Blood Ties Omnibus

by Jennifer Armintrout

  “Connections in the Movement.” He lifted out a bottle of pills and squinted to read the label.

  “I thought you guys were all about the extinction of your species.” I reached for a syringe and the vial of meperidine. “This should put me right to sleep. Got a tourniquet?”

  He handed me the stretchy strip of latex. “The rules state we can’t save a vampire’s life, not even our own. If our healing abilities don’t take care of things, that’s the end of it. Nothing in here is going to save me if I get in a bad way. There’s no rule against keeping yourself comfortable for your last few hours. Do you need a hand?”

  I had the tourniquet between my teeth and tried to wind it around my arm the way I’d seen them do it in Trainspotting. I’d started enough IVs in my time that it should have been a piece of cake, but doing it yourself wasn’t as easy as it looked. When I shook my head no in answer to Nathan’s question, the stretched length of rubber shot from my lips, snapping me painfully in the face.

  “Here, let me.” He chuckled as he deftly tied the tourniquet and thumped the fat vein on the inside of my forearm. “That looks like a good spot.”

  I watched as he carefully filled the syringe. This obviously wasn’t the first injection he’d given. “Did the Movement teach you how to do this?” I asked.

  He tapped the air bubbles toward the needle. “I picked it up somewhere. Now, hold still.”

  I felt the needle slide into my unsterilized arm. I remembered what I’d read in The Sanguinarius regarding disease: The humors that delight in causing sickness and death will not touch the vampire. He will not be affected by the plagues of Pandora.

  I could only assume the same went for modern-day germs and bacteria.

  The medicine stung as it entered my vein, but Nathan’s touch was gentle and reassuring. Even so, I fixed my gaze on his face to keep from looking at the needle in my arm—I was never good at being the patient. “So we can heal from serious injuries on our own?”

  “The depth of severity is determined by age. If someone had done to me what I did to Cyrus, I wouldn’t be sitting here right now. I would’ve healed from your stab wound in an hour, whereas you’re lucky you didn’t need stitches. By the time I found you, though, you’d already started to heal. It’s a good thing you’d fed some.” He held his thumb over the injection site as he withdrew the needle, then reached for a Band-Aid. “There. That should take the edge off, and it will help you get to sleep.”

  “What about me? How long will it take until I’m completely healed?” I really hoped the answer wasn’t two months.

  “You’ll be fine in the morning,” he said as he recapped the needle.

  I snatched it from him. “Don’t do that. It’s a universal hazard.”

  He looked amused. “A what?”

  “A universal hazard. It’s been in contact with body fluids, which transmit diseases that cause death. You could stick yourself in the process and end up dead. It’s a universal hazard, and not recapping needles is a universal precaution.” Realizing I sounded like one of my old professors, I pinched the bridge of my nose in embarrassment. “I can’t believe how easily I just rattled that off.”

  “It was very educational.” Nathan laughed. He had a great laugh, deep and genuine. It was the best thing I’d heard all day.

  He shrugged. “But I’m not worried about diseases. I’m more worried about a stake to the heart or an axe to the neck.”

  “Is that all?” I teased. “I would have thought a strapping lad such as yourself would be concerned about his cholesterol levels.”

  Suddenly serious, Nathan caught my chin in his hand and forced me to look at him. “Your heart and your head. Lose either one and you’re dead.”

  How will you kill me? I thought. “What about burning? Can you die from burning? Or drowning?”

  As if horrified by the morbid conversation—or the realization that he’d started it—he removed his hand apologetically. “The short answer is yes, you can die from anything that causes more damage than you can heal in a feasible amount of time. But let’s not talk about this now. You need to rest.”

  I wanted him to tell me more, but I just cried gratefully. “Thank you. You didn’t have to do all this.”

  He didn’t look at me as he began gathering up the medical debris from the bed. “No one ever died from being too polite. Besides, you need help. The next couple of months will be rough.”

  “I can’t imagine it will be any worse than it already has been.”

  “You’re going to have to say goodbye to your family, your friends. Everyone.” He stood. “It’s lonely being one of us.”

  “I don’t have any relatives I talk to anymore. I mean, my parents are dead, and I haven’t seen any of their family since I was little, except for at their funeral. I only moved here eight months ago, so I haven’t had time to make any friends.” I stopped myself. “Well, except for you, I guess. You’re the closest thing to a friend that I’ve got so far.”

  He didn’t look pleased to be drafted into the role. “You’re going to have to quit your job. You can’t continue to work at the hospital. The people there are too vulnerable to you.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. I’d stolen their blood, not exactly a move in the best interest of patient care. But the thought of giving up being a doctor was, well, unimaginable. After four tedious years of college and three grueling years of med school, I’d finally gotten the prize I’d been striving for. I’d sacrificed my personal life in pursuit of my goal. If I let it go, I’d have nothing. I wasn’t about to let fate, or anyone else, take away the one thing left that I cared about. “I’m not even going to discuss this. It’s not your call to make.”

  He sighed. “You’re right. It’s not. But how are you going to explain to them that you can’t work day shifts or attend morning meetings? How are you going to play off the fact that in twenty years you’ll still look…how old are you?”

  “Twenty-eight.”

  “In twenty years, you’ll still look twenty-eight. What are you going to tell people?”

  “Botox?” I yawned. The drug was taking effect. “Can’t I wait and work this out in a week? If I join your club they’ll tell me to quit, anyway, and if I don’t, you’re going to kill me.”

  The words appeared to surprise him, as though he’d forgotten he wasn’t yet on my side. He opened his mouth to speak but turned away and snapped off the light. “Get some sleep. We can talk about this later.”

  Like I had a choice. Within minutes of Nathan leaving the room, I dropped off and slept like a log.

  When I woke, I blinked sleepily and tried to remember when I’d gotten a goldfish.

  The creature stared expectantly at me from his little castle in the bowl on the bedside table. An odd feeling of loneliness swelled under my ribs. As messy and small as Nathan’s apartment was, it boasted homey, lived-in touches that were decidedly lacking at my place. I imagined going home to my high ceilings and bare walls, and the idea was too awful to contemplate. I buried my face in the pillow and pulled the covers over my head. It had been a while since Nathan had laundered the sheets. They smelled like him, and I shamelessly took a deep breath. I visualized him lying naked where I lay now. Did he bring women here?

  I couldn’t see the Nathan I knew forming a relationship with anyone. Yes, he cared for Ziggy the way a father watched over a son, but familial love came with ready-made boundaries. I’d only met him a week ago, but it didn’t take a genius to deduce that emotional intimacy and Nathan were not terms that went hand in hand. It was probably a miracle he even had a fish.

  The sun hadn’t set. No sounds of life came from the living room. Forsaking my bloodied sweatshirt, I slipped my jeans on under Nathan’s T-shirt and padded quietly to the bathroom. Despairing at my lack of a toothbrush, I brushed my teeth with my finger before venturing into the rest of the apartment.

  Nathan was sprawled across the armchair with a book in one hand and a loaded crossbow in the other. A thin line of dro
ol hung from the corner of his mouth. On the floor at his side were two wooden stakes and the axe Ziggy had attacked me with.

  “Expecting company?”

  He startled awake. “I wasn’t sleeping!”

  I jumped aside as the bolt shot from the bow and stuck in the door.

  “For Christ’s sake, I could have killed you!” He leapt to his feet. “Do you always sneak up on people like that or just when they’ve got a deadly weapon in their hand?”

  I stepped back. “I’ve never happened upon a sleeping person with a weapon before.”

  He stretched his arms wide and yawned loudly. Apparently, he’d slept well enough when he was supposed to be protecting me. “How’re the stab wounds this morning? Healed?”

  I rolled up the edge of the T-shirt. Nathan pulled the tape from the gauze pad over my belly to reveal a faint pink scar.

  “Holy crap,” I breathed, poking the spot with my finger. The tissue wasn’t even bruised. My body had mended while I slept. “How the hell did I do that?”

  “The Sanguinarius says that humors in the blood we drink sustain our tissue and imbue it with a potent healing ability. I’m sure that’s not very scientific, but it’s the best answer we’ve got so far.” He paused as an idea came to him. “You’re a doctor. If you join the Movement, maybe you could work in their research department.”

  If. It hung between us again, destroying the friendly truce of the morning. We stood, staring at each other as potential enemies instead of a host and houseguest.

  A knock at the door broke our awkward silence. Nathan grabbed one of the stakes and motioned for me to stand back. Just as he reached for the dead bolt, the door burst open.

  Nathan lunged forward, tackled the intruder and brought him to the ground. His arm was raised, poised to thrust the stake into the man’s heart.

  “Hey, hey!” the trespasser shouted. He rolled out from under Nathan.

  Ziggy got up and brushed off his clothes. He smoothed back his long, greasy hair and looked me over. “Sorry, Nate, I didn’t know you had company.”

  Nathan snapped at his young ward with barely restrained anger. “Where the hell were you?” He turned his puzzled gaze to the door. “And I could have sworn I locked that.”

  “So much for protection,” I snorted. Nathan’s warning glare stifled further comment.

  “Hanging out,” Ziggy said, answering Nathan’s first question with a shrug. “I slept in the van and went to class this morning. I’m just here to donate, then I’ve got an art history night class. So, what’s up with her? Is she like, your new girl or something?”

  “New girl? What happened to the old one?” I asked Nathan, raising an eyebrow.

  He wasn’t amused. “There hasn’t been an old one for a while.”

  I couldn’t imagine somebody who looked like Nathan going without a date for long. Then again, most women I knew—the nurses I overheard gossiping in the break room, anyway—weren’t looking for vampires as potential mates.

  Nathan hung up the heavy overcoat that Ziggy had discarded on the floor. “I don’t like you going out all night, especially with Cyrus in town. And you forgot to use the special knock. I could have killed you.”

  “That’s a phrase you seem to be using quite a bit today,” I interjected, but Nathan ignored me.

  Ziggy went straight for the kitchen, with Nathan and I trailing behind. He pulled a can of soda, marked with a territorial Z in black marker, from the refrigerator and swallowed it in one long gulp. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and coughed. “Once, then twice, then once again. Yeah, I know. I did it. You just went all Rambo on me.”

  “You knocked four times,” Nathan said. “That’s not the same thing.”

  While Ziggy consumed another soda, Nathan retrieved sterile packets of IV tubing and needles from the cupboard.

  The younger man sniffed the air and made a face. “Damn, Nate, you reek.”

  Surreptitiously, I leaned a little closer to Nathan. He did smell a bit like the bedsheets, but I’d thought it was a sexy smell. There’s pheromones for you.

  Nathan looked mildly offended, but his expression quickly changed to amusement. “I’d value your input a lot more if you hadn’t just admitted to sleeping in that crusty old van of yours.” He handed Ziggy the medical supplies. “If you have any trouble, Carrie here is a doctor.”

  Ziggy’s face blanched as he looked from Nathan to myself. “Oh, yeah, new vampire, fresh, tender Ziggy flesh. Like I’m going to let her near me when I’ve got an open vein.”

  I rolled my eyes. I wouldn’t shake hands with someone who looked like Ziggy, let alone suck blood from him. “You’re totally safe, I assure you.”

  Nathan headed toward the bathroom. “I paid for two pints, I want two pints.”

  “Two pints!” I exclaimed once the bathroom door was closed. “You can’t give him two pints of your blood!”

  Ziggy settled comfortably in a chair and tied a rubber tourniquet around his arm, much in the way I’d tried the night before. He was a bit too proficient at it.

  “Sure I can. In case you get hungry, you should know I’ve got a stake in my pocket with your name on it.” He took a few trial stabs with the needle, missing the vein each time. I didn’t know what to say. I was a little insulted he thought I was some wild, uncontrollable animal. “Here,” I said gruffly. “You’re turning yourself into a pincushion.” I took the needle from him and slid it smoothly into the only undamaged vein I could find.

  “Heroin?” I asked, casting a disapproving look at the track marks on his wrists and the backs of his hands.

  “Not that it’s any of your business, Doc, but no. I’m the cleanest donor in the city. And Nate’s not my only customer.”

  In my opinion, his cleanliness was debatable. I didn’t say so and resisted the urge to wipe my hands on my jeans after I touched him.

  “You should be more careful with the needles,” I said, trying to sound as concerned as I possibly could. “You can’t just poke around in your arm like that.”

  “Duly noted,” he replied, too distracted with the intricacies of plastic connector tubing to pay my warning much heed.

  I dropped onto the couch and averted my eyes. I didn’t trust myself to catch sight of his blood. I heard the water running in the shower and muffled singing.

  “So are you and Nate like special friends now or something?” Ziggy asked.

  “No,” I replied, “and if we were, I don’t think it would be any of your business.”

  He laughed. “Hey, no offense or anything. I just wondered because you’re, you know, wearing his clothes and all.”

  I looked down at the T-shirt and wrapped my arms around myself. “My shirt had blood on it.”

  “Listen, I don’t care. I was just trying to make conversation.” He lit a cigarette then, and noticed my expression of utter longing, he held the pack out to me.

  “No, thanks.” I waved them away, knowing I’d get no satisfaction from them. “It’d be a waste.”

  “Suit yourself,” he said, tossing them on the table. “But a lot of vampires smoke, you know. It doesn’t matter much what you do when you’re dead. You can’t get cancer or anything.”

  “Yeah, but you can’t get anything out of it, either,” I said, my voice wistful. The acrid smoke smelled better than baking cookies.

  “Not true.” He held the cigarette out.

  I took it and inhaled experimentally. He was right.

  “It’s the blood,” he said. “Blood rules all.”

  I passed the cigarette back. “But it didn’t do anything for me before.”

  “Because you were craving blood,” he explained, prodding his arm where the needle entered his skin. I cleared my throat noisily, and he jerked his hand back with a grin. “It’s like if you were craving chocolate cake, and you just kept eating SpaghettiOs. The SpaghettiOs aren’t going to do it for you, you know?”

  I hadn’t even known that vampires existed until I suddenly became one. Now some smart-a
ssed kid was telling me, a doctor, the ins and outs of my own physiology.

  The collection bag filled. He kinked the tubing and switched to an empty one. I motioned to the bag. “Do you want me to put that in the fridge?”

  He nodded. “So, how long have you been a doctor?”

  “Less than a year.” I hesitated. “I’m not sure I’m going to be a doctor much longer. Because of the vampire thing. After I worked so hard for it…I can’t believe it’s over.”

  “That’s a bitch.” He sounded genuinely sympathetic.

  The sound of the water stopped, and my mind briefly diverted to a vivid flash of Nathan emerging from the shower. I tried in vain to force the image from my thoughts.

  A loud crash, followed immediately by a yelp and a dull thud, snapped me back to reality. For a moment, I thought Nathan had fallen out of the shower. Then I noticed the brick rolling awkwardly across the floor. The window behind the armchair was broken. Sunlight streamed in, and Ziggy slumped to his knees, unconscious.

  Nathan rushed from the bathroom, a towel wrapped around his waist. He hurried to Ziggy’s side and felt frantically for a pulse.

  “What happened?” he shouted, looking from Ziggy’s lifeless form to me.

  I tried to focus on the emergency at hand, but it was hard to ignore a half-naked man standing in front of me, regardless of the circumstances.

  His chest was well defined and droplets of water still clung to his broad shoulders. I felt heat rush to my face as I imagined gripping those strong arms and raking my nails across his back.

  Yelling from the street snapped me back to the present. “Come out, come out, wherever you are!”