As I stare at my boyfriend’s fresh corpse, the reality of what I just did starts to hit home.
“Oh shit.” My words are slurred. I sound drunk. Am I high on blood? Is that even a thing? Oh God, am I a cannibal now? When I was a child, I never would have imagined this was what my life would become. I can see the headlines now—Cannibal Florist Sucks Boyfriend Dry, Fangs a lot… The woman who thanked her boyfriend for a meal by killing him, or even something simple like The Kiss of Death.
Shit, shit, shit. I’m a murderer. I’m going to go to jail, and I look terrible in orange. I really need advice and someone to stop me from spiralling, and I know the exact person who can help me.
“Tina?” I call, my voice coming out in a wobble. Nothing, zilch, nada. She must not have heard me. “Tina!” I shout this time, my panic threatening to take over, making me sound high-pitched and squeaky. She is the only person I trust, and she is the closest thing I have to family. I need her.
A thud from the direction of her room tells me she heard me this time, and it’s followed by loud, thundering footsteps that get closer with every second. The door swings open, and she stands in the entrance like a looming, dark presence or an avenging angel. Tina may be my best friend, but she can be bloody scary at times. If Colin wasn’t already dead, he would fear for his life right now.
“What happened?” she demands, the accusation in her voice clear to hear. Her eyes first lock on the male on the bed, then her gaze swings to me. “If he fucking hurt you, I’ll…” She trails off, and I’m not sure if it’s because she noticed I’m covered in blood or Colin’s pale, empty body on my bed.
Anxiety twists in my stomach, so I stay quiet, allowing her to come to her own conclusions first.
“Emmy,” she says calmly, not pulling her gaze from the body on the bed. “Why does Colin look like he’s dead?”
Wincing, I attempt to make myself smaller, rounding my shoulders and tucking my head down as I wring my hands in front of me. “I think I killed him,” I finally whisper, my words a lisp. Admitting it aloud is so much worse, because it suddenly becomes real.
Oh God, what have I done? My mind begins to spiral in panic. I’ll be locked away for sure, classed as a danger to society. Perhaps I am. Maybe I should be locked away. No, it was an accident, and I don’t even know why it happened in the first place. I don’t feel the urge to latch onto Tina’s neck and drink her blood. Besides, there is no way I’ll be able to continue doing my flower arrangements from prison, and without my flowers, I’ll have no joy in life.
As though she can feel me descending into panic-induced madness, Tina takes a deep breath and finally manages to pull her eyes away from Colin. “Okay, let’s figure this out—Whoa! What the fuck is wrong with your face?”
My heart thuds in my chest. There’s something wrong with the way I look? Running over to the mirror, I shriek at what I see. I look like I just stumbled off a horror movie set. Blood is smeared all over my chin, and my shirt is stained with it. The most shocking things about what I see in my reflection, though, are the two long fangs that seem to have appeared, extending over my bottom lip. No wonder I was talking with a lisp.
“I have fangs, and I drank his blood…” I trail off, not knowing how to explain what I was thinking when it all took place. As I look back on it, everything is a blur of need and thirst.
“So, what, you’re a vampire now?” The sarcasm in Tina’s voice makes it clear she’s just joking, but something clicks within me now that she’s labelled it.
Is that what happened? I’m a vampire? It would explain why I was so hungry for his blood when I’ve never been interested before. Then there is the steak. I had my steak rare, something I would never normally do. More and more, I’ve found that my food isn’t sustaining me, yet the blood makes me feel alive. How do you even become a vampire anyway? I’ve not been bitten as far as I’m aware.
A nervous laugh escapes me, becoming louder and more hysterical by the second. A vampire. Of all of the things to be. My laughter intensifies as Tina watches on with a raised brow, clearly thinking I’ve lost the plot. She would be right.
Shaking her head, she strides over and grips my shoulders, giving me a slight shake until I stop laughing. “Emmy, snap out of it. We need to figure this out.”
She’s right, this is serious, and losing my mind right now won’t be helpful for anyone.
“Okay, sorry. I needed to get it out of my system,” I reply, holding up my hand in acknowledgement. “I’m listening. What should I do?”
Tina has always been good at coming up with plans, whereas I’m a little more chaotic in how I go about my life. I can flit from place to place and project to project as easily as breathing. Tina, on the other hand, needs time to complete everything, see everything, do everything, before she can move onto anything else. She’s both brilliant and infuriating at the same time, and when our personalities mix together, magic happens—which is exactly why I wanted her here. If anyone is going to get me out of this, it will be her.
Giving me one last look, like she’s assessing if I’m talking shit or not, she nods and slowly turns back to glare at the body on the bed. “Why does he look like that anyway?”
To be fair, Colin’s face is set in a strange expression, like he was in the throes of ecstasy when he died. His lips are pulled back in a passionate smile. Honestly, he looks like he froze right at the point of having an orgasm, and it’s freaking me out.
“Maybe it felt good?” I suggest tentatively.
Tina gives me a look that indicates I must be mad, but she doesn’t call me out on it. Cringing, she takes a step away from him. “Can you at least shut his eyes? He’s looking at me, I don’t like it. I didn’t like him when he was alive, and although I like the fact that he’s not talking, his body is even less fun to be around.”
Startling, I shake my head. “Ew, I’m not touching him.”
“You were fine touching him a few minutes ago when you were bleeding him dry!” Throwing her hands in the air, she starts to pace, clearly trying to come up with a solution.
“It’s different now, he’s dead!” I argue indignantly. She does have a point, though, and it’s the closest she’s gotten to scolding me for my crime. This is only one of the reasons I love her. She’s supportive even when I do something stupid and/or illegal. If I go down, she’s going down with me.
Finally, after several laps around the room and quiet mutterings under her breath, she turns to me with a determined expression. I recognise that look—she has a plan. Biting down gently on my lower lip, I wait expectantly for whatever genius solution she’s come up with.
“There’s no other option. We’re going to have to go on the run.”
“That is your plan?” My voice is practically a shriek of disbelief. That has to be the worst plan she’s ever suggested, and I’ve heard a lot of shit. “I can’t go on the run! I hate running. Plus, my belly is too full.”
She arches an eyebrow at me, and I know I’m in for a scolding. “Oh, okay, why didn’t you say so?” she retorts sarcastically. “The police will certainly take that as an excuse and go easy on you. Come on, Emmy, use that brain of yours. Some strange shit is going on with you, and someone is dead. You can’t stay here and pretend nothing happened.”
My eyes well with tears. I don’t want to leave, not when we’ve worked so hard to build a life here. I finally own my own floristry business, and Tina landed her dream job as a veterinarian at the local vet office. All of that is going to be smashed apart, all because I had to grow fangs and lose control.
A hand on my shoulder snaps me out of my self-pity, and my blurry eyes slowly focus on Tina, who’s standing in front of me, her expression soft and earnest.
“You don’t have to do this alone, Emmy. I’ll be with you. I’ll help.”
“You would?” I already knew she’d go to the ends of the earth for me, but going on the run after I murdered someone is something I would never ask her to do. She doesn’t even seem concerned that she might be next, although to be honest, her blood isn’t calling to me like Colin’s did. Maybe it’s a preference thing, or maybe I’m just too full.
“Of course, you would do the same for me,” she replies. “You’re my best friend and the closest thing to family I’ve got.”
Tina and I met when we were both in the foster care system. While I never knew my parents because they died shortly after I was born, Tina’s family was dysfunctional in a way I didn’t think possible. It’s a miracle that she’s as sane and stable as she is. She was in and out of the system, and somehow, we always ended up finding each other. When we were twelve, we decided we would live together once we were old enough and could leave the system. That is exactly what we did, carving a new life for ourselves and relying only on each other.
Glancing around the room at all of the memories we’ve made here, I feel a well of sadness, followed by a wave of guilt. I’ve taken a life, and I’m grieving the loss of a home. Colin will never be able to finish whatever project he was babbling on about at dinner. He will never grow into a grumpy old man. I can find another house, though, and I will make a home for us again one day.
“I can’t believe I killed someone,” I mutter as my gaze moves to the corpse once more.
Clicking her tongue, Tina flicks her long black hair over her shoulder. “To be fair, he probably deserved it. I never did like him. He treated you like crap.”
“That is not helping right now,” I murmur, pressing my hands to my temples, hoping to ease the ache building there. “What do we do? I guess we hide the body?”
“And what do you suggest we do? Throw him into the skip and hope no one finds him?”
“No,” I say with a roll of my eyes while mentally crossing that idea off my list of plans. I hadn’t really thought that idea through anyway. Blowing out a long breath, I raise my hands in defeat. “We could go to the police and say it was an accident.”
“Oh yeah, I accidently bit my boyfriend and then drank all of his blood, but don’t worry, I’m not a threat to society.” She tsks at me, her look suggesting I’m the dumbest person in the world.
“Well, when you say it like that—”
A firm knock on the door startles us, stopping us both in our tracks. Shit, not the best timing for an unannounced visitor. I glance down at my stained shirt, and panic twists inside me as I remember that I’m wearing the contents of Colin’s arteries. I need to get changed. Oh shit, I need to hide Colin. Hopefully whoever it is will go away.
The knock sounds again, harder and more insistent this time. They are clearly not going to go away until we answer. I share a look with Tina, but I see signs that she’s trying not to panic. She thinks she’s really good at hiding her emotions, and most of the time she is, but when she panics, her nostrils flare, a sure sign that she’s trying to repress her feelings.
“I’ll go see who it is,” she says, taking charge and giving me jobs to do, knowing that I function better when I have instructions. “You need to clean yourself up. You’re covered in blood.”
Nodding, I hurry into the bathroom and run the faucet, splashing water on myself to try and remove the blood. The top is unsalvageable, so I rip it off and chuck it onto the floor. Distantly, I hear Tina chatting to someone, but I can’t make out what they are saying, so I tune them out instead. Scrubbing at my face and hands, I look at anything but the sink as the pink water drains away.
Reality hits me. This is Colin’s blood. Colin, who is now dead and sprawled across my bed.
Leaving the bathroom and not looking towards the bed, I hurry over to the wardrobe to find another top. I grab the first thing I can find and back away just as a figure appears in the open doorway.
“Emmy, there’s a police officer here from the SNPD…” She trails off at my state of undress, her mouth dropping open. If it was just her, then I wouldn’t mind her seeing me like this at all, since I walk around in my bra and underwear all the time. However, a bulky male in a uniform follows her in, his eyes flicking from Colin’s corpse to my half-naked body.
Standing in only my bra and trousers, I stare at the policeman with wide eyes. He’s the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen. I’m suddenly glad that I’m wearing my good bra and not one of the old ratty ones I usually have on. He barely fits through the door, having to tilt his shoulders so he doesn’t scrape them. By God, his biceps are huge. I bet he could lift me with just his little finger. With startling blue eyes and short, sandy hair, he looks more like a model than a police officer.
Is it wrong of me to hope this is all a sick birthday joke and he’s actually a strip-a-gram? I’ve been a naughty girl, and I need to be spanked by the hot officer.
If only.
My eyes travel over his strong jaw, with a hint of stubble showing, and his light blue button-up shirt, which looks as though it’s going to rip the second he flexes a single muscle. His tight black trousers practically cling to his thighs, which I’m pretty sure are thicker than my head. When I lift my gaze, my eyes catch on his badge and the glittering letters embossed there.
Unable to help myself, I tilt my head with curiosity. “What’s the SNPD?”
Hooking his thumbs in his belt loops, he gives me a look that tells me he’s humouring me. “The Supernatural Police Department.”
Frowning slightly, I say the acronym again to myself. “Wait, what does the N in the name stand for?”
Sighing impatiently as if this is something he’s had to deal with many times before, he gives me a pointed stare. “Natural. As in supernatural.”
Supernatural. Oh yeah, right, of course. The supernatural police, the people who watch over the supernaturals of the city… No, this can’t be right. I must have hit my head and this whole evening has just been a strange dream caused by the accident. Either that, or I am totally mishearing him. At this point, I’ve forgotten about Colin and have entered panic mode. When I panic, I tend to talk a lot.
“You know that’s all one word, right? Supernatural. It’s—”
“Emmy, now is not the time for an English lesson,” Tina warns through clenched teeth. She’s got her back to the officer and is giving me cut it out looks. I’m acting like a crazy person, and that’s not going to help anything.
The fact that he’s seen Colin’s body and is letting me have my mini meltdown should be enough to tell me that something is different here. Well, that and the fact that he’s from a supernatural branch of the police.
“Of course, sorry. I babble when I’m nervous.” I laugh to try and dispel my nerves and strange behaviour, but unfortunately, it comes out high-pitched and off, only adding to my oddness. “You said you were from the Supernatural Police Department? I didn’t know that was a thing.”
The officer looks like he wants to sigh again but manages to hold it back. “Yeah, I hear that a lot.” Clearing his throat, he pulls a notepad from his back pocket and flips it open. There is page after page full of writing, and when I try to get a glance, he turns it away so I’m unable to see it. Finally, he comes to the page he was looking for.
“There have been reports of an undocumented vampire killing a human.” Flipping the notebook closed, he nods to the forgotten shirt in my arms. “You might want to put your shirt on, as I’m going to have to take you into custody.”