him. He laughed, lifting her into his lap, her legs pinned between his as he pulled the pins from her hair.
“Alena?” Sutton was observing her closely again, and she shook her head a little trying to clear the brandy-induced thoughts from her mind.
A part of her didn’t like the loss of control she felt when the images intruded, but another part of her longed to revisit the Highlands to be with—Ephraim? She didn’t know any Ephraim. Yet the man from the old world was this Sutton, had to be. Then who the devil was Ephraim?
Sutton motioned to an olive green loveseat—the kind of furniture designed for lovers to sit side by side, legs and shoulders brushing each other’s, and again she thought of sitting between his legs, his hands shifting to her neck, caressing, lower, until his large hands were cradling her breasts.
She groaned, not sure if she’d done so aloud or too herself, until she saw Sutton’s brows raise in question.
Hell, she had to get over these delusions she was experiencing. Instead of sitting on the loveseat, she settled on a wide-winged chair dressed in butternut leather.
Shaking his head, he sighed deeply, then sat on the loveseat. “I cannot fathom why you’re so afraid of me.”
Alena took another sip of her drink, the brandy warming her inside. “I’m not afraid of you.” Wary, yes. Confused about his seeming so familiar, yes. Befuddled by the intermittent visions, yes. But afraid, no.
He studied Alena too intensely for her liking, and she considered the furnishings to get her mind off him.
No magazines or newspapers graced the warm oak coffee table. A peach brick fireplace stretching across the length of one wall and rising to the high pitched ceiling, sat cold. A glass door opened onto a brick patio, well lighted with brass lanterns, warming the outside with a soft golden glow, but none of this garnered her attention like the man sitting quietly watching her, who she was destined to terminate.
“It’s the world we live in,” Sutton finally said, his voice almost resigned. “You’re reluctant to show your feelings toward me. But had you been born before the League came into existence you would’ve loved me as I love you.”
“Love?” She didn’t mean to speak in such a high-pitched voice.
A wrinkle formed over his brow.
“You may have loved Elizabeth, but you know nothing about me.”
“I know,” he said smoothly, “that it bothers you that Mona is here. And I know you were as intrigued with me as I was with you as soon as we first made eye contact at the restaurant.”
“Only because I’m a redhead. That’s the only interest you have in me.” She avoided saying what intrigued her about him and hoped he didn’t notice.
His cheeks dimpled, and she realized then she’d never seen this side of a vampire before. “You know very well there’s much more to you that I want.”
He couldn’t feel anything for her, nor could she allow herself to feel anything for him. She was to terminate him shortly, for pity’s sake. What the hell was she really doing here? Getting too deep into an emotional whirlpool. The force of it would pull her into a deadly void faster than a single heartbeat that rushed the blood through her veins, if she didn’t get her raw emotions under control.
Wanting to get away from him, away from the confounded memories of… of him, she rose from her seat so quickly she sloshed the drink on her hand.
Before she could take a step away from her chair, he stood in front of her in a flash. He deposited their drinks on the table next to her chair, then grabbed her wrists. She made an audible gasp as the adrenaline flowed through her like the water rushed down a mountainside during a torrential downpour.
Already she feared she was losing a poignant battle with the vampire. What was there about him that could turn her into a bundle of feelings she’d never experienced before?
“You’re trembling, lass. If you’re not afraid, what is the matter?”
His eyes held her hostage like a vampire used his charms to get a human to obey. Seductive, commanding, spine-tingling. He dropped his gaze and lifted her right hand. Instead of kissing it like she had expected, he licked the spilled liquor off her skin, his tongue hot and wet and stroking her as if he was licking forbidden fruit. Tingling began in her nipples as he licked every drop of brandy off her skin. She fought closing her eyes and giving into his seduction. She fought wanting him like she knew he wanted her, of giving into her baser desires.
For heaven’s sakes—she was a huntress. And he… well, he was not mate material. So why was she nearly collapsing at his intimate touch!
His heated breath came more quickly. She could hear his heartbeat quickening, despite the fact her own was running amok.
“Tell me about Elizabeth,” Alena coaxed, worried the rogue vampire was rapidly losing control over his bloodlust and sexual craving for… well, for Elizabeth.
The notion irked her. She nearly swooned over Sutton’s touch, but he had eyes only for his lost love. That should have been enough to deter her from becoming emotionally involved with him. Yet, she couldn’t help the way she felt about him. Inexplicably drawn to him, like the tide’s strong pull.
His eyes clouded with lust, he released a heavy sigh, then led her into the dining room. At the end of the long cherry wood table, a portrait of a woman hung prominently on the wall. Alena gasped and pulled her hand free from Sutton’s. Elizabeth looked so much like Alena from her braided red hair to her penetrating blue eyes and ivory skin that her heart skipped a beat. Dressed in the MacLeod plaid, Elizabeth was striking in the gilt-framed painting.
Sutton’s hand touched Alena’s shoulder, and she shrank away from him.
“You and she are one and the same. You cannot deny it.”
“We resemble each other, yes, but…”
Damn, more than resembled. If she wasn’t related genetically, she had to be the woman’s clone. And for a fraction of a second, she wondered if there was something more to this whole setup. If the League had known she looked like Sutton’s Elizabeth… sure, they had to have. It wasn’t just because Alena was a redhead. It was because she was her identical twin. If the League had not exactly told the truth about this, what else had they been less than honest about?
Her stomach felt queasy, the muscles in her legs like rubber. God, how could she look so much like the woman?
“You are she. You must remember the love we once shared.” He said the words almost out of desperation and attempted to pull her close, but she extended her wrist blades again. He tsked. “Relationships are made of compromise. Come, sit, finish your brandy, and I’ll tell you about Elizabeth.”
She shouldn’t do as he asked. She should go home to her father’s place, although it seemed he wanted her right where she now stood. But she knew in her heart, she didn’t want to hear what had happened to Sutton’s lady, who looked so much like Alena, it gave her chills.
When she didn’t move, Sutton guided her back to her chair. “She could be stubborn, too, just like you.”
When Alena was seated, Sutton sat on the loveseat across from her. At least the solid oak coffee table provided a comfortable barrier.
Sutton sipped his brandy, then began to relate Elizabeth’s story. “Elizabeth’s father died in battle, but left word that his son would inherit their properties and have you wed—”
Alena opened her mouth to object.
He raised his hand to silence her objection. “Elizabeth, rather, to wed a cousin. But she wanted me and despised the ruthlessness of her cousin. Malcolm and several of his kinsmen sought to kill me. If I were dead, she’d marry the cousin. Or so they thought.”
“But somehow she died instead.”
Sutton studied her for a moment as if he was trying to see any recognition on her part. “Aye. She came between her brother and me. He said if she chose to live with me, he’d kill her, too. I couldn’t protect her. Not with so many of the warrior-trained, bloodthirsty MacLeods there. Elizabeth and I hadn’t blood bonded yet. I wanted to wed her first... to get her family’s approval. But it was not to be. They caught us before we were able to complete the blood bonding.”
“Did you kill them?”
“A few. But I wasn’t as strong back then as I am now. I could kill them all now.”
The bitterness in his voice surprised her. All along he’d been gentle in his manner, except when he yelled, out of necessity, for her to invite him into her apartment. Was the rogue in him coming out now?
Desperate to speak her mind, though not wanting to aggravate the situation unduly, she questioned his words. “Do you still want to kill all the rest of the MacLeods?”
His gaze shifted from his drink to her eyes. “I want to save Elizabeth from perishing the first time.”
When he didn’t answer her the way she assumed he would... yes, or no, she tried to corner him. “So you don’t want to eliminate my family?”
He frowned. “I want you to be mine again. The way we were meant to be.”
“Or you’ll kill my family?” she asked again. She tapped her fingers on the arm of her chair, trying to make sense of why he wanted her so badly. It couldn’t be just because she looked astoundingly like Elizabeth. Whoever Elizabeth had been, it had been during a different time, in a different place, and she had been a different woman. Alena could never be her. “Or is it that you want to prove to them you can have me again in your own twisted sense of justice?”
Giving her a dark look, he rose from his chair. “I want nothing of the sort.” He crossed the floor to the patio door and stared into the night. Turning, he asked, “That would make me a rogue, would it not?”
“You can’t have me. I’m a huntress and by law—”
“By the League of Hunters’ laws,” he corrected her, his voice hard.
“Well, yes, but they’re binding for you and your kind also.”
His lips thinned. “As much as I disagree about this issue, aye.”
She grasped at any thread of reason that she could use to convince him of his folly. “So you can’t have me. Any thoughts otherwise would be madness.”
“Living without you for all of these years has been madness, lass.” Anguish and defeat haunted his words.
Her skin chilled to think any man could love a woman so much that even after the centuries had passed, he still longed to have her. The idea someone could feel so strongly about her... but he didn’t think it about her. Elizabeth. That’s who he loved.
He motioned to the kitchen. “Are you hungry?”
She shook her head and tried to figure out why he’d changed the subject so abruptly.
“You didn’t eat at the restaurant,” he added.
“I’m fine.”
“The fridge is stocked. If you get hungry, you have my permission to raid the fridge.” He headed for the hall. “I have some things I must do. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She noted the tinge of aggravation in his voice, and the way he wouldn’t look at her when he left her. It shouldn’t have mattered in the least bit how he felt. He was a vampire... on her terminal list. But he didn’t fit the profile of a renegade at all. And she did care how he felt. It sickened her to think she’d been so unfeeling when he’d only shown her kindness.
Did the League know she represented the reincarnation of Elizabeth in the vampire’s mind?
She knew she’d live to regret this job.
“Sutton!” Jumping up from the chair, she chased after him. “Wait, I want a word with you!”
Chapter 6
SUTTON WATCHED ALENA from his dark study when she headed toward his bedroom, oblivious of his observing her. Had she a change of heart? His own heart picked up its pace at the thought. He wished she felt for him the way he did for her. But would she ever recall her promise to him? Would she ever realize she was his beloved for all eternity before it was too late?
Alena rapped her knuckle on his bedroom door. He took a deep breath and vanished.
Outside in the gardens, the maple leaves dripped with rainwater and the silver sphere clung to the black velvet night, shadowed by clouds. Sutton strolled down a brick path though the rose gardens, wondering what he was to do now. Having Elizabeth in the flesh appealed even if convincing her that’s who she was would be a trial. But destroying the League of Hunters and the Brotherhood of Vampires, too, would consume an overwhelming amount of energy. Wouldn’t it be so much simpler to accomplish Plan A... return to Elizabeth’s time, destroy her brother and his kin and in doing so, stop the League from ever coming into existence in the first place, then claim Elizabeth as his mate forever?
