Chapter 56: Dear Prudence

There was a strange knock on her front door. Bobby Burham doesn't knock, he just enters through the back door. Maybe it was Hoyt Fortenberry, back to pick up his sweater. Or maybe it was another of Eric's gifts. Shit, maybe it was Eric himself. She hadn't heard from him in days now. He gave her Sunday night off, then Monday when the club was closed and was always busy doing… Whatever it is that a vampire Sheriff does. And he's been MIA ever since he dropped her off from the hospital. Pamela told her he was 'dealing with vampire business' but she looked to be on edge the entire time. Her phone had been radio silent too. And what he did during the day… Well, only God knew.

But when she opened the door, she encountered the very last person she expected standing on her front steps. The Pope would have been an earlier guess, rather than the person who stood in front of her. He looked a bit paler, a couple of pounds skinnier and a little bit older. There were hints of grey in his adorably messy brown curls. His light brown eyes looked at her amused, equally fascinated at the sight of her, even though he was the one who knocked on her door.

"Jamie?" She asked, having to forcefully overcome the tight knot in her throat. "What the hell are you doing here?!"

"Honestly?" He chuckled, his eyes scanning the inside of her house. "I can ask you the very same thing."

The ghost of her ex just strolled inside her house. Olivia blinked multiple times, assuring herself this wasn't some sort of mirage. No, Jamie Kennedy was in her house, examining her semi-messy living, noting the pile of shoes in the corner.

Messy as ever. Some things never change I guess, he thought clearly. Olivia mentally slapped herself for overhearing it.

She shut herself off for a moment, closing her mind tight. A moment passed, where she just eyed the pretty boy examining the abstract art hanging on her wall - handy work of her neighbour Hoyt. Olivia had policed herself around Jamie for the entire time they dated, determined to try living a normal relationship as much as possible. But… They weren't dating anymore. She realized that for the first time, she did not owe him that kind of privacy.

And here stood James Mackenzie Kennedy, violating her life with his mere presence.

"Why are you here?"

"I got an interesting call a couple of nights ago from the Shreveport police department when they told me your Corvette had been found in a ditch near Minden, completely totalled and you were missing from the car accident."

"Why the hell would they call-" oh. She then remembered. "You're my next of kin in my insurance policy."

"Yeah, you should really change that," he said with his stupid little smile. "Since, you know, it's been almost two years since you've ghosted me."

"I didn't ghost you," she retorted. "I left you a letter."

"Oh! Of course!" He slapped his forehead sarcastically. She'd forgotten he was always a tad dramatic. "It was extremely thoughtful of you to break up with me, your fiance, by leaving a letter on the bed of our hotel room while on vacation."

Okay, that sounded really bad. "It was a corporate retreat, not a vacation."

"You really think you're gonna win that argument on a technicality?"

"We are both accountants. We get off on technicalities," she pushed back.

"Whatever makes you feel better, Olivia," he shook his head, wandering deeper into her living room.

Well, you can take the girl out of Jersey, but you can't take Jersey out of the girl. Who the hell has a blue couch? That's so tacky. Is that velvet?

She felt her blood pressure rise. What kind of ghost of boyfriend past bullshit was this? "Is that why you came all this way, Jamie? To air your grievances about me leaving you?"

And judge her decor choices? Technically Olivia didn't choose any of this furniture herself, it had come with her old apartment, but she did like it, and she had gotten compliments on it from her neighbour. Not that Miss Fortenberry struck her as a reader of Architectural Digest, but still. Plus she had had great sex on that couch.

"Not at all actually, I was worried about you," he looked back at her, with his stupid pretty face.

God, she still looks amazing.

She stiffened in place. "Because some Louisiana cops told you I was in a car accident? You could have saved your money and just called Tommy and asked. I know you two still golf together."

Which was fucking weird, by the way. But alas, her family did know she was okay.

Olivia's phone and wallet had been lost in the accident and she had spent many hours between the DMV and the bank replacing her things. But she had sent her mother an email Sunday evening telling her the Spark Notes Lite version of what had happened (minus the vampires and the Newlins parts) and that she was okay, but without a phone.

She had also managed to go to the mall kiosk (with Samuel no less) and get herself a new phone. Somehow the retail assistant talked her into getting an iPhone 3 and so far she fucking hated the thing. She missed having actual buttons. And she was also disappointed that her voice-mail inbox was empty. No messages from Eric.

"Okay, maybe worried is not the word. Intrigued, let's call it that."

"By?"

I started my own business in Soho and own my loft on the East side just like we had dreamed of, and this is how her life turned out? This can't be right-

"By you. By all of this," he nodded at her home and then at her. "And I did call Tommy by the way. He heard about the accident but said there was a zero chance that it was your car that got wrecked because if you had a Corvette before him he would never hear the end of it."

Dammit. Jamie was totally right. Tommy would literally drop dead of envy if he knew what had been sitting in her garage all these months. But Olivia knew that no matter how tempting it would be, Tommy would see right through her. He could spot shenanigans from two thousand miles away and would absolutely grill her into telling him how she got it. And God knows she can't tell him it had been a gift from a vampire. And if she lied, he would personally show up at her doorstep next. God Lord, Shreveport was corrupt enough, the last thing it needed was Tommy Wilson in the mix.

No one in her family could know - especially not after the joining. They couldn't know how close Olivia and Eric had gotten. They wouldn't understand, and she felt alienated enough from them as it was.

But Jamie didn't know her anymore. She wasn't the same person who had walked on that dark beach on the verge of tears, devastated her fiance thought she cheated her way into a promotion, heartbroken he thought so little of her. A tiny part of her reminded herself of what she had done when Eric overlooked her, and she immediately hated herself. Okay, maybe Olivia hadn't changed as much as she thought.

"It was my car," she said proudly.

He looked at her head to toe, not finding a scratch or bruise on her body. She was wearing a tank top and capris that hid the stitches on her thigh.

"So you were in the accident?"

Olivia momentarily relived the vivid moment of spinning out in the car, and locking eyes with Eric thinking that was her last moment on Earth. It wasn't. Not even close.

"Some hillbilly tried to race me and pushed me off the road. I'm fine though, just a few bruised ribs from the airbag."

Jamie blinked confused. "So why do the cops seem to think you're missing?"

She shrugged and sighed, not bothering to elaborate her lie much further. "They're just incompetent, Jamie. After you see what I pay in taxes you'll understand why."

The two spend a brief moment in muted silence, eyeing one another. This can't be it, he thought. She graduates from Ivy League school, and leaves her fast-track career in a top Manhattan accounting firm just to live in this dump of a town? In this sad little house? No way. God, did she really hate me that much?

Hate him? None of this had anything to do with him! How could he be so fucking self-centred? She left him because on that beach she discovered there was so much more in this world than the boring little life they were doomed to have together.

"Well, you've seen me, I'm alive. Sorry you wasted your time, bye-bye now-" Olivia opened the door again, motioning for him to leave her 'sad little house' through the path between her citrus trees. Trees that she loved very much and would never have if she stayed in New York. The hot summer air came inside in waves and she wished for him to leave even sooner, so she could close the damn door and relish in her 'sad little cold air-conditioned house'.

No, this is wrong. This is all wrong.

"No, no, wait!" Jamie sighed, looking at her. "Look, at least have dinner with me."

"Come again?"

"The hotel I'm staying at is like, 500 a night and they have a restaurant. I'm starving and eating alone in public is fucking depressing."

He hadn't changed much either. Olivia always found it strange when people cared so much about the opinions of complete strangers. It's not like Jamie could eat his food actively listening to what people thought or didn't think of him. Maybe it was the fear of not knowing? Jamie did care about what everyone thought of everything, and especially what they thought of him.

She shook her head low, knowing damn well the only hotel with a restaurant he would deem nice was the Rabbiteye at the Fairview, where she lived for a bit before moving into this house. Back when she was terrified of Eric looming in the dark corners of her home. The very idea of him watching her in the shadows made her skin crawl in her fear then. Now she found herself yearning for it. He didn't come to visit last night or nights since before their date. Or during the day. Olivia found herself taking longer and longer to fall asleep each night, always hoping. And every morning, disappointment.

"Please? For old time's sake. My flight is in the morning, and you'll never have to see me again."

He gave her his big sad puppy dog eyes. For a moment, nothing had changed at all. But Olivia had an ego. There was something inside her, someone who wanted to prove to Jamie that Olivia was doing more than fine. That she was doing better without him. Better alone.

"Fine," she exhaled, closing the door. "Let me get changed."

"So let me get this straight," he adjusted himself on the chair, pouring his craft IPA into the glass. Their food plates were long gone, but they still had drinks to finish. It had been oddly cathartic to catch up with Jamie because it had only solidified her choice of leaving him. He was a sad idiot. "You dumped me, while on vacation-"

"Corporate retreat." She corrected him.

"In a romantic resort in Costa Rica." Hm, I wonder if she's seeing anyone else….

Was she? No. But kind of? Olivia had to shake off his thoughts and not let him distract her. His disappearance was surely strange behaviour for someone who begged on his knees to have her. Olivia swirled her wine, trying not to think of him.

She let out a long, deep sigh. "We had to go to boring seminars during the day, and the weekend ended with that pathetic awards ceremony that was just one big senior management circle jerk-"

"Pathetic? You won!" His voice went up an octave. "You won the job we all wanted, then you practically spat on our faces by quitting. You left me and moved across the country to Shreveport, Louisiana to become a financial advisor? In the second poorest state in the country? That was your big plan?"

It was true she only accepted this dinner invite to justify her life choices as to make them sound grand and exotic but it was not quite going according to plan. But it's not like she could disclose much of the juicy truth or any of the impressive details. Also, Eric would have a fit of laughter if he ever heard Olivia describing herself as an advisor. What she suggested was not to be taken as advice.

"There's a certain beauty in being a big fish in a small pond. You can get away with a lot."

Jamie took a sip of his beer. He didn't like it very much. His mind instantly listed four better craft beers they served at Shinnecock Hills golf club. God! He was insufferable.

"Let me guess, some old guy with trendy new money?"

"Old guy, older money," she let out a tin sly grin, then hid it behind a sip of her dry rich wine.

"And he just happened to be looking for a hotshot New York accountant?"

"Yes. And I am not from New York."

"New Jersey, whatever, at least your tan is real," he shot her a pointed look. Jamie was still not buying it. "And he hired someone like you to take care of his assets? Where did you find this guy anyway?"

"One of his senior associates found me," she glared at him across the table at his comment. "And what's wrong with someone like me?"

"You know what I mean," he rolled his eyes. Young, inexperienced, female, way too pretty to ever need to take her career seriously.

Anger bubbled inside her. Excuse me? "No, I do not know what you mean."

"It's the south, Olivia. You think some old guy is just going to hand you all his money to take care of? Just like that?"

Well, it hadn't been particularly his choice. "He had been burned by a previous business partner. He wanted someone with more attention to detail."

Yeah right. The pair of tits were just a bonus.

Oh my God! She was going to marry this guy?! Seriously?

He leaned forward, suddenly more curious. "What's his money in? Oil? Shipping? Lumber?"

Drugs. "He has many fingers in many pies. We're opening a Casino next."

"A Casino in Louisiana? Groundbreaking," he snorted. "I heard they're handing out those licences to anybody nowadays, even to vampires..."

To that comment, Olivia raised her glass and drank all of it because she knew alcohol would quickly become necessary if this conversation were to continue. It wasn't nearly as good as the wine she had at Maison de Paris with Eric, but it would do. She glanced out the west side windows, watching the sun dipping behind the trees. She wondered if Eric was watching the sunset too. Was he in awe, or eager to be in the darkness again?

Jamie's mind became suddenly scattered, racing. She knew he was smart enough to figure it out. She was definitely going to need more wine.

The look on his face was a shocked one alright, but it hadn't been nearly as satisfying as she thought it would be. He was almost… Mad at her. Insulted and offended that this is the path she chose over him. Good.

"Holy shit. Olivia, tell me you did not-" there was a lot of darkness in his voice. He couldn't even say it.

But there was nothing to be said. She worked for the Mexican cartel for over half of their relationship. It took him breaking her heart to lead her to complete darkness. And the road had been hard and dangerous, filled with blood, enemies and hard choices. Yet, she liked it. She liked the dark.

"So what if I did?" She shrugged, putting her empty glass down. Her smile was cold and sensual. Like revealing a winning hand in poker. This is what she came for, she wanted to see Jamie crumble.

"Do you have a death wish or something?" His eyes widened and he lowered his voice. "I hear those freaks can do like, Jedi mind tricks on people, making them do all sorts of illegal shit."

Olivia spent all her energy focusing on not bursting out into laughter, but her smile still escaped through her lips. Oh, but there was so much this little boy didn't know.

"Vampires can't do that-"

"That's exactly something you'd say if they used it on you!"

"No, I mean," she lowered her voice a bit. "They can't do that… To me."

He blinked a couple of times. "Is this a joke?" Is she out of her fucking mind?! "Because I am straight up not getting the punch line here if there was one."

"Why would it be a joke, Jamie? Vampires have been stacking their money for hundreds of years and are wealthier than you can possibly imagine. And they need accountants who work regular bank hours. They pay well, and it works for me."

"So you're selling yourself to the highest bidder? Is that it?"

"Selling myself? Fuck you! You sell private equity to trust fund douchebags, how's that any different?"

"Oh, come on, don't come at me with this liberal war cry-"

"No! No. Honestly," Olivia was shaking her head. They should have had this conversation years ago. "Just ask what you came all this way to ask."

Jamie's mind was in full turmoil. He had so much to say, he didn't know how to begin. "You gave up everything to work for a fucking vampire? Me, your career, your family, your friends, our apartment, our whole Goddamn future to work for vampires?"

Her brows creased. "The only true part of that sentence is that I gave up on you."

It was a strange sound hearing the audible sadness of someone's heart. Jamie, for better or worse, had really loved her. His version of love, anyway.

"Does Tess know about this? About why you came here?"

She did, and she wasn't a fan of it either. But she had the right to be, being her mom. Now, Jamie after all this time? Not so much. "Why do you care about what my mother knows or doesn't know?"

"There's no way she's okay with this-"

"Jamie, I am a grown woman. I don't need my mother's approval as to how I live my life. Or yours, for that matter."

"Okay, tell you what," he splayed his fingers on the table. Oh, here we go. "I can get you a much better job in New York. Now, you may think what you will, but I think you'd be really good at selling private equity-"

"Let me guess, at your private equity firm?" She raised a brow.

His shoulders slumped. That was supposed to be his big surprise. "How did you know?"

"Tommy told me." He didn't. She picked it straight out of his brain earlier.

"Well, no one has to know we dated. I'll even sign an NDA if you want," he suggested.

There was about a zero percent chance he would not brag about their 'history' the next time he got drunk with his partners and clients. Jamie was self-conscious about being extremely vanilla in bed, so he boasted about his 'game' to anyone who was willing to hear it. It was kind of pitiful, but Olivia liked that about him - the sexual blandness part anyway. Men often thought of some pretty fucked up shit they saw in porn during sex, while Jamie just mentally repeated the alphabet backwards trying not to cum too fast in missionary.

Yep. Eric had ruined her.

"Why do you even want me to work for you? You think I'm too pretty to take my career seriously."

What? I didn't- Jamie sat back, surprised. "I never said that."

He thought it, though.

"I want you to work for me because I want to get into wealth management, and no one knows offshore accounting like you. I took over your clients at our old firm and I've seen your work. Your method is extremely thorough and impressive-"

She wanted to roll her eyes. "I know I am good at my job."

If she wasn't, she would be locked in a cell or a coffin right now.

"Did you know management was pissed off when your high-level Mexican clients left shortly after you did? They actually wanted to sue you for poaching but they couldn't prove you took them with you."

Yeah, that's because Sophie-Anne killed them all the second they started dealing vampire blood in the south. They didn't leave, they just ceased to exist.

Tired and bored of this, Olivia dove into his mind, searching for his true intentions. She didn't have to dig deep: his younger brother had gotten married last month. His best friend John was about to have his first child. Jamie felt lonely and forgotten like he was behind in the race of life. He was single at almost 30, and time was passing him by. It was the end of the party and he had no one to go home with. He had hoped she would fall back in love with him, and his whole life plan would be back on track. Jamie flew here to get back what he had lost.

"So what do you say?"

"No, thank you."

"I'll start you at 6 figures, all moving expenses paid. South facing office with all the sunshine you can get. You won't even miss the place."

Holy shit. He was doing it too. Jamie was trying to save her- "I make enough here."

"Oh, come on, Olivia. You don't settle for enough-"

"You would be correct," a cold voice interjected from behind her, appearing right next to her out of thin air. Ice formed in her veins. "More wine for the madam?"

Olivia looked up and met the server's ocean blue eyes. Goosebumps took over her skin, and everything stood still for a long time.

Why is she looking at this tall freak like that?

Olivia drowned out Jamie's mind, slamming the door on it. She couldn't take her eyes off of him. Eric stood next to her, looking sensually menacing as always. He wore black slacks paired with a smooth black crew neck, along with a blazer and a white towel draped over his forearm, trying to pass as a server. He poured more and more wine into her glass, the same label from their date. He remembered? There was a twinkle in his eye that looked at her curiously, and then at Jamie. Then back at her.

Oh shit.

"That's quite the pour, man," Jamie interrupted, nodding at the almost full glass Eric gave her. Jealousy was oozing out of him. Jamie did not like the way Olivia was looking at their server. Or the way she looked at him.

But the two of them were deadlocked into one another. Eric stopped pouring just before the glass overflowed and then turned his attention to Jamie in a way that made him sink further into his seat. "It is the lady's favourite."

"Thank you," Olivia barely managed to whisper as felt her face go ten degrees hotter. The sudden reality and gravity of the situation smacked her in the face like a slap. Jesus Christ, what the fuck was Eric going to do to Jamie? How the fuck would she explain any of this?

"Wait, you're a regular at this place?"

She watched Eric do a little incline and walk away, disappearing out back behind the bar. No staff seemed to even notice him. Suddenly what Jamie thought of her or her life didn't matter. The reason he had come down all this way didn't matter. His job, his feelings and their breakup didn't matter. He didn't matter. Their past or the faint possibility of a future was completely and utterly unimportant. Olivia had already won the second she chose not to settle for Jamie Kennedy. Now, all it mattered was maybe not getting him fucking killed.

"Yeah, I used to live here. Excuse me," Olivia threw the black cloth napkin onto the table and rushed between the tables of the restaurant.

She took a right down the hallway towards the washrooms. She didn't lie - she did know this hotel and restaurant well. She knew the washrooms to be all single occupancy.

Olivia entered a vacant room, noting the busy wallpaper and the marble tiled flooring that gave this restaurant half a reason to be this freaking overpriced for unauthentic cajun food. She waited, facing the mirror above the porcelain sink. She waited just like she had so many nights in a row. But this she knew it to be different, which is why she wasn't surprised when Eric entered the little room moments later, his eyes looking at her through the mirror. Olivia considered turning around, but she wasn't ready to face him just yet. There was a deafening loud click of the lock in the room.

"Where the hell have you been?" She hissed.

"This is a weird way of showing you've missed me," his voice was oddly calm, but Eric did not answer her burning question.

In the reflection, she saw his eyes studying every curve of her little black dress with a blank expression on his face. He was holding his cards tight against his chest. Even their bond was unreadable. In his eyes, only hunger.

"Who is he, and what is he doing here?" He whispered. There was no threat in his voice, but Olivia knew there wouldn't be. Eric was too proud and too self-controlled to ever show jealousy.

"Remember when I transferred your house to my name and told you if you killed me you would not get it back? That it would go straight to my beneficiary?"

"And that you hadn't heard from him in years," he answered immediately. Did Eric ever forget anything? "Yes, I remember it vividly."

"That would be him."

"So he's what? Your brother?"

May God have mercy on Jamie. He really shouldn't have come.

"My ex," she confessed.

He showed no reaction at that, which probably was not a good sign. "Ex what?"

"Fiancee."

"Ouch."

"I left him."

"Naturally," he towered over her from behind, speaking so quietly she had a hard time hearing his words over her rattled heartbeat.

"Cops contacted the next of kin on my car insurance," she explained. "He thought the story of me living in Louisiana and crashing a Corvette to be… Strange."

"That's not why he came down here," he said in a sly grin that made the whole room hot.

If Eric overheard Jamie offering her a job in New York, that would certainly be the end of him. It would be his body being sunk in the River next. As much as she didn't care for Jamie now, she did once, and she did not want to see him hurt. He had nothing to do with any of this.

"It's the truth. Why else would he be here?" She asked.

His hands grabbed her hips and he spun her body around, making her face him. Standing on her tippy toes, she leaned against the sink in a failed effort to put space between them. His eyes saw right through her, and something inside relaxed. It was terrifying how little control she had over what she felt for him when they were this close.

Eric ran his hand up her inner thigh, sending chills over her whole body. The tip of his index finger caressed her middle over the lace of her panties. His mouth moved closer, his lips dragging gently over the skin of her jawline, smelling her skin. Sex? Eric thought Jamie came all this way for sex?

"He doesn't want me back," she lied softly and judging by the cold smile he gave her, he knew the truth.

"That man certainly wants you on your back," his finger kept moving against the lace, and she felt adrenaline and lust take over her blood. "Need I remind you that you are mine?" His voice was faint but firm.

Olivia took a few deep breaths, trying to keep in control of her urges. She didn't want to be anyone else's, but it was hard to break the habit of putting up a fight.

"Exclusivity was not… What we agreed to."

His finger moved slowly against her, up and down. And up. "Your old lover, do you want him?"

Sex with Jamie was so bland she never even took it into consideration. His job offer was a logical option - in New York, she wouldn't have to sell drugs, launder money, evade taxes, live in the heat of hell, deal with vampire feuds, car crashes, werewolves, religious zealots, greedy vampire Queens, and the long list of enemies they had been collecting like fucking badges. Nevermind Jamie's intentions, she could start over with a clean slate-

Eric's hand delicately slipped under the thin fabric of her underwear, touching her. Her breath hitched at the feeling of his cold fingers becoming instantly slick. "Who are you wet for, Olivia?"

His finger slipped inside her, touching her deeply where she needed him. Her breath was uneven, heart started racing, and she could feel her blood rushing in her veins, calling out to his fangs, wanting to be in him. Her fingers curled against the edge of the sink she leaned on, holding for dear life. Eric watched her shiver under his touch, holding back her moans, the urge to whisper his name stuck in her throat. Her hips started to writhe slightly against his hand and Eric's lips parted in a pleased smile.

Maybe she was addicted to sex, or to Eric's blood, or that darkness of power that blossomed within her whenever they were together. Maybe it was the joining, whatever it meant. But Olivia knew he would not let her finish unless she answered the goddamn question. He would hold her hostage to her own desires for as long as it took. But God fucking dammit if she wasn't enjoying the ride.

The question was also… Painfully rhetorical. And Eric knew that, he just wanted to hear her say it. Why does he need her to say it? How could he not already know?

She propped her hips on top of the sink, spreading her legs and Eric's whole body shifted closer like an avalanche. His finger curled and massaged a maddening spot inside her, scrambling her thoughts. It was like he reprogrammed her brain to just want one thing.

Olivia raised her chin, letting her hair fall back behind her and exposing all of her neck and chest to him. His eyes watched her throat breathing heavily, and his fangs peeked from between his lips. She missed him. His touch, his gaze, his kisses, the way he tastes. "Don't you wanna know what my blood tastes like after I cum?" She whispered with a grin. Oh yes, two could play this fucking game.

His pupils blew out, almost erasing the blues of his eyes. He accepted her proposal because his thumb moved up, pressing against her clit in circles. Oh, fuck-

When her vision turned white, his teeth sank into her neck. Her arms wrapped around him like a gasp of air. She strangled a scream of pleasure and pain, as she felt a warm trickle of blood running down her chest. He drew her into his mouth, taking pieces of her inside him while suspending her in carnal bliss. She felt electricity run through every nerve, the air was seized hostage in her lungs, it was the highest of highs and she never wanted to come down.

Life had given her ample opportunities to leave. She could have taken Alcide Herveaux's deal and gotten out, sending Eric, Pamela, the Queen and half the vampires in the forsaken state to jail. She could take Jamie's job offer and leave everything and everyone behind, start a brand new life, risk free. But no.

She wanted this.

She wanted him.

She wanted him.

She wanted him.

God, she wanted him.

AN:

hello bonjour lovelies

Well, this chapter took a turn! I hope you liked it as much as I liked writing it! Twists, drama, ghosts of the past, feelings, sex, danger! This chapter had it all!

Unfortunately, I am officially out of chapters to post and I'm REALLY hoping I'll get some inspiration and time this Easter weekend. If not, please be patient with me, leave me a comment below and I'll see you all next time

xoxo