“Don’t you mean that you’re going to talk to me?” Joel asked as he sat down in one of the large leather-covered chairs. I sat on the arm of his chair.
“First things first,” I said and took the wrist he had offered earlier. He watched me raise it to my mouth and kiss it a second time, and he smiled. I bit him.
He was delicious. I had intended only to taste him and get a little of my venom into him, but he was such a treat that I took a little more that a taste. And I lingered over his wrist longer than was necessary.
Finally, I looked up at him and found him leaning back bonelessly in the chair. “God,” he said. “I hit the jackpot.”
“How have you managed to stay unattached?” I asked. “Didn’t anyone here want you?”
He smiled. “Everyone wanted me. Everyone except Preston and Hayden. They said I was too young to join with them. The others … they left me alone when I asked them to, but before that, they were all after me. And I didn’t want to join with a man. There’s too much sexual feeling involved when you guys feed. I wanted that from a woman. Preston said he would check with nearby female families after I finished college, and he’s taken me to see a couple of them, but I wasn’t interested. You are the only Ina I’ve ever been attracted to.”
“After seeing me only once?”
“Yeah. I didn’t even see you when you were here before … before your parents died. I had gone to San Francisco to spend time with some friends from college.” He shook his head. “I liked your looks when I saw the pictures the Gordons had of you and your sisters. When I saw you last night, I didn’t have a chance.”
I didn’t know what to make of that. “I’m only beginning to form my family,” I said. “You would probably have an easier life with anyone here or any of the female families you’ve seen. You know my memory only goes back a few weeks.”
“I heard.”
“And when I leave the Gordons, I’ll be alone.”
He nodded. “Then let me help you make a new family.”
I looked at him and saw that his expression had changed, had become more serious. Good. “I want you to be part of my new family,” I said. “More than that, I need you. But you and my first will have to accept each other. You will accept him. There will be peace between you. No fighting. No endangering the rest of us with destructive competitions.”
“All right. I doubt that your first and I will ever be anything like friends, but I know how it is. I suppose you told him the same thing.”
“Of course.” I paused. “He helped me, Joel. When I had no one else, when I had no idea who or what I was, he helped me.”
“I wish I had had the chance to do such a thing.” He reached up and touched my face. “Like I said, let me help you make a new family.”
A little later that morning, I put on my hooded jacket, sunglasses, and gloves and walked around to each of the houses of the community. I spotted the guards from outside, then went into the houses to do what I could to help them be less easily spotted. Being easily spotted by the kind of attackers my symbionts and I had faced would mean easily shot.
The Gordon symbionts greeted me by touching me—my shoulders, arms, hands. I found that I was comfortable with that, although I had not expected it. It was as though they had to touch me to believe that I could be Ina and yet be awake.
“You aren’t drowsy at all?” a woman named Linda Higuera asked. She was a nervous, muscular brown woman, at least six feet tall and leaning on a rifle. We were on the third floor of William’s house, and she was one of his symbionts. From what I had seen, William preferred big, powerful-looking symbionts, male and female. Wise of him.
“I’m not drowsy,” I said. “As long as I don’t get too much sun, I’m fine.”
She shook her head. “I wish William could do that. I would feel safer if he could at least wake up if we need him.”
I shrugged. “Your turn to keep him safe.”
She thought about that, then nodded. “You’re right. Damn. He’s so strong, I’ve just gotten used to depending on him. Guess it ought to work both ways.” She stopped and thought for a moment. “Do you have a phone?”
“There are phones in the guest house.”
“I mean a cell phone.”
“No, I don’t.” I wasn’t entirely sure what a cell phone was.
“You should have one so we can talk to each other if something happens. The house phones are too easy to disable.”