Creatures ok anthology, p.64
Creatures of the Dark Anthology, page 64
His soft-spoken words had her erupting into more tears. A minute later, they were both seated on the ground with her clutching his T-shirt and crying her eyes out like a little kid. She didn’t want to seem uncool or childish around him, but for some reason, she couldn’t help herself. Being next to him, smelling his scent, and actually touching him had brought forth every emotion she had been trying to lock away in the Demon Realm. There, showing emotions or a weakness was frowned upon. She was used to putting on a tough act. The hunters had a similar motto, training their best recruits to act stoic even when they were whipped or beaten to near death. For a moment, she wanted to be herself.
“It’s okay, Maya,” Ben cooed, stroking her hair.
She nodded against his muscular chest. Her vampire hunger was scratching her throat with every beat of his heart. Lifting her head, she knew her eyes were glowing slightly. Her hands moved to his neck, stroking the jugular vein and seeing it pulsate. She licked her lips, fighting the urge to sink her fangs into his skin.
“Do it,” he told her, moving his head to one side.
Her attention flicked to his face. He didn’t seem disgusted or angry with her. There was only acceptance that was making it harder for her to say no.
“Are you sure?” she whispered.
He smiled and brought her head closer to his neck. “I’m your partner. We look out for each other.”
She swallowed hard when her lips touched his skin. Her fangs ached at the need to pierce his flesh and take in his blood. Other areas of her body were beginning to come to life, and they had nothing to do with the hunger for sustenance.
“It’s fine,” he assured her one more time.
Letting go of her restraint, she bit into his skin.
He released a tight-lipped hiss from the pain. She knew it hurt, but she was too weak to make him feel good from the bite. As his blood ran down her throat, a moan escaped her. He tasted like a citrus dessert. The thirst slowly was pushed back to the back of her mind, yet the silver in her system didn’t allow her to fully recover. She would need a lot more blood to eradicate it.
She pulled back, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “I will fix the bite with my blood.” Once she bit into her thumb, she smeared her blood on his skin, watching it knit together on the spot.
“Are you feeling better?” he asked, his stern gaze never leaving her face.
Maya swallowed. A tornado of butterflies in her stomach was actively going off. She wanted to put her arms around him and kiss him so badly it hurt. But, they were nothing more than partners. He was someone who saw her as a younger sister or a good friend.
“I’m fine, thanks,” she said, getting up. Her demon side focused on the whiteness of his soul that glowed within his muscular body.
It looks so tasty… She shook her head. What the hell am I thinking? Ben is off limits!
He rose to his full six-foot-two height and planted a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “I’ll get you something to wear while you explain to me what happened.”
“I—There is something I have to do first. I’ll come back in a little bit, once I resolve my…issue.” She glanced at him with a pleading expression. “I promise to come back.”
“What could be so important that you can’t leave it until later?”
His probing stare made her nervous. She managed a smile and waved his question away. “I was going to check on Helena.”
“You can do that afterwards. She’s not going anywhere,” he countered.
Maya pressed her lips into a tight line. She was running out of excuses, not like he appeared to believe any of them. Her shoulders slumped, and she blew out a breath. “I need to feed.”
“Was my blood not enough?”
“I need a different kind of food, Ben. The demon kind.”
“Oh.” He nodded and left the room.
For a long moment, she didn’t move, thinking that he was disappointed in her. It couldn’t have been easy for him to welcome a demon into his hideout. She was one of the creatures he was taught to hate throughout his life. There was no way for them to be together while she remained a demon. She knew that, and her heart tore apart in her chest.
She left the room, climbing the stairs to the ground floor. Her initial guess was correct. He had locked her up in the basement. She listened out for his heartbeat, tracking him to one of the bedrooms on the first floor of the abandoned house.
Ben handed her one of his black T-shirts and a pair of tracksuit bottoms. She silently tugged them on. He probably didn’t want to keep looking at a half-naked vampire’s body.
He stopped in front of her and lifted her chin. “Why do you look so upset? I thought you would be happier to be with me again.”
“I am. I mean, I—” Her attention diverted to his chiselled jawline and tantalising lips. God, she wanted to kiss him so badly. Even once would make her day.
“You what?”
He kept studying her as if she was the most interesting thing in the universe. If her undead body could blush, she would have been beetroot-red from head to toe.
“I…” Why is this so difficult? “I love you.”
Ben seemed taken aback by her words. He moved back a step. The hand that was touching her a second ago fell away, breaking their sole contact.
She regretted her words immediately, trying to rectify her mistake by saying, “It was a joke. The ha-ha kind, you know?” More tears started to pool in her eyes, and she blinked them away. “It wasn’t meant to slip out like that. I’m so sorry, Ben. I’ll just go now.”
Ben caught her wrist and pulled her into an embrace that would have squeezed the air out of her lungs if she still needed to breathe. He stroked the back of her head and whispered into her ear, “Say that again, Maya.”
5
WHAT MUST BE DONE
BEN
HE MUST HAVE HEARD HER wrong. Maya loves me? That possibility had never occurred to him.
How? Why?
As her partner and instructor, he did everything he could to create a great partnership between them. He was not kind to her or bent to her will when she pleaded to stop the training because she could no longer take it. So, why on earth would she find someone like him attractive? Wouldn’t she prefer a guy who had fewer scars on his body or had not pushed her into the life of a hunter?
But, in that moment, he didn’t care for her reasons. His chest was bursting with the emotions he had kept bottled up for a very long time. She had become the light in his miserable daily existence. Without her complaining about the fruit and vegetable shakes he made every morning or giving him the puppy dog eyes when she wanted a new pair of boots or clothes, he felt lost. As he held her in his arms, he only wanted to know that he wasn’t dreaming.
Maya moved her head back to look at his face. The body she had chosen was beautiful with blue eyes and blonde hair that ran down her back in soft waves. He had missed the neon-red bob she loved to style her hair into or looking into her gem-like green eyes.
“Ben, what I said earlier, it didn’t freak you out?” she asked full of uncertainty.
He smiled at her. “We have been partners for eight years. I have watched you grow into an incredible woman and hunter. No one compared to you when I was forced by my foster parents to seek out a possible wife.”
Her eyelashes fluttered, and she glanced away. “You’re not just saying that to be nice, right?”
He chuckled and captured her head between his hands. His lips met hers in a slow dance. He didn’t want to rush things with her, and, at the same time, he was afraid that she would disappear from his sight in a blink of an eye.
Her fingers captured the material of his T-shirt and she pulled him closer. She opened her mouth for him, and he could taste a hint of copper as he deepened the kiss.
Maya moaned when he stroked her tongue with his. His hands travelled down her chest and to her ass, pressing her body against his.
When he needed to catch his breath, he pulled back, asking, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“Yes,” she whispered against his lips.
Ben cursed inwardly. He prided himself on his restraint and self-control. Yet, right now, he couldn’t find a sliver of any of those traits. He kissed her a second time, harder, as if he was a desperate man in a desert who had finally found his oasis.
She responded to him, tugging at his T-shirt and pulling it over his head. Her chilled fingers ran down his chest and the scars he had gotten throughout his hunting career, adding to his arousal. Moving down, she kissed his neck. He felt her fangs grazing his skin, and he moved his head enough for her to bite him again if she wanted to.
She didn’t. Lowering herself, she left soft kisses on his abdominal muscles while her fingers worked on undoing his belt.
Ben gently pushed her hands away, causing her to look up at him with an unspoken question in her eyes.
“Not here. There’s no bed or anything.”
Maya smirked. “I’m sure we can work around that.”
He was about to give in to the lust reflected in her eyes when he heard the front door opening.
Burnell’s voice reached his ears. “Ben, I got us some food at the supermarket nearby.”
Maya stood up quicker than Ben could blink. “Is that Richter? What is he doing here?”
Putting his T-shirt back on, Ben said, “He stayed behind to help me capture you.”
“Oh my God, he’ll kill me if he sees me!”
“I won’t let that happen.” Ben took her hand and nudged her to follow him downstairs.
Burnell was standing at the bottom of the stairs with his eyes burning holes in Ben and Maya. He drew his gun, pointing it at the girl. “Let him go from your control, and I won’t shoot you in the head, bitch.”
“She’s not controlling me, Burnell,” Ben said, stepping in front of her to protect her. He slowly raised his hands, showing the hunter that he was unarmed. “There is a lot we have to talk about.”
Burnell didn’t lower his pistol. With his free hand, he reached into his back pocket and took out a flask with the colloidal silver mixture. He tossed it to Ben. “Drink it.”
With a nod, Ben unscrewed the cap and swallowed the contents in two mouthfuls. Small daily doses of colloidal silver helped the hunters stay protected from the vampire influence. Their blood became poison to vampires if they drank too much, as well.
“See, nothing’s changed. I am not under her influence,” Ben assured his friend.
Burnell lowered his gun with a raised brow. “Mind telling me why one moment we’re catching this vampire and the next she’s your BFF?”
Ben and Maya descended the rest of the stairs. He led everyone to the kitchen where Ben rummaged through the shopping that Burnell brought back. Finding a bottle of strong liquor he was looking for, he unscrewed the top of it and took a swig.
“You may not believe it, but hear me out,” Ben began, handing his friend the bottle. “The vampire standing next to you is Maya.”
The hunter stared at him. He looked from the vampire to Ben, then back at the vampire. Once he finished taking in her figure, which Ben fought not to react to, he took a drink from the bottle.
“Very funny, Ben,” he said and pointed to the girl. “There is no way that’s Maya. She’s dead, remember?”
Maya slapped her hands to her hips, glaring at him. “I’m not dead, Richter. And quit checking out my cleavage, it’s creeping me out.”
The hunter wrapped his arm around Ben’s shoulders. “I know you miss her, but this is stupid. Maya is D-E-A-D. A hot vampire female isn’t the way I thought you’d roll after losing her.”
Shaking his arm off, Ben ran his hand through his hair. “Tell him something only you’d know, Maya.”
She smirked and sashayed to stand in front of Burnell. She jabbed her finger into his chest. “Remember that time you offered me alcohol when I was sixteen and underage? Or the time when you made fun of my flat chest, telling me that I’d never get a real man without any feminine curves? Oh wait, or that time when—”
“Okay! I get it. You’re the real deal,” Burnell said, laughing off the things she said.
Ben glared at Richter for doing all those things to an underage kid. If he had known that he was giving alcohol to the trainees at such a young age, Ben would have kicked his ass a long time ago.
“How come you’re a vampire? And did you get plastic surgery or something?” Burnell asked, reaching to touch her golden locks.
Ben slapped his hand away, pulling Maya to stand behind him. Telling this man that she was a demon would make Richter attack Maya. Vampires retained their personalities after turning, but demons were a mystery to hunters. They never captured a living one to question or torture. Not like they knew where to begin on capturing them when they clearly possessed people to travel around the Human Realm.
“She came here looking for our help,” Ben explained, avoiding any details.
Burnell’s eyes narrowed. He pulled up a barstool and took a seat on it as he placed his bottle on the kitchen counter. “I know you’re trying to protect her because she used to be your partner, but now she’s one of them. Whatever she came here to do, using familiarity to draw us in, she is not one of us anymore.”
Ben’s shoulders tensed. He glanced over his shoulder at Maya who was biting her lower lip. She only did that when she was trying to contain her anger or tears. And judging by the sorrow in her eyes, he guessed it was the latter.
“She will always be one of us, a vampire or not,” Ben said.
Maya gave him a faint smile, though it didn’t reach her eyes. “It’s fine. He’s right. I am no longer human.”
His heart ached in his chest upon hearing her pained voice. Ben wanted to pull her back into his arms and keep her safe. His logic won over. If he showed weakness as a leader, Burnell would not follow his orders anymore and attack her at will.
“That’s right, sweetheart. You’re no longer one of us. Showing up on a hunters’ radar like an idiot, what were you thinking?” Burnell demanded. “You know that we can’t let you go now that you know our safe house’s location. It took us forever to find this place.”
Ben squared his shoulders and met Burnell’s judgemental stare head on. “Get back to gathering intel on the vampires. I’ll deal with her myself.”
Maya gasped and covered her mouth with her hands.
Regardless of how much Ben wanted to comfort her, he couldn’t. Not in front of this hunter who questioned his authority.
Burnell cocked an eyebrow and burst out laughing. “You are willing to kill her? Your old partner?”
“I am willing to do what must be done. Like my parents did for a long time before you even smelled your first vampire kill,” Ben countered.
Sliding off the barstool, Richter took the bottle with him. He winked at Maya and said, “It was nice knowing you. I’m sure he’ll make it painless, for old times’ sake.”
6
LIMITED OPTIONS
MAYA
HER BODY WAS FROZEN when she looked at the back of her intimidating partner.
Is Ben planning to kill me? Is that before or after I sleep with him?
Fear and panic were replaced by anger. Once Richter left the room, she knew her eyes were glowing brightly with her strong emotions.
Ben turned around. Lowering his voice, he whispered, “Don’t look like that. I didn’t mean anything I said to him.”
She scowled at him. “I—I don’t know if I can trust you, Ben. It was a mistake coming here.” She walked around him to the back door of the house and reached for the door handle.
He grasped her from behind, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her into him. She had to lock her lips tightly together to keep a moan from fleeing her.
If I can’t trust him, who’s left? The demons?
Ben’s hot breath tickled her ear and he added, “I am not letting you go. The last time I failed to be there for you and protect you, I lost you to the Demon Realm.” His arms tightened around her middle. “I can’t lose you a second time, Maya. You’re the only family I have left in this world.”
She moved her hands to stroke his arms, brushing the fine hairs there. He had never confided in her before. Till now, he kept his troubles and deepest thoughts hidden.
Is he telling the truth?
He turned her around and planted a kiss on her forehead. “Richter will be back in an hour or two. We can leave here and find a different place to talk things through.”
“You can’t abandon your position as a clan leader,” she interjected. “I heard from the Irish hunters I’ve questioned that a few have followed you. They have put their faith in you and your ability to lead. They are your new family.”
“I know. I just—”
“No excuses, Ben. You are not a simple hunter anymore. You are a clan leader, whether you like it or not. And as a leader, you have to make some tough decisions. I understand.”
Ben ran the tips of his fingers down her cheek. His feather-light touch sent electricity coursing down her body. She stood on her tiptoes and kissed him briefly on the lips before saying, “I won’t cause you any more trouble. This demon problem, I’ll handle it myself.”
“You wouldn’t come to me if you didn’t need help,” he said, grasping her upper arms. “So, stop fighting and listen to your senior.”
Maya laughed at him pulling rank when they were no longer part of the same team. It was rather nostalgic and made her stomach clench with happiness.
He took her hand as if it was the most natural thing to do, grabbed a duffel bag full of what she assumed was weaponry, and marched her out the back door of the safe house.
*****
“So, let me get this straight,” Ben said, scratching his head. He was sitting in an almost empty café across from her. “Eliza tried to contain an Archdemon and failed. That’s why you and Helena killed her, but the demon still managed to escape?”
Maya shrugged one shoulder and sipped her coffee. “That sums it up about right.”
