Blood-Red Tear (31 page)

“When can I see him?”

They looked to me with horror.

“You cannot go to him, honey. He is with our people,” my father said.

“I need to see him for myself! I need to know he is okay,” I argued.

“We can
not take you there!” he said incredulously. “You’re human, please be reasonable.  We would never risk your life that way. I won’t have it, and Aidan wouldn’t want it.”

My mother clenched my hand.
“Sweetheart, Zoë is there; she will aid him. Now try and get some rest and we will keep you updated.” 

“I
f it were Dad who were hurt, could you sleep?”

She shook her head and looked
at my father. “No,” she murmured.

“Katie, p
lease understand. Aidan needs to rest so he can heal properly. If he knows you are distressed, he will feel it and he won’t get that rest. You need to think of him now,” my father explained.

“I’m always thinking about him
, Dad. You just don’t seem to understand that!” I curled into a ball and turned away from them. It was clear they were not going to help me get to Aidan, and without being able to physically see him alive and well, or feel him in my mind, I couldn’t help but worry about his condition.

*****

I spent the rest of the weekend in my room, ignoring my cell phone, refusing visitors, and not bothering to eat. Worry for Aidan consumed me, and a deep depression overtook me.

Monday morning
I got dressed for school pulling on a pair of old faded jeans and a T-shirt that matched my state of mind. I pulled up my hair in a ponytail and didn’t bother with makeup, figuring nothing was going to hide my puffy eyes and wan complexion. I went to the garage without bothering to eat and sat in the truck, waiting for Paul and Beth to join me. We drove to school in silence, Paul and Beth both casting worried looks my way, which I pretended to ignore.

Orin was waiting when we pulled
into the lot, and he swore when he saw me. “Your Mom told me you were sick, but I didn’t think it was this bad. Why are you here? You should be home,” he asked as he took my bag.

“
Don’t fuss. I am fine,” I told him, trying to keep the annoyance I felt from my voice.

“If you say so,” he said
, taking my book bag and reaching for my hand, which I kept at my side, much to his unhappiness.

I struggled through the morning, but b
y the time lunch came around, even I knew I was done. I looked at my uneaten lunch, and shoved the tray away, then laid my head on the table waiting for the bell to ring.

   “Katie
, what can I do to help? I can see this is more than a virus. It must have something to do with him. Did he hurt you in some way?” Orin asked. I shook my head, but he wouldn’t give up. “Does this concern him?” I nodded and he became agitated. “I should have known. What hold does he have on you that you would do this to yourself?” he demanded.

“I’m sorry,
” I whispered. “I can’t explain.”

Paul
came to my side, glaring at Orin. “I’m taking you home now.”

For once
, I did not argue with him. I stood but as soon as I did, dizziness washed over me and I stumbled. Paul lifted me into his strong arms, and I was immediately thankful he was always there to take care of me. With great gentleness, he carried me to his truck and drove me home. Once at our house, he carried me to my room and settled me on the bed, turning away as Beth helped me into my pajamas.

I curled into a ball and stared out of the window
, ignoring everyone who came and went, wanting nothing more that to be left alone.

M
y mother came with food, pleading with me to eat, but food held no appeal for me. I pushed it around the tray but couldn’t bring myself to eat it.

I spent the rest of the night alternating between sleep and staring at the ceiling
, consumed with fear for Aidan. I tried repeatedly to get him to answer me mentally, but he was completely closed off to me.

The next morning
, when the alarm went off, I pulled the plug from the wall and went back to sleep.

By that night, my father had
had enough and came to confront me. “We need to talk.” I stared blankly at him but he persisted. “You have not eaten in days, you’re pale as a ghost, and I don’t think you even have the energy to even get up from that bed. Aidan would be devastated if he knew how this was affecting you.” I didn’t answer, and he walked away with his head down and shut the door behind him as he left.

Chapter Twenty-
Eight

I woke to cool fingers caressing my cheek and a feeling of calm that flooded me with hope. My eyes snapped open and I found Aidan sitting next to me, concern for me etched upon his face.

“W
hat am I going to do with you?” he asked wearily, pulling me into his arms.

“Just love me,” I whispered.

He sighed.
“I need you to take better care of yourself, how am I supposed to live my life if you aren’t well? I cannot do the things I need to if I am worried about you all of the time.” He looked down on me sadly. “How long has it been since you ate?”

Paul answered for me
. “She has not eaten anything since Friday night. I called you because Dad was talking about calling a doctor in.” He looked at me pleadingly. “Please, stop this now. Aidan is here, you can see he is alright, so you can stop mourning for him.”

Beth appeared behind him
with a food tray in her hands, which she put on the nightstand beside me. “Katie, do you want me to help you shower and change before you eat?”

I nodded,
hating that Aidan was seeing me looking like such a mess.

“She should eat first,
” Paul argued.

“No
, I want a shower,” I protested. My legs were shaky as I rose from the bed, but I was determined to get a shower.

Aidan swore and
scooped me up in his arms, walking me to the bathroom door where Beth waited.

Bet
h helped me into the shower but told me she would wait by the door in case I needed her help.

I showered and dressed in clean pajamas, walking on unsteady legs to the door
, where Aidan was waiting to carry me back to bed. He scooped me into his arms with a grunt and carried me back to the freshly made bed, settled me in, put the food tray over my legs, and glared at me.

“Now eat,
” he commanded.

Beth had put a litt
le of everything on the tray, but I decided to nibble on a cracker with some tea to start. It was hard to eat with everyone watching me, but after a few bites, I felt my appetite returning. I was nibbling a sandwich when my parents joined us, overjoyed to see me eating, but puzzled to see Aidan next to me.

“Are you feeling better?” my father
asked him with concern.

“I’m recovering nicely
, thank you,” Aidan, answered with a dark look, obviously not happy my father brought up his condition.

My father and Paul ex
changed heated looks that worried me. I placed the sandwich down and pushed the tray away. “What’s going on?” I asked looking between them.

“Do not bother yourself
with our problems, honey,” my father said.

Paul
, on the other hand, didn’t seem to think it was something to hide. “He’s mad because I called Aidan.”

“I know you don’t want us to see each other
, but I needed know he was okay.” Surely he was not that desperate to keep us apart that he would let me suffer.

“
Of course I wanted you better, but Aidan needs to heal and I knew he would not rest if I told him how you were suffering.”

“He had to have known
; he always knows when she is hurt or in danger,” Paul argued.

“
Not when he is injured so badly and has shut down,” my father ground out from between clenched teeth, angrier than I had ever seen him, which was very telling.

He was obviously very concerned
about Aidan’s injuries. I looked Aidan over closely, noticing for the first time that his eyes had large purple half-moons under them and that his skin was much paler than usual. He looked tired and weary, very unlike the Aidan I was familiar with, and I realized his injuries had to have been severe for him to still be in such a state.

His eyes met mine as he read my thoughts
, and I cursed myself for not closing my mind to him. “I’m better. I am more concerned about you then myself,” he told me.

I probably wouldn’t have
second-guessed his words, a year or two before, but now that I was older and slightly wiser, I knew he was lying to protect me from the truth. “What happened? Why aren’t you completely healed?”

“You do not need to worry yourself about anything but getting bet
ter,” Aidan insisted with a pained look.

I leaned closer
, searching his face, but he refused to meet my gaze. I grabbed his arm and shoved the sleeve of his shirt upwards, gasping as I took in the mass of white puckered scars that laced his flesh.

“I’m fine,” he said, pulling his arm away and shoving his sleeves back down.

For the first time I noted then that his shoulders were slumped, as if it was too painful to sit up straight and I recalled how he had grunted when he had lifted me earlier. He refused to meet my gaze and instead stared down at the floor, keeping his mind closed to me, but with him so close and me out of my own funk, I could feel his pain wrap itself around me and knew he was definitely not alright.

“Show me the res
t,” I whispered, needing to know what horror he had gone through.

“No!” he hissed
, lifting his head his eyes pleading with me to drop it.

“Show me,” I demanded.

He stared blankly at me.

“Show me now!” I demanded again
, unwilling to allow him to hide his pain any longer.

“Katie, stop
,” my father said his voice hoarse with emotion.

“I am not a child, D
ad. I am tired of you all hiding things from me!” I looked back to Aidan. “I need to know,” I insisted, knotting the sheets over me in my hands, pleading with my eyes for him to understand.

Aidan sighed and
slowly took off his shirt. It seemed to take a lot of effort, and I could feel the agonizing pain each movement cost him. With his shirt he stood before me; he stood proud and tall despite the tremendous pain he was in both mentally and physically. I gasped, staring in horror at the huge jagged scars crossing his chest and stomach, wrapping up and over his shoulders. They were red and puckered, angry looking, and must have caused him great agony when inflicted. I shook my head, unable to comprehend how his body could still have such marks from an attack that had happened days before. It didn’t make sense. Vampires healed very quickly. I didn’t know much but I knew that. It would take a very significant injury to take so long to heal, and that meant the attack was worse than I had been lead to believe.

“We’ll just step outside,” my father said.

The room emptied except for Aidan and myself. I stared at his chest and felt the vomit rise in my throat. I felt physically ill as I imagined the nightmare he must have gone through. I couldn’t breathe, as my upset mixed with his pain and fear for me. I moved from the bed and stumbled to the bathroom, purging my body of everything I had just eaten, before collapsing on the cold tiled floor, my sobs filling the air.

“Katie
, don’t do this to yourself,” Aidan whispered, pulling me onto his lap and wrapping me in his arms. “If it weren’t for your warnings I would be dead. Trust me, this is nothing; I will heal in time.”

“How could you keep this from me?” I whispered. “I had the right to know.”

He winced. “I didn’t want you to worry.”

“Worry,” I screeched. “You were worried about me being worried? Well
, guess what, Aidan, I worried anyway. When I couldn’t feel you, or know what you were going through, my whole life became meaningless. I couldn’t think, couldn’t eat, didn’t want to live.”

“Don’t say that,” he bit out
, his face filled with fear. “You must live, must carry on, no matter what happens to me.”

I shook my head. “I don’t think I could.”

“Then we are truly in a predicament,” he told me, kissing my forehead. “Do you think you’re ready to go back to bed?”

“Yeah.
I need to brush my teeth first though.”

He helped me to my feet and waited at the door while I brushed my teeth. It was odd having him watch me doing something so personal
, and yet it felt right to have him there with me. After I finished he lifted me into his arms, ignoring me when I argued that I could walk and did not want him to strain himself.

H
e just chuckled and shook his head. “The day I can’t pick you up, you’ll know I’m done for.”  He carried me back to bed, tucked me under the covers, and then sat on the chair next to me holding my hand in his own, looking nervous.

“I can’t believe my parents hid this from me,” I told him.

“They tried to do what was best. No one could have anticipated that you would react this way. It is unheard of so early in a relationship with a vampire. Usually there has to be a blood exchange.”

I knew there had been
, although not in the traditional sense. “Aidan, do you remember the night you kissed me for the first time?” He nodded. “I bit my lip and broke open the cut Scott’s ring had caused, and you kissed me.”

He got my point. “That wouldn’t have mattered. I tasted your blood that
night but you didn’t taste mine,” he told me.

“But I did,” I told him.

“No, I would remember that,” he told me.

“When you clenched your hand your nails sliced into your palms.” His eyes widened as
understanding dawned. “I kissed the wounds and your blood was on my lips when you kissed me.”

“It isn’t possible,” he whispered.

“I tasted the blood, Aidan, I felt it inside of me, and I knew it had somehow changed everything, although I didn’t understand it then,” I admitted my cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

He sat in silence, staring out of
the window, his fists clenched and his face unreadable, but I could feel his disbelief and anger at himself for allowing it to happen. 

“You could have lived a normal life if I hadn’t kissed you that night,” he said stonily. “This is all my fault.”

“Aidan, no one is to blame here. It would have happened anyway at some point.”

He looked at me with sorrow-
filled eyes. “Yes, but you would have been older and ready to handle it.”

“Does it matter?” I asked him. “It happened and we can’t change it
, so there is no point in beating yourself up over it.” I squeezed his hand and smiled reassuringly.

He ran his free hand through his hair and sighed. “I suppose, but I have the feeling your father isn’t going to feel the same way.”

“Don’t tell him.”

“You know I have to
,” he said. “I respect him, and I won’t hide what I have done to make it easier on myself.” He sat back in the chair, wincing at the pain it caused.

“You shouldn’t have come,” I said guiltily.

“I knew if Paul had defied your father, things must be bad, and your health will always be more important to me than my own.”

I was so selfish I had never realized how often he gave of himself to appease me, but I knew now.
“Yeah, well, your people depend on you; they cannot afford for anything to happen to you. You should have called, not flown here from your sickbed to comfort me.”

He smiled and kissed my hand. “I would fly to the ends of the earth just for a glimpse of you.”

I recalled all of the roses and notes he had left me and knew it was true. “Will you be leaving now?” I asked. It was hard to think of him going away again, but I vowed to myself I would be brave and not make a scene. It was clear he still needed to rest and recover.

“I will leave in the morning after I take you to school
. I really need the earth and serenity of my homeland to heal properly. Now, I want your promise to me you will take better care of yourself.” He tucked a stray hair behind my ear and stroked my cheek.

“It was not something I could control,
” I told him. “Somehow your injuries affected me. I felt like I couldn’t go on without knowing you were okay.”

   “I know that
, and no one blames you, but you must remember it would kill me if anything happened to you.” I nodded. “Now, promise me you will take care of yourself so I can go home and heal.”

“I promise,
” I told him.

He leaned i
n and kissed me. A long, searing kiss that made my heart beat fast and my blood pound furiously in my veins. “You should sleep,” he murmured huskily against my lips.

I pulled back and smiled.
“I want to spend this time with you. I have been sleeping for days.” My hand was in his large one, his fingers stroking mine, spreading warmth through me, and for that moment my life was perfect.

“How’s Orin?
” he asked, ending the perfection.

“I don’t
want to talk about him with you,” I told him, looking down on our hands joined together.

“I understand,” h
e said not bothering to hide the pain in his voice.

I lifted my gaze to his and gripped his hand.
“No, I don’t think you do. When I am with Orin he makes me laugh, and he keeps me from dwelling on the fact that I miss you so much that my heart physically aches. He’s a distraction, albeit a willing one, and in the end, I know I’m going to hurt him and it is killing me.”