"Hello, angel," said a deep, familiar voice very near her face.
Tess lifted her gaze until she saw him--Dante, looking down on her, his eyes sober but smiling. He stroked her forehead, smoothing damp strands of hair out of her face.
"How do you feel?"
"Okay." She felt better than okay, her body resting on a soft mattress, cocooned in black silk sheets and the strong shelter of Dante's arms. "Where are we?"
"Someplace safe. This is where I live, Tess. Nothing can harm you here."
She registered his assurances with a pang of confusion, something shadowy and cold hovering at the edges of her consciousness. Fear. She didn't feel it now, not for him, but the feeling lingered like a mist clinging to her skin, chilling her.
She had been afraid a short while ago--deathly afraid.
Tess reached a hand up to her neck. Her fingers made contact there with a patch of inflamed, tender skin. Like a sudden flash of lightning, a memory ripped through her mind: a hideous face, with eyes as bright as lit coals, a mouth opened wide in a terrifying hiss, baring huge sharp teeth.
"I was attacked," she murmured, the words forming even before the memory took full root. "They came up to me on the street and they... attacked me. Two of them dragged me off the street and they--"
"I know," Dante said, carefully removing her hand from her neck. "But you're all right, Tess. It's over, and you don't have to be afraid now." In a blur of recollection, the night's events played in fast-forward through her mind. She relived it all, from her walk past Ben's apartment and the realization that someone other than him was inside the place, to the shocking sight of seeing the large men--if they even were men at all--leaping down from the balcony to the street below and chasing after her. She saw their terrible faces, felt the bruising strength of the hands that seized her and pulled her into the dark where the real brutality was to begin.
She could still feel the terror of that moment, when one man held her arms and the other pinned her down with the weight of his huge muscular body. She'd thought she would be raped, probably beaten as well, but her attackers' intent was only slightly less horrific.
They had bitten her.
The two savage monsters held her down like felled prey on the floor of a dark, dilapidated shed. Then they bit her at the neck and wrist and began to drink her blood.
She had been certain she was going to die there, but then something miraculous happened. Dante happened. He had killed them both, a fact Tess had not so much seen as felt. Lying on the rough plywood floor of the shed, the smell of her own blood choking her senses, she had felt Dante's presence. She had felt his rage fill the small space like a tempest of black heat.
"You... you were there too, Dante." Tess sat up, her body seeming miraculously strong, no lingering aches from her ordeal. Now that her mind was clearing, she felt energized and refreshed, like she had just awoken from a deep, rejuvenating sleep. "You found me there. You saved me, Dante."
His smile seemed haunted, as if he wasn't sure he agreed and didn't feel comfortable with her gratitude. But he wrapped his arms around her and pressed a tender kiss to her lips. "You're alive, and that's all that matters."
Tess held him close, feeling almost a part of him in some strange way. His heartbeat echoed in the cadence of her own, his body's warmth seeming to seep through her skin and bones to warm her from within. She felt connected to him now in a very visceral way. The sensation was extraordinary, so powerful it took her aback.
"Now that you're awake," Dante murmured against her ear, "there's someone waiting in the other room who'd like to see you."
Before she could respond, Dante got off the big bed and walked toward the adjacent living room. From behind him, Tess couldn't help admiring the masculine prowl of his body, the sexy network of multicolored tattoos over his back and shoulders shifting gracefully with every rolling stride. He disappeared into the other room, and Tess heard a soft animal whine that she recognized at once.
"Harvard!" she exclaimed as Dante came back into the bedroom, carrying the squirming, adorable little terrier in his arms. "You saved him too?"
Dante shook his head. "I saw him running loose before I found you and brought you here. Once I knew you were safe, I sent someone back out to get him."
He set the dog down on the bed, and Tess was immediately tackled by the perky furball. Harvard licked her hands and face as she hoisted him up for a hug, overjoyed to see him after thinking she'd lost him on the street outside Ben's apartment.
"Thank you," she said, smiling through a sudden mist of tears as the happy reunion continued. "I have to confess, I think I'm totally in love with this little beast." "Lucky dog," Dante drawled. He sat down on the edge of the bed, watching as Tess's chin got a thorough, enthusiastic washing. His expression was too carefully schooled, too grave when her eyes met his. "There are... things we need to talk about, Tess. I had hoped you might never really be part of it, but I keep dragging you further in. After tonight, you need to understand what happened, and why."
Nodding in silence, she let go of Harvard and looked at Dante's bleak gaze. Part of her already knew where the conversation was going--uncharted territory, for sure, but after what she'd seen tonight, Tess knew that things she had long taken for granted as normal and real were somehow thrown off kilter.
"What were they, Dante? Those men who attacked me--they weren't normal men. Were they?"
His head shook vaguely. "No, they weren't men. They were dangerous creatures, blood addicts. We call them Rogues."