One might expect a man battling insanity to have a cluttered, chaotic home. But Aidan thought Cliff’s apartment was tidy enough to please even the obsessive-compulsive television detective Adrian Monk.
Cliff rarely slept more than a couple of hours at a time now and constantly sought activities to keep both his mind and hands busy.
Maintaining an immaculate living space appeared to be one such activity.
Today Cliff sat on a cushy sofa, elbows on his knees, head in his hands, his fingers curling into fists and clutching his shoulder-length dreadlocks so tightly that Aidan worried he might pull his hair out.
Cliff didn’t look up as Aidan approached.
Aidan sat down beside him.
The voices were louder this morning, the internal battle the young vampire waged fiercer than ever.
Aidan listened to those voices and felt his heart sink.
Though Cliff hated to admit defeat, he was considering asking Bastien to end it for him. To kill him now before he lost the last of his lucidity and became the equivalent of a rabid dog.
Cliff would end it himself but didn’t want Melanie to find him… or whatever would be left after the virus devoured him from the inside out.
Aidan rested a hand on Cliff’s shoulder. “Do you trust me?” he asked softly.
“Yes,” Cliff whispered in a pained voice one might expect to hear emerge from the lips of someone with a pounding migraine.
“Stand up.”
Lowering his clenched fists, Cliff did so and raised glowing amber eyes full of anguish.
“Don’t be afraid,” Aidan murmured, then teleported them to a beautiful vale in Scotland.
Cliff cried out as bright afternoon sunlight bathed them.
Aidan tightened his hold on the vampire’s shoulder to keep him from bolting for the trees. “Don’t.”
Cliff threw up his hands to shield his face. The violent voices in his head shrieked and wailed, then went silent in the face of the fear that struck him.
A moment passed.
Aidan’s hand heated where he touched Cliff as his healing gift went to work.
When the vampire’s flesh didn’t begin to blister from exposure, Cliff slowly lowered his hands. Squinting against the brightness, he stared down at his exposed arms.
His smooth brown skin remained healthy. No blisters formed. No pain struck.
Cliff looked up with wide eyes, his heart beginning to pound. “How is this possible? Am I hallucinating? Is this…? Am I having another psychotic break?”
“No.” Aidan smiled. “I can heal with my hands and am using my gift to heal the damage the sun is doing in real time.”
“You can do that?” Cliff asked with astonishment.
Aidan nodded. “I wasn’t sure I could until I tried it with Ethan. I can’t say he was very pleased about being my guinea pig, but he owed me.”
A little huff of laughter escaped Cliff. “Well, you did transform his wife for him so she’d be superstrong.”
The Immortal Guardians had come to understand in recent years that, unlike those transformed by vampires, gifted ones who were transformed by immortals tended to become as strong and durable as those who transformed them. So Ethan’s wife Heather was now as fast and strong as Aidan and even had his greater tolerance for daylight, something Ethan couldn’t have given her had he transformed her himself because he had only been immortal for a century or so.
Cliff closed his eyes and tilted his face up to the sky. “It’s warm,” he murmured. “I’d forgotten how warm sunlight is. And that you can feel it on your skin.”
“With your heightened senses, you feel it a little more now.”
Cliff shook his head. When he opened his eyes, tears glistened in them. “I never thought I would feel it again. Not unless…”
Not unless he decided to end it that way, by walking into the daylight and letting the sun sear the madness—and his life—away.
Aidan squeezed his shoulder. “Every day you hold out, Cliff, every day you keep fighting, I’ll give you this. I’ll give you the sun.”
Cliff’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “Doesn’t it hurt you?”
Aidan shrugged. His skin prickled unpleasantly as he took the damage the sun did to Cliff and absorbed it into his own body, keeping Cliff healthy. The longer they remained, the more it would hurt. “It’s a mild discomfort at most,” he lied.
But Cliff was a smart man. He knew better. “Why would you do this for me?”
“Because you’re my friend. My brother. And this is what brothers do for each other.” Aidan knew Cliff would’ve done the same for him. The two had become good friends since Aidan had transferred to North Carolina.
Cliff nodded. “I would do it for you.”
Aidan didn’t doubt it. Cliff was an extraordinary man. “You hear that?”
Cliff cocked his head to one side, listening. “What?”
Aidan grinned. “I think we shocked the voices into silence.” No cries for violence filled the young vampire’s mind.
Cliff laughed, his shoulders loosening with relief. “I think you’re right. My mind hasn’t been this quiet in a long time.” He took in the beautiful scenery. “Where are we?”
“My home in Scotland.”
“All this land is yours?”
“Yes.”
“Wow. You’re a lucky man.” He sent Aidan a sly glance, appearing more at ease than Aidan had seen him in months. “Are you sure you aren’t just trying to keep me alive longer so I can help you find a wife?”
Aidan laughed. “You’ve caught me. That’s exactly why.”
Since Cliff had heightened hearing and spent most of his time at the network, he knew a lot about the gifted ones who worked there and had been sharing that information with Aidan in hopes of aiding him in his quest to find love.
“Any luck yet?” Cliff asked, watching a hawk float above them on the breeze.
Aidan shrugged. “I met Veronica Becker.”
“You did? I thought you had crossed her off the list because she’s still mourning her husband.”
“I did. But she got a flat tire.”
Cliff gave him a pointed stare.
“It wasn’t me,” Aidan protested.
“Sure it wasn’t.”
Aidan laughed. “It truly wasn’t, but she thought it was.”
Cliff grinned. “Figured it out, did she?”
“Yes, and kindly suggested I find another MO.”
The vampire laughed. “I told you so. North Carolina is like a small town. Word gets around.”
“Well, when I didn’t show up to change her flat tire, she got out to do it herself and was attacked by vampires.”
Cliff’s smile vanished. “Is she okay?”
Aidan nodded, trying to ignore the stinging pain that intensified in his skin. “She’s fine. I escorted her and her son home, then went to see Dana Pembroke.”
“The psychic?”
“Yes.”
“How’d that go?”
“She had a vision of the two of us making love.”
Cliff’s eyebrows flew up as his face brightened with a smile. “That’s awesome!”
“Aye. And she agreed to go out to dinner with me tonight.”
“Do you think she’s the one?”
Aidan shrugged. “I don’t know. But I like her.”
“And she’s psychic and saw you two naked together. Holy hell, that’s a good sign.”
Aidan grinned. “I hope so.”