Page 2 of Love Bleeds
"My, haven't you become aggressive over the last couple of weeks," he said in an irritatingly calm tone of voice before stepping forward to peer at the baby. "Have you considered feeding it?"
"He's not an it," I snapped, cradling my nephew against my chest.
"Of course not," Puck agreed easily. He side-stepped me and reached for the box of formula.
"You can't just drop in here."
"Your brother is aware that I'm here."
Was he? Wait, Collin hadn't sent him here to check up on me, had he? That thought didn't sit well with me. Maybe I wasn't the greatest babysitter in the world, but I didn't need backup in the form of an arrogant witch.
"You don't have to look at me like that," Puck remarked while mixing the formula. "Talon and Collin are on their way back here, I simply travel faster." He paused to look at me. "If you let me hold the baby, it would be easier for me to feed... him."
"Not a chance." I took a step to the side to increase the distance between me and Puck. "You just want his blood." In my arms, Nix quieted, almost as if the wordbloodhad caught his interest. I suppressed a shudder and told myself not to be ridiculous. My nephew was not creepy and I wasn't going to be scared of him. He was just a baby. Even if just last night, his fang had poked an eye out of Mister Bear. But that had been an accident. I kissed the soft dark hair on the top of Nix's head, almost as if to prove a point to myself.
Puck sighed as if my accusations had been overly dramatic, even though my brother had filled me in on the witch's curious interest. "I promised your brother that I would not draw blood from the baby. I keep my promises." He shook the bottle of formula in his hand almost casually. "Honestly, though, I thought you of all people would understand my quest for knowledge, even if the rest of your family doesn't seem scientifically-minded. What is it that you study again? Computer science?"
I almost nodded, but then didn't, because this wasn't a conversation I wanted to engage in.
Puck, however, wasn't deterred by my blank look. If anything, trying to get a reaction out of me seemed to spur him on. "Imagine if you had a chance to explore a promising new programming language that no one had thought of before but that would open up exciting new possibilities in the software world," he prompted. "You can't tell me you wouldn't be tempted to play with it."
"That's completely different," I said, and then cursed myself because I'd let myself be drawn into the conversation after all.
"Is it?" Puck rubbed his chin. "I don't believe it's that different. I believe we owe it to ourselves, as scientists, to acquire every piece of knowledge available to us."
"You keep referring to yourself as a scientist, but you're..." I waved my hand vaguely at him. "A witch," I finished lamely. Magic was pretty much the anti-thesis to science, wasn't it? Its very existence drew everything I thought I knew about the world into question.
Maybe that was why Puck annoyed me so much. The way he'd just popped into the kitchen as if the laws of physics meant nothing to him. As if all the years I'd spent studying them meant nothing to him.
If science wasn't reliable anymore, what was?
"I can be a witch and a scientist at once," Puck said, oblivious to the thoughts running through my mind as he warmed the formula. He glanced at Nix. Then at me. "I'm sure you have a lot of questions about magic."
Did I?
Yeah, I did, when I was being honest. Hundreds upon hundreds. About vampires too. But I didn't want to be drawn into all of this any further than I already was.
If my brother had never met Talon, then--
I cut that thought off before it could take root in my brain. I couldn't think like that. I couldn't blame everything that had happened on my brother, or his boyfriend.
They weren't the ones who'd killed Damian.
But that didn't change the fact that I'd lost my best friend to vampires, and I couldn't help but find myself wishing that I'd never ever learned about vampires at all--and by extension, witches.
Weren't they all the same in the end? Paranormal creatures whose existence should be limited to fiction, to books and video games and the occasional game ofDungeons & Dragons.
Things that didn't cause anyone any harm.
My throat closed up.
I made myself take a deep breath, blinking rapidly and turning away from Puck. Surreptitiously I wiped my eyes with one hand while still holding Nix in the other. I was not going to cry now, damn it. I'd cried enough to last me a life time. It was time to move on.
"My apologies," Puck said. "I don't know what I said to set you off, but--"
"It's fine," I lied.
Puck handed me the formula and I stoically pretended that nothing had happened while I fed my nephew. Puck let me. I exhaled. Seemed things were going to be fine.
