Prologue

Four months, two weeks, three days and counting that I've been living back here in my home country without Henry.

Four long months since I, Catalina Ellis, had even set eyes on him, spoken to him, held him…kissed him.

Four miserable months since he dumped me - oh I know he claimed it was for my benefit, that being with him was too dangerous and he cared too much to risk anything happening to me - but the fact was he'd rejected me, pushed me away from him.

Four months and I still couldn't let go, memories of him, of us together as clear as if they were yesterday overflowed my mind constantly. My sleep was disturbed as he consistently haunted my dreams.

Four lonely months in which time I assumed he had moved on. Me? I felt exactly the same way about him.

Four months later and it was still hard, it still hurt and my heart was still in a thousand peices.

And yet, somehow, I'm still standing, I'm still breathing…even without him.

Oh, I know I might sound melodramatic there, but…Henry was very probably the love of my life. I had never met anyone quite like him and I doubt I ever would again - to say he was unique was an understatement. He seemed to be everything I had been searching for. I'd never felt about anyone the way he made me feel - he was special. He was also passionate and loving - protective, very much the gentleman, and yet he certainly had his flaws too. He wasn't exactly bad, but he could be dangerous and unpredictable. And, I will confess - activities between the sheets with him were mind blowing!

Most importantly, Henry allowed me to be me. He accepted me the way I was - flaws and all, and never tried to change me, never judged me. He respected my beliefs and opinions, though he may not share them. Just as I respected and accepted him. I had simply never fallen as deeply or as quickly for anyone as intensely as I did for him…and that love, those depth of feelings for him were unrelenting, even though he had pushed me away. In a short space of time, he had become my world, that one true love everyone hopes to find and many never do…and I knew that no matter what, he would always be special to me. He would always be that one person I measured everyone else against, and no one would equal him - ever.

Maybe I should back up here and let you in on a little secret. Henry Fitzroy - my ex-lover, is a vampire. Yes, for real! And yes I mean the kind of vampire who walks the night, drinks human blood and has supernatural powers. But don't go trusting the media's image of them - Henry is not a blood thirsty monster, he held on to his humanity, to compassion, to his faith. He's almost 489 years old now and his mortal father just so happens to be one of the most famous male figures in history - King Henry VIII. How does one meet a vampire you might ask? Through my cousin - that's how!

I'd only gone to visit my cousin, Vicki, for a short vacation in Toronto, Canada - a break from my monotonous life. I hadn't expected to fall in love, and certainly not with a vampire. And I hadn't expected to find my private investigator of a cousin neck deep in the freaky supernatural type cases you'd only normally see on the Sci-Fi channel. But…I did, and Henry Fitzroy - vampire extraordinaire, was her partner.

Despite everything, Henry and I fell in love and had four beautiful, if not somewhat turbulent, months together before it all went wrong. An ex of Henry's - an evil witch to boot, went psycho on us and tried to kill me. Leading Henry to make the conclusion I was better off without him. What would he know? Without him I was such a wretched, sulking mess that perhaps I would have been better off dead anyway. What was the point in living just to be completely alone? To have nothing at all? To merely exist?

After my unceremonious dumping by a vampire, I carefully collected together the pieces of my broken heart, and with my tail between my legs I returned home to England. The past few months of my return had been rather isolated and friendless - nursing a broken heart all by myself. After all, the only people I could talk to about him, who knew the truth were Vicki and her long suffering assistant Goth, Coreen. I couldn't exactly talk to my friends about my vampire ex-lover, and who would believe me anyway? Most of my friends thought I was rather foolish for believing in the paranormal and claiming to be a practicing witch as it was - they'd have had me sectioned for harping on about a vampire lover. Besides, there wasn't really anyone I was that close to anymore, and especially since Henry, I had drifted away from most of them.

Leaving Canada - putting an ocean between Henry and I, was supposed to have helped. I couldn't bear to be around him and not be with him. I thought without him around, without having to see him, it would be easier to get over him. I had of course been proved wrong. I missed him every single day, I thought about him all the time, and every night he haunted my dreams - like a ghost that refused to leave me alone.

The thought of him with anyone else was a torture to even conceive. I doubted he'd spent much time mourning my loss, he would have moved on to his next conquest by now. Perhaps that was a little mean, I suppose I could be underestimating him here, but on the other hand I couldn't imagine him going without - sex and blood were one and the same to Henry, or at least they appeared to be. He'd insisted that I would be able to move on without him too, that I would be able to have a 'normal' relationship - marriage, children - the whole 'Picket Fence' fantasy. And yet, here I was , months later with nothing! I was just a depressed, lonely confusion, aching for some un-dead being who had chosen to discard me.

If that wasn't enough, my bouts of deep depression were causing me further illness. At least, the depression was what my Mum and doctor blamed it on - saying I was run-down and making myself sick over some guy I had fallen for in Canada, but she didn't know the truth. I'd suffered multiple infections since arriving home though, some having landed me in hospital for days at a time. Personally I began to suspect it could be a complication of the injury I'd endured when the psycho witch ex of Henry's had stabbed me. And on occasion I worried it was some side effect of Henry frequently drinking my blood. Neither of which I could tell my mother or my doctor about. So, we just treated each infection, I was put on anti-depressants, I refused counselling and they hoped in time it would get better, once I beat the depression.

Through all this, I was immensely grateful that I had both Coreen and Vicki to talk to. After my visit, I was extremely close to both of them, especially as they were the only two people in my life who knew the truth, whom I could talk to about Henry and not have them send me to the nearest mental asylum. Vicki was the rational voice in my head. She helped me look at things from a logical point of view and find other things to keep my mind occupied to move away from Henry. She'd worked out it was best if she never mentioned him to me. She agreed with him on that point, and thought I should move on as well. Coreen was the one I spilled my heart out to, the one I went to when I was really missing Henry and the one I knew would listen to me sympathetically. And, she was the only one I could ask about Henry, how he was doing - what he was up to.

To try and ease my aching heart, and with the support of Vicki and Coreen, I had written a new book and successfully found a publisher willing to print my work. The novel was initially your basic romance, but there was a mystery to it, there was a supernatural element and to anyone who knew the truth, it was easy to see that my lead characters were based upon Henry and myself. The hero might not have been a vampire - but he had his secrets and his mysteries to unfold….and their relationship was as doomed from the start as ours had been.

And that was how I came to find myself talked into getting in touch with Henry again. I needed an artist for my front cover…and Coreen suggested the only person I had been thinking of since the artwork had been mentioned - Henry Fitzroy. I didn't think it wise or fair to contact him simply because I needed his help, but Coreen pushed and eventually convinced me it was the right thing to do.

Having contact with Henry again, speaking with him, asking him for help - it could break my heart completely, or it could save me. Being without him in my life, trying to force him from my memories had proved futile - I simply couldn't let him go, and nothing was real until you did that completely…nothing was over until you wanted it to be. And perhaps…having him a part of my life in some small way - if that's all we could have, it would be better than nothing and it could save me from going completely insane.