Cravings (14 page)

"HEY, I have a present in the trunk," he said, returning to the car with
their room key.

"A pillow?" she asked brightly. "Your trunk's certainly long enough to
stretch out in."

"Yuck, no." He opened her door, waited impatiently while she slowly climbed
out, then slammed it and popped the trunk. He withdrew a bag with the Target
logo, and tossed it to her.

"Awww," she said. "Plastic. Gee, I didn't get you anything."

"Open it, wiseass. Sheesh. If I hadn't known you before you were a
blood-sucking fiend of the night, I'd think all vampires were this weird."

"Oh, we are." She opened the bag and saw several t-shirts, a few pairs of
shorts, two cardigans: one in white, one in black. "Oh. Clothes."

"Well, you sort of joined me with, like, just the stuff on your back, and I
know you don't need to shower or anything, but new clothes are kind of nice,
doncha think?"

He was watching her so anxiously, her dead heart almost skipped a beat.
"They're very nice," she assured him. "Very thoughtful. Thank you."

"Sure."

"I don't have any money to pay you b—"

"Forget it. We're on the end, here, second floor." He led her through the
lobby and into the elevator. "Listen," he continued when the doors closed, "what
have
you been doing for money?"

She blinked at him. She didn't have to blink much anymore, but she liked to
do it for effect. "Nothing, of course. What do I need money for? Food? Shelter?
Warm clothes? Bikinis? Sunscreen? A family to feed?" She tried—and failed—to
keep the bitterness out of her voice. "Let's not forget, for the last few years
I've been little more than an animal. This is probably the first time I've even
thought
about money in six years."

"Huh."

That was all he said as they exited the elevator, walked down the hall, and
entered their room like robots who didn't know each other. The room faced west,
and she was gratified to see the curtains were thick.

"So what about your folks?" he asked, just when she thought he was going to
shut up for a while.

She'd been pretending to read the "Welcome to the Super 8" brochure. "What
about them?"

"Well… aren't you going to tell them you aren't dead?"

She stood, crossed to him, took his hand, and placed it in the middle of her
chest. Then waited patiently. Then said, "I am dead, Daniel. Please note the
absence of a pulse."

He didn't move his hand, but made an impatient expression with his eyebrows.
"You know what I mean."

"Well, let's see… my mom left my dad when I was twelve, and I haven't seen
her since, and last I heard Dad was off somewhere in New Jersey with Stepmother
Number Three. I doubt they noticed I was dead."

"Oh," he said. Then, "Sorry."

"It's nothing."

"How come I didn't get invited to your funeral?"

"I'm sorry," she said politely. "Your invitation must have gotten lost in the
garbage disposal."

"Now, cut that out! You know what I mean."

"Look, I wasn't exactly around to plan the fucking thing, okay? Ask the
funeral director why you weren't invited.
I
was busy clawing my way out
of my own grave."

"
O-kay
. Y'don't have to be so touchy."

"And you don't have to be such a dumbass," she snapped, "and yet, you seem
unable to stop."

"Well, it's better than being a bitch!"

"No, it is
not
!"

"Yeah, it
is!"'

"You know,
most
people would have the sense to be afraid of me, but
you
, you're too dumb!"

"Afraid of what? A bloodsucking shrew?"

"Do you even know," she asked with deadly venom, "what a shrew is?"

"A shrew," he said, his index finger stabbing her nose, "is a woman of
violent temper. It's also a small mouselike animal with a sharp nose."

She paused. "I'm going to make you
eat
that dictionary."

"Try it, cutie. I'll bounce you across this room like a Super Ball."

"I don't want to be bounced like a Super Ball," she admitted, and he cracked
up.

"Awwwww," he said when he had finished hee-hawing like a donkey. "Our first
fight."

"I could snap your neck," she commented, "like a toothpick."

"You'd never hurt your driver, sugar buns!"

She concealed a shudder. "Please don't ever call me that again."

"What were we fighting about again? Because we shouldn't go to bed angry at
each other."

"You're confusing us with newlyweds." The thought would have made her blush,
if she still could have. Sadly, Smelly's blood had been long metabolized and she
was back to being corpse white until she fed again. "Never mind. Chalk it up to
a long day."

He patted the bed. "Well, you can sleep… or whatever you do… right now." He
flopped onto the bed and groped for the remote. "The nice thing about having you
for a roommate, absolutely nothing wakes you up."

"I'm so happy for you." She gingerly climbed on the bed and stretched out
beside him. "Honestly? It doesn't… creep you out or anything?"

"Heck no!" he said, a little too heartily. At her piercing stare, he added,
"Well… a little. I held my finger under your nose for, like, an hour—nothing.
Not a single tickle of breath."

"I hope you washed it first."

"My finger?" he teased. "Or your nose?"

"Very funny."

"But anyway, once I got used to it… no biggie. I mean—no offense—but you were
always different."

"Yes," she said, staring at the ceiling. "I suppose I was."

"I should have gone out with you in college."

"It doesn't matter now."

"I was an idiot."

"Yes."

"But sometimes," he said, reaching for her hand, "things can be fixed."

"And sometimes," she said, gently extricating her fingers from his, "they
can't. It's too late now, Daniel. Years too late. We were just different people
then
. Now we're different creatures entirely."

"That doesn't mean you can't have a fresh start."

She sighed and put a hand over her eyes. "Daniel, dear, you're so dumb you
make me tired. Because that's exactly what it means. I'm sorry to be blunt."

"I'm not as dumb as you think, you know," he said with mild heat, but half
his attention was already captured by ESPN.

"Of course not," she agreed. "You're just dumb compared to
me
."

"Go to sleep," he said sourly.

"I can't. The sun isn't up y—"

THE first thing she heard, hours later, was Daniel yawning like a bear at
the end of winter. "Finally," he said by way of greeting. "I didn't think you
were ever gonna wake up. And did you know it's one, two, three, you're zonked? I
thought you'd had a stroke or something."

"Fine, thanks, how are you?"

"Very funny." He yawned again. "Would you check in that bedside drawer for
the HBO guide? I can't find it anywhere."

"Why?" she asked, rolling over and groping for the knob. "We're staying in to
watch
The Sopranos
instead of driving the last half hour to St. Paul?"

"I just like to know what's on," he said. "Hey, you should be glad I'm
reading."

"Oh, I'm thrilled," she assured him. Her lips wanted to smile but she sternly
repressed them. "I'm—" Her hand dropped into the drawer and instantly she was on
fire; her mind was equal parts agony and surprise and fury: surprise at the
pain, agony at the pain, fury that she could be so stupid.

Her shriek brought Daniel off the bed and at her side in less than a
heartbeat; she didn't think a mortal could move so fast. She was holding her
wrist with her left hand. Her right hand was smoking. The drawer had pulled all
the way out of the table, and the Gideon Bible had tumbled to the floor.

"Oh my
God
," Daniel gasped, which made her shriek louder. "Your
hand, Andy, your poor—" He hauled her off the bed, kicked the Bible under the
bed, and then he was running the tap in the bathroom, taking her poor crisped
paw and running it carefully under the cool water. "Andy, I'm so sorry, I
didn't—I should have—"

She took a deep shuddering breath, which made her dizzy, but calmed her a
bit, too. "It's my own fault. I should have known it was in there. It's in every
bedside drawer in every motel in the country." She shivered against him. "It
hurts," she added dully.

"Of course it does, poor baby. If you were anyone but… well,
you
,
we'd be calling 911 this minute and taking you to the ER. But…" He looked at her
doubtfully, doubtless picturing a frantic intern trying to find her pulse, her
blood pressure, anything.

"It will heal," she said. She dared a peek at her hand. At least it wasn't
boiling smoke anymore. Her thumb was blackened, but the rest of her fingers
merely had the dark red look of boiled lobster. "Eventually."

"This is bogus," Daniel said angrily. "I get that you're a vampire and all,
but you were forced into it, and it's not like you're munching on first-graders.
What's God got against you?"

"I don't know," she replied, "but He appears to be plenty pissed."

"Well, shit. That's not fair."

"This is—is the Creator, remember? Not known for his scrupulous sense of fair
play. He asked Jacob to kill his own son, if memory serves, set Eve up, screwed
over the Jews… oh, all sorts of things. He never plays fair. He doesn't have
to—it's his board game."

"For a vampire, you know a lot about it."

"Theology minor," she reminded him.

He turned the water off, took a snow-white hand towel from the shelf, and
gently patted her hand dry. It stung like mad, but it wasn't the burning agony
it had been before.

"Poor Andy," he said again, and kissed the tip of her middle finger, which
was dark pink. "I'm really sorry. Should have got the damned HBO guide myself."

"You read my mind."

He laughed and hugged her to him. "Cripes, woman, you scared the shit out of
me. You got some lungs on you, didja know?"

"It's not every day I feel the agony of myself bursting into flames. To think
I used to fantasize about walking on the beach during sunrise! Well, forget
that."

His grip tightened. He was so tall, his chin rested on her head. "Don't talk
about that," he said into her part. "Not anymore, okay?"

"I think it's safe to say my self-destructive streak is at an end for now,"
she said truthfully into his neck. His lovely, taut neck. She could actually see
the blood pressure pumping up his jugular, and jerked back.

"Oh, come on, don't do that," he said coaxingly, grabbing her elbow and
pulling her back into his embrace. Her burned hand stuck out behind him like a
crosswalk sign. "We were kind of having a moment and everything."

"Uh… Daniel… it's not that I'm not finding this pleasant, because I truly
am…"

"Good. Now stop talking and enjoy it."

She growled at him.

"Oh, go ahead and bite, then," he murmured. "I don't care. And I bet it'll
make your hand feel better, huh? The only thing is, if I pass out, you've got to
get me to the car and drive the rest of the way."

"Daniel, you have no fucking idea what you're saying."

"Sure I do. I think you're pretty cool. It's not that I didn't like you in
school; I just didn't bother to get to know you. But now… I think you're a tough
chick handling herself in an unbelievably sucky situation. Also, you've got a
great rack for a dead girl."

"For crying out loud," she said, resting her forehead on his shoulder. "I
suppose you think you're being sweet."

"Awww, you can't resist me, gorgeous."

"Dammit!"

"I couldn't help but notice," he said, running his hands up and down her back
as she snuggled more firmly into his embrace, "that you didn't exactly deny it.
You just swore again. It totally proves me ri—mmph!"

She was kissing him. She couldn't believe she was doing it… had gotten up
just the right amount on her tiptoes and mashed her lips to his. Oh, sweet
relief. She'd wanted to do it for eight years. Of course, she'd only remembered
wanting to do it for the last seventy-two hours, but forgetting hadn't made him
less of the boy she'd pined after in college, the boy she'd followed to St. Olaf
from Carleton College, the man she pined for now. She'd left a school to follow
a football player, and had despised herself for it at the time, and ever since.

There was nothing to despise, now. He was good, he was kind, he liked her, he
didn't wince away in horror at what she was. So what if she had a few IQ points
on him? What had that gotten her, exactly? An early grave, that's what.

His tongue eased past her lips and her good hand slid through his short hair,
caressing the fine hairs at the back of his neck. His hand was under her shirt,
stroking her bare back, and then she bit him.

Now he was the one up on his toes, trembling, and as his hot salty essence
flooded her mouth the burning agony in her hand faded, faded, was a slight pain,
was a negligible itch, was gone. She could hear him groaning, could feel him
groping at her, and then her shirt was in shreds, and his was split down the
middle, and they were dancing/ staggering out of the bathroom, toward the bed,
pulling and tugging and biting and drinking and kissing.

Her back hit the bed and she disengaged, threw her head back and groaned at
the ceiling. He leaned down and kissed the blood from her fangs and she nipped
him again, gently, and sucked on his upper lip, and then he was tearing her
cotton shorts down the middle, ripping her panties away, and she got the fly of
his jeans open, got them partway down his hips, burrowed past his Jockeys and
got hold of his cock—oh, warmth, warmth, hot stiff warmth and he wanted her so
badly he was shaking with it and she could have wept with sheer gratitude, but
instead she arched toward him, locked her ankles around his back, and when he
came in for the stroke she bit him again, on the other side of his neck.

He hissed, but not in pain.

He was so warm, it was like being fucked by an electric blanket, except
infinitely sexier, and she came at once, with fresh blood in her mouth and that
hot hard part of him digging into her, pushing, stroking, shoving.

She shoved back and he groaned and gently slid his palm over her nipple, then
gripped her breast, hard, and bent, and pulled the stiff peak into his mouth,
and bit her. She was swallowing and licking the blood from her fangs and came
again when his warm mouth closed over her, when his teeth nipped her tender
flesh. She grabbed the bedspread and heard it rip beneath her groping fingers.

"Daniel," she called, wild with wanting and fear that she was hurting him, he
was mortal, he was fragile, he—he was coming inside her, she could feel her
temperature change as he filled her up.

"Andy," he managed.

"Don't—call me—that—"

"Andy," he said again, and dropped his head to her shoulder, and was
insensible for half an hour.

 

"DAMN!" he said when he regained consciousness. "You are a
demon
in
the sack! You've, like, ruined me for live girls forever."

"Eww, don't say it like that," she said. "And get off me, will you?"

"Oh, right. Sorry." He rolled to his side. "Cripes, you're squashed right
into the mattress. I must have been crushing you—how long was I out?"

"It's no big deal. It's not like I had to breathe." Actually, she had spent
that half an hour stroking his hair and listening to his long and even breaths,
listening to his pulse, wondering at the thud-thud-thud thundering in her ears,
and thinking maybe, just maybe her life hadn't gone into the shifter after all.

She had no idea vampires could have sex—well, she'd imagined they
could
,
they had all the right equipment, but she hadn't thought it would be like
flying, like soaring above the clouds, like—like being alive. It was—traitorous
thought!—better than drinking blood.

"Are you all right? Not too shaky or anything? I'm afraid I might have gotten
carried away."

"No chance, sugar, check this." He bounded up, then did half a dozen jumping
jacks. She watched his penis bob around energetically and fought a grin. "I feel
like a million bucks! I feel like I could go clubbing all night long! Want to?"

"Dead girls don't dance," she laughed.

He pounced on her and nuzzled her cleavage. "Fine, be a grump… how about you?
How's the hand?"

She flexed it for him.

"Niiiiice," he said, gently stroking the unblemished skin. "I'll be taking full
credit for that, by the way. My kick-ass blood and mighty dick were just the
curative powers you needed."

"I'm about three seconds from putting you through the window," she said,
smiling. "I don't think there's enough room on this bed for you, me, and your
overly satisfied male ego."

"We'll
make
room, bay-bee!" He gave her a hearty smack on the mouth.
"Ummm…" He busied himself with her mouth for a minute and she kissed him back,
thinking about flying, thinking about being alive, when he pulled back and said,
"How about you? Did you like it? I know it's been a while and you were kind of
freaking out about it… Jeez, like—sorry," he added, seeing her flinch. "I keep
forgetting."

"It's not your fault. And it was wonderful. Really very wonderful. Thanks for
letting me feed."

"Oh, baby, if I get laid when you feed, then slap a sign on my ass and call
me a buffet."

She started giggling and couldn't stop. He bounded into the bathroom and she heard him yell, "Check this! All my bite marks have
totally healed!"

"I think there's an enzyme or something in a vampire bite," she called after
him. "It promotes fast healing."

"Well, Jeez, that's the coolest—sorry." He came out, looking at her
curiously. "What's it like?"

"What? Watching you preen? Stupefying."

"No, when I say something about G—uh, the Big Guy. I mean, I know what it's
like when something from that neighborhood touches you—" He shuddered. "And I
never want to see it again. Or hear it! You screamed like you were—"

"On fire?" she suggested dryly.

"But what's it like for you, just hearing the name or whatever?"

"It makes me feel like throwing up," she said simply. "Like my stomach has
turned inside out and I'm going to vomit or die or both. It's—it's awful."

"Oh. Well, I'll try really really hard to curb the taking of the Big Guy's
name in vain."

"You won't have to worry about it much longer," she pointed out, though her
stomach turned inside out—and he hadn't even cursed!—at the thought. "We're
almost there. Drop me off and away you go."

"No," he said stubbornly. "That wasn't the deal. I'm taking you to see this
badass vampire queen,
that
was the deal."

"Mmmmm."

"Don't grunt at me, missy. And don't be thinking about ditching me, either."

"Wouldn't dream of it. But Daniel, have you really considered this? Not all
vampires are like me, you know."

"Cripes, I hope not." He was examining his shredded clothing and scowling at
her.

"No, I mean it. Comparably speaking, I'm a pussycat. Most vampires are much,
much worse." She shivered. "The ones that killed me, for example. Minnesota
nice, my ass."

"For crying out loud, Andy, did you, like,
eat
my jeans?" He tossed
the ruined clothes toward the garbage can. "Have you ever met any? Bad vampires,
I mean? Since you've been one?"

"I ran into one or two while I was passing through, but they didn't have
anything to do with me. I wasn't really fit for adult conversation at the time,"
she admitted. "Too young. One of them tried to help me but I ran away from him.
He was…" Terrifying. All height and dark flashing eyes and power, such a sense
of power! He wore it like he wore the expensive clothes. And his eyes… she knew
if she stayed a second longer she wouldn't be able to refuse him, so she'd fled.
He'd been kind ("What is your name?") and concerned ("How old are you?") but
he'd been too strong ("Stay a minute.") and she couldn't abide being near him,
not for another minute, another second. And he'd let her go. She'd been as
relieved as she'd been disappointed. "Anyway. Most of them are bad. And the
queen… the new queen… she'll be the worst of us all."

"How come?"

"Because the vampire she defeated—Nostro—was really
really
bad."