His conversations with Eddie were something he looked forward to every time he came home. But at home wasn’t the only place where he saw Eddie. Since he was still mentoring him, he often took him on training assignments. On other occasions they were paired up as a team and sent out on assignments together to apply what Eddie had learned. Thomas lived for those assignments.
Pride filled him every time Eddie showed that he was a quick study. It warmed Thomas’s heart to see his mentee grow into his own and become an outstanding bodyguard with a quick mind and a steady hand. But it wasn’t only Thomas’s heart that was affected; his cock was just as involved. Just looking at the young vampire with the deep dimples in his cheeks when he smiled, made him hard in an instant. And Eddie smiled often. He was a happy-go-lucky kind of guy, laid back, and relaxed.
For over a year now, Thomas had tried to suppress his feelings, to no avail. He was irrevocably and hopelessly in love with Eddie. And there was nothing he could do about it.
Thomas climbed the stairs to the main floor of the house, leaving the garage and his priceless bikes, many of them restored antiques, behind. When he entered the great room which combined an open-plan kitchen with the large living room, he found it empty. He listened, but there was no sound in the home. Eddie had not returned from work yet.
Disappointed, he glanced at the clock over the mantle of the fireplace. In less than an hour, the sun would rise and the floor-to-ceiling windows that dominated one entire wall of the great room would display the waking city at his feet. Right now the San Francisco skyline twinkled in the dark. Only, the windows weren’t real: they were monitors that played live videos from the cameras that were mounted around the perimeter of his house. A beautiful and realistic illusion, and the only way he could look outside during daytime without any UV light penetrating his home and burning him to a crisp.
Nevertheless, it was an illusion, one that helped him pretend he lived a normal life, when nothing in his life was normal. He was a vampire. He was gay. And he loved a man he had no right to desire. And underneath it all, his dark power slumbered, threatening to awake at any moment unless he kept the beast in check, a task that grew harder each year, almost as if he were a sleeping volcano, and the power in him the magma that was building up until the pressure became too strong and had to burst to the surface.
Thomas opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of blood. Slowly, he popped the cap off and set the bottle to his lips, drinking the cold liquid and allowing it to coat his dry throat. He closed his eyes, letting his heart conjure up images that made his pulse race and his cock swell.
His fangs lengthened involuntarily as the pictures intensified and blurred into just one image: Eddie lying underneath him, his head tilted to the side, offering his vein for a bite. And farther below, two cocks throbbed in concert, rubbing against each other in anticipation of what would happen next.
He shook the thought off—it would never happen, and he’d be better off if he stopped fantasizing about it. It only made the craving worse. Frustration howled through him.
Thomas gulped down the rest of the blood and tossed the bottle in the recycle bin where it clanged against the other empty bottles, reminding him that he had to dispose of them soon. Then he walked to the large leather sectional and plopped down on it, snatching the remote off the coffee table. He pointed it toward the flat screen TV and turned it on when he perceived something white in his peripheral vision. His head snapped toward the entrance door, the one he rarely used since he almost always entered his house through the garage.
His vampire vision zeroed in on the object that stuck out from underneath the door: a white envelope lay on the dark wooden floor.
He rose in one fluid motion and approached. At the door he sniffed, but whoever had pushed the envelope underneath the door was long gone. No residual scent remained. Thomas bent down and picked up the envelope, examining it from every angle. It was not addressed.
Curious, he tore it open and pulled out a single sheet of paper. Only a few words were written in a neat, but old fashioned handwriting: You can’t hide forever. One day you’ll have to admit who you are.
The letter wasn’t signed.
The paper fell from his trembling hands. They’d finally found him. How, he didn’t know.
He’d changed his last name, his identity, even moved to another country, careful not to leave any trails. But even he couldn’t hide forever. He’d always known it would happen one day. But it was too soon. He wasn’t prepared to face the truth yet. The truth of what he was, what he would always be no matter how long and hard he fought it.