Page 43 of Surface Scratch
“Red, white, or spirits?” Marcus asked, holding up an empty glass.
“Can you make liquor not taste terrible?” he asked with half a grin. “Otherwise, I’m okay with water.”
“I can definitely do that.”
Caleb watched as Marcus raided the cabinets and the fridge, pulling out all sorts of bottles and ingredients and tools like he was a contestant on some reality cooking TV show. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, giving Caleb a chance to admire his long and surprisingly muscular forearms as he began mixing various ingredients into a tumbler.
It was still hard to believe that he was there on Marcus’s invitation. Everything about it was hard to believe. The longer Caleb looked at him, the more beautiful he appeared. It was enough for his self-consciousness to rear its ugly head, making him keenly aware of the scar tissue on his face that pulled tight whenever he smiled or laughed. It didn’t seem right that Marcus was interested in him.
He couldn’t deny that it at least felt like Marcus liked him. Well, more than liked him. Probably.
Marcus walked over with two full glasses, one tall glass filled with light yellowish liquid and ice and an oversized wine glass filled to the brim with a dark red liquid. He handed Caleb the tall glass as he sat down beside him. “Long Island iced tea, the drink of choice for anyone who hates the taste of alcohol,” he said as he did.
Caleb sniffed the drink. It wasn’t minty or foul like any of the drinks Andrew and Tariq had fed him.
Marcus clinked his glass against Caleb’s. “First date redo?”
“I’m all for that,” Caleb said and took a cautious sip. He could feel the sting of the alcohol on his tongue, but it had a pleasant flavor, sweet and bitter at the same time. He took a longer drink. “This is really good.”
Marcus sipped his own drink. “I would hope so, I was a bartender all through the eighties and nineties,” he said.
Caleb took another drink, tapping his fingers across his knee nervously. “Can I ask you a question?”
Marcus planted a kiss on his cheek, the smell of copper, cigarettes, and cologne flooding his senses. His scent was intoxicating.
“I already told you that you can ask me anything.”
“How old are you?” Caleb asked. “Like, how many years have you been alive?”
Marcus set his drink down on the coffee table. “I was turned when I was thirty-two years old in 1853, so I am two hundred years old. Two hundred and one on December fifth,” he said.
Caleb wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but two hundred hadn’t even been on his radar. Marcus wasn’t just old, he was practically ancient. A million questions readied themselves behind his lips, so he swallowed them with another big gulp of the tea-colored alcohol, welcoming its warming effects in his belly as he turned the number over in his head.
“What about the others?” he asked.
Marcus’s amber eyes drifted toward the ceiling, as though he was calculating the number in his head. “Of those you have met? Vincent is maybe one hundred and twenty. The Jovanovskas are all between ninety and one hundred—they’re intentionally vague on their birthdays and when they came to America—and Tariq is the baby, as far as I know.” He chuckled at the awed expression on Caleb’s face. “I know it’s a lot, but don’t dwell on it. I’ve met some much older than myself. For now, you should eat. I could hear your stomach growling earlier tonight and figured you didn’t eat.”
Caleb loosened his tie further, the heat from the alcohol sloshing around in his stomach creeping up his neck and warming his entire core. “I’m not good at feeding myself on time,” he admitted, grabbing one of the covered aluminum bowls in front of him. “Why did you get so much food?”
Marcus hesitated, grabbing his glass and draining half of it. “I realized I failed to ask you what your favorite foods are, so I just swung for the fences,” he admitted.
“That’s… very sweet,” Caleb said, the heat in his belly finally finding his face. The sentiment filled him with a saccharine ache, punching a hole through the remains of the doubts he’d had earlier when he was in the alley with Andrew. Marcus’s angelic face lit up with a pleased smile.
He forced himself to look away from the glimmering amber eyes that bored into his own as the fluttering feeling settled into his lower abdomen. He peeled the lid off a container to reveal a stack of pancakes and a few other breakfast items. “Is this…?”
“The same thing you had the other day,” Marcus said into his glass. “Like I said, a redo.”
Caleb grabbed a plastic fork off the table. “What about the rest?” he asked as he took a bite.
“I asked Matteo to make a variety of his most popular dishes. He’ll probably want to know what you think. The dinner we went to is Matteo and Petrov’s place, and from what I understand, it’s quite popular,” Marcus said.
Caleb paused. “Vampires run a restaurant?” he asked. The words sounded wrong as they came out of his mouth. Though he supposed it wasn’t a stretch from a vampire-owned nightclub to a vampire-owned diner. “Are there any other places you guys run?”
Marcus hesitated again. “One other that I know of for sure. Vincent and Luka own the strip club on the edge of the county.” He drained the rest of his glass.
Caleb chewed his food slowly, not expecting the information but not exactly surprised either. “Why?” he asked, exchanging his fork for his tall glass of liquor. He felt like the answer would be something he needed it for.
“First off, I owe you an apology. I should have told you a while ago that Vincent and the brothers are my friends. The six of us met in Chicago many years ago and made the decision to settle down here together. We wanted to establish places where our kind might show up or seek refuge, that way we could make contact first.” Marcus walked back across to the kitchen, retrieving his unlabeled wine bottle and bringing it back with him as he spoke. “There were no hunters here then, and plenty of empty places to set up a business to keep our people in line. As long as no one rampaged through the city and we found legitimate sources of blood, they wouldn’t bother us. That dream of ours only lasted about two years before the Daylight Society showed up.”
