Page 109

Jamie

“ W here’s your new shadow?”

Jamie looked up from his computer to find Monique standing in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, eating dry cereal out of the box.

He’d been keeping himself busy fielding emails from potential clients.

Picking up any major, time-consuming project didn’t sound particularly appealing at the moment—not when his mind was firmly focused on other, much more exciting new developments—but some requests were easy enough ways to keep his bank account full.

Designing new websites, working out bugs on company apps, and so on.

“Luc? He’s running some errands.” Although, what errands a vampire could possibly have to run in this town, Jamie had no clue. And Luc hadn’t exactly been forthcoming with the answer.

Jamie’s vampire had seemed…preoccupied that morning. Not exactly distant—not when he’d made Jamie come twice before breakfast—but a little on edge, for sure.

But who knew how full of thoughts Jamie’s own head would be after multiple centuries of living? He supposed he’d find that out for himself eventually.

He grinned at the thought. How weird. How fucking cool .

Monique was still standing in the doorway, fiddling with one of her braids now. “You seem happy,” she said. It sounded almost like an accusation.

Jamie shrugged. “I’m always happy.”

Monique hummed noncommittally, staring at him. “He’s kind of an odd duck, isn’t he?”

Jamie didn’t have to ask who she meant by “he.”

“ I’m kind of an odd duck,” he pointed out, maybe a little sharply.

“Yeah, but you’re charming,” Monique countered. “And fun. Goofy. He’s very…intense. And not just because of his always-in-character costuming.”

“You know I’m odd in other ways.” Jamie turned back to his computer, thinking that would settle it. He and Monique didn’t talk about it directly—his “oddity.” Not since her ex’s accident. Not ever.

So he was surprised when Monique sat down next to him on the couch, placing her box of cereal on the coffee table before turning to face him. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, her favorite self-soothing method before confrontation. Jamie braced himself.

“I don’t blame you for what happened,” she said after another calming breath.

Oh, so they were really having this conversation. Jamie wished he had a cigarette. A toothpick. A piece of gum, even. He settled for tapping his fingers on his thigh. “I didn’t think you did.”

He’d definitely thought she did.

Monique eyed his fingers’ frantic rhythm, pursing her lips a little, but didn’t ask him to stop.

She knew him too well for that. “I know I didn’t handle it well.

I just— It didn’t make any sense to me. I’ve never even been superstitious before.

In the back of my mind, I kept thinking maybe you’d just heard it somewhere else first. Like you were playing pretend about it being a—a premonition. ”

“I told you what I saw before it happened.” And given the chance to do it all over again, Jamie wasn’t sure he would. He’d been young, still in high school. He’d thought somehow he owed it to her to tell her, that the knowing would help.

He didn’t think that way anymore.

Monique huffed a frustrated breath. “I know you did. It wasn’t making sense in my own brain. It was just so…so—Tessa almost died .”

Monique’s girlfriend at the time had been on a breathing machine for over a week. And every time Jamie had seen Monique during the ordeal, she’d had this…. look …in her eyes. Grief, yes. Fear for her girlfriend’s life, most definitely.

But also condemnation. Blame.

Like Jamie was the problem.

Jamie tapped away with his fingers, having trouble meeting Monique’s eyes. The old blame wasn’t there, but in its place was an earnestness he didn’t know what to do with.

“They always seem to come true, you know,” he found himself telling her. “No matter what I do, I don’t seem to have any control over the outcome.”

“That must be frightening.”

Jamie didn’t answer. Was it frightening? He was so used to it at this point. And his visions had brought him Luc, in a way. They’d allowed him to prepare himself for his monster finding him.

Monique cleared her throat. “You know, you pushed me away just as much, in the beginning. It was like you were rejecting me before I could reject you first. You seem so open on the surface, Jamie, but you can be really closed off when you want to be.”

Jamie cocked his head, considering that. He supposed it was true. He often left things at surface level, if the people around him allowed it. It felt safer that way. Fewer chances to freak them out by knowing things he wasn’t supposed to know.

“You’re not closed off with him though,” Monique pointed out.

Jamie laughed. “Was this all a really long-winded way of telling me you don’t approve of my new boyfriend?”

Monique latched onto that immediately. “Boyfriend?” she asked skeptically.

“Boyfriend,” Jamie asserted, his voice firm.

Now it was Monique’s turn to laugh. “Damn, Jamie. When you move, you move fast . But no. This is my way of telling you—I don’t know, I guess that it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. You have people here who love you. Really love you.”

Jamie’s fingers stilled, and he met Monique’s concerned brown eyes. “I don’t understand.”

She gave a hapless shrug. “It’s just— Ever since high school ended, you’ve always seemed like you have one foot out the door.

I always expect any day now you’ll waltz in and tell me you’re off to travel the world and never return.

And if you want to leave, that’s fine.” She placed a hand on his arm and gave a light squeeze.

“I just want to make sure you know you can come back. Anytime. Always. You have people here who love you.”

Jamie felt a rush of warmth and love for his childhood friend. “I know that,” he assured her, placing a hand on top of hers. “I promise I do.”

Except, according to Luc, it was possible—probable, even—that Jamie wouldn’t be able to come back.

That it might take him years and years to control his urges enough to be around the people that knew him the best. And by the time he could control those urges, enough years could have passed that it would raise suspicion to return still looking twenty-three.

He’d be a different Jamie altogether for an unknowable amount of time. Bloodthirsty. Wild.

Jamie didn’t mind that for himself, exactly. He wasn’t afraid of changing. He had faith—in himself, in Luc, in their bond.

But he would miss the people he loved. Maybe more than he’d let himself think.

Monique gave his arm one last squeeze before drawing her hand back and giving a little laugh. “Okay, serious talk over, I promise.”

Jamie for his part let out his own deep breath, grateful when she picked up the cereal box from the coffee table, tilting it in question before pouring a handful of its contents into Jamie’s hand, giving him something to occupy his mouth with.

Something to focus on besides the twisty, unsettled feeling in his stomach.

“Except, just one more thing.”

Jamie groaned. “Nooo,” he whined. “I can’t handle any more sincerity right now.”

She held up a placating hand. “I just want to say—just once—that I really, really appreciate all the help you’ve been giving me at the bar.

I know you don’t need the money and that you’re overqualified by like a million.

I guess I just—I just like having you there.

You make me laugh without even trying. It doesn’t feel as stressful when you’re around. ”

Jamie leaned his head against her shoulder, crunching the cereal between his teeth. “Love you too, Monique.”

Jamie wrinkled his nose at the firm, fuzzy orb that was being thrust in front of his face. “I don’t trust them.”

Luc gave a reproachful sigh. “I don’t understand.”

Jamie shifted in Luc’s lap, where he was positioned sidesaddle over Luc’s firm thighs on one of the kitchen chairs. “I just don’t. I’ve been fooled before.”

Luc huffed. “What is there to trust? It’s a fruit.” Luc held the peach up in demonstration in front of Jamie’s face. The small fruit was easily dwarfed by his large hand. “There is no trust or distrust. Only chew and swallow.”

Jamie shook his head, pushing the fruit away. “Nuh-uh. Every time I’ve tried a peach, I always think I’m going to get a bite of deliciousness, and instead it’s either mealy or weirdly crunchy.” He twisted his lips in distaste. “Gross.”

“These are perfectly ripe.” Luc tapped the side of his nose with one finger. “I can tell. Enhanced senses, flower.”

In Jamie’s personal opinion, there were probably a million better, more interesting ways to use enhanced senses than sussing out the ripeness of peaches, but he kept that to himself. “Why do you want me to eat this peach so badly?” he asked instead.

Because in Jamie’s opinion, there were also a million better, more interesting things they could be doing with the fact that they were all alone in his house.

Jamie had been stunned when Luc had arrived back from his “errands” with a bag of peaches in hand, claiming he’d stopped at a farmer’s market in town. For what possible reason, Jamie hadn’t been able to fathom.

But apparently his vampire’s watching-Jamie-eat fetish had taken a very specific turn. Luc was absolutely fixated on the peach thing.

Luc sighed again and placed the fruit on the table, toying with a piece of Jamie’s hair with his free hand.

“They were a delicacy when I was young,” he explained.

“I never tasted anything as delicious as my first peach.” Luc ran his nose along Jamie’s cheek, raising goose bumps all along Jamie’s arms. “Until you.”

Oh . Jamie liked the direction this was taking now. “What do I taste like to you?” he asked, eager to turn this conversation in a sexier direction.