V Is for Vampire Page 2

  Cheeky.

  “You can’t keep me in your apartment like a pet,” she said. “On the goddamn surface.” Shit, out of the frying pan, into the fire. Might as well turn her uv-80 on herself. The thought made her squint around for windows in the room, but she couldn’t find any. Maybe it was a basement apartment, but still.

  “I’m well aware of that.” He hooked a foot under a chair and drew it out from the small kitchen table behind him. Turned the thing backwards and sat, spraddled, arms folding across the back of the chair. Not an ugly picture at all. If November didn’t want to beat his ass, she’d probably have any number of workplace-inappropriate comments ready.

  “Well, you need to figure this shit out, Leo. I can’t stay up here.”

  “I will,” he said. “But first I need to figure out how I’m gonna explain why I set my gate to auto-lockdown at the same time an alarm went off underground, and now my partner’s missing. Better hope no one at the main office is paying attention too close, because they’re never gonna believe I left for two hours to take a piss.” He held eye contact now, and November gave him a sliver of credit. This was a legitimate first fire to put out. Not that she absolved him from setting it in the first place.

  “Do you want anything?” he asked after the silence spread.

  She exhaled. Her ribs hurt and November took another look at her side. Blood everywhere. Sticky. She made a face. “You got a shower?”

  “Right through there.” Leo pointed over her shoulder, and she twisted her neck to see an even darker rectangle in the space—an open door.

  “Okay.” She sighed. Pushed herself to her feet and then took a moment, swaying in place, deciding whether her bruised limbs had strength. When everything steadied out, November made a small ‘stay put’ gesture with splayed palms, as though that would be what kept her standing, and moved around the furniture toward the bathroom door.

  She got there and fumbled for a light panel. Found one. The mirrored wall behind the sink told her no lies. November’s face looked like she’d plowed head-first along a hallway of industrial carpet. Her tank top and pants like she’d fought a roll of concertina wire and lost.

  “You care about this towel in here?”

  “I don’t care about towels,” came his voice from the other room, sounding tired. “Use whatever you need.”

  November did just that. She shut the door and shucked off the rest of her ruined uniform. Figured out the spray system in his tub-shower and stepped inside, pulling the rediglass closed behind her.

  Lukewarm water was enough—her still-tender skin wasn’t ready for the kind of scalding heat she normally liked. She stuck her head under the spray and tried to melt past the tension in her limbs. Watery red streamers spiraled down to the drain.

  The surface. When was the last time anyone V-positive had tried to stay up here? The early twenty-second century? The uv was out of control. Even at night. The fuck had this kid been thinking, bringing her up here?

  He’s twenty-seven. Hardly a kid.

  But compared to her …

  The sting at her ribs and thigh was not going away, and the vampire brought her attention back to eyeball what was left of the wounds. She made a face and nudged at the ragged laceration on her side with careful fingertips. It wasn’t actively bleeding now, but neither had the flesh knit closed, like it should’ve. She’d coughed up all the gold—what was the problem?

  As if in response, her stomach made a noise.

  Your broke ass hasn’t had anything to eat in a week.

  And by ‘anything to eat,’ she meant blood. Regular food was all well and good for a while. But just like the ancient sailors coming down with scurvy until they figured out it was a good idea to keep a fucking lemon or two on board, if anyone V-positive went without refreshing their bloodstream for too long … well, it wasn’t pretty.

  She already wasn’t healing properly.

  Goddamn this idiot.

  November gave a low growl and finished scrubbing crusted blood from her skin, avoiding the two open wounds. She cut the spray off and stepped out into the humid little room. Swiped the hanging towel and patted rather than wiped herself dry. No sense in agitating things.

  Her clothes were on the floor in a bloody heap, and November curled a lip. Nope. This neg was gonna lend her a shirt or something. She wrapped the towel under her armpits, instead.

  “Hey,” she said, stepping out into the cooler living area, “you have got to take me back.”

  Leo was in the kitchen now, and he turned at the sound of her voice. His mouth came open and stayed that way a full beat before words came out, while hazel eyes took in legs and female shoulders and wet hair. “We just went over this,” he said after he got done realizing she was a woman. “You know I can’t do that right this instant.”

  “I need to eat.” She held his eyes, pointed.

  “I’m making us food right now,” he said, gesturing behind him at some package on the counter.

  “No,” she said, “my wounds aren’t healing. I need to eat.”

  His brows went up as her meaning took hold, but then shoulders sagged in defeat. The gate guard sighed. “Still,” he said, “I can’t take you. What do you want me to do?”

  “Go fetch me bloodmeal, then.” November crossed her arms over her chest and looked him up and down, weight on one leg. From the looks of his apartment, GateSec didn’t pay any better on the surface than it did underground, but the powdered concentrate was as cheap as it was going to get. She knew; it was what she bought every payday.

  The man exhaled and tilted his head to one side. Leaned his tailbone against the counter. “Look,” he said, “that may be readily available underground? But up here it’s a controlled substance. I can’t just ‘go get some.’ ”

  November narrowed her eyes, but it only made him flail a hand.

  “I’m telling you,” he said. “I’d have to know someone in pharma—which I don’t”—he preempted her immediate question, jutting his chin forward—“and I’d have to risk my security clearance, aka my whole job—as if I haven’t already done enough of that today—just asking someone to divert a shipment. I’m not gonna do it. Okay?”

  A controlled substance? Really? Was that just in S-Seattle, or all over the place? What the fuck would the negs do with it anyway? Who even cared?

  “So.” She shifted her weight. “You won’t take me back. And you won’t feed me.”

  Leo searched her face, frustration plain. November decided to push.

  “You think I’m a pain in your ass now?” she said. “Wait until I haven’t eaten for a couple more days.” One of the first things she’d lose control of was her temper. Negs may have coined the term ‘hangry,’ but vampires had given it teeth.

  The gate guard looked from her to the floor, the line of his mouth twisting down. “Ffuck.” He was going somewhere he clearly didn’t want to go. “You could …” A palm scrubbed at the side of his jaw. He met her eyes again. “I mean, I could …” His hands spread into a tentative shrug.

  November blinked at him. Then she laughed. “Are you kidding?”

  “I mean … it’s kind of my fault you’re even here.”

  Kind of?

  She tilted her head. “Have you ever been a live donor before?”

  Leo looked at his feet again. “Once. It’s a training requirement. So we … know what we’re up against.” A cringe of lines forked at one side of his face to admit it. She couldn’t tell whether he was disgusted by the memory or embarrassed by the way GateSec assumed half their own employees were no more than rabid dogs, even in this day and age.

  November adjusted the fold of her arms and the towel rubbed the gash on her ribs. “You know what?” she said. “Fine. Alright.” She would call his bluff. “In the bathtub.”

  His brows condensed. “What?”

  “I don’t have a lot of practice with live clean-up,” she said. “I’m gonna make a mess.” The threat of his own blood spilling would shut his bullshit o
ffer right down.

  Her gate partner’s throat moved, swallowing at the new, close rush of reality. November couldn’t deny a small bloom of satisfaction at the response. She watched him inhale and exhale more than once, and make a purposeful effort to drop his shoulders. He’d be a bigger newb than she’d thought if he wasn’t at least somewhat nervous to make a live donation to a complete stranger in an uncontrolled environment. She wasn’t starving, so he probably wouldn’t get hurt.

  Probably.

  “Right now, I assume?” Here it came. He was going to back out.

  She gave him a frank look. “Yup.”

  Leo nodded, chewing the inside of his lower lip and breaking eye contact. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

  He pushed himself away from the counter, whatever packaged meal he was going to make abandoned, and headed toward the bathroom.

  That’s fine. He can be dinner.

  November followed, in a sort of aloof skepticism, ready for him to freak out and double back at any step. He turned the light back on in the little room and was sliding the rediglass divider open on the tub by the time she stepped into the bathroom behind him.

  When he turned, she already had the towel draped over the edge of the sink.

  Leo’s eyes went wide at the naked vampire staring back at him, and November gave an airy snort. She might have been his age or younger, as far as the years on her body showed. The aging process ground to a halt for V-positives not long after they grew in their third set of cuspids, usually in their early twenties.

  She twitched him a smirk. Her fangs would be plain whether she wanted him to see them or not. Their mutual employer had all the neg guards taking Fortizan—job requirement. Her pheromones wouldn’t do shit. But GateSec didn’t need a security risk like hypnosis going around unchecked. That’s how problems got started.

  “You too, Tall, Dark and Nutritious.” She eyed him up and down. “Unless you want to try to get more blood out of that uniform later.”

  His mouth thinned into a flustered line, a not-unattractive byproduct of how little he’d thought out this offer of his, and he stripped off his uniform shirt. Then the blood-splattered white tank he wore under, off over the back of his neck in that pleasant-to-look-at way men had. November could have done far worse for a meal.

  Another knot of his features while he dropped the shirts on the floor, looking everywhere in the room but at her. The belt came next, and then muscled legs stepping out of boots, pants, and socks.

  November held back a hum of approval.

  Far worse.

  “Could you take that off?” She waved her fingers back and forth at the base of her own neck, to indicate a fine golden chain he wore around his. The liquid sunshine had been enough for one day. The last thing November needed was actual, solid gold branding her face while she ate.

  “Oh.” Leo’s hand went to the necklace. “Right.” He worked the clasp and laid it aside on the sink.

  There was no point in dragging it out. She stepped past him and into the tub. Braced her palm against the shower wall to lower herself down, to kneel in the wet basin, her back to the narrower wall. She turned her focus back to Leo Croix, expectant.

  “Um …” He took in the vampire waiting for him, indifferent to her own nudity, and shoved his palms down his thighs, lost. Vulnerable.

  Her stomach growled again, and November saw his eyes widen. Fuck it. If she was going to be stuck on the surface, of all the goddamn places, then she was going to eat this extremely attractive young man for dinner.

  “I have no way to guarantee I’ll be able to stay on my feet the whole time,” she said looking up at him. “And neither do you.”

  “What do you want me to do?” His voice had distilled down to much less confident tones. She could see his chest rise and fall. Saliva pooled under her tongue.

  “Sit down,” she said. “Between my knees. Face that way.” She tossed a hand at the opposite wall.

  And he did. Amazing. Credit where credit was due.

  The tub hadn’t been designed for that many limbs, and her knees pressed in tight to his hips. He had to sit with his legs butterflied apart, awkward, and he started when her belly and tight breasts curved down in contact with his back, his shoulders.

  Fuck me, so warm.

  “This would be a real bad time to panic,” she said, sliding lower so her mouth hovered over the crook of his neck.

  Leo inhaled and exhaled, deep. “I’m gonna try not to,” he said to the shower wall, an unconvinced lilt to his words.

  She almost felt bad. With hypnosis off the table, she couldn’t make the initial bite painless. The rush would kick in, after a point, but still …

  “Just don’t tense up.” Her advice fell quieter at his ear, more intimate than she’d intended, but it was probably a moot point, with her landing strip already scrubbing his tailbone.

  November took a loose hold of his shoulders, just above where they decided to become biceps. She could see the pulse at his throat, and her own heartbeat sped to match.

  This was rich people stuff. Live feeding. She’d only done it a couple times: the first a birthday gift from her mother, and then years later after she’d saved like a fiend. And those had been the kind of straight-laced, supervised sessions a person like her could afford in U-Seattle. There was no one here to watch her with Leo. No one to intercede on his behalf, if she lost her shit.

  And he smelled … expensive.

  “I can’t make this not hurt,” she said, unable to stop herself from nuzzling his throat with her open mouth. “I’m sorry.”

  “I get it.” His voice was thick now. “Just … try not to kill me.”

  November couldn’t help a smile. “If I kill you, I’ll never be able to talk you into giving me seconds.” She wet her lips. “Leo.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Hold still.”

  She bit down.

  “Oh, fuck!”

  There was no pulling out to shush him. Vampire fangs sank deep, and her fingers curled to grip muscle.

  “Oh my god, shit!”

  Don’t panic, idiot.

  Her donor growled against the pain, and November fed.

  Sweet fuck, did he taste good. Fresh compared to bloodmeal was sun-raised cane sugar after decades of that shit that came in packets. She had to calm down. Pace herself.

  His neck was cording; the instinct to fight her off a bear to keep in check, and November took a breath through her nose. Let it out. She relaxed her grip and let one arm slide around, high on his chest, the backs of her knuckles stroking the plane of flesh to soothe.

  She felt him try to relax, and he managed, to a degree, but November could still feel the tension in his jaw, high against her temple. The liquid, metallic heat of him was an overwhelming draw, coating her tongue, zinging past her taste buds, but she’d established a pilot bite now, and her gate partner needed reassurance.

  The vampire pulled back, nearly panting, and the moment she broke the seal, a red, wet track spilled down the gutter of a collarbone. It made a slow course past healthy muscle, a rare and fine display. Beautiful.

  “Leo.” She caught her breath.

  His response shuddered out of him. “Yeah?”

  “You’re doing great.”

  He exhaled, calming. Fists unclenching at his sides.

  “And you’re fucking delicious.”

  She fell back into it, fangs finding the same way they’d opened before.

  “Ngh! Christ!”

  Her arm around his shoulders was solid this time, and Leo’s head fell back. Under her fingertips, a nipple tightened, and a different sort of grunt vibrated into her right ear.

  Leonide Croix had hit the rush.

  Yessss.

  November let go and ate sloppy. She didn’t maintain a seal, and hot, vibrant life went streaking down the front of her entree. Her eyes fluttered open while she drank and the view over Leo’s shoulder was spectacular. A taste of every last thing the man was kept c
oming, flooding into her mouth, running a river down her throat. An aggressive itch at her ribs and thigh told November her wounds were closing. And between her new gate partner’s thighs, his cock was twitching to life.

  Don’t be selfish, Kitamura. Thank your host.

  She uncurled her circling arm, drawing from the tap at his neck all the while. The tracks of blood were too pretty to leave alone and, on her way, November smeared a palm to paint a slick, lateral streak. Visceral marks from her fingers dressing those core muscles that bunched under that sweetest of hurts.

  Her touch moved lower and Leo jerked.

  “Oh god.”

  November extracted herself enough from her meal to curve a suggestion—four fingers and a thumb—around the base of her partner’s prick. His own blood already matted half the dark hair curling there, the end of its wet course before it dripped between his cheeks to the basin and carved a vibrant path to the drain. She gave him the preview of a squeeze. A stroke. In return, she got a hiss and a groan.

  “Yeah?” November visited the bite with a pass of her tongue, not wanting to waste while she waited. He’d offered blood, not anything else.

  He nodded, urgent, head still thrown back on her shoulder. “Yeah.” The confirmation was a low breath, and his right hand moved to fold a grip around hers.

  November hummed, satisfied. “A little something for your donation, then.”

  She dragged a shameless lick up the side of his neck, and then dipped down to feed, again. With a hand on his cock and teeth in his flesh, the guard made conflicting sounds. The vampire consumed them all.

  He stood thick in her hand, upright and scalding hot. November let her fingers play, exploring the shape, the girth of him, even as she measured the sips she took at his throat. The glut was past, this was only enjoyment now.

  She turned her grip overhand and screwed it to the root of his shaft, twisting as she went to soak the side of her hand in the blood pooling here. To streak it up the length of him and slick the movements of her fist. The man shuddered, pleasure or revulsion or both, but his arm came up on the side where she drank. Fingers brushed beneath her hair to the back of her neck, pressing. Urging her to take.