Chapter Sixteen

Until that moment, Alice hadn’t seen death bearing down on her since she’d escaped from the Institute. Hunter’s face contorted into a snarl, and his fangs—and they were fangs—were on full display. She stumbled back with some disjointed idea of protecting the cat, but he raced past her, so close and so fast that she actually felt a breeze from his passage. Seconds later, he had disappeared into the woods behind the shack.

She had never seen anyone move like that. Just for a moment, she had been afraid.

Afraid of Hunter.

It had only been a few years since she’d escaped from the Institute, and she’d made a point of reading as much as she could find about post-traumatic stress disorder. She knew she wasn’t magically cured just because she’d tried so hard to move on with her life. She probably needed therapy.

Okay, she definitely needed therapy.

Frightening situations, people, and events were always going to take her right back to that room, unless she got help. That cold, white, sterile room where they’d strapped her down and stuck needles in her. Forced her to perform on demand.

Shaking, she bent to retrieve the warming basket filled with mewling kittens. The mama cat, her fur still standing on end, twined in and out between Alice’s ankles, keeping close.

“He scared me, too,” she murmured to the cat, not quite sure what to do next. Should she leave him? Should she be truly afraid and run?

At the very least, she needed to take care of the animals. She headed toward the van, and just before she got there, Hunter suddenly appeared next to her. She hadn’t seen or heard him approach, and it scared the crap out of her.

“Don’t do that!”

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I didn’t mean to scare you. Something about turning into a vampire makes a person stealthy.”

She dared a glance at his face, checking for fangs. They were gone. He looked completely normal again. Or whatever passed for normal in a vampire.

“What did you do? What happened? You know, not now but before, you almost did scare me.” Her laugh was a little shaky, but she felt like she needed to tell him the effect his actions had had on her, if not the reason that she’d been so afraid. She wasn’t ready to share her terrible past with him or anyone else, and maybe she never would be, but she needed to tell him the truth of her feelings.

“What are you thinking about?” Hunter moved closer and picked up the mama cat, who was now perfectly content to let him do so. “Everything you think or feel shows on your face. So something extremely heavy was just going through your mind.”

“I don’t really want to talk about it right now.” She focused on carefully moving the kittens to the crate.

He ducked his head and looked at the ground, afraid or unwilling to meet her gaze. “And who could blame you? I’m sorry. I’m sorry I scared you. It’s just that I don’t have much control over the hunger at this point. Meara told me it takes a while to get the hang of it, and the most important thing is to have resources available. I didn’t think about that when we got the call to come out here.”

She was silent until they finished stowing the cat and kittens in the secured crates in the van, considering her response. Wondering why she wasn’t afraid of him now.

Was she being self-destructive? Putting herself in danger just because of the attraction she felt for him? She wasn’t sure. Had no idea how to be sure. So instead, she turned the question around to him.

“What did you do?” She was almost afraid to ask, because part of her didn’t want to know the answer. But she needed to know. If Hunter was feeding on people and he had gone off to find someone to drain dry, she needed to know.

Because if that were true, she couldn’t and wouldn’t have anything more to do with him.

She felt a sharp pang of sadness at the idea, which didn’t make sense. She’d just met him, she barely knew him, and what she did know was strange and frightening and dangerous.

On the other hand, he’d stood between her and the other vampires’ threats. He’d stood up for her. Charlie liked him, but okay, Charlie was a demon. But Henry had even liked him. And now he’d taken time out of his night to come with her and get down in the muck to help her rescue a cat and her kittens.

“I found some deer,” he said, his shoulders slumping, shame in his eyes. “There were three of them—full-grown, not babies—and I only took enough from each to make them a little tired. I didn’t hurt them, Alice. They’re fine, and now, so am I, which means you are safe. And your safety is my absolute priority.”

She believed him. His sincerity was apparent in every line of his body, and now he was standing there looking at her with such sad eyes, like he expected her to tell him to leave. Like it was nothing but what he deserved.

He probably didn’t even remember that he had a kitten in his coat pocket.

But then his pocket started meowing, and he jumped a foot in the air.

Alice started laughing.

In spite of everything, she laughed, and Hunter’s entire face lit up with what looked a lot like hope. She always tried to live her new life in hope; the feeling that she’d shared some with him warmed her past her wariness. Past her fear.

Foolish or not, she wasn’t going to send him away. She’d wait and watch and be very, very careful, but she wasn’t sending him away.

Not yet.

Hunter smiled at her as if he could read her decision on her face and slowly put a hand in his pocket. “Forgot this little guy.”

He carefully retrieved the kitten and put it in the crate with the others, then fastened the door shut. “And now we go back to the rescue and take care of the kittens?”

She could tell that there was much more to the question than its surface meaning. Far deeper layers. He had asked if they’d go back to the rescue, but she knew that he was really asking a more poignant question.

Am I still welcome in your home after you’ve seen me at my worst?

She answered both questions with a single response. “Yes, Hunter. Now we go back to the rescue, and I teach you the fine art of feral-cat bathing. Nobody can say I don’t know how to show a guy a good time.”

Hunter’s blue eyes glowed so brightly that she could almost feel the heat from his gaze on her skin. When he answered her, there was a fierce intensity in his voice. “No. No, I would never say that, beautiful Alice. Thank you.”

On the drive back to her home, she had the strangest feeling that she’d agreed to far, far more than she’d intended.

…

By the time they got the cats cleaned up, fed, and safely ensconced in a crate with warm blankets and plenty of fresh water, it was nearly dawn, and Hunter had begun to look tired. When he fought to hide the third or fourth huge yawn in a row, she finally put down the towel she’d been using to dry the freshly cleaned counter and turned to face him, folding her arms.

“Okay, you. It’s clearly past bedtime for all helpful vampires. Do you have time to get home before sunrise?”

His gorgeous blue eyes widened, the glow in them brightening, and he looked at the window, but the darkness outside was still untouched by any light.

“I… Yes. I need to sleep. Soon. But I don’t have time to get back to Bane’s—I guess my house; it’s just still hard to think of a mansion as my home. Do you have anywhere here I can sleep? It just needs to have no windows.”

“How exactly do you mean no windows? I mean, will a tiny glimmer of sunshine coming in beneath a door hurt you?” She clenched her hands, her entire body tensing at the idea of him coming to harm in her home.

“I won’t hurt you, Alice,” he said gently, and she realized he was looking at her body language and probably interpreting it as fear of him, not for him.

“I know you won’t.”

Her admission caused his expression to change in some undefinable way, and she suddenly desperately wished she had the ability to read a vampire’s mind.

“No, a glimmer of sunshine in the room won’t hurt me. In fact, only direct sunlight will kill us, from what I understand, but any sunlight can be very uncomfortable and injure me as a new vampire.” A muscle in his jaw clenched, and she realized that he was embarrassed to be seen as weak.

“That’s good, then. I have a storeroom off the basement that has no windows. I think they used it to keep vegetables in or something back in the day. The house is nearly two hundred years old, you know. Should we go down there now and check it out? I have a sleeping bag you can use.”

She didn’t tell him she’d slept in the bag in her car for a few months after escaping. After hiding in a homeless shelter at night and then working all the odd jobs she could get during the day, usually paid under the table, since she’d had no identification. When she’d finally saved up enough to buy a decrepit old car, she’d felt safe for the first time in a while.

Cars, unlike beds in a homeless shelter, could be locked.

Cars could be driven far, far away from danger.

She’d cried when that car had finally died, a year or so after she’d bought it. But then she’d found the van that she still drove. She’d never let herself be without a car again.

“Alice? We should go check it out now, before I’m completely out of options, in case it doesn’t work.”

She nodded, pushing old memories away, and led him through the corridor to her house. She unlocked the connecting door and went in, but then turned around when she realized he wasn’t following.

“Hunter?”

He dropped his head and swore so softly she almost didn’t catch it. Then he blew out a breath and looked up at her. “You have to invite me in.”

“What?”

“Turns out some of the old stories are true. I’m a vampire. Part of the magic that binds us is that we can’t enter a home without being invited in.”

“But you walked right into the shelter!”

He shrugged. “It’s a business, I guess, even though it feels like an extension of your home. Henry and other volunteers can come and go, and the adopters, too. Hey, I don’t make the rules. I just have to follow them.”

She hesitated, and a shadow passed behind his eyes.

“Okay, I get it. I wouldn’t want to invite me in, either. I’ll just go find somewhere else to sleep and be sure the wolves are watching out for you. If you—”

“Hunter.”

He stilled.

“Please be welcome into my house.”

His hands clenched and then relaxed at his sides, and then he offered a not-quite-convincing grin. “Thank you.”

The basement was a cluttered mess. She’d kept meaning to clean it out and decide what to do with the decades worth of junk that had been stored down there that the previous owners had so thoughtfully left for her to deal with.

“I’m sorry. I know it’s a mess, and I’m so sorry. I have a nice guest room upstairs, but unfortunately it has huge windows, and I don’t have blackout curtains, and—”

“Alice.” His voice was warm but firm. “It’s fine. Is this the door to the storeroom?”

She had a sudden wild thought of asking him if he needed a coffin, but she luckily managed to keep the words from escaping. “Yes. This is it. There’s a string to the light bulb. I’m so sorry, it’s just—”

“It’s fine.” But as he looked around, she could see the desolation on his face. Hunter was clearly not a man who’d been accustomed to sleeping in dusty old basements. He probably had a very nice apartment in that mansion, and maybe a very nice girlfriend who lived with him…

She was shocked by the instant recoil she felt at the thought of Hunter with a nice, gorgeous, normal girlfriend. One who didn’t talk to ghosts, commune with animals, or have PTSD over her horrible past.

“Won’t your girlfriend be missing you?” She’d intended to say that in a light, casual tone, but it came out sounding sharp. Maybe even a bit angry.

He swung around and looked at her with interest. “My girlfriend?”

“I just— I meant— I’ll get that sleeping bag.”

Hunter shot out a hand and blocked the doorway. “Not just yet, I think. Not when you’ve given me a flash of hope that you might actually be willing to let me spend time with you after we resolve the issue of the Chamber.”

“I…I—” She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t remember how to make her lungs work. He was just so beautiful. And kind. And…

Hunter reached out and oh-so-gently touched her face. “I don’t have a girlfriend. Haven’t had one in a few years, to be honest.”

“Oh,” she said, more breathlessly than she’d have liked. “Oh, that’s…that’s good.”

He gave her that slow, sexy smile he was so very good at and bent his head to hers. “Alice. Can I kiss you now?”

His face was so close that she felt like she might drown in his beautiful, glowing blue eyes. “I…I don’t know. I’ve never—” She stopped speaking and wrenched her gaze from his. How could she tell this amazing man that she’d never even kissed a man? Not even a boy when she was a girl.

Never once.

“You’ve never?” He tilted his head to one side, watching her with complete and utter concentration.

“I’ve never been kissed,” she said miserably.

His sharp inhalation was quiet, but she heard it and felt totally, unbelievably humiliated, tasting shame like rusty metal in the back of her throat.

But then he took her hand and put it on his face, and the sensation of his skin beneath her fingertips made her feel like champagne mixed with lightning bolts was sizzling through her body.

“So, then, you shouldn’t be kissed now,” he said gently.

Despair swamped through her. Why was she surprised? Nobody would ever want to kiss her. “I shouldn’t?”

“No. You should be the one doing the kissing. Taking charge. Why don’t you kiss me, beautiful Alice?”

Why didn’t she?

Because she was afraid. What if she was no good at it? What if he hated it and never wanted to see her again? What if he was just humoring the poor, inexperienced girl?

But then the courage she’d fought so hard for soared up through her body.

What if she was a wonderful kisser?

He’d be lucky to have such a kiss.

“Yes,” she told him, taking his face in her hands. “Yes.”

And then she kissed him.

Tentative—so tentative at first. Her lips barely touching his.

He held perfectly still, content to let her take the lead. She tilted her head, just a little, just to find that angle…yes.

Yes.

The warmth and sensual fullness of his lips made her want to lick them. Bite them. Feelings she’d never had in her life soared through her until she was sure she must be floating. Instead of biting, though, she kissed him again. Pressed her lips to his and then dared to trace the seam of his lips with the tip of her tongue.

He made a quiet groaning sound, and she tried to step back, but his arms came up to embrace her.

“No, please don’t stop,” he said roughly. “You taste like honey and strawberries. Like laughter and kindness.”

“That’s poetic,” she managed, still breathless.

“Yes. No. Whatever you want. Please, Alice. Please kiss me again.”

She grabbed onto her courage with both hands—metaphorically, of course, because her actual hands were twined in his hair and she was curled into his body. “Yes. Okay. Yes.”

And then she was kissing him again. This time, when she dared to touch his lips with her tongue, he opened to her, coaxing her tongue to play with his. He took control of the kiss then, tightening his arms around her until she could feel the hardness of his erection pushing against her. Rather than frightening her, though, the feeling sent a wild thrill of feminine triumph through her.

She’d done this to him.

She had.

She felt so strong. So powerful. And almost drugged with wanting.

When she finally pulled back to catch her breath, she was clinging to him, unsure whether she’d still be able to stand on her shaking legs.

“Hunter. I—”

Buzz.

The pained frustration in his expression made her laugh.

“Don’t answer it,” he said, his voice husky, still not letting Alice go.

“It might be about another rescue,” she said with real regret, but on the other hand, maybe the phone had saved her from rushing into something she wasn’t ready for. “Let me take the call. The bathroom is right there, and there’s a sleeping bag in the closet inside. When I get back, we can talk—”

Hunter tilted her face up to his and kissed her again, long and deep. Then he sighed and stepped back, letting her go. “Okay. We can talk.”

For some reason, she wanted to cry at the loss of his arms around her. Yes, her body was definitely rushing to a place her heart wasn’t yet ready to go. She nodded and turned to flee, running from her own feelings as much as from the vampire in her basement. At the bottom of the staircase, when the phone quit buzzing, she turned to say something—she wasn’t sure what—and turned, only to find that Hunter was sprawled on the floor of the storeroom on top of the sleeping bag, eyes closed, looking like he was out cold.

She slowly walked back to the storage room. “Hunter?”

Nothing.

She left the room and quietly closed the door behind herself. “Saved by the break of dawn, apparently. At least I still have a few hours to sleep before I have to open up. If we can just avoid any more crises, I’ll be okay.”

And she made it all the way to the shelter and had even started to lock up before someone started pounding on the door. On the plus side, she was too tired to be frightened. And Hunter had said that there was a security team on site.

On the minus side, however, when she opened the door, an enormous wolf stood on her porch, staring up at her.

Alice blinked. Scrubbed at her eyes, and then blinked again.

Nope. Not hallucinating. There was definitely a wolf on her porch.

“Welcome to Little Darlings,” she told it.

And then she started to laugh.