The bed giving under a new weight, she mumbles in her sleep.
"Sshh," the answering whisper, "It's me."
Of course. He had been gone this time for... how many weeks? Meetings in Sydney. Acquisitions in Tokyo.
A long arm reaches across to turn her against his long, lean figure where he has stretched out next to her. Another slides easily under her; long fingers mix in her hair, to cradle her head and turn her face into a familiar shoulder. French silk, cold underneath. She shivers and is wound tighter; light breath blows her hair aside.
"Aah." Another false breath against her skin, and a cool face settles in the bend of her neck.
"Alexanderrrr," she mutters and he answers, "Yes," just before the quick sharpness and then a chill mouth attaches to her.
Warm tingling flows through her as she feels she must flow into him. She hears him moan, soft, deep in his throat, hears it from a great distance, a strange crooning that vibrates inside her. "Mmm," she murmurs in turn and is rocked slowly in rhythm to his sounds and her sensations. She frees a hand to stretch flat against his moving back, warming now under the French silk, strange skin she has never seen; she presses tight, as if she might fall. Sometimes, she swears she will.
The electric tingling reaches everywhere in her and, as always, she cannot remember it was ever this intense. The long fingers clench and relax in her hair over and over again. They are both lost. He is neither gentle with her nor brutal. They are intimate in a strange design in which they play equal part, equal only for these few moments of joining.
Reluctant to stop, but slowing instinctively, he withdraws slightly from her. The tip of a now-hot tongue presses into the wounds he has left and he blows softly on the spot, removing all trace. She is still distant, pleasure fading slowly into a languorous haze, and her hand drops from his back.
He is slow to release her, slow to turn her face from his shoulder but when he does her eyes are revealed, half closed, barely focused on his face in the dimness. She frowns, barely, and he answers with a placid stare from cool grey eyes, his mouth still full of the taste of her. She tries to touch his face; he presses a thumb into her palm and her hand is brought down again easily.
Her frown deepens. The pain is vague now, but somehow the memory is sharper than ever. Tears gather in her eyes; his expression does not change. His fingertips slide to her wrist, resting on her pulse beat. As she closes her eyes she feels the warmth slip from under her lashes, down her face. All pleasure is gone now.
"Haven't you seen enough? Taken enough? Leave me with something." She moves her hand from under his.
He leans his face close to hers, one hand still supporting her head so she cannot turn away.
"Look at me," he says.
She doesn't want to, not now. She wants to remain distant, injured. She wants him to be sorry. She knows he will not.
"Look-at-me."
He is quiet, persuasive. She opens her eyes to look into his, cool and not quite empty.
"Shall I leave you with your tears?" he asks. "They are no use to you. Your illusions? I thought you had none."
Her jaw firms under his fingers. "My pain, then."
"Ah, your pain. It's here, I think." He touches her temple, fingers resting again on pulse beat.
"Don't mock me."
"Oh no. Never."
He traces her brow as he continues to stare. She wants him to indulge her tears. Instead he is touching her in a way no other could. The hand moves along her throat, following finding the pulse beat, connecting to her. Her breath hitches, wanting to break.
"Sssh." His fingers pause at the base of her throat. "No more pain, no more fear, all that is done now. Listen," he tells her and when she does she hears her own heartbeat, steady and quiet. "Listen to the life in yourself. Strong..." He presses a finger deeper in her throat. "Very strong. It is all you need."
"I need you Alexander, I don't want to but I need..."
"And here I am, who needs you like no other. I would not be unkind." He picks up a tear on his fingertip, examines it with detachment, and presses it to her lips. "Let that be enough."
He rises from the bed and smooths his clothes, reaching for the formal jacket draped at the foot of the bed. A smile flickers in his face as he looks at her. When she sighs he mimics her.
"Come on," he tells her, tiring of his game of the distant lover. "It's not as bad as all that. Our guests are arriving soon, please meet me in the drawing room in fifteen minutes."
He glides from the room like a shadow glides from a sunbeam. She rises and dresses in one of the many elegant outfits he provides for her. He provides for her, that much is certainly true, but as she gains fine clothes and elegant dinner conversation and protection against all that might threaten her, she feels something else slipping away.
She pauses at the mirror before going downstairs. Funny, he is the vampire but she is the one who seems to be losing her reflection.