"What do you fucking take me for?"

I stared up at Lucian in dawning trepidations. I don't think I have ever been shouted at by him before. Sure he has used his cold hard tones on me before but always with a quiet control. His softly spoken words carried enough heat to incinerate those they address. There was no need...never has been a need for him to actually shout. This was...this was...

" I tell you that I love you. That you mean the world to me and you ask me to curse you into my existence? " He stared at me incredulously. Then his brow furrowed in anger. "Worse! The undead!"

It was true. I could not ever be what Lucian was. But I could become the next best thing. The living dead. The undead. I could become what I had always thought he was. Back when I hadn't known the originals existed. That they were in their own rights an entirely different specie. Looking like humans and cohabiting with humans simply because they need the humans life force for survival.

That there had always been the originals living in the same space and breathing the same air with the humans in all this time only proved how much more superior they were as a race. That they could conceal so much of their existence for so long was incredible. But all that was neither here nor there. What mattered here was me being with Lucian for as long as I exist at all. For that I was willing to do anything. Anything at all.

"You mean everything to me too. We have tried it the way we were made. Me human and you an original. But it hasn't worked has it? And I am tired! Tired of being apart from you," I hefted out an agry breath at that. " I don't want to live without you anymore. "

His hands moved closing down on my shoulders before drawing me back into his suffocating embrace. I gasped out but succumbed. I need this as much as he did. I needed the comfort that only he could provide.

"We'll find another way," he said stubbornly.

"No, we will not!" I exclaimed adamantly.

"Look lets not argue here. There's no rush to decide. We'll just take things one step at a time," said Lucian, placatingly.

But I was not having it. I didn't want to be placated. I wanted Lucian. Now and forever. Sooner rather than later.

I shook my head against him and bit a muffled response into his chest.

"I didn't get that," he murmured softly into my hair.

I wiggled to get loose then growled my frustrations at him.

" Did you just growl at me?"

I was released enough then to draw back my head. Taking a deep breath I frowned up at him. There really was no way of knowing when I would get a chance to catch my next breath. I wasn't wasting an opportunity.

" You don't know your own strength, " I grumbled under my breath. Instantly I was released and Lucian stood a good way away from me. I regretted my hasty words.

" Lucian? " I said almost pleadingly. But he only shook his head at me. "No. I have a killed you before. Never again! "

I sighed feeling a little windblown. It was as if we had both taken a swirl in a tornado and came back a full circle. This was not happening.

I took a determined step forward and then another matching Lucian's retreating pace and then closing in the distance between. I had him pegged where I wanted him. Palms flat on the wall on either side of him I hemmed him in. Effectively caging the beast within my fragile arms.

" You're not getting away from me that easily. Not this time," I enunciated with enough venom of my own that the belligerent expression he wore fled from his face. Only to be replaced by incredulous bewilderment.

I took a breath in to withstand his innate cuteness and then went on more somberly. " It really is up to you in the end. Either you convert me or I will find someone else who will."

Converting from human to vamp was a complicated affair. I would have to be drained of my blood... something Lucian was well versed in and could easily comply.... and then be inundated with vampire blood. Eventually highly enhanced blood overcomes the other at a cellular level and the genetics is tampered to produce a hybrid of the more commonly known vampires. The undead.

I will become the very existence I have been plagued by for so long. A blood suckling vampire. The bleakness of that thought swamped over my face momentarily but long enough to capture Lucian's attention. " You see! You don't want this anymore than I want it for you."

But I shook my head at him. " I want you more," I said simply. " More than life itself -that you already know. But what you now need to know is that I want above all else. I don't care anymore. If I have to drink the blood of others, I will do it. I will do everything and anything to be with you."

His hands closed about my waist and his breath ran cold chills down my back. "Give me time to figure something else out," he pleaded with me.

"No," I breathed out against him quietly but firmly.

"We'll speak with dad first, " he prevaricated.

I merely shrugged. Either way this was going to happen.

"We should get the others in," I said finally. Both Brian and Nicky were lounging outside no doubt hearing every word said but affording us this much needed belief in privacy anyhow.

" You should know first that my son Christian is here. Vanessa's dad dropped him off into my keeping for safety. He will be with me for good, " whispered Lucian hesitantly.

I was unsurprised. I knew he could never leave his son behind. Not with that wife of his.

" Christian is a horrible name," I mumbled simply. Really it was so antiquated. Lucian ruffled my hair and muttered smilingly at me, " Only you would think so."

I shrugged grumpily, " I would have liked the choice in naming our son." For that is what Christian would be. My son as much as Lucian's. The thrill I felt at that thought spun my senses so that I all but gasped out my excitement, " Oh my god! "