Since being turned mortal, I’d been drinking wine and had bought a jar of vermouth-soaked martini olives because I liked the taste, but I hadn’t had a cocktail since the 1920s.
I walked around outside the Asian Art Museum. A woman passed me walking her large, fluffy white dog. She smiled. I smiled back.
I thought about the acrid, salty taste of Ray’s blood. It hadn’t tasted good, not like blood had when I’d been undead, but it had tasted powerful. All I could taste now was alcohol and pine, and I longed for another drop of blood to roll around on my tongue.
The fact that I was looking at the dog walker down the street and wondering what her blood tasted like was probably my cue to go home. On my way, I passed the place where I’d first seen Kate, Neha’s now-deceased girlfriend. She had been lurking behind the building, in the shadows, and I’d been drawn to the scent of blood. I’d found Kate standing over the body of a jogger, on the verge of panic, blood on her lips and chin, muttering to herself about how she’d messed up. The jogger was dead from the gash in his throat.
“I’m not supposed to kill,” Kate told me.
I could tell she was a new vampire. The traces of her mortality lingered, her skin still glowing with a little bit of life, the blood setting her cheeks aflame like someone who’d had too much gin. Kate had been short, with curves and hips. She wore yoga pants and a sweatshirt and her brown hair was tied up in a messy bun. She looked like the antithesis of every vampire you see in the movies: she was a normal woman, standing over a corpse.
I helped her dispose of the body and she told me the story of how she’d been turned into a monster: she’d been mugged and beaten on her way home from work one night. She would have died, but a vampire had found her and turned her. “He asked if I wanted it,” she said as we dropped the body in Lake Washington. “But I was so out of it, I didn’t really understand. I would never have—I shouldn’t have said yes.”
She told me he’d tried to convince her to stay with him for her own safety, but she’d wanted to go home to her girlfriend and had escaped. And then on the way, she’d come across the jogger, and instinct had taken over.
She was terrified, shaking, and miserable. I could have walked away. I could have put Kate out of her misery and saved the world from one more new vampire who lacked control over her bloodlust. But instead, I’d walked her to my apartment. The next night, I took her to Underground, where vampire groupies hung out, and she found a mortal willing to donate some blood. And then, once she’d drunk enough that she didn’t pose a hazard to anyone with a pulse, I took her to see Neha.
That was how it all started. A teary reunion between lovers, Neha and Kate hugging and crying. Neha understanding immediately what Kate was and promising to fix it.
Me, promising to help.
Me, making a huge mistake.
I’d spent a year helping, until Kate finally lost patience with herself and ended it, and then I’d kept on helping because by that point it was habit, and I thought of Neha as a friend. We were working together for a common goal.
I had grieved Kate’s loss and knew that a cure could have value for those like her, the ones who thought themselves monsters and could never thrive as an immortal. I didn’t understand the Weepers, who saw immortality as a curse and a burden, but I knew that vampirism was not for everyone.
Of course, I had never, ever wanted the Cure myself.
Altruism never leads to anything but trouble.
I sighed and went back home, where I stripped off my nylons and bra. I brushed my teeth for a solid five minutes and then rinsed with Listerine twice. Then I crawled in bed and tried to sleep.
CHAPTER 6
T he next night, I was back at work. I hated to admit it, but I made a better waitress than a detective. It was a moderately busy night and I made decent tips. While waiting for my last table to
I walked around outside the Asian Art Museum. A woman passed me walking her large, fluffy white dog. She smiled. I smiled back.
I thought about the acrid, salty taste of Ray’s blood. It hadn’t tasted good, not like blood had when I’d been undead, but it had tasted powerful. All I could taste now was alcohol and pine, and I longed for another drop of blood to roll around on my tongue.
The fact that I was looking at the dog walker down the street and wondering what her blood tasted like was probably my cue to go home. On my way, I passed the place where I’d first seen Kate, Neha’s now-deceased girlfriend. She had been lurking behind the building, in the shadows, and I’d been drawn to the scent of blood. I’d found Kate standing over the body of a jogger, on the verge of panic, blood on her lips and chin, muttering to herself about how she’d messed up. The jogger was dead from the gash in his throat.
“I’m not supposed to kill,” Kate told me.
I could tell she was a new vampire. The traces of her mortality lingered, her skin still glowing with a little bit of life, the blood setting her cheeks aflame like someone who’d had too much gin. Kate had been short, with curves and hips. She wore yoga pants and a sweatshirt and her brown hair was tied up in a messy bun. She looked like the antithesis of every vampire you see in the movies: she was a normal woman, standing over a corpse.
I helped her dispose of the body and she told me the story of how she’d been turned into a monster: she’d been mugged and beaten on her way home from work one night. She would have died, but a vampire had found her and turned her. “He asked if I wanted it,” she said as we dropped the body in Lake Washington. “But I was so out of it, I didn’t really understand. I would never have—I shouldn’t have said yes.”
She told me he’d tried to convince her to stay with him for her own safety, but she’d wanted to go home to her girlfriend and had escaped. And then on the way, she’d come across the jogger, and instinct had taken over.
She was terrified, shaking, and miserable. I could have walked away. I could have put Kate out of her misery and saved the world from one more new vampire who lacked control over her bloodlust. But instead, I’d walked her to my apartment. The next night, I took her to Underground, where vampire groupies hung out, and she found a mortal willing to donate some blood. And then, once she’d drunk enough that she didn’t pose a hazard to anyone with a pulse, I took her to see Neha.
That was how it all started. A teary reunion between lovers, Neha and Kate hugging and crying. Neha understanding immediately what Kate was and promising to fix it.
Me, promising to help.
Me, making a huge mistake.
I’d spent a year helping, until Kate finally lost patience with herself and ended it, and then I’d kept on helping because by that point it was habit, and I thought of Neha as a friend. We were working together for a common goal.
I had grieved Kate’s loss and knew that a cure could have value for those like her, the ones who thought themselves monsters and could never thrive as an immortal. I didn’t understand the Weepers, who saw immortality as a curse and a burden, but I knew that vampirism was not for everyone.
Of course, I had never, ever wanted the Cure myself.
Altruism never leads to anything but trouble.
I sighed and went back home, where I stripped off my nylons and bra. I brushed my teeth for a solid five minutes and then rinsed with Listerine twice. Then I crawled in bed and tried to sleep.
CHAPTER 6
T he next night, I was back at work. I hated to admit it, but I made a better waitress than a detective. It was a moderately busy night and I made decent tips. While waiting for my last table to
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