Chapter 4
CHAPTER 4
BOZ
Oh, damn. The throbbing in my head meant I'd gone way over my drink limit this time. I'd hoped it was enough to drown my embarrassment from last night, but no.
I still remembered everything that happened before I puked on Santa's shoes outside the egress window of his first-floor apartment. Why the vampire had allowed me to walk through the available apartment on the third floor, and then to puke in the toilet and sleep on the furnished couch, was beyond me.
Gods. Santa. I'd made a complete fool of myself. After puking, I'd tried to kiss him. Vampire speed was everything the movies said it was. One moment, I was falling toward him. The next, he yanked me backward onto the couch before I could connect with his lips.
"You're sleeping here. "
I didn't have enough strength to argue. The last thing I remembered was the weight of a heated blanket being draped over me.
Against my better judgment, I opened my eyes. There was no light in the room to shock me, thank everything. It took what felt like an hour but was probably only a few minutes to pull myself up to sit. After another hour, I found the strength to turn on the end table's mock Tiffany lamp.
The blanket was burgundy, and there were two tiny dark dots near the hem. I swallowed hard and patted both sides of my neck. Nothing stung, but I knew nothing about vampire bites. Would it hurt if he bit me?
I didn't know. Didn't know much of anything, really. I sank back to the couch cushions and my headache dulled enough for me to fall into a fitful sleep.
The sound of the door opening and the aroma of chicken soup brought me back to my seated position in a flash. Fuck, my head still wasn't ready for that.
I was relieved to find Santa at the door, not some day-walking vampire assistant. But that meant …
"I'm glad to find you here," Santa said. He fished the soup, a chunk of bread, and plastic utensils from a paper bag. The stamp on the bag was for the deli just down the street. "There was a train accident near campus. "
"Shit," I said. I tried to stand, but Santa planted his hands on the blanket on either side of me, pinning me down.
"You don't have anywhere to be today, remember? Graduation isn't until tomorrow. Relax, eat, and then I'll drive you to the dorm before my shift starts."
I must have blabbed more than I remembered, after all. I blanked on any graduation conversation.
"Are you going to walk the stage?" he asked.
He didn't know everything, at least. Maybe we hadn't talked about it. "No. Not worth it."
"I have a cargo van, if you want help with moving. It would need to be this evening, though. I'm working open to close tomorrow."
My gaze fell to the two tiny dark marks on the blanket, and I pointed.
"I spilled a couple drops from my to-go cup," Santa said.
Right. We'd stopped at Blood Drive.
"Do you know what happens when a vampire bites a drunk human?" He laughed at my expression. "No, you don't want to know. Let's just say I would have been even sicker than you."
"That's interesting," I said. "You work at a bar."
"You've never wondered why there are so many vampire bars?"
I hadn't ever thought about it. I started to shake my head and winced. Instead, I raised my shoulders in a half-hearted shrug.
"Humans can feel safe around us after they've had a few drinks."
"So I should worry when I'm sober?" I wasn't the best at jokes, but his grin made my insides feel warm, and not in that icky, bloated, had-too-much-to-drink way.
"No need to worry. I won't do anything you don't beg me to do."
"But don't you have mind control or something?"
He scoffed. "We’ve talked about this. Not all vampires, sweetness."
There was that nickname again. Beyond Boz, I'd never had a nickname before. I wanted to kiss him even more now, but the inside of my mouth still tasted like death. Instead, I leaned forward to eat the soup he brought me.
"Thank you for this," I said after the first sip of broth.
"You're welcome."
"Do you bring food to all your tenants?"
He laughed. "Are you saying you're a tenant?"
I glanced around the apartment again. Other than the couch and coffee table, the living room was bare. The kitchen had working appliances but was otherwise empty. The two bedrooms were furnished with new-smelling king-sized beds and matching nightstands and dressers, but that was it.
"How did you know I needed furniture?" I asked, remembering the movie craze a few years back with a vampire that sneaked into a girl's room to watch her sleep. Had Santa sneaked into my dorm room without me knowing?
"I didn't," he said. "This was for staging. You're welcome to keep the furniture or replace it with your own."
"It's time to throw most of mine out." The futon I'd been using as both spare bed and couch for the last six years could finally go to the trash bin behind my dorm where it belonged.
"Does that mean you're moving in?"
I laughed at his tenacity. "Of course I'm moving in. Colette said she'd turn me into a vampire if I was even one minute late for work next week. You know how unreliable public transit is, and trying to hop from train to bus to ride share around here …" I trailed off. "She was serious. She said this job has a six-month probation period, but then it becomes permanent, as in, for life."
"Vampire life." Santa nodded. "Do you want to be a vampire, Boz?"
I hadn't thought about it before. Yes, I knew vampires existed, but I hadn't actively searched for them until my worthless friends dragged me to Fanglory to get laid.
"I don't know," I said. "Do you like being a vampire?"
"I miss the sun sometimes," he said. "It's like the worst allergic reaction you've ever had if you accidentally touch sunlight. And the dying every morning thing is a little unsettling at first."
"Dying every morning?"
"Scientists say it's more like our bodies go dormant. The virus that keeps us alive is only active at night. When the sun comes up, it pulls back into our deepest recesses, leaving our hearts and brains functionally dead until the next night, when it becomes active and our blood starts pumping again. Some older vampires have tricked the virus into staying active longer, but I've never tried."
"It's a virus with a renewing life cycle, like bacteria." I ate a few spoons of soup while I thought through the research I'd done back when I wanted to be a biochemist. I hated the idea of getting sick, but this virus gave you eternal life instead, if you stayed out of the sun and avoided sharp silver objects.
"Why does silver work?" I asked.
"Silver has always countered bacteria and viruses." He pointed to the soup. "Eat before it gets cold. I'll find you something to wear."
Santa had given me a pair of sweats and a t-shirt after I puked all over my nice button-down. Then, he'd shown me the full-sized washer and dryer nestled in the corner of the apartment. If I hadn't already been sold on the wood floors and great location, that would have done it.
Tonight, he returned with jeans a little big on me and another plain white t-shirt. His chest was so broad, while my head and one shoulder fit through the neck hole. Thankfully, I'd worn a belt to the bar. I tucked in the shirt and cinched the belt around both the jeans and the extra t-shirt fabric.
Santa grinned and shook his head when I emerged from the bathroom. "It will get you back to your dorm, at least."
I couldn't argue with that.
We detoured to Fanglory, and he told me to get out of his Chevelle. Shocked the hell out of me until he led me to the cargo van in the parking lot.
"If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were kidnapping me," I said once we were back on the road to Cambridge.
"Technically, you can still say no. You haven't signed the lease yet."
"It's perfect for me," I assured him. "And I have a vampire to help me move out before I change my mind."
I didn't even know how accurate that statement was until I grabbed a change of clothes that fit and padded to the dorm's communal bathroom. When I returned in my own clothes, everything but the standard college-issued bed and desk had been loaded into the van. My futon lay in pieces in the giant trash bin at the corner of the parking lot.
"I have to be at work in an hour," Santa said when he found me staring listlessly around my empty room.
"Right. Thanks for," I waved at the barren room, "all this."
"You're welcome!" He winked at me, and my face burned.
Once again, I was reminded of how wrong I was to stereotype all vampires like Bela Lugosi. Santa's skin, while pale, still held a hint of a tan. Golden highlights shone in his brown hair, probably from being kissed by the sun while he raised farm buildings and houses in his youth. He had the face of an angel, a little cherub with dimples in his cheeks and chin.
Not only did he not fit the vampire stereotype, he didn't fit what I'd thought was my ideal man. He was too perfect. Too pretty. Too good for me.
He was also a sex worker. My friends had paid for a two-for-one special. One had fucked Santa while he sucked the other. I didn't want to know who did what, so I didn't ask.
Now was not the time to wonder what sex with him would feel like. He'd promised to take me out on a date before he blew my mind with whatever he had planned …
"Tonight wasn't a date, right?" I asked as we approached the offramp.
"No." Without taking his eyes off the road, he reached over and patted my knee. "Not enough time. I have Mondays off, if you want to go then?"
"What did you have in mind?"
He grinned. "What kind of food do you like?"
"Pizza, at home."
That got an outright chuckle from him. His laugh was already one of my favorite things. I was quickly becoming addicted to hearing his voice. I wondered if that was a vampire thing, or if I had been spending too much time in my books and my head.
When Colette had asked about my college experience, I'd told her about my favorite textbooks. I'd expected her to scoff at my answer or accuse me of being the most boring candidate for the job, but she looked even more feral afterward.
Imperial Accounting had hired me as a temporary-to-immortal employee for their empress. This was my trial period before they made me a vampire. I swallowed hard at the realization. I'd played right into their hands, then. Most boring human in the world reporting for duty. Sure, I would make a reliable vampire employee, but then what?
"I'm nobody," I muttered. "Why does the empress want me?"
"You're fascinating to me," Santa said .
He kept his eyes on the road, but his hand returned to my knee and stayed there, all warm and comforting. He'd stopped at Blood Drive on the way out of town, and the temperature difference shocked me. I thought vampires stayed as cold as the dead, but warm blood seemed to revive them.
My only response would be to tell him he was the interesting one, not me, so I kept my mouth shut.
After a few turns, the apartment building loomed before us. It was darker than the other buildings, with no lights showing above the first floor, thanks to the vampire-safe window treatments on most of the windows and blackout curtains on the others.
"Give me a moment on the stairs. I'll let you know when it's ready. I can arrange the big stuff for you, but then you're on your own for unpacking."
"Thank you," I said, not knowing how else to respond. I stayed in the laundry room off the kitchen while he zipped up and down the stairs with my stuff.
"Okay," he called from the larger of the two bedrooms a moment later. It took me a hot minute to find him. Everywhere I looked, I found organized chaos. I'd expected boxes to be strewn everywhere, but he'd piled them neatly along the walls, including the wall alongside the bedroom door.
"Is the bed where you want it?" he asked.
"Beneath the window is fine." I imagined throwing the blackout curtains wide and letting the sun wake me. "I've never been fond of the sun, but I can't imagine not seeing it again."
Santa made no sound as he centered the bed beneath the window. He pointed to a box beside the door. "Sheets."
"Thanks for the furniture, again."
"It was sitting in storage, collecting dust. You're going to need your beauty sleep to work for the empress." He winked again, and my insides melted a little more. "I've got to get to work. Text me if you need anything. I'll be back around three."
"I'll be asleep." My cheeks burned at the admission. Our sleep schedules were completely opposite. We might have an hour or two each night before he left for work, but that was it. The alternative, waking before seven when I started work at nine, sounded terrible.
Besides, he was my landlord now. I wondered if that changed anything about his offer to take my pesky virginity. I'd clarify before our date on Monday, just to be sure.