by L. L. Ash
It all happened so fast, I was suddenly unbuckled and Clarence was pushing up against his window, pointed upward as the car dropped on it’s side. His arms gripped me in a painful embrace as he pushed against the passenger door and he threaded our bodies through the glass of the driver’s window. His head went first, taking the brunt of the glass until we were free falling. His arms stayed completely around me and he aimed himself back down toward the ground beneath us. Within a second of being pushed off the cliff, I felt my body crush into the ground, and heard bones snap as Clarence broke my fall. I passed out the moment we hit the ground.
When I came to I realized I still lay on a boney, bloody mess underneath me. My eyes were hazy and unfocused, but as I assessed the damage done to myself, I realized that the boney, bloody mess was Clarence. I pushed myself off him, screaming out in pain as my shoulder and arm seized. But the pain couldn’t stop the sheer agony of knowing Clarence was dead. Crushed to death protecting me from the fall. His eyes were closed, his head likely smashed to pieces where he’d made contact with the dry, sandy earth. His ribs were caved in where I had landed on him, and every bone in his body looked shattered after that fall. It was beyond me how I could have survived, but it really didn’t seem important anymore as I stared at him, broken and battered and I had no way to save him.
I started sobbing, begging him to come back, but he didn’t. It was almost an hour later, staring at him as I cried in pain from my own wounds, before I heard a pop.
Startled out of my sobbing, I looked around.
POP
I jumped again, sending shooting pain through my arm as I cradled it to my chest.
More pops, and more jumps until I realized the noise was coming from beside me. As the sounds met my ears, I watched as his flattened chest inflated again, the popping being the bones as they snapped back into place around his crushed lungs.
Minutes passed as the noise kept happening, and then another noise made me jump. A groan.
The pure torture in the tone of his groan told me the pain he must have been experiencing, even though he wasn’t conscious. It took several more minutes before his body appeared to be normal, and several more before his eyes fluttered open.
“Fucking hell,” he ground out as he managed to turn himself onto his side, his skin almost transparent it was so pale.
His glowing ice eyes met mine and he seemed to suddenly remember what had happened and why he was in pain, lying in the dirt. Panic passed over his face as he assessed me visually.
“Are you ok?” he asked in a dry, scratchy voice.
“A hell of a lot better than you! I thought you were dead!”
He tried a weak smile before saying, “Vampire, remember?”
Clarence took another minuted to gain his strength on the ground before he stood unsteadily and tried to help me up.
I cried out in pain before he managed to get me to my feet, pulling on my good arm and looked alarmed at the outburst.
“I think I broke my arm, and maybe my shoulder in the fall,” I told him, not bothering to mention my throbbing head and aching hip and back.
He stood for a moment, as if battling with himself before he lifted his wrist to his mouth and tore open the skin there.
Blood dripped down his wrist and arm as he held it to my lips.
Repulsed, I backed away and shot more pain through my arm.
“Drink,” he said weakly. “My blood will heal you.”
“No, I can’t...”
“Please, Addie,” he begged softly. “I need you strong or I may still die yet.”
Fear beat the repulsion so when he tore his wrist back open with his fangs, I squeezed my eyes shut and put the flesh to my mouth, salty blood flowing over my lips and tongue.
Clarence fell to his knees as the wound closed up again, and I felt his blood like ice flowing down my throat and into my stomach. Almost instantly my shoulder and arm began to pop, sending sharp pains through me until suddenly, the pain was gone. I felt invigorated and full of energy. Clarence looked like he was dying again.
I put his arm over my shoulders and helped him up, feeling strength I hadn’t ever felt before. I helped him for something close to a mile as he turned colder and paler, metaphorically melting in the heat of the sun. When we reached a road again, we followed for another half mile until we reached a roach motel.
We didn’t even stop to get a key. Instead we went to the nearest door and Clarence burst into it with what little strength he had left and pointed me toward the bathroom.
“Bath,” he told me in a shaky voice. “Cold.”
Clarence dropped into the nasty tub, unable to hold himself upright anymore and his hands moved toward the faucet. I beat him to it and turned the dial all the way to cold. Icy water burst out of it and he started to shiver.
“Ice,” he said, only able to speak one word sentences at the moment. I left him and grabbed the ice bucket and went running for the ice machine.
I poured bucket after bucket over him until he was huddled in the icy water, the pieces clinking together as he moved and shivered.
“Clarence,” I touched his cheek and he was freezing cold.
I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
His eyes opened, but barely, irises were clear in color as I’d ever seen them as he stayed transformed as a vampire.
Even with the shade and the cold, he looked sick.
“You need blood,” I told him, suddenly the idea popping into my head.
“N-no,” he shuddered and shivered.
“You’ll die, Clarence!”
“Then let me die!” he shouted back at me.
“You selfish son of a bitch,” I grumbled and looked around the room.
I couldn’t bite my own wrist like he did, but I could certainly find a way to cut myself. Slamming a lamp from the bedroom into the bathroom mirror, I picked up a shard of thick glass and drew a line across my wrist.
“Please don’t...” Clarence cried weakly from the tub.
“If you don’t eat you’ll die,” I told him in as even a voice as I could manage at the time.
Taking the glass more firmly in my hand, I ran over the thin line again and again until blood appeared.
I heard Clarence growl from the tub, no doubt the smell of my blood setting off his bloodlust in the moment.
“I will kill you, Addie,” he groaned, his face contorted in pain and anger.
“Don’t,” was all I said before thrusting my wrist into his face.
He didn’t even fight it. Probably COULDN’T fight it. He sucked hungrily on my wrist until it started to hurt. Moments later I felt his teeth sink into my wrist, tearing the sinew and flesh as he feasted on my blood, unwilling or unable to see the pain he caused.
I sucked in my lip, biting it as he bit again, more blood gushing out of the wound as he pulled.
A little color returned to him, and he sat up, dripping cold and wet as he hunched over my wrist. As the minutes passed, I started to feel woozy.
“Clarence,” I started to tug on my wrist. “Clarence, don’t eat too much...”
His eyes flicked to mine, animalistic things that were less than human. But somewhere in him was the man I loved, and I called out to him, praying he’d hear me.
“Please, Clarence. I need you to stop...”
His eyes widened, as if he finally saw what he was doing, and he threw my wrist away, causing me to fall onto the bathroom floor. A moment later he was there, practically on top of me as he tore open his own wrist again and fed me his blood, richer and saltier than before.
The second the thickness hit my tongue, I passed out again.
Chapter Seventeen
I woke up to beige walls and a lumpy mattress. Looking around the shadowed room, I heard a hollow groan. It startled me to realize that the noise had come from me.
Instantly Clarence was beside me. His hand was on my forehead and he was looking into my eyes. His appearance looked normal, without a trace of
his brush with death.
“How do you feel?” he asked in his low, gravelly voice that I’d come to associate with his expression of deep emotion.
“I’m ok,” I told him, making a mental assessment of my body as I moved each limb.
I felt weak, but I didn’t hurt anywhere.
“Addie, what you did was so, SO stupid Baby. I almost killed you.”
His voice shook with clear emotion and pain radiated from his expression.
“But I’m not dead. You stopped in time. If I didn’t you would have died.”
“I would have found somebody else and risked their life, not yours.”
Anger seeped into his tone now.
“Stop being dramatic,” I waved my hand around, trying to defuse the situation. “There’s only one person on earth you wouldn’t have murdered, and that is me. I’m fine. I’m a little tired and weak, but I’m fine.”
He heaved out a breath and dug his face into his hands, elbows propped on his knees as he sat on the bed opposite where I laid. Shaking his head, he eventually dropped his hands and looked at me, his expression amused and scared at the same time.
“Don’t ever, ever do that again, please, Addie?”
“No promises.”
He rolled his eyes and stood, taking a couply steps over to my bed and crouching down enough to press his lips against mine.
“You’re a stubborn filly, Addie. It will likely get you killed one day.”
“Yeah well, not today.”
“Not today,” he agreed, kissing me again.
Lying next to me he took his time stroking my hair and kissing the side of my face. I curled into him and fell back asleep.
Clarence was gone when I woke up. The room was still mostly dark and it felt a little creepy to be in the roach motel by myself. I got up, and walked slowly around the place before looking down at my blood-stained clothes and lack of shoes. Because Clarence had no cell phone, I had to just sit and wait, knowing he’d be back for me. Eventually.
About 20 minutes later he came into the room, a key chain lodged into his mouth as he fumbled with his suitcase and my two big bags. All were torn and in bad shape, but they seemed to be holding up ok for the most part.
He spit the key out onto the grungy table that also held the decades old tube TV before looking up at me.
I was staring at him in disgust.
“What?” he asked innocently.
“That’s freaking disgusting! Why did you put that in your mouth?”
He shrugged.
“I’m impervious to illness and disease. Why should I care about germs or dirt?”
I actually gagged.
He grinned.
“Come now. You should be happy. I managed to save a good deal of your luggage.”
Speaking of dirt and grunge, I felt disgusting.
He put my bags on the bed across from where I’d woken up and I was quickly unzipping them.
“I got us another car,” he said as I started to sort through what was dirty, what was clean, and what was destroyed. “We can get back on the road as soon as you’re ready.”
I nodded but looked back into the bathroom and the willies shivered through me again.
“The bathroom is disgusting. I need to shower but it’s...”
He laughed again.
“Modern day people,” he sighed, trying to reign in his humor. “You’ve no idea what it’s like to grow up in a home with a dirt floor and ash coating every surface. So delicate and sensitive to the slightest grime. It’s amusing.”
I made a face at him before grabbing shorts and a t-shirt, strolling into the bathroom with hesitance.
“Here,” he followed me in, taking a towel off the counter and lying it on the bottom of the tub. “Your clean feet won’t touch the tub.”
“Buzz off,” I groaned, feeling like a high maintenance princess for wanting a little cleanliness.
He laughed and went to the door.
“I’ll wait outside,” he told me and closed the door behind me.
I looked around and found the cleanest looking spot on the counter to put my clean clothes on before stripping and stepping into the tub with the towel laid down over it.
After my harrowing and disturbing experience in the dirty shower, I got into my clothes quickly, tucked my dirty, blood-ridden clothes into a trash can, then joined Clarence in the room.
He was sitting in front of the air conditioner, blowing full blast into his face.
“Trying to stay cool?” I asked as I slipped some sandals on and looked around for my bag.
“I got you new luggage,” he told me after watching me look around confused. “I thought it would look discomforting to have your bags ripped up and stained when we arrive.”
“Thanks, Mom would worry if she saw it,” I said, then realized why exactly we were on the road to begin with. “What time is it?”
“11pm.”
I sighed sadly and picked up my bag.
“I’ll call Aunt Cindy on the way. She’ll have expected us by about now.”
“She told you to leave in the morning,” Clarence corrected. “She won’t be expecting you until dawn at the earliest. We’ll make it before she notices our detour.”
“Detour...” I grumbled as I headed out the door, Clarence following at my heels. “How did you get a new car and luggage so fast?” I asked him, getting into the passenger seat of the burgundy coupe.
“I went to the nearest city,” he shrugged, putting the key in the ignition once he was seated. “I found a few things. The least of which is some food. It’s under your feet. You’ll need to eat soon.”
At the sound of the word food, my stomach grumbled. Tearing open the first bag I picked up, I threw some orange cheese puffs into my mouth and chewed greedily.
“Did I sleep that whole time? We crashed when the sun was still up.”
“I almost drank you dry, Addie. Even with my blood you needed time to recover.”
“And please explain why I drank your blood?” The idea churned my stomach.
“Because for a human to partake of a vampire’s blood provides them with mild symptoms of the virus. Healing, increased strength, and hunger. Just the human kind.”
I stopped chewing as I looked down at the bag of chips.
“So you gave me your blood to heal me?”
“You had broken your shoulder. And then I’d almost killed you. You needed it.”
I didn’t say anything else from there.
We drove for another couple of hours before I managed to run the entire chase and crash through my head. Only one thing didn’t make sense.
“Clee,” I asked, turning to him to watch as I asked my question. “There’s one thing doesn’t make sense about it all about the crash.”
“Just one?” he questioned, not taking his eyes from the road.
“One big thing.”
“What is it?”
“Why the hell would someone purposely ram us off the road?”
He stared ahead for a minute, licking his bottom lip as if thinking of what he should say. I wished I could see his eyes behind the new sunglasses he wore.
“They knew I was a vampire...” he said carefully. “And I assume they thought you were one too.”
“That doesn’t explain why they’d ram us off the road.”
“I know the woman who did it,” he said quietly, biting on his bottom lip.
“What?” I shrieked. “Who?”
“She is my sire. The woman who turned me 300 years ago.”
My breath caught in my throat.
“And before you ask, I don’t know why they were behind us, and I don’t know why they pushed us off the road. Any vampire could survive that fall unless they’re unlucky enough to get their heads chopped off. Either she wasn’t trying to kill us and was sending a message or she hoped we’d die before reaching help.”
I still couldn’t breath. His sire? The woman who turned him? I hadn’t seen her before we fell, but Clar
ence had and he’d cussed.
“But I don’t want you to worry about it, do you understand?” he said sternly from his seat. “Until we know why she was there and why she did what she did, we’ll assume we won’t see anything from her again. I’ll talk to Mason about it and we’ll call some old contacts. Find out exactly what she wants and how to deal with her. But for now, know that I’ll take care of you, Addie. No matter what.”
I nodded, knowing he meant it. The man was willing to die so he wouldn’t risk my life, and that wasn’t lost on me. I decided to leave it alone and sat quietly for the rest of the drive.
“What are you doing here so early?” Aunt Cindy asked as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes.
It was early morning but I couldn’t wait until a decent hour to knock on the door and see Mom.
I pushed through the door, slammed my arms around Aunt Cindy and started to cry.
Clarence arrived at some point, carrying my bag but staying back as I tried to extract comfort from my aunt.
“You have to wait until she’s awake,” Aunt Cindy said after a couple minutes, running her hand over my hair like Mom always did. “When she’s awake I’ll get you. Until then I’ll show you to your rooms. You must have driven straight through the night to get here so quickly.”
I nodded, not bothering to tell her that we’d left the night before, took a nosedive off a cliff, hovered at the brink of death twice before driving through the night. At least Clarence didn’t get tired so he didn’t need to stop to nap. I had slept periodically the entire trip.
Aunt Cindy suddenly turned to Clarence then looked back at me.
“And you’re him?” was all she asked.
“I am he,” he nodded. “I assume.”
Aunt Cindy pulled him in for a hug and said quietly, “Thank you for being here for Addie. Beverly talks all the time about her little girl and how taken she is with her boyfriend. She loves you and she hasn’t even met you yet.”
Clarence looked speechless and glanced my way before saying, “It is my pleasure to be here with Addie and Beverly, to meet her. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”