Part 4 (1/2)

He said nothing, and tried not to feel her soothing touch as she began a rhythmic ma.s.sage.

”How did she die?”

”I don't remember.” His eyes wanted to close. He hadn't slept much, and when he did, he didn't rest. He only dreamed about making frantic, hot, imaginative love to Cuyler.

”Why are you lying to me, Ramsey?”

Her fingers kneaded the sides of his neck. He let his head fall sideways to give her more access. ”I'm not going to talk to you about my mother,” he said, but his voice lacked conviction. He sighed as the image of her danced through his memory. ”She was beautiful, all carrot-colored curls and pale blue eyes. And she'd sing... Sometimes, right before I fell asleep at night, I can still hear her singing to me. Wild Irish Rose, that was her favorite.” For a few seconds his mother's lilting voice played in his memory. Then he felt Cuyler's lips on his head. She bent and pressed her cheek to his, and he felt the dampness on her skin.

”I'd take the pain away, if I knew how.”

”I know you would.” Why did he say that? And why did it sound so true? He swallowed and tried to regain his strength. ”We all have pain, Cuyler. Just part of life. You must have hurt, too, when you lost your sister.”

She sniffed, and her hands slid down his chest to rest near his heart. ”For a while I wanted to die. Then I wanted vengeance. I thought about hunting down every man involved in that raid. But it wouldn't have eased the pain. It wouldn't have brought Cindy back.”

”Might have stopped them from snuffing out another life, though.”

She straightened, came around the chair and knelt in front of him. He shouldn't have been surprised at the tears on her cheeks, but he was. Her kind wasn't supposed to have human emotions, wasn't supposed to care. Wasn't that what he'd been taught? And hadn't that particular bit of DPI doctrine been losing validity with every second he'd spent near Cuyler?

”What happened to you then?”

”A military school. Some benevolent organization foot the bill. I lived there, stayed with relatives who'd rather not have had me during vacations. Then the DPI academy, for training.”

”And indoctrination.”

He shook his head slowly, staring down into her beautiful face. ”It wasn't like that.”

But it was. Since he'd been twelve years old, he'd been educated under the organization's watchful eye, beginning with the debriefing right after his mother's murder. They were the ones who'd paid for his education, who'd provided a private tutor to teach him the things he wouldn't learn in any school. He'd been filled with hatred already, and that hatred found validation in his secret lessons, the ones he'd been warned not to talk about. He supposed now, that they'd seen him as the perfect candidate. He'd had a score to settle. He'd been seeking vengeance all his life. They'd known that, and offered him the means to achieve it.

And now he was sitting here with one of those he'd spent his life hating. He was sitting here wanting her with every cell in his body, talking to her like a cherished friend, finding a kind of understanding he'd never expected s.h.i.+ning from her teary eyes.

But it was all a lie. It had to be.

”I don't want to be here with you, Cuyler. You're too d.a.m.ned convincing.” He pushed her hands away from him and got to his feet. Leaning against the hearth, he closed his eyes.

”Why do you hate me so much?”

Lifting his head, he looked down at her, still kneeling in front of the chair. ”My mother was killed by a vampire. One of you. Someone that feeds on the innocent without a hint of remorse. A killer.” He hoped his words would rekindle the hatred in his soul, reinforce his resistance to Cuyler and her wiles.

Her eyes widened and for a moment she only stared at him in stunned silence. Finally she shook her head. ”It wasn't me.”

”You're all the same.” He looked away from her. Dammit, he couldn't spout DPI policy while he was looking into those eyes. ”So now you know. Nothing you can say is going to change it. You can pretend to be just like us all you want, Cuyler, but I know what you are. And I'll never stop hating you.”

She rose slowly, anger beginning to simmer in her eyes. ”You're lying. You don't hate me. If anything, you hate yourself for not being able to-”

He lifted a hand, cutting her off. ”Don't bother. You're only trying to convince yourself.”

”But it's so stupid! Ramsey, one of your kind murdered my sister and pumped enough bullets through my body to kill an elephant. But I don't hate you for it. I don't lump all mortals in with the few truly evil ones. I don't go out hunting them down like animals to exact vengeance.”

”Don't you?”

She flinched as if he'd slapped her. ”How can you ask me that?”

G.o.d, the hurt in her eyes... He looked at the floor, at the bean-bag, at the fire. Anything but at that pain he'd caused. ”Look, you got what you wanted. We've talked. Do you think we can get the h.e.l.l out of here now?”

She stood so still, stunned maybe. ”I don't have what I wanted. I still don't know why there's this connection between us. I still don't know what misguided force makes me give a d.a.m.n about a man like you.”

”Let's chalk it up to physical attraction and call it even.”

”It's more than that and you know it!”

He faced her, forced his expression to remain hard as stone. ”Maybe for you it is, but not for me, Cuyler.” He strode to the stairway, started up it. ”I'm packing my things. You line up whatever means of transportation got us here, and have it ready.”

”I won't.”

He never broke his stride. ”Then I'll go on foot.”

”I won't let you!” She came up the stairs behind him.

”You have to sleep sometime, Cuyler. One way or another, I'm out of here.” He went into the bedroom, slammed the door and turned the lock. He couldn't look at her, listen to her, for one more second or he'd break. It was all a game, some mind game she was playing to win his trust, and it had been working all too well. Until he'd brought the memory of his mother's death back to burning life, anyway. d.a.m.n Cuyler for making him talk about his mother, for stirring up that old pain, and especially for acting as if she cared. d.a.m.n her.

Chapter Six.

Like a potent corrosive, his rejection burned through her. But he didn't hate her. She knew better. It was in his eyes, in his voice. She was so attuned to his feelings that it was impossible to be fooled by his stubborn resistance. He liked her, in spite of his determination not to. He wanted her, though it went against everything he'd ever believed in. But she also knew that the conflicting emotions were slowly tearing his soul apart. She sensed his every emotion, even the ones he denied; frustration, confusion, anger, desire. Bringing him here, forcing him to see her as she was, instead of as DPI had painted her, was the same as torturing him. It was cruel to put him through this, especially now that she knew where his hatred originated. To see Cuyler as a woman and not a monster was, in Ramsey's mind, to betray his mother. To side with her murderer.

Maybe she ought to just take him back, let him go.

She twisted the doork.n.o.b, freeing the lock with her mind the way Rhiannon had taught her. Ramsey was asleep. He reclined on the bed, his back against the headboard, his head c.o.c.ked to one side until his ear touched his shoulder. He looked as if he'd sat down there with no intention of going to sleep.

Cuyler walked softly to him. Even in sleep, he seemed strained. A slight frown puckered his brows. His lips were tight. His pain showed in his face, a pain he'd felt for a very long time. For a moment, as she looked at him there, she saw the image of the boy he'd been. A boy whose innocence and mischief had been stolen from him along with his mother. A boy forced to become a man before his time, a man who'd forgotten how to love.

She stared at him, sending silent, soothing messages from her mind to his. She focused her energy on relaxing him into a deeper sleep and chasing his worries from his mind the way an autumn wind chases fallen leaves. Then she leaned closer, clasping his st.u.r.dy shoulders and easing him lower until his head rested on the soft pillows and his back wasn't bent so severely. She tugged a blanket from the foot of the bed to cover him. Then she bent and brushed her lips across his, a whisper of a kiss.

When she straightened away from him, his hand reached toward her. He whispered her name.

She ran a hand over his cheek, into his hair. ”I'm here. Rest now. Just rest.”

His body relaxed again, and he sank back into his deep slumber. Cuyler sighed softly, shaking her head in remorse. She couldn't let him go. Not now. DPI had targeted Ramsey for their vile organization from the second his mother had been killed, she was sure of it. They must have known of his anger, his fury and feelings of helplessness. The guilt even a boy of that age would suffer; that he hadn't been there, hadn't been able to help her. Those ruthless men had stoked the fire of Ramsey's anger, built it into the blazing inferno that was rapidly devouring his soul. They were using a young boy's pain as a weapon against Cuyler and her kind. And she couldn't shake the feeling that they intended to use it against Ramsey, as well. DPI would see both of them destroyed unless she could find a way to fight them.

She understood so much more now. But still not enough. There was no explanation for the connection between her and Ramsey. She sensed the solution to all of this hinged on her discovering the cause of that emotional, mental link. And until she did that, despite the pain it caused him, she had to keep Ramsey here, with her.

Ramsey trudged through the snow, half-blinded by the brilliant sun flas.h.i.+ng from its pristine surface into his eyes. He had to find a way out of this mess. He was desperate, and this was his last-ditch effort. There had to be some means of transportation, somewhere. A plane, a snowmobile, something. Clever as she was, Cuyler had probably hidden it a distance from the house to keep him from escaping. He didn't know why he hadn't thought of the possibility sooner.

He hadn't meant to fall asleep. He supposed the stress and sleepless nights were beginning to wear on him. It was only when he woke to see bright winter sunlight slanting through the window that he'd realized just how tired he'd been. Oddly, he felt rested, refreshed even. No dreams, for a change.