“How do we make it stop?” Reyna asked.
“Stop?” Washington asked, perplexed. “Hmm…I doubt you can make it stop. Why would you want it to stop?”
“I don’t,” Beckham said with finality. “But I don’t want Harrington to have the same access I am privy to. I don’t want anyone who has tasted her blood to have the same reaction.”
“Well, we could have someone else drink her blood and see if it works,” Washington said simply.
Beckham growled. Actually growled.
“Or…we could try something else,” Washington said hastily, taking a step back.
Reyna could see the death in Beckham’s eyes. She placed her hand on his sleeve. “It would be okay.”
“It would not.”
“I was merely suggesting the simplest test,” Washington added.
“Reyna’s blood is not for feeding,” Beckham snarled. “No one else will taste her. Not ever.”
“Becks,” she whispered.
“If her blood does allow the ability to sense her, then another vampire will have claim on her. I won’t allow it.”
“I have heard of this sort of thing before,” Washington said, obviously trying to redirect the subject. “But it’s been many years. Long before we had the technology we do now. Might I be able to take a sample of your blood to run some tests?”
Reyna nodded. Washington glanced at Beckham, who nodded as well. All three of them moved out of his office and into a lab.
Reyna took a seat and tried not to think about the needle by focusing on her breathing. In through her nose, out through her mouth. Beckham came to stand next to her.
“Hey, look at me.” She slowly did as he asked. “This will be over soon.”
She didn’t nod or do anything. She just stared at him and waited. Not watching usually helped some. She didn’t anticipate it, but it didn’t lessen the fear. It was like trying not to wait for someone to jump out at you in a haunted house.
The prick of the needle happened. Beckham inhaled deeply. His hand clenched on the chair, but he never broke eye contact. She could see him retreating deep into himself, fighting for control. Could see the hunger buried there. Then, as quickly as it happened, it was over.
“There we go,” Washington said. He cleaned up her arm, put a Band-Aid on it, and then swept the blood vials up and onto the counter. “That was interesting. Your blood smells very sweet.”
“I’ve heard that before,” Reyna said. “Do you know what that means?”
“Well, all blood smells different. Especially to vampires with our more enhanced sense of smell. But I personally only know of one other person who has ever smelled like that.”
“I’ve never smelled anything like it,” Beckham said, still in a bit of a trance.
“You were not even born yet when I discovered this woman.” Washington finished with the rest of his work and then came to stand before them. “One of the lords had a favorite who smelled similarly.”
Reyna’s head swam. “Lords?”
Washington gave her an apologetic look. “I am afraid vampires were not as we described when Visage took power.”
“Notallwas as described,” Beckham clarified.
“I don’t understand.”
“Not all vampires were crazed, animalistic monsters,” Washington told her. “We spun that tale to make it more palatable for the humans when Visage rose up from the ashes of the collapse.”
Reyna felt like her entire world had been flipped upside down. “But there were mass killings. People couldn’t go out after dark except in well-lit places, and even then it wasn’t advised.”
“That’s true. Vampires committed atrocities you could not even imagine,” Beckham told her. “However, we were on an elevated plane.”
