“Yes. If I’d killed you, I’d be dead now, too. My team would have had no choice.” He paused for a moment. “And that’s as it should be.”
Something had shifted about her perception of Campbell in the past few minutes, because the idea that he would have been killed didn’t sit well. He was still a vampire, still deadly, and she was no less frightened of him. But as she stared down at him now, he seemed more like a man than a thirst-mad animal. He seemed...honorable.
But she didn’t fool herself. The only reason he seemed sane and rational at the moment was because he had pints of human blood working their way through his system. She tried not to gag at that mental image and shifted her thoughts in a safer direction.
“Why don’t we know about all this?” she asked. “Why don’t you tell the world about the differences in vampires instead of having everyone think you’re all evil?”
“Because it’s too dangerous. Even Souled vampires have to fight their need to kill. You know that firsthand.”
She shivered at the memory.
“It’s safer for humans if they’re frightened of all of us,” he said. “Besides, do you honestly think they’d believe it if we suddenly said some of us were good guys?”
She understood the logic, was surprised any vampire would spare a thought for the safety of humans.
“So V Force enforces your laws?”
“Yeah. Just think of us as a SWAT team with fangs.”
She laughed. When he wasn’t trying to attack her, he had a nice sense of humor.
“What about you?” he asked. “Why were you out so late?”
She hesitated, not sure she wanted to reveal too much personal information even if he did seem harmless at the moment. Still, he hadn’t tried to talk his way inside, had even told her how to kill a vamp. Not that she’d ever be fast or strong enough to do so, but it still showed some trust on his part.
“I take meals to the homeless. A lot of them hang out in the parks during the day. Some things haven’t changed since before the virus.”
“And you got your car stolen and were attacked by vampires for your trouble. Classic case of no good deed goes unpunished, huh?”
She couldn’t help smiling at him, at his echoing of the very thought she’d had. “I guess.”
A lull in the conversation had Olivia wondering what in the world she was doing having a friendly conversation with a vampire. And why it was so easy to talk to him.
A light came on in the apartment across the street—Dr. Stevens getting ready to go to work the moment the sun broke the eastern horizon.
“It’s almost daybreak,” she said, returning her gaze to Campbell. Twenty-four hours ago she couldn’t have imagined giving a vampire any sort of warning. Would have instead been thankful that the sun had wiped another monster from the face of the earth.
“I know. I can feel it.”
“You can?”
“Built-in self-preservation.” He glanced over his shoulder before catching her gaze again. “Remember that. Even more than humans, vampires are all about self-preservation and taking out threats to that. So don’t trust me or any other vampire. You were lucky last night. But luck can run out.”
“Apology accepted.” She wouldn’t say what had happened was okay, because it wasn’t. But she felt his sincerity down deep, too.
Campbell shoved away from the car. “Better get home before I turn into vamp barbecue. I’ll leave your phone by the front door. I’ve added my number into your contacts so you can text me the VIN for your car. We’ll let you know if we find it.”
“Thanks.” She watched as he gave her one last long look then headed back toward the center of Midtown. Even with darkness still hugging the street, she could appreciate the way he moved—all barely contained, graceful power. Why couldn’t he be human?
She hadn’t realized until that moment how lonely she was. She had a wonderful friend in Mindy, regulars at the diner, even her favorites among the homeless she helped each day. But none of those relationships reached the loneliest spot, the one that had started growing the day the virus had killed Jeremy. No one had tempted her to open up that part of herself again until tonight. And that man wasn’t even a person anymore. Was he? What had always been clear lines before seemed a little blurrier after her conversation with Campbell.
Olivia watched him grow smaller, and a tinge of nervousness edged into her. If he didn’t get off the street soon, the sun would kill him. Vamps had incredible speed to go with their strength. Why wasn’t he using it? But then she blinked and he was gone.
And though it defied logic, she felt even lonelier than before.
Campbell pushed his supernatural speed for all it was worth to cover the blocks between Olivia’s apartment and Team 1’s headquarters, the sun’s deadly rays nipping at his heels as if they were the hounds of hell. When he finally reached home and ducked inside, he wasn’t smoking or sprouting flames but his backside was definitely beginning to get uncomfortably warm.
“Cutting it a little close, don’t you think?” Colin asked from where he lay sprawled out on the couch watching
Campbell did a quick survey of himself to make sure he wasn’t on fire. “Just took me longer to check on some things than I expected.”
Colin snorted. “And how was the lovely Miss DaCosta?”
Campbell didn’t answer. Instead he stalked to the other end of the large main living area, the rubber soles of his boots squeaking on the smoothly polished concrete floor. He rounded his desk and stared at the pile of paper work.
“You know, you’re welcome to help me out with all this anytime instead of being a couch potato.”
Colin spared him a raised-eyebrow glance. “Oh, no. I’ve done my time in that chair. You get paid the big bucks now.”
It was Campbell’s turn to snort. “Yeah, I think I’ll take my piles of cash and retire to the Caribbean.”
“Yeah, we’d go up like Roman candles in the Caribbean sun. It’d be the coolest Fourth of July ever!”
Campbell snorted again, then rifled through the previous night’s reports from all the New York V Force teams, looking to see if anything out of the ordinary caught his eye. “I’m sure there are still bikini-clad women on the beaches at night.”
Colin nodded. “You make an excellent point. I quit.”
Campbell laughed. “You’d miss us.”
“If there are babes in bikinis involved, I wouldn’t even remember who you all are.” Colin shifted to a sitting position on the end of the couch. “What’s the retirement age for a vampire, anyway?”
“Thirty years shy of forever.”
Campbell continued shuffling papers, also checking out reports from the New Jersey and Connecticut teams so he kept well informed about what was going on in the tri-state area.
And so he wouldn’t think about how beautiful Olivia looked in that window, like a golden-haired princess in a tower, as unobtainable as a walk on a sunny beach. He still couldn’t believe she’d even spoken to him after everything he’d put her through, let alone talked to him until nearly dawn.
“I don’t need to tell you she’s a bad idea,” Colin said.
Campbell looked across the room, realizing he’d stopped reading reports at some point and drifted into daydreaming about Olivia’s lips and how gorgeous she’d be with all that golden hair falling loose across her shoulders.
“You’re right. You don’t.” Colin didn’t know half of the reason why, and Campbell wasn’t about to share that dark part of his past.
