Page 17 of Fangbanger

I keep my expression carefully neutral. What’s worse? A truce with your enemy or the humiliation of wanting to touch his bare chest and knowing he’d recoil if you did? The latter, definitely the latter.

I take a deep inhale through my mouth so I catch none of his scent, concentrate, and yank open the lid of the box. A black hoodie rests inside, alongside black jeans. “You know what I meant.”

That lopsided smile again. “I did, slayer. Leah. Humans notice me. I just wondered if you did too.”

10

MARCUS

Leah drives us to the lumber yard in an ancient truck that she maneuvers like it will break at any moment. I have never felt the need to fill a silence, but with her, I find myself tempted. She darts glances at me and looks away quickly, and I am keen to capture more of her attention.

Today, she looks like a woman conjured directly from fantasies I didn’t know I had. Or thought I’d forgotten. She reminds me of a picture my youngest brother, Teddy, once asked to draw. Describe your perfect woman, he demanded one drunken evening. At that point, I was not yet dedicated to vengeance. I had time to think of such things. I described and he drew.

Leah’s mouth is just as full, her hair just as silky, her cheekbones high and her eyes deep and mysterious.

Fool.

She is a slayer. She would have killed me two nights ago. She is a means to an end. She will draw Julian in and she will remove this cursed spell.

I have spent too much of my life starving to enjoy feeling this hunger for her.

Instead of dwelling, I raise the volume on the classic rock she has on the radio.

“You like it?” she asks.

I shrug. I stopped paying attention to human music long ago, but the wailing guitar is a distraction from her scent. I turn my face away to keep her from seeing the fangs throbbing inside my mouth.

As soon as we arrive, I exit swiftly, my skin feeling too tight from the need to feed on her. Frantically, I reach out to Teddy. He will know what to do. He is well-read under all his wealthy, idle trappings.

I knock telepathically. My dear baby brother makes fun of me for hating technology. He is the youngest of us, sired by our sire mere months before I killed the cruel bastard, and he loves modern things in a way that I do not. The human world’s grasp on me began to slip once I was strong enough to hunt my enemies in earnest. Human things are a mere distraction. Humans are preoccupied with making things easier. They seek to reduce friction in their lives. Friction is the whetstone of life.

My brother answers my telepathic knock as we near the entrance. Leah’s slim hips swing in front of me.

“Go ahead without me,” I tell her.

She shrugs and meanders through the planters by the entrance, pausing to smell a flower. I shake my head at her softness. She is wrong for me in so many ways.

What brings my dear brother to my doorstep? Teddy’s voice is layered with amusement, as it is in person. Have you killed Julian yet? His voice hardens on that. We ignored Julian for years, until he killed a younger vampire Teddy sired. He slaughtered him to get back at Teddy for a bet. His cruelty has gone too far.

I’m close. But in the meantime, I have a question. I pause, steeling myself to ask the question I know I should. Could a spell mimic the mate bond enough to trick one of us?

My brother is silent. Fear licks coolly at my spine.

I have never heard of a spell that can mimic the mate bond for intensity.

His words confirm the knowledge that has been growing in my chest since I went to bed next to Leah.

As I feared. The bond grows in intensity over time, whether completed or not. If sealed, a vampire binds his mate to him and is granted immense pleasure and power beyond his years. But the bond exacts a terrible toll. Mated vampires can only feed from a mate. If a vampire does not seal the bond, what starts as a mere urge to bite grows into an undeniable need to claim, followed swiftly by agony if the bond is not completed. Severing the bond is said to be like voluntarily severing a limb.

Silence from Teddy, then, tentatively, Have you found a mate?

I roll my shoulders. Inside me, I can feel the slayer and the beginning threads of a bond. It is both pleasurable and uncomfortable at once. I believe so. She’s a slayer.

His snarl echoes in my head. My brother hates slayers with a level of animosity that is personal and terrifying.

Kill her.

I growl into the night air, and a couple exiting their car jumps before the man wraps his arm around his woman’s shoulders.