A Midsummer Night's Demon(24)

The smell of chamomile came wafting in the air when the latest rookie assigned to him sat down with her tea. “Any luck?” she asked.

“No.” The smell of her tea carried a powerful reminder of Lyn. Like a kick to his gut, it pushed the air from his lungs forcing him to take a deep inhale. “Is there any way I could get you not to drink that crap around my desk?” Ky could not keep the growl from his voice, which solicited a raised eyebrow from the trainee.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll go to the break room.”

“You do that.”

His rudeness knew no bounds. He shook his head in irritation at his manners. It wasn’t her fault she wanted to get some work done while he obsessed about Lyn. Wasn’t her fault that the tea she drank reminded him of his mate. But that didn’t keep him from being miserable about the situation.

Ky watched the rookie walk away, any normal male would appreciate the way her hips swayed. She looked beautiful, with blonde hair that fell to the middle of her back and blue eyes that sparkled when the light hit them just right. Yep, any male would be attracted to her.

Not him.

He wanted a woman with long brown hair and matching eyes. A woman who had a slight Hispanic accent that made her roll her R’s in a sexy way. He wanted Lyn. His heartmate. And no other would do. She had come into his life, filling it with hot-blooded passion. Now just an empty shell, he endured each night, did his duty and fought not to check his cell phone every two minutes to see if she returned his calls.

More than once he’d stopped by her townhouse—she refused to answer the door, even though he announced he could hear her breathing inside. He had left her messages on her home and work numbers like some kind of stalker, begging for a chance to explain—they had gone unreturned.

Completely miserable without her, he thought of her every minute, wondering what she was doing. Was she eating? Did she think of him—dream of him?

She needed more time to adjust, and he had no choice but to give her that time, because the alternative would be to give her up, and he couldn’t do that. He needed to win her back, and Ky knew he could, if she would just give him a chance.

****

One month later

The vampire sat alone at his kitchen table eating his first meal of the day. He brought his glass to his lips and took a long swallow of the crimson liquid inside. His throat constricted around the warmed blood. It was Lyn’s type—O positive—but it didn’t taste anything like Lyn.

Her blood tasted like her—sweet, spicy, with a hint of fire and a lot of passion. This crap was plain, cool, and boring. Definitely a stark contrast to his mate.

She’d been perfect for him. Daelyn Torres kept him on his toes. She didn’t take any grief from him. A brave woman, she’d been willing to do whatever it took to get her life back.

A life that no longer included him.

For the past month, he had continued to try to reach her, but she refused him every time. He walked a fine line between contacting her often enough that she knew he still cared, and not sliding over the line to seem like a psychopathic stalker.

Psychopathic. A good word to describe him. Like falling down the rabbit hole, his life seemed dark and strange without her.

He battled to keep himself focused, keep his mind sharp. Every time he did something, it reminded him of her. He got in his boat to go to shore—he remembered bringing her to his island that first night. He looked at pictures of the crime scene at work—it reminded him of the park where he lost her. He got in his car to come home after a long day—it still smelled like her after all this time.

He took a deep breath, relishing the scent of jasmine and chamomile that lingered in his home. She was everywhere, he could not escape her. And heaven help him, but he’d started to want an escape.

It killed him to think about what he was missing. He had found heaven in her arms and hell without her. He could not go on like this forever.

If she didn’t come around soon, he would have to go to her one last time to erase all memories of their time together from her mind. Goddammit, he didn’t want to do that, but he would. Keeping vampires a secret meant their survival. No demon could know about them, especially one who hated them as Lyn did.

He threw his plate across the room. It shattered, sending ceramic bits mixed with uneaten toast crumbing to the floor.

****

Lyn sat at the kitchen table alone, eating her dinner. Looking at the omelet on her plate transported her back to the day Ky had made one for her. They had been so happy. She had been so happy.