Chapter 1 #2
“I’m Eric,” I said, giving him an easy smile.
It wasn’t just his eyes that screamed exhaustion.
It was everything. His cheeks looked sunken in, the corners of his mouth twitching with tension.
I didn’t like it one bit. I might be able to protect him from other vampires—if they weren’t eons old and strong as fuck—but I couldn’t protect him from himself.
And it was obvious he wasn’t taking care of himself the way he should.
I might’ve growled a little, very lowly, but not lowly enough for Finn not to hear me. His eyes widened, but he didn’t flinch away. Instead, he kept looking at me expectantly, not willing to let me off the hook without an explanation.
So, lying to him it was. I sighed, running a hand through my hair to gain a little more time.
“That guy…” I started, firmly intending to lie to him, to tell him Alaric wasn’t a good guy, but it was impossible. The words simply refused to leave my lips. I opened my mouth, tried to speak, and closed it again when the words wouldn’t come out. I sighed.
Finn pointedly raised an eyebrow at me, crossing his arms in front of himself, his muscles straining, the veins in his forearms popping.
Hunger hit me like a punch to the gut, and the sudden want to grab his arm and bite, right into the raised vein, was so sudden it caught me completely off guard.
For fuck’s sake, I was three years old, not three months or weeks.
I should have a better grasp of myself. “That guy…” he prompted.
It took me another few seconds to take a deep breath—not my smartest idea considering he was close enough for me to scent just how enticing and delicious he smelled—and calm myself down enough to be sure I wouldn’t be showing off my fangs when I opened my mouth.
“Would you believe me if I told you that guy is a vampire and wanted to snack on you?” I asked. There. Not a lie, but close enough for me to be able to speak.
Finn laughed. “No, no, I would not.” Shaking his head, he let out a yawn. “You said something about sitting down at the bar. Right this moment, sitting down sounds like a great idea.”
He belonged in bed—to sleep—not in a bar, but I found myself nodding regardless.
It’s just a drink, and afterward, I’ll send him on his way. I don’t want him to wander off on his own and get in trouble again if I reject him. At least that’s what I told myself. However, I had the feeling I was trying to lie again, this time to myself.
“Sure. What’s your poison? A beer?” I knew he had a special fondness for a local craft beer. This club didn’t carry that particular brand, but I bet there was something available. “A cocktail?”
Finn shook his head. “I think I should be a responsible adult and get a Coke.”
I bit my lip to keep myself from blurting out that if he were a responsible adult, he’d head home being this tired, but I was too selfish, basking in his easy smile-smirk directed at me, his presence at my side. I never wanted this moment to end.
Five years. The first time I’d seen him was five years ago. I’d been patient, ever so patient, condemning myself to a life where I’d only ever see him from afar.
The fact that his wide smile was now directed at me threw me for a loop. That he didn’t flinch after I placed my hand on his lower back and gently guided him through the dancing crowd made my want for him grow even more.
“A Coke it is.” I smiled at him, nudging him a little to the right, where Bennie was occupying two barstools, waving his hand at me.
That fucker. He’d been listening in! And since he was helping me out, I couldn’t even be that mad.
Right before we reached Bennie, he got up, winking at me with an amused smile. He pushed his tongue into his cheek and waggled his eyebrows at me.
Rage flickered in my eyes, but Finn’s, “Oh look, we’re lucky,” doused it effectively.
“What a lucky coincidence indeed,” I said, waving down the owner—a fellow vampire, and according to Bennie a decent guy but one not to be messed with—to order.
“A… special for you?” he asked, waggling his eyebrows in an almost ridiculous manner that was very uncanny for most vampires.
As soon as they… no, as soon as we were out where we could be seen by other vamps, we got all serious.
Most vampires said shifters did all the posturing, but truly, vampires weren’t much better.
“Trust me, it’s good, and you want to try it. ”
Was he micro-dosing the special with real blood? Why was he so giddy about offering it to me?
Whatever. I didn’t have time to wonder about weird bartenders when I had Finn right next to me, so close I could sense the vein in his neck pulsing.
“A special for me and a Coke for him,” I ordered, nodding to Finn, who was busy yawning. He definitely belonged in bed and not in a seedy club.
“Soo… what brought you here?” I asked, opting for nonchalance and charm instead of questioning him like he was a teenager who’d snuck out to attend a college party. Even though that was exactly what I wanted to do.
Finn shrugged, a faint rosiness tinting his cheeks.
“Honestly? My friends were ribbing me because I hadn’t gone out with them in months—I was busy working on my master’s thesis, you know—but their ribbing eventually got to me, so I agreed to join them tonight.
And well, here I am.” He raised his hands, waving them both at me, but his face showed nothing but surprise.
“And now I’m here, and they went off to…
I don’t know, fuck in the bathrooms, probably.
Oh wow, I didn’t mean to tell you that.”
“I don’t mind.” I certainly didn’t. However, I did mind his friends dragging him out late at night when he looked like a stiff breeze might make him keel over.
If they were real friends, they’d have taken one look at him and turned their plans for an evening out into an evening in, ordering pizza and watching movies or whatever. Way more relaxing, and a lot safer too.
“Good. What about you? Are you here to dance?”
I scrunched up my nose in distaste. No, I certainly did not want to dance in the midst of a crowd of drunk humans.
“I…” I wanted to tell him another little white lie, but found myself unable to. Again. What the fuck was going on? I’d never had this problem before. I lied all the fucking time. “I was meeting a friend.”
There, no lie detected. “But this club isn’t really my scene.”
It was distasteful, but a necessary evil.
I couldn’t always jump people in dark alleys to feed on them.
I’d tried in the beginning, but most of the time I’d found that junkies and their blood tasted awful.
Alcohol I could tolerate, weed was okay, even the occasional MDMA was nothing to write home about but nothing I absolutely despised either.
But hardcore heroin or fentanyl users? I could practically taste them rotting away from the inside.
“Mine either.” Finn grinned, his pointed canines glistening in the blue and purple lighting. He’d make a cute vampire—for Halloween, I added quickly. In a costume. “I’m more a fan of pubs, you know?”
I did know. I’d spent plenty of nights watching him with his friends, drinking beer and participating in pub quizzes. It was hard to believe that those friends were the ones who had dragged him here, but then again, I hadn’t seen any of them yet.
“Me too.” Which was not a lie, because apparently, I couldn’t lie to him. I was a fan of pubs because that was where I’d caught glimpses of him prior to the end of my life.
Afterward… let’s just say my moral standards were a bit different.
Finn’s eyes lit up, his smile widening on his face.
He downed almost half of his Coke in one go before excitedly asking about an Irish pub downtown.
Yes, I’d been there a couple of times. Mostly for their monthly quiz nights, because I’d hoped I’d get to see him there.
However, I didn’t say the last part out loud.
Finn’s expression turned thoughtful at that. Cocking his head, he furrowed his brow and pulled his bottom lip in with his left canine. “Have we met before?”
Oh, how to answer that one?
“Uhm…” I opened my mouth, then closed it again. “I think I’ve seen you from afar?”
Finn nodded. “Yeah, that must be it. You know, when you approached, you seemed familiar. That’s why I didn’t question your butting in with that sleazeball.”
A satisfied smile spread all over my face at that.
“Thank you for your trust.”
Finn blushed, then opened his mouth to answer, only for a yawn to escape.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m a bit tired.” He downed the rest of his Coke and blinked owlishly. “I was hoping the caffeine would help.”
With the level of exhaustion he appeared to be at, I really doubted a mere glass of Coke would help. He needed a bed ASAP. And I’d get him into one, just not in the way I really wanted.
“Maybe you should go home, then?” I carefully suggested, not wanting him to refuse out of principle.
Finn shrugged and started blinking more rapidly. “Maybe… I… I don’t think I feel so good.”
He didn’t look so good either. He was swaying on his stool, his eyes having trouble focusing.
What the fuck?
This was not from exhaustion.
I reached out, steadying him on his stool as my eyes zeroed in on his pupils. They were blown wide, the brown almost completely gone.
Fuck.
He’d been drugged. Under my watch.
A rage I’d never ever felt before flooded me. My teeth lengthened, my grip on the small metal backrest tightened until I felt it denting.
Who the fuck had drugged him?
My gaze flew to the bartender, fixating on the way he grinned and winked at me.
He.
He had done this, and he was going to pay. I was going to rip his hair out, pull every single tooth out of his fucking mouth, was going to…
Finn sagged against me, his head hitting my chest with a dull thud, his scent surrounding me like a cloud. “’M really… real… tired,” he mumbled, his hands trying to find a hold in my shirt, but his movements were unfocused, his muscles lacking any strength.