Part 11 (1/2)

She relaxed in his arms. And it felt so good, so safe and so perfect there, that she couldn't believe there could be any wrong in it. Being with Michael felt like being reunited with some part of herself that had been missing all her life.

The made love again. Then she needed a food break, and he admitted that he couldn't digest solid food, and that her breakfast had made him violently ill. That he'd forced himself to eat it, knowing how he would suffer, touched her deeply. No matter what else he was, Mary believed that his feelings for her were very real. Then spent the entire night talking, laughing, making love.

And then, finally, he rose and pulled on his clothes as he walked to the front door, gazed out the window.

She stood behind him her hands sliding over his shoulders. Why couldn't he be an ordinary man? Why/ ”I have to leave you, my love. It will be dawn very soon.”

”Why can't you stay here?”

He lowered his eyes. ”I-I can't. I don't want you to see me as I am when I sleep.”

She decided not to argue, although she wanted to 'All right.”

He turned wrapped her up in his arms and kissed her deeply. ”You don't know what it means to me, Mary, that you didn't run from me when I told you what I was. You can't know. Someday... someday I'll tell you. For now-just know that you have restored he pieces of a heart that was shattered. No one else could have done that, but you did.

Tears. There were tears welling up in his eyes. Swimming there, not spilling over-he had too much will to let them spill, she thought.

He stroked her hair. ”Will you still be here when I come back?”

She nodded, looking him straight in the eyes. ”I will. I promise you, Michael, I will. I don't understand any of this, but I want to. And I'm not afraid of you. No matter what you are.”

He averted his eye, blinking rapidly. ”Lock the door behind me.” He glanced up at the sky. It was paling already. And yet he waited.

She knew he was delaying the moment when he would have to leave, to protect her right until he simply couldn't do it any longer. And finally, jut as the first ways of sun lit the sky, he kissed her once more, then opened the door and left at a brisk jog.

Mary watched as he crossed the road and vanished into the copse of woods just beyond. She tried to bank her curiosity, but she couldn't. She didn't fear him, didn't want to run from him. But she had to know. She had to know all of it.

He was long gone, of course, by the time she entered the woods. She already knew how fast he could move. It was no surprise. The woods were till dark; the early shafts of dawn didn't penetrate them. The warmth did, and as the dew-damp ground warmed, it released its moisture in the form of mists that rose from the ground, and swirled around her feet and ankles. There was a path. Difficult to see beyond the writhing silver mists, but there nonetheless.

Mary followed it. It meandered through the woodlot, then ended abruptly at a wide-open field that as dotted with shapes hiding in the food. Too short to be trees.

Perhaps shrubs of some kind. A sound drew her attention, like a door closing, and she whirled toward it but saw only the shape of what appeared to be a miniature house among the shadowy shapes.

Then she squinted as one shape seemed to come clearer. It had wings. Angel's wings. She moved closer, then went stock-still as the rays of the sun burned through the mist and it thinned, and she saw the stones all around her. Tombstones. Monuments.

A stone angel. And the little house? The little house was a crypt.

She was standing in the middle of a cemetery. And unless she was very mistaken, her loved had just entered one of the crypts and closed the door behind him.

Swallowing the urge to turn and run, she reminded herself that this was Michael, her Michael. She had to know where he spent his days.

She forced her feet to carry her closer... closer... to the crypt from whence the noise had come.

And then she stood right before it, staring up at the name engraved at the top. M I C H A E L G R A Y.

Chapter 10.

Mary called ahead, then drove two hours to get to S.I.S., the investigations agency. She had expected an office I a building in a town. The place at which she arrived was none of those things. It was a huge Victorian manor, recently renovated and stunning.

The supernatural investigations racket must be a lucrative one, Mary thought, as she drove Michael's Jag into the driveway and brought it to a stop.

And then she sat there for a couple of minutes, doing what she'd been doing during the entire drive. Wondering if she had lost her mind.

When a person tells you he is a vampire, you should run away. Any sane person would have spent the day putting as many miles between herself and Michael Gray as humanly possible. But no. She must not be sane, because she was up here on a fact- finding mission instead. And she knew exactly what kinds of facts she was hoping to find: facts that would tell her that it was going to be okay. That there could be some kind of future with Michael. That he'd told her everything now; there were no more secrets he was keeping for her. She wanted validation. She wanted to know everything about him.

Yes, she'd been thrown for a loop by what he claimed to be, and by seeing him a crypt with his name on it. And yes, she was scared to death by everything that had happened over the past few days. Not of Michael. Never of Michael. Nothing else that had happened was powerful enough to override the feelings that had been steadily growing inside her from the first time he'd walked into The Crypt.

Last night those feelings had filled her to overflowing. They made her fears and her rational mind tiny by comparison. She didn't want to run away from him. She wanted to stay. Maybe forever.

As she sat there, mulling all that over, the front door opened and a woman with short blond hair and a diamond stud in her nose stepped out onto the front porch, crossed her arms over her chest and tilted her head to one side.

Mary shut the car off and got out.

”Nice wheels,” the woman said. ”I'm Stormy. You must be Mary.”

Mary nodded and walked up the steps to shake her hand. ”Good to finally meet you.”

”You look like h.e.l.l. You okay?”

She ran her handover her neck, where Michael's teeth had pierce her skin. It still tingled there. ”I'm not sure. I think I was bitten by a vampire lat night, but I have no idea what that means.” Stormy held her gaze. ”Well, you're still alive, so I'm guessing it means you had a d.a.m.n good night. Lemme see.” She pushed Mary's hand aside and peered at her neck. ”h.e.l.l, I can't be sure. The punctures heal the minute the sunlight hits them, but sometimes there's a tiny pink spot that gives it away.” She squinted and leaned closer.

”Yeah, there's still a trace.”

Mary closed her eyes. The woman was as matter-of-fact as if she were talking about the weather. ”Then...?”

Story smiled at her. ”You really don't know anything about any of this, do you?”

Mary shook her head.

”Come on come inside and sit down. I'll fix you some tea. Max and Lou will be here any minute.” She took Mary's arm and led her inside.

The foyer was spectacular. It took Mary's breath away, with the crystal chandelier, the antique furniture and the stunning staircase leading up to the second floor.

”We live in the main part of the house. The library serves as our office. Come on, it's right through here..”

She led Mary through a set of double doors and into a library. The room contained two desks. One was neat s.h.i.+ny, nothing but a computer on top. The other held a computer but strewn with file folders and papers and coffee rings, and had a miniature of the Conspiracy Theory movie poster taped to one side. There was a gas fireplace along one wall and comfy-looking leather chairs, a settee and rows and rows and more rows of books lining the walls.

”Have a seat. I'll get the tea. And relax. You're not going to grow fangs or anything fro one vamp bite. All right?”

She couldn't believe the amount of relief that rushed through her at those words the rea.s.surance. G.o.d, to think she had actually been worried about something as far- fetched as-h.e.l.l, everything she'd ever believed to be real and normal and ordinary had been turned inside out in the past few days. She didn't suppose anything was ridiculous at this point.

Story left her in the library, closing the doors behind her. Mary started toward a chair, as instructed, but paused, drawn to the bookshelves as she noticed the t.i.tles on some of the spines. The Kybalion, The Tibetan Book of the Dead, The Key of Solomon the King...

Every book on the shelf had some mystical t.i.tle, and many appeared to be extremely old. There were illuminated ma.n.u.scripts from medieval times, for heaven's sakes.

”I see you appreciate our collection,” a woman's voice said.