Read Online All Others (Vampire Assassin League Book 27) by Jackie Ivie - Free Book Online Page A

nice. I mean
really
nice.”
    “The bed?”
    “Wow. I just got back my motor skills. I’d hate to think my mind is lagging that far behind. No. Not just the bed, although that is especially nice. I meant all of it. That’s...uh, kind of the problem.”
    “There is a problem?”
    “Yeah.”
    Cameron was on his back, propped on pillows. Tessa’s head rested against his shoulder. Her body hugged his side. One of his fingers traced some sort of pattern along her back, raising shivers in its wake. They’d finished with their shower. Dried each other off. Nearly broken this bed frame with another lovemaking session. She’d lowered the net of canopy to enshroud the bed so she could open the balcony drapes. That let the sight and sounds of the bayou into the chamber. Dawn was at least an hour away. She’d never felt so blissful. Aglow with rapture. Somnolent with the remnants of ecstasy. She was having a hard time concentrating. And he mentioned a problem?
    “Are you going to tell me what it is?” she asked.
    He blew a heavy sigh. Air rushed over her exposed skin, raising more shivers and puckering her nipples into darts against him.
    “You are a vampire.”
    “I know. I told you I was.”
    “You don’t understand. You’re a
real
vampire.”
    “I know.”
    “It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
    “I told you already.”
    “If every other theory has been tested and failed, then the end result is fact. Immutable. Uncontestable. Irrefutable.”
    Tessa shifted onto her belly in order to look up toward his face. He was regarding her with those gray-green eyes. They were such an amazing color! Light moss green. Fascinating. They stunned against his ruddy complexion, as well as the barely-there beard and mustache. Her glance dropped to his lips. They were curved into a slight smile. She returned it. But then he shook his head.
    “I still can’t see it. My mind does. But everything else is in denial. You’re so damn sexy. How can you be dead?”
    “I’m not. I’m undead. But I’m not even that, anymore. Do you want to know why?”
    “Uh...later. Maybe. I’ve got to get some facts lined up first. Why don’t we go with reanimated dead? That way I can keep it straight.”
    “Do I look reanimated to you?”
    “You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. Or imagined. That part is a solid fact, sweetheart.”
    Her heart stuttered. She caught a breath. He mimicked it, but didn’t appear to notice. “You don’t mind...my skin?”
    “What about it?”
    “My mother was a slave.”
    Tessa tensed as she watched him. He blinked several times. He had blond eyelashes. They shimmered in the candlelight.
    “I’m almost afraid to ask,” he finally said.
    “About my father?”
    “No. About what year we’re talking.”
    “Year?”
    “I’m going to guess you died – if that’s the right word – sometime before the Civil War?”
    “I was changed. I didn’t die.”
    “And the year was...?” he prompted.
    “1839.”
    He whistled. “You don’t look a day over twenty-five.”
    “I was twenty-four.”
    “Well...I’m thirty-nine. Now I’m feeling kind of old. Like I’m cradle-robbing, if that’s even possible with a woman who’s almost two centuries old. And dead.”
    “Undead.”
    “Reanimated,” he quipped.
    Tessa sighed. “You are a very handsome man, Cameron Preston. Very fit. And extremely virile.” She looked down and blushed even more severely.
    His heart stuttered this time. She knew because hers matched it.
    “Are you flattering me?” he asked.
    “No.”
    Her gaze flew back to his. He was smiling.
    “Those guys back there...they weren’t ghost hunters, were they?”
    “What guys?”
    “The Beethan group. At the Ramsay place.”
    “Those men were
Hunters
.” She spat the word.
    “Ah. I get it. They were vampire hunters. Because of course, they exist, too. And I didn’t even see it. Garlic. Crucifixes. Holy Water in the squirt guns. Wow. It feels like I’ve stumbled on