Vampires Need Not…Apply? (Accidentally Yours #4)(46)
Author: Mimi Jean Pamfiloff

His harsh expression instantly softened. And dammit if she didn’t see the bags under his eyes disappear. Or had she imagined it? It was as if he’d suddenly transformed into a vision of vampire health. Even that hard line of lips now held a hint of curve on one side.

Ixtab yippeed on the inside. He’s happy! He’s happy to see me!

“My quarters are this way.” He bowed his head and gestured toward the hallway. “After you.”

She passed him and felt his eyes burning into her. “I see you’ve reverted back to your original costume,” he said.

She smiled brightly. “Just wait until you see what I haven’t got on underneath.”

That ought to shut him up.

It did.

* * *

How the hell did she know he’d be there? Hell, not even he expected to be there. Five minutes after he’d left the villa in Bacalar, unsure he’d ever be able to bear the sight of the goddess again—because surely her “slip” had been meant as a slight, intended to put him in his place for what he’d done to her—he had received the call and then gotten on the next flight out.

So why the hell had she come? Was it to insist the humiliation ritual continue? If yes, the goddess had another thing coming. She could bring down a rain of locusts or peppercorns or… whatthehellever, and it wouldn’t change his mind. He was done with these ridiculous deities because his f**king time was up. With that one phone call back in Bacalar, everything in his world had changed; the day he’d spent a lifetime fearing had finally arrived, and now nothing mattered. Only opening that portal.

He followed her into his room, a large suite toward the back of the estate on the third floor overlooking the vineyard. Though he hadn’t been home in over six years, they’d kept it ready. It was a sign his father knew this day would come and he’d return. “You cannot negate your duty any more than you can the Acero blood flowing through your veins. Doesn’t matter how far you run, there isn’t anywhere I can’t find you.”

But Antonio, from the moment he’d understood what it truly meant to be an Acero, hoped he’d find a way for him and his brother to escape the path so many had taken before. He had much higher hopes for their humanity.

Antonio shut the door behind him and scrutinized the woman draped in bulky layers of black lace. By now, however, he’d learned not to judge an Ixtab book by its Ixtab cover. Underneath the facade of a woman resembling an old-world widow from Italy was an ancient, immortal female with a tongue as sharp as a sword and equally capable of taking down a man. And from the first moment she’d touched him, he realized her hold over him was slightly more dangerous; he was addicted to something within her.

And I hate her for it.

Not only was she distracting him from his fate, but she’d humiliated him. Called him Francisco of all the goddamned, pinche names in the word. Perhaps it served him right; what had he been thinking becoming intimate with her? She’s nothing but an evil goddess. A distraction who pleasured in his suffering from day one. A monster. Just like her sister said.

He crossed his arms and leaned against the door, putting as much distance between them as possible. “All right. We are somewhere private. Now, speak. Why the diablos are you here, woman?”

* * *

“Woman?” It had been eons since anyone had called her that.

His eyes narrowed. “Cut the mierda, goddess. Are you here to humiliate me further?”

Ixtab’s eyes surveyed the sparsely decorated room. A large bed and a sitting area, no personal belongings—similar to his apartment in New York. It was as if he rejected the notion of having a real home. Why?

“No,” she said, “I don’t want to humiliate you. I’m here because I want to tell you that—”

“I have every intention of unlocking the portal,” he interrupted. “So you’ve wasted your time coming here if it was to convince me to continue my work.”

His vampire sass began to boil her blood. “If you cut me off one more time, I swear I’ll… sizzle your man junk with an assorted array of spicy seasoning. I came to apologize. And because I thought you might need my help.”

“Actually”—he dropped his arms and walked toward the large glass double doors leading toward his private balcony—“I made significant progress last night. Alone.” He yanked open the doors and stepped outside.

The winter sun hit him directly in the face, but he didn’t shirk away. How strange. He seemed to bask in the warm rays like a mortal. Normally, vampires avoided the sun, given how it drained their power.

He glanced at her from outside. “You’ve got ten minutes. Then you need to leave.”

Grrr…

Deep breath. Patience…

Ixtab blinked and followed him outside. “All right. But no interrupting. Got it?” He didn’t reply so she took it as a yes and began telling Antonio about the man she once loved. Two hundred years ago she’d found him, a Benedictine monk who had forsaken his family to help the destitute, the lost, and the sick. “It wasn’t what one might expect or see in a corny mortal movie,” she explained. “A fatal illness had ravaged Chile. Most hard-hit was Santiago, and those who remained were stricken with grief. I worked day and night, helping to clear out their darkness so that those who lived could move on. Everywhere I went, I saw him. The poorest of neighborhoods, the makeshift hospitals, the churches where the living gathered to mourn. He was everywhere, fearless, holding the hands of the dying until their time came. I watched from a distance at first, but after a week, I could not ignore him. Something about his light drew me in.”

Ixtab held back a sob. She’d never told anyone the entire story—not even Kinich—and now, reliving it brought her back to that exact moment in time. Fresh as yesterday.

“He and I became friends—more than friends, really. I wanted him. He wanted me. But I knew being with a man wasn’t possible. Still, he insisted we were meant to be together. He begged me to kiss him, touch him, and swore there was nothing to fear; fate had brought us together. Though I didn’t tell him I was a goddess, I did tell him I was… different. Poison. He didn’t care. His conviction, his willingness to leave his life behind for me”—she looked into Antonio’s intensely focused eyes—“was so strong that I believed he was right.” Ixtab made a pathetic little shrug. “Until he touched me. Before I realized he’d been wrong, he’d made it to the cupboard and swallowed rat poison. I did everything I could, but he died.”