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I screamed, not in fear but in disgust, as Cal tossed up two bottles’ worth of blood down the front of my shirt. He moaned piteously and collapsed on top of me, pinning me to the floor and squishing the breath from my lungs.
“Crushed by nauseated vampire” was going to be such an embarrassing cause of death.
I grunted, sliding my hands under his shoulders and thrusting my arms up with all my strength. I barely budged him, and when my arms gave out, he slumped down over my chest, making it even more difficult to breathe. And I’d just sent the one other person with the key to the house away for several days. I would die on my bathroom floor, covered in vampire vomit, crushed by a dead guy who didn’t like me very much.
“I’ve got to find a new job,” I grumbled.
4
Vampires are notoriously difficult to move once they are at rest for the day. So do not try to move them. Not even a little bit.
—The Care and Feeding of Stray Vampires
It took me an hour, a slightly sprained shoulder, and the defiance of several laws of physics, but I finally unwedged myself from under my undead guest.
I stumbled to my feet, sprawling across the floor as the blood flowed back into my tingling arms and legs. During my time on the floor, I learned a few things about Cal. One, he was as heavy as a sack of wet concrete. Two, even when he was all disheveled, he still smelled pretty good. Third, his hands had a bad habit of resting on the nearest breast, even when he was unconscious.
Dead or undead, men were all pretty much the same.
Finally free of my undead burden, I took greedy, gulping breaths. A dull ache in my side had me wincing with every movement. I wondered if he’d given my ribs compression fractures. I slowly sat up, propping myself by the sink so I could get a much-needed drink of water. I wiped the sweat from my face with a wet washcloth and carefully removed the fouled, sticky-stiff T-shirt. Fortunately, it was Gigi’s T-shirt, a rather obnoxious “Coed Naked Volleyball” specimen that had nearly gotten Gigi suspended from school. Straight into the trash it went.
After calling Gigi’s cell phone to make sure she got to Sammi Jo’s house safely, I got a fresh shirt from the laundry room.
On my way back to my unconscious client, I passed my parents’ ground-floor master bedroom. When we’d moved into the house, neither one of us could bear to open the door and face the room where my parents had slept. We couldn’t face Mom’s slouchy weekend gardening clothes or Dad’s perennial bottle of Aqua Velva.
But a few months before, I’d managed to channel some “Paul trauma” energy into some postmidnight-insomnia cleaning. I’d tossed everything except photos and jewelry into boxes and sent them to the basement or to Goodwill. The room stood empty, except for the stripped bed and a nightstand. I stepped inside, blinking against the dust motes swirling on the currents of sunshine. The air was a bit stale and musty, but it would do until I could get Cal downstairs safely. I foiled the windows and made up the bed with fresh sheets. I somehow managed to get Cal rolled onto an old twin sheet from my childhood, and I dragged him down the hallway.
“Where’s Mr. Wolfe when you need him?” I muttered, lifting him carefully onto the bed. “He hauled the bodies, cleaned up the mess, orchestrated embarrassing backyard prison shower scenarios … and I’m talking to myself … about Pulp Fiction, which is not a good sign.”
I barely managed to haul Cal onto the bed, but he settled back down and was sleeping fitfully. I filled a bowl with warm water and snagged an old washcloth on my way back to my parents’ room. In repose on the old bed, the sheet thrown haphazardly across his waist, Cal reminded me of some tragic marble statue, pale and frozen and oddly beautiful. I placed the bowl near his head and wondered what the rules were for sponge-bathing the undead.
I juggled the cloth between my hands nervously, unsure of where to apply it first. Although I’d known him for a short—though eventful—period of time, I definitely liked Cal better in this inanimate, unsnarky state. The man was just unsettling; there was no other way to put it. I couldn’t seem to get my conversational bearings around him. And clearly, he had a negative impact on my decision-making skills, because I’d agreed to cohabitate with someone who was cranky, condescending, and prone to bouts of staggering insensitivity. If I’d wanted that, I’d get a cat.
Shuddering at the very thought, I bathed Cal’s face, carefully wiping the skin around his mouth, the little divot between his lip and his nose. The bloody mess had trickled down his neck and his chest clear to his waistline, so I moved the cloth down his body in smooth, sure strokes. My fingertips tingled slightly from the friction of the warm, wet cloth over cold, hard muscle. The sensation spread up my arm, through my chest, and low and hot into my belly. Biting my lip, I adjusted my hand to put the cloth between my skin and his.
“Hold it together, woman,” I muttered. “Or you’re going to have to register on a special-offender list.”
I tried to keep the ogling to a minimum, for my own dignity’s sake. But his stomach tapered down from his hips into a solid V, something I’d only seen on the covers of those men’s health magazines … which I read for the articles.
My eyes strayed south. A couple of times.
I’m only human.
My charge, however, was not human. And he would probably wake up soon either to vomit or to snack on me. So I needed to wrap up the sponge bath and go do some work that was not related to Mr. Sensitive Upchuck Reflex. I did have other clients, and I couldn’t exactly tell them that I was neglecting their needs because I’d brought a stray vampire home with me. It might give them ideas.
I set myself back to my task, carefully scrubbing the drying blood from the strange little valleys between his abdominal muscles, the dip of his navel. His skin was feeling warmer, softer, nearly human, as I worked down his body. The blood clung to the little hairs trailing toward his hips. I lifted the sheet to wipe it away and squeaked.
Somehow I had forgotten that he was naked. Clenching my eyes shut, I dropped the sheet.
Think of the money, my brain scolded itself. Wait, no, don’t think of the money; that can’t be right.
I tucked the sheet around his hips and grabbed a towel to mop up the excess water. I pressed it to Cal’s chest and felt a strong hand close around my wrist. A wry, rumbling voice said, “I don’t know what exactly you expect from this arrangement, Miss Scanlon. But I have no interest in providing additional services in exchange for my time here.”
I was confused. Did he just imply that I was some sort of predatory spinster? I was feeling less guilty about whacking him on the nose.
I yanked my arm out of his grip. I smiled acidly at him. “I’m sure you think this is a real treat for me, but let me assure you that I have no interest in you or your … vampire package.”
I was proud that I was able to string together such a cogent, haughty-sounding rebuttal. But a tiny, insistent voice in my head noted that I was, in fact, interested in his vampire package; otherwise, I wouldn’t keep looking at it.
