Antithesis: The Vampire Alliance Book Three - FIRST DRAFT COMPLETED

Antithesis Chapter 8: Eve Blakethorn-Sullivan May 2013

Eve Blakethorn-Sullivan, May 2013

I wake with a soft moan but I don’t open my eyes as Tul slides his hand up my inner thigh, content to stay in this dreamy world of sleep and the first glow of desire. For his part he obviously has other plans as his fingers begin to explore the warm folds at the apex of my thighs. His need for me flows into me, hot and liquid and coursing through me to heat my core as he teases my body awake.

On my other side Rob moans in his sleep, rolling instinctually towards me as he begins to rouse. Smiling, I finally open my eyes and gaze up at Tul who’s leaning beside me, watching my expression as he presses his fingers to my core. “You’ll wake Rob up.”

“So?” He replies, pressing a not-so-chaste kiss to my lips before pulling back to ask, “Are either of you going to mind?”

“I certainly don’t,” Rob’s admission is low and gravelly with sleep and lust as he presses a kiss to my cheek, then my collar bone, then he licks his way down to my already exposed and quickly hardening nipple.

Tul’s gasp of pleasure echoes my own as he feels every sensation I do. At his reaction I lick my lower lip, desperate to kiss him, to feel his mouth on mine. I want to kiss him so strongly, to stroke his tongue with mine...

Growling, Rob interrupts my thoughts. His frustration pours into me, at odds with what we’d all been feeling a mere moment before. Wordlessly he pulls himself to his feet, stalking to our bathroom and slamming the door. My first thoughts are ones of panic, worrying that my fears regarding their inability to share me had been correct. However, there’s no jealousy in Rob’s emotions, none at all. There’s a wealth of embarrassment, of confusion, but envy is not the problem.

“What just happened?” I wonder out loud, not expecting an answer but openly perplexed.

“I have my suspicions,” Tul answers, his desire cooling alongside mine. Rob’s humiliation works as effectively as a bucket of icy water on both of us.

Quirking a brow at him, my tone is both curious and serious, “Are you going to explain?”

Tul sighs, rubbing his hand over his short hair in a familiar gesture of concern. “You want both of us,” he murmurs, seemingly reluctant to voice his reservations.
“He isn’t jealous,” I state matter-of-factly, “I can feel that and so can you.”

Nodding he explains, “Yes and that’s the problem. We can all feel one another. Especially when we’re,” he pauses, tilting his head and considering his choice of words, “worked up. Do you find it easy, when we’re intimate, to distinguish which feelings and desires are yours and which feelings and desires are mine or his.”

Shaking my head and frowning, I admit, “No, it’s almost impossible, everything merges.” He knows this. I don’t understand why he’s asking.

Slate blue eyes meet mine, serious and urging me to understand, “Then imagine that for a century you’ve had a best friend, a friend you would never think to consider romantically, who all of a sudden you want to kiss.”

My frown deepens as I consider Tul’s implication. I’d wanted to kiss him just seconds before Rob’s disappearance. Had that made Rob want to...?  “Hell” I murmur. “Fucking hell.”

“Yeah,” Tul replies, not meeting my eye. “We’ve been connected since nineteen-sixteen and while at times it’s been frustrating we always managed. We didn’t realise that with you, with everything intensified by being Strix, things would get... Christ. Complicated, it’s complicated.”

“Can you adapt to it?” The question is hesitantly voiced and I feel guilty even asking. I can’t expect them to come to terms with this. Tul’s injury and the human threat are quite possibly the only reasons this hasn’t become a problem earlier. We’ve been too distracted to notice but clearly this is an issue. The idea that this could be an insurmountable problem, that I could lose Rob and Tul just when they’ve finally started to make me believe we have a chance, is both painful and unimaginable.

Tul looks up, studying the bathroom door as he frowns, “I’m not the problem. I’ll love you, I’ll adapt, I’ll live with it. We can embrace it or ignore it as we have been doing, either way I’ll do everything I can to make this relationship work. Him though, he’s always been slower to adapt. He didn’t recover from the sixties until well into the eighties.”

“Hell,” I repeat again while rubbing my eyes in weary concern, my emotions currently matching Rob’s confusion. “Why is nothing ever simple?”

Tul grins teasingly but I can feel his concern, “You’re a complication.”

“I don’t want to be. Tul, this could tear us apart and I can’t lose you. I can’t lose him. I can’t bear to come between you again either. I ran before because...”

He grabs my chin, forcing me to look at him, “Don’t you dare go down that route. Running away helps no one. There will be another way, we’ll manage.”

“He’s right,” Rob states from the bathroom door, “you disappearing is the worst outcome. I can cope.”

“Like you just did?” There’s no sarcasm in the question, just a simple reminder that so far he’s finding it difficult.

“No,” he responds with a rueful smile, “better than that. I promise.” Striding back he kneels next to me, his mouth brushes mine briefly before he repeats, “I promise. I love you and I can do this.”

I want to test the assurance but when Lady Marmalade starts blaring from my phone I know it’s not to be. What could Van want this early? Scrambling out of bed I grab my new mobile before she can hang up, “Van?”

“Where are you? Everyone else is already here!” She sounds annoyed and I can feel myself wilting, it must be later than I’d thought. Vanessa had somehow managed to book the rec room for a girls’ only night. A completely mad idea and not one I’m particularly thrilled about, especially as I’ll never be little miss popular.

“Shit, sorry Van, my alarm didn’t go off. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Upon hanging up and turning back to Rob and Tul I realise all tension has dissipated. As suddenly as they had arisen our relationship problems are shelved, locked away in some endeavour to ignore a potentially unsolvable complication. Sometimes denial just seems easier, and quite frankly I have no idea how to fix this. I guess Rob needs his chance to ‘cope’ as he’d put it. With admirable determination both of my husbands push down their concerns and instead Tul’s amusement at my phone call is tangible.

“Do you seriously have the Moulin Rouge version Lady Marmalade set as Van’s ring tone? Does she know?”

Feeling an embarrassed flush colour my cheeks I shrug, trying not to show my discomfort. “I’ve always used it for Van, right from first starting to work for her. But no, of course she doesn’t know,” I grin, “she’d kill me, especially now I’m no longer her pet project.”

“What ringtone do you have set for me?” Rob asks curiously and my face heats up further. “Come on,” he encourages, “it can’t be any worse than the ‘Angel’ theme tune.”

“I was very young when we met,” I point out defensively, “and you had just saved my life and you were a vampire. But no, you aren’t in as the ‘Angel’ theme anymore. I’m not telling either of you what you’re in as, neither of you will like your ringtones any more than Van would like Lady Marmalade so I’m not telling.” Rob looks about to argue so I announce determinedly, “I am having a shower.”

I’m half way to the bathroom when my phone rings again and I realise Tul’s hit speed dial. Cutting my losses I don’t bother charging back for my mobile and choose to hide in the bathroom instead, leaving them to consider the reasons why my phone is blaring Evanescence’s ‘Forgive Me’. When I programmed my ringtones the line “I can’t live this life, without you by my side, I need you to survive,” had called to me.

Clearly not done with humiliating me, Rob’s curiosity gets the better of him too. As soon as Tul’s ringtone falls silent Rob’s begins, another Evanescence song echoing in the next room. Perhaps the lyrics of ‘Even in Death’ had been more poignant in years gone by but they meant something to me.

“They’re... interesting choices,” I hear Tul remark as I hide behind the door. “What do you have for her?”

I can almost feel Rob smile. “Iris, Goo Goo Dolls. It’s one of her favourite songs. Or it was. We haven’t exactly talked music since my return from the grave. I guess she may have found another song to love since two thousand and nine,” Rob answers, and my heart swells a little. “That song was what brought me here, as 1352.”

There’s a pause but Rob continues, responding to either my curiosity or Tul’s. “After I... after 1352... after you got her out I started looking things up. My execution, why Eve was important to the Senate, me. The day I found the Avitus Gens information I knew I had to bring it here but doing so was a death sentence. As 1352 I wasn’t sure if sacrificing myself was the right decision. I was still coming to terms with the idea that I loved Eve and at first I thought the love was coming from you, not me. I was confused and... lost.

Then I walked into the Senate recreation room and Iris was on the radio. In the time it took for the chorus to play through once I’d made the decision to come. Maybe it just called to me, through the monster that was 1352. The world might not have understood what I’d become but I needed Eve to know who I was, that I was capable of caring.  I wanted her to see me and the song seemed to echo the sentiment.”

“Ghosts of memories,” Tul answers softly. “You were always inside 1352. I’m sorry I didn’t see it earlier, that I didn’t believe Eve when she thought you might be.”

Rob laughs but the sound is filled with regret, “To be fair I had arrested you and handed you to the Senate just months beforehand. I can appreciate why you would doubt. I didn’t believe Eve either. Or 1352 didn’t believe her. I don’t know, the whole thing, who I was, it’s still very confusing and if I’m honest I don’t want to untangle that web. I did things Keep... If I was still in here why didn’t I stop 1352 sooner?”

“You aren’t responsible,” Tul tells him, the exact argument I would’ve made if I wasn’t hiding in the bathroom. I still struggle to accept his next assertion though. “You’re no more responsible than Eve is for what they made her do. The Senate forced you both to do terrible things but neither of you are to blame.”

Silence falls briefly and in Rob’s emotions I can feel his denial, his shame, the regrets that feel so much like my own. “It doesn’t matter,” he says eventually and while that’s not true I can understand his need to change topic. “What’s your ringtone for her?”

A wave of Tul’s embarrassment hits me as he admits, “Aerosmith, I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing.” The words are almost too quietly spoken for me to hear.

I can feel Rob’s amusement, “That’s blunt... and corny.”

“Because your choice isn’t, Drip?” The playful sarcasm is a relief to hear considering everything that’s happened, everything I’ve caused. By the time I step under the shower spray I’m laughing along with them. For some reason the idea of two century old vampires being quite so sentimental makes me grin.

Once I’m dressed I even manage to keep smiling all the way to the rec room, although that falters at the door. I’d always hated girly nights. Come on, Eve, I tell myself, these are all vampires. It’s not going to be like the first year of uni, when a girly night meant too much wine, too many bad girly films and too much drama. These are immortal predators we’re talking about, not children who’ve just been let out from under their parents’ watchful gaze for the first time.

However, upon stepping into the room it dawns on me that this is going to be exactly like a girls’ night in a hall of residence. Well, maybe not exactly. Van has replaced the bottles of wine with a number of scantily clad humans and I can’t help but wonder how she’d persuaded Johan to let donors into the base. There hadn’t been any mortals allowed inside an Alliance facility since he’d decided he couldn’t risk their lives. Apart from the choice of beverage everything else has a certain familiarity about it though; Bridget Jones is playing on the TV though, currently in her bunny ears and fluffy tail, and numerous women are sat around cuddling various cushions as they watch and chat and sip from Van’s donors.

“Eve, be a dear and close your mouth. You aren’t a fly catcher.” Van chuckles at my look of astonishment as she hugs me and pulls me further into the room. “Have you fed today yet? No? Here.” At the snap of her fingers a human male appears at my side and offers up his neck.

“I’m alright,” I stammer and the man almost looks hurt. “Maybe later,” I tell him and the spark of hope is his eyes would have made me laugh if I’d wanted to injure his pride further. “You’ve put a lot of effort into this, Van.”

“Yes,” she answers, “all in the name of boosting morale. We spend too much time fighting for our lives. So how are your boys?” She carries on, switching subject without pause.

I barely open my mouth before she throws herself down onto the sofa next to me, exclaiming, “Oooh, drama, let’s hear it,” while looking at me expectantly.
“Do you actually know there’s drama, or are you just guessing?”

My demand is met with bubbling laughter as my ex-boss reminds me, “Eve dear, with you there’s always drama.”

There’s always drama. I’m a complication. Is that true? Will it always be true?

Van notices my expression darkening and she eyes me speculatively. “Come on, what’s up?” Noting the way I glance around she shakes her head at the concern she reads on my face. “I’ve only invited those I trust so you can spit it out.”

For some reason I do, telling her all about the effects of the three way mental connection I share with Rob and Tul. While the women gathered here have no ideas for resolving the undeniably unique problem I still feel better for having talked about it. My love life may be something which could be turned into a romantic comedy or star-crossed tragedy but at least it makes everyone else’s relationships seem significantly less dramatic. I think that actually comforts a few of them.

Bridget Jones ends just as we finish discussing the minefields which are my marriages and someone changes the disk for Confessions of a Shopaholic. Almost as easily we switch topics, instead trying to evaluate the love life of Felicity, the pretty and petite brunette who’d recently been on a date with Craig.

“He’s so funny!” She exclaims, her eyes going dreamy even as a few others shake their heads at her, obviously sharing my opinion of Craig’s sense of humour. “And so sexy!” He’d obviously taken my wardrobe advice then. “But he hasn’t so much as spoken to me since our date and I don’t know if that means he’s not interested and he just wanted to get laid, or if he’s waiting for me to make the next move.”

We spend a lot of time debating those possibilities and in the end I actually have fun, just by pretending to be a normal woman with normal friends and acquaintances. Perhaps I’ve been in need of normality for a long time. Looking around the rec room, I know that everyone here has been in need of some normality for a while but the Senate rarely allow for it these days. Not that removing the Senate will necessarily provide me with complete normality. I’m not normal, and thanks to me neither are Rob and Tul.

When the evening comes to an end I help Van tidy up, returning DVDs to boxes and rearranging furniture. The others have already left when we finally say our goodbyes. My ex-boss studies me for a moment before admitting, “You know, you came as something of a surprise when I realised how much Tully liked you. It was also a surprise years earlier when he told me Rob had found a girl, long before he realised he wanted you just as much.”

“Why?” I ask curiously. “You knew nothing about me back then.”

Van shrugs, “I guess it just blew my theory out of the water.”

“Your theory?”

She tilts her head as she studies me, clearly uncomfortable at the prospect of telling me what’s on her mind. “The connection you have with them, you know how rare it is Eve, how rare it is for it to remain. Pat explained it to you, I know she did. Have you never wondered why your boys have stayed connected for the better part of a century?”

Frowning I shake my head, “What are you implying?”

“Nothing,” Van answers with a shrug, “like I said, your arrival blew my theory out of the water. I’ll see you later, Eve.” With that she glides back down the corridor leaving the scent of discomfort in her wake. Not all of the uncertainty is hers.

“Hell,” I repeat for the umpteenth time since Tul woke me up. “Bloody hell.”