Chapter Forty-Four: Stefanie Salvatore

Present day

Outskirts of Albemarle, NC

Oh, dear god, this man was going to kill her.

Stef crossed her arms over the back of the chaise lounge in the library, her breath halting, her heart hammering, her mind turning into primal mush. Why did she have to find Raid like this? From the sweatpants, the muscular bare chest, the ruffled hair, and the pouted lips, she couldn't tear her eyes away from him while he slept.

She wasn't prepared for this. She expected Raid to be awake. After coming downstairs mid-morning, she'd noticed a small pile of dry, folded laundry on the dining table and a warm, sweet smell coming from the kitchen. She'd picked up the t-shirt at the top of the pile, recognizing it as the one Raid wore when he first came to the house and, for a reason she didn't understand, still clung onto it, smiling fondly to herself as she'd strolled around the house to find him.

The rest of the house was empty. A message received from Zara informed her that she and Adam had gone to gather blood bags at Gabe's request. Meanwhile, Phoenix had joined Gabe in a college excursion with Flick. On the car ride back from the Halfway House last night, Flick revealed to Phoenix that she was going to turn eighteen at the end of the month. Stef didn't dare ask why he was enquiring about that, but given how quickly he became infatuated with someone, she considered checking the dumbass hadn't already bought a ring. Thankfully, Gabe opened up an alternative path by offering to help fund her dream of going to Virginia Tech to study fashion design. Had she been accepted into Virginia Tech? No. But it was nothing a little compulsion couldn't rectify.

She wondered how long Raid had been awake before he fell asleep in the library. If Adam had really woken him up for Fajr Salah like he intended, he couldn't have had more than two hours of sleep. She was about to break a promise she'd made to wake Raid up when – and if – she discovered her vampire powers had returned. She felt a little bad about that, since he'd kept his promise of not telling the others she'd lost them, even during their persistent questioning.

Truth be told, she'd first noticed her heightened senses returning the moment she'd collapsed into bed last night, her eyes tearing up in an emotional overload, her hearing capturing the sound of Raid heading downstairs, brushing Gabe off with the excuse that Cristian had upset her. It wasn't untrue. There had been a spark in Cristian's eyes when he discovered she no longer had a physical advantage over him... and she hated how vulnerable that had made her feel. He had reminded her how it felt to be human in the worst way, making her question how she could want something so much that made her feel so helpless. But then Raid had stepped in... and that feeling of helplessness went away... for a while. It might have remained had he stayed with her and held her throughout the night until morning. But she never invited him to stay – choosing instead to fight back her tears alone – and he respected her privacy like the gentleman he didn't believe he was, and she sometimes wished he wasn't. So she'd battled through the recovery of a heightened whirlpool of sadness and fear alone until she'd fallen asleep, realizing that Cristian wasn't the only one she was scared of being vulnerable around.

However, this morning was completely different. Her vampire powers had returned along with a much more confident set of heightened emotions. She was focused, she was active, she was happy, she was hungry, she was... horny.

The latter wasn't as convenient, so the sight of Raid looking tasty enough to bite her teeth into – both literally and figuratively – was making her more than a little frustrated.

Stef didn't know how she managed to peel her eyes away from Raid's torso long enough to notice it, but there was a paperback book wedged between him and the back of the couch, pages facing upwards, his hand resting over it, looking suspiciously like the one she had recently been reading. So, very carefully, she slid her fingers over the cover of the book, trying to gently angle it to see the title.

"Stef?"

Shit!

Stef dropped to the floor behind the back of the chaise lounge... and immediately regretted it. She could have told him that she was about to wake him as promised. She could have told him that she was looking for her book. Unfortunately, her guilt-ridden brain knew she had been ogling his half-naked body, decided his alertness was on par with a nuclear emergency, and activated a duck and cover response.

Raid leaned over the back of the couch, looking down at her, his tone even more questioning than before. "Stef?"

Just as she was praying for an excuse to drop into her hands, she realized she was still clinging onto his t-shirt. She bounced up, pushing her hair back from her face, composing herself. She threw his t-shirt at him. "I dropped this. Put it on."

He smirked curiously. "You sure?"

No. "Yes," she replied, narrowing her eyes at him. If he didn't cover up soon, she was going to forget how to breathe. "How long have you been up?"

He pulled the t-shirt on over his head. "Long enough to make you breakfast muffins."

Stef was out of the room at vampire speed, casually strolling back seconds later with a mouthful of muffin.

Raid chuckled. He'd been hoping she'd react that way. "I take it that means your vampire powers have returned?"

"Mm-hmm," she replied, nodding as she took another bite, making her way around the chaise lounge. She tried not to look at him. She wasn't horny, she was just hungry, she decided. Whatever urge she had to be filled, this muffin was going to satisfy it.

"Do you know what happened?"

She shook her head, continuing to eat. "Uh-uh."

"Any chance I could hear some actual words? You seem more concerned with that muffin than with losing all your powers last night," he observed. It wasn't much of a complaint since he was enjoying seeing her eyes roll to the back of her head with each bite.

Swallowing the final piece, she made her way towards the bar area. He was amazing at baking, but it still hadn't satisfied the craving she had. So if she just kept her own lips busy, maybe she'd stop focusing on his. "If you need my mouth free, then don't come up with ways to occupy it."

One of his eyebrows twitched briefly upwards. That's all he thought about lately. "I'll... bear that in mind," he lightly teased. If she registered the double meaning, she didn't show it. "So what happened last night?"

Watching him cross his arms, his muscles tensing, she almost missed the question. An unhealthy obsession with forearm veins was purely because she was a vampire... wasn't it? Her charade of nonchalance was hanging on by a thread, but at least she could genuinely display indifference to her brief loss of powers last night. They had returned and that was all that mattered. She was far too focused on numbing the itch she couldn't scratch. "It was the first time I transferred you all my magic. Maybe it drained my vampire powers for a while too," she shrugged, pouring herself a bourbon. She had lost them to him during the feeding bond; it wasn't inconceivable.

"Maybe," he agreed. As long as it wasn't worrying her, he wasn't going to let it worry him. But he was a little worried about what she was doing at that moment. "Do you really have to drink so early?"

"It helps with cravings," she explained.

"I thought you didn't crave blood?"

"Not that type of craving." She leaned, one hand on the bar counter, as she raised the glass and took a swig of drink. The burn she felt in her throat only temporarily rerouted the heat she felt throughout the rest of her body.

"Hmm," Raid uttered, intrigued, studying her posture, her legs crossed at the knee, her fingers gripping the counter like it was her lifeline. She was tightly wound, but it seemed to have nothing to do with yesterday. He needed to loosen her up. He lifted up the book wedged beside him. "Any chance it might be this?" He opened the pages and it didn't take him long to find one of the many examples that had him smirking most of the morning. He began to read. "Xavarel – sounds like the name of a cold sore cream by the way –" He cleared his throat and started again. "Xavarel spread her legs, thrusting his huge manhood roughly inside her, over and over, while she screamed his name. He pinned her down by the back of the neck, slowly circling her ass with his finger, making her squirm with nerves and excitement..." Raid lowered the book to look at Stef's reaction, an eyebrow arched. "Should I continue?"

Stef raised her glass at him, cool as a cucumber, then downed the rest of the drink. So it was her book he was reading. "Go ahead. I'll break out the voice recorder. I'm sure fans of your show would be willing to pay good money to hear Raid Vaziri read smut."

Raid chuckled. "Look, all I'm saying is – if this is what you're craving – drink all you want, but keep reading this kind of material and no amount of alcohol is going to curb your cravings for sex."

Stef banged the glass down on the counter, flustered by his accuracy. She spun back towards him, her arms raised in a challenge, her words snarky. "Yeah, well, neither's hanging around with you."

Realization dawned.

Stef's hands slapped over her mouth. She did not fucking say that!

Raid's book slammed shut. She really fucking said that.

Stef's eyes widened.

Raid's mouth formed a slow, wide grin.

His eyes didn't move from hers. Her panic was real. This was a genuine slip up. He stood slowly from the couch, sauntering smugly towards her.

Stef placed her hands out in front of her, like it had any chance of stopping his approach. "It was a joke," she lied. But his arms crossed and he shook his head softly in amusement. He wasn't buying it. Shit, shit, shit! She turned back to the bottle she now desperately needed. "A very poor joke," she reiterated and poured herself another glass of bourbon.

He bit his lip, taking his time. A cat with a mouse, ready to toy with her. "Right," he feigned agreement, coming up beside her, trying to regain the eye contact that she was now desperately avoiding. The bar counter isn't that interesting, Stef. He leaned in closer, a cocky tone to his voice. "So... you've thought about what it would be like to sleep with me?"

"Drop it," she ordered, swallowing back her drink.

"Sure, sure," he nodded. Not a chance in hell. "But... you are sexually attracted to me?"

"Oh my god, Raid, you're really not going to drop it, are you?" she snapped, whipping her body around and facing him, hand gripping her empty glass like she wanted to throw it, her eye contact now lethal. "Fine! I'm attracted to you. But so are plenty of other women who watch your show, so does one more really make that much of a difference?" She turned back to the counter, ready to pour herself another drink. His ego stroked. Conversation over.

Raid's expression turned serious.

This had just turned serious.

This was really happening.

He forced himself to breathe. "It does when I've fallen in love with her."

Stef's grip tightened. Her glass shattered.

"Fuck, Stef," Raid sputtered in concern. He jumped into action while she stood dumbstruck and paralyzed, taking her by the hand, turning her towards him, prising open her fingers to remove the shards of broken glass embedded in her palm.

She was staring through her hand absently, wishing he would leave the glass in place. If she felt it, it was real. It wasn't a dream. He wasn't joking. There was no way of misinterpreting what he'd said.

He was in love with her.

The last shard removed and thrown on the counter, Raid lifted the hem of his t-shirt and pressed it to her palm, against the flow of blood. After a few checks, the bleeding finally stopped and he wiped the remaining blood away.

"How do you feel?" he asked softly.

Stef's voice came out quieter than she expected. "It'll heal."

He looked up at her face, her eyes still lowered. "I wasn't talking about your hand."

Her eyes met his, flickered down to his lips, returned back up to his eyes. Her heart was racing with temptation to confess everything, but there would be no going back afterwards. It was one thing to love him, but it was another to keep him in her world. She never even entertained the possibility of that happening, let alone weighed up the consequences.

She hadn't had time to piece together any of her thoughts when his hand came gently to her face, stealing her breath in a panic, still unsure if this was the right thing to do. She took a step backwards, whispering, "This is going too fast."

He lowered his hand but he was not backing down. "Too fast? Stef, I've been in love with you for nearly four years."

She gasped, exclaiming, "Four years?!"

He winced at the shift in tone. "Okay, admittedly, I am blurting things out too fast right now."

Did this change everything? He hadn't fallen for her as a vampire. He wasn't enchanted by the excitement or the power and confusing it for love. He'd known both sides of her – the normal, everyday human side, and the unstable, dangerous vampire side – and it meant he had loved her through both. "When?" she asked. "When did you know?"

"The same day you told me you were dating Cristian," he sighed. "Hearing it felt like my insides had turned to stone. I immediately wanted to pummel the guy."

Stef rolled her eyes. Wanting what he couldn't have? So typical of him. "Oh, so yesterday must have felt pretty great, huh?" she said dryly.

Raid beamed proudly. "It did actually."

Stef trawled through her memories, things slowly starting to slot into place. She stopped at one specifically, narrowing her eyes. "The day I told you... you went to the hospital, saying you caught your hand slamming down the trunk door of the car..? What really happened?"

"I punched a wall," he admitted sheepishly.

"I knew it!" Stef declared. "I thought it was because Savannah broke up with you."

He scrunched his face up at her like she was deranged. "No, I broke up with her afterwards," he scoffed. "She didn't visit me once in the hospital. But you did... the same night... outside of visiting hours... using your mom's security pass."

Stef bit at her smile. Little did he know, she had to go back for that pass after she was turned down via the ward's intercom for not being family. "My mom was so pissed about that," she tittered, shaking her head at the grounding she remembered she received afterwards. As her laughter faded, a moment passed between them, silently looking at each other, smiling at the memories that were now coming together, making sense. Stef then sighed heavily, slapping her hands down at her sides. It was her turn. "Since we're confessing things, I might as well admit that it was me who put red ink in Savannah's perfume bottle at the school dance."

"What?!" Raid exclaimed, his eyes widening in shock. "I defended you to the death about that! She went into the bathroom looking like my girlfriend and came out looking like Carrie White! She swore it was you! I didn't believe it. You weren't like that back then."

Stef tutted at his poor assumption. "Of course I was. Vampirism just makes me less ashamed of it."

"Well you should be ashamed of it!" he gaped. "Why did you hate Savannah? What did she ever do to you?"

"She was with you for the wrong reasons."

Raid shrugged, none the wiser. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You told her you were going to inherit a seven-bedroom penthouse in Qatar!"

Oh, yeah! He grinned. He'd forgotten that. "To be fair, my uncle there is childless. It could happen."

Stef raised an eyebrow doubtfully. "Isn't he married now?"

"I'm not saying my chances aren't getting slimmer," Raid specified. "Besides, I already paid my dues for that lie when I got back together with her for the Halloween costume party and she made us go as Aladdin and Jasmine."

Stef covered her mouth, unsure whether laughter or another dreaded confession was about to burst from it. Should she? Shouldn't she? She gritted her teeth and went for it. "I know. I was the one who convinced the DJ to play A Whole New World." She howled into her hands, remembering Savannah in her element, swirling around the dancefloor like the blonde Persian princess she believed she was destined to be.

Raid's eyes tensed in fury but his tight-lipped attempt to hold back his laughter revealed his real mood. "I. Am. Going. To. End. You." He slowly stalked towards her.

Stef continued to laugh as she backed away from him, rounding the pillar and holding her hands out defensively. "Oh, it gets worse," she admitted, struggling to speak through her laughter. "I told her you requested it."

As Stef's back finally hit the wall behind her, Raid slapped his hands either side of her, caging her in. "Anything else to confess?" he grinned wickedly.

Stef shook her head, lowering her eyes, his playfully vengeful expression making her laugh too much to talk. When she finally managed to compose herself, she replied, "No, that's all."

He tilted her chin up, forcing her to meet his eyes. "What about how you feel about me?"

All the heat from Stef's cheeks went plummeting to between her legs as his eyes burned into her with longing. She wasn't going to be able to resist him. She couldn't resist him. He knew what he was doing – what he was letting himself in for – didn't he? His life would never be normal again. "Raid..." she started hesitantly.

"If you're worried about the prophecy... if you're worried that's the only reason you feel anything for me –" he started.

She shook her head. "I'm not worried about the prophecy," she cut in.

"Well, I am," he told her. "But we can make it real, Stef, I promise you." He stroked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Over time, your feelings will become real."

Stef pushed both his arms down, her aggravation growing. "The prophecy has nothing to do with it!" she snapped.

"How do you know?" he burst back. He wanted to believe it. He'd do anything to believe it.

Stef sighed heavily. She couldn't tell him everything. There were some secrets too risky to share. But there was one loophole in the prophecy, something truthful that could guarantee him that her feelings were real. "Because the prophecy can't manifest if..." This was it. No going back. "...if I was already in love when I turned."

Raid held his breath. "In love with who?"

Stef raised her eyebrows at him. "Do you really need me to say it?"

"You say any other guy's name but mine and he's dead."

Stef shot him a reprimanding scowl. "Of course it's you, Raid, you fucking –"

Taking both sides of her face, Raid's lips crashed upon hers, cutting off her speech, her thoughts, until there was nothing left but him, and the feeling of his mouth on hers. She kissed him back, clinging onto his neck, the taste of him making her world spin. She wanted this and more. He was devouring her and still it wasn't enough. Four years of longing burned within them both, neither of them daring to stop for air, neither of them caring if they ever needed to breathe again while they had this. Raid's hands came down to her back, pulling her tightly against him, a moan escaping the clamp her teeth had against her bottom lip as his kisses trailed hungrily down her neck.

This, Stef realized. This is what it was meant to feel like. This is what she'd always wanted. This was where she was meant to be. She could never give this up. Not now. Not ever.

"You want to finish that insult, beautiful?" he growled into her neck.

She gasped as his teeth ran across her skin in the same place she had once fed on him, a teasing reminder of how it felt. "I will if you don't take me to bed soon," she threatened breathlessly.

He retraced his kisses back up her neck, stopping at her mouth. "And what if this is going too fast?" he said, mocking her initial reaction.

She scowled. "You fucking –"

She squealed as he bent down and picked her up over his shoulder. She finished the insult anyway and it earned her a spank on the ass. So obviously she said it a few more times as he carried her to the bedroom.