I woke up screaming.
Cool hands were on me in an instant, as a tall muscular body slid into a bed with me. I vaguely registered that one of the vampires must had carried me back to my room after I'd fallen asleep; good thing they were all strong. "Emma, it's alright, I'm here." Teren's cool breath hit my ear as sobs continued pouring from my mouth.
He pulled me into his chest, his body lightly shaking as he struggled to contain the energy we usually felt when we were reunited. I'd been asleep during the build-up and wasn't riled up like he was, but he was gentlemanly enough to try and not ravage me while I was so obviously grieved. He only stroked my back comfortingly and kissed my head. I knew from experience just how much restraint he was using, and loved him all the more for it.
I clung to every part of him that I could, knowing I was making that restraint harder for him, but needing his comfort. Through sobs, I muttered, "I'm so glad you're back. I had such a bad dream."
He sighed in a way that sort of sounded like a groan. "It's okay. No one hurt me, I'm fine."
I shook my head against his chest. My nightmare hadn't been about him meeting with vampires. "No, I dreamt that that man had taken us again...and our babies. He...he..." I couldn't even speak the horror out loud and started sobbing again.
Teren's light shaking stopped as he stiffened in my arms. "Did you read the journals last night?" His voice, while not angry, was not pleased.
I bit my lip and looked up at his face. The room was dark, the early morning rays blocked out by the heavy curtains closed over them, and his eyes glowed soothingly at me. I took a moment to absorb that comfort before I answered him. He waited patiently, knowing that he was soothing me, and then I noticed that he was staring at my eyes too, and that his face seemed to be relaxing. Then I noticed that his features were being lit in an odd way, not from his eyes, but from an outside source. There were no lights in the dark room and I was horribly confused, until I realized that...my eyes were glowing.
I widened them in shock and held a hand in front of my face. Sure enough, I could clearly see my palm, highlighted in a way that had nothing to do with Teren's glow. I'd never noticed this before. I hadn't realized I'd gotten this vampiric side effect too. I don't know why I'd never thought of that. I guess I'd just had too many other things on my plate to notice.
"My eyes glow now, Teren," I said through hiccups, as my breath tried to stabilize.
"I know, don't change the subject." His voice was slightly amused, but serious.
I looked back up at him, his brows bunched as he watched me. I struggled to remember his question. "Um...yes, sorry. I wanted to help," I said, a slight whine to my voice.
He sighed and pulled my head to his. Resting his cheek on my hair, I heard him inhale me, inhale every trace of the world I'd encountered while he'd been gone. I found myself doing the same with him, cringing a bit at the scent of cheap, imitation perfume; the vampire had been a girl again.
"Do you think giving yourself nightmares is helping, Emma," he said softly into my hair. I started to object but he pulled back, eyeing me seriously. "I want you mellow, relaxed." His hand came up to lightly stroke my cheek. "Let me worry about finding the mixed. You..." his hand came down to rest on my belly, a child kicking him in response, "take care of our children." He smiled as he rubbed my stomach. "And stop stressing, please?"
I gave him a half grin and then finally nodded, relaxing into his side. We were silent for a few moments and then I asked him about the nest. He sighed and rested his head against mine. "They weren't happy about me barging in on them, asking questions, but they did have an answer for me." I lifted my head to look at him and he shrugged, the glow of his eyes shaking with the movement. "It wasn't violent, Emma, I promise."
I nodded and asked, "And?" I hoped he'd tell me that they'd said something like, "Mixed? Oh, yeah, there's a group of them that meet for hot fudge sundaes every Saturday morning at the Ghirardelli Ice Cream shop in the Square."
Teren sighed. "They didn't know anything about me, but they gave me more names, a few this time."
I sighed and slumped down to his chest. I guess my scenario had been a little farfetched. Mixed were rare. We'd be lucky to find one, let alone a group of them. Teren sighed with me and kissed my head. I peeked up at him. "I thought you'd be gone longer. How come you're home? Not that I mind."
I smiled and he smiled down at me. "The pull. I found them much faster than I thought I would, and Ben and I were done by the time Great-Gran caught up with us." He chuckled. "She was not happy about immediately having to turn around and run home to beat the sun, but she didn't want to stay holed up in a strange place for a full day. Ben wanted to go to find a motel, since it was so late, but when I turned the car back towards your direction, I couldn't make myself pull away from the highway. Not when you were calling to me. Not when I had no reason to stay in the city anymore." He grinned at me seductively. "It's a good thing I took Great-Gran's car today. It's much faster than mine."
I laughed at that and ran my hands down his back to his jeans, pulling him into me. He smiled, leaning in to kiss me. "Ben?" I asked, between kisses.
Listening to the sounds of the house, I could hear Jack lightly snoring, Alanna and Imogen talking about my nightmare, since my screaming had woken them both up, and one person downstairs sighing irritably, muttering about how next time he was taking his own car. I laughed as Teren confirmed that Ben was hanging out in the living room.
Just as I started reveling in the miraculous man's mouth, he pulled back and gave me a sheepish look. "Don't take this the wrong way..." I frowned as his sheepish look increased. "They gave me a lead that I think may have something to do with a nest talked about in the journals. I think they may be connected to a group of mixed that the man already..." He sighed and ran a hand through my hair. "I really want to go check it out..."
I sighed, realizing that he was asking to leave. "Oh...can't it wait?" I squeezed his body tighter to me. "At least until morning?"
He sighed and leaned down to kiss me. "It is morning, Emma."
I peeked at the clock over his shoulder. It was morning in only the vaguest sense of the term; even the sun was probably begrudging the hour. "Barely," I muttered sullenly.
"I need to get on top of this, Em. If they have anything to do with mixed...? If they may know about us...? I thought I could get it researched enough this afternoon, that Ben, Great-Gran and I could find them tonight." I could hear the turmoil in his voice. He wanted to stay, he wanted to go. I decided to make it easy on him, since he was doing all this for me anyway, me and the kids.
I pushed away from him, cuddling up into my sheets instead. "Fine. I'm still tired anyway, I guess I'll go back to sleep."
He pulled the blankets around me, tucking me in. With a sexy smile, he leaned in to kiss me. "I'll miss you. I love you."
I bit my lip to not tell him that he didn't have to miss me, that his entire body could be wrapped around me as we speak. I didn't place that guilt trip on him though. This was just something he needed to do. "I love you too."
We both heard Ben sigh irritably again, complaining that he'd rather by snuggling up with Tracey than a throw pillow, and we both laughed. Teren sighed and ran a hand down my hair. "I probably should run Ben home."
I bit my lip and nodded, hating that he was leaving the house again. The reverse of the pull, while not as drastic as the reuniting, wasn't pleasant. It was a tearing feeling, like a part of you was being stretched away. Never detached though, just stretched. I think it made the reunion part that much sweeter. I yawned as he watched me. "I'll probably be asleep when you get back," I sighed remorsefully, knowing that there was no way I'd be able to stay awake this early after a night of restless sleeping.
He bit his lip and nodded. "I'll leave you alone." I knew how difficult that would be for him and a part of me wanted to use that to my advantage, wanted to tell him that he should at least say hello, knowing that I could twist that kinetic energy between us into a break-the-bed love fest, but another part of me didn't want to abuse our connection like that. I didn't want to use sex as a weapon to keep him near me. Not when what he was doing was so vastly important.
I put my hand on my stomach and nodded, reminding myself what really mattered. "Okay."
As Hot Ben started muttering that Teren should learn to handle his hard-ons the way every other guy did, I started laughing. "Does he remember that we can all hear him?" I chuckled.
Teren frowned at the floor and then looked back at me. "No, I think that's slipped his mind." He sighed. "I should get him home."
He pulled away from me and I sighed, watching his lean body stand, highlighted by our glowing eyes. "I still can't believe he willingly goes with you."
Teren smiled as he looked down on me. "He's actually pretty helpful." He shook his head, delight clear in his face that he had been able to keep that friendship tight. "He surprises me constantly." He gave me a wry grin. "You'd be very proud of him. Tracey too...if the whole thing wouldn't have her screaming in terror." He shrugged his shoulders and laughed at that, then leaned down to kiss me a final time.
Once back downstairs, I heard him surprise Hot Ben in the living room. "I'm done. I'll take you home now."
I heard Ben sigh gratefully. "Oh, thank god, you're fast in the bedroom too." I heard what sounded like Teren smacking him in arm. "Ow! What? Just saying..." Teren sighed and they both started heading for the door, Ben muttering, "Sorry, no offense or anything. I'm just tired. I want to go home...and be super speedy with my girl too."
Both of the guys laughed at that and I blinked, surprised. I hadn't realized in all the chaos, that Ben and Tracey had moved in together. I sighed that I was missing out on so much, being quarantined here, and smiled that Tracey and Hot Ben were moving in the right direction. Teren was right, Ben was turning out to be very surprising.
And that began the pattern of Teren getting farther and farther away from me. He'd search out every lead a vamp gave him, but he never found anything more than more names, more nests, more leads. No pureblood vampire seemed to know anything about mixed. Most of them were startled that such a thing was even possible. The one group he'd found that he'd thought was somehow connected to mixed, turned out to be a dead-end. Teren had thought they were connected because of a vague reference in the book that sounded like one of the vampire's last name, but it turned out to just be a coincidence. The purebloods had nothing to do with the long-dead mixed vampires in the journals.
So far, no vampire he met knew anything about his kind. But every vamp gave him the name of another vamp, usually to get his annoying ass off their property. But Teren didn't care how he got a name, just so long as he got one. As he was gone more and more, taking some of his family with him if the trip was close enough, I started hearing more and more about fights and scuffles.
As the weeks went by, and my lifespan dwindled, I started hearing about genuine knockouts, and started seeing the result of fighting in Teren's clothes, if not his fast healing body. And of course, he couldn't hide Hot Ben's wounds. When I saw Ben with a black eye one night, I nearly went ballistic. They both assured me that it was nothing, merely a misunderstanding, but it riled me right up, and I practically demanded that Teren stopped this craziness. Obviously, the vampire community knew nothing, and obviously his continual prodding of their nests, was starting to piss them off. He was stirring the beehives, so to speak, and as a general rule of thumb, it was a good idea to leave something as dangerous as hornets, alone.