A Bite to Remember Page 0,57

to turn Stephano as he did," Jackie said on a sigh as Marguerite returned. Vincent was presumably still with the delivery boy. "We'll have to hope his selflessness is rewarded and his life mate, when he meets her, is already an immortal."

"He already has, and she isn't," Marguerite said grimly and Jackie glanced around at her with surprise.

"He has?" Jackie asked and for some reason this news sent pain shooting through her chest. Recognizing the feeling as jealousy, she ignored it, telling herself that it was for the best. She would have no illusions now and wouldn't be foolish enough to allow herself to fall for the guy any harder than she already had.

"Yes, he has," Marguerite announced, but before she could say any more, Vincent entered the room. He looked better than he had when he'd left. He wasn't quite so pale, but he still looked tired and worn out by the day's events.

"You should get some rest," she said with concern. "We all should. We'll start on this first thing in the morning."

"I want to go check on Stephano first," Vincent murmured. "Then I'll head to bed."

Murmuring goodnight, he left the kitchen again and Jackie found herself frowning as she watched him go and realized the implications of what he'd done by saving Stephano's life.

Vincent would have to watch his life mate age and die and then would have to continue on without her. If he even got the chance to do that, Jackie thought. She knew, if it were her, she wouldn't want that. She wouldn't want to love and be with a man who would continue to look twenty-five to thirty years old while she aged, and wrinkled, and her hair turned white.

It would be fine for a while, until she hit about forty and then she'd look like the older woman with the young stud. By fifty or so, people would start to mistake her for his mother, then at seventy as his grandmother. She supposed they could avoid that by not going out in public much, but there was still the fact that while his body stayed young and beautiful, her own would age. She knew life mates bonded, but was there enough bonding that he would still find her attractive when her body began to sag and wrinkle? Or would the woman have the courage to let him see her so? Jackie didn't think she could. She'd be more likely to set him free and hope he found another. She wouldn't want him to watch her body and health disintegrate and the last breath leave her body. She couldn't be that selfish.

Chapter Ten

Jackie pushed the button to open the driveway gate, moved to the front door, tugged it open, and waited impatiently. A scowl pulled at her lips as she watched a little white hatchback careen up the driveway, and her irritation only intensified as the car squealed to a halt in front of the house.

"You're early," she snapped, glaring at the young man in the drugstore uniform as he sauntered up to the door. "I told the girl not to send the order until two-thirty P.M. It's only one-thirty P.M."

The guy wasn't a day over twenty and had longish hair that he now brushed back in an affected manner as he offered her a charming smile. His nametag read Darryl. "I was passing, so thought I'd stop and see if you were in early. You are. So here I am."

Darryl held up the small drugstore bag, his expression expectant, but Jackie continued to scowl as her mind raced over what she should do. She'd spent most of the night pondering ways to bring a meal to Vincent. Just before she'd dropped off to sleep, she'd come up with this one.

Jackie had a prescription for birth control that she hadn't bothered stopping after breaking up with her last boyfriend. It was near needing renewal. She'd decided to have her drugstore fax the prescription to the nearest neighborhood drugstore, then call and ask for it to be delivered... at two-thirty P.M.

Vincent usually got up between three and four, but Jackie had intended to wake him just a bit early to see him fed. She was hoping the saboteur had been watching long enough to know that three was the earliest Vincent usually woke up. If so, he might not be watching when this delivery was made. If he was already out there somewhere watching, she hoped he'd just think it was a plain