Chapter Five

I must have drifted in and out of consciousness but when I next became aware of my surroundings I realized that I wasn’t dreaming or imagining men. This was actually happening and now I was in a cabin lit by candles and that smelled of wood and spice.

“You should get in.” The man who’d just carried me pointed at a tin bath full to the brim with steaming water and set before a roaring fire. “It will increase your core temperature.”

I knotted my pale, blue-tinged fingers together and looked down at my black outfit. There was rip on the knee and a tear on my thigh. There was a deep scratch beneath it.

“You’re shivering again, which is a good thing.” The man stooped before me. “It means your body is coming back to life, but still, we must warm you further.”

“Who…who are you?” I asked, studying his soft brown eyes. He had small creases at the corners and looked as though he smiled a lot. The light of the fire was reflecting in them making him look as warm as his home.

“I’m Caleb, this is where I live. Please, get in the hot water, we can talk more then.”

“But I’m…dressed.”

“Fashion is not my thing,” he said, letting his gaze dip down my body. “But I don’t think that’s the most sensible outfit to be wearing on a December night in the middle of the Rockies.”

“I agree.” I paused to shiver, my teeth clattering uncontrollably. “But I hadn’t…planned…”

“On being tied to a tree, I guessed as much. Come on.” He took my hand and urged me to stand. “Take this off and get in.”

I stood dumbly as he peeled away my outfit, uncaring that he was seeing me naked. I was too numb with shock.

Aimery and Ryle are dead.

I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want to believe it.

“There was a train crash,” I said, resting my hand on his wide shoulder as he took off my heeled shoes and then peeled the lacy outfit from my feet. “An explosion. Lots of people killed.”

“Yes, I heard.” He looked up at me, but his eyes didn’t linger on my nakedness, he studied my face. It was as though my exposed female form didn’t affect him in the slightest. “You were on the train?” he asked.

I nodded.

“You’re lucky to be alive.”

“Lucky, really? My husbands are dead.” I shook my head and felt the blood drain from my face as I’d said the awful words. Saying them out loud made them true even though I was still grasping denial.

“Husbands?” Caleb said with a frown. “In the plural.”

I nodded. What was the point in lying? This whole situation was completely bizarre anyway. “Yes, my husbands.” A shiver snaked up my spine. “Aimery and Ryle.”

“In.” Caleb stood, held out his hand and helped me balance as I stepped into the warm water. To start with it burned but as I sank beneath the surface it began to soothe my skin and penetrate to my muscles.

Caleb again took no notice of my bare state or my nipples just peeking out of the water. Instead he sat on the soft sofa I’d just vacated and ran his hand through his hair. It flopped messily around his face, the long strands of his fringe caressing his cheeks. “And the woman, who tied you up. Who was she?”

“You saw her?”

“Yes.”

I swallowed as tears stung my eyes. “She’s an evil bitch. And she’s killed the men I love.”

“Yes, she’s evil, no doubt about that,” Caleb said, then his voice deepened and he kind of growled, “and she’s also a vampire.”

I snapped my head up to look at him. “How…how do you know that?”

“I saw her fangs. Saw her about to bite you. Not exactly the kind of thing humans do to each other.”

“But…” I tried to make sense of what he was saying. “So you saw the wolves too?” He paused and glanced at the door of the cabin. “Yes. I saw wolves.”

“Shit, they were vicious and in a feeding frenzy. Did you have a gun with you?”

“No, no gun.”

“Bloody hell.” I trembled and sank a little lower into the warm water. I wished I could wake up and find that this all had been a bad dream, because as life was returning to my fingers and toes the fear of wolves and the pain of having lost Aimery and Ryle were becoming more acute. I began to long for my chilled, numb state where agonizing emotions were in the deep freeze.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” Caleb was next to me, resting his hand on the side of the bath and looking at me worriedly.

I was aware of tears flowing down my face—tears of grief and despair. I couldn’t stop them. They were flooding my cheeks and dripping off my chin. My nose was running too, quite unattractively.

“Shh…” he said, again throwing a look at the door. “She can’t get you in here. We’ll never invite her over the threshold. You’re quite safe.”

What Caleb didn’t realize was that I didn’t care about Elfrida anymore. In fact I wished she had killed me because I couldn’t go on without Aimery and Ryle. Without them I didn’t even want to exist. Maybe it would have been better to be drained dry or mauled to death, then I wouldn’t have to live without my lovers.

When I woke I was still crying, maybe not on the outside but on the inside. My heart felt torn in two. My eyes were puffy and my bones ached. I also had a stomping headache that circled the back of my head and screeched down my neck. The scratch on my leg was stinging and itchy.

I was in a bed, a super-soft bed with dark green covers and pillows. At the window matching curtains were drawn though the weak wintery light spilled around the edges creating fingers on the wooden walls of the cabin.

I turned over, clasped my hands beneath my chin and drew my knees up to my chest. I’d hoped I wouldn’t wake up.

But the warmth of the bed and distant voices told me I was alive, and that some weird twist of fate had dropped me into Caleb’s home in the middle of the forest in the deepest, coldest corner of a Canadian winter. I was thousands of miles from home and the cobbled streets of London.

I stared at the door, which was open a crack, and strained to hear the conversation coming from the living area.

It was Caleb’s voice, I was sure, but there was someone else with him. Another man. The words were sharp, harsh, perhaps infused with anxiety.

Curiosity got the better of me and I pushed off the covers and stood. Glancing downward, I saw that I was dressed in a fleecy red and black checked shirt and a pair of navy sweats that slipped down my hips to my knees the moment I straightened.

Quickly, I pulled them up, covering my naked behind, and thought what a state I’d been in. Caleb must have dried and dressed me after my bath, but I couldn’t remember it, I’d been sobbing so much.

I padded barefoot to the door and peeked out.

Caleb was in the middle of the room. He still wore faded jeans and a white T-shirt and he had his hands on his hips.

Pacing in front of the fire, which had reduced to glowing embers, was a man of similar wide stature as Caleb. He was also just as tall and had the same haphazard hairstyle, only his was a little reddish, as though flecks from the fire had woven through it. He wore jeans and nothing on his top half, showing a dusting of dark chest hair shaped like a diamond.

“There’s no sign of her, nothing,” the pacing man said, rubbing his hand down his densely stubbled cheek. “Not a trace.”

“But how did you lose her?”

“They’re clever, you know that. They always have been.”

“I know, but her tracks. In the snow, where do they go?”

“They fade out, up by Gillmore Pass, just evaporate.”

“And no scent?” Caleb frowned.

“No, nothing, I told you. I went as far as I could and then it reached a point where she could have gone several different ways. It would have been pointless for me to go even farther from here.”

I worried at my bottom lip. Caleb’s friend had obviously tried to follow Elfrida. I had to admit I was surprised, though, given that two wolves were on her trail, that he hadn’t found a fight scene—either the wolves or the vampire dead in the snow.

“How is she, the girl?”

“She was cold.” Caleb reached for a log and threw it on the fire. It crunched and then spat, shifting on the ashes. “But I warmed her up and tried to figure out what she was doing tied to a tree and about to be bitten but she was pretty dazed.”

“And did you find out why the vampire woman wanted her enough to risk being here?”

“No, but I’m guessing she’s special if the bitch went to all that trouble to derail a train. She’s brought a lot of attention to the area. It’s just as well it’s on the other side of the pass.” Caleb tutted. “We can do without attention.”

“Which makes it odd that she went back that way.”

“Not really, the trail will be complicated by others. You know, death, destruction, the emergency services.” Caleb shrugged and then sighed. “The girl lost people on the train, two husbands, so she said.”

I gulped down a sob and pressed my fingers to my lips. An image of Ryle and Aimery reaching for me filled my mind and I wished they were here now, to hold me, comfort me. Press me between them and tell me it was all a bad dream.

“Shit, that’s bad…wait, two husbands?” The other man stopped pacing. “What?”

“I’m just repeating her words.” Caleb stepped up to his friend and cupped his cheeks. “It makes me thankful you made it back home safe, Isaac. It could have gotten nasty out there. It usually does when they’re around and I couldn’t survive if I lost you.”

“I’m here. I wouldn’t let one of those bastards get the better of me.” Isaac tipped his head forward and kissed Caleb. It was an intense, deep kiss and both men wound their arms around each other and pressed in close.

I stared, fascinated. Feeling like I shouldn’t be watching but unable to help myself. Just like that time with Denny and Gaspere I was compelled to spy on two men together. There was something so erotic and forbidden about it.

Isaac ran his hands down Caleb’s back and palmed his butt through the denim.

Caleb groaned, or perhaps it was Isaac. I couldn’t be sure.

Sadness seared through me. I turned away, slunk back to bed and crawled beneath the covers. Caleb hadn’t taken any notice of my nakedness because he was gay. He was in love with a man. I envied him, and Isaac, for having the person they wanted in their arms, in their home. How uncomplicated their lives appeared to be, living here, together, in the wilderness. In love and in lust with no intrusions.

Until I arrived that was.

I must have slept even though my emotions were battered and bruised and my thoughts and dreams a tangle of violent images and heartbreak.

“Hey, girl,” a deep voice said by my ear. “You need to drink something. It’s been hours since you had any sustenance. Here, open up.”

I opened my eyes and squinted over the covers. Caleb was perched on the bed holding out a steaming mug of liquid. The sun at the window had faded and I guessed it was twilight. I’d slept all day.

“You didn’t even tell me your name last night,” he said with a gentle smile.

I cleared my throat and shifted onto my elbows. My mouth was dry and my tongue sticking to my palate. I did indeed need a drink. “Beatrice, Bea.”

“Well, Bea, tea is what you need before you go into another slumber.”

I needed so much more but tea would pass for now. I reached for the cup and took a sip. The warm, mild liquid soothed my throat and wet my mouth. It wasn’t the same as the special blend of tea that my husbands gave me but it would do.

“Thanks,” I managed. “I heard voices earlier.” I couldn’t quite bring myself to admit that I’d spied on him and his boyfriend. It seemed so discourteous when they’d brought me into their home, into a place of safety, without even knowing my name. “You don’t live here alone?”

“No. I live here with Isaac.”

“He is your boyfriend?”

Caleb glanced at the door and nodded. “I guess you could call him that, though we usually prefer the term mate.”

“Mate, okay.” I took another mouthful of tea and thought what an unusual word to use for your lover. I’d heard it before though; Aimery used it on occasions.

“And did Isaac see the vampire and the wolves too?” I asked.

“Yes.” Caleb nodded seriously. “He did. We both did.”

“But what were you doing out there? In the dead of the night?”

“We heard about the train crash.” He shrugged. “Thought we should check for any casualties who’d been flung from the wreckage or wandered off hurt and dazed. This is our territory.”

“You mean your land?”

“Yes, our land.”

I nodded and remembered my race through the forest, the wind in my ears and the blur of the trees. Elfrida had been gripping me tight, though at the time I hadn’t been aware that it was her holding me. We must have traveled a considerable distance. “But I was miles away from the crash, like past mountains and valleys and…”

“Just as well we live a long way from the crash site then. It meant we found you.”

He fell silent and so did I. The tea was making my mouth feel better if nothing else. I stayed slumped in the pillows and tried to make sense of my situation.

“She’s awake.”

Isaac’s sudden appearance at the door startled me.

He strode in, his movements swift, his large stature dominating the room in a way that Caleb’s gentler actions didn’t.

“Yes,” Caleb said. “So now you two can meet. Isaac, this is Bea.”

Isaac nodded seriously. “Nice to meet you, Bea.”

“You too.”

“Happier circumstances would have been more agreeable.” Isaac spoke with an English accent and I found it comforting, reassuring. “Do you feel up to answering some questions?” He folded his arms over his bare chest and I couldn’t help but be impressed by the thick bulge of his muscles. The guy obviously spent a serious amount of time chopping logs and lugging trunks around. Wilderness living was clearly a workout on its own.

“What do you want to know?” I asked with a shrug. My situation felt so hopeless.

“To start with what the hell you were doing tied to a tree in the middle of the night with a vampire about to make a meal of you?” Isaac leaned against the wall, his shoulder banging onto the wood and his right foot propping over the left. “It was a damn dangerous situation to get yourself into.”

“I couldn’t agree more but if I answer your questions will you answer mine?”

“To the best of our ability.” Isaac nodded.

“Okay, she’s been hunting me, trailing me, Elfrida, that is.”

“Elfrida…”Caleb nodded and glanced at Isaac.

Isaac frowned. “You’re sure that’s her name? The vampire woman?”

“Yes, she’s been after me since I was in London. I fled to the Caribbean and when she followed me there I had no choice but to travel north. I thought I’d hidden my trail but it seems that wasn’t the case.”

“Why you?” Isaac asked. “She’s a vampire, she could have anyone. Why journey around the world for a slip of a girl?”

“Okay, before I answer that it’s my turn.” I paused wondering how best to ask the questions that were stacking up in my mind.

These guys were no ordinary men. There was something about them that reminded me of when I’d first met Aimery. Things just didn’t add up. There was more to it and I needed to know, but not at the expense of putting myself in danger or angering them. “How do you know about vampires? You’re not…one of them, are you?”

“Fuck, no, I’d rather die.” Isaac straightened and bashed his right fist into his left palm. “Vampires are our sworn enemy. I wish death to them all.”

A tingle ran up my chest and onto my neck. It seemed he’d been granted some of his wish. My vampires were gone. And sworn enemies? The only sworn enemies of the vampires that I knew of were wolves. Nothing else seemed to bother them.

“Bea,” Caleb said, resting his hand over mine. “Tell us why Elfrida wants you so badly. It will help us to protect you from her.”

I drew in a breath, my mind was spinning with so many thoughts. “I have Bombay blood. Apparently it’s a delicacy and is very rare.”

Caleb rubbed my hand soothingly. “Yes, it’s just about extinct.”

“But, how—”

“Do we know?” Caleb smiled. “Vampires have been in these parts before. We’ve had run-ins with them. They like to think they’re a big secret but it’s not quite the case, is it?”

“No, I guess not.” I thought of Aimery and Ryle and how handsome they’d been and how they’d turned heads wherever we went yet always handled themselves with polite grace, Aimery in particular. They certainly weren’t inconspicuous, if nothing else, because of their beauty.

“So Elfrida is after your Bombay blood,” Isaac said with a slow nod. “Okay, and what about these husbands of yours. Did they know she was after you?”

“Yes, of course, they were protecting me. Taking me to safety.”

“And they really thought they could outwit a vampire?” Isaac laughed. “You may have had two men to protect you but one hundred men couldn’t save you from a vampire with murder on her mind. Have you any idea how fast and strong they are, not to mention devious?”

I stared at him then sat upright and set my drink on the bedside table. “Isaac, Caleb, there is something you should know.” I looked between them. “And if you decide to throw me out the door to the winter and fate that’s fine, but…” My words caught in my throat. If my initial suspicions were correct they might consider me their sworn enemy too. If that were the case, getting thrown out of their home might be the least of my problems.

“But what?” Caleb frowned. “You know we won’t throw you out. That’s not the type of men we are.”

Isaac tipped his head and studied me. I wondered if he might throw me out, even if Caleb wouldn’t. “Tell,” he said curtly.

“My husbands, they knew all about Elfrida and my blood because…because they were also vampires.”

There, I’d said it. They could do with me what they wanted. I’d be helpless against their brawn.

The room fell utterly silent.

I swallowed and resisted the urge to fidget.

The two men shared a fleeting glance.

Eventually Caleb spoke, “You were married to vampires?” He narrowed his eyes and stared at me as if seeing me for the first time.

“Yes, and they loved me and I loved them. Not all vampires are bad you know.”

“What the fuck!” Isaac shoved his hands into his hair and left them there with his elbows sticking outward. The dusky brown strands stuck up messily through his fingers making him look wild and untamed.

“They live by strict rules set out by the Order,” I said, “They don’t all go around killing people, draining them dry and thinking of nothing but murder. They try and live peacefully and do good when they can.”

Caleb lifted his hand from mine and rubbed his palms together as if wiping me from them.

“My husbands adored me,” I went on, clenching my fists. “They kept me safe and happy and would do anything for me. Anything at all, they—”

“Bullshit,” Isaac said.

“It’s not.” I frowned.

“So where are they now?” Isaac demanded.

“Dead.” I stifled a sob. “Elfrida killed them to get to me. They’re dead, gone. They were on the train.”

“This is a right fucking mess,” Caleb muttered.

“A train crash wouldn’t have killed them,” Isaac said scornfully.

“Well you’re wrong. It did. If it hadn’t they would have saved me from Elfrida and you wouldn’t have had to get involved in this, this…mess.”

“Thank God we did.” Isaac walked over to me, tipped my head a little roughly and looked at my neck. “She bit you, started drinking from you. If we hadn’t arrived when we did you’d be dead too.”

“This wasn’t her,” I said and rubbed my hand over the dry scabs of the bite mark Aimery had created the last time we’d made love. “She didn’t feed from me. Her fangs barely touched me.”

Caleb stretched to peer at my neck.

Isaac snorted. “Really, and you believed all of this? Fell for it?”

“All of what?” I said, scowling at him and shifting away from his touch.

“One of your husband vampires made these marks, isn’t that right?” he said.

“Yes.” I nodded. “And I let him, in fact I asked him to.”

“Like I said, devious,” Isaac scoffed.

“No, not at all.” Anger was welling within me. Aimery and I had made each other so happy, and these marks, which would soon be gone, were all that I had left of him.

“Wake up and smell the roses, Beatrice,” Isaac went on. “Those vampires professed their love for you and kept you with them so they could feed off you whenever they wanted. Dining like kings on the most sacred blood in their world.” He paused and stooped until his face was close to mine.

I could smell the outdoors on him.

“Did it ever occur to you,” he said, “that you were being used, Bea? Used for your blood and handled, if we’re kind about it, like a pet, or if we’re honest, as a slave, a human ready meal.”

Rage rushed through me. I reached out and slapped his cheek. Hard.

The sound of flesh on flesh rang around the room as his head snapped to the right.

I glared at him.

He slowly turned back to face me and then glowered angrily as a low rumbling sound, like a growl, simmered in his throat.

“Isaac, go.” Caleb pushed roughly at his shoulder. “Go now.”

Isaac stumbled to the right, flung a scowl at Caleb and then rushed from the room.

The sound of the front door slamming followed close behind him.

“I’m sorry,” I said, pressing my hands together and trapping the lingering sting on the right one. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

“He was out of line,” Caleb said, shaking his head. “He gets like that when vampires are involved. He can’t tolerate even the mention of them.”

I let the brewing tears overspill onto my cheeks. “I’ve never been used by my vampires. I love them, loved them, as they did me.” The very thought of being seen as a pet or a slave or a…ready meal, made the tears come harder and a great, heaving shake racked my chest.

“Shh, shh…” Caleb reached out and pulled me close. “It’s okay, really, it’s okay now.”

I let the grief take hold as he hugged me. It flowed and poured from my body. It was out of control and all consuming.

But Caleb’s hot, strong chest was absorbing it all and it seemed he could cope with my despair. He wasn’t fazed by my distress. He stroked my hair, whispered soothing words and somewhere in my suffering I was grateful for him doing that.

He hardly knew me, didn’t agree with my choices, yet still he offered sympathy. He was a good soul. Of that one thing about him I was sure.