A rush of something heavy seemed to flow into my head. It nodded before I was aware of it, suddenly feeling leaden, and then I snapped my chin up again as I fought to keep my eyes from falling closed.
"G.o.d, I"m so tired all of a sudden."
"It"s the dawn. It"s on its way. I feel it, too." He added larger logs to the fire, ensuring there would be a warm bed of coals still glowing at day"s end. As he did, I quickly unrolled the blankets in what looked like a good spot. None of it was because we needed the warmth, because we didn"t. We wouldn"t be uncomfortable in the cold or even feel it once we fell asleep, nor would it kill us. But warmth was cozy, a creature comfort, and our kind apparently valued such things.
I stripped down to my T-shirt and slid in between the blankets, leaving room for him beside me.
Moments later, Ethan took off his shoes and jeans, and got in beside me wearing a T-shirt and boxers.
"It"s been a long timeand it"s extremely rare in any casesince I"ve slept with a woman," he said softly.
"Literally or figuratively."
I felt myself smile. "It"ll be literally this time, Ethan. But don"t take it personally. I don"t think I could stay awake if I tried."
"You couldn"t. But there"s always tonight."
I smiled weakly, already sliding into a sleep the depths of which I had only recently come to know.
And only once before that I could remember.
Ethan woke at sundown to find that he had rolled onto his side, either just prior to falling fully into vampiric slumber or just before emerging from it, because once a vampire entered the day sleep, he didn"t move. He was lying with an arm draped protectively over her body, his hand resting near her hip.
One of his legs was entangled with one of hers, and her head was resting against his shoulder.
He shouldn"t be surprised, he supposed. He knew he wanted her, had always wanted her. But this was different. It felt intimate, almost tender, holding her this way. It wasn"t a feeling with which he was evenvaguely familiar, much less comfortable. He found it more confusing than anything.
Gently, he began to change position, but even as he removed his arm from around her, she opened her eyes, turned her head slightly and met his gaze. Her sleepy smile filled his head with notions best ignored, but then it faltered as she took in the way they were embracing. She whispered, "Oh," but she didn"t pull free.
"I suppose we were cold or something," he said.
"I"d bet more on the "or something,"" she replied.
He took his arm from around her, rolled onto his back, then sat up slowly. "Yeah. Well"
"You said we barely knew each other back at The Farm, right?"
"Right."
"So we neverwe never shared more than that one kiss."
"No," he said.
"And it was well, what was it? Physical attraction between us?"
"It"s hard to say what it was. I mean, neither of us had any kind of experience with the opposite s.e.x. No adolescent boyfriend-girlfriend drama, no dates, nothing."
"Didn"t they teach us about s.e.x? In the cla.s.ses, I mean?"
"Sure they did," He cleared his throat, got to his feet. "Just the basic physical aspects of reproduction though. We knew how it worked, just nothing about how it felt."
"I see."
He shrugged. "They kept us apart, kept the males and females as separate from one another as possible to prevent problems. But you and I"
He broke off there, and she sat up. Her smile was mischievous, as was the twinkle in her eyes. "There was something more between us, wasn"t there, Ethan?"
"There were looks. I was attracted to you, and the way you returned those looks I got the feeling it was mutual. But we never got the chance to"
"To do more than share one kiss," she said.
"No,"
"I wish I remembered it. That first kiss."
"You might not have remembered it, even if your mind were intact. You"d been drugged and G.o.d knows what else. You were still recovering." "So you told me."
"Besides, we"ve kissed since then."
Her eyes flared so slightly that he might have imagined it, and she quickly averted them. "My memory isn"t that bad, Ethan. I haven"t forgotten." She shrugged, carefully moving her gaze back to meet his. Her eyes were beginning to gleam softly, a rose-tinted glow coming from somewhere beneath the surface.
"We have the time now," she told him. "To do more than kiss, I mean."
He couldn"t help that his gaze slid down to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, even though they were hidden from him by the T-shirt she"d pilfered. "You want to?"
"I wouldn"t have said it if I didn"t." She got to her feet, s.e.xy as h.e.l.l in the oversized shirt, and moved closer to him. "Besides, it might help my memory."
She pressed her palms to his chest, and then her body was touching his as her hands slid higher and twined around his neck. She stood on tiptoe, tipped her head back, closed her eyes.
He had no earthly reason to resist the temptation she represented. None at all, and yet there was a tiny voice deep down inside him that told him there would, be repercussions. He ignored that voice, barely even heard it above his body"s own urgent demands. His heightened senses kicked into overdrive as she pressed herself against him and set his very soul on fire.
He locked his arms around her waist and bent his head until his lips touched hers. They met lightly at first, and then the pressure increased. He wasn"t sure which of them was responsible for thatmaybe both.
And then she sighed a little, and her lips parted, and something sort of shot through him. It felt the way he was certain it would feel if he poked his finger into a live socket. The next thing he knew, he was holding her harder, bending over her and kissing the living h.e.l.l out of her. He felt as if he could never get enough.
And she was kissing him back just as eagerly, just as hungrily.
At last they pulled apart, took a step back, arms falling to their sides, and just stood there, equally stunned and, he thought, equally aroused, as well.
"Well," she said. "That was even better than last time."
"Yeah."
"I guess you were right. I was returning your looks."
He allowed himself a small, satisfied smile. "Yeah."
"And it worked, too."
He blinked and wasn"t following. "It worked ?"
"I remember. I remember you." Her eyes narrowed on him, and he wondered exactly what she remembered. But before he could ask, he sensed a human presence. A heartbeat later, he realized he"d sensed it too late.
As his vision shifted beyond Lilith to the cave opening and the night beyond it, he saw female forms, silhouetted in the darkness. A dozen women, mortals, stood there just outside their cave. Then, movingas one, their flashlights came on, twelveno, thirteenglowing spots in the night, each one trained on his eyes.
He lifted a forearm to shield his face as Lilith suddenly became aware of the danger and spun around.
He felt the ripple of fear move through hen He felt her wrestle with it, pin it and stand on its back.
"Just who the h.e.l.l do you think you are?" she demanded. "Get those lights out of my face!"
"Relax," one of the woman said. She moved in front of the others, making her all but invisible to him and, he knew, to Lilith, as well. "We just want to talk to you."
"I don"t know who you are, woman, and it"s clear you don"t know who I am, either, or you wouldn"t dare be here, in the dead of night, in the middle of nowhere, risking your life. Tell your minions to put the lights down and stop blinding me," Lilith snapped. "Now."
"I do know who you are Lilith."
When the womanand Ethan was fairly sure now that she was the same woman who"d visited earliersaid Lilith"s name, she flinched backward. He wrapped an arm around her waist from behind, an instinctively protective gesture.
"I can"t risk you getting away again," the woman said. "It"s taken me a long time to find you."
Ethan saw the woman raising her arm, and he reacted instantly, whirling Lilith out of the way even as he heard the "pfft" of the weapon and saw the dart speeding toward them.
It missed its mark, just grazing Lilith"s arm and flying harmlessly away. He pushed her behind him, clasped her hand in his, then turned and, with a low growl, lunged directly at the crowd of women. Their leader tried to take aim a second time, but he was too fast. Pulling Lilith along behind him, Ethan sped straight into the midst of them, knocking half of them to the ground with a single sweep of his arm, while still running at full speed. In another instant he and Lilith were emerging from the mob and racing through the forest.
Their feet pounded. Their speed was so great that it was difficult to avoid hitting branches, even with their heightened reflexes and preternatural night vision. At length he had to slow to a pace near that of a mortal, albeit a fast one.
"What the h.e.l.l just happened, Ethan?" Lilith asked, as they hurried along.
She kept stumbling, which worried him. At least the women, though his ears told him they were still in pursuit, had no hope of catching them. He"d put enough distance between them, and was increasing it all the time.
But deep in the forest, Lilith yanked her hand free of Ethan"s and stopped. "I need to rest."
He frowned. "You"re a vampire. You don"t need"
"Tell me what just happened. Who were those women?"
He shook his head, frowning at her. "The one doing the talking was the same one who came around asking about you. The one with the photo. I don"t know about the rest of them." "How the h.e.l.l did they find us, Ethan?"
"I don"t know."
"Well, don"t you think we"d better find out?"
He put a finger to his lips and cut loose with a whistle that was too high for human ears to detect. Within a few minutes the pounding of distant hoofbeats whispered on the wind, drawing ever nearer, until it no longer a whispered but thundered.
The beasts slowed to a trot as they reached him, tossing their great manes and blowing, excited by what they were sensing. Trouble. Danger. Impending flight.
"I say we go back there," Lilith said, gripping Scylla"s mane, and pulling herself up. She only made it partway, then slid back down. "I say we grab one of those b.i.t.c.hes and make her talk."
"And I say we get on these horses and leave here," Ethan replied. He moved beside her, cupped her b.u.t.tocks and helped her up onto Scylla.
"And go where?" she asked, wrapping her hands in the mare"s thick mane and urging the horse forward.
"Somewhere safe. Somewhere we can hole up while I try to find my brother. James will know how they tracked us." He got up onto Charybdis, clicked his tongue and rode him up beside Scylla, awaiting Lilith"s reply.
"You"ve been on your own for how long now? Almost two years?" she asked. Even before he nodded, she was rushing on. "And they never found you. Now, within twenty-four hours of my arrival, you"re being attacked by a pack of Amazons. So clearly it"s me. Somehow, they"re tracking me. Do you agree?"
He met her eyes and wanted to say no, but he knew it was senseless to lie. "Yes."
"I arrived stark naked, Eton. So if there"s anything on me leading them to us, it must be on the inside. We need to find it and get rid of it before we do anything else."
He urged Charybdis faster as they moved onto a narrow, winding trail that must have been some sort of deer path through the woods. He looked behind them. "They"ll make it here soon. Come with me, Lilith, please. We"ll figure out our next step once we"ve put more distance between us and them."
She thinned her lips and tapped Scylla"s sides with her heelsalready, Ethan imagined, missing the clothes she"d left behind. She was reduced again to nothing more than a shirt. He would have to find her something better.
"Is dawn near, Ethan?" she asked, as they increased their pace. "I thought it only just got dark."
"It did." He looked back at her. "Are you all right, Lilith?"
She nodded, but she also blinked heavily, giving the lie to her response. "We could get me X-rayed.
Maybe we could find something."
"Maybe." "But once we know then I have to go to go back."
"Return to The Farm," he said. "Risk your freedom and your life to rescue people who might rather stay right where they are."
"That"s ezakly what I"ve gotta do, an" you know"t."
Frowning, he turned, only to see Lilith slumping over Scylla"s neck. He leapt to the ground and was already running back toward her when she fell from Scylla"s back. She hit the ground hard, and he was kneeling beside her only an instant later. But she was stone cold unconscious. Scylla turned and stretched her long neck, nuzzling Lilith"s hair.
"Lilith!" Ethan shouted. He gripped her shoulders and shook her. "Lilith, what"s wrong?"
"It was a tranquilizer dart," a voice said. "They must have gotten off another shot as you ran away."
Ethan went utterly still and then slowly looked up. But he knew that voice even before he saw the man who"d spoken.
"James," he whispered.
Chapter Nine.
His brother rode a horse of his own, an Arabian, far sleeker and smaller than Ethan"s powerful draft horses. He sat his mount well, wearing a long black coat that was split in the back. He was about ten yards ahead on the trail.