Bleeding Hearts Part 4
IV.: The Calling~
Hilde watched from her upstairs window as a dark stranger approached their front door and reached out to give her brother's wrist a slight squeeze before turning his heel in a whirl of black cape. The girl was unnerved by his deadly grace, almost inhuman in the smoothness of his movements. Duo stood watching the man leave before laying his hand on the battered doorknob. But instead of opening the door right away, he fingered his left wrist once before doing so.
Hilde hesitated, then lifted a pair of binoculars to her eyes and adjusted them to a low setting. The man stopped abruptly and turned just enough to nail her with a deadly, piercing glare. A dangerous smirk curled the corner of his mouth and he mouthed some words to her.
The binoculars dropped onto the window seat and her entire composure changed. Her dark blue eyes blazed with previously absent fury and a fraction of her teeth bared.
"Hilde!"
The girl turned to answer Duo's call, but the dark visitor was gone when she returned.
"God damn you," she hissed thickly to the threes surrounding their town.
"Hilde!" Duo's footsteps could be heard as he bounded up the stairs. "I'm starving, Sis!" He paused when he saw his sister. "What's wrong?"
"Duo..." Hilde stalked toward her brother. "Who is he?"
He backed up a step. "I--I don't know--"
"And yet he has you in such a dreamy, doe-eyed state."
Her words were biting and Duo flushed. "That's not true! Heero and I--!" His eyes flew open wide as he realized just he'd just said.
"Heero..." The color drained from Hilde's face and her lips tightened to an impossibly thin line. "Stay away from him, Duo."
"But..."
Her hands shook as she grasped the boy's shoulders. "Duo, it's for your own good. The man's dangerous, I could tell just by looking at him. And you know as well as I that my evaluation of strangers is always right."
Duo's head dropped and his voice was soft, nearly inaudible. "Yeah, okay."
Hilde's stance relaxed, and she smiled warmly. "That's good to hear. Now, what say to take-out?"
Her only reply was a pathetic attempt of a grin. "Naw, I'm not hungry anymore."
~*~
Heero's looming presence was detectable to Duo now, and he no longer needed to see the man to know that he was there.
"You shouldn't be here," the American told his visitor. He didn't twitch from his curled position on the bed, voice muffled by the pillow.
There was no reply, just a cool hand pressed to the base of his exposed neck. Duo shivered at the touch, more from Heero's proximity than the near freezing night air.
"Damn it I don't know what you said to her, but she's freaked now." He finally shifted onto his back to look at Heero, who kept his gaze distant and unfazed. Unlike his, Duo's eyes were intense pools of violet-blue. "Leave her out of this, Heero. She doesn't know how deep she's in this...deal. All she knows is that you're familiar but she doesn't know why."
The American's eyes searched the cold, unresponsive ones of his companion. The roaring silence which hung over the room was deafening.
"I make no promises," Heero said finally. "I am here to complete a mission, at whatever the cost or consequences."
"You cold unfeeling bastard." Duo's voice was dull, devoid of its normal macho and sharp sarcasm.
"If I wasn't, I wouldn't have made it this far."
"If you weren't, you wouldn't be in this...condition in the first place."
For that Heero had no comeback, so he merely settled himself in the battered wicker chair beside the bed. "Go to sleep, you need it."
"Mm," came the tired reply.
It seemed that mere seconds passed before Duo's breathing evened out and rest finally overcame the boy. Heero sat back and watched him sleep. This was not the first time he had done so. He had found himself standing over the American the night before, attention fixed on the moonlit face of the young man in slumber. Over it he saw a different visage, one wizened with experience, scarred from battle, yet still so enticing. That was when he had lost control and given in to his futilely repressed desire.
Heero sat back and frowned. That had not been a smart thing to do. But by the gods the boy tasted sweet, his blood enriched with life itself as it flowed from a small puncture in the side of his neck into Heero's starved, ravishing mouth. His tongue ran over his fangs at the memory of such exquisite pleasure, suddenly craving for another taste. His gaze fell on the slender body partially hidden by layers of blankets and sheets.
TBC...
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