Page 24 of First Blood
Clutching the edges of the towel at my hip like a virgin in a locker room, I gently creaked the bathroom door open and stepped out.
Laurie lay in the middle of the bed, his curls fanned out on the pillow like a Renaissance angel’s. The cup sat empty on the nightstand, and he’d tucked himself into both blankets just like I’d told him to. His eyes peeked at me over the top edge of the quilts.
Awkwardly, I turned my back, dropped the towel, and got the other sweatpants and the t-shirt out of the wardrobe and onto me as quickly as I could.
And then there was nothing left but to get in the bed. I slid in on the side nearest the door, putting myself between Laurie and everything out there. I expected him to scoot over to make room for me, but he didn’t move a muscle, just stared up at me with those blue eyes, solemn and still.
I managed to fit in on my side, pulling the quilts over both of us, and then I settled down next to him. His heartbeats transmitted through the mattress, a slight vibration. The cabin was eerily quiet, even for someone with my enhanced hearing, with only his breathing and mine and the faint creaking of the pipes cooling down to disturb the stillness. His breath fanned my face, and our knees touched.
Laurie blinked at me, his eyes gleaming. “You must be so mad at me,” he said, his voice shaking a little. It wasn’t from cold anymore; he’d warmed up. “Getting in the car with them. I should have known better, I knew they were bad news and I ignored my instincts. You almost died. You should’ve died. I mean, anyone else would’ve died.”
“Mad at you?” I couldn’t even begin to parse his thought process there. “They would’ve grabbed you and shoved you in the car if you hadn’t gotten in. Why the fuck would I be mad at you?”
Laurie’s full lower lip wobbled, and his eyes started to fill up. Oh, fucking hell. Here it came. I’d known he was going to lose it at some point during the night, and I’d still spoken to him like he was Esther, or someone else who wasn’t afraid and didn’t give a fuck.
“You slammed the bathroom door,” Laurie whispered, and then he started to sob, his whole body shaking.
I pulled him into my arms and held him cradled against my chest, wrapped as tightly to me as I could get him. He fit like he was meant to be there and nowhere else. It took a long time for him to stop crying, and even then he shuddered every couple of minutes, drew in a deep, hitching breath, and pressed his face into my shoulder like he couldn’t get close enough.
“I’m sorry,” he said, muffled into my chest. “I’m so sorry. I’m pathetic.”
“You’re fucking incredible,” was all I could say to that. “I charged out into a fight without the weapon that was sitting right there ready for me to grab it, got myself basically killed, and would’ve died if you hadn’t taken that shot. You saved my life. And before that, you were so brave. I couldn’t believe it when you tried to convince them I wasn’t coming. That was fucking smart. Captured soldiers who get trained for that don’t always have that much presence of mind, stalling for time, throwing their captors off their game.” I squeezed him and pressed a kiss to the top of his head, careful not to hurt the cut along his hairline. I wasn’t sure what they’d done to him to cause it, but at least I knew that all three options for the perpetrator were stacked up like firewood in the back of an SUV outside. That was kind of satisfying. “You were incredible,” I repeated. Because it bore repeating, and I’d say it again and again until he believed me.
There was a long, long silence, long enough that I might have thought he’d gone to sleep except for the rapid skipping of his heartbeat.
He spoke so softly even I almost couldn’t hear it, and when my brain processed the words I couldn’t believe what he’d said. It sounded like, “I wasn’t brave. I really didn’t think you’d come.”
“Laurie?” My own voice had gone hoarse. “You can’t possibly mean that. You didn’t —what?”
Silence. I unwrapped my arm from around his back and gently slid my fingers under his chin, tipping his head back so I could see his face. Laurie didn’t look blank anymore. He was miserable, his lips curved down and his face puffy from crying. And he couldn’t meet my eyes. Drops clung to his eyelashes, shining like crystal.
“You really didn’t think I’d come for you? I’d always come — they were — fuck, they were torturing you. They were going to kill you. You thought I’d shrug andwalk away?” I tried to keep the hurt out of my voice, but it bled through. Of all the shitty opinions people had held of me over a couple of hundred years, this had to be the worst. I’d had mortal enemies who thought better of me than that. And this was Laurie. Most people’s opinions didn’t matter to me, but his did.
“I was wrong.” He swallowed. “Obviously. But I didn’t see any reason why you would. I insulted you. I didn’t think you were coming back. Why would you walk into an obvious trap to save me? My blood’s not that special.” At that, he looked up at last, his eyes wide with something like fear. “Or is it? I mean — is there something you’re not telling me?”
“Your blood’s great, but it doesn’t have anything to do with why I’m here.” I took a second to get my other thoughts in order. In the end, there wasn’t anything I could do. I could try to give him money, which he’d probably refuse. Try to get him a different job, ditto. I’d already offered all of that and he’d turned me down. He trusted me enough to let me take care of him for the moment, but…he’d thought I was going to leave him to die. I’d proved him wrong, but anyone with a fraction of a soul would’ve done the same — and what he’d seen of me up to now hadn’t given him even that much confidence in me. If that’d been his overall impression, he wouldn’t want me around. Which I had to respect. Even though the thought of not being around Laurie ever again left me with a nasty, hollow, sick feeling all the way from my chest down to my very bones. “I’ll leave you alone after this, okay? No more feeding. No more watching you from fire escapes. I’ll be gone. I promise.”
Laurie’s face crumpled, all the remaining fight seeming to drain out of him as I watched. His eyes dimmed. And he bit his lip. Fuck, I wanted to lick him.
One of his curls tickled my neck, and he was so warm, so delicate, almost weightless in my arms. If he told me to let him go, I’d have to. The arm still around him tightened at the thought, and my thumb stroked the curve of his throat where my hand still held his chin.
And then he tipped his head back even more, baring his throat to me. Pale and smooth, it could’ve been carved out of marble if it weren’t for the blood pulsing just beneath the surface, hot and vital.
“You need to feed now, though,” he said. “I don’t know that much about vampires, but I know you need to feed after healing wounds like that. You can have as much as you want.”
“Not after tonight. You need to rest —”
“Bite me, Victor,” he said, and this time he didn’t sound like he was asking. That was a demand, plain and simple. My fangs were out in an instant. I’d been trying to ignore the scent of his blood and my own body’s urgent demands, but I was already teetering on a knife’s edge. If I’d been a younger vampire with less control, I’d have bitten him the second I could move after getting shot. Laurie wormed his arm out from under the quilts and wrapped his hand around the back of my neck, tugging me down. “I want you to. Please.”
Maybe there was someone out there whose self-control could’ve stood up to that, but he wasn’t me. I let Laurie pull me down until my face pressed against his throat, until I was mouthing the thin skin beneath his ear, until his heartbeat and his scent eclipsed everything else in the world.
Chapter 10
Joined
I bit, and his blood flooded my mouth, hot and rich and as necessary as breathing. I drank and drank, instinct taking over as my body insisted on replenishing its strength. The lingering damage to my internal organs healed immediately. And then it was pure bliss, life flowing into me and making me invincible.
My cock strained hard and insistently against a soft, pliant body, and I distantly felt movement under me and fingers clawing into my shoulder.
