by Heidi Betts
That same low moan came again and she stepped farther into the room, rounding the end table at the foot of the sofa—and jerked to a halt. Her eyes widened, heart speeding up in her chest.
“Oh, my God,” she breathed. She felt frozen in place, unable to move.
Sean lay sprawled on the sofa, taking up every inch of the off-white space. His eyes were closed in what she hoped was simply deep sleep. His clothes—a pair of worn jeans and a dark green sweater—were rumpled and his sandy blond hair stuck out in every direction.
And draped across his chest like a beauty pageant sash was a wide red ribbon, complete with giant bow.
One corner of a large white envelope was tucked underneath, just over his heart. She slid it free, careful not to disturb him. Inside was a card with Snoopy and the rest of the Peanuts gang standing around Charlie Brown’s legendary twig of a tree, singing a Christmas carol.
Vivian opened the card. Scrawled in large, flowing script were the words: Merry Christmas. Enjoy your present. It was signed simply A.
“Oh, no,” she murmured, closing the card and dropping it to the coffee table in front of the couch. “What did you do?”
She wasn’t sure if she was asking an invisible Angelina or herself, but a sinking feeling was beginning to churn in her gut.
Kneeling down beside the sofa, she ran her gaze over Sean’s still form. He looked all right. Unconscious and slightly the worse for wear, but his lips were rosy instead of blue, and his skin still retained a hint of color rather than being the porcelain white of someone no longer shuffling along the mortal coil.
Though shallow and slow, his chest was rising and falling as he drew air into his lungs. Which didn’t exactly allay her fears. On the one hand, breathing was good. On the other, it only meant he wasn’t dead, not that he wasn’t undead.
Vampires breathed in and out the same as everyone else. It wasn’t necessary; they could go a millennia without oxygen, if circumstances warranted it. But it was as easy to continue breathing as to stop, and it allowed them to blend in more easily without looking like mannequins or drawing sometimes unwanted attention to themselves.
Taking a deep breath herself—one she really did feel she needed to brace herself—she lifted a hand and carefully turned his face away from her. A low moan rolled past his lips, and she paused, waiting to see if he was about to wake up. When his jaw remained slack against her fingers, she reluctantly lowered her gaze to the side of his throat.
And there they were. Two perfectly round puncture marks just over his jugular. The holes were still tinged red, but well on their way to being healed.
With a long, heartfelt groan, she released his chin and dropped her head to the edge of the sofa.
“Dammit, Angelina,” she muttered into the thick cushion. “What the hell am I supposed to do now?”
Sean felt like hell, but couldn’t figure out why. He didn’t have a hangover because he hadn’t gone on a bender since college. And it couldn’t be the chemotherapy, even though the doctor had warned him the treatments would be rough—vomiting, exhaustion, and becoming a sickly version of Mr. Clean were just some of the fun side effects he’d been promised—because he’d decided against it.
There was no point. He’d been diagnosed too late, the tumor in his brain too large and deeply embedded, rendering it inoperable. His oncologist had made it clear that while treatment might extend the quantity of his life, it certainly wouldn’t improve the quality.
He was dying; he’d come to terms with that. But damned if he’d spend whatever time he had left hunched over a toilet bowl puking his guts up and looking like an extra on the set of some B-movie disaster flick.
And call it ego, but he also didn’t want to be seen on the air or by friends and family while he wasted away to nothing. At least this way, he would look fairly normal and like himself right up until the end.
Unfortunately, his illness apparently wasn’t going to let him feel normal right up until the end. He groaned, squeezing his eyes shut and covering his face with the back of his arm.
Maybe it was time to ask the doc for that pain medication he’d mentioned. He hadn’t wanted to start using it so soon, not until it was absolutely necessary, but if he was going to wake up every morning feeling like this…a pill or two might not be out of the question.
“Sean?”
His name echoed in his ears, like someone was calling to him from the end of a very long, very dark tunnel. How was that possible? He’d been alone in his apartment when he’d gone to bed—hadn’t he?
“Sean, are you awake?”
That voice again. A woman’s voice. Maybe he was imagining it, especially since it sounded eerily like Vivian. Which was impossible. He hadn’t seen or spoken to her since he’d dropped her off at her place the night of their…
Of their what? Indiscretion? Affair? Surrender to something that had been a long time coming?
A cool hand brushed over his brow and hair, and he lowered his arm, forcing his eyes open.
Okay, so maybe he was drunk. Or dead, if folks were wrong about that whole “no more suffering after death” thing. Because unless he was imagining things or losing his mind—which was a possibility, of course—Vivian was whispering his name. She was leaning over him, watching him with wide hazel eyes.
“Viv?” His voice cracked, his throat dry and raw, making him cough.
She stroked his arm and patted his shoulder until the fit subsided.
“Are you all right?” she asked. “How are you feeling?”
“Like I’ve been hit by a bus,” he croaked. “Or maybe worked through the digestive system of a Tyrannosaurus Rex.” And shit out the other end.
“I’m sorry,” she told him. “You’ll start feeling better soon, I promise.”
He frowned—or thought he did. Why did she look so guilt ridden? And how did she know how he felt or that he’d feel better soon?
“What—?” He stopped, cleared his throat, and licked his lips. “What happened?”
Had they gotten back together and drunk themselves into comas? Had he passed out and cracked his head on the corner of the sink or something?
“It’s…complicated,” she said, eyes darting everywhere but on his face.
Before he could ask anything more, she jumped to her feet and hurried off, returning only seconds later with a dark brown bottle and a coffee mug that said And then Buffy staked Edward. The End. She popped the top off the bottle and poured some kind of thick, goopy liquid into the cup.
“This will make you feel better,” she told him, helping to prop him up slightly and bringing the mug to his mouth.
It smelled funny, but also…kind of good.
“What is it?” he asked.
Her lips twisted. “Don’t ask. Not yet. Just…trust me, okay?”
He hesitated a moment, then began to drink. At first, whatever it was nearly made him gag. It was like trying to swallow wet newspaper, heavy and gelatinous. But then the texture grew on him, as did the taste. It was sweet and tangy, oddly metallic, but he liked that.
The more he drank, the more he wanted, grasping the cup with his own hands and tipping it higher even as he tilted his head back to take it all. He finished with a gasp, licking his lips to be sure he didn’t miss so much as a drop.
“How do you feel now?” Vivian asked, setting the mug on the low coffee table beside the couch.
He sat still for a second, assessing. Actually, he felt much better. His headache was gone. He no longer felt as though he’d been dragged behind a tractor trailer for twenty or thirty miles, and in fact felt sort of…energized.
“Good,” he answered. “Really good. What was in that stuff?”
Once again, she averted her gaze. “Oh, you know—vitamins, minerals, all the usual pick-me-ups.”
“And why do I need to be picked up?” he asked, suspecting she knew more about his condition than he did.
“You had a bit of an…accident,” she said slowly.
He raised a
brow, pushing himself into a full sitting position now that he had his strength back. His strength and then some. He felt warm, flushed, almost buzzed, like his blood was humming under his skin and he could bench press a Sherman tank without breaking a sweat.
“What kind of accident?”
She studied him a moment. Opened her mouth as though to speak, licked her lips nervously, and closed it again. Then she hopped up and began to pace. Back and forth, back and forth on the other side of the low coffee table, rubbing her hands up and down her arms.
Sean watched her, curious about her sudden case of nerves and what she was hiding from him, but more distracted by her appearance. Her long, auburn hair fell about her face and shoulders in waves. It was obvious she hadn’t done anything special with it; no fancy French twist or loose upsweep the way she often wore it at work. But damned if she wasn’t all the sexier for the natural look.
She hadn’t bothered to dress, either, still in a sexy silk robe, dotted with tiny rosebuds, the front slit flipping open and closed as she stalked, revealing glimpses of long, shapely calves and the barest hint of pale thighs.
Okay, so now he was not only feeling better, he was horny as hell. A hard-on was working its way due north behind the fly of his jeans, forcing him to shift around on the sofa to find a position that didn’t threaten to snap his dick in half.
As he swung around to put his feet on the floor and tried to tug inconspicuously at the crotch of his pants, he realized that the fireplace and pale eggshell walls behind Vivian’s pacing form were completely unfamiliar. Come to think of it, so were the sofa and coffee table, and the brightly lit, fully decorated Christmas tree in the corner.
He’d never seen them before. And he sure as hell hadn’t bothered setting up a tree at his own apartment.
Brows knit, he broke into her distracted power walk. “This is your place, right?” It was the only logical explanation, especially considering the way she was dressed.
She stopped pacing and turned to face him, arms linked across her chest. The pose did wonderful things for her breasts, pushing them up and forward and causing the silky material of her robe to part.
He swallowed, telling himself to stop ogling her lovely feminine attributes and look her in the eye instead. But damned if his gaze didn’t remain right where it was for a good ten seconds, locked on like a heat-seeking missile.
“Yes,” she responded.
“How did I get here?” he wanted to know.
“That’s…kind of a long story,” she told him. “And I’m not entirely sure you’ll like the answer.”
Well, that caught his attention. The reporter in him perked up and stood on point, ready to find out what the devil was going on.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said, his tone letting her know he wasn’t going to tolerate anymore beating around the bush. “And like it or not, I think I deserve to know. What the hell’s going on here, Vivian?”
TYPE A-POSITIVE
Vivian rubbed her arms, trying to ward off the sudden chill that had her hands shaking and her bare toes curling into the carpet. She knew darn well the apartment itself wasn’t cold; nor was she usually bothered much by changing temperatures one way or the other.
But this chill had much more to do with what she was feeling inside—big, fat, Jabba the Hut fear over how Sean was going to react when she told him exactly what the hell was going on, and guilt that he’d been put in this predicament at all. Her own anger at Angelina’s rogue behavior was there, too, but taking a distant back seat to the rest of her riotous emotions.
Taking a deep breath to steel her nerves, she linked her fingers at her waist and tried not to fidget while she faced him. Head on, eyes meeting, no running away from this one.
“There are…some things you don’t know about me,” she started slowly.
“Okay,” he said, watching and waiting.
“Did you ever wonder why I was more than willing to work with you any time you wanted, for as long as you wanted, provided it was at night? But that if anything needed done during daylight hours, I called in sick?”
His brows knit. “No. We all work late hours. It’s part of the job description. And everyone’s entitled to a sick day now and then.”
Right. Except she was never really sick, and no one else would burst into flames if they agreed to work overtime.
“Fine, you’re right, I blend in well. But trust me when I say that I didn’t just agree to work nights for the network, I accepted the job because I could.” And because it was an excuse to be closer to him eight hours out of every day. But he didn’t need to know that, at least not yet.
“Here’s the thing,” she said, deciding another approach was necessary. This time, she was going for the tear-it-off method, just like a Band-Aid. “I’m a vampire. I know you don’t care for them, which is part of the reason I never told you, but it’s true.”
For the longest minute of her life, he simply stared at her, face blank, eyes expressionless. And then he burst out laughing.
“Good one,” he told her. “So what really happened? Did I show up at your door after dropping you off the other night and tie one on? Maybe cry on your shoulder until you figured loading me up with alcohol was the only way to shut me up?”
“No.” She groaned in frustration. “I’m not kidding. I really am a vampire, and now…well, now so are you.”
He didn’t laugh this time, but he did scoff. “You’re a little late for playing trick-or-treat, Viv. Halloween was two months ago. And April Fool’s is still a ways off.”
“It’s not a trick or an April Fool’s.” Rounding the coffee table, she sat on the sofa beside him, getting close enough that he could look her directly in the eye and know she was serious. Then she lifted her lips and showed him her teeth.
“Look,” she said, tapping the pointy enamel. “Fangs. And you have them, too.”
Reaching over, she pulled back his upper lip and clicked her nail against one of his incisors. “Feel them with your tongue. They’re real.”
He did just that, and gave a small, startled jerk. With a shake of his head, he said, “Okay, that’s a bit far to go for a practical joke. What did you do, glue them in? And how long will the stuff last? I won’t have to try to eat with these in, will I?”
Oh, if he only knew. “You never have to eat again, if you don’t want to. You can stick to just drinking.”
“Drinking what?” he asked, but his voice sounded wary, as though he were finally beginning to believe her, even against his better judgment.
“You know what. Blood. Although you can stick with the synthetic stuff, if you want. It’s not quite as good as the real thing, but it’s perfectly healthy for you.”
“All right, that’s enough,” he snapped. Jumping to his feet, he rounded the low pinewood table and picked up pacing where she’d left off. “I am not going to start drinking blood. That’s just ridiculous. Not to mention disgusting.”
She raised a brow at his look of disdain. “I’ve got news for you, Sean, you already did. And if I remember correctly, after draining the entire glass, you said you were feeling ‘much better.’”
His gaze darted to the mug on the coffee table and the empty bottle of NuBlood plasma next to it. He paled slightly, and she saw his Adam’s apple bob up and down as he swallowed.
“I had no idea you had such a vivid imagination,” he muttered, apparently still in denial. “Or such a cruel streak. But I’m damn well sick of it now, so knock it off. I don’t know how I got here or what you’ve been up to since I arrived, but I think it’s about time I went home.”
The look of anger, betrayal, and she suspected near-hatred on his face cut her to the bone.
“Wait!” she called out as he headed for the door.
He paused, allowing her to catch up, but didn’t turn around. She stopped a few inches from his rigid form, resisting the urge to reach out and touch him.
“I’m sorry you don’t believe me,” she murmured softly. “I’m e
ven more sorry that you think I’m being cruel or that I would ever lie to you about something like this. We’ve been together a long time. I’d like to think you’d know me a little better than that by now.”
And that was what really hurt; that they’d worked together for more than two years and she’d been half in love with him for every day of them, yet he didn’t have it in him to believe her about this, or at least hear her out.
“But here’s the truth, whether you choose to take me at my word or not. I’m a vampire. And thanks to a friend who came over to console me after you told me you were dying, you’re a vampire now, too. I didn’t ask her to turn you. She took that upon herself, wrapping you up in a bow and leaving you on my sofa like some kind of life-size Christmas present.”
His head tilted down and he saw the big, red ribbon, which she assumed he hadn’t noticed until she pointed it out. And he must not have been amused because he tore it off over his head and pitched it to the floor at his feet.
“The problem is,” she continued, ignoring the gesture, “now that you are a vampire, there are a few things that are going to take some getting used to.”
He didn’t turn around, but he wasn’t storming out, either, which she took as a semi-decent sign. “The blood, for one thing. You can eat regular food, anything you want. But only blood will fill you up and keep you strong. And for a while, until the transformation has truly taken root, you’re going to be hungrier and need more than usual.”
She waited a moment to let that sink in, then licked her lips and went on. “I know you want to leave, but it might be a good idea to hang around for a while. I’ll fill you in, answer any questions you have, and I’ve got plenty of plasma on hand to keep you from getting sick. And if you still don’t believe me by the time the sun comes up…”
She swallowed hard, not wanting to utter the next words, but knowing they were necessary if she was ever going to convince him of his new immortality. “Well, I guess you could always open the blinds and test my theory. Being incinerated is a hell of a lot faster than dying of some slow-moving disease, anyway.” Though she wasn’t sure it would be any less painful. Thankfully, she hadn’t yet had the occasion to find out.
