His fingers shook.
This was new and not good.
He swiveled, angling back up the hall in the direction of Samantha’s door. What he needed lay just beyond a few inches of carved, fine wood.
But he couldn’t go there. He couldn’t do that to her and he knew once he got started, he wouldn’t be able to control himself, not with her, not with a blood rose.
And sex would follow.
Because the trembling increased, he finally understood that her presence made his symptoms worse, so he had no other choice, but to call for help. He arranged for a later feed, just before his patrols for the following evening.
For now, rest would help, so he headed back the way he’d come.
Maybe facing off with Ry had taken a toll, and clearly meeting his blood rose had hit his reserves hard, but he needed sleep. He had his cell with him and in an emergency, he had a support call service hooked up to an intercom system in his house.
He paused only once, just outside Samantha’s door. He heard a soft humming sound, a single pitch, somewhat high. He suspected she was matching the sound the crystal ceiling made for her.
He shook his head, as disbelief, maybe even shock, still worked within his mind.
Once inside his rooms, he stripped and showered, then lay down on his bed. He’d fully intended to have a hard think about his current situation, but like the proverbial head-hitting-the-pillow, he was asleep and slept until his alarm sounded at four the next afternoon.
He woke up not feeling rested at all, but rather like horses had stomped on him all night. He sat up dizzy and put his head in his hands. He needed blood. Now.
Naturally, his thoughts turned to Samantha, which cramped up his stomach into a fierce knot of pain. He swore he could smell her blood even though at least forty feet of house separated them. He slid from bed and found it was easier to tolerate his condition so long as he kept moving.
All that held him together was the knowledge that his doneuse, Angela, would arrive soon.
He showered quickly then placed a phone call to the Merhaine Realm. He said a quick prayer that communications between Realms would be open because he needed help with Samantha, help he couldn’t give her, not even a little. He was a vampire. Her faeness could only be interpreted by another fae and his choice for serving up all that information landed on the most powerful in the Nine Realms.
The phone rang and rang and just as he’d begun cursing fate, Davido answered. “Hello and good eventide to you. Vojalie the Wise’s residence, your handsome troll here. With whom do I have the great pleasure of speaking?”
Ethan smiled and shook his head. Warmth spread through his chest. He had great affection for both Vojalie and Davido and often forgot that, unlike he and his Guard, most realm-folk led relatively normal lives.
Davido was old, as in no one really knew how ancient he was. He’d never, therefore, fully taken on modern speech patterns. “Ethan here. How’s it hangin’, my friend?”
“Ah, Ethan. How uplifting to hear your voice! What nonsense we have these days with the realm-to-realm access points coming and going like fog rolling through then disappearing only to come back. Have you Andrea’s daughter there with you?”
“Wait, what? How the hell did you know that? Has someone called you tonight?”
“Nay. Tis my beautiful one. The ceiling dome of her living room has been cloudy and at times black. Imagine, black! Visions and headaches have settled on her and she’s been weeping for Andrea again. She said Andrea’s precious daughter would be in Bergisson soon. So, you have her?”
“Yes.”
“And did you say anything to her, about Vojalie I mean and Andrea?”
“No, of course not. I thought Vojalie should be the one to tell Samantha about her mother and all things fae. But we need your wife here, Davido. Is there any chance—”
“She’s been packed and waiting for your call these five days.”
Five days. Sometimes he forgot how different the fae were from vampires. “Well, good, that’s good. Can you bring her now and the baby, of course. She’ll want the baby with her.”
Vojalie had given birth not long ago and the fae were she-bears when it came to offspring. He wondered if Samantha would be the same, a thought that led to a sequence of images that ended with her belly full of his child and how he’d gotten her that way.
He gripped his stomach and bent over at the waist. Could a vampire perish from lust? He began to think it possible. Sweet Goddess, he needed to get fed and laid, the sooner the better.
“Of course Bernice will be with her and I shall accompany them both.”
“I was hoping that would be the case. I’ll have Vojalie’s favorite guest suite prepared for the three of you.”
When he hung up, he spent the next five minutes just breathing through the pain. He couldn’t put this off. He placed a second call to hurry up the appointment and within a few minutes, his doneuse, Angela, walked into his bedroom, a frown between her brows.
“Ethan, why did you wait so long? You look like you haven’t fed in weeks. Is it true your blood rose has come? It’s been all over the Bergisson blogs.”
He nodded and waved her forward. “You’d better just give me the inside of your elbow. I don’t trust myself at your neck.”
“Whatever you need, mastyr, you know that.” Angela had a husband and three children, all in elementary school. She’d been serving him for decades and at one time had been one of his lovers, but that was years ago.
He respected her choices and never, never, crossed the line with any of his doneuses once they took a husband, regardless of species. She was a wife to a powerful shifter, a wolf named Smack, a descriptive name for exactly what would happen to Ethan if he ever strayed from his principles.
He bit quickly and struggled to keep from collapsing the vein by sucking too hard. She spoke quietly to him about her children, which helped a lot to keep him on an even keel, especially to prevent him from thinking about what existed off the conservatory, in one of his guest suites, so close, so close.
Ah, Samantha.
“Hey, easy does it, mastyr. Smack won’t want to see a bruise.”
He gentled his suckling and focused hard on the home run her second son had made in T-ball.
When he finished, he fell back against the bed. At least his stomach had settled down. “Thank you.”
“Sweet Goddess, Ethan, you don’t look much better than when I came in. I take it your blood rose hasn’t given it up for you?”
She smiled when she spoke, teasing him, but the imagery made him sit up again way too fast. His head swam and he barely kept from throwing up what she’d just given him. “Don’t talk like that about her.” Now he was defensive. Great.