by Lisa Olsen
“Tell me what to do,” I begged. “Do I need to apply pressure to stop the bleeding, or be digging out bullets or what?” If I could get him stabilized, then maybe I could run out and find him some blood.
“No, I’m pretty sure most of ‘em went right through.” His eyes drifted shut again. “Just need rest and some blood. No fresh people’s blood.” They popped open again as he added that last, wanting to make sure I took special note of it.
“No people, I gotcha,” I whispered, snatching up the blanket folded on the back of the couch, and pressing it against the bloody mess. Worst case scenario, if any bullets remained, he could always have them removed later. The important thing was to get him stabilized. That meant blood, and mine was the only around.
“Here, take some of mine.” I held my wrist out to him.
“Just need rest.”
“Carter, if you pass out now you might not wake up.” He wouldn’t die, but his body wouldn’t have the strength to reanimate itself without blood forced into it and his brain would suffer from the loss of blood. A dangerous state for a fugitive to be in. Despite my promise to Rob, there was only one thing left to do. “Take it before I have to end up forcing it into your mouth.”
Frak… was he even listening anymore? He didn’t respond at all when I touched my arm to his lips. With an annoyed huff, I bit into my own wrist, trusting the scent to stir him, and it did. His tongue flicked out to taste the blood, mouth fastening over my wrist in the next instant, drinking greedily. I sucked in a silent breath as the first wave of pleasure hit, not wanting to interfere with his feeding by projecting my emotions into it. It was bad enough to be letting him taste me, I didn’t want to let him taste me the way I had with Rob.
Once started, it was like he couldn’t get enough, his hand circling my wrist to bind me to him in case I wanted to pull away. I grit my teeth against the sultry fire dancing along my veins, my hands clenched into fists to keep from touching him.
“Am I hurting you?” he asked suddenly, breaking contact and I gasped, able to draw breath as the sensation stopped.
“No, just take what you need,” I managed to get out, not daring to look at him.
“I-I don’t want to cause you any pain,” he stammered, dropping hold of my wrist like a hot potato. My head cleared, the heat starting to dissipate without that contact between us.
Did he really not get it? “You’re not. It’s… it’s the opposite.” I darted a quick look at him, my cheeks flushing red as I saw the awareness of what I was experiencing hit him all at once.
“Oh.”
“Haven’t you ever had anyone drink from you before?” It seemed ludicrous for a vampire never to have experienced.
“It hasn’t exactly come up in the company I keep,” he admitted with a wry twist of the lips. “So, it’s um… it feels good then?”
This wasn’t a conversation I wanted to get into with him, not one bit. He was still incredibly weak and we didn’t have time to stop to chat about it. That’s the thought I clung to anyway, denying I might be taking anything selfish out of it.
“That’s not important right now, just take what you need,” I insisted, holding my arm up again. Good gravy it was embarrassing. His eyes were on me this time as he bit into my wrist and I looked away.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I took in a long, slow breath, gripping the edge of the couch to keep from moaning as his mouth pulled at my flesh, drawing me closer with silent hands. My body canted toward his, but I kept from pressing against him except where our knees touched, even when my own fangs slid out in response to the throb of pleasure.
I began the count in my head for different reasons than I usually did, desperately clinging to the numbers to draw some sort of order into the chaos screaming in my body. His hand covered mine and my eyes flew open, pinned by his bright blue gaze. My eyelids fluttered with every draw of his mouth, my sharp teeth piercing my own lip to keep from crying out. The taste of my own blood burst across my tongue and I sucked on it lightly in tune with his motions.
We sat there for what felt like an eternity, his chest rising and falling in time with mine, linked by the light press of hands and his mouth at my wrist. Having long ago lost track of the count, a ribbon of panic went through me when I realized he might’ve already taken too much.
“That’s enough,” I said, clearing my throat when the words came out husky with need. His mouth worked harder, taking one more pull and another, and then he let me go, tongue flicking over his lips to catch the last drop of my blood.
My shoulders sagged with relief as the sharp pleasure started to fade, and I stayed stock still, my body entirely too overly sensitized. Thankfully, Carter didn’t say a word, his head tipping back to look up at the ceiling as he drew in a long, steadying breath. Gradually, I came to myself and I could think straight again.
“That was, um…” He paused to swallow, and I realized he hadn’t been entirely unaffected by the experience either. I also realized his hand was still covering mine, and I gently pulled it free.
“I know, I’m sorry I didn’t warn you about that. I thought you knew.”
“It’s been – I can’t remember how long – since I’ve drunk straight from the source. But that was… Christ, I don’t know what it is. Your blood…”
“I know.” No wonder he was on sensory overload. My first taste of vampire blood had been overwhelming too, and I hadn’t been living on animal or bagged blood.
“No, I don’t think you do. Your blood is so much more than that. It’s…”
“Extra super tasty, yep, I get it.” I didn’t want to dwell on the experience, I already felt awful about letting him drink from me after promising Rob. Then again, I’d also been straight up from the start that there were certain circumstances where I might not have a choice. This certainly fit that mold.
His hand opened and closed, chest flexing as he drew in a deep breath and rolled his shoulders. “I can’t believe how much better I am already. This completely blows away bagged blood, you know that?” He rose to his feet too quickly and then staggered back as his weakened body protested the sudden movement.
“Whoa, slow down, cowboy. You need to rest before you’re back to full strength. Your body is still repairing itself, now’s not the time to go dancing.”
Carter collapsed on the sofa beside me with a soft groan. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. Too bad, I do a mean Macarena.”
Something about that struck me as inordinately funny and I broke into uncontrollable giggles – so much that a wave of dizziness hit me in my weakened condition. I fell back against the cushions with a hiccupping squeak, closing my eyes to keep the room from spinning.
“Hey, are you alright? Shit, I took too much, didn’t I?”
“I’ll be fine,” I assured him, the dizziness dissipating when I held still. “I just need to rest a bit too.”
“You didn’t have to do that, you know. But thank you.”
I looked over at him, trying to decipher the look on his face. He didn’t have that sappy puppy dog look I’d gotten from Evan after giving him my blood, but our friendship had definitely changed with the exchange. Deepened somehow. It wasn’t uncomfortable any more though, and I gave him an easy smile.
“You’re welcome. Do you want to tell me how you ended up shot and bleeding in a church confessional?”
Carter chuckled, filling me in on the story. He’d been spotted by Corazon and Zoe near Dead Lazlo’s and they’d chased him halfway across town, calling in two others that sounded like Cage and Frost. While I teased him at first about being pinned down by a couple of girls, I had to agree, four against one in a less than familiar city were terrible odds to face. I had to give him props for evading them, even if he would’ve been pretty screwed if I hadn’t been able to track him down.
I got up to drink some water, glad to see I could manage it on steady feet. Having to call Lee or Gunnar to come and pick me up would’ve been awkward, and calling Rob was completely out of the
question. “If you want to go lie down, the bed’s through there,” I suggested when he turned down a glass of water for himself.
“No thanks, I’m good to chill here for a while. You go ahead though if you want.”
“No thanks, I’m good to chill here for a while,” I smiled, using his words. “You know, you should think about changing your appearance if you’re going to be sticking around for a while. Or do you think you’ll be moving on soon?” Even though I understood it would be a lot safer for him, it made me sad to think of him leaving town. We made a good team and I liked his dedication to protecting humans, even if I did think he was overzealous at times.
“Trying to get rid of me, huh?” he chuckled. “Nah, I think I’ll stick around for a while. What do you think? Should I dye my hair black, go for the dark and dangerous look?” He struck an overtly sinister pose that made me laugh again.
“No way, I think you should definitely go ginger. Maybe if you dressed like a nerdy student you might blend in more. Did you ever think of that?”
“I used to be a nerdy student, I’ll have you know. Not a ginger, but definitely on the nerdy side.”
“Oh yeah? How long ago was that?” I asked, shifting my seat to look at him better.
“Ooh, let’s see, I was studying at Cleveland State. Nixon was president. I guess it was 1969 or thereabouts.”
“What were you studying?”
“Economics, with a minor in Mathematics.” He made a face. “Yeah, I know, even I knew it was boring at the time. I wanted to be a teacher back in the day. Well, a college professor ultimately, but I planned to start with high school. I never got to finish though, so I guess it doesn’t matter all that much now.”
“I thought about being a teacher myself,” I admitted. “Music, either private or at a school, I wasn’t picky. I hated the one and only course on politics I took as a requirement. It’s funny how our lives turn out so differently than we plan for.”
“Truer words were never spoken.”
I wasn’t sure if I should ask him about how he was turned, it didn’t sound like it was a pleasant memory. I wanted to ask him what happened to turn him against vampires altogether and why he had such an aversion to drinking from humans. I wanted to know how he’d ended up as a vigilante and where he’d picked up his training. But all that came out was, “You’ve honestly never had anyone drink from you before? Not even a human?”
It took him a second to roll with it, his brows furrowing with the change in topic. “I told you, I don’t drink from humans. I don’t enter into any kind of blood play, ever. I haven’t had a physical relationship with another vampire before.”
“Not even with your Sire?”
“No, I definitely didn’t do that sort of thing with her,” he snorted before turning pensive. “Though I wonder now why she didn’t try it on me.”
“Is she still around?”
“No. No, she’s dead.”
“Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?” It was difficult to tell from the look on his face.
“It’s… both.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not particularly, no,” he said with a tight smile.
“Tell me why you hate vampires so much then.”
“They’re all wrapped up together.”
“Oh. I’m sorry, you don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to. I’m just trying to understand how you got to where you are today. Rogue vampire hunter… it makes a girl curious.” He didn’t reply and I felt a twist of guilt for pushing him into the darker corners of his mind. “Sorry, I’m being nosy. Ignore me.”
“No, it’s okay,” he said, surprising me. “I just haven’t ever told anyone this story before.”
“Take your time,” I murmured, even though I had to keep my foot still from tapping in anticipation.
“Let’s see, where do I start? I told you I was in college back in 1969, but my number got called up and I was drafted before I was even close to completing my major. I did two tours in Vietnam, and when I got out…” He fell silent, staring off into space. I didn’t dare say anything, leaving him to pick up the thread again when he was good and ready. “I was a bit of a mess. I didn’t go home right away. In fact, it was over a year before I made it back to see my family. I’ve often wondered if I’d made it home sooner, if any of it could’ve been prevented.”
The military training explained some of his skills, though he was far deadlier now. I almost didn’t want him to get to the bad parts, feeling something awful was about to enfold.
“I went back home when I got the word that my parents had both died in a fire. It wasn’t like it is now, they’d been dead for over two months by the time my sister got a hold of me. My sister…” Carter lapsed into silence again, swallowing before he continued. “She’d never been the type to handle responsibility very well, and everything was a mess. No arrangements had been made at all. What was left of my parents had been left unclaimed. The bank was sending loan default letters even though my parents had insurance and that had to be straightened out. My dad’s hardware store had been broken into and one of the neighbors had been kind enough to board up the windows but like I said, it was a mess.”
“I can imagine,” I murmured, feeling like this wasn’t the worst of it.
“When I saw Erica, I knew something was off, but I didn’t realize how bad it was at first. All I knew was she didn’t seem all that upset that Mom and Dad were gone. She didn’t seem to care about anything except the fact that I was home and how glad she was to see me. A little too glad to see me,” he added, shifting uncomfortably.
“What do you mean?”
“It was little things at first. She sat too close to me, or the way she hugged me wasn’t the way a sister normally hugs a brother. Whenever we were together she’d hold my hand or run her fingers through my hair. We’d never been what you would call a touchy feely kind of family to begin with. It started to make me uncomfortable.”
“Oh, that kind of glad to see you.” Yikes.
“Anyway, I thought maybe it was the grief, manifesting itself in some fucked up way because she never talked about missing our folks. I don’t know, I never studied psychology, I just knew it made me uncomfortable and I wanted to finish up with my parents’ estate and move on. I didn’t notice at first that she only turned up after sundown, or the fact that she didn’t eat much when she invited me over for dinner.
“When I first mentioned finishing up with the bank and leaving town, she lost it. Started yelling about all the plans she had for us and she came at me. I didn’t want to hurt her, but she was so strong… I had to defend myself. All that did was piss her off even more and that’s when I saw the fangs.”
I knew what was coming next, at least, I thought I did.
“I woke up later, weak from blood loss, and she told me what she was, like it was this great thing. Like she’d given me this huge gift. She told me all about her master, how great he was and how we were going to be a family. It made me sick to hear about her twisted plans for the three of us. Later, when I saw how he treated her, I realized just how broken she was. She’d been the one to set fire to my parents’ house with them inside, hoping to lure me back home. It was like my sister wasn’t there anymore, replaced by this monster in her skin.”
“I’m sorry,” I breathed, not wanting to break the spell, but needing him to know he wasn’t alone. “Did they force you to stay with them?”
Carter nodded. “When I made it clear I didn’t want to have anything to do with her sick fantasies, they locked me up in the basement of his house. She kept me weak, giving me barely enough blood to keep me conscious, but that wasn’t the worst of it. The worst thing was having to watch while they brought home human playmates. They never lasted more than a few days. That’s where I learned the depravity that vampires can sink to. I saw things…” He swallowed, voice faltering and I covered his hand with mine.
“But not all vampires are like that. Not all choose t
o be cruel and vicious. You didn’t.”
“I didn’t get to choose to be this way at the start. She didn’t give me a choice about anything,” he snorted. “I don’t know, maybe that’s not fair. I’m the one who took that first drink and I killed my share of victims in those months. I could’ve chosen to end it, but I was weak, the hunger always won out in the end.”
They’d kept him like that for months? No wonder it’d screwed him up. “Carter, it’s not your fault they tortured you like that.”
“I can’t blame them for the horrible things I did, even after I escaped. That was all me. I’m the one who chose to keep feeding at the expense of others, and I’m the one who has to live with my crimes.”
“You figured it out eventually though, right? You said you don’t even feed live from humans any more. You proved it doesn’t have to be like that. Most vampires feed humanely.”
“You and I both know most vampires don’t give a rat’s ass about what’s right or wrong anymore. I’ve seen it time and again. That’s the only reason I haven’t ended it before now. At first it was to hunt down my sister and put an end to her sick games. And then once she was gone, I dedicated myself to finding the bastard who turned her and end it once and for all.”
“You found him then? Or is he still out there somewhere?”
“No, I caught up with him in Biloxi. He’d taken to picking up runaways, and…” Carter stopped, his brows dipping closer together. “Some things are better left unsaid.”
“You got him though. He’s dead right?” I said, giving his hand a squeeze. “Thanks to you, he can’t hurt anyone else ever again.”
“Yeah, eventually.”
We sat there in silence, until he leaned forward and picked up the glass of water he’d turned down before. “I think I’ll take that drink now,” he said, draining the entire glass.
“And you’ve been alone this whole time?” It seemed incredible that he’d never forged a single connection with anyone, human or vampire, in more than forty years.