Do Mine Eyes Deceive Me...A Gorgeous Sadistic Vampire?

I looked around me quickly, making sure there was nobody in the hallway to see me. I strained my ears all around the ground level, but heard no footsteps. So i raised my fist up, and my knuckles were millimeters from the door before it swung open and I was pulled inside.

We stood like that for a moment. His hands clasped around my elbows that might have hurt had I been more breakable. I barely felt a thing.

I wasn't sure if that had to do with my newly indestructable hide, or the fact that I was too lost in his purple eyes to notice anything else. They were a very vibrant violet on this day, and I knew he must have just gone hunting. That seemed odd to me. We had just gone two days ago. What was the urgent need to do it again so soon?

"You have a nice room," I breathed out, chewing the insides of my cheek. As he stayed silent for another few minutes, I made a pact to myself right then and there. I don't know what made me do it, but it just seemed like a good idea.

I vowed to myself that I wouldn't ask him questions that I didn't want to know the answer to anymore. Maybe it would make things easier, and prevent any heartache that might have come around otherwise.

"Please don't tell me we're back to small talk?" he groaned, walking around the room that I had just complimented and sitting down in a recliner. I eyed the couch, seeing that it was much more suitable for two people and wondering if Harrison didn't want to sit by me.

I hated that I was prone to such petty doubts. "No, not really. The silence felt kind of awkward though . . ." I trailed off.

"I heard you conversation with the faerie, and the rusalka for that matter. I can't decide which of them holds more interest to me, however," he said, ignoring my last statement.

"Why is that?" I asked. "I mean, you'd think a threatening rusalka - which I've never heard of - would be potentially more interesting than my friendly new faerie."

"I'm not worried about Eris," he chuckled. "The teachers warned me about her, and said she just likes her power as a Chieftan. What I'm more interested in is part of the conversation that occurred between the faerie and yourself.'

"What is a chieftan, and her name is Claire, not 'the faerie'," I said indignantly.

"A Chieftan is the highest grade here at UPA. It goes Novice, Secondary, Initiate, Primary, Subaltern, Senior, Chiefan. Yes, you will have to start out as a Novice, but depending on your performance, you can be bumped up easily," he sighed.

"Oh, well I can handle that," I agreed. "And about the conversation I had with Claire, are you referring to whenever she asked me if I had a boyfriend?"

"How insightful of you to catch on," he said caustically.

"There's no need to be sarcastic, Harrison," I snapped. "I've asked you this question before, and you didn't give me a verbal response."

"You're right; I'm sorry," he amended. "But what do you want me to say, Joanalie? I wasn't about to scare you away!"

"I want to know what you want," I whispered. I still hadn't sitten down yet, so I began to pace back in forth in front of Harrison's place on his comfy-looking armchair. "And what do you think of scaring me, now?"

He flipped his arm out and caught my hand. I was jerked to a hault that prevented me from pacing any longer. He pulled me to him and placed me sideways on his lap so my legs were hanging over the edge and my head was at a higher altitude than his for once.

"I want to be with you, Joanalie. And I don't care if I scare you away anymore because I'm not letting you go anywhere," he said firmly, looking up at me with his lips in a tight line and a determinedly fierce expression on his face.

"Then be with me, Harrison!" I sang joyfully. "That's all I've been waiting for. You know I don't care about anything that's happened between us in the past. Because that's just it - it's in the past, and that's where it will stay."

He jumped up, and I nearly fell on my ass. I would have if the feral part of me had not forced me to land on my toes gracefully.

"Alright, fine. Then let me do this properly. Stand up, would you?" he suggested impatiently.

I laughed before stretching to my full height. He got down on one knee, and for a second there, my breath caught in my throat. This isn't quite what I had in mind . . .

"Joanalie Noelle Rivers." he paused, taking once of my hands in both of his, and looking up at me like a puppy with purple irises.

"Yes?" I urged him. I wasn't really ready for this commitment, even though we were supposedly married in the council's eyes anyway. I had meant just being officially together; not eloped!

"Girlfriend doesn't seem like the right word, does it?" he began. I let out a sigh.

"To hell with it!" he cried. "We're not going to stay like this for hours trying to think of an appropriate title for our relationship. Joanalie, you will be my girlfriend, even though it's more than just a teenage crush - so much more than that . . ."

There had not been a question in his declaration. But I smiled at him and said "Yes," anyway. he jumped up and basically attacked me. I fell back against the couch as we kissed with a jubilant passion.

This is how things were supposed to be.

Right?

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