A/N: I'm aware this fandom isn't very active. But if you like the story, a word or two of encouragement is always appreciated.

Catherine awoke with a start, suddenly overwhelmed by the sense of something not being quite right. Looking up, she noticed Vincent standing across the room, just inside the doorway. He remained frozen, as still as a statue, but even so, she could feel the disquiet emanating from him.

"I told you to leave," he growled at her in a furious tone.

Not for the first time that night, Catherine felt no small measure of fear in his presence. But she pushed it away, instead embracing her love and letting it give her the courage to stand up to him.

"How could I leave you?"

Quickly, she scrambled from the bed to approach him, hoping that if she could just reach out and touch him, she might be able to break the spell of anger and self-hatred he had fallen under.

"Father told me…" He stopped, looking away.

Confused and increasingly nervous, Catherine asked, "What did Father tell you now?"

"He told me… what I have done… to you."

She shook her head. "I don't know what you mean."

He forced his gaze back up to hers.

"You must tell me the truth," he implored, anger having given way to despair.

But Catherine still did not comprehend the horrible belief Vincent had now taken upon himself. While they had never withheld the truth from her, she searched her memory for something which might have been misunderstood, something perhaps taken out of context. But the only thing Catherine had never shared with him were the feelings she kept tightly guarded within her, the bodily desires she locked away to spare them both.

For just a moment, she hesitated, wondering if somehow her feelings were the cause of his renewed agitation. Already, he had been pushed to the brink with the news that not only was Anna his mother, but… he had killed her during his birth. The knowledge that Catherine desired him in more than a strictly platonic manner paled in comparison to that earth-shattering revelation.

But there was nothing else she had ever hidden from him. Dumbfounded, she looked at him imploringly, her mouth slightly agape.

"Vincent, I don't..."

She broke off as he looked away from her in agony. His eyes scanned the room as if he were searching for something, some point to moor himself to in the raging sea of his mental anguish. Finally, he looked down at his hands, his expression full of disgust. "Please," he begged. "I must hear it from your lips."

"Please. I must hear it from your lips."

He wrenched each word from his throat with something equal to the effort of pulling a subway car single-handed. And as his statement filled the air between them, Vincent could not banish the image Father had painted of her in his mind, of the skin she now covered with tunnel clothing scarred and indelibly marked by his hands.

Unable to suppress his guilt, he was not looking at her when she finally asked him softly, "Vincent, what has upset you so? Truly, I don't understand. Is this about Anna?"

Anger flared within him, more at himself than at her, but also at Father for having assisted her with such a charade. Through the bond, he could feel her confusion, and he wondered if perhaps she had deluded herself into denying what he had done to her.

"Father told me what I did to you, what I have done, again and again," he said in a short, clipped explanation. Finally, he pulled his gaze back up to hers, but she only looked at him with wide-eyed bewilderment. Even now, confronted with the truth, she refused to acknowledge what he was, what kind of a monstrosity she permitted herself to love.

"I don't know what Father told you, but-" she began hesitantly.

"Stop denying the truth!" he roared.

He expected his reaction to frighten her, for her to take a step back from him. But he did not expect her anger to flare back at him.

"When have I ever lied to you?" Catherine demanded sharply.

"Father told me that we have been together," he stated before he could lose his nerve. "He told me we were together every time… after I…"

After he killed for her. After he raked razor-sharp claws through the flesh of evil men who would have taken away his beloved, who would have hurt her and left her to bleed to death, as those men had done so long ago. And then, after killing those men, he had used her body and torn her skin with those same deadly claws.

Vincent focused on those memories which escaped him, of the fevered nights of physical passion they had apparently shared. While the faces of those dead men would always haunt his dreams, he could find no remembrance of sharing Catherine's embrace, of joining her body in the darkness. And thankfully, he could not remember the marks his hands had so carelessly left on her skin.

Catherine was already shaking her head, obviously unwilling to cede to him, and his ire grew stronger.

"Father told me that he bandaged your wounds himself," Vincent stated. "He…"

His voice died in his throat as he tried to recount Father's explanation.

"More than once, she needed… stitches," Father related to him. "I know I should have told you long ago, but how could I? I knew it would have destroyed you to hear the truth…"

"What wounds?" Catherine implored.

But her stubborn refusal to answer him truthfully, her demand that he say the words, infuriated him.

"The wounds these made!" he declared, holding up his furred, clawed hands. Angrily, he curled both into tight fists, digging his claws into his own palms. The pain felt good, almost cleansing, as he felt skin give way. Within seconds, blood flowed and drops of the hot liquid began to fall onto the floor at his feet.

"Vincent!" Catherine exclaimed, immediately moving towards him.

But he stopped her with a growl. Frozen, Catherine looked at him with alarm, her green eyes suddenly appearing very dark in the barely lit chamber. But the bond pressed at him insistently, a gentle but firm reminder that she did not fear him. Rather she feared for him.

For a minute or two, Vincent simply stood across from her, taking in deep breaths as he struggled to regain control of himself. He had lowered his hands to his sides, but they remained tightly coiled into fists, droplets of blood leaking through his fingers.

Catherine also remained still, her eyes flicking between the intensity of his expression to the set of his body, so obviously on edge, to his fists.

"Vincent," she finally whispered, her voice so gentle and hesitant that she might as well have been calming a small child. "I have no idea what you're talking about. You've never hurt me, not once. I have no idea why Father would say such things-"

"Your shoulders," he interrupted, desperate to stop her from lying to protect him. Closing his eyes as he pictured her arms, he thought about how the injuries likely matched those he had inflicted on Lisa.

"When was the last time she wore something which did not cover them?" Father had asked. "She takes greater care now because she knows you'll ask questions. But if you were to see them - they are covered in scars. Some of the wounds were so fresh that… I had to stitch over old wounds not yet healed."

While Vincent knew that he had seen her in night gowns and dresses with bare shoulders, he could not pinpoint exactly when. His mind reeled with confusion as he tried to make sense of it. But nothing had made sense, not since he had learned the origin of his birth. His entire world had been built on lies.

Anguished, he went on, "Your thighs…"

He could picture her sitting astride him, loving him with her body and soul even as he raked deadly claws across the sides of her legs to keep her in place. In his mind's eye, he could imagine a gasp of pleasure turn to pain as his hands drew blood.

Blood… so much blood. The scent of it would have filled his nostrils, and he could only imagine the smell leaving her nauseated.

"And your… your breasts," he finally managed, the effort of saying that final word exhausting him.

Father had said little about that area, obviously embarrassed to have even brought it up, except to specify that Vincent had been the most gentle with her there. The scratches he inflicted on her healed well, although the remnants of a few bite marks would always stay with her.

He shuddered violently at the image of his fangs marring her delicate skin. Nothing could ever be right again. What Father had told him about Anna was horrible enough. But he had been a baby, then. Now… The thought of having harmed Catherine was his undoing. His life was over. Nothing else mattered, not once he made her admit the truth to him.

"Father told you these things?" she demanded, taking a step towards him. Vincent moved away from her automatically, needing the distance between them. How could he let her reach for him, comfort him, now that these truths had been laid bare between them?

"He told me everything."

"Then he told you lies!" Catherine stated simply. "Vincent, you and I have never been together. Not that way. And you have never once caused me physical harm."

Through the bond, he felt the strength of her conviction as she spoke. The connection between them felt so open, so utterly honest, that he felt rocked to his very core.

But if Catherine told the truth, then… Had Father lied to him? Why would he do such a thing? While Father tended to bend the truth now and then, he always did it to spare his feelings, never to cause him pain...

As anguish and guilt swept over him, Vincent watched the love of his life, the most beautiful and kind woman he had ever laid eyes on, staring back at him with a gaze full of compassion. Without saying a word or even breaking eye contact, she reached up and loosened the ties on her gown.

Vincent's breath caught in his throat as she let the fabric slip off her shoulders and fall casually to the ground around her ankles. She wore no bra beneath, only a set of lace panties, and her nearly nude form stood before him suddenly.

Somehow, he forced his gaze to drift down to her body - her bare breasts, her hourglass figure, the swell of her hips...

Moving slowly, Catherine turned away from him, presenting her side and then her back. But she did not stop moving until she had gone in a full circle and faced him yet again. Stunned, Vincent simply stared, his eyes forgetting how to blink just as his lungs had forgotten how to draw in air.

Her skin was flawless. Every line of her body was a testament to perfection, a feminine landscape worthy of volume upon volume of poetry. Where he expected to see raised and puckered scars, there was nothing of the sort, not fresh wounds nor long healed ones. Nothing.

The only scar he could see was the one just in front of her left ear, a reminder of both the night when he had found her and of her own courage in overcoming that violent attack.

"You see?" she asked finally. "I don't have a mark on me. You've never touched me. You have never once hurt me."

Before he could answer, she stooped down to pick up her gown, pulling it back up to cover her naked form. Her movements betrayed no embarrassment, only confused agitation at his accusations. Unable to speak, he simply watched her.

When Catherine finally looked up at him again, he still found himself too stunned to speak. His mind could not even formulate a response, as though it had shut down completely.

The agitation which had grown inside of him like a fire, consuming all it touched, had instantly ceased. The image of her naked and unafraid banished his inner rage, dousing it like cold water. The one emotion which remained filled him in the absence of his rage - awe. He stood completely awe-struck at the sight of her.

Shaking his head to clear it, Vincent looked up, expecting her to follow her demonstration with anger and irritation at his unfounded beliefs. While his emotions had deceived him, his eyes had not. Her body showed no scars, no marks or bruises or any other evidence of the brutal assaults he thought had occurred. Every word she had spoken was the truth, not a lie intended to spare him the guilt of his inhumane actions.

Even so, he could tell from the look in her eyes that she would have given herself to him as he'd alleged - gladly. She simply did not believe he would hurt her.

"Catherine…" he managed finally, his voice barely able to form the two syllables of her name.

A fresh wave of shame flooded through him as Vincent recognized his willingness to believe in the evil side of his nature rather than in his beloved's word. The weight of it brought him to his knees, and he shut his eyes as fresh waves of recrimination washed over him. Once more, he had hurt Catherine in not believing her, and she deserved so much more, so much better. Somehow, he had pushed his own fears onto her and cast her as a villain when nothing could be further from the truth.

Tears flowed from his eyes like the silent river so many miles below the tunnels they stood in, and Vincent did nothing to stop them. His allegations rang in his ears, his anger and pain reflected back at him from Catherine's perspective. Whatever he had done, whatever acts he might be guilty of committing, she had done nothing worthy of blame. She had committed no deception, had done nothing unworthy save love him far more than he deserved.

She loved him.

He felt it even now, as strong as ever. And barely a moment after her deeply held affection willed him through the bond, he felt her hand reach for him. The silky smoothness of her fingers gently cupped his cheek, guiding his eyes up to hers. With great effort, Vincent forced himself to comply, and as he did so, he saw her kneeling on the cold floor in front of him. Her face showed nothing but compassion - compassion and love - and without waiting, she moved very close to him.

Her lips pressed against his in a gentle, chaste kiss.

Even as innocent as it was, their lips barely meeting, every nerve ending in his body suddenly seemed to have caught fire. Vincent's blood heated and rushed through his veins with frightening speed.

But she did not keep the kiss so innocent as it started. Before he could even react to the exquisite reality of what she was doing, she deepened the kiss, parting his lips with her own even as her hand moved from his cheek to the back of his neck, holding him firmly in place.

She kissed him deeply, exploring and loving him without hesitation. As he always suspected, she tasted as sensuous as she smelled, and the warmth of her mouth seared him to his very soul.

Eventually, when his lungs cried out for air, they broke apart, but Catherine did not withdraw from him. Rather, her body very close to his, her arm wrapped tightly around his body. Slowly, Vincent felt himself relax even as his more primal urgings responded to her nearness, and he brought his hand up to touch the side of her face.

Blood.

The liquid redness still coated the palm of his hand, and Vincent reflexively pushed himself back as he realized how close he had come to touching her with that hand.

"Oh God, Vincent," she gasped, seeing what had caused his reaction.

She looked around in desperation for something to stop the bleeding. Thinking quickly, she opened the top dresser drawer and found several small clothes often used for washing. Grabbing two, she returned to his side and pressed the soft white cloth into his palm before reaching for his other hand. She repeated the gesture, desperate to stop the bleeding which he had inflicted.

"Catherine, you shouldn't-"

"No, you need proper medical care," she told him, already standing even as she gripped his forearms to help him up from the floor. "Those can get infected…"

"Catherine, stop," he begged her. At last, she froze before looking up at him. "You're sure I've never hurt you?" he asked.

She began shaking her head even before he had finished his desperate plea.

"I don't know why Father would tell you those horrible things, but you have never once done anything to hurt me. Never, Vincent, I swear it on my life. And as for us being together… while I have had fantasies of what it would feel like to be with you, we have never…"

Her truthfulness resounded loudly through the bond, unmistakable in her need to be believed.

"Why would Father lie?" he asked as much of her as of himself.

Catherine looked down, obviously as confused over this question as he, but then she looked up at him. "I don't know," she admitted. "But if he lied about this, perhaps he lied about what happened to Anna as well."

TBC