“Wonderful.” Lucian said. He paused, then stepped back in front of my roommates. “You will also clean up this kitchen in two minutes. It’s filthy. Have some self-respect.”
I was about to tell him to stop mind controlling my roommates but decided that I could let some abuses of his power slide. At least for now.
I normally took clothes off to sleep, but considering the circumstances, I went into my closet and threw on an extra thick hoodie and some pajama bottoms. I considered an extra pair of underwear too, but decided I was fooling myself. If Lucian started waving his vampire cock around, it was going to take more than a couple layers of panties to stop it.
I climbed under my blankets and eyed him suspiciously. “You’re not going to try anything, are you?” Cue my stupid, “bond brain” hoping he would.
“I’m going to try to rest. Though I usually sleep during the day. This will be an adjustment.”
I yawned. “Just stay on your side of the room and I’ll stay on mine, okay?”
Lucian looked unconcerned and sat down in the corner.
I was trying my best not to do anything that might tip the scales in the battle waging within my mind. Even a subtle act of kindness might be too much, but he looked pathetic sitting there with his long, sculpted legs on the hard floor.
I sighed, then lobbed a pillow at him. I picked up an extra blanket and threw it as well. “I don’t know if vampires use pillows and blankets, but there you go.”
Lucian gave a slight nod of appreciation, but it still didn’t look like he planned to lie down.
I sat in silence with my eyes closed for a while, occasionally sneaking a look in his direction. Half of the times I looked were to make sure he was still staying on his side of the room and the other half were because the man was a work of art. Pale blue light was filtering through my window, and it was hitting his smooth skin just right, making him look like some kind of god of the night.
I let out a frustrated sigh, then sat up a little, looking in his direction. “How does it work, anyway? The whole vampire thing, I mean.”
“What do you mean?”
“Like in some movies vampires have to kill people to feed. Sometimes they turn anyone they bite into a vampire too. Sometimes they sparkle in the sunlight. What are the rules?”
Lucian tilted his head. I’d already noticed a pattern with him when he wasn’t sure if he should answer my questions. He’d hesitate, then spoke slowly when he finally answered, as if he was reading from a script he’d just mentally scribbled down. “Feeding is not fatal for humans.”
I waited. When he didn’t say more, I decided to press him. “That’s it?”
“We use our power of suggestion to make them forget they ever saw us, and they are somewhat weak from blood loss the following day. That’s it.”
“Then why do you look like there’s something you’re not telling me?”
“Because it’s as I told you before. The less you know, the safer you are. Your goal should be to wait out the worst of the bond, then pretend you never met me and forget my kind exist. The more you know, the harder that will be.”
“Why can’t you just wipe my memory? It doesn’t seem to faze you at all to do it to other people.”
“The bond lends some of my power to you. Especially now, it would take a great deal of effort to wipe your memory.”
“Wait. When Bennigan came to Anya’s, he tried to make me forget I’d seen him. It didn’t work, and that was before you made me drink your blood. What does that mean?”
Lucian nodded, as if he’d already thought about that exact point. Then I saw the same unwillingness to divulge more.
I folded my arms. “I’m in danger. You said it yourself. I think it should be my choice to decide how informed I want to be about that danger. Don’t you?”
Lucian watched me for several long moments until I thought his eyes might actually be seeing straight into my thoughts. Finally, he looked down, nodding. “There have been cases where a human bonds with one of my kind without the transfer of blood. It’s extremely rare, and in every case I know of, the bond that developed from those instances was unusually strong.” He raised his eyes to meet mine again, and I felt a surge of heat flow through me from his smoldering gaze. “And every one of those cases resulted in a pairing.”
I didn’t need to be an expert in geezer slang or vampire vernacular to figure out what he meant by “a pairing.” I swallowed. “So far,” I added.
“So far,” he agreed.
“Do vampires get married?”
“Yes.”
I laid back down and rolled to the side, trying to sleep again. A few minutes later, I opened my eyes and turned toward him. “You’re not going to drink my blood while I’m sleeping, are you?”
“No,” he said. “Drinking your blood would consummate the bond and turn you into a vampire.”
“Oh, yeah. I remember you saying that. But what if—"
“Sleep, Cara Skies.”
I saw Lucian was lying on his back again with his arms crossed over his chest and his legs straight out. I grinned to myself, then tried to get comfortable. It was going to be a long night. And a long day after.
11
Lucian
Cara had let me borrow some clothes from her roommates. I was outfitted with a hooded garment, gloves, sunglasses, and an ample application of a substance she called “sunscreen.” Armored as I was, the sun seemed to take its toll all the same, if maybe a little more slowly.
I followed her to her academic studies and watched the changed world as we traveled. I had already lived longer than I thought the mind was truly capable of coping with. But I had always watched progress crawl by. It was only when I looked back that the technological and societal changes seemed startling.
Ever since Cara released us from what I’d begun to think might become an eternal slumber, I was struck by the way the world had moved on. It was like a dose of mortality. A small taste of death, almost.
I looked around and saw time would happily pass without me. It would keep plowing forward, relentless and unforgiving, whether or not I was still creeping in its shadow.
Today, Cara was wearing a torn t-shirt with lightning bolts and electrified puppies on it with equally shredded jeans and black boots. I frowned. “Do you need money for new clothing? Yours appear damaged.”
She laughed. “It’s a style. Kind of. I mean, I guess it depends who you ask. And if you asked most people, they’d probably say I was too old to even make an attempt to express myself with clothes.”
“I enjoy seeing the different things you wear. It’s interesting.”
She smiled wide and open, then chewed her lip. That was a new expression, I noted. Genuine happiness, maybe? Whatever it was, I decided I liked it. “Thank you, Lucian. That’s really sweet.”
“Yes, well, women in my time wore gigantic dresses and about ten layers. I am thinking I prefer the direction fashion has gone since I was detained.”
Cara looked suddenly thoughtful. “Do you… Did you date humans? Or are humans just like food to you guys?”
I had a vision of Marabella. The images of her as a girl of seventeen waving to me from the fence that separated our family’s land was faint. The more vivid image was of her hunched over, old, and wrinkled in a rocking chair. I’d been watching her from a distance, separate from the stream of time everybody and everything I’d ever known was chained to.
It had been the first time I sensed the real cost of what was done to me. The price I paid was knowing I’d outlive everything I ever cared about. I’d watch it all fade and die. Eventually, I’d feel like I did now. I would look at something pure, sweet, and full of life and feel only pain. Because I knew I couldn’t stay part of Cara’s life a moment longer than I had to. She’d grow old and live a life. She’d die and I’d carry on.
But she couldn’t be mine.
Cara smiled playfully, then bumped my nose with her knuckle, making me flinch. “You went all misty eyed ther
e, Lucian. Were you thinking of some girl you had the hots for like a million years ago?”
I shook my head. “No. My kind do not make a habit of dating humans. Relationships where only one half of the equation gets old and dies tend to create complications.”
She pursed her lips. “Yeah. I guess that makes sense.” She bumped her shoulder into me, eyes twinkling with mischief. “You’re saying you wouldn’t date me because you’ll be too pretty for wrinkly old me in ten years?”
“It would be a cruelty to both of us if we pursued a relationship. Just a promise of loss that would hang over both our heads.”
She nodded, studying her lap. “Yeah. I was just kidding, obviously. Besides, I’ve said since I was a little girl that I would never, ever date a vampire. So…”
I chuckled. “I’m sure you did.”
“Well, um, we’re not technically supposed to bring friends to our classes,” Cara said. “So if my professor asks, you’re a foreign exchange student, okay?”
We didn’t talk as much for the rest of our walk, partly because the sun was draining me more quickly this time. I suspected the more I exposed myself in a short period of time, the more it would tap my reserves of strength. If the bond didn’t fade soon, I thought we might need to find another arrangement to keep me from day walking as much as I had been.
I was grateful when we reached the shade of a tall, sleek building that was swarming with young students wearing bags on their backs or carrying books at their sides. “What is a foreign exchange student?”
“It’s like when someone from another country comes to live with you. They sort of have to follow you around like a puppy since they’re out of their element. So maybe they’ll let it slide. We can say you’re from Transylvania.”
“Now it’s you who is the tease.”
The hint of red that crept into Cara’s cheeks made me want to pull her close. The bond thrummed inside me, pounding with a physical force in my chest and head, practically demanding I reach out to her. Demanding I have more.
I closed my eyes, calming myself and controlling the urges.
“By the way,” she said once we started walking again. “Were you able to sleep last night?”
“Yes,” I said. It was a lie. I’d been awake the entire night while I did my best to suppress the urge to go to her. In fact, I hadn’t truly slept since my brief nap on the smelly couch in Anya’s basement. I could feel the heaviness of sleep calling me, even now.
“And you?”
“Yes,” she said, biting the inside of her bottom lip. A lie.
We sat in a large auditorium where a small, bent over woman proceeded to drone on about some scientific jargon I couldn’t begin to follow. I blinked heavy eyes, then stifled a yawn.
I was not going to fall asleep in a room full of humans. If I forgot the obvious danger, I could at least think of the indignity of it. My kind had always gone to great lengths to protect ourselves when we slumbered. Resting now would be unconscionable.
It was a complete and total embarrassment I would not allow.
12
Cara
Lucian’s head was heavy on my shoulder and I could see his eyes were closed behind his sunglasses. The weirdo had slumped over, then crossed his arms over his chest and forced his huge body into a sitting version of the stiff “vampire in a coffin” look.
I tried not to notice the looks he was generating, especially when he started snoring softly.
Seriously? What kind of vampire snored?
I hardly heard a word my professor said because I was too distracted by the man who had his head against my arm. He had great hair, I noticed for about the hundredth time.
I looked down at the silky, thick black hair that was against my arm, then chewed my pencil, feeling my hand twitching upwards.
No. You are not going to sneakily feel his hair. You are not—
I took a small lock of loose hair between my fingers and gently stroked it. Soft.
I pulled my hand away, shaking my head. Get a hold of yourself, Cara.
I lasted about two more minutes before I had my entire hand on his head, drinking in the cool, soft smoothness of his thick hair. God, he was so gorgeous it wasn’t even fair. I wondered if that was a vampire thing, or just a Lucian thing. Did those little black specks in his blood go through his system and find ways to make him more irresistible? Straighten out a nose here, thicken an eyelash there. Sculpt a ridiculous jawline here, fill up some ridiculously kissable lips there.
But then I remembered the Jezabel woman. She hadn’t been unattractive, but she wasn’t the picture of beauty like the other vampires I’d seen. Maybe the pretty ones just lived longer? Except that made Vlad an anomaly. Though he would’ve been strikingly handsome if he made an ounce of effort, I suspected.
The more time I had, the more I found myself wanting to ask Lucian a million questions. How old was he, anyway? How did he become a vampire in the first place? Had he ever been married? Had kids?
I was thinking about everything but my class when I realized people were getting up and leaving. Lucian stirred, and his eyes were on me before I realized my hand was still buried in his hair.
I snatched it back, then flashed an unsteady smile. “Sorry,” I said.
He straightened, then cleared his throat. “It appears I drifted off. Briefly.”
“Actually, you fell asleep hard. And it was pretty much right away.” I glanced at the clock. “And it wasn’t that brief. This was a two-hour class.”
“Nonsense,” Lucian said, standing up and stretching out his legs and arms. “Where do we travel next?”
I grinned. “We ‘travel’ to advanced biochem. And if this class put you to sleep, I’m going to need a bucket of cold water to wake you after that one.”
“Cold water is fatal to my kind,” Lucian said.
I paused as I was getting up. “What? Really? God, Lucian. You need to tell me this stuff. What if I’d spilled my drink on your or something?”
He showed a slow forming smile. “That was a joke.”
I punched his shoulder softly. “It wasn’t a funny one.”
My mind wandered as we headed to biochem.
I was dragging a vampire around with me from class to class. A vampire dressed in a hoodie and sunglasses, even though it was a relatively warm day.
I thought it was still going to take time before I could completely grasp the entirety of the situation. There was only so much my brain could absorb in such a short period of time, after all. But one thing seemed to be forming into crystal clarity.
Lucian wasn’t like any guy I’d ever met. And it was more than the whole supernatural angle. He paid a different sort of attention to me whether I was speaking or just looking out the window. He made it seem like I was the most important thing in his world, even if he kept talking like he’d vanish from my life the moment the bond was gone.
Temporary or not, it felt good. Dangerously good.
He was giving me a taste of the kind of fast and furious relationship I’d resigned myself to never have. After all, devoting myself to academia and the long hours that were probably ahead of me bent over microscopes was probably a death sentence for my dating life. By the time I emerged from a sterile lab at age fifty, my dating prospects would had depressingly dwindled.
So maybe I should’ve felt like I’d suffered some injustice by being nearly killed because of Lucian and now “bonded” to him. Instead, I felt gratitude. He was giving me a little taste of the fun I knew I was leaving behind, and I may not be immortal like he claimed to be, but I had a feeling I’d remember these days for the rest of my life.
Lucian leaned in a doorway, clad in his shades. He let out a long groan.
“You okay?” I asked.
He nodded. “All this sunlight tires me.”
I gave his broad back a sympathetic rub. “I know. I’m sorry. Maybe if the bond loosens up some you can crawl around in the tunnels beneath campus or something. I bet you love creeping around
tunnels, right?”
Lucian side-eyed me. “I will not creep through tunnels. Though I do admit I find the damp darkness rather pleasant. There’s also something comforting in the close-quarters.”
I grinned. “Are all the other vampires as cliché as you?”
“I am a unique individual.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m sure you are. Are you ready to start walking, unique individual, or do you need more time?”
“I’m fine.”
We headed outside toward the biochem building, gathering a constant barrage of blatant stares from anyone who noticed us.
“Garlic?” I asked. “Does that hurt you?”
“No. I quite enjoy the flavor.”
“Crosses?”
“Nope.”
“So how do people hurt vampires?”
“That question is a dangerous one.”
“For you.”
“And you,” he said, looking very serious.
“Fine. How old are you?”
“That’s not a polite question to ask a vampire.”
I grinned, pushing the doors open and heading through a breezeway toward the science building. “Seriously?”
“I was born in 1712 in a village not far from here.”
I’d gathered that he was old, but I hadn’t quite been prepared for just how old. “Wow. And you don’t age?”
Lucian shook his head. “Physically, no. We grow stronger with time.”
“So… You have like, super powers?”
“Enhanced senses. Strength. Healing capabilities. But most of my kind develop far more in one direction than any other.”
“So what’s your thing? A super strong nose? Because that would probably be the lamest, right? Watch out! Here comes Vlad! He’s going to sniff out what you had for breakfast and then shame you for eating leftover pizza at five in the morning!”
Lucian eyed me, amusement twinkling in his dark eyes. “No. I’ve always healed more quickly than average. It’s the only reason I can walk this much in the daylight. Even an elder vampire would only be able to manage a few minutes of direct sunlight. But I’m hard to kill.”
Kiss Kiss Fang Fang: A Sucky Vampire Romantic Comedy Page 6
