Thank you all again for your comments, I apologise for any mistakes people find, I will do my best to rectify them over the course of the series!
This is a bit of a short chapter I'm afraid but good news: I plan to post Chapter 4 (which will be a big one) on Wednesday so you all get an extra chapter this week (aren't you lucky)!
Enjoy everyone... mochadesire
Chapter 3
Silence had reigned in the library for a good five minutes. All that while Luke had stared at Philippe as if he was crazy and Philippe had gazed passively back. The Frenchman even looked somewhat amused. Tanji's eyes were wide as saucers as she observed both of the men.
Luke's trance broke when he became aware of Philippe happily humming under his breath.
"The Harry Potter theme tune? Are you fucking kidding me?" Luke growled, not quite able to understand how his friend could be so nonchalant about it all. Philippe beamed in response and proclaimed innocently: "What? It's a brilliant tune." Tanji immediately collapsed into giggles, shaking hysterically; Luke too felt the corners of his lips tug upwards into a reluctant smile. The ice had been broken.
"You know, sometimes I really loathe the fact that you are impossible to be mad at," he stated resignedly. Whilst he wanted to wipe that smirk off of Philippe's face, he knew that it was not the vampire's fault. He was simply the messenger.
Luke sat heavily on his plush leather sofa, the material creaking gently in protest at his sudden weight. It groaned again softly as Tanji seated herself slowly next to him, worry clearly showing in the lines of her dark face.
"How are you feeling Luka?" she asked gently, her small hand coming up to rest sympathetically across his broad, tense shoulders. Philippe, who had stopped humming, leant forward intently, the smile on his face undermining the puzzlement and anxiety that showed in the depths of his cerulean eyes. Luke shrugged, his face resting in his hands. "I don't know. What would you do if you suddenly found out that a woman you just met is going to be your mate for the rest of your life?" His voice took on a sarcastic tone that he immediately regretted when he noticed Tanji quietly grit her teeth and held back a retort.
"I don't know about you," Philippe proclaimed in a bored tone that belied the severity of the situation, "But I would have had her strapped down to by bed by now." He grinned mischievously and waggled his pale eyebrows suggestively. Luke shot him a withering look.
"Yeah," he said as if stating the obvious, "And how do you think that would have gone down with Rowan?" He shuddered dramatically, imagining the scenario. "The woman would crucify me."
Philippe looked coy. "I thought she said if you called her 'woman' that she would slug you round the face?" he said petulantly. If looks could kill; Philippe would have been dead in that moment.
Luke rose silently from his place by the fire to gaze out of the large bay windows in the library. He rested his forehead against the freezing panes of glass and closed his eyes. He felt the first rays of sunlight stroke his face like a kindly mother and not for the first time in his long life, he felt relieved that the myths about vampires not being able to stand the sun were just that: myths.
He relaxed under the soft caress of the sunrise, the magenta and burnt orange hues suddenly bursting into the gloomy room. Luke pondered on life and how it had boiled down to this moment in time; to that one exquisite woman lying battered and bruised downstairs.
Luke immediately felt all of his one thousand, five hundred years of age. He had been sired all that time ago in rural Italy; blissfully unaware of the world. His Sire had taken him under her wing, she had taught him to control his bloodlust and she had taught him to protect himself. She, like Rowan, had been a fiery, beautiful woman of Egyptian origin. She had an exotic demeanour that caused men to flock to her like sheep. But Luke had come to see that she was far from perfect. Underneath that perfect façade, he learned that she fostered a soul that was pure evil. She took pleasure in the pain of others and was only happy when she was scaring some poor soul to their deaths. Luke remembered the day he left; the burden that felt like it had suddenly been lifted from his shoulders. He had wandered, listless, for a while until he was fortunate enough to work a passage to the New World. He had never looked back.
Aware that Philippe and Tanji had slipped from the room a while ago, Luke's thoughts once again turned to Rowan. He couldn't help himself. It was like every way he turned she was there; just close enough to appear reachable, but just far enough to make him lose hope. Luke whispered his vocabulary of swear words into the panes in every language he knew. Finding resolve in that personal method of blowing off steam, he straightened purposefully.
The sun lit the angular planes of his cheeks, making his golden tan appear to glow. As he strode intently from the empty room, no one would have been able to mistake the look in his eyes; he was going to seduce his woman, no matter how hard she resisted.
***
Rowan shot up out of bed with a cry. Her gaze was wild, her bouncing curls in complete disarray. Momentarily disorientated, she failed to recognise the room she was in. Trying desperately to reign in her rapid breathing she recalled the nightmare that jolted her back to reality. She had been back in the warehouse, slumped against the wall, the dismembered head of Remy lolling besides her. Four indescribable shadows were advancing on her, menace beating off of them in dark waves.
She had scrambled frantically; her hands and feet were bound. The beasts continued to creep forward as she felt her fear threaten to paralyse her. She knew that Luke would come for her before she was overcome; she just knew it. Slowly but surely, the shadows moved closer and closer. Rowan had felt a scream building in her throat.
As the pain began, she jolted awake, screaming for Luke.
Rowan was thoroughly shaken. Her breathing was fast and ragged and her hands trembled ferociously. As the memories of the previous night flooded back to her, she began to sluggishly recall her surroundings: the kindly doctor who had fussed over her, the pain of her wounds being swabbed, the intense stare Luke had fixed her with before he left the room.
She hung her head, the tip of her chin just coming to rest against the soft mounds of her chest. Never had she felt so completely drained. Although her body had stopped screaming at her for the abuse it had received the night previously, her mind seriously ached from questions going over and over in her mind. Most of them, she found, involved Luke.
