La Vida Vampire

“Hurry back. I brought your mail in.”


I stopped in my doorway. “I should say thanks, but I bet you snooped through that, too.”

“Only a little.”

From behind his back, he produced the set of Monk DVDs I’d ordered, flourishing them as if he were a magician. “Unless you’re too tired, I thought we could curl up on the couch and watch a marathon.”

“I thought we’d discuss the shooting,” I said.

“What’s to discuss? It wasn’t Gorman, and much as Ike might want to off one or both of us, he wouldn ’t bother with a gun.”

“But what good would it do Etienne to shoot either of us? ” I asked, surprised that he seemed so, well, blasé about the incident now. “It just doesn’t make sense.”

“No, it doesn’t,” he agreed as he opened the DVD box. “But rehashing it won’t solve anything either.”

“Saber,” I said, crossing to stand nearer and plead my case. “We can at least check the photos Eugene was supposed to e-mail. Maybe there’s a clue in them. Something to really tie Etienne to the murders.”

Saber tossed the box on the couch and lightly laid his hands on my shoulders. “We’ve done all we can, Cesca. We gave March solid information. It’s his jurisdiction, his job to finish.”

I fought to ignore the thrill of Saber’s touch. “March will call us after he talks to Etienne?”

“Tomorrow. Maybe he’ll have made an arrest by then. And,” he added, sliding his fingertips down my good arm and capturing my hand, “if you don’t feel like watching Monk, we’ll do something else.”

The way his voice deepened, I knew what that something else might be. Kissing I could handle. Sex? My heart thumped double its usual time. Nope, I wasn’t ready for that. Was I?

Besides, maybe watching Monk solve cases would inspire us with some brilliant way of catching Etienne. Couldn’t hurt.



After sharing so much action with Saber, it was weird to do something mundane like watch TV together. The intimacy made me twitchy, or maybe it was just my shoulder aching, but I couldn’t seem to settle in one spot. We were half an hour into the first episode when Saber hit the Pause button.

“Are you hurting?” he asked, peering in my eyes.

“Why?”

“You keep squirming over there,” he said, “over there” being my end of the couch.

“I’m a little uncomfortable,” I admitted, “but I’ll find a good position in a minute.”

“No, you won’t. Come here.”

He took my hand, braced his back against the sofa arm, and tugged me into the V of his spread legs until my hip brushed his crotch. I started to scramble away, but he slung his arm around my waist and snuggled my left side to his chest.

“Does that take the pressure off your shoulder?” he asked.

“Um, yes.” It put pressure other places, like low in my belly, but I didn’t say that.

“Good, now relax.”

Surprisingly, after my hormones stopped spiking, I did.



Three episodes into our marathon, Saber decided he was hungry. We found Maggie’s stash of microwave popcorn and, while it popped, Saber inched my shirt off my right shoulder to check the bandage. His touch should ’ve been clinical, but to me it was erotic. So was his warm breath on my neck. Our kiss at the bay front leapt to mind in vivid detail, and my pheromones fired. In the nick of time, the microwave beeped. Instead of chewing nails to take the edge off my horniness, I munched on a few handfuls of the extra buttery popcorn, then washed the salt taste away with water, heavy on the ice. When we’d finished snacking, Saber pulled me against his chest again, but he didn’t use the remote right away. He used his lips, kissing my temple through a curtain of hair, then lifting it from my neck to plant a kiss on my shoulder. My body reacted, but my brain did, too.

“Uh, Saber,” I said, as he turned me in his arms. His cobalt blue eyes had darkened to midnight. “What are you doing?”

“Making a pass,” he whispered. “Why, am I doing it wrong?”

“Oh, no, you’re doing it, ahhh, fine,” I breathed as he swirled his tongue around my ear. “But,” I gulped, “but you’re a vampire hunter and, uh-oh, executioner, and I’m—”

“The weirdest vampire I’ve ever met?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m forgetting all that right now.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re also,” he said, kissing my jaw as if to punctuate the words, “a delectable, desirable woman.”

“I-I am?”

“You are.” He cupped my jaw. “Now, are you going to analyze or enjoy?”

“Just remember,” I murmured as his lips neared, “you started this.”

His mouth settled on mine like it was there for the long haul. And it was. Hurt shoulder? What shoulder? Saber ’s legs and arms encircled me, his sensuous lips and teeth nipped and teased me into a hot, panting puddle of need. It would probably kill me, but I could hardly wait for more.

That’s when the kissing stopped and Saber rested his forehead against mine.