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“Pumping,” she said. “I crave… life force. I cravehearts. I can—I can hurt people.” She was agonized.
“Hey, sweetheart, anyone can hurt people. That’s why there’s all kinds of creatures in jail for murder, you know?”
“Yeah, but I… I can…” She put her hand on his chest, then.
Suddenly, he felt his heart start to speed up, beating faster and harder. It felt like he was running a marathon or in the middle of fucking her really hard. It made him feel flushed and excited and anxious.
She moved her hand away, rolling away from him on the bed. “Sorry.”
He went after her, tangling her up with his coils. “Hey, hey, what’s going on?”
“You’re going to act like it’s no big deal?”
“I don’t think itisa big deal,” he said.
“I can feed on your heart without removing it from your chest,” she said. “I couldkillyou.”
“Okay,” he said. “I have paralyzing venom. What do you think happens if I bite someone with that and give them a full dose of it, huh?”
She let him pull her back into his arms. She let out a shaky breath. “Well, you don’t do that.”
“I don’t,” he said. “And you don’t feed on hearts either.”
“I have,” she said. “When it first happened, I have.”
“Did you kill someone?”
“No,” she said quietly.
“Okay, then.”
“But… he… he went to the hospital.”
“Okay,” he said, stroking his hand carefully down her body. “That must have been scary.”
“He didn’t know it was me. It was a boy in high school. He just thought he was having some kind of attack, and they took him to the hospital and no one knows I did it, no one except, um, Tommy.”
“This is what’s between you,” he said. “I get it.” He kissed her forehead. “But, I mean, Dahlia, that kind of thing happens sometimes. Once, I hooked up with this vampire chick, and I let her bite me and—”
“Did you go to the hospital?”
“Well, no. But I lost consciousness. She was freaked out and terrified, and shaking me, and I came to, and I’m all woozy, and she’s naked, and there’s blood everywhere, and she’s sobbing over me, like—”
“It’s not the same thing. You don’t get this.”
“Okay,” he said.
“Never mind.” She burrowed into him.
He resumed stroking her wings. “What do you want me to say? You want me to be afraid of you?”
“Maybe.”
“I’m not,” he told her.
“I might not be a very good person deep down, Niles.”
That made him laugh. “Dahlia, you’re the best person I know.”
