Wild (26 page)

“Stay with me, angel. Don’t leave me.”

I kissed her face again, and held her body close to mine, so she could soak up the warmth coming from my chest. I knew she needed to get warmer. I briefly pulled her away from my chest, opened my coat and undid the buttons of my shirt. Then I placed her against my naked chest and wrapped the blanket over her.

Her hands and her face were like ice against my warm chest, but it didn’t bother me. I needed her to soak up my heat. I continued rubbing her back, until finally, finally she stirred.

“I love you, angel, I love you,” I whispered to her. I looked down at her and saw her eyelids flutter. She was gaining consciousness. My angel was back.

I continued to let her rest against my chest. Her eyes opened.

“Vince,” was all she said, before I felt her lips pressed against my skin. Nothing had ever felt better in my life than those lips against my naked chest.

I held her. That was all I wanted to do.

She lifted her head and looked at me. “I’m so sorry.”

I put my hand underneath her chin. “You have nothing to be sorry about. It was my fault. I should have been more careful. Please forgive me.”

“There’s nothing to forgive.” She pulled herself up to move her head closer to mine. “Please kiss me,” she whispered.

I was gentle when I lowered my mouth onto her lips. She felt so breakable. I didn’t want to hurt her. Her body was still aching, I was sure. She surprised me with the fierceness with which she kissed me, and I realized then that she had also been scared, scared she would lose me, just like I had been scared to lose her. I understood the hunger in her kiss all too well. She didn’t want me to hold back. She needed to feel that I was with her, that I was still hers.

I felt her hands stoke my naked chest and didn’t stop her. She had the right to touch me whenever she wanted to. I would never stop her again. Her heart was beating fast, but for once I knew I didn’t need to worry about it. Her heart was beating for me.

She wanted to be touched. I could feel it by the way she moved in my arms. I slipped my hand underneath her sweater and found her breasts. She moaned softly as soon as my hand started caressing them. I loved touching her. It was the most natural thing I had ever done. Her body responded to every touch, every motion. It made me dizzy to kiss her and caress her breasts and feel her touch my chest, but I didn’t dare let go of her. I didn’t want her to think I wanted to stop. I wanted it to be her choice when to stop, or not, if she didn’t want to stop. I didn’t care. I just wanted her to be happy.

21. Annette’s Plot

I felt like a high school girl smooching in the back seat of his car with him. I wondered whether he felt like being back in high school too.

I welcomed his hands touching my skin and I didn’t want him to stop kissing me. Quite unexpectedly his hand which had caressed my breasts moved to my pants, opened the button and pulled the zipper down.

“Relax, my angel, I’m going to take your pain away,” he whispered to me in between kisses.

He started taken my pants down and I helped him. I couldn’t believe what he was doing, since he had always been the one to hold back and show caution, but when he had started kissing me I had felt something else. I had felt he didn’t want to stop, he wanted to give me anything I wanted, he was grateful I was alive. His kisses had been filled with such desperation, such pain I knew he didn’t want to let go of me ever again.

When he slipped his hand inside my panties and pulled them off me, I knew I was already wet long before his hand even touched me. I gasped when I felt his fingers explore me. I could feel him slowly probing until he slid one finger inside of me while he continued to stroke my clit with his thumb. He rhythmically moved back and forth, responding to every movement of my body.

“I love touching you,” I heard him say and his voice sounded almost as if he was drunk.

I was breathless from his kisses and his touch. I couldn’t respond. He didn’t expect me to, because he didn’t let go of my lips.

Under his expert hand I could feel the excitement build in me. His passionate kisses only intensified the emotions he awakened in me.

I sensed how my body became flushed, how the blood rushed through me while he continued touching me in all the right ways, as if he knew my body better than I did.

I couldn’t hold back the overwhelming feelings I had for him, the warmth and pleasure I felt under his caress, the thirst and hunger he satisfied with his kiss and touch. He was everything I wanted and needed, and he knew it. I couldn’t hold back anymore and felt how he drove me to the edge until my body exploded in an orgasm of epic proportions.

He looked into my eyes and smiled.

“There’s nothing better than an orgasm to forget pain,” he stated.

I knew I blushed. But he was right. I had completely forgotten the pain from earlier.

He chuckled. “Get used to it, because I’m going to make love to you until you beg me to stop.”

Now I chuckled. “I won’t beg.”

I didn’t want to stop kissing him, so I didn’t. His lips were gentle and warm and I soaked him up. His hand went back to my breasts caressing them softly almost as if he was playing with them.

When he finally stopped kissing me, I rested my head on his chest. “Can we go home?”

“I’ll need to check on something first.”

“What is it?” I looked up at him.

“Mrs. Entwhistle is going to be really pissed when she finds out what I gave her.”

“But didn’t you give her your antidote? You gave it to me.”

“Do you remember I mixed two different vials when I first gave you the antidote, and then when I gave it to Carmela?”

“Sure.”

“Well, this time I brought the vials with me premixed. What Mrs. Entwhistle doesn’t know is that once the two components are mixed they are only effective for about two hours, before they break down. All she’ll have is some useless saline solution.”

I smiled and gave him a hug. “I’m so glad you didn’t have to give up your antidote for me.”

He made me look at him. “You know I would have given it up for you, had it been necessary, don’t you?”

I nodded. I knew he would have given up anything for me. “I love you.”

He kissed me. “Let’s see whether we can go home.”

He opened a compartment behind one of the back seats and pulled out a laptop. Once he had booted it up and checked for an internet connection he logged into his server and pulled up his home security system. I was fascinated.

 “You can see your security cameras from here?”

“Yes.” He turned the laptop so I could see it better. “I can see everything that’s going on. I’ll just run through the last couple of hours to see if our hiding place has been compromised. I wouldn’t want us to run into another trap.”

He scanned the footage.

“Vince, once she realizes the serum is useless, she’ll try to find us again. We will have to stop her.”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“I have an idea.”

“Uh, oh.”

Vince insisted on carrying me up the stairs when we got home. In fact, I got the feeling he was suddenly pampering me more than usual. He made sure I was comfortably seated on the couch before he brought me something to drink.

On the way home in the car he had told me about the explosion of the lab and how we had escaped and I got the distinct feeling he didn’t tell me how close we had really come to not making it. The way he had responded to me in the back seat of his car reminded me of somebody who wanted to forget everything.

The late night news brought a live report about the explosion at UCSF. The police had no clue what had happened and it was assumed a gas pipe had blown in one of the labs, which was close enough to the truth.

The report brought me back to what I had mentioned to Vince in the car, namely that I had a plan to bring the Entwhistles down.

It had been a shock to me when Entwhistle’s wife had waited for us in the lab. I had had no inkling she was involved in her husband’s activities. It even seemed she was the driving force behind it.

“I know how we can get them,” I told Vince.

He raised an eyebrow. “So what’s your plan?”

“You’re going to have to pin my death on them.”

I could virtually feel the lightening bolt go through his body as he shot up and stared at me with wide eyes. “What?” His voice boomed through the room.

“My faked death.” I corrected myself, but he didn’t seem to hear me.

He grabbed me by the shoulders. “Not funny, Annette. Really, not funny.” He fumed.

I had never seen him so mad. I could see his eyes flicker amber and suddenly felt his claws dig into my shoulders. He pulled them off me as soon as he realized his hands had turned into claws.

He turned away from me and I could see how he balled his claws into fists trying to control himself. It was the first time I had seen him transform in anger and I realized now that this was what he had warned me about.  It was those moments which he had been afraid of, those uncontrolled and unexpected moments.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

He raised his hand without turning back to me. “A minute, please.”

His voice was labored and he was breathing hard. I could sense the turmoil in him, the pain, the memories and finally realized what he had been going through all these years. The tremendous loneliness, the shame, the guilt. And I understood how much he needed me to heal.

Finally he moved. But instead of turning back to me he moved away from me toward the armchair on the other side of the coffee table. He sat down.

He looked back at me. He was fully human again.

“Do you see now why I’m so dangerous?” His voice sounded resigned. He averted his eyes. He couldn’t look at me.

“I’m sorry,” I said again.

He lifted his eyes to look at me. “You’re sorry?
I
hurt you, and
you
are sorry? You should be scared of me. You should be running away right now.”

I shook my head. “I’m not afraid of you, never have been, never will.”

“You can still leave now, before it happens again. Think about it. You’re young, you’ll get over it.” Again he had to look away. I knew how hard it was for him to say these words, to give me a way out. I could sense he knew he wouldn’t get over it. What made him think even for a second I would?

Slowly I got up from the couch. My steps barely made any noise, but I knew he could hear me. Still he didn’t look up. His eyes were closed as if he didn’t want to see anything, as if he wanted to shut everything out.

I stopped and kneeled down in front of him, and simply put my head in his lap.

“I belong here. I’m not leaving. Get used to it. And besides, I’ve told you before, you can’t hurt me.”

I felt his hands on my head, and then slowly he pulled me up to face him. I immediately saw that his eyes were filled with tears.

“I don’t deserve you.” He let his head rest on my chest.

“I’m not here because you deserve me. I’m here because I love you.” I put my arms around him. “I never want to hear you send me away again.”

I heard him breathe in deeply. “I promise.” He kept his head in my chest. “I’m so sorry. Please forgive me. I suppressed my emotions for the last few hours. I couldn’t risk transforming in front of her. Today was more than I could take. I almost lost you. Forgive me, my angel.”

I lifted his head up with both my hands. His eyes showed so much pain I couldn’t imagine anybody being able to bear that much.

“Shh, I’m here and I’m staying. You are my life.”

I kissed him and felt the salt of his tears touch my lips. I could feel how careful he suddenly kissed me back, how gently he touched me. Everything would be alright. It would be just a small hurdle to get over. I would learn how to read his stress better, and he would learn how to control himself better. We could make it work.

“Are you ready to hear my plan now? I promise nothing bad will happen to me.”

He nodded. His expression was serious, his facial muscles still tenser than normal as if he was trying to hold back his emotions.

“We need to frame the Entwhistles for my murder. All we need is a death certificate, an autopsy report, photos of my corpse and a few pieces of paper to link me to his clinical trial.” I laid it out for him.

“I hate the way you say corpse.”

I smirked. “I think with a little bit of creative make-up I’ll make a pretty nice corpse.”

“It’s never going to work, angel. For once, how on earth do you want to get a real death certificate without actually dying, which you’d better not be planning or I’m going to have another fit.”

Even though his words were serious, I could tell he had recovered and was actually mocking me.

I shook my head. “Well, that’s where my connections come in.”

“
You
have connections? Excuse me, but aren’t you the girl I rescued, the girl who knew nobody?”

“I didn’t say that. I said there was nobody you needed to notify for me,” I corrected him. “That’s entirely different.”

“You know what I’m starting to think? That you have more secrets than I do.”

I instantly recalled the number of flings I had had in the last few years, something I really didn’t want to share with him, especially considering he had been celibate for the last thirty years.

He interrupted my thoughts. “I’m right, aren’t I?” He gave me a shameless grin.  “I’m sure it will be fun eliciting those secrets from you.”

I knew he couldn’t read my mind, but I also knew he could read my thoughts when he was in his animal state and concentrated on me, and I figured he was thinking the same thing. A look into his sparkling green eyes told me I had guessed right.

“You wouldn’t!” I glared at him.

He laughed. “Well, we’ll just have to find out who can keep their thoughts to themselves better. I do like a challenge, especially when it involves you.”

I decided to spoil his fun. “There’s really nothing to tell, except for the fact that I wasn’t a virgin before I met you. There you go. Now you know everything about me.” I hoped this would take him off the trail.