Deadman's Blood Read online

  “So you think I should marry her before we...you know....”

  “I’m not saying anything. I’m telling you how it was and how it is now. You have to decide what your intentions are.”

  “But marriage? It seems so old fashioned.”

  “Maybe. Look...Blake and Devon both live with their girlfriends and they aren’t married, although Devon’s engaged to Darby now so that will change soon. You and Blake are pretty close; why don’t you ask him what his thoughts are on the subject. Either way...you need to talk to Melanie.”

  Anton finished his beer and said, “I think I’m going to head to bed, little brother. If you need to talk, I’m always around.” He patted Josh’s shoulder as he walked past him and into the darkness of the sleeping house.

  Josh sat and pondered the advice his newly found brother had given him. He’d never much thought about marriage, but then he’d never met anyone like Lanie before. He could envision himself coming home to Lanie every night and even having a rugrat or two. He had to shake his head at this vision to see if he was seeing right. He’d never thought of himself as a husband or father, but a couple of weeks ago he never knew vampires and werewolves existed, let alone that his biological father was a vampire, so why couldn’t he be a husband? Crazier things have happened, he thought.

  *****

  Josh stayed up most of the night thinking about what Anton had said and what he needed to relay to Lanie. Somewhere during the night it became so clear to him what he wanted to do and wanted to be, that everything else fell into place. About that time he heard the shuffling of Bernard’s feet headed for the kitchen. If Josh had a grandfather, Bernard would be how he pictured him. Josh guessed he was in his sixties or seventies. Lighthearted, kind, and quiet, he seemed to be all knowing. He was handsome for his age and his eyes always twinkled like he had some wonderful secret he would let you in on when he deemed necessary.

  Bernard served as a butler to Anton and Dominic, but it was obvious he was far more than that to the family.

  “Master Josh, what are you doing up at this hour? Or did you not sleep?”

  Josh shrugged his shoulders.

  “I see. Is everything okay?”

  “Mmmmm..No, but it will be...soon...hopefully.”

  “Good.” Bernard was struggling with a jar of strawberry preserves.

  “Let me get that for you,” Josh offered.

  “Thank you, Master Josh. I don’t have the strength I once had,” Bernard said as he handed over the jar.

  “Bernard, please, don’t call me Master. I’m no one’s master. We’re friends. Just call me Josh,” he said.

  “That’s kind of you...Josh, but you are a Larsen, and I’ve served the Larsens since I was a young boy. I think it would be quite hard to break that habit.”

  “How? You...well, of course you know. You seem to have your own psychic abilities, Bernard.”

  As Josh finished his sentence, he started to twist the top of the jar and it exploded everywhere. He had completely crushed the jar. Covered in strawberry preserves, Bernard rushed to him with a towel, attending to the sticky mess, when he noticed the jar lid bent in half still in his right hand and two nasty glass shards stuck in the palm of his left.

  Bernard led him to the sink where he proceeded to rinse off the sticky red preserves and blood that was now coming fast as Bernard pulled the shards from Josh’s palm.

  “I ... I don’t know what happened?”

  “Well, I think you misjudged your own strength. Let’s get you bandaged up.”

  He wrapped a clean dishtowel around Josh’s hand twice and closed it into a loose fist.

  “Keep that tight against your palm while I go get the first aid kit.” He walked Josh over to the stool at the granite island where Josh had spent most of the night thinking and said, “I’ll be right back.”

  Josh was embarrassed. He hated having the attention of others brought to him and now here was Bernard fussing over him and his cuts. The jar must have been flawed or something, because he felt he had barely gotten a grip on it when it collapsed in his hand. Weird. I’ve never had anything like that happen before, he thought.

  Bernard must have had his running shoes on because that guy was like a lightning bolt. Before Josh knew it, he was all bandaged up. He got up and went to the sink to get a rag to help clean up the mess when Bernard reprimanded him.

  “You go sit down, young man. I am quite capable of cleaning up a bit of jam. You need to keep that bandage dry so it can heal. But if you would like to do something to help, why don’t you cut those oranges in half for me and run them through the juicer.”

  Josh nodded and scooted the bowl closer to him, along with the cutting board and knife. He proceeded to cut an orange in half, making a loud ‘clunk’ noise on the board. When he looked closer, he noticed a deep cut in the maple cutting board, maybe a half inch deep.

  Bernard looked up from his work when he heard the sound and saw the cut in the board. “Dear Lord, Son. It’s an orange, not a brick. Easy does it, we don’t want you going through the granite,” Bernard said as he chuckled.

  Josh looked at the knife in his hand and then again at the board. He was puzzled. He picked up another orange and laid the knife atop it and it glided through like melted butter.

  “Boy, Bernard...you must keep these knives incredibly sharp.”

  Bernard looked up surprised. “Not really. I practically mutilated a tomato yesterday with that very knife and was thinking I should take the lot in to be sharpened this week.”

  Josh grabbed another orange and without applying the least amount of pressure, again, the knife went through the orange like butter. Hmmmm, he thought to himself, puzzled. Seems pretty sharp to me. He finished his chore as Bernard started breakfast and Dominic came in.

  “A bright and lovely good morning to you, Bernard,” Dominic said, then turned, spying Josh at the end of the island finishing up the last of the oranges. “Oh. And a sunny good morning to you too, Josh. Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes, thank you,” Josh said as Bernard looked at him, smiled, and shook his head.

  “Smells good, Bernard. Anything I can do to help?” Dominic asked.

  “You could set the table, if you like?” Bernard said.

  “I would indeed,” Dominic said. He seemed to be in a rather chipper mood.

  Josh could hear the others starting to emerge from their slumber and commune in the dining room adjacent to the kitchen.

  Bernard finished up and started carrying food out to the dining room and Josh brought the large tower coffee maker into the dining room along with the orange juice.

  Not everyone had made it down yet. Reading the paper next to a stunning blonde looking over his shoulder was Devon. The blonde next to him was his fiancée, Darby. Devon was Blake’s vampire brother. Darby was playing with a loose lock of Devon’s long, brown, curly hair that hadn’t made it back into the ponytail. His brown eyes pretended to interpret what he was trying to read from the paper, but the smile on his face said his lovely bride to be was distracting him terribly by whatever she was whispering in his ear through smiling lips of her own. He hadn’t noticed before, but when Darby turned towards Josh, her eyes were incredibly blue in contrast to Devon’s brown eyes.

  Darby leaned to her other side and stole a piece of perfectly buttered toast from her sister, Rowan’s plate. Rowan didn’t notice as she was deep in conversation with Sally. In contrast, the two witch sisters, Rowan and Darby, were like Devon and Blake. Blake, six foot five, and Devon was just under six foot - Darby was a lean, five foot ten to Rowan’s five foot four, but both women were striking. They both were blonde but Rowan was more of a strawberry blonde with beautiful Caribbean blue eyes. Darby’s hair was up and back in a clip, while Rowan’s was down resting on her back. Though both were witches, Rowan was also a werewolf. Though Josh hadn’t seen her in that form yet, he thought with the color of her hair and eyes, she must be a sight to see.

  Sally too, was gorgeous. She had
smoking, sexy green eyes and curves to make any man sigh. She now owned Darby’s old bookstore back in California and lived next door to Rowan and Blake with Dean, the man walking behind Blake and smacking him in the head as he did so. Dean sat quickly next to his witch girlfriend, Sally, safe out of Blake’s reach.

  Dean was a werewolf, several days a month, but he also was the group’s plucky comic relief. At first glance Dean looked stern, almost crabby, but he was a loyal and sensitive friend to all in the room.

  Just walking into the dining room was Mark, followed by his girlfriend, Alyssa. Mark had a tough guy shell with a marshmallow filling. His beautiful sidekick, Alyssa, was from a family of gypsies world famous for the high wire act. A tiny bit of a thing, she carried her own with Mark and kept him mostly in line, especially since Mark was the only one in the room beside Bernard without a supernatural power.

  When Mark and Alyssa were seated, Josh realized that he hadn’t seen Lanie yet. He looked to Bernard who met his gaze and shook his head no. Josh started to get up when Dominic met his glance. He said quietly, “Where are you going? We have an announcement that pertains to you and some other family matters to discuss.”

  “I know. I’m sorry, but there’s something I have to do...now...it’s very important to me. Make the announcement without me and when I’m done, catch me up on the family matters. I wouldn’t bow out if it weren’t important.”

  “I know you wouldn’t,” Dominic said with a smile. He now realized who wasn’t in the room and nodded at Josh. “Go. Take care of your business.”

  Josh excused himself and practically ran out of the room, catching Blake’s smile and Anton’s approval as he passed.

  *****

  He took the stairs two at a time and in an instant, he was standing in front of Lanie’s bedroom door. He took a deep breath, shook his arms, and stretched his neck from side to side, like an Olympian might do getting ready for a race, then he knocked on the door and listened.

  Nothing.

  He knocked again and waited.

  Nothing.

  Panic started to creep in and he grabbed the doorknob and turned it, only to have it come off in his hand. He looked down at it and it was crushed, like a car had driven over it.

  What the heck is going on today? he thought.

  The door creaked open a tiny bit. Obviously, he had broken the door mechanism too. He pushed the door open slowly and said, “Lanie?”

  There was no one in the room. His heart sank just when the bathroom door opened behind him and Lanie, with her head down, ran right into him.

  “Oh, thank God. I thought you were gone.”

  “Josh?” Melanie said, surprised.

  Her hair was wet and her eyes were red and puffy from crying. She was standing there in a robe that looked five sizes too big for her. She obviously hadn’t heard him knock. His hands came up to her face, when he realized he still had the crushed doorknob in his hand. He dropped it and shut the door to the hallway and brought both hands up to her face.

  He smiled. Her lips were pouty and her eyes were welling like she would start crying any second. He leaned down and kissed her forehead, then looked at her again with a crazy, big smile when one teardrop let loose and fell on his right thumb.

  “Don’t cry, Angel. Please don’t cry anymore.”

  He pulled her to his chest and wrapped his huge arms around her tiny frame, and she couldn’t help but sob as she clung to him.

  He could barely hear her muffled voice against his chest as she said, “I’m so sorry I’m not sexy enough or pretty enough to...turn you on the way I should.”

  “Oh....No...” He couldn’t help himself; he started chuckling. He put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her away from his chest, to which she reluctantly conceded, but she wouldn’t look up at him. “No, no, no. That’s not it at all - in fact it’s so wrong, I can’t help myself from laughing. Lanie? Please look at me.”

  She wouldn’t. With his rough hands against her chin, he moved her head upwards to look at him. Smiling pathetically, he said, “You could be wearing a garbage bag and I’d think you were the sexiest thing on the planet.”

  Her face was red and wet with tears and she was sniffing. One hand raked away her dark bangs from her eyes then both thumbs wiped the puddle of tears that had accumulated under her eyes. “Really?” she asked.

  Josh, still smiling, said, “Really.”

  He bent down and swept her off her feet and cradled her in his arms.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “We need to talk,” he said as he spun around and headed for the bed. With a swoop, he was seated in the middle of the bed and then he gently set her down in front of him.

  “We do?” she said timidly.

  “We do. Lanie, I need to explain what happened last night.”

  “Do we have to?” she said meekly and about ready to cry again.

  “Yes. We have to, because you obviously have some misconception that I don’t want to be with you.”

  Still looking down at her hands, she said nothing. And he wasn’t sure but he thought he saw tears fall into her lap.

  With a gentle hand under her chin, he lifted her head so that she would look him in the eye, but she kept her eyes down. He had been right; the tears ran like a flash flood down her cheek and onto her hand.

  “Lanie. I have wanted to make love to you from almost the beginning. Do you remember when we were running from that vampire and we stayed in that tiny hotel just outside of Shasta?”

  She nodded, but still wouldn’t look at him.

  “You came out of the bathroom with my flannel shirt on and I had never seen anything more sexy in my life. I went into the bathroom after to get ready for bed myself and saw your panties drying over the towel rack; I thought I was going to die. I was so turned on that I was embarrassed you’d notice and think I was a moron. I don’t think I slept at all that night. I was so scared I’d take you in my sleep. Just thinking about it now makes me excited and a bit embarrassed.”

  “Really?” she said meekly.

  “Really.”

  “Then why....” Melanie asked.

  “Why did I practically jump out of bed when you told me you were a virgin?” Josh finished.

  Her eyes fell and she nodded her head.

  “Because...well....I didn’t think I deserved you.”

  “You what?”

  “Suddenly you became this angel of purity and self control and here I was pawing at you like a gorilla. It made me realize what a gift you were giving me and I was stunned, to say the least. I didn’t deserve you...I still don’t,” Josh explained.

  “You’re wrong. Don’t say that,” Melanie argued.

  “It’s true. I thought my sinful hands would go up in a cloud of ash like that vampire in the alley a few weeks back, if I touched someone so virtuous. I freaked.”

  “Josh, I’m not that virtuous, I’ve just not...been around much....and hadn’t found the one I wanted to....share it with. If my situation had not been one of such isolation, I probably would have done it a long time ago. The opportunity or the right person just hadn’t presented itself.”

  “Either way, it’s a gift I intend on being grateful for and when we do make love, I want it to be special and perfect for both of us,” Josh said.

  “So we are back to ....you don’t want to?” Melanie asked.

  “No, Lanie. You’re my angel and I want you more than anything I thought possible,” Josh replied.

  “I’m not an angel, Josh. I’m just a messed up, twenty-five-year-old woman who wants you so badly, I’m embarrassed.”

  “You’ve been my guardian angel from the start. You helped me when I had no one else. You brought me to Blake, Rowan, Dean, and Sally, who taught me to control my abilities and helped me with the bloodstone mess. You lured a deadly vampire away from me and after you to protect me for more than two and a half weeks. You then gave me your love and showed me what our love could be together. You will always be my a
ngel, Lanie.

  “And don’t be embarrassed, I feel the same way and trust me, men are way hornier than women,” Josh said.

  “That’s not what it feels like,” Melanie admitted.

  “I know, but we’ll get through it together.”

  “But that’s the point. Why ‘get through it’? Why not just do it and move on?”

  “You’re going to be the death of me - I swear it. Because, Angel, you’re worth it. I want to do this right and I want you to know what my intentions are.”

  “Your intentions? What, are you suddenly from the Victorian era?”

  “Ummmm. No, but that might have been where I got my advice from.”

  “Advice?”

  “Yeah. I kind of talked to Anton last night,” Josh admitted.

  “About this? My virginity? Oh God!”

  “I know. Please don’t be angry, but I really needed some advice and I have to admit, he made a lot of sense and was very helpful.”

  “Really?”

  “Trust me, Lanie. He’s not going to say anything, besides... he’s my brother.”

  “Yeah. I guess he is. It’s still embarrassing though,” she admitted.

  “I know. I’m sorry. It was not easy for me either, but for the first time in my life I could see myself as something other than just ‘Josh’. I pictured myself as a ‘husband’ and even a ‘father’,” he said.

  Melanie looked up in astonishment.

  Josh continued, “And Lanie, in that picture was you, right there with me as my bride and beautiful mother of my kids - our kids - I realized I really liked this picture of us and so....these are my intentions, Lanie.”

  “What are you saying, Josh? Are you asking me to marry you?”

  “No. I’m telling you that I’d like to see our relationship develop into something more than just sex. If your intentions are the same, then I will ask you properly at a later date,” Josh explained.

  She was stunned. “I...well...”

  He put his hand to his forehead like she had done the night before and said in a southern belle voice, “Oh no. You don’t find me sexy enough? Maybe I’m not pretty enough for you? Oh, woe is me! Maybe I’m not experienced enough for you!”