“Aaron stopped by my work earlier.”
“Your idiot friend?”
“Yes, and he’s not an idiot. He wanted to know what was going on with the treasure. I told him it was all a lie and there was no treasure.”
I slipped my arm around him, and he curled into my side. This was nice, and no matter how strong I knewour bond was, I could not fight the need to be close to him. “Did he believe you?”
“I think so. I told him they probably made it up to hide the fact they’d buried you.”
“When the sun has set, I will go to the farm and retrieve some of the gold that’s hidden there. The rock I gave you earlier is not all there is. You can split it between the two of you. I have no need of it.” I had grown tired of the game of keeping it from them. Gold had no meaning for me. I could take anything I wanted, but my mate still lived with the responsibilities of the human world and I didn’t want to keep lying to him.
“I’ll go with you,” he said and sat up.
“No. You stay here. It won’t take me long,” I said. It wasn’t that I didn’t want him with me, it was that I needed to feel free after being locked in his house at the mercy of the sun.
“Marlon? I want to.” His eyes pleaded with me, but I needed to feel the night air on my skin. To know that I could go if I wanted to.
“I promise I won’t be long.”
“Hey, Blake, are you down there?”
My head snapped in the direction of the sound, and my eyes locked on the human as he came into view. His eyes widened, and he flinched back from my glare. Blake stood and put himself between the two of us and walked over to where his friend stood frozen. “Hey, I said I’d call you later. I just got home.”
“Oh, sorry. I was nearby and just thought I’d stop by. Is that okay?” he asked and looked between the two of us.
“Of course, did you eat yet?”
“No, I thought I’d see if you wanted to get something.”
“Marlon, how long will you be gone?” Blake asked and turned to meet my eyes.
“Not long, love. You get some dinner with your friend,” I said, and surprised myself at how friendly I sounded. I still wasn’t sure what to think of Aaron. It was obvious he didn’t trust me, and I didn’t trust him either. Some humans were highly aware of vampires, and whether they knew it or not, their senses were correct. They needed to be wary of us. Something told me he could be a threat to me, but he was human, and I could snap his neck before he saw me move. Despite that, my senses were rarely wrong.
“Want to get a pizza?” Blake asked, and Aaron forced his eyes away from me and back to Blake.
“Yeah, that would be good.” Aaron still hadn’t moved from the bottom of the stairs, and I could feel his discomfort at being in the room with me.
The sun would be below the horizon at any moment, then I’d be free. I was so focused on freedom I barely noticed Aaron climbing the stairs, leaving me alone once again with my mate.
“You’ll come back, won’t you?” Blake asked. His eyes were full of worry and doubt. I rushed to him and pulled him into my arms.
“I’ll never leave you. You’re my mate.” During the day I couldn’t leave, but he didn’t understand how strong the compulsion to stay with him was, even after seeing me frozen from his leaving me earlier. He wastruly my mate, and I knew he wouldn’t want to leave me, but he could, which was why he’d been able to go to work. He knew I’d be waiting for him. But without the sun to trap me, he was filled with doubt. “I have been trapped in a grave for an eternity. Would you deny me my freedom now you’ve given it to me?” His expression softened then, and he wrapped his arms around my waist.
“Come back to me,” he whispered.
“Always.”
Fifteen
Blake
“I’ll be back soon,” Marlon promised again, and as soon as the sun was beneath the foothills in the west he was gone. Like a shot in the dark, he moved so fast I didn’t see him move. He was there, then he was gone.
“Do you think he’ll come back?” Aaron asked, bringing my thoughts back to him and away from the feeling in my chest that told me he was farther away from me than I wanted him to be.
“He’ll always come back,” I murmured, repeating what Marlon had said earlier. “Did you want to go get a pizza?” There was a bar in town that served it, and they didn’t deliver, so if we were having it, one of us was going to get it, or we were going there to eat.
“Let’s go there. I’d rather not be here when he returns if I can avoid it,” Aaron said with a shiver.
