Chapter Nine

“I NEED to stop seeing Avery,” Tyson told Mrs. Peggs.

She glanced up from where she was reading the paper with her morning cup of tea. “What are you talking about, dear?”

Tyson took a big inhale. He hadn’t had the tea in a few days, and the smell turned his stomach. It had been years since the tea had smelled so repugnant. Maybe it was a combination of that and what had gone down the night before.

“He’s seen too much, noticed too many things. Some stuff went down last night that he’s going to ask a lot of questions about. Avery’s smart. Too smart. He’s going to figure out we’re not normal very soon, if he hasn’t already.”

There was very little chance after last night that Avery hadn’t figured out the world Tyson came from was anything but normal. It was only a matter of time before he started questioning just how much Tyson belonged in that very unusual world.

“Do you want him to know?” Mrs. Peggs asked.

“You know that’s not safe. I haven’t been in a serious relationship since… well, her. And you weren’t around yet for that whole thing but know how well that turned out. How it’s still turning out.”

Mrs. Peggs’s great-grandmother hadn’t even been born when he’d gotten involved with Clara—aka the most serious mistake he’d ever made in his life. One that seemed to follow him to this day. Mrs. Peggs still knew all about it.

“Avery is not Clara. Not even remotely.” Mrs. Peggs made a face. She hadn’t had much contact with Clara over the years, but since Clara seemed to refuse to completely disappear from Tyson’s life, she’d had some. She also made her distaste of his ex very clear.

“I know he’s not, but I’m just scared. We don’t tell people. Ever. How would I even start?”

“It’ll be a lot easier since that lovely Harry Potter book,” Mrs. Peggs quipped. “Just tell him you got a hold of the sorcerer’s stone.”

Tyson snorted. “I mean, you’re not exactly wrong, are you? But I’m not going to tell him anything. It’s not safe.”

Nobody in New Orleans really knew what Tyson was, how he stayed young without drinking blood or howling at the moon. He was human. With enhancements. Even Donovan and Dan, who were the closest thing he had to friends outside of Mrs. Peggs, didn’t exactly know. They just knew he didn’t talk about it, and they didn’t ask questions. Everyone in his community knew better than to ask questions when someone wasn’t very forthcoming with information. Avery wasn’t versed in the social niceties that came along with his world.

“Well, I think you should do what you want, darling. I trust that one. And if he’s asking questions, you’re going to end up losing him if you don’t come clean eventually. I don’t think you want to lose him.”

He didn’t. That was the thing. Avery, in just a few short weeks, had become addictive. Essential. Tyson craved him when he wasn’t there. He found himself wanting to go to Avery’s classes, wait by his house—which would be creepy. And Tyson might be the kind of guy who moped around his huge old mansion in a long coat and hung out at bars with vampires and werewolves, but he wasn’t that kind of creepy. At least he hoped it hadn’t gotten to that stage.

“Tell him,” Mrs. Peggs said. “I honestly don’t think you have anything to lose with this one.”

“I’ll think about it,” Tyson said, like it wasn’t a huge deal. The hugest deal and the biggest personal decision he’d made in about a hundred years. It wasn’t about retiling his kitchen or deciding if he was going to the bar or not. It was… everything. His entire existence. He just had to decide if he was going to trust Avery with all of that.

In the meantime, he hadn’t drunk his tea, and he… didn’t really want to. He wanted beignets. “I’ll be back in a little bit. I’m going to head out for the morning,” Tyson said.

“Of course, darling. I’ll see you later.”

ALTHOUGH Tyson was scared of what Avery knew, or thought he knew, what subjects he might bring up in the middle of dinner, Tyson still couldn’t resist inviting him over. He was almost surprised when Avery came, overnight bag and all. He looked a bit sheepish and a lot apprehensive, but he gave Tyson a long warm hug, talked about his classes while they made dinner, and snuggled up close to Tyson on the couch while they watched a movie—a habit Tyson had sort of started to enjoy with Avery close by.

It wasn’t until they went to bed that things got stilted. Odd. Avery kissed him like he always did, and stripped his clothes off and opened to Tyson’s touch. Everything should’ve felt normal. It was normal. But it wasn’t. Tyson still loved touching him, loved watching Avery fall apart underneath him, and probably loved the end the most, when he wrapped Avery in his arms and lay there, limp and satiated, if a bit confused.

Tyson wished that if Avery was going to say anything about the bar, he would just rip off the bandage and get it over with.

OKAY, so the sex had been a little weird. Amazing as usual, but… he didn’t know what the hell was wrong. Was he waiting for Tyson to pop a fang in the middle and start draining his blood? It hadn’t happened in the considerable number of times they’d had sex last week or, like, at all. But Avery didn’t know what to think.

The room was bathed in the cool light of a full moon, glowing and pale, and Tyson looked so beautiful. His skin had a pinky sheen overlaid by pale blue, and his lips were plump and a little bruised from kisses. He looked content. Not something Avery would have said ever before. Tyson had been sexy and indulgent, dashing, mysterious, but content? That was something new. He smiled down at Avery and tugged at his hair.

“That was amazing,” he whispered.

“Yeah.” Avery didn’t know what to say in return. It had been. But the whole thing…. He couldn’t get the bar out of his head, how those guys had just rushed Brooke and Dan, how Donovan and Tyson had protected them, how they just looked so angry, so authoritative. What the hell was that all about?

Tyson was still lying there quietly in his huge old room, in a bed that looked like it belonged to royalty, and Avery for the first time was starting to wonder what the hell he was doing there. The haze from the first couple of days was finally wearing off, and Tyson was still so amazing and addictive and beautiful and intelligent, but Avery was starting to get scared. Like maybe he’d gotten himself in a little too deep. Or a fuckton. Depending on what the definition of “a little” happened to be.

There had been real, actual danger the other night, and Tyson hadn’t even hesitated before jumping into it. Not to mention those guys. It was easy to think when he was tipsy and in that bar where everything seemed possible, but in the cold light of the real world, how could he still think what he definitely thought? They weren’t human; they weren’t good, and still…. They were afraid of Tyson.

Tyson rubbed Avery’s back and dropped a little kiss on his forehead. “You okay?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you’re usually flopped across me like a puppy by this point. You’re all tense. I can feel it.”

“Oh. Sorry.” Avery shifted closer to Tyson and slung his leg across Tyson’s hips, but he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t make himself relax like he had every time before.

Tyson’s hand stilled. “Don’t say sorry. What’s wrong?”

Avery sighed. How exactly was he supposed to bring it up? He thought about asking how long Tyson had known Donovan, how long he and Brooke had been friends, how to tactfully—“I know what you are.”

Oh. Well, that wasn’t what he meant to say. Seriously. No tact.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I know what you are.” He figured he was in it, might as well go whole hog. Get it all out in the open.

“What exactly am I?” Tyson asked. His brow had crinkled, and he stared at Avery with those disconcerting pale blue eyes.

Here was where Avery was going to say it out loud and either get confirmation in the worst way or make himself look like a humongous fool. And crackpot to boot. He took a deep breath and went for it.

“You’re a vampire.”

He didn’t mean to blurt it out like that either. Nor did he mean to scowl when Tyson burst into laughter.

“A vampire?” He snorted. It was like he couldn’t keep his giggles in. Avery would’ve probably thought his laugh was beautiful and open if he wasn’t so irked at the fact that he was being laughed at.

“Yes. A vampire. I mean, I don’t know anything about vampires, but you rarely sleep, you didn’t eat for almost a week—at least not in front of me—and what the hell did I see at the bar? Are you and Donovan like… the vampire enforcers?”

Tyson let the last of a few laughs out and calmed down.

“I’m not a vampire, Avery.”

“You’re… really?”

He’d been, well, kind of sure.

“Definitely. I think I’d be very aware if I was a vampire. Especially since I have friends who are.”

Avery choked. “Are you serious?”

“You thought I was a vampire, but you don’t believe me when I say other people are?” He still looked like he was on the verge of another burst of laughter.

“Who?”

Tyson sighed. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but it’s not a huge secret. Donovan. And Dan, the bartender.”

“Wait. Donovan’s a vampire. Dan is?” He was so cheerful and smiley. Definitely hadn’t mastered the brooding-in-corners trick yet.

And then he got the part again where Tyson said he wasn’t. If his friends were, and he was tall and beautiful and pale and he didn’t eat much, well, the shoe fit….

“I don’t believe you.” Avery had a wild thought. He took his nail and was about to scratch his own arm to see what Tyson’s reaction to blood was, when Tyson stopped him.

“Really. I’m not one. Don’t hurt yourself.”

“Do you have… an eating disorder?”

“Are we back at that? I thought we solved that.” Tyson grinned again. “No. I don’t have any eating problems. No, I’m not a vampire, and yes, Dan and Donovan are. But don’t hold it against them. I don’t.” Avery knew Tyson was trying to make it light, but the joke fell flat. He was too busy staring wide-eyed at Tyson like he was from another planet, which, when he thought of it… possible?

“Then what’s going on here? What are you? What happened at the bar?

“How ’bout I answer the first question?” Tyson said.

“Right, the first question. Fine. What are you, then? Vampire is out. Werewolf? Very realistic ghost? I don’t get it.”

Tyson sighed. “There really isn’t a word for it, which is one of the reasons I don’t like to get into it. There aren’t many out there like me. I’ve only met about ten in my entire life. Before you freak out, I’m human. Completely human. Just let me explain.”

Avery sat up in bed and pulled the sheets around his naked hips. “I’m waiting.”

“Get comfortable. It’s a long story.”