Page 35 of Bitten Vampire
Baylor is delighted to see me.
House is not happy.Where have you been?she yells.
The gate swings open. Hot and sweaty,I shuffle through. I take a single step toward the front door before it swings back and smacks me on the bum.
“Did you just… spank me?” I scowl, rubbing the spot.
She magics up a glass of water before I have even shut the door. I chug it; she replaces it with another. I drop onto the sofa, knee bouncing, and pour out the whole story.
She groans, swears, and scolds me six ways from Sunday, then asks what my Clan Master looked like in that suit.
I roll my eyes, smile and describe him in vivid detail.
We agree: no more nights out as a vampire. They’d find me. But no one is looking for the human delivery driver. Even if Valdarr knows my name, I should still be in the clear.
Chapter Fifteen
Three Weeks Later
It has beenthree weeks since the Vampire Sector debacle, and I have managed to avoid further fanged problems. I glance at my wrist. The raven’s mark stares back. I suppose I shall always be tied to him, whether I like it or not.
I miss Valdarr, which is ridiculous. He’s a stranger.
I wish I’d stayed longer, got to know him, learned more about the vampire part of me that still itches beneath the skin. I wonder what might have happened if I had asked questions, if I’d let him help instead of running.
Shamefully, I conducted some online stalking, ‘research,’ I told myself, on Valdarr and his clan.
It turns out I have been more of a shut-in than Irealised, because in vampire circles, Valdarr is a celebrity—an ancient one. Records place him founding the clan between 800 and 1050 CE. Over a thousand years old. My worry about being a ‘cougar’ is laughable; it is the other way around. He is practically prehistoric.
His father? Older still. And looking into their bloody and violent history, I do not want their attention—now or ever.
Still, I think about him far more than I should.
I’m certain there was a spark between us, yet it may be his enormous amount of power and nothing more than wishful thinking. After all, he is a beautiful thousand-year-old vampire, and if I’m honest, someone like me—someone not even good enough for Jay—could never be enough for Valdarr.
Yet he remembered me. Helped me. That counts for something, doesn’t it?
Yet my intuition—the little voice that grows louder by the day—warns me that it is dangerous, and I believe it. His father, the Grand Master, killed me once; if he discovers I’m still walking around, what then?
My overactive imagination supplies lurid daydreams—vivid, brutal scenes in which he realises what I have become and ensures that my second death is permanent.
No bins. No miracles. Only pain.
It is almost as though I can see the future, a precognition that should be impossible. Every time it happens, I shut it down. I ought to speak to House about it, but it is easier to blame my misfiring brain, an effect of getting no proper rest.
I worry that my head will pop off fromlack of sleep, but I’ve adapted. Two months into this vampire business and I have found a new normal. I’ve been working, head down on deliveries in the Human Sector, then knuckling down to my online job at night. For once everything seems to be going… well.
I have even started a modest nest egg and feel more in control than I have for years.
I drink blood every other day, and we have discovered that 250 ml is the magic amount to keep my weight stable. It isn’t about calories; if it were, I’d need litres of the stuff. It’s about balance, about keeping the magic animating my undead body steady and strong. My bones are now covered in the perfect amount of lean muscle.
Today’s problem? What to wear to the wedding.
You would think being turned into a creature of the night would excuse my absence. But no. I have to go. I need to rebuild my career. I need to show Theresa and her smug son that they didn’t break me. That I’m still standing.
It’s a win–win, provided I can scuttle out before sunset and avoid transforming during the family photos or worse, eating the guests.
From the hall, the giver of fur, filthy paws, and excessive slobbery kisses watches me with betrayal in his eyes. “Aroo, awww, awooo,”Baylor lets out a series of long, theatrical howls from behind the warded door.
