I grab some gauze from underneath the sink, then press it against the wound to stop the bleeding. Once it slows to a trickle, I clean the gash, accompanying myself with a string of “Ow”s.
Maybe I should get stitches, but how to explain my injury? I can barely convince myself it really happened. Even now my mind is forming a wall of denial.
Shane’s fangs were fake. Not plastic, of course, but maybe porcelain. Very sharp porcelain.
I close my eyes and shake my head. The fangs were one thing, but his strength and speed, and the magnetic pull of his eyes—entirely inhuman.
No no no.
Not. Possible
. Except it is.
I quit that stupid job because I thought they were nuts, or making fun of me, or both. But everything in the booklet was true. The DJs aren’t insane, they’re “just” vampires.
I bandage the wound, then return to my room, afraid of what I’ll see. My bed looks like a murder scene, which it almost was.
Or was it? Shane didn’t seem like he wanted to kill me—he could have done it easily enough. Maybe he thought I’d be a willing “source.” My body quakes at the thought, the sudden movement delivering new jolts of pain.
I carry my sheets at arm’s length to the bathroom and place them in the tub, which I fill with cold water. Soon
the water turns pink to match the tile. I feel like crying, but I don’t. They’re just sheets, after all, and my head is so... so...
I clutch the sink to keep from pitching onto the floor. My vision turns blurry and liquid. I ease myself down to lie on the fuzzy bath mat, then carefully place my feet on the toilet, wincing at the pain in my left leg.
The booklet didn’t say vampire bites were poisonous, so this dizziness must be shock. I draw the other end of the bath mat over me for warmth, even though it smells like feet. Closing my eyes just makes the room spin, so I stare at the stucco ceiling and try to calm the whirlpool of my thoughts.
Calling me a skeptic is like calling a polar bear white. But this is huge. Huger than an alien invasion and the return of Elvis put together. If vampires exist, maybe anything could.
No. Must not go off deep end of Crackpot Canyon. Must cling to what’s left of brain.
When the light-headedness subsides, I drain and refill the tub to let the covers soak, then drag my winter comforter from the hall closet and retreat to the living room for the night. I can’t face the disaster that took place in my bedroom. Plus it’s my only set of sheets.
As I lie bundled on the couch, memories of pleasure and pain slosh through my fogged-up mind. I hope my subconscious doesn’t get the two mixed up. I’m not that kind of girl.
I’m suffocating to death, but it’s okay, because judging by the bright light I somehow made it into heaven. I never thought it would be so humid.
“Ciara?”
“Hi, God.” Frankly, I’m disappointed He’s really a man. I figured being perfect would preclude that.
He shakes my shoulder, an inelegant gesture for a deity. “Ciara, wake up.”
“Hot up here. Can I have a Popsicle?”
Heavy sigh, very ungodlike. My mind starts to climb out of the quicksand that must be sleep.
But if I’m not dead—
I sit up and throw off the blanket, smacking into something solid that grunts.
David.
“What the hell?” I blink at him in the bright morning light while he grimaces and shakes his hand hard. A snap of knuckle signals his finger unjamming.
“Your doors were unlocked,” he says. “You’re not as smart as I thought you were.”
His distracted glance tells me I’m also not wearing as much pants as he thought I was. I jerk the blanket back over my bare legs, one of which throbs with pain. “Sorry I hit you. I’m usually nice to men who wander into my apartment while I sleep.”
“Shane said you needed help.”
I should be angry at this invasion of privacy, but all I feel is hot and miserable in my sweatshirt. I tug at the collar. “I need to change.”
“I should look at your bite first.” He holds up a hand as I gape at him. “If it makes you feel better, I’m trained as an EMT.” He opens a red vinyl bag on the coffee table to reveal a complete wound care set: bandages, antiseptic, gauze, flexi tape. I don’t want to think what the tweezers are for.
The thought of the gash in my thigh makes my head sloshy again. I slump back against the pillow. “At least get me a clean T-shirt from my bureau. Top drawer.”
He heads into my bedroom. A few moments later he appears with a T-shirt from last year’s Warped Tour. He hands it to me, then steps into the hallway out of sight. “I’m sorry you got hurt. I didn’t want you to find out the hard way.”
“Technically I found out through the handy-dandy pamphlet you gave me.” My sweatshirt sticks to my back as I struggle out of it. “I just didn’t believe it.”
“I know. I got your message.”
I pull the clean T-shirt over my head, wishing I could wash first. “A glass of water would be great.”
David crosses through the living room into the
kitchen. He pulls a glass out of the dish drainer and fills it from the faucet. “So what happened?”
“Met vampire in bar. Brought vampire home. Lost some blood. Oh, and I think I got someone arrested.”
He brings me the glass.
“Thanks.” I take a sip of water, which has that sitting-in-the-pipes-all-night taste. “Why didn’t you just tell me the truth?”
“You wouldn’t have believed me. You didn’t believe the primer.”
“Primer?”
“What you called the pamphlet. It’s just a reference guide, not the full field manual. You should read that next, now that you believe.”
I hold the cool glass against my face. “Hard to stay skeptical after a demonstration like … ”
Hey, wait a minute.
Suddenly the day doesn’t seem so hot anymore. In fact, it feels like ice cubes are surfing through my blood vessels.
“You sent Shane in as the convincer, didn’t you?” My voice rises. “This was all planned!”
He holds his hands up. “Plan B, yes. But I didn’t think he’d bite you. Obviously things got—” He gestures to my wound. “—out of control.”
Anger pulses through me, and I want to get up to punch him, or at least shove him out the door. But the slightest movement brings a stab of pain, and I collapse back on the pillow.
“I’m so sorry.” David puts his hands in the pockets of his khakis and stands there for a few uncomfortable moments. “I really should take a look.”
“I’ll call an ambulance.”
“And you’ll explain it how?”
“Dog bite.”
“What was a dog doing down there?”
My jaw clenches as I contemplate tough questions in a small town—not to mention my total lack of health insurance.
I pull back the blanket to reveal the bandage on my thigh. Grimacing, I tug the tape from my skin and peel the bandage off the wound.
David bends over and hisses in a breath. “Oh my God.”
“Are you this professional with all your patients?”
“I was expecting a couple of puncture wounds, but he really tore you.”
“He pulled away when I kicked him in the head.”
David straightens and turns away quickly, no doubt disturbed by the visual I just gave him. “I’ll go wash my hands.” He leaves without waiting for my reply.
In a few minutes he’s back at my side, with a clean cloth, soap, and a mixing bowl for a basin. He slips on a pair of squeaky latex gloves and hands me a flashlight to shine on the wound.
I have to ask, “Will I turn into a vampire?”
“For that he’d have to drain you to the point of death, and then you’d have to drink his blood in return.”
“I’m pretty sure I didn’t do that.”
“It’s all in the primer.” He kneels next to the sofa. “I thought you read it.”
“Yeah, but there could have been advances in vampire technology in the last fifty years.”
“Some things never change. Now hold still.”
It hurts when he cleans it, almost as much as the original injury. I can’t hold back a whine.
“I’m really sorry,” he says.
“It’s not you. I have a low pain threshold. I need sedation just to go to the hairdresser.”
“No, I mean, I’m sorry he hurt you.”
“You said that already.”
“They can be very persuasive.”
I start to protest that it was my idea to come back to my apartment, but then I remember it was Shane who first proposed it, in the liquor store. “His breath is warm,” I tell David, recalling the way the refrigerator door fogged up when Shane spoke to me through it. “I thought vampires didn’t have body heat.”
“He’s young, still has the side effects of humanity. Life and undeath, it’s not either-or, it’s more of a continuum.”
“When did he, you know—”
“Die? April 1995. Regina made him.”
I snort. Special connection, all right.
David plops the washcloth in the bowl, pats my wound dry with a soft clean towel, then gently applies an antibiotic ointment. My angry humiliation quenches any possible attraction to him. Ever.
“You need stitches,” he says, and embarrassment becomes the least of my problems.
“No no no. I hate sharp things. Why do you think I kicked Shane’s head away?”
“You won’t feel it.” He unwraps a syringe and pokes it into a little vial. “Lidocaine.”
I try to scoot away, but I’m at the end of the couch, and my leg hurts worse than ever. “Is this standard issue for an EMT?”
“It’s not the first time I’ve had to clean up after my employees.”
Fear of the syringe has finally woken me up. “Time out. You owe me answers.”
“Which I’ll be happy to give while the lidocaine takes effect.”
I cover my eyes with my arm. “Get it over with.”
The needle slips under my skin. I bite the edge of the throw pillow until it’s over.
I uncover my face. David puts the syringe in a red plastic biohazard bottle, then opens a suture kit. The sight of all that stainless steel sharpness makes my stomach pitch like I’m on a capsizing boat.
“Talk to me so I don’t throw up.”
“What do you want to talk about?”
Not vampires. “Did you learn medic stuff in the army?”
“Technically the term is ‘combat lifesaver,’ not ‘medic.’” He takes off the gloves and smooths the front of his blue polo shirt. “And technically I wasn’t in the army.” He sits on the edge of the sofa cushion. “I was in a paramilitary group called the International Agency for the Control and Management of Undead Corporeal Entities. The Control, for short.”
Right, because “IACMUCE” doesn’t have much of a ring.
“You said, ‘International.’ So they’re not affiliated with the U.S. government?”
He waves his hand dismissively. “Much older. Around for millennia, although it wasn’t always called the Control. Its original name is in an unpronounceable dead language.” He puts on a new set of gloves and starts arranging the
torture implements on a clean towel. I’m going to trust a vampire hunter to stitch my leg? I check to see if the phone is within reach. Nope.
“Anyway,” he continues, “those at the top levels of national governments are aware of them and even coordinate operations with them when it suits their needs.”
“Does the Control kill vampires?”
“Originally, yes.” David picks up a scalpel and looks at my wound. He changes his mind and puts it back in the kit, allowing my heart to start beating again. “But about a hundred years ago, their focus changed to management. Sign of the times, I guess, with the worldwide rise of bureaucracy. Besides, like wolves or bears, the vast majority of vampires don’t kill.”
I’m not surprised, given that Shane let me go. “Then they’re not evil?”
“Like humans, some vampires are bad, some are good, most are in-between. Granted, having so much power and beauty does turn some of them into monsters.” David’s jaw tightens for a moment, then he seems to will himself to smile. “On the other hand, to protect themselves, they have to be model citizens.”
“Why?”
“Police stations have windows.”
I draw in a sharp breath. “Sunlight, of course. So where do they get their blood? Butcher shops?”
“No, it has to be human blood. They either get it from blood banks or from donors who like to be bitten.”
“What kind of freak would want to be bitten?”
He looks away quickly, a spot of red flushing each cheek.
Oh. Ew.
He picks up the sickle-shaped needle. “You should be numb by now.”
He has me lie down, then arranges the blanket to provide a semblance of modesty and keep me from seeing what he’s doing. When the needle enters, it feels like it’s poking someone else’s skin. No pain.
I let out a deep sigh of relief. “Will I have a scar?”
“Not a bad one, if I can help it.” His face is the portrait of concentration; you’d never know he’s operating a few inches from my crotch.
“So back to the Control,” I say to ease the tension.
“By the time I joined, disposal was the exception. We only eliminated a few vampires, the ones who went crazy and posed a threat to civilians.”
“You mean when they started to lose touch with their Life Time, like the brochure said.”
“Right. The primer and the field manual are for Control agents.”
“Which you’re not anymore?”
He pauses before answering. “I left to start the radio station with our owner.”
“And the owner, is he—”
“She. Elizabeth.” A muscle twitches near his left eye. “A vampire.”
“Why would she sell the station? Won’t her fellow vamps lose their jobs?”
“And their home, and probably their sanity.”
My neck jerks. “Sanity?”
He stops stitching and looks me in the eye. “They’d lose what is, for their kind, a unique opportunity to function in this world in spite of—or rather, because of—their temporal peculiarity.”
“The whole ‘stuck in time’ thing? Yeah, I guess Grace-land only needs so many nighttime tour guides.” I pretend I don’t care about the answer to this question: “Will they die if the station’s sold?”
“Not right away.” He turns back to the operation. “Theoretically they could live forever, getting physically stronger. But psychologically, they start to decay.”
“Can you tell by looking at them?”
“Not at first. If you compared, say, Shane or Regina to other vampires their age, you wouldn’t see much difference.” He carefully shifts my knee to spread my thighs farther apart. “But once they’re twenty-five or thirty in vampire years, like Jim or Noah, they become … vacant.”