“You did? May I ask why?” His fingers did the walking up to her neck then into her hair. He played with a strand of hair as though he’d never seen hair before.
“I wanted to devote more time to Shannon and…other things.”
They’d both finished another glass of wine, so he poured another refill. “Things? That sounds mysterious. What are you after? UFOs?”
He cut his chuckle short when she didn’t laugh along with him. “Tell me you’re joking. You don’t believe in little green men, do you?”
She downed the wine, finding comfort and courage in the dark liquid. “If you’d asked me a few months ago, I would’ve said no. But now? I’m not so sure.”
He left her only long enough to open the second bottle of wine, but it was far too long for her. In that small time, she missed watching the way his mouth moved as he talked and missed glancing at the tent forming under his jeans. She sighed when he returned to his seat and placed the bottle on the coffee table in front of them.
“So should I assume that you had a close encounter a few months ago?”
She could hear the teasing tone in his voice but didn’t blame him. “You could say so.”
He peered at her with his amazing cerulean eyes. “Okay, now you’ve really got me hooked. What happened?”
She put her wine down on the table and shifted to look straight at him. The room spun a little from that quick movement but stabilized as soon as she placed a hand on his shoulder. He was the type of man who could make anything seem more solid than it was.
“I started believing in a lot of unbelievable things after my sister Christine’s death.” She searched his face for any sign that he might believe her. She took a leap of faith, needing to tell someone. “She suffered an awful death.”
He nodded. “Like I said, Forever’s a small town and stories get around it faster than fish around bait.”
Was he saying he believed in vampires and werewolves? Or did he think they were just stories and nothing more. “Then there was the day I shot a werewolf.”
He didn’t laugh, but that didn’t make the anxious churning in her stomach any better. “Did you hear what I said? I shot a werewolf.”
He frowned, his gaze hard on hers. “Where did this happen?”
“I rushed into Deacon Slater’s house and saw Shannon standing there with two very large, very unusual-looking wolves. I saw the intelligence in their eyes, and I knew right then and there that they were werewolves. I was terrified for myself and for my sister. But not scared enough that I wouldn’t do whatever I could to protect her. I shot one of them, grabbed Shannon, and ran for dear life.”
He opened his mouth to speak, closed it, then tried again. “I don’t know what to say.”
“I know how it sounds, but I also know what I saw. And there’s more.” She waited, but he didn’t say anything else, so she plowed ahead, determined to get it over with. “Deacon Slater is a vampire.”
She hoped he’d believe her. Instead, anger flared inside when she saw him roll his lips under to keep from laughing. “It’s the truth. That’s why Shannon was here. We thought Deacon Slater was the vampire who killed our younger sister, Christine.”
He skimmed his palms along her arms. But he didn’t do it in the way a potential lover might do it. Instead, it was more like he was trying to keep a crazy person calm before she went bat shit and started screaming about aliens abducting her. She thrust his hands off her and stood up. “I know what I saw, Blane. If you don’t believe it, then you need to get the hell out.”
“Easy, Charlie. I’m not saying you’re wrong. There are a lot of unknown things in this wild world.” He stood and started to reach for her but lowered his hands when she glared at him.
“But you don’t really believe me, do you?”
“Shannon’s never said one word to me about werewolves and vampires.”
She stalked to the door and flung it open. “I think you need to go.”
He came to her but acted like she didn’t have the door wide open for him to leave. “I just wonder, with all that’s happened, if you know what’s real and what’s not.”
“Trust me, I do.”
“Do you?” He stepped closer to her. “Can you feel the connection between us, Charlie? Can you trust your senses enough to know it’s real?”
“I–I told you to leave.”
“Admit it. Tell me you feel the bond between us.”
She was deep into telling the truth and couldn’t stop. “I feel it.”
“And you sensed it between you and Reese, didn’t you?”