B Positive by Jewel Killian

Eight

I stompedaround my apartment as I got ready for my shift at the bar.

Who the hell did he think he was?

Buying my building while he kept me tranqed in his compound? And for what? Keeping tabs on me?

I could understand wanting to vet me. A king could never be too safe. But that shouldn’t include buying my building. Who the hell just does that?

I ripped a brush through my still-wet hair and braided it into a cute Dutch braid bun. Then, I tugged on my high-waisted jeans and cropped halter. The outfit was my work uniform. I had seven different halters in seven different colors and countless pairs of high-waisted jeans. I’d discovered early on which outfit earned me the highest tips and bought a week’s worth.

I shucked on my comfiest pair of boots and headed to the bar for my shift.

I was still mad.

Really fucking mad. If this was the kind of controlling bullshit I had to look forward to while working for him, the king and I would definitely be having words.

At least I had the bar to distract me for a while.

The walk through town burned off most of my foul mood, and Jerry’s greeting at the back door took care of the rest.

“Hello, my star bartender. How was your day off?” He wore a smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes, and I had to resist the urge to give Jerry a big bear hug right then and there.

“It fucking sucked, Jer, but I’m here now and ready to get the night started.”

“Atta girl.” He gave me a fatherly wink. “Just so you know, April had to call out because her boyfriend is in the hospital.”

I paused, employee password half-typed into the MICROS system. “Oh, no. I hope he’s all right.”

“Me too. But we won’t know anything for a few days. It’s pretty bad. The doctors say it was some kind of animal. They put him in a medically induced coma.”

I kept my face neutral, but my skin went cold and tingly. Animal attacks were never animal attacks. Not in Laurel Cove. “Oh, God, how awful.”

Jerry nodded, face grim. “Yeah. It really is. And it means you’ll have the bar to yourself. I couldn’t get anyone to cover her shift on such short notice.”

“Sure, no problem. I can handle a Sunday on my own.”

Honestly, I was glad for the distraction of constant customers. Plus, there was the fat wad of tips I’d have at the end of the night.

But poor April. An animal attack?

That was going to sit in my head all night and fester, I could tell.

We had a deal with the local officials. They gave us access to their blood bank, and the king made sure their re-election campaigns stayed fully funded.

All the vamps in Laurel Cove knew that. No one here would be careless enough to feed off someone in the wild.

The last time there was an “animal attack” in Laurel Cove, I was the animal.

It’s why my nest kicked me out.

Which meant there was a baby vamp running around the cove with no maker to show them the way.

I had to find them. Had to get through to them before they hurt more people.

God knows, I wished someone would have done it for me.

“Hey, you okay, Eden?” Concern creased Jerry’s jovial face.

“Yeah, just worried about April. I hope her boyfriend pulls through.”

Jerry nodded, and I went up front to cut fruit garnishes, fill up the mixers, and stock the well for when we opened.

One task blended into the next, and before I knew it, we were open for business.

About halfway through my shift, a pretty and familiar brunette came up to the bar.

Ah, shit. Okay, play it cool, Eden, don’t lead her on.“Hey, what can I get you?”

“Hey,” she said shyly. “You might not remember me. You probably don’t, not with how many people you must see in a day. I know if I had your job, I wouldn’t be able to keep everyone I met in a day straight.” She smiled, realizing she was rambling. “Sorry. I—I’m Annette. I was here the other night. You saved me from getting roofied.”

I smiled at her. “I remember you. Did you bring a date here to vet?”

“Oh, um, no that’s not why I’m here.” Her cheeks stained red.

I knew what she was here for but I wasn’t trying to give her anything to work with. “Oh, well, what can I get ya to drink, then? I don’t have time to chat. It’s just me at the bar tonight.”

She pulled her lip between her teeth. “Oh, sure. Sorry. I’ll just have a vodka cranberry then.”

“Coming right up,” I said, food-service smile affixed firmly in place. I made her drink quickly and worked my way to the opposite end of the bar. With a little luck, I’d keep my distance and Annette would get the idea.

As the night wore on, Annette kept nursing that drink, never letting it leave her hand. A few guys approached her on different occasions, but they quickly found she wasn’t interested.

Annette only had eyes for me. At least for a few more days.

“You could simply compel her to forget you,” a rough, raspy voice suggested through the din of bar noise, landing directly on my lady bits.

My gaze flew to meet his.

God, he looked good. A literal king among the Chad and Kevin plebs. Plebs, who knew Julian deserved respect or fear, and gave him a ridiculously wide berth.

He stood there, basking in my admiration, all poised and powerful and perfectly fuckable.

My face flushed and I couldn’t tell if it was because of how pissed off I was that he would dare to buy my building and then show up at my bar, or because I was fucking turned on. “What the fuck are you doing here?” I snapped.

“Tsk, tsk. Is that any way to talk to a customer?”

My lip curled. “Look, I only agreed to working for you, not being stalked. Now, get the fuck out of my bar before you get it in your head to buy it too.” I hissed low enough that only he could hear.

“Hm. I’m not interested in acquiring any bars at the moment.” He gave the too-old-to-be-trendy-but-too-nice-to-be-a-dive bar a once over. “But I do quite like it here. I think I’ll stay.”

“You absolutely do not like it here.”

He pulled out a stool and sat without glancing at it or even brushing it off. “You know nothing about me, Eden. How could you possibly know what sort of bars I like?”

Okay, that was a totally fair point. “I don’t need to know what kind of bars you like to know you’re here for some self-serving purpose. Now, I’ll say it again. Get out of my bar.”

He leaned in, letting me get a good whiff of his intoxicating scent. Cedar and pine and… His gaze glowed brighter. Warm pools of hazel lapped at my senses, pulling me under his spell.

I backed the fuck up, ass grazing the bar sink. “Are you seriously trying to fucking compel me right now?” I lashed out, revulsion clinging to my words, hands gripping the edge of the sink so tight the metal whined.

The king’s brows pulled together. “Who the hell turned you?”

“What? Why are you bringing that up again?”

He leaned all the way across the bar. “I’m not trying to compel you, Eden. And you would know that if your maker had given you even a basic primer on our kind. Now, I’ll ask again. Who the hell turned you? I’d like to pay them a visit and let them know what an awful job they did.”

“That’s none of your goddamn business,” I yelled, loud enough to draw attention. “Just leave me alone, Julian. I agreed to work for you, not to be interrogated at my place of business.”

“Interrogating you? I’m only trying to get to know you, Eden. Why do you consistently think the worst of me? I don’t want to behead you and I’m not stalking you. Seems awfully shallow of you to assume I have no redeeming qualities whatsoever.”

How fucking dare he!?

I was not shallow. “You want to know? You really want to know, Julian? Normal people don’t buy other people’s apartment buildings. They don’t set their safe codes to the birthday of someone they’ve never met.” And they don’t make me want to rip off my clothes and fuck them on top of the bar. “I like to take money from the rich because I think the world would be a lot better off with one less billionaire in it. You use your money and resources as weapons. You bought my fucking apartment building. You let me take a priceless diamond because apparently you’re worth so much, priceless isn’t actually that big of a deal. That’s not normal.”

He sat there, completely unfazed. “Mmm, not normal for anyone but a king, perhaps.”

I shook my head, seeing red. “You’re part of the problem. Part of the system made to keep the working poor stuck and living paycheck to paycheck. I watched my mother scrape by trying to make ends meet. She worked her ass off and sometimes she still had to take handouts from her church.”

She was why I’d worked my ass off to make a nest egg. I never wanted to be in that position again. Wearing hand-me-downs that never fit right. Needing to eat the free school lunches. And getting made fun of for both.

Food scarcity was fucking awful and while there had always been a meal at mealtime, there wasn’t extra. Snacks just weren’t a thing in my mother’s house. And there was never anything to drink except tap water because I’d get in trouble for “sucking down all the milk” that was meant for her coffee.

Julian’s gaze trapped me, pinning me to the spot. “I didn’t make your mother poor, Eden.”

My hands shook, skin went icy, and I leveled a diamond-hard stare at him. “I know that, you arrogant fuck. As I already said, you are part of the system made to keep poor people poor. Now for the last fucking time, get the fuck out of my bar.”

Jerry appeared behind him, a deep frown on his face. “You all right, Eden?”

Before I could answer, Julian spun around and locked eyes with my teddy bear bouncer. I knew what was coming next, and there was no way in hell I’d let that happen.

I launched myself across the bar, putting my body between the vampire king of Laurel Cove and Jerry. “Don’t you dare compel my friends,” I ordered the king.

He gazed down at me, a small smile on his face. “As you wish. Though I’d be interested to learn the rules surrounding your double standards, since you seemed to have no qualms compelling my hired help. Or the county clerk. Or any of the safe companies you dealt with while researching my safes.”

How the fuck did he know any of that? “That was different!”

“I don’t see how.” A devious smile lifted his lips. “Why don’t you explain it to me? Over dinner. Let’s say, tomorrow night?”

He sweetened the offer by setting another limited-edition Starbucks cup on the bar top. The scent of warm blood wafted to me and the black raised diamond pattern called to the emo childhood I never got to have. I snatched the cup and put it in the wine fridge. The last thing I wanted was to blood moan in front of my customers.

“Tomorrow then. I’ll pick you up after your shift.” The king beamed at me.

“Fine.” I said. One meal wouldn’t hurt. I couldn’t wait to watch that smug face of his fall as I explained all the ways he was wrong. I didn’t have a double standard. What I did was about survival. It was completely different.

“I’ll look forward to it then.” The king stood and strode to the exit like he owned the place.

Ass.

The moment Jerry shut the door behind him, I could finally take a full breath.

Maybe he was right. Maybe I had been jumping to conclusions. But could he really blame me?