Read Online A Vampire's Christmas Carol by Cynthia Eden - Free Book Online

was starting
my
life. I was running toward my future, not from you.”
    Ben didn’t relax his guard. Not for a moment.  “I’m supposed to believe that crap?  You and your shifter buddies were a pack.” At least, he’d thought they were. They’d sure all attacked together. “You were fighting with them.”
    “It’s not easy to kill an alpha shifter. Even if the prick is crazy as all hell.”  The man smiled. He had thick, dark hair and eerily bright green eyes.  Ben had never seen eyes shine quite the way this shifter’s did.
    The guy was also stark naked.
    “You freed me from him,” the shifter said. “So now, I owe you.”
    “Great,” Ben snapped. Cause that was what he wanted. A cat saying he was grateful. “How about you put on some clothes and we’ll call it even?”
    The man waved his hand again, and clothes just—appeared. Jeans. A t-shirt.  A t-shirt? In the winter?
    “I don’t get cold,” the guy told him. “Shifters usually run hot.”
    Wonderful for them.  Ben shouldered past the guy.
    “Ah, at least you’re going in the right direction…”
    The cat was following him. No, not following him. The cat shifter was right
beside
Ben now. The guy moved fast.
    “I’m Jamison,” the fellow said.
    Ben whirled toward him. “Fuck off,
Jamison
.”
    Jamison’s green eyes narrowed. “I’m your last visitor for the night.”
    This was so screwed. “I don’t want you.” Ben grabbed the shifter by the t-shirt. “I want Simone back. Bring
her
back
.
” She was the only visitor he cared about.
    “Ah, enjoyed that little meet-and-greet, did you?”  Humor flashed in the shifter’s eyes. “But that angel is smokin’, so I don’t blame you a single bit for wanting to tap that ass.”
    Ben slammed his head into the shifter’s nose. There was a savagely satisfying crunch of sound. Blood spurted. The shifter howled.
    “Don’t fucking talk about her,” Ben snarled at him. He was more than ready to let his own beast out. “She’s the woman I’m going to—”
    “What? Marry?” The shifter pressed a hand to his bleeding nose. Then, not even pausing for a second, he snapped the broken nose back into place. “Sorry, man, but I don’t see that in your future.” 
    “Oh, you don’t?”  It took every bit of his self-control not to grab the guy and re-break his nose just for the hell of it. “Then what do you see?”
    Jamison flashed a broad smile. One that showed way too many sharp teeth. “I thought you’d never ask.” His hand slapped down on Ben’s shoulder. “The future…that’s what I’m all about tonight. Your future and that sweet-ass angel’s future.”
    Ben’s back teeth ground together.
    Jamison pushed him forward. They started plodding through the thick snow.  “She wasn’t just
your
angel,” Jamison told him as if confiding a big secret. “It’s not like a one angel per person deal. They watch over a lot of folks at the same time.”
    Ben hadn’t known that. Mostly because he didn’t know anything about angels. 
    “I was her charge, too.” Jamison stopped, staring straight ahead. “I used to think death would be my way out.  The alpha was so freaking twisted. He cut on us just as much as he did his prey.”  Jamison’s hand rubbed over his chest. “But then, maybe we
were
his prey.” His hand dropped.
    Ben’s head tilted as he considered the shifter. The guy’s nose wasn’t bleeding anymore. It wasn’t even swollen. 
    “We heal fast,” Jamison said, obviously reading the question on his face. “Almost as fast as vampires do. That’s why I didn’t scar, no matter how many times the alpha took the skin right from my body.”
    Fuck. 
    “The past can be hell, and the future…” Jamison exhaled on a rough sigh. “Sometimes, it can be a nightmare, too.”
    “I’m supposed to believe that you’re about to show me the future?”
    “I’m going to show you the future that
could
be,” Jamison said carefully. “The real future is what