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“I could put a cooler in your tent, if you’d like. It would save you some trouble. But are you sure it’s a good idea to drink more blood if you’re sick to your stomach?” His brow crinkled. Clearly, he didn’t understand my question. I’m guessing it had been a while since he’d had a tummy ache. “When humans are nauseated, they usually avoid eating so they don’t throw up.”
“Yes, but I’m not human,” he responded snidely, as if the implication was insulting.
I ignored the haughty tone. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yes, considering the surroundings.”
I chose to ignore that, too.
“What is this?” Cal inquired, looking up at the hanks of herbs hanging from the ceiling to dry.
“Cuttings, from my garden. Lavender, chamomile, mint. I like making my own herbal teas, sachets, potpourri, that sort of thing. And Gigi gets heat rash sometimes. Lavender baths help.”
His eyes narrowed at me. “You seem to know an awful lot about plants.”
I scoffed. “Yeah, that’s right, I poisoned you. I’m part of a mass antivampire conspiracy. And then, after I tampered with your blood, I snuck back to the scene of the crime, stumbled over your unconscious body, and took you back to my house, all so I could become your domestic servant. I am obviously the greatest criminal mastermind since Ponzi.”
He snorted but didn’t say anything further. I let the kitchen steep in silence for a few beats. Cal didn’t seem to be doing much better than the day before. His hands shook slightly as they gripped the donor blood. His shoulders were slack, as if he had trouble lifting the weight of his head.
“Do you feel strong enough to take a shower?” I asked. “There are still some, uh, red spots on your face. And your back. Plus, you kind of have a bedraggled-zombie thing going.”
Cal frowned, surveying his wrinkled clothes and rubbing a hand over his equally furrowed face.
“If you think you’ll have trouble standing that long, we could get you one of those shower chairs,” I offered.
“You mean the kind that senior citizens fall off of, never to get back up?”
“Um, yes.”
“I’m willing to risk standing,” he said blandly.
We had a full bath on the ground floor, which was good, because despite the bottled blood, Cal seemed too pale and shaky to take another flight of stairs. After covering the windows with foil, I made sure he had fresh towels and waited outside the bathroom door while the water warmed up. I heard the shower curtain sling across the rod.
A few moments passed, and I heard him call, “I don’t suppose you have soap that doesn’t smell like fruit or flowers or some combination thereof?”
“Sorry, this is a girlie household. You’re lucky there’s not a Disney princess on the label,” I said, glad that there was a door between us to keep him from seeing my snickering. There was a faint grumbling noise while the shower started up.
Gigi appeared at the end of the hall, her team bag slung over her shoulder. She was chewing her lip, eyeing the bathroom door like there was an army of evil winged monkeys ready to burst through it.
Gigi had Wizard of Oz issues.
“All packed?” I asked.
“Yeah. Sammi Jo said I could stay at her place for a few days. But I’m not sure about this, Iris. I mean, as cute as he is—in a haggard Lord of the Rings sort of way—you barely know this guy.”
“Do you mean Gollum or Éomer?” I asked. “Because that’s a pretty wide spectrum of haggard.”
“Don’t try to distract me,” she accused, pointing her finger at me. “And he defies all hot Tolkien stereotypes. He’s all rough-hewn intensity with a pretty mouth—”
“You came up with that description awfully quick,” I noted. “And what sort of teenager says ‘rough-hewn’?”
“You shouldn’t leave those romance novels lying around,” she shot back. “I’m a teenage girl. We mentally tag and categorize attractive male specimens within ten seconds of eye contact. And stop with the distractions. I mean, he’s a vampire. You’ve always told me to be super-cautious around them, and now you’ve invited one to stay? I don’t know if it’s a great idea to leave you alone with him.”
“So you would rather stay, just in case, so he can kill us both?”
She glared at me. “Iris! I’m serious!”
“So am I!” I exclaimed. “Look, I’m sure I’ll be fine. But I think it would be a good idea for you to be elsewhere for a while, just until I have some idea how this is going to pan out.”
