Page 18 of Wolfgang

Eric waved a hand. “Go right ahead.”

“Remember,” Wolfe said, pausing at the door, “I will never harm you. And I would rip every limb off any creature who tried.”

Eric stared. Was that supposed to be comforting?

As soon as Wolfe left, Eric scrambled out of the bed, noting peripherally he was wearing some weird robe. But at least he had his underwear on underneath. He crossed over to the room’s largest window, checking to see how wide it would open.

Because if Wolfe was willing to let someone convince Eric to leave? Perfect.

But either way, Eric was getting the fuck out of there.

Eric’s rescuer was not who he’d been expecting.

“Little King?” Dressed in street clothes—jeans and a hoodie, with some sort of messenger bag across his chest—dark-brown curls in a messy halo around his head, there was King’s little brother, Danny, an ER nurse Eric knew peripherally from around the hospital. A good-looking kid, although Eric had never personally hit on him, not wanting to get clocked in the face by an overprotective Gabe if his advances were unwelcome.

“Hi, Dr. Monroe.” Danny’s smile was kind, maybe a little sad. He definitely didn’t look as panicked as he rightly should, considering the situation.

Eric shut the window he’d been fiddling with. It wasn’t going to open wide enough for him to fit through anyway. “You’re here to get me out?”

Danny gave him a strange half nod. Not exactly reassuring. “If that’s what you want.” And wasn’t that cryptic as hell? “But we need to talk first. Do you want to sit?”

Eric shook his head. He was feeling…agitated, all overheated and tingly, like his skin wasn’t quite fitting right. It was a strange sort of agitation though. Like from the outside, in. Which didn’t make any sense, but he didn’t know how else to describe it. He still wasn’t frightened exactly, not like he should be. But he didn’t think he could sit still either.

Danny sat in the chair by the bed instead, taking a deep breath afterward and letting it out slowly. “Do you understand what happened to you?”

Eric tugged absently at the fabric tying his robe together. “That fucker bit me, knocked me unconscious, then kidnapped me.”

Danny’s already big brown eyes grew even larger, but he nodded slowly, as if that tracked perfectly. He cleared his throat. “And do you remember what his face looked like, when he bit you?”

How wasthatthe focus right now? Not, “Oh my fucking God, he bit you, are you kidding?” But Danny had a point. Eric thought back on that moment in the massage studio. “Um…weird. I thought— For a minute, I thought…”

“Was it anything like this?” And there, under the bright daylight streaming in through the window, right in front of Eric’s stone-cold-sober eyes, Danny’s face…changed. Just like Wolfe’s had, back at Serenity. The pupils took over those big brown eyes completely, turning them fully black. Danny’s lips parted to reveal pointed teeth.

And all Eric could do was stand there. “Holy fuckingfuck.”

Danny winced, a surprisingly human expression on such a weirdly not-quite-human face. “I’m really sorry. I know this is an abrupt way to do this, but I’m not sure how much time Wolfe is willing to give us. He’s clearly already very…protective of you. So, um, brass tacks: vampires are real. Wolfe is one, so are Gabe and I. And now…so are you.”

Eric was vaguely aware he was shaking his head frantically. “Nope. Nuh-uh. No way.” But he couldseeit. Danny’s face was right in front of him. He could reach out and touch those fangs. And he remembered that bite. The gulping sounds. Wolfe’s freaky eyes and fangs.

Danny gave his head a slight shake, and his face went back to normal, just like that. “You can do what I just did too. Do you feel, like a…presence inside you? Just, um, relax. Let it out.”

Eric could waste more time protesting. He could go the denial route for sure. But he could feel it…something different inside him. Something strange and covetous and starved.

There was a standing mirror in the room, right next to the closet; Eric placed himself in front of it. He could feel that presence, like a shifting shadow behind his eyes, under his skin yet intangible at the same time. So just…let it out.

He ended up staring at himself for a good minute before turning helplessly to Danny. “I don’t know how to let it out. I don’t know how to relax.”

“I have something that might help.” Danny dug into the satchel around his chest and pulled out a brown paper bag, casually fishing out a blood bag from inside.

“Are you serious right now?”

Danny shrugged, like carrying around pilfered sacks of blood was no big deal. “Just look at this and think of how hungry you are.”

“But I’mnothungry exactly. Not for food, I don’t think. Or blood, I guess. I’m…restless.”Want Wolfe backwas the crazy thought that zipped through his head. It didn’t even sound like his own voice thinking it.

Danny nodded, calm as ever. “Then focus on that restlessness.”

Eric did, turning back to face the mirror. He thought of how ill-fitting his skin felt, how badly he wanted to be…soothed somehow. How he had a sneaking suspicion he knew exactlywhohe wanted to do the soothing. How if he just asked, he was pretty sure he could get exactly what he wanted. As he did so, he felt some of that internal pressure release, and then his face—his own fucking face—changed, just like Danny’s. Just like Wolfe’s.

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