It was barely two a.m., but it had been hours since he’d left the vamp compound and he was going a little stir crazy. He’d hosed down the inside of his Tahoe one more time, knowing if he left it as it was, it would attract every scavenger in the forest. He’d washed away the remaining blood, balling up wet paper and bandages and throwing them in the secure trash bin behind his house. It had eaten up at least an hour—an hour he hadn’t spent sitting around waiting to hear from Sophia. He used up a bit more time with a hot shower, but showers just didn’t take as long as they had before he’d spent twelve years in the Navy. Unless he was showering with someone. Which brought him right back to Sophia. And damn if he didn’t still want her. It would have been easy if she’d maintained that cool vampire persona she’d thrown at him tonight. Or even if she’d become someone completely different in the years since they’d spent time together. But tonight, standing there in the dark with her hand on his arm, the years had fallen away and he’d been back in that Central American village, with the heat and humidity, the smells of the jungle all around him, and the ebb and flow of Spanish teasing his ears.
