He didn't want to feel the way he did about Mary. He didn't want this power between them to be anything more than the undeniable awareness that always came between her kind and his. She was one of what vampires called The Chosen-a human with the belladonna antigen. They were linked by blood, the two of them. The overwhelming urge to protect her was to be expected.

And yet he couldn't deny that there was more than that. He was compelled to walk close to her, stand close to her, sit beside her, touch her at every opportunity, smell her.

Taste her...

No. Not that. He wouldn't do that. She must never know what he was. The memory of Sally's reaction to that knowledge was as fresh as if it had happened yesterday.

They walked to the small store down the beach, and he bought two bags of groceries. It was a difficult task, since it had been a long time since he'd had to shop for food, and the items offered today were foreign in comparison to what had filled the shelves in his own time.

He had to keep nudging her to make choices, and eventually she got over any feeling that he ought to be the one to choose and just did it. His relief must have shown on his face as the cashier rang them out.

"Not much of a shopper, are you?"

He shrugged. "I usually east out."

She shook her head. "You don't know what you're missing."

He did know, but to be honest, he didn't miss it al that much. The appeal of food paled in comparison to the lust for blood. Of course, he couldn't tell her that. Or that while food might taste good going down, that was all it did. Blood came alive inside him, sparkling and sizzling through his veins like living energy. Electricity times a thousand. Life. It was life. Even the stale aged blood he used as his sustenance, stolen from blood banks or hospitals, held the spark of that power. He was hungry. It had been days since he'd fed. Yet he wanted to be near her, to protect her his every waking moment. He couldn't take tie away to scavenge for a meal.

He took the tow paper grocery bags from the counter and, carrying one in each arm, left the store. Mary caught up quickly and took one of the bags from him. "You don't need to wait on me, you know."

"I wasn't." No. He was trying to keep her from seeing the glow of bloodlust in his eyes. He fought his hunger, wrestled it into submission, buried it and focused only on her.

She walked along the path beside him, warm and alive and beautiful. Her hair was long and loose tonight. The sea wind blew it around her face. In front of the store was a small parking area, and a road beyond it. Behind it, there was a narrow, well-worn path that wound back to the beach.

"What is it you do?" she asked at length.

"Do?"

"Yeah. You said your work keeps you away most days remember?"

"Oh. My... work."

She smiled at him a little nervously. "Must pay well. You drive a Jag. Live in a magnificent house on a private beach."

Plus, seventy years of careful investing had it's benefits, he thought.

"Is it law-enforcement related?"

He glanced at her, realized he was expected to come up with an answer, one that made as much sense as her suggestion did. "Yeah, as a matter of fact, it is. I do consulting work for, uh, security companies. You know the kind that set up alarm systems and tie lock for office buildings and banks and things like that?" He wondered if it sounded at all plausible and watched her face carefully for her reaction.

She nodded as if it made perfect sense. "Sounds exciting."

"Id far rather be here with you," he told her.

She blushed in the darkness lowered her eyes, didn't answer.

They arrived back at the beach house, and he insisted on taking the bag from her as they climbed the stairs. She couldn't know it was less than weightless to a ma as powerful as he, and she argued.

"I'm just as capable of carrying a bag of groceries up the stairs as you are, you know," she said, trotting up the steps behind him.

"No, you aren't."

"Am so."

"Would you like me to carry you up, as well Mary?"

She smacked him on the shoulder from behind. "Show-off."

He loved her when she was in a teasing, playful mood. It meant she wasn't dwelling on her fear. They reached the top, and he turned to face her. "Key's are still in my pocket." He nodded downward. "You want to reach in and there and feel for them?"

She smirked at him. "You wish." Then she took one of the bags from him, freeing him to get his keys himself. She was more relaxed than he'd seen her since he'd first started going to the bar to watch over her at night, almost two weeks ago. The moon had been new then.

He opened the door, and she went inside, toed off her shoes and carried the grocery bags to the kitchen. Setting them on the table, she began unpacking. She turned to a cupboard to open it, then frowned and opened a couple more. "You weren't kidding about eating out a lot, were you?"

"I've only been living here a couple of weeks. I really haven't stocked the place yet."

"Been too busy being my guardian angel to worry about eating properly, I'll bet."

She couldn't possibly know how right she was about that. He shrugged, still nervous that the lack of food in the cupboards would cause her to ask questions, but Mary seemed to accept his explanations. There were dishes in some of the cupboards. They'd been there when he'd moved into the place, and he'd washed them and put them right back-even though to him they were little more than props.

"You know, you're really roughing it here, Michael. No coffeemaker. No toaster. There's not even a microwave."

"Like I said-"

"Oh, don't explain. I've never yet met a member of your species to be overly concerned with nesting.'

He went very still in the small kitchen. "My... species?"

"Yeah. Male."

He closed his eyes as his relief emerged in the form of a sigh and every tense muscle relaxed. For a second he'd thought she might have known or guessed what he was.

But why would she guess? She probably didn't even believe creatures such as he existed.

When they finished emptying the grocery bags, she stretched her lovely arms, yawned and said, "It's after midnight. I think I'll get some sleep. I cant believe you're up this late when you have to get up before dawn."

"I rarely sleep much at night."

She shrugged. "Well, you should." She smiled at him. "You don't take very good care of yourself. You need to do better."

"I'll try my best."

Their eyes met and held for a long moment. Finally she sighed and looked away. "Good night, Michael."

"Good night."

Then she headed into her bedroom. Michael sat in the living room, listening to her. Sensing her. He could close his eyes and know where she was, what she was doing, just by opening his mind. He didn't even need to probe hers.

He heard the water in the bathroom, felt her peel away her clothes and step into the shower. He wanted her. It was a hunger, like the hunger for blood. And it was just as natural in his kind. Desire, in a vampire, wasn't a mere fancy or passing impulse. It was a demanding, insatiable, driving need. He, for whatever reasons-and he didn't doubt their blood bond was one of them-desired her. He would know no peace until he had her.

He sighed and told himself that likely meant he would never know peace. Because he wasn't going to have her. The risk that he would loose himself to the need to taste her blood was too great. He knew that now as he'd never known it before. He was going to protect her until he knew she was safe, and then he was going to go on his way, long before she could learn what he was.

He continued sitting there, tuned in to her essence, if not her thoughts for a long, long while. The shower stopped running, and she put on something slight. A T-shirt, perhaps Then she slid into the bed and closed her eyes.

She slept. He felt her sinking into sleep rapidly, and he knew she hadn't been sleeping well since this entire thing had begun. She felt safe here, with him.

For a time he was content to sit there, feeling her sleep. Then he heard her, very clearly, whisper his name. Michael. At first he thought she had spoken it deliberately, called, to him, and he was on his feet and at the bedroom door before it occurred to him that she was still asleep.

She'd said his name in her sleep.

He closed his hand on the doorknob, turned it, opened the door and stepped into the bedroom. She lay on her side, and he could see her face, serene, relaxed. Yes, she was asleep, hugging he pillow. She nuzzled it's softness with her cheek, and again, she muttered his name. This tie her hips moved just a little as she did, and her arms clutched the pillow fighter to her breast.

She was dreaming. About him.

He shouldn't. He told himself he really shouldn't. She'd asked him not to pry into her mind, and he had honored that request, for the most part.

But he didn't think he knew any man, mortal or otherwise, who could have resisted just a tiny bit of exploration. He moved closer to the bed until he stood right beside it, his thighs touching the mattress. He lowered his hand, planning to lay it atop hers very lightly, to enhance their connection, let him view her thoughts more vividly and with less effort. But before he could make contact, her hand moved, turned and gripped his wrist hard. Her breathing quickened just a little. And still she slept.

He stared down at her face, then closed his eyes and focused on her mind, her thoughts, her touch.

And then he was there, inside her dream. He saw two nude people, writhing on the bed: himself and Mary. She was lying beneath him, her legs wrapped around his waist, linked at the ankles. His hips were snapping as he drove into her, and hers moved in time, receiving him. He felt her need mounting, her desire building, and yet she couldn't reach satisfaction. Not in her sleep. Not in a fantasy.

He burned with wanting her, wanting to assuage her hunger-but he knew that would mean facing the temptation to assuage his own. And he needed her trust right now. He would lose it if she learned what he was, and if he lost her trust, she would die. Even with Tommy gone, he felt the menace surrounding her lie a nimbus. She was still in danger.

He stroked her face and her hair, leaning closer, whispering to her mind with his, coaxing her dream along with erotic images projected into her mind and words spoken softly into her ear, until she shivered and trembled with the release his will and deemed inevitable. And then her arms curled around his neck and her face turned up to his. He kissed her. He knew he shouldn't, but to deny himself even this brief taste of her was more than he could bear. He kissed her, and her mouth moved beneath his, lips parting, tongue tasting. Her fingers splayed in his hair as she kissed him, and he took full advantage of the opportunity to explore her mouth.

But she was sliding ever closer to lucidity, climbing slowly from the dream state, and he knew it had to end before she opened her eyes.

He eased into her mind with the command that she must sleep. That all this was just a pleasant dream and nothing more. He couldn't quite bring himself to tell her to forget. No, he wanted her to remember, because he would.

He felt her falling away into the depths of slumber, and he lifted his head from hers. Tucking the covers around her once more, brushing astray coppery curl from her check he forcibly ignored the soft, inviting rush of blood flowing just beneath her skin, the delicate, steady thrum of its pulsing there. Involuntarily he licked his lips.

Then he closed his eyes, and forcibly turned away from her, striding out of the room, and out of the house. He needed blood. It wouldn't take long.

* * * * *

When he crept back into the house a half hour before dawn, sated and warm thanks to the local blood bank's flimsy locks but no less hungry for her, he smelled something that made him slightly queasy. Following the aroma and his sense of Mary in the kitchen, he found her there, scooping yellow omelettes with flecks of green and brown and red onto plates. Two of them.

Mary?" he asked. "Why are you up so early?"

She looked toward him, smiling brightly. The way she sparkled his morning took his breath away. "I set the alarm an got up early so I could make you a special breakfast before you had to leave for work."

He looked at the plate, then at her. His stomach twisted "You shouldn't have gone to the trouble-"

"It's the least I could do, after all you've done for me." She shrugged. "You said you eat out most of the time. I thought a home-cooked breakfast would be a welcome change."

"That's... I don't know what to say." He truly didn't. He couldn't actually... eat that thing. Could he? And yet it touched him to his core that she wanted to do this for him. To take care of him-the way he wanted to take care of her.

She smiled again and pulled out his chair. I'm going to go out walking today and if I should pass a shop that sells them, I'll buy you a coffeemaker. I don't know how you manage to start the day without coffee." She pulled out a chair and sat down. "Well? Dig in."

Licking his lips, he sat in the chair opposite her. The smell of the omelette wafted up to his nostrils, and his stomach rebelled again. He glanced at his wristwatch. "I'm not going to have time to do this luscious meal justice."

"I'm not gonna be offended if you have to eat and run. I know you have to get moving early."

He nodded and watched her eat a few bites. But she kept looking at him, and he knew damned well she was going to be wounded and offended and, worst of all, suspicious if he didn't eat the food. Bracing himself, he picked up the fork, squared his shoulders and shoved a bit into his mouth.

Sold food was a misnomer. It wasn't solid at all, but a mushy mass that only got more soggy as one attempted to grind it to a digestible consistency with one's teeth. He tried his best to turn the sound of revulsion leaping up from his gut into moans of ecstasy. He almost gagged when he had to swallow, but he managed to force it down, and then he shoveled in another bite, and another.

He devoured fully half of his meal, then pushed his chair away from the table. Bits of the horrible thing still clung to his teeth and tongue, and his in the crevices of his mouth. 'That was the most delicious omelette I've ever had, Mary. Truly. Thank you. I'm so sorry I have to go."

"You're welcome. And don't apologize."

He was already halfway to the front door. His body was not designed to digest solid food. His liquid diet was absorbed into his blood stream directly from the stomach. The rest of the tract-hell, he didn't know, but he'd always assumed it was simply shut down. It certainly hadn't preformed any noticeable function since he'd been transformed.

He closed the door behind him, and stumbled to the car, his keys in his hand as his stomach convulsed. His plan was to get into the car, drive out of sight and then-but no, it was too late for that. Dropping the keys on the car's front seat, he slammed the door and ran across the narrow side road and into a decorative copse of pinon pines. And then he fell to his knees as his stomach rejected the meal in terms so violent he thought his body was being torn apart from within.

When if finally stopped, he moved a few steps away, fell to the ground, and lay there, shaking trembling, chilled trough and oddly weak. He remained that way for several moments, until disgust forced him to get to his feet again and move farther. There was a stream a few yards away, runoff from the mountains leading into the sea. He went to it, dipped his hands full of icy cold water and filled his mouth with it, over an over, swishing, rinsing and spitting until he had rid his mouth of every crumb he could manage.

He need a full bathroom, with a shower and sink and, most of all, a toothbrush. And floss. He shivered, and then he moved on into the scrubby excuse for a woodlot over the narrow deer path.

The sun was on its way. He could already feel its touch on the air, though it had yet to peek over the ocean. He followed the trail, a shortcut to the cemetery, and emerged into the place from the rear. It was an old cemetery, with several family plots, each one consisting of one large stone an several smaller ones, all surrounded by a wrought-iron fence. They occurred in various sizes and styles, but nearly all the groups here were grouped that way.

A few more recent graves stood alone. Up the hill a bit were the crypts, including his own. His name was engraved on the top, chiseled into the granite, in all caps. He'd purchased it, allegedly for his father, even staged a fake funeral a month ago, in preparation for his move here, knowing he would need a backup shelter from the daylight.

The door was sealed and looked like all the others. But there was hidden catch to release the lock from the outside. He did so, glancing around, opening his senses to be sure he wasn't observed. Then he opened the door and went inside. He closed it behind him an slid home the additional locks he'd installed on the inside of the crypt.

He sighed as he faced the four-by-eight rectangle and the stone slab upon which he was going to spend the day.