Blood Sugar

by Kat Turner

  “Well, now they’ll be payin’ to keep me quiet and shit.” Susan corrected her son. “But I’ll find somebody to pay a nice adoption fee for my big boy.”

  The mother did her gross, audible kissy-face thing and tugged the neon yellow chain.

  All Eve could do was watch the spectacle of two dumb fucks and their spawn locked in an absurd tug-of-war with an awful, yet undeniably pathetic, mutant monster. Sobering clarity cleared her head. Sometimes nefarious motivations boiled down to greed, just like Jonnie had said.

  And lust for money combined with stupidity? Now that’s the stuff of evil.

  Dale’s chain snapped, the force making the father sprawl backward. The disruption startled a shout from Rustin, who dropped his leash as he staggered to the side. The Pollyanna bucked, sending Susan flying through the air. She flopped against a wall of empty tanks, moaning, limbs akimbo.

  Rustin, in an unexpected flash of intelligence, darted from the shed like a slick minnow.

  Metal clattered against metal as he locked the Pollyanna and three unfortunates in the building together. His choice rendered Eve screwed, but she didn’t blame the abused boy for looking out for himself. Calmer than she should be, she held her scissors tight.

  As predicted, the Pollyanna moved in an awkward gait, its bulk falling from side to side as it lurched to Dale first.

  The man screamed while the beast made mercifully quick work of him. It used its teeth, landing a couple of strategically placed bites. Next it came for Susan, dispatching her with equal efficiency.

  In tandem, Dale and Susan’s souls rose from their corpses. Golden light spheres—all troubled souls got the same thing regardless of morality or character—floated to Eve and came to rest in her lap. They instantly launched into their life stories.

  The Pollyanna turned its broad head in Eve’s direction and slogged on over. Gritting her teeth, she focused on its left eye, the vertical streak of red pupil. The scissors were steel blades of hope in her hands, the closest she’d come to a magic sword.

  Her heart slammed as she aimed her scissors and aligned her best shot, the extent of her world fixed on vulnerable spots amid hard, scaly flesh.

  Rearing back, muscles taut, the creature opened its mouth and screamed, giving Eve a glimpse of its pink, massive, toothy maw.

  Now. She pointed the tip of her blade at the eye and slammed it down, being the proverbial ball as she focused all she had at piercing that jelly-soft orb of tissue.

  But the Pollyanna evaded her strike with startling agility, scurrying into a corner on those awful bug legs. The retreat didn’t last long, as the monster recalibrated with a shake and grunt and stalked back to Eve with its back arched.

  Shit. She’d missed, and now it looked madder than ever and intent on a new kill. Yet it crept to her slowly and with intention, taking its time in a way that it hadn’t with Susan and Dale.

  Sentient and intelligent enough to enjoy the hunt, Eve bet.

  But she had a few seconds to think while the Pollyanna savored its foreplay. She wiggled her ankles, finding the binds looser than they’d been originally. The struggle must’ve given her some slack. So she jerked and bent, settling on a twist and turn motion with her feet that seemed to promise results. Sure enough, she created enough wiggle room to step out of her restraints slowly and discreetly, being careful in case the monster was smart enough to catch on to her impending escape and hasten its plan.

  The Pollyanna closed two more feet of space between them, buzzing and rattling as it huffed big, aggressive breaths. Eve waited, teeth clenched and scissors clutched as hard as her grip would allow. Closer, closer.

  And the fiend came closer, close enough for Eve to smell its fishy, reptilian musk. Once in striking distance, the Pollyanna reared up on its cricket legs, those teeny stubs writhing and wriggling all along the underbelly, and bared its mouthful of fangs. The black tongue shot out, tasting the air in front of Eve’s face while she sized up the underside of her adversary.

  Those cricket legs were, by far, its biggest weakness. Before she had time to overthink of miss her chance, Eve vaulted to stand and kicked the Pollyanna’s stomach as hard as she could, her heel connecting to hard flesh with a nasty crunch. She’d broken something inside of it.

  The creature screeched, flopping backwards, and connected with a thud on the dirt ground. Belly up, it howled and wheezed, its chest caved in, those feeler-feet squirming in every direction.

  Eve knew what she had to do. She took no joy in the completion of her grim mission but, in a sense, her career had prepared her for grim and gory missions. She slit the Pollyanna’s throat with a single, clean swipe to cleave soft skin. Black-red blood bloomed in the gash, spilling over the neck wound in dark swells that pooled crimson on the floor. The creature jerked one last time before going still.

  No golden light emerged, which negated any guilt or shame that Eve was tempted to suffer for her dirty deed. This creature lacked a soul. It was never supposed to exist, and thus never truly existed in a spiritual sense. She dropped her scissors and backed away, covering her nose once the rancid smell hit.

  Metallic bashing at the door prompted her to whip her head in the direction of the banging and clanging. Wood bulged and crunched as an unseen person attacked the lock. Three more slams, and it blew open wide. Jonnie stood in the threshold, holding a pair of bolt cutters.

  “Come in,” Eve yelled, her invitation so much more than a necessary formality.

  In that moment, she invited him to see the worst of her, the awful wages of her mistake. Two dead bodies, their desperate souls clinging to her. A thing that should not be, slain at her feet. Whether or not the lunacy in the shed would have happened if Eve had properly processed Lacey way back when couldn’t be decided with certainty. But beyond a shadow of a doubt, the scene mirrored her. Her powers and abilities, who she was at her deepest core.

  And Eve had lied to herself when she’d reasoned that the essence of her shame was the mistake with Lacey, the incompetence. The powers themselves, her death magic, was the true source of her wound. Eve lived with the fear that she had been born with a fault. That she was wrong. No more secrets. No more lies.

  Jonnie ran to her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and back, and hummed a soothing tune. “I’m too late. I’m so, so sorry. Are you hurt, Eve darling?”

  “No. I’m more or less okay, given the circumstances. And you’re right on time.” She’d needed to fight her own battle at the very end, she figured.

  “I’m so sorry I didn’t get here until now. I’m so sorry you went through this. I should have fought harder to keep you by my side. I should have never let you go.” His murmured words were relief and regret and love, all spun together into a poem and a promise.

  “No, I’m sorry. For lying and leaving and freaking out. I guess the worst part of me thought that if you knew me, really knew me, you’d never be able to love me. So I hid and I lied. I rejected you before you’d have the chance to reject me. But here I am. This is me, Jonnie. Right here.”

  “I know. And I’m here, Eve. I’m here to stay.” Jonnie pointed at Susan and Dale. “I say we call in an anonymous tip about them. Claim to be door-to-door missionaries who smelled a bad smell.”

  “What about that?” She gestured to the monstrous remains.

  Jonnie sighed. “Let someone else figure it out. Maybe the authorities will haul it onto a lab and trace it back to Scarab. Truth be told, I don’t really care. This isn’t our problem.”

  “You’re right.” Stench of the bodies overpowering now that her adrenaline rush had faded, Eve took Jonnie’s hand and led the pair out of the shed.

  They walked through the dirt back yard, wiggling through a gap in the chain-link fence that he’d used to bypass the problem of having to enter and pass through the house.

  She allowed herself a moment to appreciate the perfect autumn day. The crisp air, blue sky, the late-afternoon sun brushing sidewalks with a buttery glaze. All of the beauty cleansed her
of what she’d gone through, scrubbed away the ugliness of her ordeal.

  A dart punctured her happiness with memories of an important fact. “There’s a kid, too, somewhere. Rustin. He ran off.”

  “We can say we saw him in the house or backyard. They’ll get Child Services involved.”

  “Rustin knows about all of this. What if he talks?” They curved around the side of the home and reached the driveway, where the black rental sedan Jonnie had driven sat parked.

  Jonnie shook his head, mouth bending into a resigned half-smile. “Then he talks. And if they ring us for a statement, we give a statement. We’re innocent and have nothing to hide.”

  With Lacey safe and at peace, Eve relished the truth of his claim. “I’ve never felt innocent.”

  “It’s not the right word exactly.” He stopped walking and cupped her face in both hands. “But you’re pure. And principled, and gifted. You bring people comfort and peace when they need it most of all. And you’re the proof, Eve, that’s there’s more to life than this. That there are mysteries and dimensions and aspects of spirit beyond our wildest dreams. Being with you taught me that. Being with you taught me that belonging doesn’t mean conforming or even fitting in. It means embracing our true selves in all of their wild contradictions and eccentricities. Because we are worthy, Eve. Of happiness. Of love. Not despite what makes us different, either. Because of it.”

  A holy force went to work on her, rearranging everything inside to create symmetry where it hadn’t existed before. Because there hadn’t been completion or wholeness. Eve had lacked a crucial element to give to herself and to others, and to accept from others. Sure, she’d experienced it in muted consistency, and also in flashes and peeks. A perfect birthday party, cuddles with a happy dog, the cozy blankets of family traditions, and the medicine of good-natured laughter.

  But she’d never before sat with the feeling in such totality, such awareness of sheer expanse. Of abundance and goodness for all. But ever since that rainy night on her stoop, that first walk along the river, a certain someone had been trying to show her the beauty in her heart.

  It was there, locked in a tomb, but he’d patiently stuck with her, picking at the lock, until she’d come around and helped him open it. Because he’d seen what she was capable of, he’d seen her potential, long before she had and in ways she’d never thought possible.

  “I love you, Jonnie. I love you.”

  “I love you.” He stroked her cheeks like she was something to be savored while appraising her face in gentle rapture.

  A silence fell as they entered a private, perfect cocoon of unspoken cherishes. But right below the surface, at the water’s edge of her conscious mind, Dale and Susan kept right on talking. Predictably sad life stories, tales of abuse and neglect and the deadening cynicism of lives born into poverty and rooted there until their extinctions. “I need to get home and transition them.”

  Jonnie’s grin split his face. “You know why I love you even more, you having said that?’

  She chuckled. “Why?”

  “Because you would be justified in telling these two rubbish people to piss right off. Letting them fade away or putting them on a one-way express to hell is what they deserve. But I know you never would. You give people more than what they deserve.”

  She shrugged, sheepish. “I suppose I have scruples, yes.”

  “It’s leaps and bounds beyond scruples. You live up here, my spirit goddess.” He waved a hand above his head.

  “My self-esteem is dangerously high right now.”

  “This is only the beginning.”

  He dropped a kiss to her temple, got in the car, and started the engine.

  On the highway drive back into town, Jonnie told Eve about Cara. About how he’d saved her with his blood and turned her into a vampire in the process, and how he planned to be a more involved presence in her life as he walked her through the particulars of her new reality. His sister and brother-in-law were accepting, but if a time came when Jonnie struggled with his family, Eve would stand by his side in support.

  A stop at a convenience store ended with a burner phone and an anonymous call to the police about a suspicious smell and an unsupervised boy at the Mudd property. Jonnie nodded at her once as they threw the phone away, his gesture an acknowledgement of their consensus. The tribulation was over. If the police got ambitious, they might attempt to track the burner phone, but this possibility was an unknown they’d deal with in the future. For the sake of their sanity and happiness, they’d best forget about it.

  They resumed the drive. He parallel parked on the street, squeezing between two other cars. They strolled to her home holding hands, the two souls orbiting her waist like she was a titan of a planet, they two moons in her thrall.

  Long shadows stretched from Eve and Jonnie’s bodies, stilt-legged apparitions coasting along the walkway. She laughed and unlocked the door.

  “Your gorgeous laugh is poetry to my heart. And what’s so funny?” Jonnie nuzzled her hair, making an hourglass study of her curves with his touch.

  “We’ve come full circle. You, me, and a lost soul or two standing at my doorstep.”

  “And yet everything has changed.”

  The lock opened with a click, and she led him in. So much meaning, dense as dark chocolate, filled his simple statement. Before was dark and wet, agitated and shot through with angst. Before was uncertain and flailing, two broken people advancing and retreating, reaching out and pushing away on an anonymous and lonely night.

  After was comfort. Security. Healing. The sense that if they stepped over the edge, they wouldn’t plummet off a cliff to certain doom. They would fly. Soar, together.

  Sure, logistics remained. His recording and touring schedule kept him on the move, while her career rooted her in Louisville. But for now, they were together and happy. And Eve was confident they could navigate the ins and outs of maintaining a relationship in the face of life’s mundane stressors and hurdles. They’d already defeated some mammoth obstacles as a couple.

  “Be right back, okay? Make yourself at home.” In the vestibule, Eve stood on her tiptoes and kissed Jonnie’s cheek.

  She raced up the stairs and took care of Susan and Dale, sending them somewhere where they would be content at last. Freed from their hate, from the fear that underpins hate, perhaps these two could learn love in the next life. Hell, if she could find true love, anything was possible.

  The ritual went well, and Eve rode a lilt of euphoria as she came back down and breezed through her living room and into the kitchen.

  Jonnie leaned against the island, reading the label on a bottle of wine he’d pulled from her countertop rack. “Notes of cherry, licorice, chocolate, and oak with a smooth finish and robust tannins.”

  She got down two wine glasses. “I have a confession to make.”

  “Hm?” The wine cork popped.

  Eve set the stemware on the island. “I know it’s classy to claim to be able to detect all of these different elements in wine, but mostly I just taste the alcohol.”

  He poured red liquid into glasses, a gleam shining in his dark eyes. “This is the starter course, love. Because I know something that tastes a thousand times sweeter and spicier and more complex than the finest wine.”

  “Your fangs are popping.” She hopped up on the marble slab and wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him close.

  “That’s not the only thing.” He nibbled the shell of her ear as a full erection pressed between her legs.

  She tilted her head back. A moan escaped him as he brushed warm lips against her neck.

  “I hope I’m like wine and get better with age.”

  “I guess I’ll find out, because I plan to enjoy you for a long, long time. Again.”

  He sucked the pulse point below her jaw, making her gasp with pleasure.

  “And again.” Sharp points dragged her skin as his lips traveled the length of a vein. Her center aching and wet, she ground against his hardness.


  “And again.” His whisper tickled her flesh with hot breath, peep of a tongue moistening the target area.

  “Shut up and bite me.”

  “Patience, love. We have all the time in the world.”

  With that, Jonnie turned his face from Eve’s neck and kissed her on the lips. She lost herself in the sealing of their union, a kiss so extraordinary she lost sight of where she ended, and he began. Bodies joined in licks and brushes and the crash of tongues.

  Eve became one with herself, in perfect alignment with her man. Because together, more so than apart, each of them could do more than exist. In the face of so much death and darkness, together they would thrive.

  Hot blood ran through Eve’s veins, the offering which gave her lover life. And he returned that lifeblood to her, through the power of his love.

  There was nothing sweeter.

  ***

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  And don’t miss more paranormal romance like EDGE OF THE WOODS by City Owl Author, Jules Kelley. Turn the page for a sneak peek!

  Sneak Peek of Edge of the Woods

  Jules Kelley

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  Taking the job in Pine Grove had been a risk, but as far as he was concerned, it was already paying off. He’d washed off the last of the dust from the Arizona desert at a gas station somewhere north of Salt Lake City, and now, watching the foothills of western Montana fill his view, he barely remembered what Tucson looked like.