He stepped back. “See? This is why I think it’s a dream. Yeah, this has to be a dream. They’ll find me in my apartment next month, frozen to the ground, blue and black, withered up, skin with an inch of frost—”
“Stop. Ew.”
“I’m unconscious. There’s no way on earth you’d come along all sweet and doe-eyed, and say, ‘May I suck your cock, please?’ Never in a billion—”
“Not unless hell froze over?” Penny arched one eyebrow.
“Exactly!”Wait a minute... “ I know Pine Ridge has some sort of magical confluence, three Ley Lines that let the supernatural and human worlds merge, and all that. Don’t think it’s Hell, but...” He gaped. “Well, fuck me. What if you’re right? What if Witchie Poo’s spell spreads outside of the apartments, through the foundation, and keeps on going through the town? D’you think it’s hit the ‘magical hub’ or whatever?”
“We’ll have to find out, but first, can we see if you fix my throat? I don’t have any cough drops, and I’m out of orange juice.”
HE DIDN’T PASS OUT. He was just sort of dazed. She was, too. He was in shock. She was simply fading fast. Either way, both of them lost the function of their legs and collapsed onto her bed. “Lemme make it good for you, baby.” He decided if this were one of those supernatural “hell or what passes for it has frozen over” events, he’d better enjoy it. He was probably going to die shortly after she recovered.
“Why sound sad?” Penny slid her panties to her ankles and limply shook them off one foot, letting them land next to the pool of black denim.
No point in lying. She won’t remember this anyway, only remember the bad parts, with my luck.“When this is over,you’re gonna hate me an’ most likely kill me. I’m finally getting a chance to be with someone I think I could fall for, someone I could love, but she’s too sick to enjoy it. Not sure if she’d ever want me except in the eleventh-hour circumstances.”
“Those are all super good reasons for misery,” Penny murmured, face showing pangs of sympathy for the handsome vamp beside her. Her own voice became glum. “And you’ll hurt me later. Tell me I was a slut. That I wasn’t good. That I don’t know how to make a real man happy, or a real demon, I guess.”
His brain should only be subjected to so many complete and utter moments of shock per day. He took a full ten seconds to make a coherent sentence.“What? Why would I say that, why would I do that?”I might be a lot of things, but I’m not suicidal!
“I don’t know. You get to say what you’re scared of, so I do, too. Fair.”
“I’ll never mock you. Or hurt you. I wanna make you happy. I wanna make you well.”
“Even if I’m not on fire?”
“Especiallywhen you’re not on fire. Fire’s a bit problematic for vampires.”
“Humans, too!” she pointed out with a pout. Her face cleared. “We could... we could do truces when we aren’t melting and burning and freezing, and magic isn’t involved.” Her tone was cautious, eyes guarded as she rolled onto her side, facing him, one hand going tentatively to his chest.
His own eyes were wary as he placed his hand atop hers, noticing that the deep royal blue of frozen blood under skin had gone to a look of white on white, tiny tracks in the snow of his skin. “We could do that. I’m in.”
“Me, too. And... I’d like to maybe do things, like nice things, like keep each other warm—or cool—on a non-eleventh hour basis.”
His heart didn’t beat. It was probably quite literally frozen at the moment. Still, it froze again in a whole new way, a tense way, waiting for the answer to his question, “You’d give us a try?”
“Mmhm.” Her hand was suddenly millimeters from his nose, making him yelp and jerk his head back. “Shake on it?”
“Deal.” He maneuvered his arm up at an odd angle to take her proffered hand.
“Yay! Oh. Poop. You’re not big anymore.” She looked down.
“I just held my heart up to see if you’d shoot holes in it. Give a bloke a second,” he snapped irritably.
“I can help!” Penny scooted down, sighing when she found his legs and tucked his chilly toes between her calves, cocooning around him, cheek on his thigh. “Look, it already woke up!”
He had to chuckle and give in. “Yes, Pen, your lips inches from him wakes him—oohhhh!”
“Mmm!” Penny held up a hand with a muffled exclamation.
Brax hesitated. “I’m not... I’m not pushing it in, if that’s the sign for back off, you’ve got to move, not me,” he tried to explain.
“That’s a high five, doofus,” Penny snapped, lifting her mouth off her new delightfully chilled treat. She thrust her palm at him pointedly, and he slapped it as requested. “Also, sorry. I promise, no more mean words.”
“I died and went to heaven. Wait...”
“You’re just regularly undead dead. Okay, you have to help me with this part. I figure if they made a movie about it, there’s something tricky.”
