17. Taste the Shape of Her
17
TASTE THE SHAPE OF HER
DOM
H ow I managed to get wrapped up in a grimspawn crisis on the brink of a pandemic and find myself in a budding romance is beyond me.
I’m a fucking idiot.
That’s how.
Going into this, I never knew I’d fall for the witch. But here I am, thinking of her non-stop and counting the minutes until I see her again. The memory of her scent lingers with me even now—a hint of strawberries and wildflowers mixed with summer rain and springtime thunder. I can taste the shape of her; I can hear her in my bones. Thinking of the way her thick thighs bounce when she walks and how succulent her ass looked in those jeans.
Fuck.
I could bite right into her.
I salivate at the thought, my eyes trying to switch to their predatory white, but I push back at it and steel myself, solidifying my core while taking a deep breath.
I need to eat.
Even though we can eat human food, it does nothing for us. We don’t feel full after eating it, and it doesn’t do anything to our bodies. It doesn’t even come back out; it just…turns into blood.
Sitting on a bench in the middle of Windsor, watching people for someone who will be susceptible to my charms, my phone vibrates in my pocket.
Pulling it out, I see a picture of rose petals floating mid-air from Sayah.
She has entered my veins and is becoming inescapable. I’m proud of her for making new strides with the bracelet I gave her.
Now I just gotta keep my family from killing her.
Hopefully, the tear did the trick for Tallyn.
I haven’t received another Whispering Leaf, so perhaps that’s helping her summon more power.
Who knows.
A biting breeze blows the scents of so many different flavors of people my way. To a mortal human, it would be chilly, but because our blood is different, we don’t feel temperature the same way they do.
There’s a scent on the breeze that smells like jasmine and strawberries. I spot a young girl stumbling out of a bar, lighting a cigarette, and teetering down the narrow passageway between two buildings.
Standing, I follow her slowly, delicately maneuvering fast between glances of bar patrons.
Up ahead of me, she takes a drag of her cigarette and trips over her own feet, falling down ungracefully on her knees.
“Fuck!” she spews.
Flashing up to her, I catch her eyes and hold her gaze; before she can startle I begin my veilweave.
You are not afraid. I’m not going to hurt you. You will let me drink from you, and then you will go home, forgetting you ever saw me.
Her green eyes gloss over stonily, and she robotically tilts her head toward the sky, her fingers lifting the cigarette toward her red lips. Pulling smoke from the filter, the tendons in her neck flex, and my mouth waters. My fangs slither out from my gums, and my eyes compress into vertical slits, the dryness indicating the white has siphoned all the green from them.
Her skin is salty and tastes like bathtub jungle juice, but as soon as my teeth pierce her skin and the delectable nectar hits my tongue and slides down my throat, I am soothed. Blood is like a balm to a burn, soothing a deep and unyielding hunger.
As I drink from her, I feel the presence before I see it.
Before I can race away, the creature jumps on my back and tries to gnaw at me. Dodging the first attempt, I duck right and try to grab its arm, catching the sight of the grotesque being before me. The features of her face have melted together, skin covers her eyes, and her nose is flattened; only a gaping mouth with rows of razor-sharp teeth remain.
The only weapon that I have on me is my thimble, and I know they aren’t as reactive to silver as we are, but I jab up anyway and slice cleanly across the grim’s face, brownish-black blood gushing out.
The creature shrieks and comes at me faster, almost taking a chunk out of my arm. Narrowly escaping the attempted carnage, I flee to the left as it clings to my pant leg, dropping me to my knees.
Drawing all my power, I whisk upright just in time to see her razor-sharp teeth directly in my face.
Her breath is hot and sour, the smell of rotting flesh and body odor ripple through me, and I think of Sayah before I’m ripped apart. Her ocean blue eyes are like a salve for my damned soul, a calming thought before the end…
A silver machete pulverizes through the top of her skull, halving her face. The top half falls off and lands on the ground with a thud as her lifeless body collapses onto mine. The acrid stench of the rotten blood is enough to make me gag as I heave her off me and corral the retching feeling, stumbling to the side.
“That one nearly got ya there,” a female voice says to my right.
Raising my gaze, I notice a buxom, brown-haired individual with a button nose and full, crimson lips. She gives off the vibe of someone heading to a college kegger rather than resembling a typical vampire, her maroon leather jacket contrasting her pale white skin.
“Yeah,” I respond, hoisting myself off the ground and dusting my pants. Not that it’s going to get the awful grim guts off them. I need a shower. “Thanks.”
“No problem,” she replies, bending down and wiping the machete blade clean on the grim’s pants.
“Do you just always carry your machete on you, or?”
She rises, her prominent chest bouncing with laughter. “No. I live up there—” she inclines her head at the metal fire escape scaffolding lining the east side of the building we’re under. “I heard the bastard shriek. They’re getting worse.”
“You’re telling me. My family and I are looking for ways to get a handle on the influx in New York, but it’s leading us nowhere fast.”
“Yeah, I don’t know anything about that,” she says, offering me a bemused smile. “I just kill ‘em when I see ‘em. You’ve gotten no leads?”
“Maybe a coven in Vegas can give us insight on the warlocks. But that’s all so far.” I don’t know this broad from Adam; I’m not about to tell her anything more than that. Even though her energy is tingly, like she’s very upbeat and positive, I don’t trust any old vampire I meet on the street.
“I’ve got friends in Vegas that can show you around. They may know more than I do. My friend Jesse. You got a phone?”
Retrieving the phone from my back pocket, I hold it to my face to unlock the screen and hand it to her.
“There,” she says after plugging her friend’s number in. “Just hit him up when you’re there, and they can help you.”
“Thank you, um. . .”
“Cora,” she says, offering me her hand.
Shaking it, I reply, “Dom.”
“Well.” She lets my palm go and leans her machete against the brick wall. “You gonna finish her, or?” she asks of the still veilweaved human, lighting another cigarette and staring into space.
“Uh, no, I don’t do that. You’re welcome to if you’d like; I just don’t want to witness it.”
A sinister grin splits her face, her irises contracting and flaring white. “Oh, one of those vamps, huh?” she teases, the ivory of her fangs glinting off the amber light of the streetlamp above.
“Yeah, something like that. Want me to toss this thing in the dumpster?” I ask, kicking the grim’s side.
She kneels before the human and slips the girl’s hair all to one side, gripping her neck. “Nah, I got em. I’ll toss them both out in the dumpster.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Go. Get out of here. And be safe out there.”
“Hey, thanks again,” I say, turning to leave the way I came.
The resonant sound of skin being punctured and slurping follows me as I track back down the alleyway.
Almost getting my face chewed off has a purpose , I think as I rush towards the direction of my car.
It led me to someone who may know how to find the entrance to Never in Vegas.