“Trust me, sunshine,” Colin ground the words out between teeth clenched in pain. “I accept any price I have to pay to be with you, and it will not separate us.” At his words the light intensified until it bowed his body. The vampire screamed, and then he was knocked from the bed. He landed on the floor, limp and unconscious.
Summer was sobbing when she rushed to him, touching his face, calling his name, praying to the Goddess to please let him wake up . . . please, she’d do anything . . . just please . . . please . . .
Colin drew a deep breath and then exhaled, coughing painfully. Summer helped him sit up. “Colin! Goddess, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” his voice was raw, as if he hadn’t spoken in centuries. “I’m fine,” he repeated, after clearing his throat. He started to take her in his arms but suddenly froze. “Blessed Goddess!” He sounded utterly shocked.
“What is it? Maybe I should call someone. A vampire doctor?”
Then Colin completely surprised Summer by jumping to his feet, throwing back his head, and laughing with uninhibited joy.
Still on the floor, Summer looked up at him, utterly confused. “Colin?” Was he hysterical? Is this how vampires acted when they’d been mortally wounded?
“I don’t need a vampire doctor, Summer, my sunshine, my dream, my love. Somehow, someway, you and your magic have made me human again!”
She stared at him, this time really seeing him. He was still a tall, handsome man, but the marble cast of his skin was gone. It had been replaced by the healthy flush of a living, breathing man.
And she wasn’t touching him at all. He was truly alive.
“It’ll go away,” she whispered. “It won’t last.”
“I think you’re wrong, Sunshine,” he said, pulling her to her feet. “Have you ever given up trying to control your magic before tonight?”
“No,” she said slowly. “I’ve always fought it or run from it. And it’s not just my magic I gave up control of tonight, Colin. It’s my life. When I trusted you, I had to give up being in total control of myself.”
“I think there was something about your decision to trust me that drastically affected your magic.” Colin cupped her face. “All these years you’ve believed your magic was flawed, messed up. I don’t think it was. I think it was pure light—the pure energy of sunshine—and when you gave me your complete trust, when you relinquished control, you also gave your magic to me.”
“It should have killed you. You’re a vampire; you can’t stand the light.”
“Perhaps, but I’ve never loved the light until I loved you. I desired it, coveted it, yearned for it, but never really loved it until you.”
“So my light didn’t kill you.”
“No, Sunshine. Your light burned away the darkness of my past and saved me.”
“So now you think we can make love and I can orgasm without worrying about us being zapped apart.”
“Over and over again, Sunshine,” he said, smiling.
“Sounds like a perfect happily ever after to me.”
“Me, too, Sunshine. Me, too.”
Colin took her back to bed and, as the Certified Discipline Nymph Jenny would say, ravished her thoroughly for many passion-filled, out-of-control years.
