Chapter 007
Respect
Friday, February 01, 2008; 3:30 a.m. PST
Josef's Home, Beverly House, Beverly Hills, California
The other night when I was planning to be moving around the house, I wore a t-shirt out of respect for the fact that Beth is now living in the main house and might not be as comfortable as Rider and I am with casual nudity or at least casual partial nudity. However, tonight I'm staying in my bedroom, so I took off the scratchy t-shirt and am only wearing my sleep pants.
I'm propped up in my rarely slept in bed reading my area vampires' claims against other vampires and supernaturals while doing my best not to fall asleep because most of the complaints are petty and stupid. I release a heavy breath and flip to the next page when screaming interrupts my efforts. In the time it takes Beth's heart to beat once, I'm out of my bed, down the hallway, and inside her bedroom.
Despite the pulled blinds and there being no light in the room, I can see her perfectly, lying in her bed tossing and turning and fighting with her covers screaming, "Don't leave me. Don't leave! Stay with me!"
I'm not the only one who came running. Rider arrives a second after I do. I glance at him and tell him, "Thank you for acting so quickly, but I'll take care of her. You go back to whatever you were doing."
He frowns but says, "If either of you needs anything, just holler."
I nod, and he inclines his head before he then strides out of her room at a human pace. My words took less than a second, so I move closer to Beth's bedside while she continues to beg someone, "Please don't leave me! Don't leave! Stay with me! Please, stay!"
Two people in Beth's life have 'left' her in recent times. Despite our certainty that Mick is going to be wishing for death by the time he's caught, I sincerely doubt she's screaming at Mick to stay. There is a certain amount of terror laced into her voice that can only come from watching someone you care about die a violent death. Therefore, I don't need to be a genius to guess that the mystery person that she so desperately wants to stay is her deceased boyfriend that she and Mick couldn't save almost exactly a month ago.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, I brush her hair from her sweaty face and say, "Beth, wake up. It's just a dream."
She keeps twisting and turning in her sleep and begging him to stay with her, so I grab her shoulder and shake her a bit, which causes her to scream a wordless, but ear piercing, yell and sit up in bed clutching her chest as if she's in pain.
I'm pretty sure she doesn't yet realize that I'm here so in a soft voice I ask, "Beth, are you okay?"
Silly question, I know, but I can't bring myself to tell her that everything is okay. Joshua Lindsey is dead, and, in Beth's opinion, that means nothing is okay.
Her head turns sharply to look at me, and her eyes are wide enough that I can see the whites of her eyes all the way around her irises despite the darkness of the room.
It takes a minute for her eyes to finally focus on me but when they do her lip begins to tremble, so I move so that I'm sitting against her headboard and then open my arms and tell her, "Come here, Blondie."
The word 'come' barely leaves my mouth before she flings herself into my arms. Wrapping my arms around her, I kiss the top of her head and tell her, "Shh, you're safe."
She rubs at her watery eyes with one hand and sniffles into my chest before saying, "He's dead."
I give a small nod and exhale deeply before telling her, "If you're referring to your boyfriend, then yes, Mr. Lindsey is dead."
Pulling away a little, she glances up at me and says, "Please call him Josh. I know you didn't know him, but since he died everyone is so formal when they talk about him, even people who knew him."
I lean down and kiss the top of her head before telling her, "Josh then."
After she snuggles back into my chest, she says, "Thank you."
Pausing, she sniffles again before asking, "Did I wake you?"
With a shake my head, and after chuckling lightly, I tell her, "I'm a vampire, Beth. We tend to be awake at night, living by moonlight, and asleep during the day."
Giggling despite her earlier tears, she says, "Duh, I should have known that. Sorry."
I shake my head again and tighten my arms around her small frame before telling her, "You have no reason to apologize."
Her long exhale ghosts over my bare chest before she shifts in my arms and after rubbing her face against my chest she says, "I may not have woken you, but I definitely disturbed you."
I neither confirm nor deny that statement and instead ask her, "Do you want to talk about your dream?"
When she screamed, I didn't stop to throw my t-shirt back on. I just ran to her side, so now when she snuggles in deeper, it's an effort on my part to focus on her words instead of the warm puffs of her breaths blasting across my cool, bare chest.
With a voice that trembles somewhat, she says, "It was just me reliving Josh's murder. I think seeing Dominic dead just brought back memories. I mean I know the deaths were different. Huerta shot Josh three times, severing his carotid and femoral arteries before he died on a dirt road in the middle of Griffith Park. Dominic, on the other hand, died indoors, in a tub of water, and it might even be an accidental death. It was not the bloody, dusty mess that Josh's death was."
She pauses and then squeezes my ribcage tighter and in a soft voice with a slight tremor admits, "There was so much blood when Josh was shot, and afterward I felt like I couldn't get his blood off my hands for weeks. I'd scrub my hands a couple of times a day until they were nearly raw I scrubbed so hard, but the blood wouldn't come off. It's only been in the last week or so that the sensation of bloodied hands has lessened some. Sometimes I can still feel the tackiness of it drying on my skin from after he died, but I think that part of my trauma has mostly been overcome."
After a short pause, she releases a heavy sigh and tells me, "I haven't had nightmares for almost a week now, too. I thought they were gone for good, but Dominic's only the second dead body I've been up close and personal with since Josh died, so I think that's why the nightmare happened tonight."
She shifts her face and gazes at me while still resting her cheek on my shoulder and says, "I really am sorry I disturbed whatever you were doing."
Despite the topic of our conversation her warm breath on my bare skin is wreaking havoc on my libido. Still, I chuckle, and after shifting a little trying to make my quickly tightening sleep pants more comfortable, I tell her, "I was reading complaints made by my vampires against other vampires and supernaturals. Part of my duties as sheriff is mediating between aggrieved parties within the supernatural community and trying to sort out a resolution that is agreeable to all parties involved. I hold office hours to settle disputes the first and third Tuesday of every month. With everything that happened this past week I put off reading the complaints that I'll be dealing with this coming Tuesday, so I was just catching up on that reading. Most of the time I get bored and have to get up and do something else anyway because my vampires are much pettier and more childish than I hope I am."
With a short giggle, she traces an utterly distracting design with the tip of her finger on the skin of my chest, and then says, "You have your obstinate moments Josef, but I would never call you petty or childish."
I grin at that and tell her, "Thank you."
She nods, her hair rubbing along my shoulder and I can feel her lips form a smile against my chest before she says, "You're welcome, Josef."
Pausing, she lifts her head to glance at the clock on the bedside table and then she smiles faintly and asks, "So, technically it's Friday, one day closer to my turning. Have you decided when you're going to turn me?
Shaking my head, I tell her, "We need to solve Dominic's death first. There are way too many vampires involved in this shit storm, so we need to figure out what happened and spin it to avoid the humans asking the wrong questions about the wrong people."
She squeezes her arms around me and then relaxes her hold, so I tell her, "Unless it takes more than our allotted days, you need to stay human long enough to solve this case. If necessary, I might even be able to convince my maker to give us an extension. Your solve rate and the speed with which you tend to solve your cases leads me to believe an extension won't be necessary, but I'll mention it when I speak to Jorge later today to prepare him for the possibility."
After shifting in my arms she asks, "Do you think he'd be willing to grant us an extension? He doesn't seem the type to me."
Laugher bursts out of me at that epic understatement before I tell her, "Oh if it's in the best interest of the community, he'll grant an extension. He'll hate every second of it, but he'll allow it if he thinks you have the best chance of keeping the humans from discovering us before our intended revelation."
She pulls away somewhat and observes me for a couple of seconds before asking, "Um, when do you plan to reveal yourselves? You and my future grandsire have both said later this year, and I think one of you mentioned the summertime, but has an actual date been chosen yet?"
I tighten my hold on her and say, "Yes. If all goes according to plan, we'll hold multiple press conferences after sunset on Friday, May 23rd. The 111th anniversary of the first publication of Bram Stoker's Dracula is on the 26th, so we thought that weekend would be appropriate. It's also Memorial Day Weekend here in the US, so people will have the whole long-weekend to calm themselves before going into work the following Tuesday. We're banking on winning over the Americans and then their acceptance influencing other countries to accept us as well."
She doesn't respond so I shrug and tell her, "Anyway, the most respectable vampires from each state and country will hold a press conference an hour after sunset in their respective time-zones starting with the Eastern Time zone and put their names and faces out there to help the cause. I will, of course, be one of those vampires. Actually, all sheriffs and royals will be the public faces of the community. You, as my childe, will likely be outed fairly quickly, but we'll discuss the finer details of that closer to the revelation."
She doesn't respond verbally and her finger, which has been tracing designs on my bare chest brushes over my nipple. I groan and shift a little again which causes her to glance at me from her place with her cheek pressed against my shoulder. She smirks and asks, "Something wrong, Josef?"
With a chuckle, I tell her, "Not wrong per say, but if you keep playing with fire this evening is going to have a whole different ending, and you won't be getting much more sleep tonight. Given your recent losses, I think it might be wise to hold off on starting any sort of physical relationship until you've been able to properly grieve not just for Josh but for the loss of your relationship with Mick as well."
She shakes her head, and even though she speaks into my chest, I can hear her pout loud and clear when she says, "I'm tired of being sad Josef. I just want to forget."
Her breath is hot against my cold skin to the point that it's beginning to be a little difficult to think straight. To clear the haze in my mind I pull her face off my chest and lean down a little, so I can see her eyes, or more specifically so she can see mine, in the dark and tell her, "Not tonight Beth. You need to heal."
She frowns, shakes her head, and says, "But—"
I interrupt her and shake my head at her while I say, "You can't understand the complexities of a maker/childe relationship just yet but suffice it to say it's an eternal relationship. The good ones flourish and prosper for eternity, and that's what I want with you. I do not want to be your rebound guy, and while I have no problem offering you comfort whenever you need it, I care more for your physical, emotional, and mental well-being than I do about getting off in this moment. As your future maker, I don't think it would be in either of our best interest to go there tonight."
She opens her mouth again, so I place my finger on her lips and tell her, "I'm saying no for tonight, not forever, maybe not even for two days from now, but for tonight the answer is no. I need you to respect that just as you would expect me to respect the word no from any woman, you included. I need you to show me the same respect, can you do that for me, Beth?"
Her mouth closes with an audible snap, and she slowly nods and then after a minute or so of silence she says, "I'm sorry, Josef, that wasn't fair of me."
I squeeze her a touch and say, "Apology accepted, but I think it's just one more clue that it's a bad idea tonight because I know you well enough to know that if you were thinking clearly without guilt and grief coloring your view, you wouldn't have pressed me when I said no."
She snuggles into my chest and effectively buries her face back into my chest. I can feel the heat of her blush rising in her cheeks against my shoulder, so I just hold her and let her hide her embarrassment to the best of her ability.
Soon after, her breathing evens out, and she snores every now and then, so I shift us so that we're laying down and continue to hold her until I need to go to rest in my freezer.
I'm awoken a few hours later by my internal warning system alerting me of the sun's imminent rising. If I have to guess, I'd say the sun will be breaching the horizon in about half an hour. I turn my head a tad and glance at the clock on the table beside the bed. It's 6:19 a.m. and my belief is correct because sunrise is at 6:50 this morning.
Beth drew the curtains in the bedroom before going to bed, and there is a special film treatment on every window in the house so that the sunlight won't affect me, so I just stay snuggled up with Beth in my arms.
It's been almost 53 years, April 28, 1955, to be specific, since I last lay in a bed with a human just holding them while they slept. Oh, I've fucked probably thousands of human women since then, some of them in beds, but holding them while they slept? Only Sarah and now Beth have ever had that privilege while still human. Everyone else either left before sleeping became an issue or I left once they fell asleep.
Laying here holding Beth while she's so vulnerable is a unique experience for me. She's warm in ways I honestly can't remember having been myself it was that long ago. Her chest rises and falls with every precious breath and every couple of minutes her arms tighten around me before loosening back to their previous hold.
I could kill her without even trying, especially while she's asleep and she is fully aware of that fact, and yet she's sleeping in the arms of a known killer like it's the safest place for her to be. That's pretty accurate because the last thing I want is for her to die permanently. However, she seems to be sleeping better with my arms and hands holding her tightly than she did while in her bed alone.
These hands have killed hundreds of thousands of humans in my long life, and she's finding comfort from their tight hold. These hands that have inflicted immeasurable pain and caused nightmares for thousands are so far as I can tell keeping her nightmares away for the night.
I rest my chin on top of her head and breathe in her unique scent. It's always smelled somewhat off to me like someone altered it, but I've never encountered that before, so I don't know what it means. You can't change scents to my knowledge, cover them up, sure, but alter them, not in my experience. Still, the smell of her lavender and vanilla bathing products hardly manages to cover up the underlying aroma of the forest after a spring rain, and it brings me comfort and the long almost forgotten memories of my siblings laughing and running while we played in the woods beside our village.
I can remember my brothers' and sisters' names, but their faces are harder to remember. I was only 12 and human when I last saw them, so I hadn't received eidetic memory by becoming a vampire yet.
Beth's scent in my nose makes their fuzzy faces just a little bit clearer, and I struggle to push away the cobwebs from my human memories and sharpen up the images.
I'm brought out of my memories and my marginally successful attempt at remembering forgotten details about my brothers and sisters 40 minutes later, when the alarm goes off and Beth, barely awake, reaches over me and slaps at the clock. It turns itself off for the time being, and she snuggles deeper into my arms.
After kissing the top of her head, I ask, "Good morning sleepy head. Did you have better dreams the second go around?"
Her silky tresses rub against my chest when she shrugs, and then she glances at me through the curtain of her messy hair and says, "Yes, I don't remember dreaming while you were holding me."
I smile before I tell her, "Good, I didn't think you had any bad dreams, but I thought it best to double check. I want you to let me know if you continue to have trouble sleeping."
She lifts her head from its resting place on my shoulder and even though I'm sure her human eyes are having difficulty seeing me in the low light her eyes still focus on mine before she asks, "Do vampires dream?"
A chuckle rumbles in my chest before I tell her something Mick might prefer she not know, "I've been known to dream on occasion, usually of my human family back before my father died, and I know Mick has a recurring dream. In the dream, he explains himself to a blonde reporter and tells her all about vampires in an exclusive interview."
Her head pops off my chest, and it takes her a minute to focus on my face but when she does her brow furrows, and she frowns before asking, "Seriously?"
I wiggle my eyebrows and tell her, "Seriously. It began around the time you joined the school paper in high school, and to my knowledge, it persisted at least until you discovered our secret. He hasn't mentioned having it since shortly after you saved his life and caught him feeding to heal his wounds, but I know he had it every couple of days before he re-met you at the Design Center Fountain, and then after that, he had it every day until you two began hunting Pollock."
Her eyes droop, but I imagine if she were more awake they'd be wide open at that news. She shakes her head somewhat and says, "Mick has deep-seated issues. It's not just me who sees that, right?"
I just blink a few times and then take in a deep, heavy breath before telling her, "He does have incredibly deep-seated issues. I, um, I don't have enough time right now to tell you his whole story before you need to get up and go to work, but he was a medic in the Second World War, and it messed with him. His whole unit except his best friend died in a patrol gone terribly wrong. I just found out recently that for a while he thought his best friend had died, too, and that messes with your head, even after you discover the person is alive. Throw in that he fell in love with his best friend's wife and had an affair with her while they thought the friend was dead and it completely warped him."
I tighten my arms around her a touch and say, "By the time he met Coraline he had had an unbelievably long string of one-night stands, and he was immediately drawn to her, and she knew that. He loved her, though, or at least the her that she let him see."
Beth nods causing her silken hair to run along my bare shoulder before I let go of a harsh breath and tell her, "I was at the party when they first met, and, as I told you last night, I felt the pull to him. Unfortunately, I was so focused on my upcoming sabbatical and getting out of L.A. that I didn't really recognize the feeling for what it was, so I flew to New York shortly afterward. Therefore, I didn't witness much of their courting, but I've heard enough from both Mick and others who were there to know that Coraline played him like a fiddle."
I give a gentle shake of my head and then say, "Don't get me wrong, I think she loved and still loves him. However, I don't think she knows how to love someone in a healthy way. Anyway, she pulled his strings, and he thought it was a forever kind of love and clearly so did she."
She shifts in my arms but doesn't verbally respond, so after tightening my hold on her even more, I tell her, "How she went about turning him and telling him she was a vampire was obviously the wrong way to do it. I think that he would have reacted much more favorably if she had sat him down before they got married and explained everything much like he did with you after you discovered our secret. In fact, he'd probably still be a vampire, only willingly, and would still be happily married to her, or at least as happy as a woman who enjoys toying with men would allow her husband to be."
Shifting somewhat with Beth in my arms, I pause for a moment and then say, "The point is her being a vampire and her turning him without his knowledge or consent would not have been the cause of their break up, and I think they would have been as happy as they could be for a time. But she turned him in the middle of lovemaking without warning him, and when he woke, it was with a thirst no amount of water could quench."
She seems to sense my desire not to tell her this next part, but I did promise, so after she tightens her arm around me, offering comfort in her own way, I tell her, "Remember, I wasn't here yet, but by Mick's own account he would starve himself until his body knew it was feed or die time. Then after days of not feeding, he'd go on a rampage and kill whole slews of people. He was probably even more prolific than Pollack and Mineo combined. Actually, I know he was. He didn't kill every day, but for just about two and a half years every three or four days his body would force him to hunt, and he'd just randomly attack people and drain a whole string of strangers before denying himself all over again and restarting the cycle."
She's quiet, but she squeezes me a little, so I tell her, "I was despondent right after Sarah didn't wake. I didn't break out of my depression until about a month later when I got a call from Alistair Rodriguez, the King of California, asking me to come back to his state and figure out who was slaughtering humans left and right in my old area. The vampire standing in for me as sheriff while I took the much-needed break was having no luck, and he didn't know much, but he knew that they needed help. All they did know for sure was that whoever was responsible was a vampire and not hiding his murders from the humans."
I shift Beth in my arms slightly and then tell her, "I needed to get out of New York and move on with my life, so I arranged for nurses to tend to Sarah around the clock and then I flew back here. Once I arrived, it took me less than 72-hours to notice a pattern, so I easily followed the trail of bodies back to Mick and Coraline. When I realized what she had done, I told him in no uncertain terms that if he fed on a regular basis, he would not have to kill to feed. She never told him that, so he had no clue."
Beth huffs and says with a bit of bite in her voice, "Just another reason to hate the bitch. She forced him to become a killer simply by leaving essential information out."
I run my hand through her hair before saying, "You're absolutely correct. Mick probably wouldn't have killed anyone if she'd done things properly and certainly not the number of deaths he wound up causing in those first almost two and a half years."
She traces a figure eight on my chest over and over, so I squeeze her gently and then relax my hold before saying, "When I reported the issue to the king, he first asked me if I was coming back to work for him. When I told him that I was ready to resume my position, he asked me if I'd be willing to teach Mick, and when I agreed, Mick promised to try to learn from me."
I exhale deeply, shift my hold on her again, and lean down kissing the top of her head before saying, "And it worked, too. Mick stopped killing humans without provocation, and we quickly became best friends. I was an active sheriff for almost 5,000 years straight, having served under six different Royals in that time, and with only short breaks in between jobs. Between August of 1952 and early June of 1955, I took a break from being sheriff of Area Two, but I resumed my duties here about a week after I got back to L.A. because the vampire standing in for me decided he'd had enough of being in charge and needed a break too."
She lifts her head from my shoulder where it was resting and quirks an eyebrow at me before asking, "He was acting sheriff for just under three years, and he needed a break? How many breaks have you taken in 5,000 years?"
I chuckle and tell her, "Some people just aren't built to be a sheriff and he is one of them. As for how many breaks I've taken, I think in five millennia I've taken a grand total of 100 years off from being a Sheriff. Usually, I plan to take a decade off and then three or four years into my sabbatical I end up resuming my duties because not being a sheriff is terribly boring to me. Of course, I do take vacations and have taken several centuries worth of vacation time, but during my vacations, I was still the sheriff and mostly kept up-to-date about what was going on in my area even while I was away. The century of time off was different because I officially named someone else as the temporary sheriff, or my king did anyway. Like I said, some vampires aren't meant to be sheriff. You're either a sheriff for centuries, or millennia in my case, or you last no more than a decade before you and your royal decide someone else needs to be in charge."
She grins and says, "I figured if you've been a sheriff for 5,000 years, that it must suit you."
A bark of laughter escapes me at that understatement, and then I tell her, "It really does. Anyway, back to Mick. Between mid-1955 and early 1985, Mick fed on freshies daily and things were good, incredible even. He didn't starve himself, so I don't think he killed a single human in that entire time. Then one fateful night in mid-January of 1985 a young widow showed up on his doorstep. Her daughter was missing, and he knew the moment he stepped into your bedroom that Coraline had taken you. The thought of a child turning because of him sickened him, so he tracked her down and killed her, or as you know tried to anyway. Then, once you were safe, he stopped feeding on freshies and started only feeding on bags of dead blood. He won't even drink donated blood from living people, only blood from corpses, which is disgusting in most cases."
I release a gust of air and brush my hand over her bare arm and then tell her, "I never could get him to explain why he refused to drink fresh after he saved you. Occasionally, I'd sneak a few drops of fresh blood into whatever he was drinking, and he'd always smell it before he got any into him, and he'd put the glass aside and not drink from it. That both reassured me that he still had proper vampire senses but concerned me because vampires can't go on forever drinking dead blood. Anyway, I'm sure his unwillingness to drink fresh blood has something to do with his self-image and the fact that he sees himself and the rest of us as monsters, but he's refused to explain himself the few times I've asked."
She squeezes me a little, so I say, "So, yes, he has issues, but only some of them are caused by the circumstances surrounding his being a vampire. Some of them like the reason Coraline was able to draw him into her web in the first place and the fact that he could never completely cut her loose stem from other traumas that have nothing to do with how Coraline turned him. Don't get me wrong, betrayal like that on your wedding night by the woman you love would fuck with the strongest of psyches, but it's only one source of his problems."
She moves her head up and down causing her hair to slide across my bare shoulder again, which is entirely distracting. I force myself to focus and tell her, "I will require you to feed on freshies. A snack from a bag or bottle, be it human or synthetic, every now and then is okay but nothing resembling a habit. Know that the few times you do drink bottled, I will encourage you to avoid dead blood because that sustains us even less than fresh bottled blood."
She squeezes me in response, so I tell her, "However, not feeding live daily makes it harder to control your urges and your emotions. The risk is too great, especially for a newborn, and with the fact that we'll be revealing ourselves soon, public scrutiny will be deep and searching, so we need to avoid accidents as much as possible. The Cleaners should have no problem continuing to erase the occasional mistake, but I'd prefer to avoid you accidentally killing someone. You're not built for killing Beth, and I'd rather keep from turning you into a cold-blooded killer."
She snuggles in closer and says, "Thank you for that, and thank you for telling me about Mick. I don't want to hurt anyone, but if I understand correctly we, or you, can feed without killing, yes?"
With a stroke of my hand along her side, I rest my hand over hers on my chest and tell her, "Yes."
She smiles at me and finishes by saying, "Then I want to learn how to live feed without hurting anyone."
After kissing the top of her head, I tell her, "Then that is what I will teach you."
She lifts her head off my shoulder and looks at me before she asks, "What's synthetic? I didn't think it had been accomplished yet."
Now, it's my turn to trace figure eights on her bare shoulder before telling her, "Vampires have recently, as in the last three months, managed to create synthetic blood that can sustain us for a while. Yakonomo Corporation, the company who will begin producing and bottling synthetic blood for vampire consumption, will be announcing the successful creation of synthetic blood on Wednesday of next week. Anyway, because I am part owner of the company with a few other key members of my Grandsire's Bloodline I know that the trials have shown successful use in blood transfusions for humans, and it will curb a vampire's need to live feed for a short while. We plan to lead humans to believe that we can survive on synthetic alone. However, it's not true, especially for newborns. They need real, preferably fresh, blood fairly often."
She lifts her head once more to gaze at me, causing her silky hair to slide over my bare shoulder again before she says, "Oh, okay. Good to know."
The last word crosses her lips about half a second before her alarm goes off again, so I reach over and turn it off and tell her, "Time to get up. You have damage control to work on."
She groans but sits up, and after wiping the sleep from her eyes, she says, "Stupid Simone. If she didn't kill Dominic, then she's not very bright because she was soaking wet, which means she at least tried to get him out of the tub instead of calling for help."
I chuckle despite the topic at hand before I tell her, "I'm beginning to question her intelligence for myself, and will likely sever ties with her soon, but first we need to figure out who, if anyone, killed Dominic and steer the cops away from all of the vampires in attendance."
She shrugs one elegant shoulder, so I sit up, too, and tell her, "I'll have my car bring you to the Criminal Courts Building, and the driver will stay there and be at your disposal all day in case you need to go anywhere. I imagine you'll want to talk to Emma and Jackson, so I'll call them and warn them that you're coming and that you're to be my childe as soon as we clean up this mess. If they don't cooperate, call me, and I'll command them as their sheriff to be as helpful as they can be. While it won't hold the same weight as a command from a maker, it will convince them that I'm serious and that they need to take you just as seriously."
She doesn't respond and instead stretches before climbing over me and getting out of bed. I grab her hand when she passes me and tell her, "I want Alejandro to go with you like he did yesterday. He doesn't leave your side unless you go into the bathroom and you only go in there after he clears it."
She turns and stares at me, and with a frown on her face she shakes her head, squeezes my hand, and says, "Josef, do you really think that's necessary? Do you really think someone is going to try to kidnap me from the Los Angeles Criminal Courts Building?"
Swinging my legs over the side of the bed, I turn and face her. Still holding her hand, I pull her into the 'V' between my legs and then let go of her hand and place my hands on her hips before I gaze up at her and say, "Beth, I don't know that anyone is going to try anything. However, I wouldn't be doing my best to protect you if I leave it to chance. Quite frankly, you and your safety are worth too much to me for me to leave anything to chance."
She frowns but doesn't argue, so I incline my head and tell her, "If you care about your own safety at all, I need you to let me do my job as your future maker. Let me do everything in my power to keep you safe so that we can both survive to see another day and if I'm very good at my mission, spend centuries and eventually millennia together."
She leans down and kisses my cheek and says, "Okay, Josef, I won't argue or be difficult."
I smile and tell her, "Thank you, Childe."
She shakes her head and says, "No, thank you, Josef. I realize I'm being far more trouble than I'm worth, and you're making no complaints and doing everything you can to keep me safe. I know I thanked you for helping Mick save me from Anders and for being willing to turn me, but I haven't said thank you for protecting me from Mick, so thank you."
She pauses and then with furrowed brow asks, "God, how messed up is it that you need to protect me from Mick? I mean, it's Mick. He wouldn't hurt me."
I pull on her hips and move her so that she's sitting on my knee. Using my hand, I turn her chin and gaze into her watery eyes before telling her, "Beth, I know this is difficult for you in multiple ways, but if Mick kidnaps you, a blood-hunt will be called on both of you. You won't get a chance to state your case either because you're human. They would capture him and try him publicly, but they would kill you, and he wouldn't even know it until it was too late. While he wouldn't actively try to hurt you and I fully believe he thinks he's protecting you, he's not protecting you at all. He's putting you in danger. He's just making matters worse, and deep down he knows that, but he's so blinded by his belief that we're monsters that he can only focus on you not becoming one of us."
She's frowning, and I can smell the salt of her unshed tears, so I stroke her cheek with one hand and tell her, "Mick's not thinking clearly. If he were, he wouldn't have run, and he would do whatever possible to keep you safe, but his words to me Wednesday night before you came home show me that he's not even remotely thinking clearly. He said it himself when he asked me if I really thought he was going to stand by and let me destroy your life. I tried to explain that I wasn't destroying it but rather saving it and that if you don't turn, you will die and that would definitely destroy your life. However, he blew my words off, and I don't think Mick can see the stark difference between dead and undead right now. At the very least he's considering dead to be the better prospect when, in reality, it's the worse choice."
She sniffles and reaches up and wipes a tear away while I use my thumb to dry the other cheek of her tears before I say, "I know you love him and I know you trust him, but right now, he's a threat to you. What's worse, he's still in the wind and other than a brief stop at a bank in San Diego we don't know where he is or who he might have enlisted to help him carry out any plans he might have in the works. I've asked my maker to alert me to anything his people discover during their investigation, and I have Rider doing his own investigation into Mick's cyber trail, but that means that until he's caught and we know everything that Mick has put in place, you need to let Alejandro be your shadow. At least until I'm certain Mick and anyone working for him is no longer a threat to you."
She still has tears running down her cheeks, so I reach up and wipe the tears off her face with my thumbs again before kissing the side of her head and telling her, "I'm sorry that Mick is essentially the enemy right now. I know in your head and heart he's your guardian angel, but for the immediate future, he's the threat. I wish I could talk some sense into him, but I'm fairly sure it's going to take a century, at least, of him and Celeste butting heads before he might begin to see himself and other vampires clearly."
She quirks an eyebrow and asks, "He's right, though, not all vampires are like you and him. They kill Willy Nilly, or am I wrong?"
Frowning somewhat, I tell her, "You're right. There are a lot of vampires that don't value human life. I'd even go so far as to say that I don't value human life the same way Mick does, but what he, and perhaps you, aren't realizing is that humans aren't these pure, saintly creatures. You've got good and decent ones, and you've got evil ones, and then you've got the overwhelming majority somewhere in the middle. I'd argue that the same is true of vampires. The only difference is that the old vamps like Jorge, Celeste, and me come from more violent times so the standards of living and dying were different and some of us have a tough time shifting to the more modern ways of dealing with our disputes. That's especially true because it's true of all the old vampires and we're the ones that control things, so the community still does things the old ways because why fix something that still works."
My chestnut eyes meet her cobalt ones, and then I tell her a closely guarded secret, "Despite what others, including Mick, think, I don't go around killing indiscriminately. I'd even say that most vampires don't do that, but we, for the most part, realize that humans are just as capable of evil as vampires are. Hitler and his army of SS officers, except for one specific pack of weres, were human. Stalin and Saddam Hussein were human, too. The horrors of Sarajevo and more recently in places like the Sudan were all perpetrated by humans."
She doesn't say anything, so I incline my head at her and say, "Most of the creatures that commit large-scale evil in this world are human, not supernatural. Mick seemingly forgets that of the four or five horrible crimes he's attempting to solve at any given time, three, sometimes four, of them were committed not by vampires but by humans."
Her eyes widen at that, so I say, "It's true, there have even been occasions when all of his cases had human criminals behind them. I will admit that there is almost always a vampire or other supernatural in my area that's committing a crime of some sort. However, most of his cases involve human monsters, not supernatural ones."
She tilts her head to the side and just stares at me for a minute. I give her the time to absorb what I just said and then she nods slowly and tells me, "I understand what you're saying Josef, I really do, and I get that Vampires aren't the only monsters in the world. What I don't understand, is if you don't value human life the same way Mick does then why are you working so hard to keep me safe? You don't owe me anything, and yet you're going out of your way to make sure I live to see another day. What makes me matter when the rest don't seem to matter to you at all?"
I smile gently before trying my best to explain something that's exceedingly difficult to put into words, "Why do humans fall in love, like what makes one human fall in love with person B instead of person C? Certain people just mesh and complement each other better than others. The same is true for vampires. It's just slightly more pronounced with us. In my long life, I've been something resembling friends with somewhere between 1,000 and 1,200 humans, but most of those friendships were superficial, and many of them didn't know what I am."
I shrug and tell her, "I've liked, respected, and trusted about five dozen of those thousand humans enough to offer immortality to them. I'll be honest, that estimation is probably a little on the low side compared to the reality of it, but it's still barely a fraction of the humans I've encountered in my long life."
With a tiny shake my head, I say, "I got along with each of them better than I get along with most. I knew almost immediately that I could spend forever knowing them and not end up hating them at some point. I know in my soul that I won't hate you either and because the number is so low compared to the number of humans I've met in approximately 5,408 years, I've learned to value those who are good matches with me. I value them, and I almost always offer to turn them. Not all of them agree, not even most agree, in fact out of more than 60 humans whom I've offered to turn I only turned 14 of them, well, 15 if you count Mick. The point is, I almost always offer."
She tilts her head to the other side but she's got a soft smile on her face, so I kiss her forehead and then say, "You are one of those humans, and the only reason I hadn't offered already is that I knew it would destroy my relationship with Mick and possibly cost him his life. However, as I said the other night, I was slowly getting to the point that I would have gone over his head or otherwise schemed a way to get you turned. I wasn't particularly picky about who had to be your maker. I just knew you are meant to be eternal."
Her eyes widen at that, so I take her hand and squeeze it gently before then telling her, "Don't misunderstand me, in my mind, the ideal situation was always me being your sire, in part because I would have felt a hole where our bond is if Mick had turned you. However, I knew deep down that the important thing was making sure that if you were willing, you would last for all of eternity. And for the record, I've never felt the pull and had the person refuse my offer. The only ones who ever turned me down were humans I didn't feel the pull towards, so I was fairly sure that if I asked, you would say yes."
She grins so I smile back and tell her, "Now, I've finally made the offer to you, and you've accepted. That makes you even more valuable to me than if you had said no because now you've agreed to know me for eternity, and I'll be damned if anyone is going to prevent that from happening. Now that you've accepted my offer, only one or both of us dying will keep me from turning you."
She kisses my cheek, so I squeeze her hip and tell her, "As for keeping you safe, Beth, it's my honor and privilege to keep you safe. Remember what I said about vampires and those they consider theirs?"
She tilts her head and has a gentle grin on her face, so I continue explaining myself, "Well, Mick may consider you his, but I consider you mine. Plus, now that Jorge has ruled that I must turn you, the rest of the community considers you mine as well. Furthermore, childer and future childer are in a special category all their own. Once you agreed to become my childe, the value I placed on your life increased exponentially. It was already high to begin with, or I wouldn't have wanted to turn you in the first place, but now you are mine in a way that only 15 others ever have been before. As I've said before, above all else, I protect those that are mine to the best of my ability, and that's especially true for my childer."
I exhale a loud breath and then show her an open and festering wound that I've had for more than 52 years now, "The last time I didn't properly protect someone, Sarah didn't wake up, and I'm not willing to lose you, too, so I'm going to do everything I possibly can to protect you. That means Alejandro goes everywhere with you until I've turned you. And I'll be honest, once I turn you, I'm going to be stuck to you like glue, or, rather, you'll be stuck to me. In the first few decades, neither of us will want to be too far from the other, so you won't be going too many places by yourself and definitely not before you're a vampire."
She grins but says, "Sarah wasn't your fault, Josef. You told me her doctor prescribed medicine with silver in it. That's not your fault. I don't know what's in 99% of the things that my doctor tells me to take so how could you expect you, who isn't even human, to know every ingredient of every drug a human might take."
I shake my head faintly, so she sighs and says, "While we're on the subject, I know Sarah doesn't blame you either. She loved you like no other, and she knows you loved her. I'm sure of it. It was in every word she wrote. It was a terrible accident, but it wasn't really anyone's fault, and if it takes me the rest of forever, I will get you to see and know that in the deepest parts of your soul."
I smile at that because if anyone has a chance of convincing me that Sarah's coma isn't my fault, it's probably the woman sitting on my lap right now. I don't tell her that, though. Instead, I tighten my hold on her hip just a bit, so she says, "As for you protecting me, I already said that I won't argue or be difficult, and I'm going to try really hard not to go back on either of those statements. So, I'll just say thank you for caring about me over all the other humans you've ever met."
Smirking I tell her, "It's purely selfish, Beth. I just don't want to live in a world where Beth Turner no longer exists. Therefore, I am going to do everything in my power to make sure that horrible future never comes true, even if it means losing my best friend, at least for a while. We're eternal and forever is a long time, so I have high hopes that eventually he'll forgive me."
She shrugs noncommittally, and her scowl clearly tells me that she doesn't think that I'm the one who needs forgiving, so I squeeze her hip again and say, "I'm working under the assumption that once he sees that I've kept my promises to him, he'll forgive me at least a little. When he sees that I'm making sure that you don't follow in our newborn footsteps by creating massacres, I'm hoping that he'll slowly begin to realize that I was serious when I said I wasn't ruining your life but rather saving it. It's a long shot that he'll ever truly forgive me, but I'm willing to live with that so long as you continue to exist."
She tilts her head and then ducks it down a little and kisses me quickly on the lips before pulling back with wide round eyes. After a moment of staring at me, she brings her hand to her lips and rubs them before a somewhat dazed smile spreads across her face.
After a moment of just staring at me her grin fades somewhat and she tells me, "I don't think you're the one in need of forgiveness, but I know you love him, so I hope he forgives you. Once they capture him, and it's safe, and you and Celeste decide our seeing each other won't undermine what you're teaching us, then I'll do my best to show him that just because I'll be a vampire that doesn't mean that anything other than my diet has changed."
I squeeze her hip once more with my hand that's resting there and then help her stand before telling her, "That's probably the one thing that will win him over more than time alone."
She grins so I grab her hand and squeeze gently in reply and then say, "It's getting late, and you still aren't even dressed yet."
She leans in and then kisses my cheek this time before letting go of my hand and rushing over to the closet, going into it, and then coming out a moment later with her clothes for the day and striding towards the bathroom.
I take that as my cue and leave the room, so she can get ready for the day ahead.
I go to my bedroom, and I throw on a t-shirt, grab the paperwork still lying on my bed, and then I head to my office a few doors down to finish reading the reports I never finished reading last night, but not until after I call Alejandro.
I met Alejandro Diego Rojas in Guatemala in 1547, three years after he turned. He's been my friend ever since, and for the last 400 years, he's been my go-to bodyguard whenever I have a human that needs protecting for whatever reason.
He picks up on the first ring, and I don't even get to say hello before he tells me, "Good morning, Sheriff. I'm planning to meet Ms. Turner at your house in about 30 minutes. Does that work for you or do you need me sooner?"
I laugh and tell him, "Hello to you, too."
He chuckles back but doesn't apologize and, honestly, I don't expect him to, so I tell him, "That should work."
I can hear the smile in his voice when he says, "Then tell her that I'll be waiting by the limo."
With a sharp nod even though he can't see it, I tell him, "I will, thank you."
He chuckles again and says, "But of course, Josef. I know how rare it is for you to turn a human. Although this one is ostensibly being forced on you by your maker, I, and every other vampire in attendance last night heard you say that you chose her to be your childe long before the Magister intervened. We all heard, clear as day, that the only reason you hadn't already claimed her for yourself is St. John's previous claim on her and your well-known attachment to him. Your compatibility with Ms. Turner is obvious to anyone who pays attention. The two of you seem to click in ways I don't think you have with anyone else, not even your previous childer. Therefore, I'm ignoring the Magister's involvement in all of this and am treating Ms. Turner like the other humans you wanted me to protect."
I merely say, "Good."
He drops the subject after that and asks, "If there's nothing else, Josef, I need to finish getting ready, so I can be there in time to pick up your future childe."
After I shift in my seat, I tell him, "That is all."
We say goodbye, and I sit back and read the reports until Beth stops into my office 45 minutes later. She's wearing a grey fitted dress jacket that hugs her curves and black slacks. It's too bad that the shell she's wearing under her coat hides her cleavage because I desperately wouldn't mind seeing some of her milky curves that I got a peak of last night while she was wearing her crimson dress.
Alas, it's not meant to be, so I smile at her when she says, "Okay, I'm heading out if I can find the front door. It took me 12 minutes, multiple empty rooms, a U-turn, and directions from Rider to find you."
I laugh, and after putting down the papers I was reading, I ask, "Would you like an escort to the front door?"
She gives a gentle nod, so I rise from my chair, and after grabbing my phone off the desk, I stroll to the door before motioning for her to precede me out into the hallway. When I step through the doorway, I smirk and tell her, "Turn left."
She does so, and after I place my hand on the small of her back, I tell her, "The main house is basically an 'H' shape with four floors. You have two long corridors that have shorter corridors at the ends of them pointing in and out of the 'H' like in a Serif Typeface. Another corridor connects the main two corridors in the middle and is shorter than the legs of the 'H' but longer than the serifs. You just need to figure out which corridor and floor has which rooms."
She narrows her eyes and says, "I might need to use a string like in the labyrinth. I'll tie it along all the paths I might need to take but make each string a different color instead of just red so that I can just follow the one that goes where I need to go. Maybe I'll even make a list of which color goes where that I can keep in my pocket."
I chuckle and ask, "You got the idea from the myth because I don't recall that being in the movie?"
She stops walking and turns wide eyes on me and then nods slowly before asking, "You saw that movie?"
I stop walking too and snicker before saying, "Rider has an unhealthy obsession with David Bowie, so, yes, I was forced to watch the movie."
She giggles and says, "Ooh, I love Bowie. I'll have to compare my interests with Rider's interests. We might have stuff in common, and we can drag each other to those sorts of things instead of making you sit through whatever."
I grin and tell her, "He'd love that, and you might actually have quite a bit in common with him from what I know of you, so that would be fabulous, and I'm certainly not going to do anything to discourage you from forming a sibling bond with Rider, or any of my other childer for that matter."
She snorts and says, "And you certainly won't discourage anything that prevents you from having to watch or do things that don't interest you. Although you get bonus points for having gone and watched Labyrinth with Rider even though you clearly didn't want to."
I smile and tell her, "I care about all my childer. I wouldn't have offered to turn them if I didn't, and I try to stay involved in their lives and do things together that interest them whenever possible, even if it doesn't necessarily interest me."
She grabs my hand and squeezes before saying, "I'm really happy that you're the one who will turn me. I don't think things would turn out so well if Mick were going to be my maker. I'm lucky it'll be you."
I lift our still joined hands and bring them to my lips before kissing the back of her hand and then tell her, "I don't think you're the only lucky one in this situation."
A blush rushes over her cheeks, but she nods, so I squeeze her hand and tell her, "Going back to navigating the house, our rooms and Rider's rooms are on the third floor. My suite of rooms is on the outside of the 'H.' My office is attached to the sitting room that's connected to my bedroom. All three rooms have doors out in the hallway, so my office is the second door down from my bedroom door, which is almost parallel to your room. If you take a right out of your room and walk until you get to the next hallway and then go to the end of that and take a left, you'll find my bedroom four doors down and the office two more doors down from that. Rider's rooms are on the opposite side of this hallway, and his bedroom is two more doors down from my office, and then his office is the second door down from that. However, to get to this corridor, you must pass several of the many stairwells to get to the ground floor, but most of them are behind doors so they might be difficult to find until you're familiar with the setup of the house. The main stairs lead directly to the front door, though."
She narrows her eyes even more and frowns, so I tell her, "We've passed six doors, and now we turn into the other corridor." We walk for a minute, and then I tell her, "See? There are the main stairs."
I lead her down the stairs, but then I steer her away from the front door towards the kitchen and tell her, "First you need to eat."
She jerks her head from side to side, so I shake mine back at her and say, "You will have another long and trying day sorting through all the vampires involved in your case. Trust me, we're a trying lot as a rule so…" Pushing through the door to the kitchen I rarely enter, I interrupt myself and say, "Hello, Susan."
My head cook smiles at us, and says, "Good morning, Sir, I assume Miss Beth would like some breakfast before starting her day."
I don't give my stubborn future childe a chance to say no and instead tell Susan, "Yes, she would. What smells so delicious? Is it something that she can have for breakfast?"
Susan turns to the oven and pulls out two cookie sheets with half a dozen coffee mugs on each of them that all have some sort of bread popping out of them. I don't get to ask what it is again before Beth bounces on her toes and says, "Oh, Popovers. Josef, I think I'm suddenly hungry for breakfast after all."
Chuckling, I tell her, "Good. While you eat, I'll just step out and call Jackson and Emma and see when they might be available to fit you in."
She nods, so I go out into the hallway and place my call. The phone rings three times before a muffled and sleepy voice says, "This better be good, I still have half an hour before I need to be awake."
Chuckling I tell him, "Jackson, it's Josef. I apologize for the early call."
I hear fabric rustling before he says, "Josef? No, it's no problem, I assume you're calling about last night. What do you need? Whatever it is if I can give it, I will."
I smile and tell him, "Thank you, Old Friend. I know you met her briefly while she was making her rounds with the A.D.A., but I didn't get a chance to formally introduce you to my future childe last night. Her name is Beth Turner. As you might have surmised, she works for the D.A.'s office and will be trying to sort this matter out without allowing the humans to discover our existence before the planned revelation."
He says, "Yes, of course, I assume she needs to talk to Emma or me?"
Even though he can't see it, I grin at his willingness to cooperate and tell him, "Yes, she's the new Area Two Investigator. It's unofficial for now, but once she turns and acclimates to life as a vampire, I'll make the official announcement. In the meantime, I want you to treat her with the utmost respect."
I can hear the smile in his voice when he says, "We may not have gotten to formally meet her last night, but every vampire there heard her conversations with you and your maker, and we all saw and heard her make the infamous North American Magister laugh like a schoolboy. Anyone who has won him over while still human must be quite something else, so we would have treated her with respect anyway."
He pauses then says, "Hold on a second. Emma is looking through her date book. I have a meeting with a possible new client, and I'm guessing it will take most of the morning, so Emma will be the easiest of the two of us to reschedule her appointments to fit Ms. Turner in."
I hear Emma say, "I'm free from 10 a.m. until 1 p.m. and if that doesn't fit her availability have her call and I'll move a few meetings around."
I smile, and after Jackson repeats what his wife said, I tell them both, "I will tell her and give her your numbers to reach you directly if she needs a different time."
Jackson says, "Of course, Josef, whatever she needs."
That causes a grin to spread across my face before I tell him, "Thank you, Jackson."
He chuckles and says, "It's no problem. I'm jealous that Emma will get a formal introduction before I do."
I laugh at that and tell him, "When this mess is over, I'll invite you both over for drinks and officially introduce you."
The grin that is likely on his face is still obvious when he says, "I'm going to hold you to that, Josef."
Striding back towards the kitchen, I say, "I'm sure you will. Call me if you have any issues with the humans regarding this mess, and I'll see if Beth can straighten everything out."
I imagine he's still grinning when he tells me, "We will, Josef."
We hang up a moment later after saying goodbye.
When I enter the kitchen, Beth is nowhere in sight. Tilting my head to the side, Susan chuckles and inclines her head towards a door to the right of the room and says, "I figured she'd be more comfortable in the breakfast nook than in here with me banging about."
I smile before telling her, "Thank you, Susan."
She gives a gentle nod and says, "It's my pleasure, Sir."
Susan is a were-bear and has worked for me for close to 64 years and has always seemed to enjoy taking care of the humans I keep on hand, so I know she means that. I just grin before heading to the door she pointed out and entering a room I'm not sure I've been in since Marion's death in 1961.
Beth is sitting at the end of the counter on the far side of the long room. The filtered sunlight is shining through the wall that's made entirely of windows and makes her hair shine around her like a halo.
She glances up and over from her popover and giggles lightly before asking, "Why does a vampire have a sunroom that doubles as a breakfast nook?"
With a chuckle, I sit beside her and tilt my face up a bit enjoying the warmth of the sun that I can only safely feel through specially treated windows. All the windows in each of my residences and businesses have a special treatment on them so I can enjoy the sun as much as possible.
After a minute, I glance at her and answer her question, "I bought the house from William Randolph's estate right after he died, and as you know, he was human, as were the three different owners before him, so the rooms full of windows were their thing, the breakfast nook, too. I had all the windows treated with a special film that keeps me safe despite the sunlight shining brightly into the room. It's nice because I get to feel the warmth of the sun on my skin without feeling those tingling and draining feelings I usually feel while under the light of the sun."
She grins and then takes another bite of her breakfast and after chewing and swallowing she turns her face and stares at me before asking, "And the naked girls sunning out by the pool? Did they come with the house, too?"
I chuckle, and after wiggling my eyebrows, I tell her, "No, those are some of my freshies. I've found that freshies usually have no shame, so they often walk around buck naked if they can get away with it. I think it's an effort to entice the vampires, and we, as a rule, don't mind nudity. Supernaturals tend to be incredibly sexual or at least sensual, and the two-natured are naked when they shift back to their human forms, so most of us wind up with freshies and the two-natured roaming our houses or businesses in their birthday suits. If it bothers you, I can order everyone to wear clothes when they're not in their private rooms."
She shakes her head while she chews and then after swallowing she says, "It's their home, too, and if they're comfortable, then I'll get used to it. Plus, I'm gonna be a vampire soon, so I assume I'll be sensual, too, so don't worry about it. It just surprised me is all."
I grin and nod my head, so she smiles at me and asks, "So, what's the verdict on my getting a meeting with the Monaghans?"
I pick up the napkin lying beside her plate and use it to wipe some butter off her chin. She giggles again and takes the napkin from me and rubs her chin and lips before asking me, "All clean?"
I lean in and inspect her face before then smiling and telling her, "All clean."
She slowly moves her head up and down and takes another bite of the bready popover, so I sit back in my chair beside her and say, "I'll text you Emma and Jackson's phone numbers, both their cell and office numbers as well as the address of their office. Emma says to come by anytime between ten and one, and if that doesn't work for you she said for you to call her, and she'll move some other people around."
She gives a soft nod before taking another bite of her breakfast so after texting her the information I promised her, I sit and watch her eat her food.
Is arousal normal when watching a human eat? It's never happened to me before, not even with Sarah, but apparently, there is a first time for everything because my sleep pants are definitely getting tighter again.
She looks at me when she takes her last bite and then hops off her chair and after picking up her plate and empty juice glass she brings her dishes to Susan in the kitchen.
Beth comes back to the counter a moment later and leans over and kisses my cheek or she would have if I hadn't turned my face just at the right time to get a kiss on the lips. I laugh at her round eyes and tell her, "Alejandro should already be with the limo. Have a good day at work, Dear."
She laughs and then grabs her purse and computer bag off the floor beside her chair where she put them while she ate and then heads out the door into the kitchen. I count, and five seconds later she comes back into the room and asks, "Uh, is it just a straight shot down the hallway to the front door?"
I chuckle and tell her, "Yes. Go out of the kitchen door and take a left and then don't make any turns while going down the hallway and you'll eventually find the front entryway."
She inclines her head towards me and says, "Okay, have a good rest, Josef."
I watch her stride out of the room again before getting up and heading to my bedroom to get at least an hour or two in my freezer before I need to be up and doing things.
I make sure to take my phone into my freezer room with me in case Beth calls while I'm asleep.
I strip my clothes off and then barely remember getting into my freezer and laying down before I am out like a light.
Author's Note: The idea for the string came from a conversation I had with one of my betas when we were discussing the specifics of Josef's house, so thank you pyrodaemon for giving me the idea that spawned 500+ additional words in this chapter.
