Kiss Hide Bite: A Vampire Romantic Thriller

by Anna Rainn

  “You mean I had him tied down,” Marcus hissed. “You used my meeting with Nick to go after his partner and this girl?”

  “We thought she had the vial!” Osmond defended.

  “And did she, Oz?” Nick asked, his eyes holding mine for a second, before moving back to the defeated vampire before him.

  “No. Apparently, the cow had given it to him,” he signaled at Caleb. “And he had given it to you, dear Nicholas.” Osmond turned to Marcus. “My blood has been in his possession since last night, Marcus. Did he tell you about that?”

  Marcus shook his head. “What need would Nick have for your blood?”

  “Maybe he’ll sell it! That’s what this Caleb and the cow were conspiring to do. It is not cheap leading a human life. Hell, maybe he’ll even drink it. Nobody ever asked him how he feels about vampire blood.”

  Nick hissed at this, but Marcus moved slightly, positioning himself closer to Nick to keep any rash actions at bay.

  “Who else has been working with you, Osmond?” Marcus asked.

  Osmond looked around at the bodies on the floor, his eyes lost and bitter. “There were three more outside,” he said.

  “Yes, there were. We’ve been introduced,” Marcus said, nodding, then he turned to Nick. “Okay, Nick. I’ll take it from here. The blood?”

  Nick walked to me. I was still tied down, but he made no effort to free me. Instead, he turned to Caleb.

  “The blood, Caleb.”

  “Untie me,” Caleb said.

  Nick shook his head. “Tell me,” he said.

  “Okay. You don’t trust me, I understand,” Caleb said. “I’m sorry to drag you into this. They were going to kill us; I had to lie so you’d come and help. They were going to kill her too!”

  “The blood,” Nick demanded.

  Caleb took a deep breath, his eyes flickered to me, then back to Nick, “Around my neck.”

  Nick pulled Caleb’s necklaces from under his black T-shirt. A shark tooth, a miniature fantasy blade, a dog tag with a smiley face on it, and a long oversized metal bar. Nick opened the bar necklace’s clasp and pulled an invisible, seamless cap off it. From inside, he pulled a long thin cylinder with thick red liquid.

  Wordlessly, Marcus walked and took the vial, then he walked out with Osmond tracking behind him like a reprimanded dog.

  “Marcus,” Nick called. The old vampire turned.

  “All three of them walk, and this stays between us.”

  Marcus nodded, then the two vampires were gone.

  Nick’s hand brushed mine, then hesitated, and backed off.

  “Let’s get you out of these.”

  “No, wait! Evie. Nick, you have to find Evie.”

  “Calm down. She’s home safe. If anything, you need to call her and let her know you’re okay. She is the one who dialed 911 after she heard what she thought was a gang coming through the backdoor. I was en route the moment that call was made.”

  I exhaled. “Did you have the blood all along” I couldn’t help my disappointment with Caleb. “Why didn’t you just give it to them?”

  “Were you not here with us?” Caleb met my eyes, “The moment I gave them the vial, they were going to kill us. I WAS trying to get rid of this disaster Bianca had put in my hands when they caught me.”

  Nick was untying me as I spoke, his hands brushing hair out of my eyes, sweat off my forehead, fear off my heart. He then moved to Caleb and Britney.

  “How did you know about the blood if Caleb hadn’t given it to you yesterday?” I asked Nick.

  “I didn’t know, and neither did Marcus. You told me over the phone, and I winged it. When you said the word blood, it all made sense.”

  “Marcus didn’t know what they were up to?” Britney asked, timidly.

  “No. Just like us, Marcus thought this was only Justin and Tyler taking revenge on Bianca and that they have formed some sort of fixation of Marissa. After the 911 call tonight, he only knew that his people were attacking her again and that he needed to show up and put a stop to it. At least that’s what the message I left him said.”

  “You’re here,” I whispered. We were all standing free now.

  “I’m here.” He squeezed my hand.

  Chapter 37

  “I’d kill you if you weren’t so damn weak,” Nick spat at Caleb.

  “Who are you kidding?” Caleb hit back. “You’re a vampire; she’s not safe with you. At least I didn’t endanger her on purpose.”

  “You think I put her in danger?” Nick narrowed his eyes at Caleb. The redhead was hovering on the side.

  “Just being alone with her is enough,” Caleb said.

  Black and Foam was in ruins all around us. We stood in the middle, the two men fighting, me listening to my own thoughts materialize on both lips, and Britney watching.

  “No. YOU brought a vial of vampire blood into her café, you invited her into your home with this blood in it. Did you have any idea what risk you were putting Marissa at? All this time, she was being attacked because of something you had, and you never spoke a word.”

  “I didn’t know what was in the necklace at the time,” Caleb defended, clearly pained by Nick’s words. “Bianca called me that day. I never changed my number; just blocked hers, and she had a new one. She said she needed to see me urgently. I thought it was about money, told her I could not help, but she said she didn’t need financial help. If anything, she was looking for a business opportunity to invest some money she has come across. She insisted that our meeting wasn’t about this, though. When I saw her, she looked like those first few days back when we all worked together, before she dyed her hair red and started getting all the weird visitors. She asked me to keep this necklace safe for her and not to ask questions. I said no, I told her nothing good ever came from dealing with her, but she said she wasn’t going to take no for an answer, not after everything both you and I have done to her, Marissa.”

  The last sentence hit a nerve for me, but I pushed the guilt away.

  “And why did she come back, Caleb?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I thought she came back to hurt you when I first heard about what happened. When Bianca and I spoke about you in the car, she had anger in her eyes. She never forgave you. But after I spoke to Britney, I started thinking that maybe this wasn’t the case. Maybe she came to see you to ask for closure or even for help. I don’t know.” Caleb’s hands had dug into his jeans pocket the way they always do. He was looking straight at me, and ignoring Nick and Britney with their perspective hostile and timid energies. I am the only person he wanted to convince.

  Britney spoke for the first time, her voice thin and shaky, “Bianca was getting her life back together. She had left her job with me at the club and was going to make a different life for herself,” she whispered. “She thought you owed her. She spoke about you a lot, always said she would come to you when she leaves and that you will make it up to her. I think that’s why she came back that night. To ask for help.”

  Tears were stinging my eyes. Bianca, the girl I got fired for sleeping with clients during business hours. All this time, I thought she was giving sexual favors when it was blood she gave. The pale skin and tired face, it was blood loss. And she was finally out of favors to sell.

  Britney went on. “That’s why I came to warn you. You didn’t deserve what they were going to do… to burn to death,” she was wrapping her arms around her thin frame, trying to keep the shivers away. “Caleb spoke to me when on my way down. He thought I looked like Bianca.” The two exchanged a nervous look, then Caleb gave a subtle nod, and Britney continued, “I gave him my number and ran out before you caught up with me. We spoke later. He didn’t know what that thing Bianca gave him was or what to do with it. When he told me about the necklace, I instantly knew he had vampire blood; this had been Bianca’s exit plan for some time. But Caleb didn’t know what he had or what it could do.”

  “I didn’t care about the money, Marissa,” Caleb interrupted, “I just wanted to get r
id of the damn thing.”

  “And he couldn’t just throw away vampire blood,” Britney said. “We didn’t know it was Osmond’s. My guess was Justin since he was the one who killed Bianca. But even if it was the blood of a young vampire like Justin, it was too dangerous. The only safe way to dispose of it was to sell it to another vampire.”

  Nick was glaring at her. She looked away, taking a step further from him.

  “If a human tastes it, they die,” Britney said.

  “Why would a human try to taste a vampire’s blood?”

  “It has an allure, a pull, so to speak,” Nick tried to explain.

  “And why would a vampire buy another vampire’s blood?” I asked.

  “Power.” It was Nick who answered. “Whoever got their hand on this vial was going to be very happy. Osmond is strong.”

  I remembered Marcus’s words: You’re old. Your blood is old.

  “But they thought I had the blood.”

  “They must’ve been following me ever since that night I warned you of the attack. They knew I was close to Bianca. Tonight was the first night Caleb and I met since; everything was planned over the phone, but we had to see each other for me to take the vial.”

  “So they tailed you and got a hold of you and Caleb.”

  Britney nodded.

  “You two are justifying and justifying. You know what I’m hearing? You almost killed Marissa.” Nick cocked his head. Britney staggered back in fear, but he didn’t bother with her. He turned to Caleb, “You should’ve come to me, or told the police about your meeting with Bianca. Instead, you decided to dabble with things you don’t understand.”

  “But you’re a vampire too. How was I to know you were trustworthy?” Caleb countered.

  Nick was silent for some time, unable to answer Caleb’s question. And wasn’t that a question I too struggled with?

  Nick placed his hand on my arm, pulling me away.

  “Make your way back home. You’re both safe. Marissa and I need to talk.”

  Chapter 38

  Being alone in a car with a vampire is a bad idea, I hear some of you say, but by this point, I had more or less come to peace with the knowledge that Nick was no ordinary vampire. He saved my life yet again. And not just mine, but also Caleb’s and Britney’s.

  I sat in my parked car with him next to me, unmoving and silent for long minutes. Behind me, Black and Foam was dark. Caleb had closed up and left with Britney. The café would be closed tomorrow and for at least a few days. Disposing of the dead vampires would fall to Nick. The repairs I will worry about later.

  Finally, when Nick hadn’t said anything for over ten minutes, I put the key into the ignition, eased my foot on the gas pedal, and started driving.

  “Where do you want me to take you?” I asked Nick, then remembering his ride was back at my coffee shop, “Is your motorbike okay? Would you like me to turn back and take you to Black and Foam to get it?”

  “No,” he said, and I realized he was scared. That’s what the silence was about. He was dreading the conversation to come.

  “I never asked you how come you have both a car and a motorbike?” I kept my eyes on the road, feeling his nervous energy shift next to me.

  “I guess you can say there are two sides of me, two lives,” he said. He was starting to breach the subject. Good.

  “And do they both work well together?” I asked, carefully.

  “No,” he said. “I get hungry.”

  My heart started beating faster, my body reacting to the word in spite of me.

  “But I never eat.”

  I looked at him. He was staring right at me, his eyes light, transparent.

  From the radio, Taylor Swift’s voice rose, serenading a mystery lover with ocean blue eyes.

  “You never eat?” I asked, unsure of what I heard.

  “Remember that story I told you about how I met Owen? The group of girls who got attacked by wild vampires on Halloween night? I didn’t just happen to follow them into the woods. I was one of them, Marissa. That night, my brothers and I went out to have some fun. The girls ran out of the house, and we hunted them down. Every step of the way, we knew we weren’t supposed to feed, not like this, but the hunger and the thrill took over. We took turns feeding on the first girl that fell, but she wasn’t enough. The ones who ran were more exciting. When we had the two running girls surrounded behind the house, they were as good as dead, and so was Owen and his partner when they arrived at the scene. It was then that I decided I had to do something. It was my idea to send one of the girls back to the house to lure the others out. I told my brothers I would follow her, make sure she doesn’t run away. They believed me. When we arrived at the door, I let her go back into the house and told her to stay inside, no matter what. Then I came back for them. I killed my own brothers.” He paused, the bitter tone of his last words lingering. “This night was the last time I tasted human blood.”

  “Nick,” I whispered, unable to find the right words.

  He shifted his eyes away from mine and to the dark outside his window.

  “I didn’t have silver bullets back then; I lied about this part. I fought fair alongside Owen and his partner Ryan. That’s how Ryan died and how Owen and I became friends. I have been helping out with supernatural cases ever since. And from this day, I stopped drinking human blood, even if it was willingly given. I feed on animal blood now. You can call me vegan,” Nick smiled self consciously.

  “And your people… They let you live?”

  “My faction accepted my decision to leave and my unusual lifestyle. My brothers had broken our laws. I guess they thought I would come back sooner or later. I didn’t, but in time, I have come to act as a mediator between the two worlds, and I made friends on both sides, not as a blue faction novice, but as who I am, whatever that is.”

  “Blue faction… is that why your eyes glow blue, while the others have red eyes?”

  He nodded.

  “But your eyes never glowed before, Nick, until that very last night.”

  “My eyes stopped glowing after a few years of abstinence. I liked to think of it as me being less a beast and more a man. That night, a drop of your blood slid into my mouth.”

  “My blood didn’t slide into your mouth, Nick. You bit me.”

  “I try to control it, Marissa. It’s not always easy,” his voice went up an octave, defensive. “In the past seven years, I have never slipped once. Then there was you.”

  “Don’t blame this on me,” I whispered, tears stinging my eyes. I remembered him pushing me, telling me to get off him, to go away. I remember thinking I did something wrong when it had been all his fault, his fault for who he is, his fault for letting his teeth pierce my skin, for surrendering to what he called the beast in him.

  “This wasn’t the first time you were alone with me. What about the first night we went home together, our very first night, were you planning to…” the words died on my tongue.

  “No! It was what it was, a one night stand, I’ll admit to that. It was never meant to be anything more. I can’t allow myself to have anything more.”

  So it was true. He may not have been the monster I feared him to be, but my initial doubts about him were true: he was in the habit of random one nights. After everything I have been through, I shouldn’t care so much about this; it was the smallest of many evils, but it still hurt.

  “The fact that I never could forget about you was even more reason to stay faithful to the rules I have set for myself. The way I felt about you, these intense feelings were a recipe for disaster. It was only a matter of time before I lost control. I couldn’t risk this. So I stayed away until we met the night of the murder.”

  “Is this why you refused to go in when I invited you that night?” I may not have admitted it to myself, but even during the few happy days of our relationship, this incident stuck out, stabbing at my pride.

  “I couldn’t trust myself around you, especially that night when I was unfed.”


  “And the night you bit me?” I asked.

  “I was unfed,” he admitted. “I wasn’t careful; I got too comfortable, too confident in my self-control. Someone like me should never forget about taking precautions.”

  I exhaled audibly, my deep sigh heavy with feelings I couldn’t even begin to separate, let alone describe. All the shame I have been carrying for over a year, all the doubt, the wounded pride and the hopelessness lurking under the surface, they were all withering now, like a vampire in sunlight. Our connection had been real. And his departure then and again the night of Bianca’s murder was only evidence that Nick felt about me the way I felt about him. Maybe not exactly the same way; he feels and wants differently, but to him, I was important, not a one night stand, and not a meal prospect as I later feared.

  “What does this mean for us?” I asked, forcing the words out of my mouth. They had to be said, as hard as they were, and as shattering as the answer might be.

  “It means I am as not good for you as other guys, Marissa, human guys. But it also means that if you let me, now that you know who I am, what I am,” he paused. “If you let me, I want us to be together.” A warm hand took hold of mine. He wasn’t cold; he was well-fed, I noted.

  “I’ll never hurt you again, Marissa, not your body, and not your feelings.”

  I glanced at him. His teeth were biting his lower lip, his eyes eluded mine. The expressions on his face were none I have seen before, anxious, unsure, guilty.

  “Except if I ask you to.” I squeezed his hand.

  His face broke into a smile, and his blue irises shot sideways, briefly connecting with mine. I could see the playfulness seeping back into his look.

  “You only like it that way, don’t you?” He teased.

  I rolled my eyes.

  “Come on,” he urged me on. “We’re laying it all out there. You like it when I’m in charge; you like it rough.”

  “Fuck you, Nick.”

  He nodded. “I’ll take that as a yes."

  Chapter 39

  Rain collided with the sprawling french windows, the big droplets gliding down to replenish the water streams. The occasional headlight reflected off the rainy window every few minutes, pulling my eyes to the glittering glass.