Chapter 19
Cori
Cori stepped onto her front porch. The cool, crisp air of early October hit her skin, invigorating her. Coming out when it was dark was risky, but she honestly didn’t care at this point. She stared down at her pack of emergency cigarettes she’d kept stashed in her closet and pulled one out, lighting it. The burn of nicotine felt even better than the night air. Sure, it choked her a little after not smoking for seven weeks, but she wouldn’t make it another day without one. She was far too close to losing it.
She’d finally returned to work the day before, but only after Bartol assigned Tormod to ride with her in the truck and stay with her all day. He wasn’t that bad. The nerou enjoyed riding in human transportation, and it turned out he had an artistic side as well. While sitting at her tattoo shop, he’d come up with a few clever designs her customers might like. She’d told him if anyone asked for them, she’d give him a cut of the profits. He’d been so excited at the prospect he’d promised to work at night to come up with more. Maybe that would keep him busy while at the compound, and he wouldn’t get into more trouble there.
For the most part, he wasn’t a problem except when he found a customer suspicious. Then he became scary protective to the point he’d run two potential clients off. Most likely, it had been his glowing violet eyes and the way his voice dropped to pure demonic that got to them. Even the toughest guys wanted no part of that. Cori was afraid people would stop coming to her shop if he kept it up, and Asher had voiced similar concerns about having him around. She was going to have a long talk with Tormod about that when he arrived tomorrow.
He wasn’t her biggest distraction, though.
Near the end of the day, Bartol would show up to relieve the nerou and send him home. He didn’t bother the customers at all. In fact, he sat so quietly and still that most people didn’t even notice him. What irritated Cori about him was that he completely ignored her—even if she called him a few choice names—and his eyes were ice cold. Ever since she accused him of being overprotective, he’d kept his distance. She was surprised he still insisted on being around at all, but he must have felt duty bound, and that bothered her, too. Everyone was going through a great deal of trouble to look after her when she wasn’t even sure she deserved it.
Cori took a long drag on her cigarette, noting she’d nearly finished it already. How many would she need before she felt calm enough to get some sleep tonight? Except for when Bartol had compelled her to rest after the last attack, she’d hardly been able to shut her eyes for more than an hour or two. It didn’t matter that she was exhausted. She was too afraid to let herself sleep.
“What are you doing out here?” Bartol asked, appearing before her. He hadn’t flashed, which meant he’d been moving around invisibly.
She scowled at him. “How long have you been watching me?”
“I was patrolling the woods when I caught the scent of your cigarette smoke.” His face was a granite mask, and his voice held no emotion. “I revealed myself as soon as I came upon you.”
“Wasn’t that nice of you.” She stubbed her cigarette out.
He was silent for a moment, then gestured at the pack in her hand. “Those are not good for your health.”
“Neither is being stalked by a crazy vampire. Which one do you think will kill me first?”
“You should go inside,” he said.
Cori sat down on the porch steps instead. “Go fuck yourself.”
Bartol’s jaw hardened—the first sign of emotion he’d shown. “I’m trying to protect you, but I can’t do that if you flaunt yourself to your stalker.”
“Then stop protecting me—all of you!” She couldn’t take it anymore. She just couldn’t. Everyone was going out of their way and rearranging their schedules so that she could be safe. It wasn’t right, and it needed to stop.
“You want Griff to capture you? Kill you?” Bartol asked, taking a step forward. Now his face was turning red, and he looked like he might lose control.
Cori was done with being afraid—of him or anyone else.
She tilted her head back and stared up at the sky. “It’s not what I want, but it’s what I deserve. I can’t live like this anymore.”
“We will find him.”
“It’s been over three weeks since I got that note, and we are no closer to figuring out where he’s hiding since then.” She let out a loud sigh and met his gaze. “I’m exhausted from it all and want it to be over, even if that means coming out where my ex can get to me.”
“I was tortured for a century,” Bartol said, coming to stand before her. The good side of his face was bathed in the soft moonlight and the scarred part in shadows. “But it took a lot longer than three weeks to break me.”
“Easy to say when you’re immortal and can’t die. You knew you’d be free someday.”
He stared at her. “Do you have any idea what it is like to have someone slowly peel your skin off one narrow strip at a time?”
“No,” she said quietly. This was the first time he’d ever described the torture he’d suffered to her. It made her gut clench just imagining it.
“Do you know what it’s like to be put in a room with no light and have all the oxygen sucked out until your lungs collapse, and you’re left for weeks with nothing other than your own thoughts and the desperate need for oxygen?”
Cori gulped. “You know I couldn’t.”
“Exactly,” he said in a bitter tone, “because you have the blessing of mortality to give you release. Your body can only endure a certain amount of torture before it will shut itself down. Imagine what it would be like if you could suffer every conceivable atrocity and survive all of it.”
She could barely breathe, hearing him tell his tale.
Bartol’s gaze turned distant. “I have been chained to a rack and stretched until nearly all my bones were pulled from their sockets or broken. I have had hot irons thrust into my body repeatedly until I had puncture wounds covering every inch of me. My eyes have been carved out so that I could not see for days and my eardrums ruptured so that I could not hear. Hot vats of oil were poured onto me until almost none of my flesh remained.” He took a deep breath, anguish in his eyes. “These are just a few of the tortures I endured on a daily basis for nearly one hundred years, and I would have given anything for someone to protect me from them.”
Cori didn’t know how to respond. The idea of anyone suffering for that long and not being a complete basket case was amazing. No wonder he didn’t like to be touched. She couldn’t blame him much for not wanting to be around people, either. Once you’ve seen how truly awful the world can be, it’s hard to trust anyone.
Bartol stood there with his hands shoved in his jeans pockets, expression guarded. He probably expected her to show him pity or give him platitudes. She might not have suffered in the same way as him, but she knew that wouldn’t help anyway. Every individual handled emotional pain differently. There was no specific response she could give that would work for him or anyone else who’d been through a similar trauma, but Cori had recognized one thing about him from the beginning. He needed normalcy. Treating him like a victim only made his ability to overcome his suffering that much harder.
She cocked her head. “Do you think the crime you committed was enough to deserve the punishment you received?”
“No.” He looked away. “I fornicated for a prolonged period with an angel. Perhaps I deserved something, but not that.”
She agreed. What he’d done was impulsive and reckless, and it more or less spit in the archangels’ faces, but it wasn’t worth a hundred years of horrible torture. “My case is different,” she said, trying to get through to him that they couldn’t compare their problems. “Maybe I deserve whatever Griff does to me.”
He moved so quickly she didn’t see it coming. One moment she sat on her porch steps, and in the next, she found herself flattened against the front door. Bartol held her arms above her head and looked deeply into her eyes. “He will never touch you again if I can help it.”
“It’s not your job to save me, Bartol,” she said, mesmerized by his brilliant golden eyes. She’d never seen so much passion in them before—as if he’d just come alive for the first time.
He tightened his grip on her wrists, though not so much it hurt. “I made it my job.”
“What if I tell you to go away?” she asked, licking her lips.
Bartol followed her tongue like a predator would prey. “Make me leave.”
Cori arched her back, pressing her breasts into his chest. She tried angling her head closer to his but couldn’t quite reach his face no matter how much she tried. Inches separated their mouths, and their warm breath mingled. Bartol held her back from getting any closer, but he didn’t look the slightest bit repulsed by their close proximity.
She stared up at him, breaths turning ragged. “Make me beg.”
Bartol let out a snarl, eyes flashing like a wild animal. He brought his lips down on hers hard. She lifted onto her toes and kissed him back for all she was worth. Finally…finally, she’d gotten what she wanted. He didn’t give her soft and easy. His lips were brutal against hers as if he was punishing her for making him want this. Cori gave as good as she got, kissing him just as roughly. If that’s the way he wanted, she could handle it.
He transferred her wrists to one hand and brought the other down to yank her hips closer to his. The hardest erection she’d ever felt pressed against her stomach. She lost all reason in that moment, never wanting anyone more in her life. It was as if this was exactly where she was supposed to be and had only discovered it now.
He broke off the kiss to trace his lips and tongue along her jaw line, nipping when he got to her ear. She wished she had her hands free so that she could touch him, but he still held her firmly. He wanted full control over her.
“Bartol,” she said in a breathy whisper.
He ran his tongue along her ear, and she shivered. It might have been a while, but she had to remember this man had been a master at seduction for most of his life. His free hand roamed her body, touching her hips, belly, and eventually squeezing her breasts. All the while, his mouth continued to drive her wild with the way he could move it against her skin.
“Please,” she begged. “Let me touch you.”
He stopped moving. She felt it the moment he realized what he was doing, and his body went rigid. He stumbled back, barely making it down the stairs without falling in his effort to get away from her. Horror filled his face, and he started shaking. Cori was at a loss and didn’t know what to do. The torture he’d described was horrible, but could it have affected his ability to ever experience intimacy again? Was there more he hadn’t told her?
Bartol fell to his knees and grabbed his head. When she hurried toward him, he held up a warning hand. “Don’t…come…any closer.”
“But.” She stopped in the middle of the steps. “What can I do?”
He gulped in deep breaths like he was having a panic attack. Cori stood there and watched helplessly. Finally, he lifted his head. For the rest of her life, she would never forget the look in his eyes. His very soul was hanging on by a thread. Whatever had happened to him, he’d been damaged beyond repair—or very close to it. How he was functioning at all, she didn’t know.
“Do not tempt me again,” he said in a tortured voice. “And get inside—now!”
Bartol stared at her hard until she did as he asked. She fled into her house and slammed the front door, turning the deadbolt because she knew he’d insist if he didn’t hear it. From her front window, she caught him flash away. Cori’s stomach churned. Had she set him back in the recovery process so much that he might not ever heal from his psychological damage? Had she just made a huge mistake?