Escaping Exile Page 5

  Felipe bowed first, and Mrs. June crooned at his arrival. Older ladies loved Felipe, possibly because he resembled a china doll they wanted to dress up. She raised her gloved hand to me, and I kissed it.

  “My good sirs, this young man is new to our fine city by way of Boston.” She had a loud singsong voice that echoed like opera.

  His name was Mr. Deville—although he was quick to say “just Cameron”—and his accent was so unlike the familiar Southern lilt to be practically foreign. Fairly quickly, Mrs. June swept off in her myriad skirts to mingle with other guests, which left Felipe and me alone with the tall delicacy that had apparently moved south to manage his father’s shipping business on the Louisiana coast.

  “How long have you been here, Cameron?” Felipe’s elbow brushed against the born-and-bred Northerner’s too-thick coat.

  “Only a week. I still get lost every morning on the way to work.”

  Felipe laughed at this.

  I sipped my champagne, smiling. “And what do you think of our grand city?”

  His eyes brightened slightly at the sound of my voice. Egad, I practically had this battle won, and it had barely begun.

  “New Orleans is different than Boston. There’s something mesmerizing about it.” He paused. “The gardens are beautiful.”

  Felipe leaned closer. “Aren’t they?”

  “Have you seen the garden here?” I asked. “Mrs. June has an impressive green thumb.”

  Cameron cleared his throat and looked at his shoes. Shy, then? How delightful. “I haven’t, no. I haven’t seen the garden.”

  “But you must,” Felipe purred. He wrapped loose fingers around Cameron’s forearm. “We’ll show you.”

  He nodded his assent and looked up at me from behind a fringe of light eyelashes. Poor Felipe would have to take desperate measures to win his attentions as our new friend apparently had an affection for overly tall men with rugged jaws and blond hair.

  We made our way past guests and down candlelit halls. Felipe still held to Cameron’s arm, but the crimson beauty kept glancing back at me. Outside, no moon shone on the lush gated garden. The only light came from a few flickering torches, which threw dancing shadows over flower and leaf. Sweet gardenia and the scent of Cameron’s blood mixed in the night.

  “Told you it was luscious,” Felipe crooned. God, he was laying it on thick.

  “Yes.” Cameron’s hand reached out, fingers touching the edge of a rose.

  I listened for other occupants, but finding none, I made the first advance. I stepped up close behind Cameron and kissed the side of his neck. He whimpered immediately.

  Felipe’s teeth flashed in the semidark. “Well, wasn’t that a lovely sound? Are there many garden trysts in Boston?”

  “No.” Cameron leaned back against me, so I planted kisses behind his ear.

  Felipe moved closer and rested his palms on Cameron’s chest. “You aren’t a virgin, are you, darling?”

  Cameron’s head drooped forward as I ran my nose up the back of his neck.

  “My goodness, you are.”

  I looked up in time to see Felipe lick his lips, and I was fully prepared to tell my little friend to go the fuck away when he reached a fist forward and wrapped his hand in Cameron’s hair. He tugged Cameron’s head up roughly, and the young man shouted in complaint.

  “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that sodomites burn in hell?” Felipe smiled and bared every bit of his razor-sharp fangs.

  I stifled Cameron’s cries with my hand and held tight when he tried to back away, flee, and tell the whole city that two polite society gents were actually monsters.

  Panic made him flail, but I held on tight and glared at Felipe. “What is the matter with you? Are you utterly mad?”

  Recognizing my unnatural strength, Cameron slumped back against me. His warm tears tickled the hand that covered his mouth.

  Felipe laughed. “A little. I also did not want you to win.”

  I shushed Cameron, more out of self-preservation than compassion. It would be easy to kill him, but how many people had seen us leave together? I was not prepared to flee my favorite city thanks to one vampire’s idiotic pride.

  “What do we do with him now, you fool?”

  Felipe crept closer, and Cameron renewed his fight, especially when Felipe again revealed his fangs and petted the poor boy’s head. “Take him home. Play with him. Make sure he’s never seen again.”

  The sound of Cameron’s hysterical screams threatened to escape my palm, so I bit into his neck and drank. He froze as soon as my teeth broke his skin. I turned away so Felipe couldn’t watch—I knew how much he liked to watch—and drank until Cameron was too weak to stand. I dropped him in the dirt and shoved Felipe so hard, his feet left the ground as he flew backward.

  “Did you mean to kidnap him all along?”

  Felipe shrugged, brushing at his arms as though dirty. “My yearnings can be so fickle. Yes. No. Does it matter? He’s coming with us now.” He came closer and knelt by Cameron, whose fingers flexed and dug in the dirt. “I do believe I’ll make him my slave.”

  “He wanted me.”

  “Yes, Andrew, but you don’t keep humans.” He stood and tapped me on the shoulder. “Now. Let us clear our reputations, hmm?”

  Felipe was the king of subterfuge. He tied Cameron’s cravat higher on his neck, tighter, to hide my bite mark. Then, we called for a robust servant. In the grand hall, we excused Cameron’s drunkenness to Mrs. June and put him in a carriage—destination, our coven. We made sure to wander the party to prove our innocence and, eventually, with vampire speed, rushed home to find Cameron unconscious in our foyer and a very angry Michelle.

  Felipe waved at me before scooping Cameron into his arms. “Andrew’s idea. After all, you would forgive him anything.”

  I shook my head as Felipe disappeared upstairs with his new toy.

  “Someday, it will be too much,” Michelle said. “You will go too far.”

  Looking back, I wonder at how much Felipe played me, how much he made me seem the villain. I didn’t mind being feared, especially by other vampires, but I should have foreseen my end. I should have expected my exile.

  For his part, poor Cameron killed himself two months later. No one ever arrived on our doorstep looking for him. Felipe would have left his body to rot, so I took responsibility. I dug up a recently buried corpse in Saint Louis Cemetery and added Cameron’s to the plot to ensure his body would never be found. So many years later, his family probably still searches for him.

  I suppose no one searches for me, but after all the monstrous things I’ve done, maybe I do not deserve to be found.

  Chapter Eleven

  EDMUND SPRAWLS ACROSS me, half conscious. I kiss his forehead, still too awake myself. “Who was the first man to touch you?”

  He chuckles warm breath across my neck. “Why, so you can hunt him down and tear his head off?” He moves closer and tangles our legs together. “He wasn’t a man. We were boys.”

  “Now, I really must hear.”

  He runs his hand across my chest, and I hum at the attention. “There isn’t much to hear. We were fourteen, and he was a boy at school. Messy kisses and sloppy hands in a broom closet.” He laughs. “I recall I had yet to grow, but Thomas—that was his name—had to have been six feet tall already. I didn’t care. I was so thrilled. I balanced on the edge of a shelf to be able to reach his mouth.”

  I give his shoulders a squeeze.

  “We ended up rutting against each other on the floor. I suppose that was the first time I realized how much I enjoy having someone’s weight on me. We ruined our breeches, and Thomas split my lip in his fervor.” He leans up on his elbow, and whatever tiredness I suspected is gone. Visiting the past has awakened my sailor. “Impossible to separate us after that.”

  When he says no more, I ask, “What happened to him?”

  “Oh, I suspect he’s married by now. He shunned that deviant side of himself eventually.”

  I sit up
beside him and cup his face. “How could anyone turn his back on you?”

  “Not everyone is as morally reprehensible as the two of us.”

  “Thank God.” I suck his lower lip and let it go with a pop. “The entire world would be nothing but blood and orgies.”

  He snickers. “Now you. You tell me about your first.”

  “It was a very long time ago.”

  “I imagine. But you do remember, don’t you?”

  I twist my finger around a lock of his hair. Filthy as it is, I am amazed it still feels so soft. “Yes. I remember. Of course I do. I was too busy fighting battles to be forced into providing offspring. The thought of being with a woman…” I shudder, and Edmund laughs.

  “My God. A lover of men, through and through.”

  “Yes. Would you believe I wasn’t a sensual person until my twenties at least?”

  “No.” He shakes his head.

  “It’s true. I didn’t know that kind of pleasure until, well…until I was old enough to die.”

  “We are always old enough to die.”

  I chuckle my agreement. “He was a keeper of horses. Younger than me and smaller. They sometimes called him a witch, the way he could calm even the maddest stallion—and maybe he was. He certainly cast a spell on me. We kept everything secret. And then, he died of a strange illness. I took many lovers after him.”

  Edmund touches my lips, and I suck his fingertip into my mouth. “Making up for lost time?”

  I kiss the tip of his finger as he pulls it back. “No. Burying the memory of him perhaps. Losing myself in the bodies of others, on and off the battlefield. Either I was killing or fucking.”

  “Like a wild animal.”

  I move closer until Edmund falls onto his back, and I linger above him. “I believe you are the wilder of the two of us.” I lean down and kiss his neck. I kiss and lick until he shivers and sighs.

  “I was very tired not ten minutes ago.”

  “Tired now?” I suck at his collarbone, and his chest expands with breath.

  “No. Not tired.”

  I straddle his hips and drive him happily mad, one lick and one nibble at a time. His skin tastes salty like the ocean, and his grasping, scraping hands would draw blood—if I could bleed.

  Chapter Twelve

  THERE IS NOTHING innocent about my Edmund. As he climbs a palm tree, seeking a few high-flying coconuts, I smile at my own naiveté. To think, I’d once fretted over scaring him away—the poor, bruised sailor who knew only the gentle touch of women. Laughable. Edmund is more of a beast than I, and yet even in the blindness of passion, he’s smart.

  We’ve spent the majority of the past day and night pleasuring each other, but he hasn’t let me fuck him. He hasn’t given me that part of himself, no matter how much my fingers wander, no matter how many times I’ve begged. No, he will not allow me into that part of his body I so soundly seek.

  I suspect he considers fucking the epitome of his value. Somewhere in his psyche, he thinks I will kill him once his most intimate heat has surrounded me. I won’t. I could never kill Edmund, not now. I would even die for him, give up my gift of eternity for him.

  If I told him these things, I doubt he’d believe me. He would think me playing him like some mid-Eastern trader. He does trust me—too much maybe—but not enough to give me everything. Not yet.

  “Careful,” he shouts.

  I step back as a coconut falls with a heavy thud onto the moist forest floor. Then, I look up at Edmund. He has rigged some huge jungle leaves into a harness that allows him to rest his feet on the trunk and balance without falling. The man is full of strange information. I almost love him for it.

  He even caught a wild boar this morning. I asked him not to kill it, and he didn’t question me. The filthy creature remains tied up near our house, and I hope to find a way to feed without Edmund watching—but that’s not likely. He’ll want to watch me feed as part of his species study. I don’t so much mind showing him my increased strength after consuming blood, but I’m still embarrassed by the idea of letting Edmund see what a monster I am. I don’t imagine he’ll be scared, but, God, he makes me want to be human again.

  He’s only halfway down the tree when he leaps, lands, and rolls.

  “You remind me of soldiers I once saw in Japan.”

  He tucks two coconuts under his arm. “Never been.”

  “So you haven’t been everywhere.”

  He smiles and kisses me, his hand on the back of my neck.

  Then, I smell them and curse myself again for allowing Edmund’s scent to blind me to our surroundings.

  I whisper, “We need to move.”

  He freezes, focus darting to the thick surrounding foliage. “Which direction?”

  “Behind you. Run.”

  He drops the coconuts and takes off barefoot. I follow close behind and hear only one native voice, shouting something in their barbarian tongue. Edmund runs as fast as he thinks. He’s adept at avoiding hanging leaves and roots alike. Even I struggle to keep pace, but I still feel presences around us like dark spirits in a wood. No one knows this damned island better than the cannibals. Still, we aren’t surrounded. The natives are behind us at least, so Edmund and I keep running until we see our precious lagoon, sharp mountain at its opposite end.

  He stops at the water’s edge. “They’ll lose my scent if I’m underwater.”

  “But—”

  He points to a shadowy spot. “Get them to go away. They’ve no interest in you.”

  And if he drowns?

  “I’ll be fine.” He must read my expression. “Just hurry the fuck up.” Fully clothed, he dives in and starts swimming. As soon as his head disappears beneath the surface, I hear a twig snap.

  There are four of them, all men, and they’re not as well fed as Edmund once joked. Skin painted in dried mud, the natives are short but broad. Their rib cages, covered in nothing but skin, heave from exertion.

  I press my fangs out and smile.

  Four pairs of hands tighten on pointed spears, but they make no move to come closer. They probably think me a demon, and my great height has intimidated men from Paris to Timbuktu.

  I wave my hand, gesturing behind them. I hope they understand I want them to go away—need them to, in fact. Edmund will soon have been underwater too long.

  When they don’t move, I hiss. Their eyes widen as they mumble between each other. I take a warning step forward, and finally, they scatter into the woods like an earthbound flock of birds.

  I back into the warm water, still watching for any sign they might return, but already, their horrid scent has moved away. The stench of rotting flesh is but a memory when I reach Edmund and drag him up by the front of his soaking shirt.

  He gasps in a huge breath of air as I hug him to me. I push his wet hair from his face and kiss his cheeks. “How long can you hold your breath?”

  He still swallows air in great gulps. “I guess we found out.”

  My Edmund doesn’t even argue when I carry him home.

  Chapter Thirteen

  THE CANNIBALS KNOW he’s here, and I don’t know what to do about it. It’s only a matter of time before they come to kill us both. I think Edmund realizes as much. He’s more subdued tonight as he guts some fish by the fire. He doesn’t talk as he usually does. He doesn’t tell me any of his mad stories or about yet another rare species of butterfly he found when he tripped through a spiderweb in India.

  I need to be as strong as possible for him. “Edmund. I must feed.”

  He stops working on the fish. “Can I watch?”

  I nod. It’s time for him to see me for what I am—not only his lover but a dark creature, as well.

  Outside, the wild boar grunts and leaps forward and back as we approach. Despite being tethered to a tree, this beast is ruthless. It will not die without a fight. I think of Edmund with his poison dart frogs, knife fights, and electric eels. He’s been chasing death his whole life, and he finally found me.

  I h
old the struggling beast to my chest. It squeals and kicks as I bite down hard into its back. The hair is coarse, rank with filth, and the skin is hard to break—but I break it. Blood spurts into my mouth as the animal continues to flail against me. Its blood is sour but palatable. It’s nothing like Edmund would taste. I lose myself in the warm, red liquid and drink and drink until the boar’s heart stops beating. I throw the dead carcass away from me and don’t even bother wiping the blood from my face. I turn around.

  He kneels at the base of a tree with his back leaned against it. His fingers cling to the bark, and his eyes are wide. He stands when I draw close but still clings to the tree as if it might protect him.

  Edmund shouts when I grab his arm—too roughly, as the beast’s blood flows through me. I still might be too weak to kill a tribe of cannibals, but I’m powerful enough to control one human. I shove him into our house, and he almost tumbles from the force of it. He spins to face me, shoulders tense. I lick my lips and grin before rinsing the horrid scent of slaughtered boar from my face.

  I move toward him and tear his shirt. He shoves me backward, but I latch onto his wrist, spin him around, and pin him to the wall. His elbow to my ribs knocks a gasp from my chest, and I laugh. It puts enough space between us for him to punch me hard. Christ, the man knows how to hit. When the haze clears from my eyes, he stands in front of me, gaze darting to the door, to me, and back again. He has nowhere to go.

  “I’m sorry I hit you,” he says.

  “Trying to sweet-talk me, Edmund?”

  He stares at me.

  “Are you frightened, now that you’ve seen me feed? I’m as bad as the cannibals, wouldn’t you say?” He doesn’t stop me when I push him backward with my hand on his chest. He trips into bed, and I tear off his breeches and the remainder of his shirt before climbing on top of him and lifting one of his legs over my shoulder. I push one finger into him, and his head falls back, mouth wide. I thrust in a second finger, and his eyes shoot open, pain wrinkling his features.