Vermilion Kiss (8 page)

I reached out a hand, coughed, and forced myself to say, “Sang. That’s enough!”

He was still sucking the man’s blood long after his head had drooped and his body had become limp and cold. His green eyes were glazed with death like two cloudy marbles. Sang turned his head to me; a frown creased his face as he stopped drinking and realized that the shifter was dead. He struggled to his feet and clambered over to me.

“Lily! Are you all right? Wh-what happened? Did I…kill that man?”

“Sang,” I choked.

“Oh God, Lily, I have to get you back ASAP! Here, drink my blood, it’ll help you.” He sliced his wrist and offered it to my mouth.

As my fangs clicked from their sheath, I saw two people coming our way. One was rubbing the elongated spine of a shotgun.

The little color that was on my face must’ve washed away to a pure white of terror as the two people approached us at a casual stride.

Run! Run! Run!
My voice echoed urgently inside my head.
Get up and run!
I struggled to move my legs but I was becoming dizzy with blood loss. The bleeding from my stomach was not stopping at all in the least and I wondered if maybe that shifter had coated his claw with some kind of anti-coagulate. Whatever it was, the blood rushed from my wound in a wet cascade of vermilion.

Sang gazed ahead, the wrist he had given me dropped to his side like a heavy bag of stones. His fingers were individually shaking and tears streaked down his cheeks.

“Lily,” he wheezed. “I don’t think I can take them on. I’m exhausted from using so much power. Oh, will Dari freak when he finds out I released the seal without telling him! If I make it back, that is.”

“We
are
making it back!” I hollered angrily at him. I tried to move my legs again and they felt numb, so numb, and when the bottom of my foot met the pavement it slipped on the sticky mess of blood puddled around me.

I jutted my chin up and saw that the two people were only about thirty feet from us. One was a woman in a blue flannel shirt, about in her late twenties, with a hawkish face and short brunette hair. The other was a little girl with a curly blonde tumble of hair, a heart-shaped face, and robin-egg blue eyes, wearing in a frilly white dress with matching shiny white Mary Jane shoes. She clutched to her chest a stuffed white teddy bear. The way she looked at us though, was that of an evil origin. A completely dark and dangerous aura permeated the air as they stepped closer and closer and I lay helpless on the ground while Sang panted heavily and crouched down in a striking position.

The little girl broke away from the woman’s side and started toward Sang. I could hear the lioness inside me snarling and snapping her teeth, ready to battle. But I was too weak the summon her. Too weak to stand up. Too weak to do anything.

“Emilia.” The woman’s voice was hoarse and stern. “You’re to be beside me at all times.”

The little girl, Emilia, smiled coyly. “Rebecca, you’re clearly forgetting something. I’m two hundred years older than you, which makes me
your
superior.”

Rebecca clamped her mouth shut with a pout and raised the gun to her right eye, pointing it directly at me. “Don’t worry, little lamb. It’ll be quick and over with if you let me get a clear shot of your head, honey.”

I turned my head to the right to see that Sang had jumped at Emilia and was swiping at her with his nails. She expertly dodged his attacks and then, before Sang or I could comprehend what was happening, she grabbed a handgun from inside the frills of her dress and shot at Sang five times.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

I screamed in horror as Sang dropped to his knees, five bloody holes scattered across his chest, shoulders, and abdomen.

The sweet, intoxicating scent of his blood reminded my body of the extremely intense painful and burning fire that roared through my throat like a sandstorm. Blood still dripped quickly from my wound. It made a light
tap
tap
tap
sound as it hit the ground.

My vision was overcome with gold and red and I started to rise from my pitiful place on bloody cement, hair wild and sticking all over my face.

Emilia shrieked, “What are you doing? Kill her!”

Rebecca’s hands quavered on the shotgun as I floated above the earth, my eyes shrouded in circles of red and gold and black, hair whipping around as if they were Medusa’s snakes.

Blood! Blood! Blood! Blood!
My voice cried in my head
. Blood! Need blood! Need blood! Must have blood now! Eat her! Eat her! Eat her! Devour her whole ‘til there’s nothing left but a wrinkled, empty bag of flesh. Eat! Eat! Eat!

I mumbled to myself. “Yes, you’re right. I have to eat. I must.” I flicked my eyes upon Rebecca, hammered my gaze into her soul. “You’re mine. You’re mine! You’re my feast! Yes, I’m going to consume you!”

As I slowly walked to her, she pulled the trigger and a copper bullet flew to my skull. The moment before it reached me it shattered into a thousand tiny particles of dust that dispersed through the air.

She fired again, and again, and again, and each time I laughed and laughed and laughed at how easy it was to break her bullets in mid-flight. She threw the gun onto the road and stumbled to get away but she tripped on her own heel and splat into a ditch of mud like the dirty filth that she was.

I grinned like the Cheshire cat, as I could already smell the delicious scent of her life fluid as it slipped coolly down my parched and burning throat. I pinned her wrists above her head, straddled her legs with mine and sank my fangs into the side of her skinny little neck. The rush of blood was so satisfying, so worth it, so beautiful as I hungrily pulled it out, licked my lips, licked the blood that seeped from the two holes I had made, and then sucked more and more until Rebecca was no more than a pile of shriveled skin and bone.

Emilia was backing away, her gun held tightly within her tiny grubby fingers. I teetered after her, craving her blood, wanting her, needing her. She started to run but I was faster and dug my hands into her shoulders as her expression turned to pure shock and terror.

“But—but you were almost dead! The shifter had inflicted such a mortal wound and the anti-coagulate should’ve bled you dry. Why? Why are you still alive?”

I cocked my head to the left and said with a giggle, “I’m not mortal, am I? So what would a mortal wound do? Oh, well, time to eat!”

She screamed shrilly as my fangs sank deep into the base of her ivory neck and I began to draw on her enticing, delectable blood that was like liquid candy coating my mouth. As I drank and drank and drank, I occasionally broke into a fit of uncontrollable laughter and then went back to drain my prize.

I felt so powerful, so overwhelmingly strong. All my wounds had already closed and I was left busy sating the raging hunger that plagued my body so. When I was finished with Emilia, I threw her unidentifiable corpse to the ground and marched toward Sang.

It wasn’t enough! It wasn’t enough! It wasn’t enough! I needed more!
More!

As I knelt over Sang and stretched my jaw, he uttered feebly, “Lily. Lily, please come back. Please. I love you.”

The power swelled up inside me into one colossal ball of energy and then vanished as if it were never there. My vision returned to normal and I leaned against the wall for support as all my limbs began to feel incredibly weak and tired.

“Sang,” I said softly while tears spilled from my eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, Lily. We all make mistakes. We just have to learn from them.”

I didn’t know what to say. I was scared. I was scared. I was so scared. I was frightened, terrified, and afraid.

Not of what was after me or what was hiding in the shadows behind the closet.

I was scared.

Of myself.

My eyes wearily fluttered open and I groaned as my stomach gurgled and flipped. I peered down at myself and saw I was in Darius’s vast king bed with a leopard patterned quilt tucked around me. I wiped the crust from my eyes and yawned. The room was dark and the curtains were drawn, and shivered as a wave of coldness swept through me.

I looked to the side and Darius was right there at the head of the bed, sitting on a red velvet chair, staring at me as I was some kind of rare specimen. He lifted a hand and weaved his fingers between mine, let out a sigh, and shook his thick mane of chocolate hair out of his face.

His voice was wounded with concern and worry. “How are you feeling, my dear?”

I groaned again as my stomach rumbled, and then I sneezed. “Ugh, I feel really cold. And my stomach hurts like a bitch.”

He smoothed the sweaty hair that hung across my face back onto my head and stood. “I would expect your stomach to be rather upset, but you being cold is not a symptom I am happy about.”

I coughed weakly. “What exactly happened? Why am I in bed? I was out shopping with Sang…” There was a foggy barrier in my memory that barricaded me from going beyond the point of where Sang and I left the
7-Eleven
. It was like my mind was TV static and I couldn’t change the channel

Darius rubbed the fuzzy stubble on his chin. “Ah, you don’t remember. I can tell you what happened, if you’d like.” In one fluid motion, he was beneath the covers behind me, arms folded around my chest, face nuzzled in the mess of my hair.

He was dressed in his red robe with the faux tiger fluff trimming, and it felt so warm against me. I didn’t know if I was still in my outfit from before or in something entirely new, but having Darius next to me greatly comforted and soothed the surging anxiety inside.

I yawned again and closed my hands around his arms. “I’d like to know.” My voice was raspy.

He entangled his legs with mine and responded, “Very well. I peered into Sang’s memories, so I know a good bit of what occurred. You both were suddenly attacked by a shifter, and it targeted
you
of all people first.” Anger and hatred dripped from his tone.

“I was attacked?” I just couldn’t remember. Everything was like a thick blanket of snow that I was trapped underneath.

He continued, “Yes, my dear, you were severely wounded in the stomach. Sang was so worried that he indignantly released the seal I had placed on his abilities and killed the shifter. Shortly after, though, two people of which I am sure were regular humans, were going to shoot both of you, and Sang, having been incapable of fighting due to exhaustion, you fought for him and yourself. Unfortunately, the hunger had also taken a toll on your mind and you forcefully awakened a bit of your potential abilities, and you killed those people via drinking their blood.”

He had to kidding, right? There’s no way I would kill anyone, especially a human, especially
two
humans. I couldn’t have, could I? I would never purposefully kill someone. I wasn’t like that. I wasn’t some blood-craved monster. He had to exaggerating on that part because I couldn’t fathom it, couldn’t register it at all. This all had to be some kind of twisted plan of his to get me to drink human blood or quit my job or something along those lines.

“You performed very well, my dear. Astounding, really. Your first time tasting the blood of a human and you finished the meal as well. I’m terribly proud of you.”

No! I didn’t do that! I didn’t kill anyone! I didn’t. I didn’t. I didn’t!

Yes, you did.
My voice uttered like a ghost in the dark.
You killed them. You drank their blood. It was all you.

No! No, it wasn’t! It wasn’t me! It was someone else. It had to be someone else!

Don’t you remember? You’ve done this all before. When you were with Annabelle. You drank the blood of an innocent human.

Darius held me tighter and brushed his eyelashes, like butterfly wings, along the side of my forehead and I realized that I had been thrashing like a fish on land and he had helped me stop.

“Sh…everything is all right, my Lily. You and Sang are not dead and that is all that counts, yes? Those people attempted to kill you, so you fought back in defense. It was the natural action to take. When a zebra is confronted by a lion, does the zebra not kick and run with all its strength?”

I took what he said into account. Yes, if they were trying to kill me, then it was right of me to defend myself. I was the zebra and they were the lions, except I became the lion in the end. But that didn’t change the fact that I murdered two people. I was a killer, and that fact I could never change.

Darius’s breath sent chills down my spine and broke me out in gooseflesh as he breathed on my neck. His cool, smooth tongue licked at the lobe of my ear, his mouth pulled it in, and he roughly suckled on it as if it were a lollipop. Then he nibbled on my ear, an electric spark flushed through my body, and I arched my back, soaked in the pleasure of having him claim me by the ear.

He whispered gently, “Did you enjoy how your friend smelled? Did she make your mouth water with hunger?”

I thought back to when I’d seen Dana at the
7-Eleven
and how I’d briefly thought about tasting her blood. The notion sickened me, making my stomach do a gold medal gymnastic flip.

“No,” I lied. “No, she didn’t.”

Yes she did. Don’t lie. You know you’d love to plunge your fangs into that pretty little freckled neck and drink her ‘til the last drop.

No! No! I will do no such thing!

Darius kissed a fiery row down my neck and teased at my skin with his teeth. “What’s the matter, my dear? You seem unsettled.”

“I’m fine.” I huffed.

He said, “Good. To warm you up, we are going to take a bath right now. And there is
no
refusing.” I could practically hear the grin in his voice.

He insisted on getting the bath started while I stripped the bloodstained white silk nightgown off and groaned. There was no way to get that stain out. Might as well dump it in the trash.

After I closed the lid to the garbage can, I waited impatiently outside the bathroom door, tapped my feet, and drummed my fingers against the frame. Steam poured from the cracks and it smelled like lavender and vanilla.