HAVEN

Thank God, it was quitting time. My entire body ached from head to toe. A hot bath filled with Epsom salts and a glass of wine was definitely my date for the night. I looked forward to having the next two days off all to myself, where I didn’t have to think about or see the handsome and seductive Max O’Neill. I wasn’t completely immune to his deep, gravelly voice or his boyish smile. It did things to me, things I thought had been obliterated long ago. He had a swagger about him that screamed bad boy, yet his eyes spoke of something totally different, a loneliness filled with pain. I recognized it the moment he bent at the waist and forced me to make eye contact with him after his visit with the senator. Everything about him caused a physical reaction within me: my heartbeat was faster, my breaths were a near pant, and let’s not forget about the peak of my nipples or that feeling of fullness as they ached to be squeezed. The titillation was so powerful, I’d never felt anything like it in my life, all without actually touching. How is that possible?

My next assignment would definitely be devoid of long-lost relatives, especially mysterious, handsome ones; I’d make sure of that. Max wasn’t something I’d anticipated as a problem when I first accepted the job. Bad enough I had to deal with Jeremy every other day. His showing up out of the blue placed a big giant monkey wrench in my plans to remain unemotional about the people I served as caregiver. Granted, Max wasn’t my patient, and from what I could tell, wasn’t in jeopardy of dying, but he was a distraction to all five of my senses. The three I grudgingly used—sight, smell, and hearing—were fighting with my womanhood to complete the circle with the other two—touch and taste. I just had to find a way to remain impassive and not give in to those feelings of wantonness. Yes, that’s it! Deny, deny, deny.

I made it to my car in record time. I just hoped the thing started up without its usual theatrics. The duct tape holding the tailpipe in place was barely hanging on; if it wasn’t for the wire hanger attached, it surely would have fallen off by now. I reached the hood, stroked it lightly, and gave it a little pep talk before climbing in.

“Be a good little boy and start up like you’re supposed to, and I’ll make sure when the times comes to give you a proper burial.” Hey, it’s worked before.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me. You talk to your car, Heaven?”

“Jesus, Max, you scared the crap outta me. Stop sneaking up on me like that.”

“I was here first, so technically, you snuck up on me, woman.” I was still breathing heavily and holding my chest when I took in his worn features. I’d just seen him an hour ago, and he looked worse than before, if that were possible. His hair was sticking up all over the place, as if he had been pulling on it, his face was red, especially around the eyes, as if he had been crying, and his clothes, well, they were just a complete mess of wrinkles and dirt. What the hell happened in the last hour? He was frazzled, bone-weary, and ready to drop. He refused to look at me directly, concentrating on the ground in front of him. I was instantly concerned with his mental health and well-being. Call it medical intuition; years of training had taught me how to spot a person on the edge, and Max was definitely straddling the line.

“Max? What’s happened?” I stepped toward him standing on the other side of the car.

“Nothing…I just…My mother…I need to get the fuck outta here.” He turned to leave, but I couldn’t let him go, not like that. He wasn’t making any sense.

“You can’t drive, Max. Just wait a minute, let’s talk.” He was already shaking his head no before I’d asked him the question. His entire body was twitching, like a drug addict looking for his next fix. He was losing it right in front of my eyes.

“No. No. No. I need to go. This place…I can’t stay here.” He tried to leave again, so I stood in front of him and blocked his path. If I let him go now, he could seriously hurt someone driving erratically, especially in this frame of mind. I had to do something.

“Ok, get in and I’ll take you. Wherever you want to go, I’ll take you.” I thought he would protest. Instead, he jumped into the passenger seat of my piece-of-shit car and waited. I had no idea where he wanted to go, but anywhere was better than here. Luckily for us, my shitty car decided to play nice and crank up on the first try. Thank you, pep talk. I set off in no particular direction just fast enough to clear us from the gated community and away from the senator’s mansion. Max’s fidgeting was starting to freak me out. The silence in the car wasn’t helping either. How the hell did I get myself into this situation? I had to do something to snap him out of the funk he was in, and I had to do it fast.

“Do you believe in vampires, Max?” It was so off the wall it just might work.

“What?”

“Vampires? Do you believe in them?” I half smiled in his direction, but he wasn’t paying attention. He was looking out of the window completely lost inside himself. I tried harder.

“When I was a little girl, we had this big giant oak tree in the front of my parents’ house that was spooky as hell at night. The limbs were all over the place, some large, some small, most of which looked like large creepy arms ready to reach out and grab you.” I let go of the steering wheel and waived my arms around like an idiot. It gave him the full effect. Still no response.

“Anyway. My brother and I would race past that tree to get to the front door every time our parents took us out at night. We’d cross our arms in front of us like this.” I let go of the wheel and demonstrated the sign of the cross using both arms, then continued.

“We hauled ass after the count of three. My brother would try his hardest to keep up on his little legs. I had to pick him up and drag him along with me. Do you know how hard it is to run and look up at the same time? I just knew a vampire was waiting for us in that tree, perched on one of those limbs, just waiting for the right time to strike. To this day, whenever I pass a tree at night, I look up and search for the vampire before I pass by. I just know one day I’ll spot him.”

The fidgeting finally stopped, and Max turned in his seat and gave me his full attention. It was a stupid story but a real one. Grown woman or not, fuck those vampires. He took a few deep breaths, which was a good sign. He was calming himself down, exactly the desired effect I had been going for. He spoke for the first time since we’d started driving, and I was relieved to see him finally breaking through.

“That’s the dumbest shit I’d ever heard in my life, Heaven.”

“Oh yeah? Don’t say I didn’t warn you, buddy. They’re out there, mark my words.” I looked toward him and tried to make my teeth look like those of a vampire. He shook his head and rolled his eyes at my stupidity. If I wasn’t mistaken, there was a ghost of a smile on his handsome face. Take that, Dr. Phil.

“If one of those fuckers decides to jump out while you’re with me, I’ll beat his ass and steal his teeth as a souvenir.”

“Are you sure about that? They can be pretty tough to take down if you’re not prepared. Think you can handle it?”

“Woman. There ain’t a tough time invented that I can’t handle, including some asshole jumping out of trees dragging his teeth behind him. Trust me.”

Max might have been talking about killing vampires when he mentioned the word ‘trust,’ but the idea of placing my trust in anyone, for any reason, was a foreign concept. The last time I’d trusted someone to do the right thing, it turned out to be the worst mistake of my life, one I was still paying for. As a child, you trust the adults in your life to protect you from harm, guide you in the right direction, and care about your welfare. I’d placed my trust in my cousins to take care of us when my parents died, and they failed, miserably. Sure, we had a roof over our heads and avoided the pitfalls of foster care life, but our lives hadn’t been better, far from it.

At least you still have your life. What about Landon?

Not a day goes by that I don’t think about my brother and the circumstances surrounding his death. If only I had tried harder, been better at what cousin Richard wanted me to do, my brother would still be alive. He didn’t deserve the hand he was dealt, neither one of us did. He had been sweet and too kindhearted for this cruel world, the worst traits to have as a naïve child. Whenever I was sad, he would hold me tightly around my neck and stroke my hair for hours until I felt better. He didn’t know that my sadness never stemmed from the loss of our parents but from something else, something more heinous. I tried to protect him the best way I knew how, by doing exactly what Richard wanted. But it hadn’t been enough, not nearly enough.

No. Trust would never be a part of this temporary relation between Max and me. He was one of them, the entitled rich. It was just a matter of time before he tried to take what he wanted with total disregard for my feelings. I wouldn’t risk getting close to him for any reason; it was just not worth the letdown when I was proven right. Wise choice, Haven.

“How about we stop and grab a coffee?” It was the friendly thing to do. One quick cup should buy me enough time to make sure he wasn’t a danger to himself and others.

“Sure, why not. But you’re buying, vampire slayer.”