Until the Sun Falls from the Sky by Kristen Ashley Page A

broken with fear.
    His middle finger touched my temple gently then his hand flattened carefully against the side of my face. “Tonight.”
    “But, you can’t need –”
    “I’ll not be feeding.”
    Oh my God. That meant we’d be…
    “I’ll not be fucking you either,” he went on.
    I shook my head. “Then why are you coming back tonight?”
    “We need to talk.”
    I stared at him a second before shaking my head again. “No, we don’t.”
    “We do.”
    “We don’t.”
    He sighed again and his face dipped closer to mine. I sucked in my breath.
    “We do, ” he repeated.
    Now I was angry, freaked out, hating him, terrified of him and confused.
    “But I thought –” I started.
    He cut me off. “Tonight.”
    “Lucien –”
    His face dipped even closer, so close I didn’t suck in breath. I quit breathing altogether.
    Then his lips touched mine, briefly, softly. Then he moved from the bed.
    I got up on an elbow. This took it out of me, my head swam alarmingly and I fell back down.
    Whoa.
    What was that? What the hell was that?
    Before I could process this, he was back, dressed completely except his suit jacket was bunched in his large hand.
    He leaned in, put a fist in the bed on either side of me and got close. “You need to rest, pet. All day,” he ordered.
    “But –”
    “Rest.”
    “But –”
    “All day.”
    “But –”
    His mouth touched mine but he didn’t kiss me and he kept his eyes open, boring into mine.
    I quieted.
    “I took too much from you last night,” he murmured against my lips. “You need to rest.”
    My mouth opened under his and I began to speak, “I –”
    I stopped speaking when his tongue darted in and touched mine, startling me. It was a fleeting touch but even so, his open eyes kept mine captive and I registered a distinct, excited flurry in the region of my belly.
    Now.
    Exactly.
    What was that?
    A flurry? Caused by a kiss from my near-murderer?
    That proved it. I was deranged.
    “Rest,” he whispered against my mouth.
    Before I knew it, he was gone.
    * * * * *
    I opened my eyes again when I sensed movement in the room.
    It was light, I could still see the sun shining around the curtains so it was not yet “tonight” which meant, I hoped, the movement wasn’t Lucien.
    It wasn’t. It was Edwina tiptoeing around the bed.
    “I’m awake,” I announced, cautiously getting up on an elbow.
    She jumped at the sound of my voice and whirled to face me.
    “You’re awake,” she repeated.
    I nodded, focusing on her. She was a beautiful, older woman, older than my mother. How I knew this I didn’t know because her face was nearly unlined but I guessed it to be true. Her hair was thick, long and white and it looked soft. It was pulled back in a ponytail at her nape. Like yesterday, she was wearing a gauzy outfit, a swirly, peachy-pink skirt and beige-pink flowy blouse cinched with an equally flowy scarf belt low on her waist.
    She looked like a stylish hippie. Strange but true.
    “Lucien spent the night,” she declared on a strangled whisper.
    I kept staring at her.
    Then I asked, “What?”
    “Lucien,” she said then spoke no more.
    “Yes, Lucien –” I prompted.
    “ Spent the night, ” she breathed in what sounded like deep surprise.
    God, she was weird.
    “Yes, he did,” I replied slowly.
    “Why?” she asked, still in a breathy, stunned voice.
    Why did Lucien do anything? Because Lucien wanted to, that was why.
    “He just did,” I answered.
    “I don’t… he never…” She stopped then pivoted jerkily and walked briskly to the windows, throwing open the curtains as she wittered on. “This is unheard of, unprecedented. I don’t know what to say. I can’t even –”
    “Edwina,” I cut her off.
    She turned again and the minute her eyes hit me they grew so big, they nearly popped out of her head and she gasped. Loudly.
    At the same time her hand flew to her mouth.
    I knew I’d passed out before I’d been able to pull a comb through my hair and