Chapter Twenty-eight – Jack
Chapter Twenty-eight
Jack
I’m not proud to say I stalked Tamo and then murdered him. Maybe someday I’ll tell you how I did it—but for now I’ll tell you what I didn’t do—I didn’t touch a drop of his blood. I made it look like an accident, so much so it almost was one. That was that.
Morally adaptable indeed.
Two weeks to the hour, I was back at the EDM club. I paid, whammied the bouncer about my ID, and then pressed inside. Whatever DJ was here tonight was a celebrity, the place was already packed and it wasn’t even midnight.
I wound through the club, using all my senses to search for Paco.
I’d convinced myself when I’d seen him last that it was better this way, if he changed his mind I wouldn’t have his phone number to call him, or him mine.
But when I’d finished making my way through the entire club floor, upstairs and downstairs and bathrooms too, I would’ve paid any amount of money to be able to text him.
One hour passed. Another. I stood with my back against a wall, scanning the room, hoping every time someone new came in the door, and being disappointed. By two am I’d felt all the bass drops my heart could take. Something had happened. Or maybe I hadn’t gotten to Tamo in time….
Then, through the doorway that lead from the bar into the club, a rush of people left as one, a bachelorette night ending with someone sick—and a few new people came in. I spotted him among them and started shoving my way through the crowd.
The crowd, drunken or high, fought back. I didn’t want to hurt anyone so I started shouting, “Let me through,” until I made a path that led me to his side. When I stopped, the crowd closed behind me again like I had never been there.
We stared at each other for a few moments as the music pulsed, then I spoke first. “I thought you weren’t coming.”
“Some of us have to wait in line.” He grinned at me and I found myself grinning back. “Did you do what you had to?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to tell me what it was?”
“No.”
His eyes narrowed as he thought about pressing, but I thought I saw him remember the answer the last time he’d asked for the truth. “Is it done? All the way?”
“Yeah.” I nodded a little.
“You want to….” he let his voice drift, looking at me while shrugging at the crowd behind him.
“I do,” I said, grabbing his arm and pulling him in.
We knew the night was long enough to dance like we didn’t care.
I pressed against him, feeling all of him brush against me before leaning back only to have him follow.
Knowing what was coming made each building moment sweeter, made each of our movements both more magnetic and mischievous.
I could finally feel the music’s purpose and let it take everything else but right now away.
And then it swelled and we were pressed against one another tight by the thrashing of the crowd and I felt enveloped in life almost so much as to not need to feed—except I still wanted to.
From him. I could think of nothing more beautiful and rich.
I looked at him and he looked at me, and as if he knew what I was thinking, he started winding his way out, with me close behind.
We paused after we breeched the crowd. “Where to?” Paco asked, chest heaving at the thought of being with me.
“This way,” I said, and pulled left.
This wasn’t the same club we’d been at when we first met, but the layout was similar, long winding line for the women’s bathroom, and none at all for the men’s. I went inside and he laughed.
“Really?”
“Yeah.” I hopped up to sit on the sink counter and looked down at him. “You took something from me in a bathroom not that long ago, Paco.”
“And now you want to take something from me?” He took a step forward to stand between my knees.
“If you’ll let me.” We were so close and it was as if I were seeing him through two sets of eyes, the still-human ones that noticed the shy quirk of his lips, the way preparing to smile made his eyes crinkle, and the other ones that could see the way the blood in him reacted to me being near—the fear that trembled the pulse at his throat and the way that movement called me, like a quickly waving hand.
He reached his hands up for my face and I moved with his intent, letting him bring me down to kiss him.
Our lips parted at the same time, and kissing him felt like coming home.
No wonder I’d had to ask him for permission.
His hands laced behind my neck and mine ran through his hair and someone came in and made a disagreeable sound.
I lifted my head up and growled,“Go.” He left without question.
“Wow,” Paco said, realizing what’d gone on. “Could you always do that?”
“A little.” I watched him realize that I could’ve ordered him to do anything, at any moment, and I went on before I lost my nerve.
“We can’t be together, Paco. We can be this, whatever this is—but I can never really be with you.
Not just during the daylight, but from night to night.
It’s not safe for me to stay anywhere too long, with anyone.
There’s always a chance I’m being watched. It could put you in danger.”
His lips thinned then he sighed. “Usually when guys say we can’t be together it’s because they’re an asshole.”
“I just wanted you to know. Before we do this—if we do this. It doesn’t change anything.”
“What’s the definition of too long?”
“I’m not sure. A night or two a month?”
“What’ll you do the rest of the time?”
“What I have to.”
His pulse steadied to a firm throb and I thought the moment lost, but then he said, “All right.”
It was ask him to repeat it a thousand times, or take him at his word.
I hopped off the sink and our bodies twined, both of us stepping against one another, me kissing him up against the wall.
The music took on a new speed outside, frantic, as the crowd shouted, caught up in the electronic rhythm’s tribal beat, and I decided to take my chance.
I kissed him, hard, then pulled back and felt my fangs descend, piercing through skin as I leaned into Paco, parts of him hard, soft, warm.
I waited for a second, not wanting to push his head to the side—then he caught his hand in my hair and brought my mouth down.
My hunger wanted to savage him, but the rest of me knew far better. My teeth pierced his neck, gentle for all they were sharp, and I heard him gasp as I started drinking. The first taste made my heart soar. Life—given freely from someone who knew what it meant—nothing had ever tasted so good.
I told myself I’d only take three sips, but it was hard—my whole body ached for a fourth, a fifth, to get to the bottom of Paco’s sweet red wine. I pushed myself away reluctantly, panting, eager, and hard.
He looked at me while my fangs pulled back, as if trying to understand what I was. “Are you okay?” I asked when I could. Because I’d been gentle, the cuts I’d given him had sealed perfectly back up, it was as if I’d never touched him.
“Kiss me,” he said, and I did, smearing the red from my lips all over his own. When he didn’t return it, I retreated, and saw him looking faintly shocked.
“I can’t believe you like that.”
“If you only knew how sweet you tasted, you wouldn’t give any to me at all.” I smeared my thumb across his lips to clean a smear, bringing it back to my own to lick clean.
“Is that it?” he asked. Our hips were still matched, there was no way he couldn’t feel me hard.
“For tonight.” I took a step back. I wanted to tell him what he’d meant to me, how being with him had given me a tenuous connection to my humanity, but that would’ve crushed this moment, and made what I’d said before about not being with him more cruel.
What I said instead was, “I think you saved my life again.”
He stepped closer, and kissed my lips gently. “Any time.”