AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You know what I am. You know what you are,” he said quietly, as if we were talking about being Episcopalian. “I offered you a choice, and you took it.”
I shot him what I hoped was a truly scathing glare. “Some choice. I was dying. Some drunk shot me from a pickup. Why couldn’t I have just woken up with gonorrhea like every other girl of loose moral fiber?”
He barked out a laugh. “You’re very funny.”
I chose to accept that as a compliment and move on. “Thanks. Well, I’ve got to go.”
I’d taken about half a step toward the bedroom door. Gabriel was blocking my path. How did he move like that? It was really irritating.
“You can’t leave,” he said, closing his hands around my wrists. He seemed to enjoy the contact, judging from the way his eyes darkened and flashed. It was an epic struggle to ignore the drool -worthiness of the man currently stroking my cheek.
Remembering that he’d just given me what amounted to an eternal hickey helped considerably. “You need to feed, soon. It’s been three days since you’ve taken anything at all.”
“I’m not taking anything from you.” I shoved him back even as my mind raced. Three days? He couldn’t be serious. No one can sleep for three days. Oh, right, I was dead. New rules.
“You must drink, Jane.”
“I won’t!”
“This could be much more difficult. I’m trying to make it easy on you,” he said, advancing on me.
“I don’t think that’s possible,” I said, pressing my hand against his chest to keep him away. It was like touching a brick wall.
Hard, immovable, and lifeless. There was no heartbeat beneath my palm, no breath.
This was not good.
“You have to feed, and there are things we need to discuss, ” he murmured. He moved closer, running the tip of his nose along my hairline. That worried me, considering the three-day bathing hiatus. But my general odor didn’t seem to bother him. Quite the contrary. He pulled my hand low, dragging me against him. I desired nothing more than to lean into him, let him wrap me in those long arms, and drink from him until I couldn’t care anymore.
And then my stupid logical brain piped up. I didn’t know this guy. I didn’t even know where I was, really. For all I knew, I was having some sort of bizarre allergic reaction to the GHB he’d slipped me. And now I was going to let him slobber all over me?
Um, no.
“Stay away from me!” I threw him into a wall. Hard. Hard enough to knock some attractive watercolors off the plaster and to the floor.
I grabbed my purse, which was conveniently placed by the front door. Gabriel was such a considerate abductor/host. He even left the front door unpadlocked.
The sun had just set, leaving a muggy late-summer evening in its wake. The scent of growth, quiet and green, hung heavy in the air. I heard everything. I saw everything. I could count the craters on the moon. I could count every mosquito buzz past, bypassing my tender skin out of respect for a fellow bloodsucker. I heard the rustle of every leaf on every tree. I could feel animals in the woods, scuttling through the grass. Dark things feeding, running, feasting—and I envied them.
“Jane!” Gabriel was framed in the front door. He did not seem happy.
I’m not a “spring into action” sort of girl. And yet I was dashing headlong into the woods like an overcaffeinated gazelle. I bounded through the trees, sensing animals stop and watch me as I sprinted by. I laughed into the wind, amazed at this new freedom. I broke into an easy lope when I could no longer sense Gabriel behind me. I stayed away from the main roads, vaulting over barbed-wire fences and through pastures. I disturbed Hank Yancy’s cattle enough to send him running to his front porch with a shotgun.
It took about two miles before it registered that my feet were bare and stinging, but even that felt good. I ’d never felt so alive, so aware, so ravenously hungry. I finally understood those crazy people who talked about runner’s highs.
I bounded up the front steps of River Oaks, the 147-year-old pre-Civil War farmhouse I inherited from my great-aunt Jettie, and threw myself on the living-room sofa, dazed and laughing. I had to figure out what the hell to do next. First order of business, I was starving. Where did a vampire get her very first breakfast?
I was evaluating the overall ick factor of that statement when Zeb Lavelle, my best friend since first grade, strode into my living room.
“Janie, where the hell have you been?”
3
There are many alternatives to drinking human blood, including synthetic blood and animal blood. Warm-blooded animals, such as pigs or cows, are recommended, as reptilian blood tends to be bitter. In order to make synthetic or animal blood more palatable, we suggest microwaving it for thirty-eight seconds at 75-percent power. Dropping a penny into the blood (after microwaving!) also gives it an authentic coppery taste.
—From The Guide for the Newly Undead
“I—”
