by Fiona Zedde
Then she was gone. Kylie didn’t even see her move. One moment, Silvija was there with her threats, and the next Kylie was sitting alone on the balcony.
“Fuck.” She clenched her teeth as the challenge Silvija had thrown echoed in her ears. “Fucking bitch!”
“Kylie? Are you still here?”
Olivia’s tentative footsteps sounded in the apartment.
“I’m here.” She projected her voice up to the bedroom and hopped off the balcony’s edge.
“I thought you left.” Olivia sounded relieved.
“No. Not yet.” She sank into the sofa across from the television and dismissed Silvija from her mind.
Instead, she occupied herself by trying not to imagine what Olivia was doing up there in her bedroom. She was trying not to think about Olivia’s naked body, the upward curve of her breasts, and the wide nipples that she had tasted in dreams.
Without seeing it, she knew Olivia stood on the left side of her bed, naked. The golden light from the floor lamp haloed her body, highlighting its subtle curves, the graceful tilt of her neck as she looked down at her body, an automatic evaluation she always performed, checking to see what changes had happened since she last noticed.
The damp towel had already been tossed aside on the bed, a purple curl of cloth against the recently changed forest green comforter painted with lush gold stripes. Kylie knew exactly where on the bedside table Olivia kept the copper bottle of cocoa butter lotion. She could hear when Olivia pumped the thick, creamy liquid into her palm, then rubbed her palms together, smoothing the lotion in slow and deliberate movements over her arms, shoulders, her breasts.
She shivered at the thought of Olivia’s breasts. Her hands moving over them, smoothing lotion into the luscious brown skin, over the nipples she liked to pinch as—
“You want to go out tonight?”
Kylie blinked, cheeks tingling with arousal and embarrassment as Olivia appeared in front of her. Olivia was already fully dressed in an ankle-length pink dress and a cropped denim jacket. She smelled of her cocoa butter and her short coils gleamed under the light. She was ready much sooner than Kylie and her decadent imagination hoped she would be.
“Come on,” Olivia said. “We’re going for a drive.”
She didn’t wait for Kylie to respond. She grabbed her bag from the coat rack by the door and her keys from the hook on the wall. She looked over her shoulder at Kylie. “Coming?”
Kylie scrambled to her feet, nearly tripping. She untangled the vivid fantasy playing in her mind from the reality of Olivia standing before her. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
They left the building and walked to the nearby parking lot. Olivia stopped next to a two-door, black Jeep Wrangler.
“Here we are.” She jingled her keys.
Her smile was mischievous as she unlocked the doors. Inside the SUV, she leaned over to the passenger side and shoved open the door for Kylie. “Get in.”
The Jeep rumbled to life and music burst from the speakers, a growling female voice and stinging electric guitars. Olivia gave a shrug of apology before turning the stereo down and changing to mellow pop music. She drove the Jeep from the parking lot and out to the small side street.
When Kylie was killed, she hadn’t been able to drive. After becoming one of the clan, she’d been chauffeured around, flown to most places, or went on foot, so she never bothered to learn. For her, driving was an exotic thing. She watched Olivia handle the manual drive SUV with an expert touch. She changed gears with a sexy competence Kylie could not look away from. She watched the narrow, short-nailed fingers as they grasped the shifter, smoothly guiding the car from hill to valley then hill again. A warm tingle settled in Kylie’s belly at the sight.
She cleared her throat and looked out the window.
Olivia took them into the heart of the city, through darkness and bright lights while the Jeep’s tires whispered across the asphalt. Music serenaded them from the speakers, and Olivia hummed along.
“It’s nice to be out of the apartment.” Olivia took her eyes away from the road to glance at Kylie.
“It feels the same to me,” Kylie said.
But even before her words died away, she realized the difference. The freedom of being out in a vehicle with the breeze rushing in through the windows and Olivia tapping her fingers against the steering wheel and singing beneath her breath about teenage love. Olivia seemed more relaxed, even a little happy. “It’s nice,” Kylie finally said.
But nice or not, the freedom of the open road couldn’t allow her to forget what Silvija had said to her on the balcony. What could the clan leader do to Olivia, anyway? Kylie glanced at Olivia, thinking of her slender frailty and the way she trusted when she had no reason to. The repercussions to Olivia would be dire if she stayed. Death would be the least of Olivia’s worries if Silvija followed through with her threat.
“I’m leaving for home soon,” she said, unable to keep the reluctance from her voice.
“Why?” This time Olivia turned completely around to look at her. “You just got here.” A hint of irony touched her mouth.
Kylie looked away from her teasing gaze. “I—there are things I need to take care of at home.”
“Liar.”
Olivia said the word casually and with affection. “You don’t have to go anywhere.” She lifted her hand from the gearshift and patted Kylie’s thigh. “What would you do if I told you I won’t let you go?”
“Then I won’t go.”
Olivia smiled faintly and put her hand back where it belonged. “Stay, my little cat burglar. I’m just starting to enjoy your company.”
What if she could stay? What would that look like and how long could it last? Kylie was under no illusions that she could skirt the law of the clan—Silvija was the law—and get away with it. Even if she could stay, she feared very much that her clan leader would take it out on Olivia. She could not bear it if something happened to Olivia because of her.
“I have a week,” Kylie finally said. “I can’t stay any longer than that.”
“I’m sure we can find plenty to do in that time.” Olivia smiled again, her eyes warm and engaging.
Kylie almost found herself smiling back, caught in Olivia’s playful enthusiasm that emerged at the oddest times from the cloak of sadness she wore.
Kylie didn’t know how to frame her attraction to Olivia. Didn’t know how to balance her inexplicable desire to be in her company from any selfish wish to ensure Olivia’s well-being. She felt like someone had planted this need for Olivia inside her and the need had latched on to her deep down, leaving her unable to separate its insidious presence from anything that she wanted for herself. She didn’t want to feel this desire for Olivia, even though it distracted her from the ocean of years that stretched out before her.
Olivia didn’t have that much time. If Silvija had her way, Olivia only had a week left before being drained dry and left sprawled out in some alley in the neighborhood, another statistic of the city. She bit her lip and looked over at Olivia.
Suddenly, the car lurched from its lane, flinging Kylie against the door.
“Shit!”
Olivia gripped the steering wheel in both hands as the Jeep swerved into another lane. Tires screeched and a nearby car horn bleated in distress as the SUV narrowly missed sideswiping an oncoming car.
“Crate,” Olivia muttered. “There was a damn crate in the road.” Her eyes narrowed. “Who the hell does that? That’s some dangerous shit.”
“It’s okay,” Kylie said, reaching out to briefly touch Olivia’s knee. “You handled it.”
Olivia smiled tensely at her before turning back to the road.
Kylie could hear her accelerated heartbeat. Olivia held on so grimly to her life, not accepting in any way the possibility of her death, even with the sickness eating away at her. Belle had said she could smell the decay inside Olivia. But Kylie was blind and dumb to it. Oblivious to everything except Olivia’s e
motional nakedness, the need and sorrow dripping from her like fresh blood.
They drifted on into the night, the familiar sense of comfort and contentment from Olivia’s presence enfolding Kylie as they seemed to float over the asphalt in the dark SUV. The roll of the tires against the road was a soothing hum.
“Where are we going?” Kylie asked.
“We are already here.” Olivia gestured to the city stretched out in front of the windshield.
The smell of night drifted in through the windows, and Kylie breathed it deeply. Danger. Blood. Fear. A sweetness that reminded her of other vampires, though none of the scents she detected belonged to either her mother or Violet.
Unfamiliar vampires. She’d seen and met her fair share of beasts from other clans, but none of the scents on the air seemed familiar. Since she wasn’t in the mood to make any new friends, she deliberately turned her nose away from them.
The landscape changed. No more craftsman houses or pretty Tudors lining the street. Now it was warehouses, some converted to lofts, graffitied storefronts, restaurants, music thumping from behind the walls of nightclubs. The sounds of the evening were all around them. Screams. Laughter. The staccato tap of a woman’s high heels on the sidewalk as she hurried to her destination.
Up ahead, Kylie heard the sound of flesh against flesh. At first, she thought it was sex, rough and urgent, in a dark alley. But as the car drew closer, she realized it wasn’t anything so friendly. On the left side of the street, separated by a steady stream of traffic, she saw it.
A fight. An unfair one. A man on his hands and knees, cowering against the wall while three boys, teenagers no older than Kylie had been when she was taken, kicking and punching. They were all dark-haired and pale-skinned, the victim and his attackers, like one big unhappy family.
Olivia drove slowly, so Kylie saw it all. The blood flying from the downed man’s mouth. A hand clutching in pain at his stomach, trying in vain to protect the already damaged body.
Kylie put a hand on the door, a latent instinct rising in her despite the fact that the fighters were all human. She plucked open the door and Olivia gasped as it fell open and Kylie jumped out into the street, slamming the door of the SUV behind her.
She strode across traffic, ignoring the cars that honked their horns at her. Kylie banged her fist against the hood of a white Cadillac as it almost ran her over, the driver pressing on his horn. The three boys pounding on the man did not look up. They were focused in their ferocity. Drilling the man into the ground with their kicks and punches. They growled and panted as they did their work, sounds building fast and hard like the beating of drums.
The man on the ground grunted with each blow, shouting at them when he was able to catch his breath. He chanted the words in a long stream, so it took Kylie a few seconds to understand what he was saying. Then it became clear.
“Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you.” Over and over again.
The smell of the blood in the alley made Kylie’s tongue tingle. It took every ounce of her control not to leap into the fray and drink them all dry. Her teeth stretched with greed. She was far from hungry. She’d fed earlier that night before going to Olivia. Anything she took now would just be a snack or—she revised that estimate, taking in the potential banquet before her—a lavish second meal.
The man stopped his mindless chanting.
“Help me,” he gurgled, staring up at her with blackened eyes. Blood dripped from his torn cheek. His hair hung over his face, a limp curtain gusted by each labored breath.
The boys working on him jerked their heads up to look at Kylie.
“Get the fuck out of here!” one of them shouted.
The boys were thin and pale-eyed, wearing deliberately frayed T-shirts and jeans. They were college types, but savage. Maybe fraternity boys. The three boys looked at her, the bubbling acid of their anger pouring from them and threatening anything in their path.
Contrary to what Kylie expected, there was nothing smug about them. What they were doing was not a game. They were all in deadly earnest as they tended to the man at their feet.
Even with Kylie standing there, looking like a non-threatening young woman in her loose jeans and Transformers T-shirt, one of the boys kicked the man on the ground. It was a vicious and deliberate motion. But Kylie felt it was not done for her benefit, but to let the man know there was no one saving him from their punishments.
So Kylie gave them hers.
She leapt and landed on a boy’s back. He screamed as she hooked her fingers in his neck, sank her fangs into his throat. Ripped. She drank deeply from him, and his screams gurgled away into the night. He dropped to his knees, already dying, blood spilling.
Before the other two could react, she jumped from him, faster than they could see, elbow stabbing at one throat, fist ramming into a soft belly. She whirled around to face the floundering boy who came at her like a toppling bowling pin. She dodged his amateurish attack to deliver a jab to his kidneys, a fist to his face.
Bones crunched under her hand. Blood splashed. There were screams, shouts for help. One was already dead. She could smell his voided bowels. Another was on his way to meet his maker. She grabbed the liveliest. The thin one who had shouted at her. She squeezed his throat.
He wheezed, trying desperately to pull air into his lungs. His breath was sharp and ripe against her face, fear-stenched, and his eyes wide with terror.
“Do you like how it feels?” Kylie crouched over him, pushing the distraction of his dying friends to the rear of her consciousness. “I see you can dish it out but can’t take it.”
The boy wheezed. “It was him!” he gasped.
“It was him, what?” Kylie paused the pressure of her fingers around his throat.
“He raped our sister!”
He coughed under Kylie’s tight grip, his body bucking as his lungs fought for air. Her grip abruptly loosened, but did not release. She pressed him down into the ground, a hand flat against his chest, knees pinning his legs.
Kylie spun to look at the man he and his dead friends had been beating into submission. “Is this true?”
She gasped the question, already fighting a sickening feeling.
“No!” The man uncurled from a ball on the ground, scuttled backward to sag against the wall. He pressed a trembling hand to his stomach. “He’s lying!”
But she had already seen the truth of it in his eyes. The boys hadn’t been beating on this helpless, grown man for fun. It had been for revenge.
She released her hold on the boy, flying to her feet. He rolled his head to stare at the bleeding man who was now in better shape than he was. His look was poison, filled with rage and pain. “I wish I’d been able to bring her your dick in a paper bag!” He gasped the words, fighting for consciousness.
Kylie stared down at what she had done, horror overwhelming her.
“Kylie?”
She turned to see Olivia standing at the mouth of the alley. Olivia stared at the dead and dying men, at Kylie’s bloody hands and face, a fist pressed over her own mouth.
Fuck.
“What…?” Olivia’s voice trembled. “What did you do?”
“Call an ambulance,” Kylie croaked. “This one is injured.”
With the dead men at her feet, she felt embarrassed, the thing that she had set out to do gone horribly wrong. She turned away as Olivia reached into her pocket for her cell phone.
Kylie wanted to castrate the rapist and make sure he didn’t violate another woman. But she also didn’t want to be wrong. She crouched over the boys she could save, adjusted their bodies on the ground so they wouldn’t choke on their own blood. She straightened and looked at the rapist, her footsteps taking her unconsciously toward him. He shrank back against the wall, whimpering.
“Kylie!” Olivia’s voice stopped her. “The police will be here soon.” Sirens screamed in the distance.
She straightened and backed away, watching the rapist tremble in relief with each backward step she took. Kylie wa
nted to rip off his dick and feed it to him.
“We should go.” She felt a hand on hers. Olivia’s. The warm human fingers twined around hers that were sticky with blood. “Come.”
Olivia darted a look over her shoulder, tugged again at Kylie’s hand. “Come,” she said again.
Soon, they were in the Jeep and driving again. Kylie sagged back in the seat, her bloody hands draped over her thighs. On the radio, a song was playing, something slow and sexy, a woman singing about moonlight and leather.
Kylie closed her eyes and tried not to think of anything significant. Tried to ignore Olivia’s questioning looks. The effervescent possibility of the night was over now. The only thing left of it was the blood going to waste in a dirty alley, the fearful, darting looks that Olivia threw at Kylie’s hands. And that man who had been getting what he deserved before she exploded into that alley. Her mother would have never made a mistake like that. Kylie closed her eyes.
Was it over now? Was this the way she would lose the human woman? To get her to be so disgusted with her and so afraid that Kylie would have no choice but to go back to New York with her head bent in defeat.
She opened her eyes when the vehicle stopped. They were at the gas station, well lit but mostly empty at nearly midnight on a Tuesday. Olivia turned off the SUV and got out. She opened the passenger door and pulled it wide.
“Come on.”
She reached into the Jeep with the hand that was already bloody from touching Kylie. Mystified, Kylie glanced between Olivia’s hand and the doors of the gas station, not sure what they were doing. When she did nothing, Olivia reached in, grabbed her hand, and tugged.
Kylie allowed herself to be plucked from the Jeep and into the light of the parking lot. They walked into the gas station and up to the woman behind the register.
“Restroom?”
The woman barely looked up from her magazine, only pointed to the right, past a display of monogrammed mugs with a peach on one side and the usual collection of American names on the other. Kylie vaguely noticed Olivia’s name among them.
