The Turning-Blood Ties 1 (6 page)

I snorted. “Where do I sign in blood?”

“This isn’t a joke.” He turned to face me, and I saw from his irritated countenance that it certainly was not. “I can’t guarantee the Movement will even accept you, but it’s your only shot at surviving. Your sire’s death sentence extends to you.”

My heart pounded and my legs tensed in anticipation of running. I took a step back.

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“You’d really kill me, wouldn’t you?”

“Yes.” He looked away, then sank onto the couch. “It’s nothing personal. But I don’t know you well enough to tell whether you’re going to play loyal fledgling to Cyrus or not. You seem like a nice girl, but I’m not willing to take that chance.”

“Nothing personal.” I laughed bitterly in disbelief. “You know, it is personal. When I get lured into a trap and almost get decapitated, it’s personal. When some guy I just met tells me he’s going to kill me, it’s personal. Because it’s my life. You’re out of your mind if you think I’m going down without a fight.”

The corner of his mouth twitched and I thought he was going to laugh. I would have punched him in the face if he did.

Good thing he didn’t. “I can respect that. But it doesn’t change my position. You need to make a decision. Ask the Movement for mercy and hope they grant it to you. You won’t get it from me.”

“Why not just kill me now?” I asked, hoping he wouldn’t take this as an invitation. He merely shrugged and said, “Because without a kill order, I don’t get paid.”

“A kill order?” How much more like a bad horror movie could this possibly get?

“If you decide not to ask the Movement for membership, I’ll report you. You’ll be processed in their system and a kill order will be issued a few days later.” He shrugged again, as if he couldn’t care less about the conversation. “I suppose you could make a run for it, but until I have that order in my hand, I’m not going to do anything to you. I don’t work for free.”

I was about to argue that he could just kill me, then report me. Luckily, the common sense which seemed to have deserted me in the past few weeks found its way back, and I held my tongue. “How very Han Solo of you.”

He didn’t smile or laugh. In fact, he looked even more grave than before. “It’s up to you. Petition for membership or die. I can get them on the phone right now.”

“Fine.” I ground my teeth over the words. “Can I make an informed decision at least?”

He frowned and cocked his head, studying me from the corner of his eye, as if this were a trick. “What do you propose?”

I chose my words carefully. “Give me a chance to read The Sanguinarius and have some time to let all this sink in. I didn’t believe in vampires or monsters before tonight, and I’m in what we in the medical field call ‘a state of shock.’ It’s only fair to know what I’m getting into. Besides, I’m a smart girl. I’m not going to join up with some organization just because you claim they’re the good guys.”

“They are the good guys.” There was no amusement in his tone, just absolute conviction in the truth of his words.

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, well that’s what the Nazis said about themselves.”

He slowly rose to his feet. Power, dark and barely leashed, emanated from him. And that, combined with his physical presence, made him more terrifying than John Doe had been as he’d sunk his claws into me.

Of course, John Doe hadn’t been this hot. Somehow, my physical attraction to Nathan made him seem more dangerous.

But he didn’t attack me. He just invaded my personal space and shattered my comfort zone. He leaned down so our noses practically touched. “How do I know you’re not stalling so you can get back to Cyrus and gain his protection?”

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“Because until you mentioned it, the thought hadn’t crossed my mind.” I don’t know if he expected me to cower or cry or melt into his arms, but I could tell by the pronounced blink of his eyes that I’d surprised him. “Give me a couple of weeks. You can even check in on me. I’ll give you an answer at the end.”

“Or you’ll run screaming.” He tried again to frighten me, but I was confident he wouldn’t kill me tonight. Something in the way he raked his eyes over my body, like he did now, raw and hungry, told me he had something of a soft spot for women. Or a hard spot, depending on how you looked at it.

A deliberately slow smile played across my lips. “Do I look like the kind of girl who runs away from trouble?”

He folded his arms across his chest. “You ran away from Ziggy.”

Touché. “Yeah, but Ziggy had an axe. Are you going to kill me with your bare hands?”

He grinned. “I’m good with my hands.”

Holy hormones, Batman.

The door to Ziggy’s room burst open, and Nathan instantly stepped away. The teen stalked angrily into the kitchen, middle finger raised toward Nathan as he passed.

“I know, I know, I’ve got an early class, I should get my rest,” the boy called. “Psych 101, I so need to be awake for that. I’m just making a sandwich before bed.”

“Bed?” I asked stupidly, checking my watch. Ten after ten. “I have to go.”

Nathan followed me to the door. “Have you thought of what you’ll do should Cyrus come looking for you?”

I hadn’t. “I’ll tell him to go away, that I gave at the office,” I said, my uneasiness at the prospect betrayed by my forced laugh.

I couldn’t stand the thought that I shared a plasma-level connection with the monster who’d attacked me. It was bad enough he’d invaded my nightmares. His blood had become part of me, too.

Nathan studied my face for a moment, and I stared back, unable to discern a single emotion. He’d probably practiced hiding his feelings for so long that even he couldn’t find them. He looked away and handed me my coat. “If you need anything, you have my number. And this,” he said. He held out The Sanguinarius. I took the book in one hand and awkwardly tried to slip into my coat with the other. He moved behind me to help, and it took all my self-control to keep from leaning against him. What could I say? It had been a long time since I’d engaged in threatening, pseudo-sexual banter with anyone.

“Thanks,” I said quietly, putting my hand on the doorknob.

“One more thing,” Nathan said. “If you need blood, please come to me. I always have some to spare. Just don’t go outside afterward. In the daytime, I mean. In fact, you should probably start avoiding it entirely. I’m sure after a while, even if you hold out from feeding, the change will complete itself on its own. I’m always here, if you need…help.”

“Thanks, but I don’t have any desire to drink blood.”

“You’ll feel it soon,” Nathan warned as I descended the stairs.

“Feel what?” I was more concerned by the prospect of the snow on the ground outside than his ominous tone.

“The hunger. You’ll feel the hunger.”

Four

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When Carrie Met Dahlia

I didn’t give Nathan’s warning much thought until the night the hunger came over me. I’d spent the week doing my best to live life as though nothing had changed. Faced with what might be the last fourteen days of life before submitting myself to the Movement’s judgment, I was going to savor them.

Of course, I read The Sanguinarius. It was as dry and Victorian as Lord of the Rings. I reminded myself that the course of my existence was dependent upon finishing this particular book.

Nathan called to check in on me every night. I cursed myself for having a listed number. Sometimes his call came after I’d gone to work, and soon I found myself actually looking forward to the end of my shift so I could hear his voice on my answering machine. But by the end of the week, my spare thoughts—no, my every thought—had turned to blood. To get through my night shifts at the hospital, I snacked constantly. Coffee, pizza, popcorn, anything with a substantial aroma that covered the smell of blood. A few nurses made envious remarks about my ability to eat so much and never gain weight. I barely heard them. The obnoxious thumping of their pulses was all I could hear. Blood became an all-consuming distraction. I took numerous, drastic measures to ensure the safety of everyone around me. On my frequent breaks, I locked myself in the staff bathroom and used a razor blade to make small, shallow cuts on the inside of my arm. Then I licked away the blood that welled up. It did little to slake my thirst, but the resultant marks piqued the interest of the psychiatry resident. I spent a great deal of time avoiding him and his softly spoken invitations to talk about my “recovery.”

Despite my hunger, I couldn’t stomach the thought of drinking human blood. Once or twice, in desperation, I’d snuck a vial drawn from a patient and brought it home with me. But the threat of tiny viruses just waiting to take up residence in my body made my skin crawl. I poured the blood down the sink and destroyed the vials. My weight dropped dramatically. I lost ten pounds in three days. I was tired and sick. Everywhere I went, the sound of human hearts pumping blood through fat, blue veins absolutely maddened me.

The Sanguinarius recommended feeding captive vampires raw steak. Whoever wrote it had obviously never seen a 20/20 expose about slaughterhouse contamination and E. coli. My nights off were almost worse than the nights I had to work. At least at the hospital I had to force myself to concentrate on something other than the hunger. I was struggling through a particularly bad night at home when I finally gave up and went back to Wealthy Avenue. Tears streamed down my face as I shook uncontrollably behind the wheel, like a drug addict in desperate need of a fix.

Nathan hadn’t called me that night, and it hadn’t occurred to me to call him before I showed up at his doorstep. I needed blood. I needed it badly. My hands trembled as I rang the bell to his apartment.

There was no answer. The window of the shop was dark, and no one responded to my frantic knocking.

Young men and women hurried up and down the sidewalk. The pumping of their blood drowned out the words of their conversation. Most of them looked young enough to have a curfew, but some could have been college students. College students from other states, perhaps, with few acquaintances in their new

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surroundings. Like me, if they went missing, no one would look for them for days, possibly even weeks….

I was horrified at the thought, but I needed blood. Since I wasn’t up to hijacking a bloodmobile, I would have to find a donor.

I didn’t go back to my car. I needed to walk in the fresh air and open space. I don’t know how long I searched. I was selective. One bar looked too dank and bluecollar for my tastes. It would be crowded with middle-aged men in flannel shirts watching sports on television. I wanted someone young. Someone beautiful. I spotted her on the street.

She crossed against the light. Her pale, blond hair flew behind her like a banner in the wind. The way she clutched her coat to her chest accentuated her skinniness. I had never felt this sort of attraction toward anyone before, let alone a woman. It was not an attraction in a sexual sense. It was an animal instinct, as pure and natural as breathing. I wanted her blood.

The girl in the black coat pushed through a small cluster of young men and women loitering on the sidewalk. As I approached, I read the name of the building she ducked into.

The covered windows of Club Cite were framed by blue neon tubes. The brick building had been painted black, but the paint job had not been kept up, revealing flecks of the original red brick. The place was dirty and run-down. Once inside, I followed her down the stairs. The walls around us vibrated with a muffled bass line. She pulled open the door at the bottom and the entire corridor flooded with noise. The club was packed with young people, all dressed in black. Some were Dickensian, with top hats and walking sticks. More were swathed in torn fishnets patched with electrical tape. They all looked at me as though my blue jeans and freckled face disgusted them.

I couldn’t have cared less. I’d lost sight of my prey. Finding her tragic figure in this writhing mass of self-pity would be impossible.

“She went into the bathroom,” a voice said close to my ear. “But I wouldn’t go after her if I were you. She doesn’t know what you are.”

My heart could have stopped beating. My chest tightened, and the excitement of the chase vanished. I was caught.

I turned slowly, expecting to face a uniformed officer. Instead, I found myself looking down at the smirking face of a very confident young woman. She wasn’t slender by any means, and she swayed to the music with an innate grace that erased any notion she found her body bulky or unwieldy. The standard Robert Smith makeup of heavy eyeliner and deep red lipstick decorated her pale face, and a thick riot of red curls hung to her shoulders.

“You’re surprised?” she asked, putting her hands on her ample hips. “You were being so obvious.”

“Obvious?” My mouth felt dry.

She looked me over with her head cocked to one side. Her curls bobbed as she laughed.

“Yeah, obvious. But don’t worry, most of the kids here wouldn’t know a real vampire if one came up and bit them on the ass. They’re here because their parents just don’t understand.”

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The pulsating music, combined with the sound of beating hearts all around me, made me feel as if a speed metal drummers’ convention was getting into full swing in my frontal lobe. I squinted against the swirling light and movement of the room. “How did you know what I am?”

“You must be new to this whole vampire thing, huh?” she asked. She smiled a perfectly mischievous smile, as if she’d practiced it in a mirror for years. “That girl over there, she’ll scream like a banshee before you get two drops out of her, and then where will you be? In a whole heap of trouble, that’s where.”