Blood Magic by Laken Cane

Chapter Ten

He sprang up like a jack-in-the-box, and his eyes flipped open, showing nothing but pure, glossy black that bled out from his iris and colored his entire eye. He opened his mouth and hissed, his fangs already dropped and locked into place. They’d probably come down early into his burial when he’d first begun starving and had simply not retracted.

Sometimes it was difficult to tell a vampire from a human.

This was not one of those times.

Then he looked at me. “Oh shit,” I cried, and jerked backward, but the blood injection had done its job—somewhat—and in seconds he’d left his three-foot-deep bed, wrapped his arms and legs around me, and was aiming those awful fangs right at my throat. “Hold off, Joe,” I screamed, when I saw him over the vampire’s shoulder, his blade raised.

But Joe wasn’t one to wait—not when he thought I was in danger. I had one chance. I was wolf strong and not even close to starved. The vampire might have had the element of surprise on his side, but I had pure muscle. I flipped him over and straddled him, then leaned over so my face was near his mouth, as he blindly turned his head this way and that, biting the air, seeking the hot blood he could smell. The blood that meant he was free, at last, from his chains.

“Hey,” I murmured. “You’re okay. You’re free. Calm down, let the blood bring you back. You’re okay.”

He heard me, and he listened.

Somehow, my voice got through the fog of his tortured mind, and he listened. He hesitated. The black of his eyes began to recede like pools of brackish water dried up and chased away by the sun, and finally, he could see. He could think.

And he could speak.

“Why,” he murmured. “Why have you saved me?”

“What’d he say?” Joe growled, but neither the vampire nor I looked at him.

The vampire snaked his arms around my body, and I swear I’ve never seen such a look of intensity in anyone’s eyes. Not in my entire life. But there were other things in there, too. Things I couldn’t comprehend—but I knew they were bad. He was too raw, too recently saved, to hide them.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

I could only shake my head. I knew now was not the time to have a conversation with the man. Not right now. “Come find me,” I told him. “When you’re…normal.”

He didn’t take his stare from mine, and for a few seconds, I thought he was trying to shade me. Then I realized he wasn’t quite strong enough for that—he was simply…feeling me.

And then he turned his head and scraped his fangs along my inner arm, right above my wrist. Just a scratch—but it was enough to make me bleed. Enough to give him a taste. He whispered something, something I didn’t understand.

I threw myself away from him. “Joe,” I said. “Let’s go.”

“Just like that?” Joe asked, but I was already halfway back to the car. I left the vampire there on the bed of golden leaves, and I ran away.

I felt something in my heart, like maybe I’d made the worst mistake of my life. Or the best mistake. I didn’t know. I only knew it was overwhelming.

“I thought you had to talk to him,” Joe said, after we’d jumped into his car.

“Go,” I said, and maybe he heard the urgency in my voice because he wasted no time doing exactly as I asked.

“You okay?” he asked, when we were back on the highway. “What happened back there?”

I didn’t tell him the vampire had bitten me. I wasn’t sure what it meant—I just knew it meant something. I’d been around a few vampires. I’d even killed a few. But this was something new. I didn’t want to say that he was different.

But he was different.

The only real question was…

Why?

“Kait?”

I focused on Joe, more than a little spooked. “I’m not sure,” I told him. “I guess I freaked out.”

“Understandable. If you want to know the truth, I freaked out a little, too.”

That made me smile and I relaxed a bit. I wanted to look at my wrist, but I didn’t dare. Not yet.

“Vampires,” Joe said. “I mean, real fucking vampires.”

“Stop at a drive-thru,” I said, suddenly ravenous. “I need protein.”

“I could use some coffee,” he said. “Kait, are you sure you’re okay? You seem off. Weirder than usual.” He said it gently and with the utmost sincerity.

I snorted. “I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”

“And the bloodsucker?”

I stared out my window as Joe’s car carried me farther and farther away from the vampire. Maybe I should have been pissed at myself. I might have thought it had been a wasted trip.

But I knew in my bones it hadn’t been.

Only time would tell if I was right.

“I don’t know,” I murmured. “I just don’t know.”

I was pretty sure he shivered, and I couldn’t blame him for that.