A small teaser; I hope you enjoy it! Sage
Oh, and when the full chapter is done a proper thanks will be given out to everyone who commented.
Chapter Two: Search and Not Found(Two weeks after the events of Chapter One)
James leapt over the fence and ran towards the front entrance of Thierry's mansion. "Any word?"
Ash cast his eyes down. "I'm sorry James. We've heard nothing."
Mare however took the initiative and wrapped her arms around James' neck. "Don't worry we'll find her. I promise."
With tears in his eyes James sighed. "Don't make promises you don't know if you can keep."
Mare set herself at a distance and placed her back against Ash's chest. James slowly dragged himself in the house and dropped onto Thierry's couch.
"What am I going to do without my Poppy?" he croaked and cried into his hands.
Everyone in the mansion stood in a group around the broken lamia. The grim silence continued as the Daybreakers looked on in helplessness.
~~~~~James' life after a Poppy-less year
"James get up! You can't keep doing this to yourself," Ash yelled at him as he jumped up and down on his cousins' bed.
A girl with coppery red curly hair popped her head out from under the bed. For a second Ash thought it might have been Poppy, but then the wonderful happiness and hope that he had had for a second evaporated as he saw that the girls eyes were brown and not green.
"Um, he's in the shower," the girl said.
She lowered the cover a bit more giving Ash a view of her bitten neck. He gave the girl a disgusted look.
"You need to leave," Ash said hauling her up and leaping off the bed.
"Wait a minute I'm naked!" she screeched.
Ash growled. "I don't care what you are, you still need to leave."
The girl got out of the bed completely naked and sized Ash up. "And who the hell are you to tell me to leave?"
"Did he tell you he has a wife and that she is so much in love with him?"
The girls' eyes widened. "What? That s.o.b. I swear he didn't tell me! That is the last thing I need. Another heartbroken wife out for revenge on me; this little sexcapade wasn't even worth it. I didn't even have an orgasm. He was drunk! I mean his package is hot as hell, but……"
Ash groaned. "I do not want to hear this."
Steam curled from the bathroom door as it opened. Ash met the gaze of a shattered, but handsome face. "I'm not married. I was never married."
"—Um……but he said," the red head bit her lip in confusion.
James' eyes were deadly. "He was mistaken."
Ash lowered his eyes. It had been a mean lie that he hadn't intended for James to hear.
"Perhaps it might be better if I left all the same," the girl replied as she glanced back and forth between the two beautiful men, one glaring, and the other looking ashamed.
"Yeah," James spoke not relieving Ash of his glare.
The girl scurried around the room picking up pieces of scattered clothing. "Have you seen my underwear?" she asked James, but when he didn't reply she added. "You can just send them too me."
With that the young girl leapt past Ash and out the door.
"Why are you here Ash?"
"I came to get you out of bed, to keep you away from alcohol for a day at least."
James swallowed; his Adams apple bobbed up and down, as he grinded his teeth together. "You better leave too."
Ash shook his had and placed his hands on his hips. "Naw man. How 'bout you come with me. We'll go hiking, a camping trip. Get your mind off things?"
"You askin'?"
Ash looked at James warily. "Half asking, half demanding."
"You know I don't go well with demands."
A bit of panic entered Ash. Even though James was in a terry cloth towel that was wrapped around his waist the man looked so dangerous at that point that Ash had gotten his first ounce of fear in over a year.
"Go back to your wife Ash and stay out my life."
"What-what life man? Y-you sleep all day, you get up go to the bar for hours on end, get drunk to no means, go on the prowl for a fast fuck, get dinner, and go back to sleep. Now pardon me, but when did that ever become a classification for having a life?"
"Fuck you! I'm doing good with this life."
Ash sighed. "You're not happy."
"How the hell can I be happy without 'her'?"
Ash threw his hands up. "I-I don't know. That's for you to decide. I'm not asking you to fall in love again!"
"Then what the hell are you asking?"
"I'm asking you to come with me and the guys on a camping trip and start a life, a better one than this anyway.."
"How can I have a life without her? What about Mare?"
"She's fine with it."
"Tell me Ash, what would you do if when you came back from the trip Mary-Lynnette was no where to be found. What would you do if you couldn't hold her in your arms at night?" James' voice cracked. "If you couldn't kiss her, couldn't smell her hair? What would you do if you reached out to hold her, to make love to her, and she wasn't there?"
Ash looked at James and then back down to his feet.
"You don't know!" James viewed. "You want to know why you don't know, because it wasn't Mare that got taken right from under your nose. You can hold her every night, and make sweet love to her whenever you want. You can tease her about her wild red hair and you can kiss her beautiful red full lips to no end."
Ash swallowed a lump in his throat. James had switched from Mare to Poppy.
"You will never know what it's like to loose your soulmate. You married her and you've made a baby with her. You see her every night. She's flesh and blood to you, but P-P…" James stumbled on Poppy's name.
"Poppy," Ash helped.
"All I have of her is a picture. A small wallet sized picture that doesn't even come close to capturing her beauty, her essence. I sometimes think this last picture captured her and that it wasn't Seth," James whimpered as he fell too the bed.
Ash stood over him and felt a tear slide down his cheek. "James I……"
James jerked his head up as if noticing Ash for the first time. "Get out!"
"Whoa, wait a minute," Ash started backwards.
James reached for something and threw it at him. "Get the fuck and stay out of my life. Go back to your wife where you can re-live everything you've done with her. Laugh about the past, talk about the future, look at pictures from a wedding that was beautiful right?"
"You would have known if you had accepted the invitation."
Tears were streaming down his face. "You know I thought my tears had run dry. Would you get the hell out! Get out!"
"Fine! Just do me a favor; think about the camping trip, please James. Poppy wouldn't want this. She wouldn't have wanted you to waste your life on booze and whores."
"Don't talk about her like she's dead! Don't you dare!"
Ash shook his head and reached for the door. "Think about!"
James glared at the door one more time before he convulsed in another fit of tears.
::Teaser Ends::
Sorry for the spelling mistakes other errors, or anything else that was wrong with it. I hope you all enjoyed it.
