“What did you just say?” Because if she’d heard him correctly, the implications—
“I said that for all Supernaturals, too much knowledge of our abilities and vulnerabilities could prove dangerous. To maintain a certain amount of mystery, we counter any true information with total lies, so outsiders never know exactly what to believe. Also, common humans still cling to their wild imaginings from before our public emergence. That confuses the matter further, in ways we gladly encourage.”
“So how do I know you’re telling me the truth now?” Picking at a soggy piece of tortilla, she regarded him closely. “For that matter, how do I know you haven’t already fed from me and fiddled with my mind at some point?”
His shoulder lifted in an unconcerned shrug.
“Are you? Have you?” she demanded.
“Yes, and no.”
Both his face and his tone were expressionless. Impossible to read for signs of deceit.
She threw her hands in the air. “How can I be sure?”
“You can’t.” He sat back on his barstool, infuriatingly nonchalant. “You just have to trust me.”
“You’ve basically told me not to trust anyone!” It was a near yell, accompanied by the near addition of the wordassholeat the end.
He pointed at her. “Exactly. Well done, human.”
Setting down her burrito, she dropped her chin to her chest, dug her knuckles into her aching temples, and tried to regain control of her temper.
For a minute, silence blanketed the austere fortress he’d built for himself.
“Do you need medicine?” When he spoke again, his voice was quiet. “I don’t have any, but perhaps you carry some in your bag?”
Oh, right. Ibuprofen.
Stretching out an arm to her left, she snagged her purse and tugged it closer. The pill bottle, of course, had fallen to the bottom of the bag, so finding it took some time.
When she chanced upon her little tin of cinnamon Altoids, buried beneath her hairbrush, she looked up. “Want a mint?”
His mouth opened, then closed, and he stared at her oddly.
“That’s not a hint, by the way,” she told him, to clarify matters. “I just thought you’d like this flavor. It’s my favorite.”
His gaze flicked to the tin, then back to her.
“Or maybe you can’t consume anything but blood?” That would certainly explain his refrigerator’s contents. “Does human food hurt your stomach?”
He shook his head. “We can eat whatever we want. It simply has no nutritional value for us, however pleasant it might taste.”
In that case, why in the world did his kitchen contain nothing but blood?
The mints rattled as she shook her tin coaxingly. “If that’s true, then live a little, Not-Chad. Have a mint.”
“Your container appears to be festooned with hair,” he said slowly. “But thank you. That’s…very kind.”
The dented box creaked as it opened. “The hair’s only on the outside. See? The mints inside are perfectly…” She hesitated. “Well, there’s only one hair in there. Two, max.”
He shuddered.
Fine. More mints for her, then. “You never answered my other questions, you know. About how you managed to get footage from inside the compound, whether all vampires have bougie underground lairs like yours, and what your real name is.”
After wrestling open her bottle of ibuprofen, washing the pills down with water, and putting everything back in her purse, she ate more of her burrito and waited to discover whether Not-Chad would offer any new information, however dubious in its veracity.
He remained silent for a few moments, then sighed and gripped his nape with one broad hand. “The common human government only shares that camera footage with the highest officials from the Supernatural and Enhanced Ruling Council. At one time, I was expected to fill an open seat on SERC, and I still have connections there. Some of those connections owe me favors. Since moving to the Zone, I’ve allowed them to repay their debts with classified information about the creatures, including the interior footage.”
