My Guardian ( Book VI )

I will stay with you

(3rd person P.O.V)

Jared sighed, before replying, “I’m a vampire.” He watched her for her reaction. “Are you afraid of me?”

Alia could hear a certain tone underlying his question, his head was turned away, his face pained. Reluctantly raising a hand to his face she pulled it so he would look at her. She watched him lean more into her hand as she stroked his face with her thumb. Smiling warmly at him,

“Why should I have to fear my guardian? I’ve waited so many years to meet my watcher, and now, I’ve finally met him. Can I now have his name?”

Lifting his hand to cover hers, his gaze unwavering as he stared into her bright orbs, “Jared Ellwood.”

“Jared,” she tested, loving the sound of it on her tongue. “I love it.” She then placed the hand on his cheek to her mouth as she looked away, a crimson blush dusting her features.

“I love your blush, it makes you look beautiful.” His words made her glance at him.

‘He thinks I’m beautiful…’

When he noticed her expression change to one he recognized but felt it was a disappointment, Jared exclaimed. “What did I say? I didn’t mean to upset you in any way—”

He was silenced with a soft finger to his lips, he was slightly embarrassed, he couldn’t recall the last time he had acted like that. But the thought of being the one who hurt her bothered him, he would make it right. She looked at him with a small smile, “No one’s ever told me I was beautiful is all, other than Sara of course. I’ve always felt that there was something wrong with me.”

“You’ve always been beautiful, since the first moment I saw you—only minutes after you were born. You’re more beautiful than your sister.”

“You’re just saying that…”

“No, I’m not, I have been on this earth for many, many years, no woman can compare to you.”

“Please Jared, you don’t have to lie—”

“I’m not lying,” he said a little more forcefully, causing her to shrink back in his arms some. “The only other woman I can think of who was beautiful was my mother, only two women will be beautiful in my eyes, you and my mother. I have looked at no other woman and will not look at anyone but you.”

“But you could have any woman you want, why to choose me?”

Closing his eyes and sighing before he opened them again. “I have had many women chase me, but vampires only desire one person, the one they are made for, their soul mate if you will. Mine is you.” Alia stopped breathing as he continued, “Vampires are fiercely loyal to their significant other but it is rare that they may take another other than their destined partner. My older brother had found his mate not long after he turned twenty in human years and has been happy since. I, on the other hand, grew tired of wondering where you were, so I found a sorcerer and asked him to find you. He told me you had centuries to be born and the only clue he gave me was that she would have a cherry blossom shaped birthmark on her neck and be of royal blood in the Knight clan and daughter to Elena.

“I had been close to the castle since your great-great-grandmother was Queen, and your great-grandmother hit on me and I hid from her and waited in the shadows until I met your mother. I told her I was waiting for you and I was eager for her to conceive a daughter, she and Sara were skeptical I could tell, but when she told me she was pregnant I was rejoicing. Sadly, your mother died before I could thank her, and since then I have been waiting and watching you and as I have I had fallen in love with you.”

He saw her eyes widen before they seemed to close, “I can’t say I’ve fallen in love with you,” she opened her eyes to look deep into his, “but there is one thing that I do love about you…” Jared waited for her to carry on, “your voice. It’s always helped me sleep at night, haunted my thoughts about what you could possibly look like.”

“Alia,” he said lightly, “I want you to stay with me. Even if you cannot love me in return,” she heard the desperation in his tone. “I will give you everything you want, the love you deserve, which I promised myself and your mother you would have the day you were born. I will protect you with my life, my very being should it come to it. I will not force you into anything, if you wish to leave now I let you go without question and let you fall in love with someone of your own choice…no matter how much it breaks me. I will live alone if you choose to be elsewhere; you alone will have my heart, no other woman will I see. My eyes are only for you and only have been. What will your decision be?”

The Ellwood waited for her answer, he was eager to hear what she would choose. ‘I don’t want to lose her…’ she seemed to be debating quite hard with herself her eyebrows scrunched together and she bit her lower lip. If this was to be the last time he was with her, so be it, but he would hold her as long as possible. Then he tightened his grip.

Digesting everything he had said, from his past and to how he found out about her and how he waited for her touched her. He did seem devoted to her with his confession. And when he said he wanted her to be with him she felt warm and fuzzy, and when he said if she wished to leave, he’d let her…she didn’t know what to say to that. He was giving her a choice. Creasing her eyebrows together, she thought, ‘He has been so kind to me, even over the years, I love his voice,’ biting her lip. ‘Perhaps I could come to love him in time.’ She blinked when she felt his embrace become stronger. When she had seen his anguished expression her heart ached, she may not love him because she knows nothing about him, but she knew this was killing him. “Jared,” she said softly.

Her gentle voice broke the vampire from his inner turmoil of her possible rejection. She stared up into his dark eyes, hand replaced upon his face and her thumb rubbing his thin lips and her gaze flickering to them before returning to stare into his orbs, which watched her movements with such intensity. “Perhaps in time I can love you, will you let me get to know you?”

“If that is your wish.”

“Then I will stay with you, and if everything turns out, I will fall in love with you just as you have with me.” Alia smiled at her vampire, taking notice of his relieved expression. “But before I go, can I leave Sara a message?”

“Of course,” Jared said, “and if it pleases you, she can come along. There is plenty of room.” With that, the Ellwood vampire carried her in his arms and dashed through the trees toward the Knight castle with haste, eager to take her with him so he could protect her and show her how much he loved her, and he prayed, that she would eventually come to love him in return.