Love Me Forever. Rosemary Laurey

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СКАЧАТЬ looked doubtful but took the box. “Thanks.”

      “Have a look. See what you think.”

      She slipped the lid off and reached into tissue, putting the box on a chair, before shaking out the cape. Her lips parted as she stared at the velvet hanging in rich folds. She should be wearing velvet like this. Velvet and the finest satin and lace not blue jeans and a worn sweatshirt. “It’s beautiful,” she said, “but…”

      Her skin would surely taste like new cream on honey cake. He smiled. “You don’t think Sam will like it?”

      She laughed. “He’d love it but I really think…”

      He could feel the tug between her longing and her anxiety. “Look, Stella…” She hadn’t balked at his use of her given name, so he went on. “See if it fits him. If so, why not keep it?”

      “Because it’s more than I can afford!” Her face flushed red with mortification at her admission. He could hear the rush of blood to her face. Abel, help him! He had to will his fangs to stay retracted. He hadn’t realized how much he needed to feed.

      “We haven’t even mentioned a price.”

      She fixed him with an exasperated look. “I know what things cost and this was custom-made.”

      Yes, custom made for Sam!

      She started re-folding the cape. She really was going to refuse! It would be so easy to will her to agree—she was halfway there, all it would take was a little nudge of her mind and she’d agree to what her heart wanted to accept. He resisted the temptation. Somehow it seemed important that she accept freely. “It was a special order.” By him. “But there’s limited market for children’s outfits.” That much was true. “Yesterday evening it was sitting up there in Dixie’s workroom, no use to anybody.” Because it was still on the bolt. “If it fits Sam, at least someone is getting use out of it and it won’t go to waste.”

      That last line was a touch of genius. He bet “thrifty” was her middle name. She nodded. “Thanks.” She paused. “I didn’t mean to sound ungracious.”

      “You didn’t. Just careful. No one wants to run up obligations they can’t meet. Dixie said to pay her whatever you’d have spent on another costume.”

      He should have stopped when he was winning. Stella looked at him. “That would hardly meet the cost of the fabric.”

      “No,” Justin replied, and watched as she frowned. “But it’s more than she’ll get with it sitting in a box in her storeroom, and this way someone gets to use it other than the moths.” Now he was tempted to push her will just a little.

      “And if you promise to bring Sam by the shop, it will be a great advertisement for us.”

      He sensed her acceptance a second before she spoke. “Thanks.” She had a smile that could fell a strong man. How any mortal man had ever resisted her, he’d never know. It made this vampire want to…

      “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

      He wanted her blood, rich and warm and flowing over his tongue. He needed her skin against his lips. “Coffee would be brilliant.”

      She brought the box with her as she led the way into the kitchen, a bright room with a tall bay window. Justin sat in the chair she offered, glanced out of the window at a sand-box and swing and a dilapidated garage at the end of the garden, and then gave his full attention to the object of his lust. A lust he’d better damn well keep reined in.

      Stella filled a kettle and put it to boil. She reached for two mugs from a row on hooks under the cabinets. “Instant okay?” she asked as she measured out spoonfuls from a large jar.

      “By all means.” Fluids would slow his metabolism down, and about time too. Of course walking out of here would work even better.

      “Cream and sugar?” Stella half-turned his way.

      “No, thank you, just black.”

      She busied herself, bending down to get milk from the fridge, reaching for sugar from a cabinet and finally taking the boiling kettle from the stove. “Here.” She placed the steaming mug in front of him. The aroma rose strong and fresh but masked by the scent of warm-blooded woman. He took a long swig from the mug.

      Miscalculation that. She was staring at him. “You must have a throat made of asbestos.”

      “Hot drinks don’t bother me.” Any more than heat or cold or bullets. Fire could be fatal but… “It’s good coffee.”

      “Thanks.”

      He remembered to drink the rest of it at a more mortal pace. “There’s also a pair of trousers in the box,” he went on when she’d relaxed a little. “Dixie thought they might do.” Stella was giving him her don’t-patronize-me look again.

      “They’re an odd size she wasn’t able to sell. They’re bound to be too big, but Dixie can take them in if you like.”

      “I’ll fix them,” Stella replied. “Or I’ll end up owing for alterations as well as the costume.”

      That was her acceptance as well as her bid for independence, and Justin acknowledged it with a smile. “Think they’ll fit him?” Dixie had assured him they were far too big, but wearable under the cape, and the mismatched sizes would reinforce their fable of stray garments just hanging around the place.

      Stella fetched the box. Putting the cape over the back of a spare chair, she pulled out the trousers. “Yes, they are a bit big,” she said holding them up, “but that’s soon taken care of. The waist’s elastic and I can turn them up.” She folded them away and then picked up the cape, her hands stroking the velvet as she folded it carefully. “They really are beautiful,” she said. “Sam will be thrilled. Thanks.” She smiled.

      It was the sort of smile to shatter a man’s mind or exalt his soul—or send a vampire’s thoughts down forbidden avenues. She was prospective sustenance not solace. “You’ll come by the shop on Beggars’ Night?”

      “You bet!” She glanced at his now-empty mug. “Want another coffee?”

      “No, thank you. I…” A great crash from outside stopped him.

      “What’s that?” It sounded like a small explosion but surely not…

      Stella had jumped up and now frowned out of the window. “It’s those no-good Day boys!”

      Children were doing this? “What did they do?”

      “They’re throwing bottles and trash at my garage.” She shook her head. “Do it all the time. They…” She was interrupted by a great shout from behind her house and another smash.

      “Not anymore, they won’t!” Justin said, racing out the back door and down the garden. Without pausing to think, he vaulted the sagging chain fence.

      He landed just feet from one youth and inches from another.

      The shorter one scowled at Justin, the taller, presumably older one drew his arm back, a glass jar clutched in his fist. A mass of broken glass and stones СКАЧАТЬ