CHAPTER 3.

  QUILL

  White noise.

  All rationality and conscious thought is gone. This moment is primal. I held Cecilia and let her body press into mine like a seal healing a gaping hole, while the blood on her skin soaks into my clothes and skin feels like a salve for the soul.

  It’s not about lost sanity or sexual desire, though that does hum somewhere in the back of my beast’s mind. It's an innate purity, a rightness that suddenly undid so many years of wrong. The darkness of my body flows into hers as her lightness flows into mine.

  And for that beautiful moment, we are one.

  Then she whimpers.

  Oh, fuck. She just had her throat cut.

  Returned to reality, I lift her quickly into my arms and dart out the back door. It takes me to a damp alleyway where there’s no one around. It’s almost pitch bck if not for a street mp in the distance flickering on and off at random intervals.

  Even in the shadows, I can see it. Vampires have excellent night vision. There’s so… so much blood on Cecilia. And fuck, she smells so fucking good.

  I might be 200 years old, but I’m retively young for a vampire. And that means my impulses are still shit.

  This poor girl is going to bleed out and all my can think of is getting a straw and drinking up this feast she’s leaving behind and figuring out why I feel the most vulnerable I’ve ever felt in my life while paradoxically also the most powerful.

  And now I’m hyper aware of the blood on us, a reminder of the nature of my beast. I’m fucking sweating at the sight like a teenaged boy watching porn for the first time.

  “Quill,” she says softly.

  “Fuck. Right. Hold on, I’m calling 911–”

  To my surprise, she swiftly elbows my phone out of my grasp. Her eyes dart down the alleyway.

  “Jagger.”

  What?

  “You… want me to go after Jagger?”

  She nods, and then I look at the blood seeping down her chest and painting the tops of her breasts gloriously red. If I was 100 years younger, I probably would have bust in my pants already at the sight alone.

  I meet her eyes again, desperate. “I’m not leaving you.” I picked up my phone which was covered in her blood. “Let me call for help.”

  “No!” she cried hoarsely. “I’m going to be fine–”

  “No you aren’t,” I reply, pitying her. “You’re in shock. You’re scared because you’ve seen some crazy shit tonight. And I’m going to get you to a hospital.”

  She scowls and before I’m about to take off in a flurry towards the nearest hospital, she headbutts me. Hard.

  I dropped her by instinct, my hand immediately going to my nose. She didn’t break it I don’t think, but it still ached.

  “Jesus… fuck! What the fuck was that? Are you seriously in fight or flight mode? I’m trying to save you! You’re going to bleed out!”

  Cecilia sits up and I realized her hands are no longer covering the slice from Jagger’s knife. In fact, there’s no more fresh blood pouring out of her because the wound has closed up completely.

  She stands, wiping blood off on the thigh of her dress. It was pointless and she realizes it as she frowned her still red palm. My mouth is gaping as she finally looks up at me.

  It takes my brain a few moments to register what happened.

  “So you’re… not human.” I mutter in realization.

  She smiles and nods towards the shadows. “I’m fine. Go get Jagger.”

  “Hold the fuck on. You knew about Jagger all along.”

  “There really isn’t time,” she insists, but her body sways, her voice slurring a bit as she continues speaking, “Use your super speed and find him before he goes into hiding.”

  “Not until I get some answers.” I jut an accusatory finger at her, feeling oddly… used? “What are you? Who sent you?”

  Cecilia groans, holding a palm to her head. “I’m…”

  I cursed aloud as her body crumpled and I caught her. I hefted her up into my arms like I’m carrying a bride through the threshold of our home. Except we don’t have a home and my bride should be dead from the bloodloss.

  I looked around. She doesn’t have a purse with her. All I have is her first name.

  And I’m covered in her blood. I can’t exactly march right back into the ballroom and ask if anyone knows who she is.

  The only option I have for now is to take her home to my apartment. And to hope that I can keep my shit together long enough to not drain the rest of her blood.

  ***

  After some cursing and finagling with the keys in my pocket, I get my apartment door open. I kicked it the rest of the way open and carry Cecilia in.

  First thing is getting the blood off her. I can’t fucking handle this scent. I’m going to go into a blood rampage, and I haven’t gone berserk in nearly fifty years. I’m not about to start again.

  I gently y her down in my shower and turned the handle. Once the water was warm, I took the hand-held nozzle and began to spray her down.

  You’d think getting sprayed in the face and chest with jets of water would wake her up, but Cecilia was completely comatose.

  I watched the red streaks of her blood circle the drain and darted my tongue over my protruding fangs. Gods below and above, I bet–I know– she tastes fucking incredible.

  Why are you even holding back? The voice in my brain asks me. Why not have a taste?

  Because I won’t be able to stop once I start. She’s unconscious. It would be wrong.

  Morals and vampires usually didn’t mix because my kind typically didn’t give a shit about what was right or wrong. But… I’d have a dead woman on my hands. And I can’t handle that right now. I’m trying to make amends for my past, not make it worse.

  I got most of the blood off her, but now her stained dress is soaked, and I realize I need to get her out of it and changed before I put her in my bed.

  I sighed. I needed to call for help.

  ***

  Macy was my “unofficial” secretary. She just turned 19 and lived next door with her two siblings who were probably 5 and 10. Their parents were rich, but I never saw them. They had a nanny, I think, at one point. I hadn’t seen her for months, either.

  These kids were pretty much feral and living on their own. Macy made sure her younger siblings got to school, made sure they were fed, bathed and in bed at a reasonable hour. She was insufferable, pretty much par for the course of a disgrunted teenaged girl. But I liked her.

  A few years back, Macy found me passed out against my door one night and in a drunken stupor, I told her I needed blood.

  Not a real headscratcher to figure out what I was at that point.

  To her credit, Macy never outed me. It probably has to do with the fact she’s always hard-pressed for cash. And I needed someone to field calls and run the administrative side of my PI firm. So we’ve been working together for well over a year now. I don’t know that I’d call her a friend, per se, but we trust each other. And for a vampire, that’s about as close as a human can get to us.

  When Macy appears in my living room, she’s wearing a dark tank top and leggings and her bck hair is tied up in a messy bun. She has a brand new eyebrow piercing that looks swollen and painful. I decide to not tell her it smells infected and jump to my feet instead. I had been nervously pacing the room waiting for her to show up for the past few minutes.

  “What do you want? It’s almost midnight, dickweed. I have css in the morning.”

  “And I’m having an emergency, asswipe.” I snarl, and grab her arm and drag her to the shower. Cecilia is passed out cold, her cheek pressed against the drain.

  “Oh, shit. You killed her.” Macy sounds more excited than horrified.

  “She’s not dead,” I snapped. “I need your help changing her and getting her into bed.”

  Macy levels a look at me. “I’m not putting my fingerprints on her.“

  “I pay you to do whatever I need you to do,” I hiss, looming over her. The vampire beast demands dominance over her, being she’s my natural prey. But Macy isn’t phased as she stares up at me with crossed arms.

  “Well, your pay is shit. Especially to deal with disposing of a dead body.”

  “For the st time, she’s not dead. I should fucking know. I can hear her heartbeat.”

  Macy and I both look down when Cecilia makes a soft, sighing sound. I crouched down, turning my ear towards her to listen closely.

  “Is she… humming?” Macy whispered.

  “Not very well. Come on. I’ll turn her around so you can unzip her dress.”

  “Ugh. Fine! But you’re buying me tickets to Coachel.”

  I gawked at her. “I’m a vampire, not a fucking miracle worker.” I slowly turned Cecilia onto her stomach and then stood, gesturing widely down to her. “Hurry up. She’s cold.”

  Macy flipped me the bird and then squatted down to unzip Cecilia.

  Even though I really wanted to see what Cecilia looked like naked, the whole point of this was to be a gentleman and uphold some shaky morales that, for whatever reason, seemed important to stand by when it came to this woman.

  I darted out of the room and rummaged through my clothes to find something clean for her to be changed into.

  I hadn’t done undry in a while– that was supposed to be a part of Macy’s duties until she decided to pass it off to her 10-year-old brother. Who doesn’t know how to do undry. Or even turn on a washing machine.

  So I’ve been doing it, though I haven’t bothered washing anything for several weeks.

  I find an old t-shirt that used to be bck but faded to a gray, and stick my head back into the bathroom. “I have something here for you to change her into. I’m gonna get the bed ready.”

  I see my assistant’s hand poke out of the shower and I toss the t-shirt at it for her to catch. I hear rustling and Macy grunts before gasping softly.

  “Whoa.”

  “What? What is it?” I said in a panic, appearing back at the doorway. I don’t know why I’m freaking out over Cecilia. She just proved she can survive a lethal slice to the neck.

  “Nothin’,” Macy replies with a clicking of her tongue. “She’s stacked. Wish I had tits like this. Think they’re real?”

  God, I don’t even care. I scrubbed my fingers over my face, pressing the tips against my eyelids. She’s killing me. It doesn’t help that Macy is just as inappropriate as I am.

  “Okay. We’re ready.”

  I returned to the shower stall. Macy had propped the blonde up against the wall, her hands folded in her p with her head drooped against her shoulder.

  Seeing Cecilia in my shirt that’s way too big and looks like a nightgown on her body… It does something to me. Her scent is already intoxicating, but to have it mixing with mine? The primal vampire beast in me likes that. Likes that very much.

  I don’t know why the prick is being so possessive right now, but at least he’s content with that shirt as a sign of marking her. Because there’s no way in fuck I’m going to let myself taste her blood.

  Even as I think that, I still take a longing gnce at the light pink droplets of watery blood that didn’t go down the drain. I envision them drying and licking them off the tile like a fucking psychopath.

  I cringed at myself. Gods, I really… really need blood. And to get id.

  Cecilia weighed nothing in my hold as I carried her to my bed and y her ontop of the bedding. I stared at her with my hands on my hips and Macy joined my side.

  “Uh… should I put her under the bnkets?” I asked.

  Macy shrugs. “Dunno. Never kidnapped someone before. What is the comfort level you’re going for here?”

  I stared at her incredulously. “I did not kidnap her.”

  “Is that the story we’re gonna tell the cops when they come looking for her?”

  “God damnit, I have a headache and your smart ass remarks aren’t helping. And I need to find that little demon prick.”

  “Wait a minute,” Macy began, shooting a hand out to grab my forearm. “You didn’t find Jagger? I saw photos online of him getting out of a golden mbo at the ga. He was wearing a gold suit, Quill. How on earth did you fuck this up?”

  “I did find him. He slit her throat,” I snapped, pointing at Cecilia. “I couldn’t let her bleed out. He got away. Which is why I’m gonna find him right now.”

  “And leave her?” Macy pointed at Cecilia.

  “No, you’re gonna–”

  “Oh, no! I’m sure as fuck not a babysitter to this woman! You take care of your own shit, Quill. I’m going home and going to bed.”

  “Why are you being so pissy?” I demanded and sniffed the air as she stormed past me. “You’re not on your period.”

  Macy scowled loudly, spinning around. “Are you fucking with me right now, man? How many times do I have to expin that I’m not your human servant? You brought her here so deal with her yourself because I have to call Terrence’s wife and tell that poor dy that my dipshit boss couldn’t catch the demon that was standing around with a fucking golden bow on his head, ripe for the taking. So yeah, I’m pissy!” She stomped to my front door and threw it open. “And another thing. Fuck. You!”

  The door smmed shut, and I winced.

  “...Christ.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out another cigarette. I lit it quickly and took in a deep breath. I blew out a long drag and lulled my head back, shutting my eyes.

  “She doesn’t like you very much,” a soft voice rasped behind me.

  I spun around and almost jumped out of my skin at the sight of Cecilia sitting up. She was pale, for sure, and there was a long, angry red mark on her neck still. But otherwise she looked… fine.

  “Cecilia.” There was a strange mixture of arousal seeing her in my clothes and in my bed… and also relief knowing she was awake. “Are you okay?”

  She blinked at me. “I told you to go after Jagger.”

  Sticking to that point, huh? “Not gonna tell me how the fuck you survived a ssh through your jugur?”

  “Well, how does anyone survive that? I’m not human. Just like you.”

  I cocked my head to the side. “You knew?”

  She smiled at me with sympathy. “You look like Count Dracu. Of course I knew. I’m pretty sure anyone who sees you knows.”

  My hand moved to my beard self-consciously. “That’s rude.”

  She ughed, and the sound rang in my ears like a sweet melody.

  “Uh, are you thirsty or something? I don’t have a lot here.”

  “Any ginger ale?” she asks hopefully. Ginger ale? What was she, a senior citizen?

  Funnily enough, I used to carry it all the time. I don’t even know why, I never drank it. I shook my head.

  “Just wine. And blood. But I doubt that you’re a vampire.”

  She smiled, looking sad to the point that my gut tightened. “Not a vampire. Water would be wonderful, thank you.”

  I brought her a gss of tap water, which she accepted with both hands.

  “Are you gonna tell me what you were doing with the demon? And what institution you’re with?”

  She took a long gulp of the water with her chin tilted back, and I got a fresh view of her creamy skin. Gods. That beautiful neck. My fangs ached again.

  Her head lowered after she’d almost drained the entire gss in one gulp. And now her rge blue eyes were fixated on me.

  “You look like you’re in pain,” she said when she caught my gaze again. “When’s the st time you had blood?”

  Perceptive little shit, isn’t she?

  “Uh, a day or so. I’ve been busy.” I frowned. “I don’t generally like to drink with… company.”

  This surprised her for some reason and her eyebrows lift. “Oh. Why?”

  “The subscription service I use has different donors. Sometimes it makes me… react depending on whose blood I’m drinking.” My words are carefully vague. “It’s a safety precaution if anything.”

  Her eyebrows lowered in understanding, and I was grateful she didn’t pry. “I see. I’ll get out of your way, then.”

  “W-wait a minute,” I stumbled forward as she tried to get out of bed. “I don’t care if you’re a demon or a fairy or a fucking dragon, no one can just go running around after losing that much blood. Take it easy for a bit, Cecilia.”

  The blonde frowns at me, her expressive eyes staring up at me as if she’s looking for something else. Like she wants me to say something else.

  “I really can’t,” she whispers to me like she’s sharing a secret. “I need to go home. I’ll be okay, honest.”

  She stands up and stares down at herself, pulling on the bck t-shirt that sits at her low hip.

  “Oh, uh, your dress is still in the bathroom.”

  “Do you… have something I could wear underneath this?” she asks with a flush. “The cops might pick me up for prostitution without pants on.”

  I chuckled, just to mask the arousing reminder that she was entirely nude beneath my shirt. “I’ve seen women wear far less than that even in winter.”

  She idly fiddles with the hem of my t-shirt while I rummage through my dresser. I see a pair of gray trousers that wouldn’t fit her. I found a pair of sweatpants on the ground, but they hadn’t been washed. Big surprise there.

  I find some old exercise shorts that I’m pretty sure I haven’t worn since the 80s or 90s judging by the bright shade of orange. I don’t even remember buying them, but if I did, what the fuck was I thinking?

  I held them up and turned to her with uncertainty. “These work?”

  Her lips curve. I expected her to burst into ughter, but she’s strangely happy as she reaches for them. “Yeah. They work.”

  She changed into a the shorts and a pullover sweater when she refused to accept my overcoat. I helped her put her soaked dress in an old grocery bag and walked her to the front door of my apartment.

  Cecilia’s hand goes on the doorknob, and she’s about to turn it, but she hesitates. Her eyes slowly gaze back around the apartment over her shoulder, and I watch her curiously with my hands in my pockets to fight the urge to touch her.

  She seems like she’s searching for something in particur, but her gaze ends up on me.

  “Thanks for looking after me,” she murmurs. I swallow as I carefully take a step towards her.

  “No problem. I didn’t do much.”

  “Tell Macy I said thank you, too. Her name is Macy, right?”

  “The she-devil pain in my ass that was in here earlier? Yes. That’s Macy.”

  Cecilia smiles and I hesitate with an upheld palm.

  “Uh, it’s not inappropriate or anything. She’s just my secretary. Or my assistant. I don’t know what the kosher term to use nowadays.” I don’t know why I feel the need to crify that for her. Maybe so she knows a 200 year old vampire isn’t fucking a nineteen year old human girl.

  “Oh.” Cecilia doesn’t sound disappointed or relieved by that admission. I don’t know how to take that. I’ve been tiptoeing around asking for her number or to take her out for dinner. Or something. Anything.

  The beast in me doesn’t want to even let her leave, as though my life depended on it. He’s always been a dramatic fucker, so I restrain the urges.

  “Cecilia, I know we had a fucked up start, but, I was gonna… ask if you’d like to, uh, go out sometime.”

  I’ve asked out plenty of women. Well, correction, I’ve fucked a lot of women. The old song and dance routine of meeting at a bar, sharing a drink, going back to someone’s pce. I’m used to the impersonal detachment. I had it down to a science. And I’ve never had a problem with women approaching me.

  Until now. My ego got taken down a notch when she compared me to fucking Count Dracu, and now I’m convinced I look like that cartoon fucker on the cereal box.

  And somehow the words that usually come out from me smoothly and easily became garbled and awkward. Probably because I realize this question isn’t impersonal or fleeting. It’s asking for more than that. I’m drawn to this woman. And gauging by the way we connected in that dark hallway just hours before, I think she’s drawn to me, too.

  “I can’t. I’m sorry,” she says quickly, looking like she’s in pain, perhaps bordering on panic. Okay, maybe I read this entirely wrong. She had just gotten felt up by the world’s worst fucking demon. She’d had her throat cut. Maybe when she clung to me, she was just relieved that she’d been saved.

  I nod sheepishly, trying to not let the profound disappointment show.

  “At least let me walk you home. It’s te.”

  “I’ll walk, it’s not too far.”

  Maybe she’s seeing someone. I mean, of course, she is. Cecilia is beautiful and gentle and everything that is perfect. And that scent. I don’t know how every creature with a decent nose in the city isn’t circling her like a shark every moment of the day.

  She pulls the door open, and the beast inside me panics. Without thinking, I sm it shut with my palm by the side of her head, and I feel her body entirely freeze behind me.

  Now I’ve scared her and screwed this up for real. Real fucking smooth, Quill.

  “Sorry–” I released my palm, jolting back a step. “Sorry. That was my beast. Not me.”

  Her head twists just enough to gnce at me over her shoulder. Bizarrely, Cecilia doesn’t look scared. She seems intrigued.

  “Your beast?”

  “It’s just what I call the vampire urges,” I crify, ignoring the faint blush on my cheeks. I’m blushing. Like a schoolgirl. That’s what this woman has reduced me to and she seems clueless. “Has a mind of its own.”

  She hesitates with her fingertips still on the doorknob, but she’s not turning it. “Is the beast… hard to control?”

  “Only when I haven’t fed.” Or when I’m around a scent like yours. Then again, I’ve never been around a scent like hers. Mouth-watering. Tantalizing. Gods, I really want to lick up those dried blood spots on my shower floor right now.

  Cecilia slowly turns to face me, her bright eyes staring up at me.

  “Jagger. We… should talk about finding Jagger.”

  “Right now?”

  She shakes her head. “Tomorrow, if you’re free. There’s a diner down the street called Merle’s. We could meet for lunch.”

  Is Cecilia asking me out? Maybe my charm is working better than I realized. And I’m pretty sure I was supposed to go on a video call with a client around lunch time, but I would re-work anything in my schedule to see her again. Macy is gonna be pissed, but what else is new?

  “Yeah, sure. Noon?”

  Cecilia nods and then smiles softly. “Okay.”

  She looks at the doorknob and then back at me, another hesitation. Through my shirt, I see her breasts heaving. She’s flushed still from my smming the door shut and startling her.

  But that’s not all. My senses are going fucking overboard. I can feel her temperature raising. Her arousal.

  The beast wants more.

  Her hands are trembling now as she slowly turns the doorknob a second time, but I lose my fight. I lunge at her.

  And she lets me.

  Her sweet body is smmed against the door and my mouth is on hers. The second our mouths meet, it feels like two pieces of a puzzle clicking together. It feels so fucking right.

  And I dare to taste her as our kiss deepens, I let myself lick her lips to urge them open. And she whimpers just softly as our tongues meet. Gods, she’s so warm and soft. My palm immediately goes to her breast through the fabric of the shirt, palming it and feeling its glorious weight.

  Macy was right. She is built.

  I feel Cecilia arch against me and I groan, feeling her tits press against my chest and my cock strains against my pants as it grinds against her abdomen. One zip and a flick and I could be inside her. Right now.

  “Fuck, Cece.” I hear myself whisper.

  Cecilia jolts away from me, her eyes wide with parted, swollen lips.

  She sps me hard and then gasps at herself, pulling her hands over her mouth with her shoulders practically up to her ears.

  “Quill. I’m so sorry. I-I didn’t mean to–”

  I quickly shook my head. “No. That’s…” I quickly raked some of my stray hair back. “Forgive me. I got over-excit–”

  Before I can finish my sentence, Cecilia has already escaped from the front door. And it almost closes, but there’s a pause. She pokes her head through, staring at me. She’s wide-eyed, still flushed. Still… aroused. I can smell it.

  “Noon. Merle’s.” She says, and takes one gnce at my cock for some reason before quickly shutting the door.

  I stood dazed in the foyer with the strangest erection of my life. Did she hate that? Did she love it? Why did she sp me? I can still feel the slight tingling sting of it, and I pressed my cold finger tips to the skin as if it were a kiss.

  And why the fuck didn’t I ask her how she knew my name?