“Look closer.”
I took out my cellphone and turned on the flashlight before waving it over what I thought was just a rock. Something sparkled and shined on the rock. I looked closer and could see thick veins of gold running through it. “Whoa,” I said, scrutinizing it and shocked by its weight. “That’s amazing. Where did he find it?”
“He had a secret mine in the Sierra that he’d stolen from his partner. Or I should say he murdered his partner and stole the deed to the mine.”
“Things in the past do not sound fun,” I said. I knew it was tough back then, but I knew more about the way of life, not the fact there were vampires out there ready to kill you or people who were so greedy they’d kill their mining partner for gold.
“The way of men has never changed. Humans are violent and sometimes greedy.”
“Not all of us are,” I said. “I wasn’t looking for gold out of greed, I swear.” He knew this. We’d just talked about it, but I felt the need to make sure he knew.
“Have you ever been in love?” he asked me, taking me by surprise.
“Why would you ask that?”
“Just curious,” he said and tried to hold back his smile.
“Then the answer is no. I’ve had a few crushes, and more than a few one-night stands, but so far, I haven’t met anyone who I want to spend more than one night with.”
“You’re old to still be unmarried.”
“What? I’m only twenty-three,” I said and tried to hide the fact he’d insulted me.
“They would have deemed you too old to marry when I was young. The girls wanted the younger men to marry to avoid being forced to marry the really old men,” he said as though that was a normal thing, which I guess to him it was. But not anymore.
I folded my arms and leaned in close to him. “Well, in my time, people marry who they want, when they want. Some don’t ever get married. You’re allowed to do what you want and love who you choose. Not to mention we’re in California and you can’t get married until you’re an adult.”
“Then my apologies. I thought maybe you had chosen to be a bachelor.”
What the fuck?After taking a deep breath, I tried to remind myself he was from long ago and they had very different ideas then, but I also felt like he was testing my reaction to see if I’d answer honestly. “I didn’t choose anything. I just didn’t find the right guy yet.”
He smiled and nodded at that before locking his hands behind his back and taking a few steps before looking up at the moon. “It’s a beautiful night, don’t you think?”
He was so weird, but so intriguing that I couldn’t have made myself leave if I wanted to. Then I realized it was my turn to ask a question.
Eight
Marlon
“Go ahead,” I said when it was obvious he wasn’t sure he should ask what he wanted to.
“How did you meet your mate?” he finally asked as he chewed his lip and looked more concerned than he had when I had burst out of my dirt prison. My mind instantly wandered back to that time so long ago when I’d first set eyes on who would eventually become the most important human in my world. There was a smile on my lips as years of memories rushed through my mind. Not everything with him was bad, and I had forgotten that.
“I came to this country for a new start. I’d grown tired of hiding during the day and hunting humans at night. Some of us lived a different way, and I wanted to try that. We didn’t have to feed from humans, but most of us preferred to. A vampire could do whatever it wanted. Until the humans figured out ways to kill us.”
“Did many of you died?” he asked.
“There weren’t that many to begin with, but yes, most of us were destroyed. So, I came here. It was very early times, and there were few humans who came here that survived. But finally, after many attempts, they established a few settlements.”
“So, how did you meet?” He knew I was stalling, but I hoped he’d lose interest if I dragged it out. Once again, Blake surprised me.
“We were both going to the West. He was on a wagon train, and I was walking by night and staying out ofthe sun during the day. One night, when he was restless, he took a walk around the area where they were camping. I saw him then. He was the most beautiful human I’d ever seen. There was something about him that made me want to know more about him and the harder I tried to ignore it, the stronger the need was.”
“Did he know you were there?”
“Not at first, but after that first night I started traveling the same distance at night that they had by day, hoping to get a glimpse of this human that had somehow made an impression on me in ways other than the taste of his blood.”
“How old was he?” Blake asked and opened the back of his truck to sit on it.
