He sighed and brought his hand to my cheek. As always, his cool skin gave me a slight shiver before I adapted to it. "What do you see when you look at me, Emma?"
My lips twisted into a wry grin. "A sexy, baby daddy corpse."
He rolled his eyes and shook his head, his hand on my cheek moving to run back through my hair. "If you didn't know about the walking dead part."
I laughed and bit my lip as I studied the attractive man beside me. Finally, I sighed and ran a hand down his chest, his skin cold to the touch, even through his t-shirt. "I see a smart, successful, funny, attractive, twenty-something year old man, who nearly glows with life and vitality." I cocked my head at him. "You're quite a catch."
He chuckled and leaned into me, placing his lips gently on mine. "You are too," he whispered, his cool lips brushing against my warm ones. My heart started beating faster and he smiled wider at hearing it. He pulled away, looking satisfied. "It will be fine."
I frowned, both at the nagging doubt in my head and the absence of his lips. "But...what are you going to do at work?"
Teren worked for Gate magazine, as a writer in the life and style section. Several San Franciscoans were learning how to enjoy day-to-day living in the beautiful City by the Bay from a dead man. I loved the irony in that. He appeared to love it too as an amused smile lit his face. "Well, I'm going to write fascinating and entertaining articles about daily life in beautiful San Fran."
Funny. Teren had a bit of a smartass streak in him, one that I generally found amusing, but as I was sort of trying to have an earnest conversation, was currently starting to irritate me. He cocked his head and twisted his lips, reading the emotion on my face. "Everything will be just like it was before we left, Emma." He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. "Well, that's not entirely true. I may tell everyone that I'm engaged...and about to be a dad."
I straightened on the bed and grabbed his hand, squeezing it tight. "No, don't do that."
He frowned at me and pulled away to look over my rigid posture. "Why not?" He leaned in, a devilish smile on his face. "Embarrassed?"
A small laugh escaped me against my will and relaxing, I lightly smacked his chest. "No." I sighed and laid my head on his shoulder. "But, they'll want to shake your hand or something, to congratulate you." My hand still enclosed in his tightened even more. I really didn't want anyone feeling that cool skin and getting suspicious.
Not sharing my concerns, Teren laughed and I sat up straight to glare at him. He grinned and shook his head. "So..."
I frowned at his still smiling face. "Well, you're not exactly room temperature. People are going to notice that."
He frowned too. "I'm not going to be lovingly caressing my coworkers, Emma. It's mainly just me alone in an office all day, writing or researching."
I frowned deeper at another smartass comment interrupting my semi-serious conversation. "What if they want to do that guy hug thing?"
He raised his eyebrows. "Guy hug thing?" I smacked his shoulder at the amusement on his face and he continued, ignoring my physicality. "It's still winter, I can explain the coldness away with the weather." I opened my mouth to object and he raised a hand, stopping me. "I know, we live in California, it gets warm here, but, Emma, some people are just naturally cold. It will raise less suspicion than you think."
I shook my head. "Still, even for a regular human, you're a cold man."
He smirked at me and tilted his head at me. "Only on the outside."
I sighed, remembering how his relaxed attitude about his secret had gotten us nearly killed before. He looked over my face and sighed too. "I know, Emma. I'll be careful. I won't touch people more than necessary. I'll fake breathing. I'll act completely human, just like I've always tried to." His hand came back up to my cheek as my eyes started to water. His getting exposed again scared me more than I ever thought it was possible to be scared. "I will be careful." He shook his head. "But I need this...I need to feel normal." He squatted down to look me directly in the eye. "You know this."
I sniffed, but a tear ran down my cheek anyway. I still had nightmares of that terrifying man who'd taken us, and what I'd done to escape him. A part of me never wanted to go back home. A part of me wanted to stay here, at his parents' ranch, safely surrounded by vampires that would die to protect me, and the children inside of me. And a part of me, wanted to be stronger than the scared little girl that I was starting to sound like.
His thumb brushed away my tear and I exhaled slowly. I nodded and he leaned in to kiss me again. As he pulled away, one final objection poured from my mouth, "What if you need to eat?" That was one thing he definitely couldn't do around humans.
He grinned and shook his head. "I can get food, Emma. And I don't need to eat at work. I can wait until I'm home," his hand came down to rub my stomach again, "with you."
I bit my lip at the thought of moving in with him as soon as we got back. That definitely made leaving here a bonus, but yet another thought struck me and I let it out, knowing it was better to have my fears verbalized than bottled up inside me. "What if you have to eat...with humans? A business lunch or something?"
He frowned and turned his head away from me. Maybe he hadn't thought about that yet. He didn't exactly have a functioning digestive tract anymore. He couldn't scarf down the bloody steaks he used to enjoy before his conversion. He stood and ran a hand through his hair. "Well..." He twisted to look at me still on the bed, watching him. He gave me a tired smile. "I'll think of something."
I sighed, but let it drop. I couldn't expect him to have all the answers, but I did expect him to think of all of the questions. My hand drifted to my stomach, wishing I could hear their heartbeats like Teren sometimes could, wishing I could feel them move already, so I'd know they were okay. We had so much more to lose now, we both needed to be careful.
I stood and wrapped my arms around his trim waist. He sighed contently and pulled me in closer. I had to imagine that to him, I was sort of a heat source. I probably felt pretty good wrapped around him. That's what I liked to think, anyway. I closed my eyes and laid my head on his silent chest, happy that I could still do that, happy we were still together, despite all the odds.
I leaned up to kiss him, torn yet again on staying here a little longer (and tossing him down on that impressive bed) or getting back to the real world. I exhaled lightly as our lips moved together, the light stubble that he preferred to keep along his jaw line, wonderfully scratchy against my sensitive skin. It really wasn't much of a choice. We had to go back. For one, my "vacation" time was over. I'd exhausted every amount of paid time off I had, coming out to the ranch to help Teren through the scary process of converting. I needed to be back at work tomorrow morning.
That will be weird to go back to. I've been gone for over six weeks, just over seven really. From what my friend Tracey had told me over the phone, my boss had been going through temps like Kleenex. The most successful one had only made it a week. While it made me happy that my job at the accounting firm I worked at had missed me, I was also not looking forward to the mound of work I'd need to catch up on. I had a feeling I'd need another vacation soon.
Oh well, at least I had a wedding to look forward to planning. An impromptu wedding. A few weeks away from now wedding. We'd decided to get married the week before Christmas...which meant I had just about a month to get everything ready. But, since I did have a household of eager vampires waiting to help out, I was pretty sure it would go smoothly. Well, the planning anyway, I was still a little unsure of the actual ceremony. My family and a few close friends would be staying at the ranch for the wedding weekend. The ranch of mixed-vampires and that one impertinent full vampire. She was the one I was most worried about. Halina.
As Teren's kiss intensified, his cool hands slipping under my shirt and running up my bare back, I worried about the eldest vampire being in proximity to people close to me. I wasn't worried that she would hurt them, I was pretty sure she'd be on a tight leash, well, as tight a leash as you can keep on a vampire, but I was fairly certain she'd get a huge kick out of scaring the crap out of all of them. She immensely enjoyed intimidating people, and she sure intimidated the heck out of me.
And how would the vampires eat while my family was here? They usually sat at the table with Teren's human father, Jack, and drank blood from a carafe that kept it warm. They couldn't exactly do that with my mom and friends in the room. Especially since the tiniest amount of blood on their tongues made their fangs drop down. That was kind of a clue that even my mom would pick up on.
So, if eating at the table was out, I guess they'd be roaming the countryside for food, picking off some of their cattle in the farthest away fields. I felt a little bad about making them have to do that, although, it probably wasn't too big a deal for them. Even if Teren liked to deny it, all the vamps had an instinct to hunt, buried deep inside them. I'd seen them all do it, the night of Teren's conversion. Sure, they'd been hunting stupid cattle that hadn't even moved, but the look on their faces as they circled and attacked, well, it had been terrifying and exhilarating to watch.
Abruptly Teren pulled away from my mouth, his cool tongue breaking apart from mine. At the absence of his caress, my head snapped back to what we were currently doing. He twisted his lips and cocked an eyebrow at me. "Am I...bothering you?" he asked, annoyance and amusement in his voice.
I laughed and pulled him tighter, shaking my head. "No, I'm sorry. Just...being reflective today."
He sighed as he looked me over; the crystal-clear blueness of his eyes in stark contrast to the darkness of his hair. "You're really still worried? Don't you want to be home?"
He looked down at the floor, to where I'm assuming his mother was, and then across the hall, to where I knew his grandmother was hiding out the daylight. Another vamp trait, or maybe it was just an Adams trait - they could all sense each other. It was more profound the closer they got, and while he stayed in the same house as them, he always knew exactly what rooms they were in. It came in handy sometimes, like when I needed to know where he was on this massive ranch - I only had to find the closest vamp and they could point me in the right direction. It also came in handy if say, we were kidnapped and driven to the middle of nowhere and I needed to drive us back to this ranch, only I had no clue where it was. Yeah, unfortunately, it also came in handy that way too.
Teren's eyes came back to mine. "Wouldn't you like to be somewhere...more private?"
My arms around his waist tightened and I sighed contentedly this time. "Yes, I would. I know...I'm stressing. It will be fine."
He kissed my nose. "Yes, it will be." He released me and grabbed our bags, tossing them on the bed and starting the process of packing...and it was a process, I'd brought a lot of stuff with me. Over his shoulder he tossed, "Besides, it's not like I'm going to be letting the guys at work lovingly rest their heads against my chest." He turned and grinned back at me.
I smirked. "Funny. You better not let any of the women at work do that either." I raised an eyebrow at him and then playfully walked up and smacked his ass.