He kissed them. Hannah ignored the kiss and poked a finger in.
Shock flared in Thierry's eyes.
There. That was it. The long canine tooth, just barely sharp. Not yet the tooth of a predator, of a fox or a lynx or wolf. She ran her finger against it.
The shock turned to something else. A glazed look. Need mixed with pure terror.
Thierry whispered, "Don't-Hannah, please. You don't know-"
Hannah tested the tip of the tooth with her thumb. Yes, it was sharper now. Longer, more delicate. It would look like the tooth of an arctic fox in her palm-milky-white, translucent, elegantly curved.
Thierry's chest was heaving. "Please stop. I-I can't-"
Hannah was enthralled. I don't know why people are afraid of vampires, she thought. A human could tease or torture a vampire this way, driving him insane-if she were cruel.
Or she could choose to be kind.
Very gently, Hannah reached with her other hand. She touched the back of Thierry's neck, bringing just the slightest pressure to bear. But he was so obedient to her touch-it was easy to guide his mouth to her throat.
Hannah...
She could feel him trembling.
Don't be afraid, she told him silently. And she pulled him closer.
He grabbed her shoulders to push her away-and then just hung on. Clinging desperately, helplessly.
Kissing her neck over and over. She felt his control break... and then felt the sharpness of teeth.
It wasn't like pain. It was like the tenderness, a hurting that was good.
And then... devastating bliss.
Not a physical feeling. It was emotional. They were completely together, and light poured through them.
How many lives together have we missed? How many times have I had to say, Maybe in the next life?
How did we ever manage to come apart?
It was as if her question went searching through both their minds, soaring and diving, looking for an answer on its own. And Thierry didn't put up any resistance. She knew that he couldn't; he was as caught up as she was in what was happening between them, as overwhelmed.
There was nothing to stop her from finding the answer.
This revelation didn't come all in one blinding illumination. Instead it came in small flashes, each almost too brief to understand.
Flash. Thierry's face above her. Not the gentle face she had seen by the porch. A savage face with an animal light in the eyes. A snarling mouth ... and teeth red with blood.
No ...
Flash. Pain. Teeth that tore her throat. The feel of her blood spilling warm over her neck. Darkness coming.
Oh, God, no...
Flash. A different face. A woman with black hair and eyes full of concern. "Don't you know? He's evil.
How many times does he have to kill you before you realize that?"
No, no, no, no...
But saying no didn't change anything.
It was the truth. She was seeing her own memories-seeing things that had really happened. She knew that.
He'd killed her.
Hannah, no-
It was a cry of anguish. Hannah wrenched herself away. She could see the shock in Thierry's eyes, she could feel him shaking.
"You really did it," she whispered.
"Hannah-"
"That's why you woke me up from the hypnosis! You didn't want me to remember! You knew I'd find out the truth!" Hannah was beside herself with grief and anger. If she hadn't trusted him, if everything hadn't been so perfect, she wouldn't have felt so betrayed. As it was, it was the greatest betrayal of her life-of all her lives.
It had all been a lie-everything she'd just been feeling. The togetherness, the love, the joy ... all false.
"Hannah, that wasn't the reason...."
"You're evil! You're a killer!" She told me, Hannah thought. The woman with black hair; she told me the truth. Why didn't I remember her? Why didn't I listen this time?
She could remember other things now, other things the woman had said. "He's unbelievably cunning...
he'll try to trick you. He'll try to use mind control ..."
Mind control. Influencing her. He'd admitted that.
And what she'd been feeling tonight was some sort of trick. He'd managed to play on her emotions ...
God, he'd even gotten her to offer him her blood. She'd let him bite her, drink from her like some parasite....
"I hate you," she whispered.
She saw how that hurt him; he flinched and looked away, stricken. Then he gripped her shoulders again, his voice soft. "Hannah, I wanted to explain to you. Please. You don't understand everything ..."
"Yes, I do! I do! I remember everything! And I understand what you really are." Her voice was as quiet as his, but much more intense. She shrugged her shoulders and shifted backward to get away from him. She didn't want to feel his hands on her.
He looked jolted. Unbelieving. "You remember . .. everything?"
"Everything." Hannah was proud and cold now. "So you can just go away, because whatever you've got planned won't work. Whatever-tricks-you were going to use..." She shook her head. "Just go."
For just a second, a strange expression crossed Thierry's face. An expression so tragic and lonely that Hannah's throat closed.
But she couldn't let herself soften. She couldn't give him a chance to trick her again.
"Just stay away from me," she said. With all the confusion and turmoil inside her, that was the only thing she could keep clear in her mind. "I never want to see you again."
He had gotten control of himself. He looked shell-shocked but his eyes were steady. "I've never wanted to hurt you," he said quietly. "And all I want to do now is protect you. But if that's what you want, I'll go away."
How could he claim he'd never wanted to hurt her? Didn't killing her count? "That is what I want. And I don't need your protection." "You have it anyway," he said. And then he moved, faster than she could ever hope to move, almost faster than thought. In an instant, he was close to her. His fingers touched her left cheek, light as a moth's wings. And then he was taking her hand, slipping something on her finger.