Page 41 of Night of the Vampire
I did as he said, sipping the sweet drink slowly while the two of them watched me. After a few minutes, I started feeling better. Not quite as woozy, at least.
"Better?" Killian asked me.
I nodded.
"She needs food," Jamal told him.
"I'll take care of her," he growled in response.
I glared at the both of them. "I can take care of my own damn self." My fear was fading fast now that they were both acting somewhat normal again. "Now, please tell me what the hell is going on. And especially why that woman"—I pointed down the hall—"just drank my blood."
Killian exchanged a brief look with Jamal before he sat down beside me, turning his body so he faced me. He reached out to touch my arm, the gesture more like something to soothe his own needs than mine, but I pulled away. With a frown, he dropped his hand to his leg and rubbed his thigh, something I'd noticed him doing before when he was feeling stressed.
"Kenya drank your blood," Again, he looked angry and flashed his fangs even though he'd been the one who'd forced her to do it, "because she is a vampire. And so am I. And so is Jamal."
A vampire. The word didn't shock me as much as it probably should have. But with everything that had happened to me in my life and all of the revelations I've had since moving back here, somehow it didn't seem that farfetched. Witches. Vampires. This was New Orleans, after all. We had ghosts, too.
And, well, call me crazy, but it all made so much more sense now. Why I only seemed to see Killian at night. The way he moved, or didn't move at all. How I'd never seen him eat. Hell, even the way my aunt had warned me to stay away from him. And the look on her face when I'd first mentioned his name.
"You don't seem surprised," he said.
I glanced over at him. "I'm not. Not really."
"Does it scare you?"
"Yes." Then I shook my head. "No. Not when you're acting normal."
"Like a human, you mean?" Jamal said.
I looked up at him. "Yes."
"We're not human, Lizzy," Killian told me. "Not anymore. We live in the dark. We're hunted like animals at times. We have the strength of fifteen men. Our senses are beyond what any human could ever conceive of." He paused. "And aye, we drink blood. I can hear yours racing through your veins right now, and it's driving me near insane."
My heart had finally started to slow to its normal pace, but it suddenly sped up again.
Killian smiled a predator's smile.
"Are you going to kill me?"
He shook his head. "I can't."
"Why not?"
"Because you're mine."
I set my empty glass down on the floor beside my foot and pushed the loose strands of my hair out of my face. "You keep saying that."
"Because it's true."
"Killian, stop messing around and just tell her."
Killian never took his eyes from me. "Mind your own fucking business, Jamal."
With a roll of his eyes, Jamal crossed his arms over his chest and wandered over to the opposite end of the couch, taking a seat on the arm. As far away from me as he could get.
Gathering my courage, I angled myself to face Killian. "I want to know what it means. Tell me what it means. In plain English. Not all this secretive vampire bullshit."
He smiled as his eyes traveled over my face. "You are truly something, Acushla."
