"Yes."

"I miss Caleb," I said.

"As do I," Pallo said softly to me.

Chapter 14.

I had to fight to fall asleep. I visualized the white light of peace moving up from my toes, over my legs, past my hips, up and over my breast, sliding over my face, and moving out the top of my head. My body felt completely relaxed. I had released the tension from the day and felt sleep come on me. It was glorious. I made a mental note to thank Nana for the tip.

My peaceful rest was interrupted. I felt my subconscious mind wandering. It was digging in deep crevices that often go unnoticed. It came up with something, and shared it with me in the form of a nightmare. I was running down a long corridor from something. I could hear it moving quickly behind me, but I couldn't see it. I didn't want to see it. I wore no shoes, and I could tell my feet were bleeding. I could feel the presence behind me closing in. I wanted to move faster, but I felt like I was wading through an invisible fog of mola.s.ses. I put my arms into it and pushed against the force slowing me down. There was a door ahead of me. I knew that was the way out. I knew that behind that door lay safety. When I reached it, I pulled on the k.n.o.b. My hand was slick with sweat and it slipped off. I wiped it on the bottom of the long blue dress I wore. I pulled the trailing end of the sleeves into my hand and tried the k.n.o.b again. I felt it turn, and I pulled it open a few inches when something slammed into me from behind. My body was pressed to the door--my fingers were closed in it. I knew they were broken. I could feel the throbbing pain shoot up my arm and into my neck.

Hot breath blew against the back of my head. Something snarled and drew air into its lungs.

"Look at me." The voice was very low and barely human.

"Don't," I said, leaning against the door. "Please, don't do this." Hot tears streamed down my checks.

"You smell of him," the demonic voice said. "I said look at me." An ice cold hand gripped my shoulder, pulling me free from the door. Its hand ran across my very swollen stomach. "I am gone from you only a few months, and you cannot even wait for me. Instead, you lie with him and you betray me with this." Its hands pressed hard against my stomach. Something moved inside me, I could feel the tiny life growing within. Two hands gripped my shoulders and pushed my back to the door, forceful but not painful.

"No, you have changed, you're not the same, you are a--"

"Go ahead." Its breath was so hot against my cheek. I fought with all my might not to open my eyes and look at it. "I am a monster now. And you thought that you had freed yourself of demons."

I tried to slide away from it, but it was too strong. I swallowed hard. "Please don't hurt us."

"Oh, that is good. Begging like a dog for your life." Its fingers wrapped tight around my arms. I cried. "Now you weep. Now you show that you have emotions. Tell me, did you weep so for me when you believed me gone?" I was reaching it. I knew that on some level I was appealing to whatever humanity it had left in it. "I do not think you mourned long. By the looks of you," --it pushed at my stomach again--, "you didn't hesitate to seek the arms of another. Look at me when I speak to you, Gwyneth."

"I can't." My voice was small. I could feel its face close to mine, too close. It pushed its mouth onto mine, forcing its tongue inside. Fangs nicked my tongue, and my mouth filled with blood.

I kicked awake in the bed, my heart pounding in my chest. I lifted my hand to my mouth and came away with blood. I had bitten through my bottom lip during the nightmare. Something touched my cheek, and I screamed.

"Gwyneth, it is I," Pallo whispered. "What is wrong?"

He stared at me sleepily. I tried to relax. He was so sweet and genuine. I wanted to wrap myself around him and let him hold me until I fell back asleep. I wanted a lot of things in my life, but the fact remained that he was a vampire, so I sat still.

"I had a bad dream." I sounded like a child. "I..."

"You do not have to explain to me. Come, let me hold you." His arm slid around my back. "You are safe now, you are safe."

I leaned back in his arm and wanted to thank him for being so kind, even though I had treated him so badly.

"You're warm," I said. Okay, it wasn't 'I'm sorry for being a jerk', but it was the best I could come up with.

"So I am," he said, propping his head up with his hand. From the look on his face it surprised him too. "You bring out the best in me, what can I say?" He kissed me on the cheek, and when he pulled back, his face was flushed. I caressed his cheek, and he pressed a kiss to my wrist. A shiver ran down my spine. I didn't want to have such a vulnerable spot near his mouth. I knew that he hadn't fed since we'd been here, and I wasn't planning on being breakfast.

"There is no need to fear me," he whispered between tiny kisses on my skin.

I wasn't sure I wanted to take his word on that. It took every ounce of my willpower to turn away from him and climb out of the bed. His hands brushed along my back as I stood.

"What time do you think it is?" I asked, trying to keep myself from climbing back into the bed and straddling him.

"I would say it is probably close to six."

"Great. I can still make it into the office before Ken gets in. How do we get out of here?"

He looked up at me. "Six p.m."

"We slept all day long? I've got to go."

"We go nowhere until we are both ready."

"Where's your kitchen?"

"Go out the door and down the staircase. You shall find it on the lower level. Third door on the right, although I am not sure what Lydia will have provided for us."

He was still lying on top of the covers.

"What, no personal tour?" I said, smiling.

"Forgive me, Gwyneth, but I am not feeling like myself."

"You need blood, don't you?"

He closed his eyes a moment, and then looked to me. "Yes."

I started towards him. I really had no idea what I planned to do when I got there, but at that point I didn't care.

Pallo's stopped me. "No, you go and attend to your needs. I will be fine."

"But," I started to say. I figured a two hundred and seventy-five year old vampire ought to know what's best for him. "Don't fall asleep."

I headed out the door in the direction he had pointed me in. I walked out into the hall. It was grand. On the left side was a row of three doors. The right was open to the floor below. A large rounded banister ran along the side and curved to follow the staircase. I started downstairs and stopped dead in my tracks. A large oil painting hung on the wall above the landing. There was a woman and a man standing near the edge of a river. The woman wore a long white dress similar to the one I was wearing now, and the man wore a loose, silky white shirt and a pair of brown pants. They were standing face to face, holding hands. The man's wavy brown hair was pulled back into a pony tail at the base of his neck. I looked at the profile harder and knew that I was staring at Pallo. I knew this was, or had been, his home at one time, so I wasn't shocked. What did shock me, however, was the face of the woman he was holding hands with. It was me. Well, almost me. The woman's face was identical to mine, except for the fact that she had the most beautiful violet-colored eyes. She stared up at Pallo's face with so much love in her violet eyes that I could almost feel it sweep over me. I clutched the cold, hard railing to keep my footing, swallowing hard to keep from being sick.

"Gwyneth." Pallo's voice came from the top of the staircase.

"Who did this?" I asked.

"Who did what?" He stood behind me, but I didn't turn around.

"Did you do this? Is this your idea of a joke?"

"I do not know what you are taking about." He touched my shoulder.

"You planned this, didn't you? You said you'd seen my name in the Nocturnal Journal. Did you see a picture, too? There's no Lydia. This isn't some house from your past. Mystical portal, my a.s.s! What I want to know is how you managed to find someone to paint a picture of the two of us." I was so angry I could feel my jaw tightening. "I hope they didn't charge you too much, because my eyes are blue."

"Please, allow me to explain. Come back to the room."

"G.o.d, you just don't quit. You'll do just about anything to get me in there with you." I stepped down another step to get his hand off of me.

"Gwyneth, that painting has been here for centuries. I had an artist paint it before I became what I am now." He sighed and continued, "I had a life before I became a monster, and that is one of the few things left to remind me of it."

My mind raced. I knew he told the truth. I would have sensed him lying to me. But if what Pallo said was true, how was it that I was in the picture with him? It was impossible. It was painted at least two hundred years before I was born.

"Gwyneth, I should have told you. When I saw you standing in my home, I could not think. There you stood, in the flesh, in my home.... He told us we would be rewarded, but neither of us expected you to return. We never expected a second chance at...."

I felt his hand on my shoulder again and I cringed. I pulled away and ran downstairs. I had to keep grabbing the material on my nightgown to keep from tripping.

I hit the bottom with such speed that I slid toward the front door. My shoulder took most of the hit from slamming into the heavy door. My right hand went numb and I had to use my left hand to open the door.

"No!" Pallo screamed from the staircase. He was having trouble keeping up with me because he hadn't fed yet.

I looked back at him coming downstairs. His eyes flashed wildly at me. I stepped out the door, and felt the ground give way under my feet. My stomach rose to my throat. The ground came upon me with such force it knocked the wind out of me. My hair spilled over my face like a curtain. Something crashed onto the floor next to me. My breathing went ragged, and I felt like a caged animal.

"Are you all right?"

I pulled my hair back and looked wildly at Pallo crouched on the floor next to me. He looked sick. He was bent over, holding his abdomen. He looked ghastly white, so much so that I thought he might start to glow in the dark.

"Are you hurt?"

"No, I need to...." He looked to me and could not bring himself to say the word feed.

"We need to get you back to the park. Come on." I stood, and it hit me that we were not sitting in front of a house, but what looked to be a dungeon. All the joking I had done about his house, and he really did have one.

"This is not mine."

I was getting pretty d.a.m.n sick and tired of his little mind--reading tricks but didn't have the energy to fight with him. When I looked at him and saw his body hunched over like a tiger about to strike, I put my hand on his back. His skin was no longer warm. It was cold and clammy. "You're dying." I bent and wrapped my body around his. In my mind, I thought that my body heat would warm him, but it didn't work.

"No. I am already dead," he said. No trace of the strong and sure Pallo remained in his voice.

"Well, great, since you've already been there and done that we can skip it and go home."

"Home?" He turned his face to me. All of the glory had faded from his brown eyes, only gray ones remained.

"Yes, home. We can fight more after we get there." I helped him to his feet. When I was sure he wasn't going to pa.s.s out, I turned to look around the room.

"So, where are we? And don't state the obvious again."

"h.e.l.l."

"Figuratively or literally?"

"Does it matter?"

He had a point. I started to ask him how to get out of here when he put a finger to his lip to shush me. I listened but heard only silence.

He gestured to a metal door at the end of the room. He whispered in an unfamiliar language. I had no idea what he was saying, but if I had to take a crack at it, I'd have guessed he spoke in Latin.

"What are you doing?"

"Praying," he said softly.

"Vampires do that?" I couldn't hide the shock in my voice.

Howling pierced the silence like a knife. Pallo pulled me behind him in a protective manner and stood tall.

The door burst open. Two h.e.l.lhounds leapt inside. They stopped at Pallo's feet, growling. Red eyes blazed at us, almost glowing. They were twice the size of full grown Great Danes. Pallo pushed me back slowly.

"I see you've met the boys," a woman's voice said.

I looked to see her standing in the open doorway. She was about my height, average. Okay, short, and had long red hair. She looked like she had been dunked in leather: a leather top squeezed her large breast together, and her pants fit her body so tightly I was positive she couldn't sit down.

She looked familiar to me, but I couldn't place her. Yeah, you would think that a pair of beady yellow eyes and a chick dressed like a biker-wh.o.r.e-from-h.e.l.l would be easy to recall.

She spared me a glance then concentrated on Pallo.

"Pallo, Pallo. I didn't expect a visit from you today." She pulled a knife holder from her back pocket. "You should have called. I could have prepared the room, just the way you like it."

"Talia, it's been a long time."

"You know her?" I couldn't keep my mouth shut any longer.

She took a step closer and caressed the neck of one hound.

"Who is your little friend? Do not tell me you've taken to bedding virgins now? I thought you were done with that. They break so easy, don't they?" She smiled and fangs showed. I was happy at least one vamp I'd met was holding true to a Hollywood image.

"He's not bedding me, and I'm not a virgin."

"Oh, I see why you like her. You always did have a thing for mouthy girls. Is she good with her mouth in other places as well?"

"Talia, to what do we owe the honor of this visit?" Pallo asked. The muscles in his arms flexed.

"I was running an errand for the Queen, but since I found you, let us just say it is for old time's sake." She licked the blade of her knife. I could feel Pallo's fear. He was opening himself up to me. He feared this tiny little redhead.

"I do not recognize these two," he said, looking at the h.e.l.lhounds.

"They are new. They just completed the initiation process a few days ago. They no longer have any ties to the human world. They 'severed' them. I have had to make so many new little ones as of late. I have lost many of my children. The humans hunt us like we are animals."

"That's a shocker." I bit my lip, but it was too late.

Talia gave me a look. "Show her you are not animals."

The two hounds' backs curved abnormally backwards as they howled. I lifted my hands to cover my ears. The decibel level was almost deafening in the chamber.