shoulders and drawing me against his chest. Any other time, I would’ve been clawing at the walls to escape his touch. Now, I gave in to all the pressure of the last few days and truly wept, twisting to cling to his bare shoulders, my entire body shaking with the torrent of emotions fighting to escape me. Though his skin was cool, I felt no lingering sense of doubt or terror at being pressed so close to him. He did no more than hold me, lightly running his fingers through my hair, even as I buckled under the weight of worry and stress. He was my anchor in that moment, a pillar of cold strength, holding me close and keeping me from being swept away entirely.
I’m not quite sure how long I cried. By the end of it I was exhausted, chest heaving as I gasped in a few last hitching, sobbing breaths.
“All right?” he asked, pausing in his soothing motions.
“I think so,” I whispered, voice raw. Though I’d cried until there were no more tears, I wasn’t totally empty. There was enough sanity left to me to worry what he must think of me, and what could possibly have prompted me to hold him so tightly. “Thank you.”
He loosened his grip on me and dipped a finger under my chin, tilting my head up. At first, he said nothing. Instead, he lightly ran the pad of his thumb under my eyes, carefully wiping away the moisture gathered there. His smile, usually wicked and hinting at all things dark and devious, was surprisingly kind. “What are friends for?”
I choked out a little laugh, wiping at my eyes myself. Unbelievable. I’d just cried all over Alec Royce. The Alec Royce. One of the oldest vampires in the United States. The same guy who had once tried to kill me. Even if the attempt hadn’t necessarily been made under his own volition, it was one hell of a strange way for our relationship to turn. Who’d have thought the monster had a heart?
“Why don’t you go ahead and clean up? The bathroom is through my bedroom in the back.”
I nodded weakly, and he helped steady me when I stood up. He left me alone to put myself back together, shutting the door behind me.
I took a few minutes to rinse my face, gathering my shattered pride back into a semblance of what it had been before I broke down. A few minutes later, after washing the worst of the signs of my breakdown from my face, I emerged to find the vampire sprawled on the futon in his bedroom tapping away on a laptop. He looked up, the clear concern in his features tugging every last string tied to my heart.
“Better?”
“Much,” I replied. My eyes were still red in the mirror, but that would fade with time. “Thank you, Royce. I’m sorry about—”
“Don’t,” he admonished, waving a hand at me. “You’ve been under an extraordinary amount of pressure. Don’t apologize for it.”
“Okay,” I whispered, chastised.
“I need to get some things done, but I’ll speak with you tonight before I go to the office. For now, why don’t you go downstairs and get settled in. Try to rest. I’ll have someone stop by later to fill you in on how we do things here.”
I nodded, heading to the door. He stopped me before I got far.
“Shiarra?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t blame yourself for any of this. Regardless of how events turn out, you will always have a place with me.”
I needed to get out of here before the waterworks started up again. I nodded and hurried away, padding quietly across the empty expanse of the room with the statuary and dashing down the stairs. When I reached the foot of the stairs, Wes was peering down the hall. He shrugged and turned away when he spotted me, resuming his post.
I entered the apartment I was going to share with Sara for the next month or so, taking it in at a glance. Clean, furnished, and tastefully—if sparsely—appointed. A bookshelf holding a number of German titles and a few pieces of artwork added a touch of hominess to an otherwise painfully plain room.
The dogs didn’t greet me at the door like I expected; instead, they were cringing at the far end of the room, huddled shivering like they were afraid they were about to be eaten by monsters. Come to think of it, that might not have been too far off the mark if Sara and I hadn’t