Lover's Kiss (4 page)

Chapter 6

Beth rose to her feet again and dusted herself off. She felt different. Almost loose. She looked down and saw that not only was her jacket torn and dirty, but her shirt had come untied. The red and white plaid top was torn at the seams and had some specks of her blood on it. She retied it under her breasts and tucked everything back in place. The failing seams left her breasts unsupported and ready to fall out with the slightest jiggle. She shook her head and pulled her jacket around her.

She stared down at the body of the dead junky. The heroin in the dead girl's veins was now in Beth's body. She laughed at her own joke. The blood in the dead girl's veins was in another dead girl's veins. She giggled and stumbled when she tried to take a step. That's right, her boots were gone. She'd thrown them away. She shrugged. Not a big deal, she could buy more.

The problem was the girl. Or the girl's body. The two holes in her neck were an obvious cause of death. Obvious, and terrifying. Beth giggled at the thought of John or another cop doing an examination. It would be funny to watch. Funny, but Penny would be pissed. That was the kind of thing that the male vampires had been killed for.

Beth sighed. She had to take care of the body. The problem was she couldn't fly. Couldn't even jump worth a damn. Dragging a dead homeless girl through the crowded streets would be funny, but also something that would draw attention.

She frowned. She had to get going, why did this dumb bitch have to make things hard for her? She frowned and looked around the alley. It was brighter now, not from light but because she'd fed. She'd learned to match her heartbeat to the beat of her victim's, spreading the blood through her body with each swallow. It felt romantic, one person giving their life so that she might live.

Now the romance was over. The stupid bitch was dead weight. Literally. Beth scowled and looked back down at her. She couldn't move her and dump her in the river or find a place to burn her up. That meant she needed to do something else. But what? There were no doors on the buildings. A few windows, but those were twenty feet up on the fire escape. She could reach it on her own, but not carrying another person.

That left one option. She had to hide the cause of death. An autopsy would reveal the woman had been drained dry, but would anyone spend the money finding cause of death on a homeless drug addict? She probably had a record for theft and prostitution, on top of drug charges. Beth nodded. The cops wouldn't think twice about her. They probably figured it was just a matter of time until her body showed up.

So how could she hide the wound and keep people from wondering what happened? Two small holes, near each other but not close enough. Beth frowned. She was immortal, damn it! Why should a stupid problem like this slow her down?

Beth tilted her head and smiled. It was vicious and gruesome, but it would hide the wound. She lifted her hand and stared at it, willing her fingernails to lengthen and grow stronger. She twisted her hand, admiring the sharp points, and then had them darken to black, the same as she'd seen Penny's at one time. She grinned. It was a good look on her.

Beth grabbed the dead girl's greasy hair and lifted her off the ground. She wrapped her other hand around her throat and then pushed her razor edged nails into the pliant flesh. She twisted and sawed, tearing the flesh until she'd reduced the corpse's throat to ribbons of near bloodless flesh. She crushed her spine and severed the ligaments and muscles holding it together, letting the body fall to a heap.

Beth lifted the head and stared into the unseeing eyes. She tilted her head and then giggled. Stupid druggy. She tossed the head on the pile of trash and reached down to wipe the gore off her hand on the corpse's dirty clothes. She stood and looked both ways, making sure that both ends of the alley were unoccupied. She smiled and glanced up. The crowds were growing smaller, but walking without shoes would draw attention, even if her new home was only a few blocks away. She needed to not be seen.

Beth leapt up, grabbing the walkway again and flipping herself up and onto it with ease now that she knew how. She jogged up the stairs, winding back and forth until she'd reached the fourth floor. The roof was another ten feet up, but that was an easy jump. She landed on her feet and slipped on the ice and snow covering the roof. She caught herself on the lip at the edge and straightened before peering over the side. A twenty foot drop had broken bones. A fifty plus foot drop would leave her helpless.

She shook the thoughts away. They were stupid. She was alive and well. That's what mattered. Well, not alive, technically, but better than that stupid junkie she'd sucked dry. Beth turned and looked to the north, where the next door building was. The alley was only ten feet wide, if that. An easy jump. She backed away from the edge, digging her toes in and easily finding purchase in the ice.

Beth ran and leapt, sailing through the air and almost whooping in delight. She was flying! For a few seconds, at least. In a few years, according to Penny, she'd be able to make her own wings and fly wherever she wanted. A few years seemed like so far away, but she knew it would come and go in no time. Besides, she would never die. Time held little meaning now. Well, in the grand scheme of things. She only had a few hours left until sunrise. That was a deadline she didn't dare miss.

She slid across the slippery roof of the second building until she dug her toes in and drove her heels down. The ice was only slippery when she wanted it to be. Another benefit of being a goddess. Beth grinned and turned to the west. The next building was the same height, but it was across a busy two way street. The road, plus sidewalks, meant she had a leap of thirty or forty feet.

She grinned and dug her toes in. A few seconds later she was sailing through the air over the unsuspecting late night revelers below. She sailed over the edge of the roof and landed with her feet running. She circled back and walked up to the edge of the roof, grinning wide and staring in wonder at the incredible jump she'd just managed. She looked down and saw a young man wiping snow off his head and looking up.

Beth laughed and danced away from the edge before he turned and looked her way. She turned and looked the other way. The buildings stretched on at different heights and distances. She had a ways to go and it looked like it was going to be fun.

Chapter 7

Beth climbed over the railing and onto the balcony of Penny's penthouse apartment. Well, her apartment too, according to Penny. She turned and leaned over the railing, staring down at the ground nearly a hundred feet below. She teetered, her bare feet clinging to the icy balcony while her thighs pressed against the railing. A laugh burst out of her mouth, draining the chest full of air she'd been holding.

She'd figured out that, since she didn't need to breathe and she kept forgetting to inhale before speaking, why not hold her breath all the time? She'd tried it while leaping from building to building and climbing up the sides to get to the roofs. So far, so good.

The ice on the door behind her cracked as it pushed open. Beth spun around and saw Penny standing with her eyes wide in surprise. "Beth? How did you get up here?"

"I climbed," she replied and grinned. She stepped over to her and hugged her, pulling her tight and then pressing her cold lips against Penny's. "I learned so much tonight!"

Penny frowned and leaned back. "Beth? What's going on."

"What? Nothing! I walked around a little to do some thinking."

"I see. I was worried about you. Do you know what those two were?"

Beth frowned and then let out a giggle. "Oh, those werewolves?" she waved her hand, dismissing them. "No big deal. I've dealt with werewolves before. All big and showy and full of themselves. Hunter and Tiffany fit the stereotype perfectly!"

"I see," Penny said. "Something's different about you. Where are your boots?"

Beth looked down and shrugged. "I broke a heel so I ditched them."

"You've been walking around barefoot? Did anyone see?"

"That's nothing," Beth said and unbuttoned her jacket. She held it out to the side and let Penny see her right boob hanging free and her left one barely held behind the slightly less torn shirt. "See anything you like?"

Penny frowned. "Come inside. Now."

Beth laughed. "Why, nobody's going to see us up here."

"Just do it."

Beth shrugged and stepped into the apartment. Penny followed and pulled the door shut behind her while she was shrugging coat off her shoulders. Beth kept walking, her coat dragging on the ground, and said, "I ran into an old friend tonight."

"An old friend?"

"In uniform. Need any more clues?"

"Did he see you?"

Beth spun and saw Penny's serious expression. It made her giggle. "Relax. I'm with you now, right?"

"Beth, this isn't funny. And I don't own you. That does remind me I wanted to ask you about the club earlier."

"The kiss?" Beth winked at her. "It was nice, want to do it again?"

"Elizabeth!"

Beth laughed. "Loosen up, Penny. It was fun. You're a good kisser, but you've probably had a lot of experience."

"What's gotten into you?" Penny wondered aloud. "Be serious."

Beth rolled her eyes. "Okay, fine. I did it because I saw those two wolves come in and I wanted to get us both out of there. In the past, a kiss that hot had steam coming out of my ears and I figured we'd rush through the back so we could, uh, do more."

"Sex isn't the same for us," Penny pointed out.

"No shit," Beth lamented. "It was a nice kiss. Very nice. But I wasn't creaming my panties like I should have been."

Penny frowned. "We don't have the same drive as the living do. For us feeding brings pleasure."

"Fuck yeah it does," Beth agreed.

Penny's eyes narrowed. "Tell me about tonight. After you left."

Beth shrugged and related the story of running into John and taking off before he could see her. Or at least she thought she got away. Then how she hurt herself and fixed herself up. She smiled. "Turns out healing myself wiped me out."

"I'm impressed that you could do so much, so soon," Penny said. "You're strong. I knew you would be."

Penny grinned. "I had no idea! Except I didn't feel strong after that. I could barely see anything around me. I could barely think either, except about how to make myself feel better."

"The thirst."

Beth nodded. "Fuck yeah! I had to find somebody and I had to do it now! I got lucky, there was this homeless bitch in the alley that I hadn't noticed before. With my blood goggles on she stood out like a sore thumb though."

"Blood goggles?"

"Yeah, you know, beer goggles make ugly people look better because you're drunk. It's a figure of speech. Well for us when we're thirsty the living look so bright they glow. So blood goggles."

"Interesting," Penny opined.

"Thanks. So, um, I fed on her. I don't know if she saw me or not before, but I don't know if it mattered, she was pretty strung out on whatever she'd taken. I think I saw some needles in her pile of shit. Probably heroin."

Penny groaned. "That explains it."

"Explains what?"

"You're high."

"High?" Beth laughed. "How can I be high? I'm dead! I mean, I don't work like that. You said that stuff doesn't affect us. We can't get stoned or drunk."

"I did say that," Penny admitted. "I meant by taking those things directly. You did not, you drank the blood of a person that was under the effects."

"I— oh shit," Beth stared and then laughed. "I guess that's why I feel so good then?"

Penny frowned. "Yes, but don't make a habit of it."

"Can vampires be addicts?"

"It won't change your body physically," Penny said after a delay. "But you were reckless, weren't you?"

"Reckless? How?" Beth protested. "I went out of my way to not be seen! You should have seen me, I was jumping from building to building like some kind of superhero. Then I pulled a spider-woman trick and climbed up a few others, including this one, to get up here. We can do so much cool stuff!"

Penny closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them. "Yes, we can. But we can be seen and we can be discovered. That's why we don't do that sort of thing. Now what about your victim? What did you do to her?"

Beth pouted at the rebuke but found she couldn't stay upset for long. "Oh, well, I don't have wings like you do and there was no place to stash the body, so I hid the wound as best I could and left her buried in her pile of crap."

"Hid the wound?"

"Yeah," Beth nodded, dodging the question as much as she could.

Penny frowned. "How?"

Beth smiled. She had a hunch Penny wouldn't be as impressed as she was. She held up her hand which still sported the black claws for fingernails – they'd come in handy when she needed to climb. "I tore her head off."

Penny blinked and then muttered a short phrase that made no sense to Beth. She couldn't even figure out what language Penny had spoken, the words were so strange.

"Penny? Didn't I do good? I mean, I shredded that bitch's throat good, nobody will be able  to tell I drank her dry."

"You tore her head off," Penny repeated. "There should be a lot of blood. You drained her."

"I did," Beth admitted. "I found if I match my heart to theirs I can time swallowing and everything so I don't look pregnant when I'm done. Plus it's cool, our hearts stop beating at the same time, but for me that's not a big deal."

Penny smirked in spite of her frustration at Beth's actions. "I forgot to tell you about that. I am impressed. You amaze me one minute and remind me the next that you're young and inexperienced."

"Stupid?"

"No, inexperienced," Penny stressed. "Tell me, where was this homeless woman?"

Beth frowned. "Four or five blocks away to the south. In an alley. I think there was a Greek deli in one of the buildings?"

Penny nodded. "Wait here."

"What?"

"I'm going to take care of the body."

"Oh!"

"You will wait here, right?"

Beth nodded. "I may be stoned— or high or whatever— but I'm not stupid. I mean sure, you say you don't own me and that's true, but if I leave what happens to me? I don't know what to do or how to survive. For a little while, sure, but long term?"

Penny frowned. "I'd hoped you wanted to stay for other reasons."

"What, like love?" Beth asked and then laughed. She stepped up to her stone faced mentor and hugged her. Penny remained stiff until Beth kissed her again and encouraged her by opening her lips and tickling Penny's with her tongue. The tension melted out of Penny's body and the two embraced for a short but sweet moment.

"We are not bound by the passion of the flesh, but we do feel," Penny said.

Beth smiled. "I know, or at least I'm learning. And I love you, Penny. You've been my savior, my teacher, and my friend. What more could I ask?"

Penny smiled. "Good. Then I will be back as quick as I may. The sun will rise soon."

Beth nodded. "I'll be waiting."

"You will?"

"In your bed," Beth said with a wink.

Penny's blue eyes sparkled. "Our bed."

"Mmm," Beth agreed. "One of these nights we'll have to make sure we have time enough to make it ours."

Penny laughed and reached up to brush her hand against Beth's cheek. "So sweet and beautiful," she whispered. "I'll be back."

Beth nodded. Before she could tell Penny to go the door to the balcony opened and Penny was gone. Beth shook her head and laughed as the vampire's clothes fluttered to the floor in front of her. She'd learned a lot tonight but she was a long ways from being as good as Penny was! Lucky for her, she had all the time in the world to get there.