Chapter Four

The next morning, Mac woke with a splitting headache and someone pounding on her door. It was still dark in her room, the sun hadn’t risen yet. Throwing back the covers, she clumsily got out of bed and stumbled toward the door, calling out, "I’m coming, hold on a sec."
She opened the door, just a crack, and blinked sleepily at a very aggravated rock star. "We’ve been waiting on you for half an hour," he told her. "Are you coming with us to the interview or not?"

Mac looked at Jon, puzzled. "What time is it?"

"It’s 8:30," he answered her, "we were supposed to meet in the lobby at 8 sharp to go to the radio station."

"I remember," she told him, "I’m sorry I must have overslept."

"Ever heard of an alarm clock?" he threw at her.

"I have one," she answered sharply, then quickly changed her tone. "Look, go on without me, I’ll catch up with ya’ll later."

"Whatever," he flung at her as he stormed off down the hall.

Mac watched him angrily punch the button to call the elevator then closed the door and leaned back against it. "Whoa, Mac, you’re really getting off on a good foot here," she said sarcastically to the empty room. She walked back through the room and fell across the bed. Closing her eyes briefly, she thought about the night before. She had come back from Jon’s room and hurriedly got ready for bed. She now knew she had fallen asleep without setting her alarm clock. Apparently, all of her recent traveling and the stress of dealing with Jon had finally caught up to her, and she had overslept. Sunrise being so late here in winter had aided her sleeping in. "Damn it," she muttered to the empty room. Throwing one arm over her face, she announced, "I need a Dr. Pepper." Too bad there wasn’t anyone there to get one for her. She rolled over and grabbed the phone. Room service. She needed breakfast and a very big glass of Dr. Pepper. Disappointed to discover the hotel didn’t deliver sodas in a five gallon bucket with a straw, she just told them to send a glass of ice and a two liter bottle of the stuff and ordered her usual scrambled eggs with cheese and buttered wheat toast.

Hoping it would help her to wake up, Mac decided to take a quick shower before her breakfast arrived. She had just stepped out of the shower, when the knock came at the door. Throwing on her thick terry-cloth robe, she tied the belt on the way to answer it.

After eating her breakfast, she sat curled up in one of the curved-back chairs by the window enjoying her second glass of Dr. Pepper. While watching the sunrise, she contemplated her present problem. What was it about Jon that made her turn into a complete ninny whenever she was in a room with him? She was sure it wasn’t just that he was an attractive male, because she had been around numerous attractive men in her lifetime. But, none of them had ever oozed sex with every move, gesture, and word. Thinking about how many times she had been at a loss for words, or worse, lost her temper, she almost shuddered. Her fingers brushed her lips as she thought about the kiss the night before. What a kiss! It was almost too hot, too explosive to be referred to with such a small word. Kiss. The word seemed so inadequate to describe what had happened last night. Although, if lumped into the category of other four letter words, maybe it fit quite well. She wasn’t sure how to act when she saw him again. This morning didn’t really count, since she had been half asleep. But, their next encounter was sure to be uncomfortable, at least for her.

Why? That’s the word that kept bouncing around in her head. That one word reverberated back and forth in her skull, echoing back to her Daniel-bruised ego. Why? Mac shook her head to dispel the one word echo and leaned forward to set her glass on the table. Rising slowly from the chair, she moved to the bedroom to get dressed for the day and her next encounter with the singer that she wouldn’t seem to get out of her mind.

**************************

The band and a few crew members were preparing to leave the radio station across town, when Jon came to a dead stop in the lobby. Everyone except Richie continued toward the door. Jon was quickly checking the pockets of his jacket and jeans. The sun might have still been below the horizon when they left the hotel, but it had finally made an appearance by the time they were heading back.

"Shit," Richie exclaimed, immediately realizing the problem. "You forgot your sunglasses, didn’t you?" he asked in a whisper.

"Apparently," Jon answered just as softly.

Richie offered Jon his pair, before asking, "Where the hell is your head, Kidd?"

"Don’t call me that," Jon frowned at him. "You know now that the stupid nickname doesn’t apply. I’m way older than all of you."

"Question, neatly avoided," Richie commented dryly.

"Fuck you, Sambora," he answered, before walking out to join the rest of the group at the van.

Richie chuckled softly to himself as he headed for the waiting vehicle. He knew where Jon’s head was; he didn’t need him to answer the question. All Richie was wondering is how long his friend was going to fight his attraction to the little reporter. Climbing into the back seat next to his friend, Richie couldn’t help but get in another dig or two. He leaned toward Jon and asked softly, "Why don’t you just take her to your bed and get it over with?"

"Butt out, Rich," Jon grumbled.

"Ah," Richie said, nodding in understanding, "you know if you take her to your bed, it won’t be over."

"Fuck you, Sambora," the singer said, threateningly.

"Sorry, Kidd," Richie answered, grinning unabashedly, "I gotta turn ya down, I don’t swing that way."

Jon growled low in response. "If you were anyone else...," he left the sentence dangling in warning.

"Yeah, I know," Richie paused dramatically, "you would’ve already ripped my throat out and sucked me dry." Then he chuckled softly at the notion. His friend just turned toward the window and began to ignore him.

**************************

Back at the hotel, Jon paced the confines of his room. His thoughts were resting squarely on the beautiful reporter in her room across the hall. Richie was right. Jon knew this as surely as he knew the sky was blue, the sun was hot and that Richie was an ass. Somehow, he just couldn’t bring himself to admit it out loud.

A knock on his door interrupted his thoughts, and the smell of Richie’s cologne drifted to him under the door.

"Come on in, Rich," he called out, dreading the coming discussion.

"Do you know how unnerving it is when you do that?"

"Do what?"

"Never mind," Richie shook his head. Jon’s vampire powers had long been an interesting topic for him, but Jon didn’t like to talk about them. Richie knew that Jon would give anything to be human again, so he liked to pretend he was. But, there were just some things Jon did without thinking that most humans couldn’t even begin to imagine doing.

"Come to harass me some more about Ms. Donaldson?"

"No," his answer surprised Jon. "Actually, I came to see if you wanna talk about it."

That was just one more thing that Richie was good at, knowing when a friend needed to talk. Jon walked across the room and practically threw himself down in a chair by the window.

"I know I should talk about it," he began, "but I really don’t know what to say."

"Why don’t you start with why you’re fighting this so damn hard?"

"Rich, she’s a reporter," he reminded his friend. "What if she puts my dirty little secret in her article?"

"Can’t you just keep that little secret to yourself?"

He thrust his fingers through his hair in frustration. "I don’t think so. Hell, when I kissed her last night, I couldn’t even control my fangs."

"Whoa," Richie exclaimed, "back up. You kissed her?"

"Yeah," Jon answered, "and trust me, that’s not all I wanted to do to her."

"Ok, personal question time," Richie grinned. "Can’t you have sex with a woman without...well, you know...biting her?"

"Depends."

"On?"

"Whether or not I can control the urge. And last night I couldn’t."

"Did you bite her then?" Richie asked.

"No, I pulled away and made her leave."

"Then you controlled it," Richie pointed out.

"Rich, you don’t understand."

"Then explain it to me."

"Rich, I can’t even touch her mind without her knowing it, much less control it. If I bit her, she’s smart enough to start putting it all together."

"Is she someone you could have a relationship with?"

"You know the answer to that."

"Then why won’t you try?"

"I don’t wanna get personally invested in another woman, then her turn on me when she finds out what I am."

"Are you so sure she would turn on you?"

"Honestly, I don’t know."

"Let me ask you something," Richie glanced at the door, then back at Jon. This was the most talkative Jon had been about being a vampire since the night they had been drunk out of their minds ten years ago and his friend had told him his secret. "Remember when you introduced me to Stefan in Greece and Raul in Brazil?"

"Yes," Jon nodded, "and Kristoff in Russia."

"Yeah, yeah," Richie nodded, "all your male vampire friends. Don’t you have any female vamp friends?"

"Not exactly," Jon hedged.

"Why not?"

"There’s not very many female vamps out there. They have to be born vampires. Very few females can be turned vampire."

"Why is that?"

"It tends to turn them into raving lunatics."

"Do you know why?"

"Not exactly. Kristoff’s wife was human, but she has some psychic abilities. She didn’t go crazy when he turned her."

"And you’ve never come across a female vamp while you were out hunting or whatever, and had any kind of connection with her?"

"Female vamps don’t hunt," Jon said quietly.

"Excuse me? Don’t they have to feed like you?"

"No," Jon shook his head. "Their life-mate feeds them. They can only feed from the male they are bound to."

"What about the ones that are born vamps?"

"There aren’t too many of those. But, they must feed from their father, until they find their life-mate."

"And how do you know when you’ve found your life-mate?"

"Uh," Jon looked at Richie questioningly, "why all the questions, Rich?"

"Curious," Richie answered quickly, "and you’ve never been willing to talk about it before."

Jon smiled. "To answer your question, after having sex with your life-mate a mark much like a tattoo will appear on your chest over your heart."

"What does it look like?"

"Sort of like a lightening bolt."

"So, what if Mac is your life-mate?"

"I wouldn’t know without having sex with her, and I can’t do that unless I can control the urge to bite her. But, it’s highly doubtful."

"Ya never know ‘til ya try," Richie told him, grinning.