Lover Awakened

'Sorry, my hands are cold.' Sarelle blew on her fingertips, then went back to his chest.

Good God. Something was happening in his body, some kind of wild shifting inside his skin. His breath grew short, strangled. He opened his mouth so he could get more air in.

'That is really cool.'

He was disappointed when she dropped her hand. But then she smiled at him.

'So do you think you might want to go out sometime? You know, we could go to the laser-tag place. That could be cool. Or maybe the movies.'

John nodded like the dummy he was.

'Good.'

Their eyes met. She was so pretty, she made him dizzy.

'Do you want to kiss me?' she whispered.

John's eyes cracked open. Like a balloon had popped behind his head.

'Because I'd like you to.' She licked her lips a little. 'I really would.'

Whoa… Chance of a lifetime, right here, right now, he thought.

Do not pass out. Passing out would be a total buzz kill.

John quickly called on every movie he'd ever seen… and got no help at all. As a horror fan, he was just swamped by visions of Godzilla stomping across Tokyo and of Jaws chewing on the ass end of the Orca. Big help.

He thought of the mechanics. Head tilt. Lean forward. Make the contact.

Sarelle glanced around, flushing. 'If you don't want to, that's cool. I just thought…'

'John?' Wellsie's voice came from down the hall. And got closer as she kept talking. 'Sarelle? Where are you guys?'

He winced. Before he lost his nerve, he grabbed Sarelle's hand, pulled her forward, and planted a good one right on her mouth, his lips tight against hers. No tongue, but there wasn't time, and he'd probably need to call 911 after something like that anyway. As it was, he was practically hyperventilating.

Then he pushed her back. And worried about how he'd done.

He risked a look. Oh… Her smile was radiant.

He thought his chest would explode with happiness.

He was just dropping his hand as Wellsie stuck her head in the door. 'I need to go to—ah… I'm sorry. I didn't know that you two…'

John tried to marshal a nothing-special smile and then noticed that Wellsie's eyes were fixated on his chest. He looked down. His shirt was wide-open.

Scrambling to button the damn thing up just made the situation worse, but he couldn't help himself.

'I'd better go,' Sarelle said easily. 'My mahmen wanted me home early. John, I'll be on the computer later, okay? We'll figure out what movie to go see or whatever. Night, Wellsie.'

As Sarelle walked down toward the living room, he couldn't resist glancing around Wellsie. He watched as Sarelle took her coat out of the hall closet, put it on, and got her keys from her pocket. Moments later the muted sound of the front door closing drifted down the hall.

There was a long silence. Then Wellsie laughed and pushed back some of her red hair.

'I, ah, I have no idea how to handle this,' she said. 'Except to say that I like her a lot and she has good taste in males.'

John rubbed his face, aware that he was the color of a tomato.

I'm going to go for a walk, he signed.

'Well, Tohr just called. He was going to swing by the house and pick you up. Thought you might want to hang with him at the training center, since he's got some admin work to do. Anyway, it's your choice to stay or not. And I'm off to a Princeps Council meeting.'

He nodded as Wellsie started to turn away.

'Ah, John?' She paused and looked over her shoulder. 'Your shirt's… um, it's buttoned up kind of off- kilter.'

He glanced down. And started to laugh. Even though he made no sound he just had to let his joy out, and Wellsie smiled, obviously happy for him. As he did the buttons up the right way, he had never loved the woman more.

Bella spent the hours after she returned to the mansion sitting up in Zsadist's bed with her diary in her lap. She didn't do anything with the journal at first, too caught up in what had happened at her house.

Jesus… She couldn't say she was surprised that Zsadist was every bit the menace she'd thought he was. And he'd saved her, hadn't he? If that lesser he'd killed had gotten its hands on her, she would have ended up back in a hole in the ground.

The trouble was, she couldn't decide whether what he'd done was evidence of his strength or his brutality.

As she decided it was probably both, she worried about whether he was okay. He'd been hurt and yet he was still out there, probably trying to find more slayers. God… What if he—

What if. What if… She was going to drive herself crazy if she kept this up.

Desperate for something else to focus on, she leafed through what she'd written in her journal over the past year. Zsadist's name had played a prominent role in the entries right before she'd been abducted. She'd been so obsessed by him, and couldn't say that had changed. Matter of fact, her feelings were so strong for him now, even after what he'd done tonight, that she wondered if she didn't…

Love him. Oh… man.

Suddenly she couldn't be alone, not with that realization shooting around her head. She brushed her teeth and her hair and made a go for the first floor, hoping she'd run into someone. Except halfway down the stairs, she heard voices from the dining room and came to a halt. The last meal of the night was in progress, but the idea of joining all the Brothers and Mary and Beth seemed overwhelming. Besides, wouldn't Zsadist be there? And how could she face him without giving herself away? No way that male was going to deal well with her loving him. No way.

Ah, hell. She was going to have to see him sooner or later. And hiding wasn't her thing.

But when she got to the bottom of the staircase and stepped off onto the foyer's mosaic floor, she realized she'd forgotten to put any shoes on. How could she go into the king and queen's dining room with bare feet?

She looked back up at the second floor and became utterly exhausted. Too tired to go up and come down again, too embarrassed to go forward, she just listened to the sounds of the meal: Male and female voices chatted and laughed. A wine bottle was uncorked with a pop. Someone thanked Fritz for bringing out more lamb.

She looked down at her naked feet, thinking she was such a fool. A shattered fool. She was lost because of what the lesser had done to her. And shaky because of what she'd seen Zsadist do tonight. And so alone after realizing what she felt for that male.

She was about to throw in the towel and go back upstairs when something brushed against her leg. She jumped and looked down, meeting the jade green eyes of a black cat. The feline blinked, purred at her, and rubbed its head against the skin of her ankle.

Bending at the waist, she stroked its fur with unsteady hands. The animal was incomparably elegant, all lean lines and graceful, sliding movements. And for no good reason, her eyes got blurry. The more emotional she got, the closer she and the cat became, until she was sitting on the last step of the staircase and the animal had crawled into her lap.

'His name is Boo.'

Bella gasped and looked up. Phury was standing in front of her, a towering male no longer dressed in war clothes, but now in cashmere and wool. He had a napkin in his hand, as if he'd just gotten up from the table, and he smelled really good, like he'd recently showered and shaved. Staring at him, she became aware that all the talk and sounds of eating had bled from the air, leaving a silence that told her everyone knew she'd come downstairs and gotten stuck on the periphery.

Phury knelt down and pressed his linen napkin into her hand. Which was how she realized there were tears running down her cheeks.