Blood, Dirt, and Lies

by Rachel Graves

  “Okay then, Nancy’s looking for you. She called your agent, then here.”

  “Fuck.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What did you tell her?”

  “That I didn’t know where you were. You need to deal with it, Anna.”

  “I know. I know.” She repeated the words as if she were convincing herself. “Thanks, Mal.”

  “Anytime.” I hung up the phone and waited a minute before I called Phoebe.

  We had a good long talk. The phone call made me realize how lucky I was that my relationship made it through the awkward beginning part and into something steady. Struck with a sudden desire to be with Jakob, I called him and offered to be in his bed if he found a way to get off of work early.

  ****

  Saturday, the most perfect day of the week. On Saturday the weekend stretches out in front of you waiting to be filled with things you want to do, not things you have to do. On Saturday there isn’t any reason to get up in the morning, except that you want to.

  Saturday, perfection and bliss all wrapped up into one day. I spent the morning on the phone talking with movers, picking dates to move in and getting estimates. Eventually, I went with the people Lucas recommended. Sure, seeing werewolves in the light of the full moon scared me senseless, but when it came to heavy lifting they sounded like the best option.

  Actually, I looked down at my scribbled notes, the best option would be to call them back and cancel, moving myself. If I let a charity take a bunch of the furniture Jakob and Mark could handle the rest. Really, I should make Mark do it all to pay him back for calling me the dog whisperer after reading my reports on Tiny.

  I sighed and headed out of Jakob’s front door for an afternoon run. My first few steps were heavy with anxiety, but the sun warming my back convinced me no werewolves were going to interrupt this run. After the first mile, my mind shifted into a contemplative running mood. It was February third, Candlemas, a holy feast day for Jakob, and E’s birthday.

  In another few weeks, it would Mardi Gras, and the state would come alive with parades. Already the woods were alive with sounds and the weather was back to normal in the fifties. Spring whispered around the edges of the day, the first green shoots coming up, the sun regaining some of its strength. The run made me feel alive, and I finished sooner than expected, pleased with how much easier it was after a few months of discipline.

  Back home, after my post-run shower I thought about climbing into bed with Jakob for some fun. Although he could have gotten up, he didn’t, so I headed to the kitchen to fix myself a snack instead. I wiped the wash cloth over Jakob’s counter in a silly circle. Soon this would be my counter in my kitchen. I felt at home here, but somehow having a date, having movers lined up, made it more real. This was going to be mine. My cell phone broke the silence with a happy chirp.

  “Mors,” I answered not recognizing the number on the other end.

  “Mallory? This is Nancy. I need to talk to you.” I could tell from her voice she’d been crying. Saying yes meant hearing that Anna had told her about the affair or she’d figured it out somehow. I didn’t want to say yes.

  “Uh, okay, I could meet you somewhere or—”

  “I’m in your driveway.” What? She was where? What kind of stalker woman was Anna living with? I took a minute to get over the shock.

  “Actually, I’m at Jakob’s so if you’re at the Eclipse—”

  “No, I’m here, right outside.”

  “You have his address?” I asked, surprised.

  “We sent you a Yule card, remember?” I did remember. Anna and Nancy posed in front of a high blazing Yule fire signed with Anna’s name in Nancy’s handwriting. I’d thrown it away.

  “Right, me but Jakob…”

  “Of course, he got one too!” she exclaimed as if I’d accused her of murder. “I’ll be at the door in a second!”

  “Uh, yeah, uh…” But there was no one to hear me wavering; she’d hung up. The doorbell rang a second later and I lead her to the kitchen. Nancy looked out of place in Jakob’s house, her dyed three tone hair (black with fake red and blonde highlights) and her frumpy jeans with heavy work boots didn’t fit. The same way she didn’t fit with Anna. The way she didn’t dance, and couldn’t talk about fashion. Opposites attract, at least that’s what I’d been telling myself whenever I saw them together.

  “So what’s up?” I asked after we dispensed with the usual hellos and drink offers.

  “Anna’s having an affair!” she wailed, then added “with a man” as if that made the offense somehow worse.

  I tried to look shocked but it didn’t work and Nancy, who I always thought was dumber than a stump, caught it. Her sadness changed to anger in an instant.

  “You knew! You knew and didn’t tell me? How could you do this to me? I thought you were my friend!”

  “Actually, I’m Anna’s friend,” I said quietly, trying to slip the truth past her.

  “What? We’re a couple, you’re our friend.”

  “No.” I drew the word out, trying to think of way to be comforting without lying. “I’m her friend, you’re her girlfriend. I like you but we aren’t friends. Here I’ll prove it: what’s my favorite food? What type of movies do I like? What’s my favorite sport?”

  “But…but none of that matters…we’re friends!” she insisted.

  “No, see my friends know all that and you don’t. You know Anna’s favorites but not mine.”

  “It doesn’t matter if you know what sport someone likes or what movies they watch if you love them.”

  “Oh my God, you don’t know. You’ve lived with Anna for three months and you don’t really know her.” I was thinking aloud, saying things I shouldn’t have because the anger fading from her face came back with a vengeance.

  “I think I know her pretty well, Mallory, like I know how she feels about you.” Her smile was pure malice but it didn’t affect me. Anna let that cat out of the bag ages ago. I knew about her crush and she knew it wasn’t reciprocated. We’d worked through it.

  “So do I. We talked about it.”

  Again, it wasn’t the answer Nancy wanted to hear. “Well…I…I…you know what? I live with her. I’m there, okay? When she comes home, when she calls, I’m there. That’s got to count for something.”

  “Yeah, sure, you’re her roommate, whatever. Nancy, look why don’t you—”

  “No! I’m not like a roommate.”

  “No, a roommate would pay rent.” Oh, I shouldn’t have let that thought slip out of my head.

  “What?”

  “Rent? Like half the expenses? Like buying dinner once in a while or groceries? Do you pay for anything? Do anything? Or do you just live off her?”

  “I hired the maid. I pick up the dry-cleaning. I deal with the lawn guy.”

  “Right, but actually paying for something? Or do something of value like say, cooking a meal?”

  “We go out.” Her voice got cold. “What do you do around here, Mallory? Cook a lot? Clean a lot? You can’t call me a, a leech when that’s what you’re doing.”

  “I…” I stopped. What did I do around Jakob’s place? Not much. I bought groceries, but he didn’t eat. It was always clean so there wasn’t anything for me to do there. “I have my own place,” I finished.

  “Yeah? For how long? How long until you’re just like me? And when he screws around on you the way she did, I hope you go to someone who’s just as nasty and mean as you are.”

  Triumphant, Nancy walked out in a huff. I paced. What did I do? What did I bring to this relationship? Why was Jakob with me? The walls pressed in on me, stopping me from thinking straight, trapping me in a cave that used to feel like home.

  “Mallory? Is everything all right?” He’d been listening maybe, polite enough not to say so, but Jakob had heard.

  “I’m canceling the movers, I can’t move in.” I moved through the house desperate for some way to escape, to get someplace where I could think.

  “What? Why?” Jako
b looked at me confused.

  “I won’t live off you like a leech. I’m canceling everything; I didn’t realize what I was doing.”

  “No.”

  “What?”

  “No, you can’t.”

  “I damn well can. I won’t live like that: won’t be some parasite. We’ll find some new place and be equal partners…goddamn it! Where are my keys?” I gave up on finding them on the dresser and started going through the clothes in the hamper.

  “Then be my partner, be my wife.”

  I glared at him furious. “I’m serious. Nancy’s right, I can’t say I hate the way she lives off Anna and then live off of you the same way. I can’t preach one thing and do another. I’m sorry, I just…where the hell are my keys?”

  I found them stuffed deep in the pocket of a dirty pair of jeans. Who did the laundry around here? I’d never seen Jakob do it. I’d never even seen a washer. I took it for granted that if my clothes went in the hamper they’d show up folded in the drawer the next time I came over. I was worse than Nancy. At least she picked up the dry cleaning.

  I snatched at the keys. If this had been my home there would have been a hook by the door for them, but there wasn’t. Their disappearance and the frustration I went through trying to find them proved the point again. I didn’t even look at Jakob as I stormed out, desperate to get some air.

  He caught me by the front door, moving too fast for me to see, faster than any human could move.

  “No,” he repeated.

  “I…I need to think, I need some air.”

  “Then we’ll go outside and talk, but I won’t have you drive when you’re this upset.”

  “Fine,” I said, meaning anything but. We ended up on the porch, him sitting in the shade, me pacing in the sunset. “She’s right. I don’t know why you like me. What do we have in common? Besides, I don’t do anything to help around here. I can’t move in with you like this.”

  “I don’t like you,” Jakob said, calmly. My head snapped up and I stopped pacing. “I love you. There’s a difference. And what you do is more important than any chore or errand. You bring life to my home. You bring excitement and laughter. You introduce me to things I’d never find on my own. The night I danced with you was the first time I danced in half a century. Without you I work and I sleep, with you I live.”

  Aw, how could a girl resist a speech like that? I fought to stay firm even as I walked over to him. “But we’re going to be equals when I move in, right? I won’t be a leech?”

  “Never,” he promised, sealing it with a kiss.

  “You’ll let me pay half the rent and everything?” I kissed him back, the thoughts of storming out still within reach.

  “There is no rent,” he whispered. “But I’m sure we’ll work something out.”

  I kissed him, a slow sweet kiss, my fingertips on his jaw, looking into those deep blue eyes. My anger melted away.

  “I don’t want to be like her,” I whispered between kisses, my lips moving against his as I spoke.

  “You won’t be, ever,” he promised, moving his hands around my back guiding me down to sit nearly on top of him, my legs bent beside his. We kissed in the shadows as they grew longer, as the sun set, kissed and nothing else, his hands on my back, my arms wrapped around him.

  The moment seemed to last forever, gentle and sweet, and then it changed, comfort giving way to passion. His mouth moved lower, as he opened the buttons of my shirt to kiss my neck. A second button opened and he kissed to the hollow in my throat, the kisses coming faster. Before I could catch my breath my shirt was completely open and his mouth found my nipple, sucking gently.

  I leaned back, feeling his teeth brush me. He was so gentle but I wanted more, begged for more. He teased me with tenderness then stopped, bringing his hand to massage my breast while he spoke.

  “Is there something you’d like, my love?” he asked.

  “You know damn well what I want.” Tired of waiting I pushed him back on the lounge and stood up to strip. Jakob only grinned at me, shifted into a mist and then shifted back naked, his clothes underneath him. It was a spectacle I’d seen a hundred times but the lightning-quick transformation from one state to the next always stopped me. His hands reached out for me, not willing to wait until I finished gawking, and pulled me close.

  His mouth pressed against me lower now, open, painting my body with passion’s fire. Wide open-mouthed caresses floated down my stomach, making me squirm until he stopped, his face above my middle, his eyes locked on mine.

  “You are so beautiful,” he whispered, before dipping his head down low and tracing my body his tongue. I moaned, ready for more, needing more but forced to endure the slow sweetness of his touch. The tip of his tongue outlined me, barely brushing my skin while his hands held my hips, changing their angle to meet his needs.

  With his head between my legs he altered the dance of his tongue, moving harder against me. I screamed with the sensation, desperate for what it would bring, and he responded, moving faster, sinking his fingers into my hot wet middle while his tongue moved above them.

  I screamed and begged as my pleasure grew. The pressure between my legs shut out the world until all I could feel was him and what he did to me. I focused on it, giving those feelings, his firm tongue, those quick-moving fingers, all my attention. My breath came in pants as suddenly every muscle in my body tensed and then exploded in release.

  He drifted up from my waist, kissing a line up my body while I tried to get enough air into my lungs. I held onto him as if he tethered me to this world of pleasure, a place I didn’t want to leave. He whispered to me about how I couldn’t leave him, how he couldn’t live without this passion in his life. He held me gently and I knew he thought we were done, that my pleasure was the only point.

  “I’ll stay, but only if we’re equal partners, remember?” I teased, pressing his back against the lounge and floating down to take the hard length of him in my mouth.

  Above me he leaned back, moaning as I swirled my tongue around him. His body was ready, on the edge as I nibbled and sucked, slowing the pace of my mouth to draw it out for him.

  I moved against him, playing my fingers down the length of him, taking only the tip of him in my mouth. Then, remembering the feeling of his tongue on me, I lashed him, hard long strokes making him moan and beg.

  I waited, wanting to see his face in the final moment, but he stopped me, pulling me up by the shoulders to face him, kissing me while he plunged inside me. My hips met his as he thrust inside me, taking me. We moved together, pressed close, and I watched as the power of our love took him.

  Chapter 13

  After our shared passion, Jakob carried me into the bedroom, worried I was getting cold. Buried under the warm blankets, I cuddled close to him and fell into a relaxed cat nap. That sweet sleep never lasted long, but it always came with a feeling of bliss I adored. On more than one occasion I’d canceled everything we had planned to stay in bed close to Jakob, talking to him or watching him rest. He didn’t need the sleep but he stayed next to me letting me drink in the sight of him.

  Tonight he wasn’t as indulgent. A devout Catholic for all the decades of his long life, he wasn’t going to let a little cuddling get in the way of mass on a holy day. I watched him dress, delighted to know I was wholly responsible for the smile on his face.

  The service was my doing. As a vampire, Jakob couldn’t step into most Christian churches. Last summer I’d talked Danny’s priest into a service in Latin, an evening service without communion, holy water, or a cross, in short, a vampire friendly service.

  It turned out several of the church’s older patrons enjoyed the old-fashioned mass. What I’d thought would be a sparsely attended private mass became one filled with gray heads and the scent of muscle cream thirty minutes before the Father arrived. Most of them came early to pray the rosary. I was still working on how to get one for Jakob that wasn’t holy enough to burn him.

  I put on my black cashmere wrap dress, wh
ich would be tied tightly shut during the service but opened at the neck in a much less demure way for the party after it. I hoped I could get Jakob to take off his tie and leave his suit jacket in the car. I didn’t know what kind of a party E threw but I suspected it was a ton more casual than that. Jakob had packaged some gift up for E, sparing me the trouble of deciding what to get, and it rode in the car with us to church.

  I’m not Catholic, probably never will be; after all, my mother raised me none of the above, but it mattered to Jakob, so I went. I liked the Latin, the way the words sounded, even though I didn’t know what they meant.

  Danny usually brought his family, so I had an excuse to sit with Emma on my lap, the two of us generally listening to the church part of things and occasionally whispering quietly. I knew as a good babysitter I shouldn’t play favorites but Emma was my favorite. That hadn’t change now that I knew she was a selkie. If anything, it made her more of my favorite to know she was different like me.

  The service let out and we joined the slow procession of people shaking hands with the priest on the way out the door. Emma wriggled free of me to run forward. The first few times we’d tried this Katie let them play in the nearly empty parking lot. The three girls giggled and screeched through games of hide and seek in the parking lot or catch on the sidewalk that went from the small rectory where Jakob’s mass was held and the big church where the girls usually worshiped.

  The games kept them distracted while the adults said goodbye. It was an idyllic scene but not one that worked for the hellions. Three times out of four it ended in tears, ruined tights, and muddy dresses. After that, Katie instituted a new order; the grownups promised no more than five minutes of chatting and the kids stood quietly.

  To seal the agreement, Nora, the oldest, received a watch with a timer. The three of them huddled around it off to the side literally watching the seconds tick down. When it chirped I helped hustle the girls into the car before Armageddon broke out.

  When I got back Jakob was reliving the war with someone who fought near where he did. I didn’t ask what war. Most of the people who came to his church service were older than me, like three times my age. I figured Jakob balanced me out, what with him making the average age in our pew something like one hundred and two. Still, I was glad when we left and headed to E’s birthday party. I liked the idea of a conversation about events that happened after I was born.