Jeanne Stein - Chosen

In the light, I see what’s been done. Whip marks, something jagged, barbed. But something else. A white substance cakes the wounds, keeps them open, bleeding.

The smell tells me. Brine. The sea.

Salt.

Why salt?

Lance turns dull eyes toward me, answers the question he read in my mind. “Salt keeps a vampire’s wounds from healing. Leaves scars.”

In a burst of clarity, I understand. Underwood wanted to inflict a punishment that would mark Lance forever. Scars like this would end his modeling career. End that part of him that’s connected to the human community.

“Why?”

He turns his face away.

He doesn’t need to answer.

It’s me. Underwood did this because of me.

I want to howl in anger. All this because I refused to stay with him tonight? There has to be more. It doesn’t matter. I swallow the rage. Save it for later to relish while I plot my revenge. Now, I’ll get Lance into the shower. Maybe it’s not too late to mitigate the damage.

“You can’t,” Lance says simply.

I turn the rage outward. “What do you mean, I can’t? I won’t let him do this. You can’t let him do this. What’s the matter with you?”

Lance’s expression is resigned. He’s prepared to accept Underwood’s punishment.

I’m not.

“You can’t fight me. Either you let me help you or I’ll do it without your help. I’m stronger than you. You know it.”

In spite of his anguish, Lance smiles. “I’m sorry to have gotten you mixed up in this.”

He’s been leaning on me. Now he straightens as much as his injured back allows. “I suppose truth be told, I’m more afraid of you than Julian anyway.”

Humor. A good sign.

“Glad to see you’ve come to your senses.” But my voice is rough with outrage. I put an arm around his waist and we trudge up the stairs to the bedroom.

I guard my thoughts. Lance has been through enough. I’ll take care of him. Tonight.

I don’t bother to strip. I climb into the shower with him, turn the water on his back. He winces and cries out. Vampires have remarkable healing powers, but we aren’t impervious to pain. The salt makes it worse. I’m trembling at his suffering, but unless we get all the salt out of the wounds, the healing can’t begin. I use my fingers to gently open the cuts, let the water dissolve the salt, wash it away. The water runs red with blood. It soaks my clothes, splashes on my face. I taste it. It’s Lance’s blood and—another’s.

Lance has fed tonight.

I flash on the women in Underwood’s entourage. They were there for one purpose. It shouldn’t surprise me that Lance would partake. We are vampire.

I don’t like the unfamiliar stab of jealousy piercing my heart. It’s unreasonable.

We are vampire.

I focus on Lance. The cuts, now clean, begin to heal. I think we have stopped the scarring. Any marks left at all will be unnoticeable. Having a fresh infusion of human blood has made the difference. We are revenant creatures, the walking dead who derive sustenance and immortality from what we take from the living.

I should be grateful to the women who provided Lance the gift that is allowing him to heal like this. I should be. I run a hand lightly over his back. The cuts are fading. My own blood would have eased the pain, but only a human’s blood could have worked this miracle.

I should be grateful.

Except the jealousy returns. He owes this human a debt. I owe this human a debt. The thought stabs at my heart.

Lance has been leaning against the shower wall, propped on one hand, back to me, head down. I put my arms around him. I listen to his heart, feel the cloud of physical discomfort lift from his thoughts only to be replaced by a darker shadow. Despair. The torment is as real as the pain.

“It’s all right, Lance,” I whisper. “You’re safe now.”

Only when he begins to shake do I realize he’s crying. He won’t turn around. Won’t let me into his thoughts. I’ve never felt so helpless. I do the only thing I can think of. I tighten my arms around him and hold him as he cries.

I’ve lost track of time.

Lance is quiet against me, no longer shaking. I can’t tell what he’s thinking because he’s not letting me in. He still won’t face me.

When the water in the shower turns cold, I stir and drop my hands. “We should get out.”

At the sound of my voice, he rouses himself and pushes open the shower door. I turn off the tap and step out after him.

He’s wrapping a towel around his waist. When he turns, he looks surprised to see I’m dressed. Embarrassment darkens his face. “I didn’t realize—”

I put a hand to his lips. “It’s all right.” I begin to peel off my clothes, let them drop into the sink. When I’m naked, he steps close and wraps me in a towel. His hands are trembling, his fingers icier than usual. If he were a human, I’d say he was in shock. I don’t know if vampires experience such frailties.

I take his hand and lead him into the bedroom. I’m not shielding my thoughts. I know Lance is reading them as we crawl exhausted under the bedclothes. Our bodies don’t touch, but I’ve never been more aware of a physical presence. We’re linked now by something more than mutual attraction or sexual convenience. It happened without my knowing it. It happened without my consent.

But it happened.

The feelings that washed over me when I saw Lance in that basement. The jealousy I experienced when I knew he’d been with a woman—even to feed. The deep rage that burns inside when I think about Underwood. The satisfaction I will experience when I make him pay for what he’s done.

All real and powerful, emanating from the one emotion I’d managed to avoid my entire human life. The one emotion I never imagined I’d experience as vampire.

The one emotion I expected to elude me forever.

Lance rolls on his side and looks down at me. The halo of his hair surrounds his beautiful face and glows in the darkness as if backlit. “You still can’t say it though, can you?”

I roll toward him. Brush a tangle of hair from his face. Touch his cheek. “You know,” I whisper. “Isn’t knowing enough?”

Lance is asleep beside me. So why am I awake?

The clock on the nightstand says six a.m. We’ve been in bed only a few hours.

It’s the sun. The fucking desert sun, peeking through a chink in the curtains, sending a laser spear of light directly at my eyes. A cosmic wake-up call.

That’s why I’m awake.

I lift my face, sniff.

That and the smell of coffee.

I groan and roll over.

Adele must be awake, too.

Memories of last night flood back. I raise myself on my elbows and lean toward Lance.

He looks peaceful. I doubt he’ll remain that way when he wakes up. When I start questioning him.

I need to find out why Underwood attacked him so savagely. I need to find out what part I played in it, because the one thing I’m sure of is that I am at the core of Underwood’s cruelty. He wanted something from me last night and when he didn’t get it, he took it out on Lance.

Why would Lance allow it to happen? Why wouldn’t he fight back? Or did he, and was what happened the result of his resistance?

I scoot carefully away from him, not wanting to disturb him. I start to swing my legs over the edge of the bed.

An arm encircles my waist, pulls me back. “Where are you going?”

Lance wraps his arms around me, cradles me so that his head is on my shoulder. Our bodies fit together like two halves of a whole. It feels right—like this is the way we are supposed to start each morning and this is the way we are supposed to end each night. When he presses his body against mine, his erection nudges the small of my back. An invitation.