In Love With a Vampire

Chapter Seventeen

Donna

I reached the doorway leading outside alone. Aggravated, I doubled back into the kitchen. Pete was stroking his chin, occasionally pushing his glasses away from the bridge of his nose. I had not properly assessed his build since my arrival since he seemed to never be around. While he was not particularly attractive, Pete was well built with broad shoulders, a puffed chest, and muscular arms. He was the type of human you wanted on your side in situations like this. The only problem was that I was certain Pete did not have particularly warm feelings towards my kind.

“We are wasting time, we should be out there canvassing the area for them…”

“And where would you like to start? Can you see where they are hmmm? Can vampires locate each other using their minds?”

“We are not witches…”

“Wait, witches exist?”

Both Pete and I shifted simultaneously to regard Lory who had refilled her glass of wine. She shrugged her shoulders and looked straight ahead, taking tiny sips from the glass. How was she meant to help us save Maria and Diana in the state she was currently in?

“The wine calms her nerves, do not worry, my wife can handle her liquor.

I furrowed my eyebrows at Pete who responded with a brief smirk.

“If you are so good at reading minds why don’t you locate those bloody assassins?”

“I will…you see humans, unlike your kind, have brains. We do not need heightened abilities to make everything easier for us.”

“Wait, you think being a vampire is easy?”

“Don’t you reach places faster? Don’t you easily decipher sounds? Can you not spot things from miles away?”

I growled and slammed my palms on the kitchen table earning a whimper from Lory.

“Do you experience cravings that cripple you? Has your body ever felt like rubber because you failed to eat two meals?”

Pete leaned against the table and c****d his head. He was facing me, his dark, beady eyes intense with ripples of rage.

“Yes, we get hungry and we become weak. And I don’t know about Lory but Pizza cravings do cripple me…So yes your kind? Not so special after all just a bunch of self-entitled monsters.”

In one fluid movement, I thrust myself across the table and circled my hands around Pete’s neck. He immediately lost color in his face, a purple hue beginning to form in his cheeks. I felt a force attempting to pull me backward, each time the tug came, a high-pitched scream ensued. I increased the pressure around Pete’s neck, my mind painting an image of Maria harmed by a mere human. I channeled my anger, anxiety, and fear into the act and derived pleasure from the sound of Pete fighting for air. My eyes flitted to a large vein that had surfaced in his neck. I felt my teeth elongate, I felt my pulse quicken. I angled my head towards his neck and sunk my teeth into the flesh of his neck; my entire being reverberated with pleasure. Is this what it felt like, to drink directly from a human’s neck? I had heard tales, I had read texts but I had never experienced it.

Stop it Donna! You are going to kill him.

I ignored my subconscious and dug my teeth deeper into Pete’s neck. When I resurfaced, I closed my eyes to savor the taste. I was so engrossed in my morbid act that I did not see Lory approach me with a knife from behind. I was about to bury my head in Pete’s neck once more when I felt a sharp pain emanating from my side. The pain was excruciating, I felt like I was standing in the sun without my protection ring. My flesh was burning. Trembling, I turned to look at Lory. She was holding a knife in one hand and a wine glass in the other. One look at the knife told me it was caked with something. Whatever that substance was, it was powerful enough to make me sink to the floor and lose consciousness.

* * *

I woke up with a start.

The sudden movement sent sharp pain waves through my body. A strained scream escaped my throat as I lifted my shirt to examine the wound. A bandage had been carefully placed on it. Panic brewed in my stomach. Why had I not healed? Were these the weapons that the assassins possessed? How many other humans had the? Did my kind really stand a chance against humans? I had been drinking human blood for years. I had trained in combat every day for as long as I could recall. If that had happened to Maria, she would have died. I clambered off the bed that I had no recollection of getting in and made my way to the kitchen. My ears caught the sound of Lory’s squeaky voice and Pete’s gruff baritone.

“Why aggravate her? She is clearly worried about her friends…We are supposed to be helping them not challenging who they are…”

“Are you seriously defending the creature who almost killed me in front of you? She could not control her hunger Lo’. I could feel her need to get more. These creatures are monsters…even the ones that think they are not.”

“Just refrain from agitating her. Thank God I still had this or you would be dead.”

“I love you too honey…”

I walked into the kitchen in time to encounter an intimate moment between husband and wife. Lory placed a light kiss on Pete’s forehead evoking a warm feeling in the pit of my stomach. An image of Sorokin flashed in my head. As she pulled away, I spotted the gaping wound on Pete’s neck. My hand flew to slap my open mouth. What had I done? I recalled crossing the table and attacking Pete after he made an offhand comment about my tribe. But that was it. I assumed I had choked him to a point of scaring Lory who in turn responded by attacking me with some kind of vampitre killing substance. I remembered the chokin, I even recalled Lory stabbing me but feeding?

“I fed on you?”

The couple turned to look at me. There was raw fear in Lory’s eyes and bubbling rage in Pete’s.

“What do you think? Ow!”

Lory swatted Pete’s arm and beckoned me to join them.

“Do you not remember doing this?”

I shook my head rapidly, furiously blinking so as to keep my tears at bay. I watched as Lory and Pete shared a concerned look.

“Has this ever happened before?”

I racked my brain for a lost memory of me losing sentience. There were none.

“Lately I have been having these panic attacks-"

“I am sorry did you just say panic attacks?”

I shot Pete a glare who raised his hands in mock surrender.

“And I have not been feeding well…I just…I do not know what is happening. Something is wrong with me…Being here has…changed me.”

My body went stiff as Lory wrapped her arms around my length and pulled me into a tight embrace. I had not even noticed her moving toward me.

“I am sorry I stabbed you, Donna…”

“I am sorry I tried to kill your husband Lory…”

“Are you friggin’ kidding me? I am the one with a devoured neck here!"

I pulled away from Lory who was smiling warmly at me. She then reached out to wipe a stray tear from my cheek.

“We will figure all that out later…Now we need to locate your friends.”

Maria.

A wave of guilt engulfed me. I had been holding out hope that she would show up from school but she had not. One glance outside told me that hours had passed since I attacked Pete. If she were okay, she would be here with me.

“I think I know where they could be. I just received an invitation to a private party from Andrew McAllister.”

Lory’s face paled. She swiftly turned and made her way to the kitchen cabinets. We quietly watched her as she aggressively rummaged for something. Seconds later she gave a victorious whoop as she retrieved a large, green bottle of wine.

“Who is this Andrew?”

Pete regarded his wife with worry before sighing and averting his gaze to the phone that was sitting on his lap. I cleared my throat ready to pose the question again but Pete’s voice cut through the tense kitchen air.

“Andrew is my brother-in-law and he is currently in the running to be Scanton’s mayor, again.”

“What does this have to do with the assassins and Maria?”

“Yeah I should have led with this, Andrew is the leader of the VA.”

Lory banged the half-empty bottle of wine against the table and smacked her lips. She then ran her hand through her blouse and shuddered.

“Well, we cannot show up in these clothes. If we have any chance of rescuing your friends we better get changed.”