by Sarra Cannon
But I refused to listen.
I didn’t care about tomorrow. All I cared about was right now. This moment. And all I wanted was to feel him against me. Inside me.
My hands reached for the belt at his waist and his stomach rippled at the touch of my skin against his. He moaned and kissed me harder as I pulled his belt from his jeans.
His hands explored my naked skin, leaving a trail of heat in their wake. I shuddered against him as he leaned over me, our bare chests pressed tightly against each other.
Rend kissed me, then moved his mouth across my cheek and down toward my shoulder. He pushed the white shirt down, exposing the skin at the base of my neck. Just as I had earlier at his house, I lifted my chin, giving him complete access. Wanting him more than ever.
His lips brushed against my sensitive skin and I shivered, digging my fingers into his biceps.
His body went rigid and he let out a low growl. The sound sent a wave of fear through me. His mouth opened against my skin and two sharp points dug into me, breaking the skin as I cried out in pain.
I jerked away from him, but he held me down against the top of the table, his strength too much for me. He seemed to be frozen in place as desire and fear waged war inside my core. What was happening to him?
Finally, he wrenched himself away from me, a loud groan escaping as he moved quickly across the room, his form nothing more than a blur of shadows.
I sat up and pulled what was left of the white dress shirt tight around my trembling form.
“Rend?” My voice wavered. I stood and backed as far as I could against the wall, my arms wrapped around myself like a bandage. Warm blood trickled from the small wounds at my neck, and I knew what he was. I knew it, but I didn’t want to believe it.
I shook my head, unable to stop the tears from falling down my cheeks.
Rend stood beside the window, his hand gripping the wooden frame with such power it had partially crumbled in his hand. His back rose and fell with each deep, rapid breath.
“I thought I could control it,” he finally said, his voice tense and filled with darkness. “This is why I’m dangerous for you, Franki.”
I yearned for him and feared him in that moment, body and soul surrendered to a man I could never have. The pain of it split me in two as my body shivered against the wall of my small apartment.
“This is why we can never be together,” he said.
He turned to me then, his face cloaked in shadow, but enough light coming through the window for me to see two white fangs protruding from his mouth, my red blood smeared across his lips.
Episode 4: The Dying
Chapter 1
Heartsick
Rend wiped the blood from his lips.
My blood.
But he couldn’t wipe the hunger from his eyes. Hunger I had stupidly mistaken for something entirely different. His chest rose and fell with each labored breath, and I wondered what kind of self-control he still had at this point. Was I in danger?
I clutched the torn shirt that covered my body, pulling it tighter across my cold skin. I pressed my back against the wall of my small campus apartment, desperately trying to make sense of what had just happened.
I was torn between an intense desire for him and an even more intense desire to get the fuck out of dodge.
At my neck, blood pulsed and dripped from two small wounds. My skin throbbed. His teeth had barely punctured the surface, but it was enough to rip us apart.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were one of them?” I asked. I could hear the judgment in my own tone, but I knew what I was feeling was less about hating what he was, and more about hating that he’d lied about it.
“I’m not one of them,” he said. His voice was grating and rough, low, like an animal’s growl.
A piece of the wooden frame of the window crumbled and fell to the floor at his feet. He released his hold on the wood and moved away.
I flinched and pushed back against the wall, realizing, with sudden terror, there was nowhere else to go. If he wanted to kill me there would be nothing I could do to stop him.
Rend took a couple of steps toward me, but when I flinched, he stopped cold. His forehead wrinkled with tension and he swallowed hard. “You’re afraid of me,” he said, disgust dripping from his tone.
“You just grew fangs and bit me,” I said. “Is there some other reaction I should be having right now?”
“Dammit, Franki, don’t make jokes right now,” he growled. “You don’t understand.”
“I understand perfectly,” I said, lifting my eyes to his. “You lied to me about everything. About keeping me safe. About wanting to protect me. You lied about who you are.”
Even as I said those words, I knew I was holding back the one thing that hurt most.
He had lied about wanting me.
I thought he wanted me the same way I wanted him. I believed there was something real between us. Something special. I thought there was true passion in the way he kissed me.
But the whole time, he wanted the same thing those three vampires in the alley behind his club had wanted. He wasn’t attracted to me.
He was attracted to my blood.
I was disgusted and heartsick. I very rarely let myself be vulnerable around men—or anyone, really—and I felt stupid for letting down my guard around him.
He hadn’t killed me, but he may as well have. I wanted him so badly, and to bring me so close and then take it all away was cruel.
“You should go,” I said. It came out timid and weak. Just seconds ago, the last thing in the world I wanted was to be apart from him.
Now, I couldn’t send him away fast enough.
“We need to talk about this,” he said, taking two steps toward me. “You have to listen to me.”
“I don’t have to do anything,” I said. My eyes flashed with anger and he stopped moving. I welcomed the anger. Embraced it. The more I embraced the anger, the faster the heartache part of it descended into the darkness. “I want you to get the hell out of here.”
Rend’s eyes darkened to a deep pool of blackness.
My legs grew weak and I had to lean against the wall for support. My heart thundered in my chest.
“Go,” I said again, this time with less conviction and more fear.
Rend’s hand closed into a tight fist. His jaw tensed as he slammed his fist into the wall, leaving a huge hole. He lifted the side table into the air and threw it to the ground with such force the floor beneath my feet vibrated.
Then, in an instant, he crossed the room to me. His body pressed against mine, crushing me against the wall.
He brought a hand to my throat and used one finger to turn my head to the side. My bleeding neck was completely exposed to him, and in that moment, I was certain this was the end.
He leaned in close, his breath hot against my cheek.
“I didn’t ask for any of this,” he said. “I am not one of them, Franki. Not anymore.”
I closed my eyes and waited, trembling. My body betrayed me by responding with desire instead of terror. Part of me understood, even then, that desire was a million times more dangerous.
“Please,” I said in the tiniest whisper. A single tear slid down my cheek and onto his hand. “Please go.”
Rend released his hold on my throat and ran his index finger softly along my skin, tracing the path of my tear. I opened my eyes and met his black stare.
“I’m sorry,” he said. He shook his head and backed away. “I’m so sorry, Franki.”
For a long moment, our eyes locked together in mutual regret and sorrow.
Rend looked away first, his gaze dropping to the floor. He opened his mouth as if to say something more, but then he shook his head and backed away. His body disintegrated into shadow. One minute he was whole and human, and the next, he was nothing more than a cloud of black smoke that hovered for only a moment before slipping through the crack under my door.
I slid down the wall until I hit the floor. I rested my
head on bent knees, hugging them so tightly I could hardly breathe. I wanted nothing more than to rewind the night. I should have been more careful. I should have protected myself better.
Not from vampires or demons or even the Devil himself.
I should have protected myself from love.
Chapter 2
Stop Trying To Guess
“Franki?”
Katy shook my arm. I opened my eyes and found her standing above me, concern etched on her face.
“Are you all right?” she asked, an edge of panic in her voice. “What the hell happened?”
Oh, shit.
My eyes opened wider and I looked around, seeing the apartment and my torn clothes the way Katy must be seeing it. Our side table was smashed, my books were all over the floor, and there was dried blood all over my shirt and neck.
How the hell was I going to explain this? I sucked at lying, and I couldn’t even begin to think of a good enough explanation for this. One that didn’t sound insane.
Even the truth sounded insane.
I reached for her hand and she pulled me to my feet. I put my arms around her and hugged her as tightly as I could. “I need to tell you something, but you have to promise me you won’t have me committed to an asylum.”
Katy pulled away and narrowed her eyes at me. “You’re seriously scaring me here,” she said. “First, you don’t come home from work. You don’t call or text me to say what’s up. Now, I come home to find you curled up asleep on the floor, wearing a ripped blood-stained shirt? This isn’t like you at all, Franki.”
“I know,” I said. “I’ve had some serious shit going on the past few days. I promise I’ll explain everything, but can you make a pot of coffee first, while I get cleaned up?”
“Are you on drugs or something?” she asked. Her entire body was tense.
“I wish,” I muttered.
Her eyes flashed wide, and I shook my head.
“No, okay? I’m not on drugs. I don’t want to be on drugs. I don’t plan to do drugs,” I said. “Just do me a favor and stop trying to guess or figure out what’s going on, because trust me, you’ll never in a million years guess this.”
“Franki—”
“Coffee,” I said, stepping around her and making my way to the bathroom. If I was really going to attempt to make enough sense of all this to explain it to her, I was going to need that coffee. And I had to get out of this stupid shirt.
I grabbed a clean washcloth from under the sink and ran the water until it got steaming hot. I carefully wiped the dried blood from my neck, then stared at the two small puncture-wounds. They looked exactly like what you’d expect a vampire bite to look like.
I must have seen more than a dozen vampire movies in my life, but not once had I ever believed they could really exist. Even being attacked by those three in the alley hadn’t made it feel as real as seeing the actual marks on my skin.
Rend is a vampire.
The thought brought on a wave of nausea. I gripped the edge of the sink and took several deep breaths. How could I have missed the fact that he was different?
I hadn’t, though. Not completely. I’d caught the references to Rend being older than your average human. I’d seen the strange drawings in his office and known he was capable of great magic.
The truth was I hadn’t allowed myself to put two-and-two together. I let my desire for him cloud my ability to care about anything else.
The hot water running in the sink had steamed up the mirror. I wiped a section clear and looked at myself in the mirror again. I brought my fingers up to the small teeth marks.
No matter how much I wanted him, there was no denying this. He had hurt me. Yes, it could have been much worse, but wasn’t this bad enough? The one person I’d been trusting to keep me safe was the most dangerous person on the planet. I’d let my guard down around him, and that was just about worse than anything else. I’d let him into my heart in ways I’d never let a man in before.
I couldn’t let it happen again.
“Franki?” Katy knocked on the door to the bathroom. “You can’t seriously be making me wait to hear this. Are you sure you’re okay?”
I cleared my throat and turned off the water.
“I’ll be okay,” I said. I rummaged in my makeup bag for a bandaid and placed it over the marks on my neck. She was going to think I was crazy, but I knew I had to tell her the truth. Lying to someone I cared about right now would make me the worst kind of hypocrite.
“The coffee’s almost ready,” Katy said.
“I’ll be out in a second,” I said.
I waited until I heard her walk back toward the kitchen before I slipped out of the bathroom and into my bedroom. I undressed quickly, shedding my bloodied clothes and pulling on a pair of sweat pants and a tank top.
I picked Rend’s white shirt off the floor, thinking how I’d worn it last night to find comfort and feel close to him. And how, less than twelve hours later, I wasn’t sure if I ever wanted to see him again.
I wadded the shirt up and tossed it into the trashcan under my desk.
I took another deep breath, then made my way out to have coffee with my best friend and tell her about how I’d almost been killed by vampires.
Chapter 3
Not Ever
Katy sat across from me, her mouth open.
She hadn’t said a word in the past half hour and she hadn’t taken so much as a sip of her coffee. Mostly, she just stared at me, listening in awe.
Or horror.
I wasn’t sure which.
“When he left, I must have sat on the floor until I finally fell asleep,” I said, coming to the end of my story. I’d told her almost everything, from the vampires in the alley to Fallon’s threat and Rend’s visit last night.
I bit my lip and waited for her to react. Tell me I was crazy. Something.
Instead, she sat still, her hands gripping her favorite Eiffel Tower coffee mug.
“Katy, say something. Please.”
She took a deep breath in and raised her eyebrows. “Are you going to see him again?”
I pressed my hand against my forehead. “Wait, you heard all that and this is the burning question on your mind?”
Maybe she was the crazy one here.
“Franki, do you seriously think I haven’t always known there was something different about you?” she asked in a soft voice. She placed her hand on mine and squeezed. “We’ve been friends for as long as I can remember. I notice things like unexplained gusts of wind when you get angry or the way you flinch every time someone uses the word witch.”
I shook my head. “Why didn’t you ever say anything?”
She shrugged and released my hand, finally taking a sip of her coffee. She stuck her tongue out and made a face. “Yuck, this is cold.”
She stood up, dumped her cup out in the sink, and poured a fresh one.
“I’m serious,” I said. “You’re telling me you’ve known all this time I was a witch and you never once asked me about it or confronted me about it?”
“It was obvious you were sensitive about it,” she said. “The same way I almost never ask you about your mom. It’s just not important if it’s going to hurt you to talk about it.”
I ran a hand through my knotted hair. “Great. So I’m the last one to find out who I really am,” I mumbled. “Next, you’ll be telling me you knew vampires were real.”
She shrugged again. “It’s not like I’ve ever met one before, but I guess I’m not really that surprised. There’re all kinds of weird shit going on in the world that we never even hear about,” she said. “And I’m definitely not surprised there’s crazy shit going on at Venom. That place is definitely the kind of place where vampires would hang out.”
I laughed and threw my arms around her neck. “Thank you,” I said.
“For what?”
“For making me feel a little bit less crazy,” I said. “I thought you were going to have me committed.”
She smiled
and went back to sit down on the barstool. “Oh, I still think you’re crazy,” she said. “I just don’t think that’s any different from any other day.”
I rolled my eyes and opened the fridge. “I’m going to make eggs and bacon,” I said. “Are you hungry?”
“Starving,” she said. “But you still haven’t answered my question.”
My stomach flipped over. I grabbed the eggs and butter and set them down on the counter next to the stove.
I hadn’t answered her partly because I had no idea what to say. Was I ever going to see Rend again? Should I go back to the club? Or just go back to my life before Venom?
As if I could.
“You really care about this guy, don’t you?”
I groaned and put my hands over my face. “Is it that obvious?”
“As long as I’ve known you, I’ve never seen you this twisted up over someone,” she said. “It just sucks he’s a vampire.”
I laughed, but kind of wanted to cry at the same time. “Yes. Yes it does.” I cracked the eggs into a bowl and poured a little bit of milk inside. “The thing is, I honestly wasn’t as hurt by the fact that he’d tried to kill me as I was by the fact that he lied to me.”
“Did he ever tell you he wasn’t a vampire?”
“Well, no, but leaving it out is just as bad, right?”
Katy leaned over the counter. “It’s not exactly a lie,” she said. “It’s just not telling the whole truth. You can’t expect a guy to confess his deepest, darkest secrets to you the second you meet.”
“I can if it’s a secret that could put me in danger.”
She nodded. “Maybe.”
My eyes widened and I put a hand on my hip. “Are you taking his side, here?”
Katy held her hands up in defense. “Hey, you know I’m always on your side,” she said. “I’m just saying that it sounds to me as if he’s been risking a lot to keep you safe. I don’t think he would intentionally turn around and put you in danger.”
“What does that even mean? If he’s a vampire, he should have known he was putting me in danger by even coming up here.”