Page 71 of Bad Luck Vampire

“That’s what comes o’ weanin’ a bairn too early,” Inan opined, and then shook his head. “I tried to warn Marsle when she decided ’twas time to take the pair o’ ’em off the teat, but she wouldn’y listen.”

“Dear God,” Alasdair growled, and launched himself out of his seat, but then winced as his not quite fully healed chest complained at the movement. As he waited for the pain to pass, he scowled at Ludan. “You couldn’t think of a less painful way to reveal what we are to her?”

Ludan considered that briefly and then nodded. “I suppose I could’ve stabbed Colle.” Both brothers gaped at the man as he continued, “But that didn’y seem right since he’s just finished healin’ from getting T-boned in yer stead.”

“You could’ve stabbed yourself,” Alasdair pointed out grimly.

“Now, why the devil would I do that?” Ludan asked with surprise. “She’s yer mate.”

Expelling an exasperated breath, Alasdair left the room and headed for the bedroom in search of Sophie. He gave a glance back at the end of the hall and saw that his uncles as well as Colle and Tybo were following. Alasdair glared at them, expecting that would be enough to tell them they weren’t welcome, and then entered the bedroom and crossed to the bathroom door.

Alasdair paused there, reached for the doorknob, hesitated, and then raised his hand to knock.

“Sophie?” he called, tapping on the door. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” she snapped. “Go away.”

Alasdair grimaced and shifted his feet. “Sophie, love, I know this is a bit of a shock—”

“A shock?” she asked on a disbelieving laugh. “A shock would be finding out you were married. I just watched fangs pop out of your mouth and you suck blood through them. That’s not a shock, that’s some horror story shit there, Alasdair.”

Alasdair grunted. He could hardly argue with that. Scratching his head, he took a moment to figure out what to say next, and then tried, “There is a bright side to this.”

“A bright side?” she echoed with disbelief.

“At least you don’t have to worry about me dying on you like your past fiancés.”

A choked sound came through the door and then she growled, “You are not my fiancé. As for your not dying... well, frankly, right now I’m not thinking that’s necessarily a good thing. For God’s sake, Alasdair, you’re a vampire!”

“Honey, like Uncle Ludan told you, we’re immortals, not vampires.”

A very unamused snort came from the other side of the door. “Well, Alasdair, honey, you can call it what you want, but if it looks like a duck and quacks like duck, it’s a damned duck.”

“We’re not ducks!” he protested, and then cursed. “I mean vampires. We’re not vampires. We’re immortals.”

“Did you bite me?” Sophie asked sharply, and he could hear the sound of rustling clothing. She was obviously examining her body for bite marks.

“I have never bitten you, I swear,” Alasdair said solemnly. “I would never bite you.” He paused and then admitted, “At least not without your permission.”

Alasdair barely heard her words when she muttered, “Like that would ever happen.”

Ignoring it, he said patiently, “Sophie, you saw me consuming that bag of blood in the kitchen. That’s how we feed now. We do not feed on people anymore.”

Alasdair only realized his mistake when she squawked, “Anymore?”

Groaning, he leaned his forehead against the door. “Before blood banks, we did have to feed off of people. But we never killed them,” Alasdair added quickly. “We just took what we needed to stay alive. Think of it like milking a cow... without the involvement of teats. Well, usually anyway,” he muttered to be completely honest. “The point is, you don’t need to kill a cow to get milk and we don’t have to kill mortals to get blood. In fact, it’s inadvisable. It reduces the herd you can milk in future.”

“Did you seriously just compare me to a cow?” Sophie sounded pretty outraged. “And what the hell do you mean it usually doesn’t involve teats? Have you been running around for the last however many years, just biting women’s boobs for blood? Like their wrist or neck wouldn’t do the job? You just had to bite a boob? I’m really starting to think you have some kind of oral fetish there, buddy.”

Alasdair was staring at the door at a complete loss, wondering how it had all gone so wrong, when he was suddenly pushed aside. Glancing around with surprise, he saw that his uncle Ludan had pushed him out of the way and was now taking his place in front of the door.

A glance around the room then showed him that every one of the men had followed him inside despite his glare and had no doubt witnessed the entire conversation so far. That was obvious from the fact that Colle had his forehead in his palm, and the rest of them were staring at him with a combination of horror and accusation, telling him he was making a mess of this.

As if he didn’t already know that, Alasdair thought with a sigh. There was a reason he didn’t like to talk much, and it wasn’t just that he didn’t like people.

“Eeejit,” Ludan growled at him, and then faced the door. “Lass, I promise ye, Alasdair has no’ been bitin’ lass’s boobs for blood for his three centuries,” he assured her in a raspy voice, and then frowned and glanced to Alasdair with narrowed eyes. “Have ye?”

“No. Of course not,” Alasdair snapped.

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