Wings In The Night - Blue Twilight Part 39

He stared into her eyes. "This isn't easy for me, you know."

"I know."

Nodding, he stuffed the rest of her things into her bag, closed it and took her hand, drawing her to her feet again. He led her out to Stormy's room and told her to wait there, by the door. Then he ran across the parking lot to her car, flung the bags into the trunk and drove the Bug over to park it in front of where Max stood waiting. He opened the door to Stormy's room and led her inside, again insisting she sit and hold the ice to her head while he gathered up Stormy's things, shoving them into her overnight bag. He spoke as he packed.

"I want to tell you something, and I don't want you to respond right away. All right?"

She nodded.

"When we made love-and that's what it was, Maxie. Don't even think it was anything less. When we made love, and I was lying there, holding you and thinking about what had to happen next, I wasn'tfeeling defeated or conquered or painted into a corner. I was feeling...mostly...relieved"

"You were?"

He nodded, and paused with Stormy's hairbrush in his hand, staring down for a moment at the yellow hairs, reflecting the light he'd flicked on when he'd entered the room. "I don't think Storm is in any danger from that vampire, " he said.

Max blinked at the total change of subject. "What makes you think that?"

"Because when he looks at her...there's something in his eyes."

"He doesn't even know her."

"Even so, that look-it reminds me of the way I feel when I look at you."

She lifted her gaze to his. But he just gripped her hand and tugged her to her feet again, leading her out of the room. He tossed the bag into the car on the way, then took her into Jason's room. She knew the drill by now and sat down in the chair. Lou looked in the closet, yanked out Jay's coat, and then skimmed the room for the handful of things Jason had acquired while in this town.

"My ice is melting."

"Hold on a little longer. I got off the subject. Where was I?"

"You were relieved after we made love"

"Yeah. I was relieved. Mostly because I was so tired of resisting you. Tired of saying no, tired of trying to keep my feelings under control so you wouldn't see them."

She frowned. He wasn't looking at her. He finished checking dresser drawers and moved into the bathroom, returning with a handful of items he dropped onto the coat.

"Why didn't you want me to know?"

He rolled the coat up, toiletries and all.

She got to her feet before he could pick it up. "Lou, could you stop bustling for a minute and look at me?"

He did. He looked at her, and he looked tormented. "I'm so f.u.c.king scared I'll screw this up. I tried to make marriage work once, Maxie. I tried, and I failed, and I ended up bleeding, and so did she. I lost her. I tried to be a father to my kid, and I lost him, too. If I hurt you that way, I don't think I could live with myself."

"I'm not gonna let you hurt me, Lou. And you're sure as h.e.l.l not gonna lose me."

He ran his hands through her hair. Nodded once, and seemed to square his shoulders. "Okay, then.

Here it is, straight up. I love you. I am G.o.dd.a.m.n head over heels for you, Max. I think I have been for just about always." "You have?"

"h.e.l.l, yes. How could I not be?" He took the melting-ice-filled towel and moved it away, so he could look at the cut on her head. "I was relieved after we made love, because I figured I could stop fighting it.

Just for some reason I was still denying how I felt. Force of habit. Fear of failure. I don't know. So I told you we might as well get married and made it sound like I was taking a plea-bargain deal from a D.A.

who was about to fry my a.s.s. That wasn't what I was doing, though."

"No?"

"Max, it took scaring me half to death to prove it to me out there. But it finally came clear. You and me, we're already partners. We work together. We play together. When the s.h.i.t hits the fan in my life, the only thing I want to do is call 'you, or come over and tell you about it. Ditto when something good happens. And I think it's the same for you."

She nodded. "It's always been."

"You're my best friend, " he told her. "But it goes way deeper. 'Cause the thought of you with another man makes me want to do murder, kid. When we first hooked up with Jason, I was...I thought he...Jesus, Max, I wanted to beat him senseless. You're mine."

"I've always been yours. Just waiting for you to decide you wanted me to be."

"I've always wanted you to be. I just didn't realize what was right under my nose. I want to be your partner in the business, Maxie. I want to move up there to Maine and buy a fishing boat and take you out on the ocean for weekends and holidays. I want to have the right to be jealous and possessive and overprotective of you-and I want the whole world to know I have that right. Because I love you like n.o.body ever loved anybody. Ever. And that's why I want you to marry me, Max."

She slid her arms around his neck, stood on tiptoe and kissed his mouth slowly. "You know how long I've waited for you to wake up and smell the doughnuts, Malone?"

"Too long. I'm sorry, babe. I'm not gonna make you wait for anything ever again. Promise. I'll marry you right now-as soon we can drive to a justice of the peace, if you want."

She shook her head sadly. "I can't get married without my best friend standing beside me, Lou."

"Then we'd better get busy tracking her down. Because, frankly, I don't think I want to wait much longer." He slid an arm around her, picked up the bundle from the bed and led her out to the car. Then he opened the pa.s.senger door, and when she got in, he leaned over, buckled her seat belt around her and lingered just long enough to press his mouth to hers.

It was going to take some getting used to, having him be the one seducing her for a change. She thought she liked it.

Lou straightened away, his eyes dancing over her face as if he were looking at heaven; then he closed her door, flung Jason's rolled-up coat into the back seat and went around the car to get behind the wheel.

He started the engine and drove onto the road, away from the town of Endover . As they pa.s.sed through town, the sun was rising. People were stepping out of their houses, looking around, blinking in the light like moles too long underground. Their eyes were clear and sharp, if still a bit squinty. "G.o.d, I'm glad to leave that place behind, " Max said as they drove on. "But I think the thrall that held it is already fading."

"I think so, too. It felt different when we came back from the island. Lighter. And Gary seemed more normal, too."

"We faced down Dracula, " Max said, looking sideways at Lou. "I can't believe this was the very first official case of our new agency. Dracula. The biggest, baddest of all the big bads."

"And we lived to tell the tale, " he said. "Doesn't bode well for a quiet, peaceful future, does it?"

She sent him an alarmed look.

He smiled. "Honey, don't worry. It's you I want. Not peace and quiet. But lively, lovely Mad Max Stuart." He smiled slowly then. "Mad Max Malone. h.e.l.l, that's got a sweet ring to it."

"I've always thought so, " she said, and she leaned across the car to kiss his neck, then rested her head, hair still damp from the towel, on his shoulder. "I adore you, Lou."

"It's mutual, kid."

"Where are we going?"

"We're going to find a doc to st.i.tch up your head. And then we're going to find Stormy. After that, it doesn't matter. Because wherever we go, we'll be going together. For as long as I live, Max. That's a promise."

"I'm going to hold you to it, " she told him.

"I'm counting on it?'

Epilogue.

Stormy sat in the sailboat, her hands bound together, watching as the man she believed to be Dracula himself manned the sailboat with the skill of a seasoned sailor. He aimed for the dark horizon as the night wind billowed in the sails and sent them skimming over the ocean at dizzying speeds, farther and farther away from everything she had ever known... And toward something she both antic.i.p.ated and feared. Something strangely enticing, oddly familiar, and yet terrifying, all at once. Something that both drew and repelled her.

Just like the man himself.

Dracula.

He looked back at her, his long black hair whipping in the wind. He looked at her as warily as if she were one of those vampire hunters she'd heard Max talking about.

She said, "You can untie me, you know."

"I don't trust you not to try to escape. And if you do, you'll drown, Tempest."

Tempest. Somehow the name wasn't so unpleasant when it came from his lips, in his voice. She couldn't take her eyes off him, couldn't stop feeling his mouth on her, his teeth-G.o.d, her neck tingled and came alive at the mere memory. "I promise I won't try to escape. I couldn't swim all the way to sh.o.r.e from here, anyway. And I know you aren't going to hurt me."

"Don't be so sure of that, little one."

He leaned down, and she lifted her bound wrists to him. He drew out a blade and held her hand in one of his, while he used the other to slice the ropes cleanly. Then he held it a moment longer.

"What you are feeling, " he whispered close to her ear, "has an explanation."

"Does it?"

He nodded, lifting his black eyes and locking them with hers. "I drank from you. It was foolish of me. I should not have done it. All for the sake of making a point, shocking your friends. But I am sometimes...impulsive?'

"It wasn't like I thought it would be."

"No. And it creates a...an attraction. That is why your blood heats when you meet my eyes, little one. It will pa.s.s."

She held his eyes with hers. She said, "I don't think so."

"No?"

Shaking her head side to side, she whispered, "No. Because I was feeling... what I am feeling...long before you so much as touched me. Maybe...before I even met you. Maybe...maybe far, far longer than that."

He narrowed his eyes on her. "What do you mean by that?"

She drew a breath, eyelids lowered. "I don't know. I don't know, Vlad."

He stared at her for a long, long time as they sailed on. "The sun will be up soon. I will be forced to seekshelter. I hope you won't mind resting through the day with your body bound to that of a dead man."

The thought made her shudder with fear. And with something else. Something that felt like desire.

To be continued in PRINCE OF TWILIGHT.

Coming from MIRA Books in March 2006