Well, this wasn’t how Gena had wanted the day to go. They’d been having such a nice time before he had to go and ruin it.

Hell, the evening had even started with Marcus taking Lady for a small walk around the block with Gena. Afterwards, she’d gotten some great food and was walking around the city she’d always dreamed of going to. The temperature was cool, but it wasn’t freezing cold yet.

It really had been as perfect as an evening could get, considering all the extenuating circumstances. It’s true, she thought. Sex ruins everything.

Was it really so hard for him to give her some space? They were in a city full of beautiful women. What was it that made her so irresistible? It was probably because she was the first to say no to him.

Even so, he should know better than to get involved with someone he had to stay in close quarters with for an indeterminate amount of time. How awkward would it be if something did happen between them and then he got sick of her while he still needed her help?

Gena also had to take into consideration that she’d only just met Marcus a whole twenty-four hours ago. She was shocked she was even considering doing anything with him after only knowing him for such a short amount of time.

She’d never been with a man within less than a month of dating, let alone less than a day of meeting. But then again, she’d gone through some radical changes in the past week.

Ideas shot through her. “It’s because of what is happening to me, isn’t it?” she said out loud.

Marcus shot her a puzzled look. “What?”

“I think this new body is out of whack. That’s why my libido is acting so strange.”

Marcus held a hand to his heart as if he were wounded. “You do know how to bruise an ego, don’t you?”

Gena rolled her eyes. “Stop making this about you. I have been doing things in the past three days that I would have never done before all this started happening to me.”

“We can’t rule out the possibility that your personality has changed as well,” he conceded. “But you also have to admit you have been in situations you could have never even imagined one week ago. Who’s to say you wouldn’t have always reacted the same way?”

“You didn’t even know me before,” she pointed out. “What makes you think I would’ve stayed the same?”

“I have seen quite a few people transition from being from human to vampire. Physically, almost everything is different about the person after the change is done. They are stronger, faster, and have senses better than they had ever even imagined possible. On top of that, they also have the prey drive and natural instincts to feed.

“Even with all those changes, the personality is basically the same. A coward in life is a coward in the afterlife as well. As far as I can tell, you’re no coward and I highly doubt you ever were. You stood up to that man when he pointed a gun at you and burst right past Gareth, who is scary-looking even before you know what he is, to confront Vlad. If that isn’t courage, I don’t know what is.”

Gena was taken aback by the sudden flattery. She’d never considered herself brave before. She wasn’t good at taking a compliment, so she deflected the conversation away from her. “You don’t believe people can change?”

“No. I believe people, and vampires for that matter, are constantly changing and evolving as time goes by. However, it’s a long-term process and not something that happens over the course of one week.”

Gena was about to go deeper into his opinion on people changing when a passerby bumped into her. She lost her balance for a second but righted herself quickly enough. The offending stranger never bothered to apologize, she noted.

She’d been listening to Marcus so intently she almost forgot they were in a crowded street. “Should we not talk about this in such a public place?”

Marcus shrugged. “Even if someone did overhear something they shouldn’t, they are much more likely to think you are crazy than believe I’m a vampire. You can ask me anything you want out here, and I’ll tell you.”

The possible questions raced across her mind. Where should she even start? “Well, I guess the obvious question I should’ve asked a lot sooner is how often do you eat?”

Marcus laughed. “Probably would’ve been better asked yesterday,” he agreed.

“In my defense, you said you were going to protect me, and I assumed that meant no biting,” she said.

“I see your point,” he said. “I can have a big ‘meal’ once a week and be fine, but having a small drink every other day or so is enough to get me by.”

“Who do you get your ‘meals’ from?”

“Well, for most humans,” he gave her a pointed look, “I can simply ask them to step aside for a few minutes and convince them they accidentally cut themselves when I’m done.”

Gena frowned at that, but Marcus continued. “However, in more recent years, Aleksander has set up blood banks all around the Americas and Europe. These blood banks will accept all donations, but any donors with low iron counts or other diseases harmful to humans will be filtered to us. It’s very freeing to not need to hunt every night.”

“You just go to the local blood grocery store?” asked Gena, skeptically.

“The supply isn’t big enough for brick-and-mortar,” said Marcus. “The Internet is the best way to place an order right now.”

Gena laughed. “Of course the Internet would be a great place to buy blood.”

“Well, this is only the pure-born vampires. I never told you that the turned vampires don’t even drink humans.” Gena raised a questioning eyebrow and waited for him to continue. “Turned vampires survive on vampire blood.”

“Why would they need different blood?”

“There are many scientific ways to explain almost everything on this planet. You can teach all the children in school how babies are made, but when it comes down to it, that moment when a fetus becomes a sentient being, whenever it happens, cannot be explained by science. Some things are just magic.”

“Is that a fancy way of saying you don’t know?” asked Gena with a joking smile.

“In a roundabout way. I guess the point is that a lot of the things that make me what I am don’t make sense according to human science. Either there’s a deeper and more complicated science that explains how I exist or it’s magic. I don’t know why I’m here, but I do know I am.”

Gena thought about all the things she’d seen lately. Between mind-controlling vampires and her own (double) murder, a little magic wasn’t too hard to believe in.

“When I woke up, I was so freaked out,” said Gena. “It took me a few moments to fully understand. I don’t think I could ever explain the feeling of seeing yourself laying lifeless on the floor.”

“I can try to imagine,” offered Marcus.

“How?”

“Well, I have never seen myself dead, but I have seen a lot of death. There is something truly tragic about seeing someone who used to be so full of joy and light turned into an empty shell.”

Gena frowned. “Now that you put it that way, I’m even more depressed about it.”

“It was not my intention,” said Marcus. “Everyone has their own unique experiences, and no one will be able to relate exactly to you. That doesn’t mean you’re alone.”

She couldn’t reply to that. It was a nice sentiment he was trying to make, but in truth, she was alone. She was being continuously told she was no longer human, but so far she had no idea what she could be.

She looked at the nameless people who passed them. They all looked so normal. They all knew what they were. Up until her murder, Gena had known exactly where she stood. She was an independent woman with plans on being a doctor. She had plans on buying the home she rented and dog lover. Above all, she was certain of her humanity.

“When do you think I can see that psychic?” asked Gena.

“Vlad is working on it. Hopefully we can have one in the city tomorrow night,” said Marcus. “Tell me more about the man who killed you.”

That was a topic she didn’t want to get into, but she had no choice if Marcus was to protect her as he promised. He couldn’t protect her if he didn’t know all the threats against her.

“I’m still really confused about what happened, myself. I worked with Ryan for years, and he never as much as looked at me and then all of the sudden, he was cornering me after work and telling me, not asking, that we should be together. I turned him down and the next night he was at my house. He barged in and told me we were meant to be. Some bullshit about him giving up drugs and now that he was clean, there was some ‘brightness’ about me that made me different. Have you ever heard of anything like that before?”

Marcus thought about that for a moment. “Well, I have heard people that are crazy ramble on before, but nothing that sounded specifically like your situation. Brightness is an interesting choice of words. He could have been referring to an aura around you.”

“What would my aura have to do with anything?”

“Well, I’ve never seen one myself, but psychics can see them on just about anybody. It could be that Ryan is an untrained psychic and spotted your aura,” said Marcus.

“If all humans have an aura, why would Ryan single me out?”

“He’d single you out because your aura was different. That would mean your aura was different even before he killed you, leading me to believe whatever makes you special was something that happened long before he killed you.”

Gena’s heart sunk as she processed that information. “I swear, I’m just about as normal as normal can get. I always have been.”