TEN MINUTES LATER, I WAS sitting on the edge of the bathtub in our motel bathroom, gritting my teeth as Ryan laid strips of cold, wet gauze across my face and neck. The sprint across the parking lot had been nightmarish—though I had tried to cover my face with my shirt, it hadn’t been very effective. The sun is pretty good at burning newborn vampire flesh, something I’ve since seen first–hand.
My arms were raw and a couple of blisters had already popped up. In comparison to how fast my cut finger had healed in the shower, this seemed contradictory. Heal immediately from one thing but fall prey to something as innocent as the sun?
“Can I ever go in the sun again?” I asked anxiously.
He wrapped a wet towel around my right arm. “Of course. It’s just an initial reaction. Once you build up a tolerance, you’ll be fine.”
“So I have to feel like this for how long?”
He stopped fussing with my arm and sat on the edge of the bathtub beside me. “That depends. If you take my blood, you’ll heal pretty much straightaway. And you’ll have less problem the next time you go out in the sun. My tolerance will help you.”
“And if I don’t drink your blood?”
He stood and went over to the sink. “A couple of weeks, maybe more. And if you go back in the sun during that time, you’ll be even worse. The sun’s about the only thing that can scar a vampire’s flesh. More than, say, a broken wine bottle to the head or a stake to the chest.” A warm, metallic scent wafted across to me. It didn’t smell all that bad, to be honest. It smelled good. Which was, in itself, A Very Bad Thing.
I groaned. “Okay.”
He smirked.
“Well,” he said, “don’t be so appreciative.”
“I would have stayed in here,” I complained. “You’re the one who took me out in the fucking sun.”
He presented me with a small glass tumbler, filled with fresh, warm blood. I stared at it apprehensively, slightly disturbed by the fact that not two minutes ago it was pumping around Ryan’s circulatory system.
I pinched my nose shut and threw the blood down my throat like it was tequila, gulping and gasping and trying not to throw up. I took one of the sugar packets that I’d jammed into my pocket at the diner and ripped the top off, pouring it over my tongue.
“I wanted to see what your tolerance was like. And I’m also the one who saved your fucking life a few days ago, remember?”
“You’re also the one who fucking kidnapped me,” I shot back, but between the words kidnapped and me, tires squealed close by and Ryan’s gaze switched to the window.
I felt the color drain from my face, and a voice inside my head told me to stay silent and still. I did.
Ryan looked at me, putting a finger to his lips as he handed me a stuffed calico bag about the size of a deck of cards. It smelled like lavender and cat pee. He motioned for me to keep holding it, and he did likewise with an identical bag.
Footsteps echoed like machine gun bullets across the parking lot. I realized that if I concentrated hard enough, I could figure out approximately where people were in the parking lot. I could even hear how many cars were out there and the heartbeats of the people who were presumably searching for us. I could also hear my heartbeat. It was fast, and it was afraid. I looked at the empty tumbler I’d just drank from, an oily red smear still coating it, and wondered.
We sat there as the minutes dragged on. Finally, the footsteps seemed to retreat and the sound of skidding tires marked a hasty exit. It frightened me that someone was trying so hard to find me—us—and I didn’t want to imagine what would happen if I was captured again. I very much doubt I would be taken back alive, especially now that I was a vampire and presumably useless for Caleb’s torturous bloodletting experiments.
Finally, Ryan took a breath and seemed to relax marginally. “Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’m fine. Did you just hold your breath that whole time?”
“I don’t know. I wasn’t thinking about it. I guess so.”
“Wow.”
“Vampires get most nutrients and oxygen from drinking blood. Breathing is just a habit at my age.”
“Riiiight. So … what’s your plan? How are we getting out of here?”
Ryan glanced at me, apparently amused. “We’ll wait. Our ride is here very soon, and she can protect you better than just me and a couple of hex bags.”
I eyed him warily. “You’re such a bad ass, why can’t we just steal a car and drive ourselves to wherever it is we’re going?”
“I might be a ‘bad ass’,” he used his fingers to make rabbit ears, “but I’m no magic user. These hex bags will help us hide in here for a few hours, but if we leave now, we’ll be followed.”
I tensed up, panicking. “I don’t want to go back there.”
“You won’t! Just stay calm, don’t freak out.”
“I already am freaking out.” My heart was thumping so loud I could barely think.
“I’m aware of that, thanks.”
“Get out of my head! Again!”
“It’s a little hard not to hear what you’re thinking. You’re like a goddamn emergency beacon, shouting out our coordinates.”
“And you’re a goddamn psychopath! Magic will help us get out of here? I think this is just one, big prank you assholes are playing on me before you kill me.”
Ryan’s cell vibrated on the bathroom counter, and the screen lit up. He snatched it up and studied the screen. “Not long now,” he said in a voice that didn’t sound at all reassuring.
“She should have helicoptered in,” I deadpanned. “Would have been quicker.”
Ryan nodded. “She did want to bring the Apache. I told her it’d attract too much attention.”
“Well, good for you.” I looked around the tiny bathroom and longed for some wide open space. I studied the skin on my arms and realized it was almost completely healed. No blisters, and only a slight reddish tinge that was getting fainter by the minute.
“Hey, it worked.”
Ryan took my hand and studied my arm. “You’re a fast healer,” he said.
I told him about how I had cut my finger in the shower. “Will everything heal that fast?”
He shook his head. “I have a lot to explain, and I’ll try my best to do that on the way home. For now, yes you will heal fast, but you’re not invincible. A lot of new vampires get too cocky, think they’re indestructible, and they get themselves killed pretty fast.”
“What’s going to get me killed?” I asked softly. “Apart from those guys outside.”
“Well, fire’s really dangerous for vampires. It will kill you just as soon as a regular person. Bullets aren’t so bad, as long as you don’t get hit in a major artery. There are a few plants that are poisonous to vampires. None that you’ll find anywhere around here.”
“Just one more question,” I said. “How the hell are there such things as vampires? I mean, how did you come about? Was someone bitten by a bat or something?” I scowled. “Will I turn into a bat?”
“That’s a long story,” he smiled reassuringly. “A bat–free story, though. Let’s wait for the car ride for that one.”
Ryan’s phone buzzed again. “She’s here,” he said. I followed him out of the bathroom and into the main room. “Grab your stuff, let’s go.”
I stood in the middle of the room, still clutching the calico ‘hex’ bag. “Uh … what stuff?”
He grabbed the pile of bloodied sheets and dumped them into my arms, then gathered up his own duffel bag and that hideous glass jar. “Here. Let’s go, quickly. Don’t lose that hex bag.”
I stumbled out into the intensifying midday sunshine, relieved to feel only a slight irritation on my exposed skin. I wanted to ask how many days we’d been here, but now wasn’t the time. Ryan walked briskly to a Ford Explorer that sat idling halfway between the motel room and the diner. I followed, tossing the sheets into the car and taking a seat in the back.
A pretty woman with straight, strawberry blonde hair, huge green eyes and high cheekbones looked me over from her spot behind the wheel. I smiled awkwardly as Ryan dove into the front passenger seat.
“Go!” he urged, slamming his door as the woman spun the wheels and screeched off down the street. I questioned the instinct to put my seatbelt on, thinking it useless now that I was technically dead. Or undead. I made a mental note to get my new–found status cleared up.
We ended up on what looked like a freeway, and after about ten minutes, the woman driving seemed to relax slightly and backed off the gas. Ryan popped the safety back on his revolver and rested it on his lap.
“Mia Blake,” he said, gesturing, “meet Ivy. I think you two are going to like each other.”
I swallowed dryly. “Thanks for the ride,” I said.
She turned and grinned at me, her perfectly straight, white teeth looking more Hollywood than Dracula.
“No problem,” she said. “I would have brought the helicopter if I could.”
I nodded in disbelief as we made our way to Los Angeles.