“I’m as cold as I’ve always been.” Takashi untucked his shirt and dropped it to the floor. “You’re colder than you should be.”
“I am?” Zack kissed behind Takashi’s ear. He swept his hand up Takashi’s torso until he found his nipple. He rolled his thumb over his tender flesh.
Takashi gasped into Zack’s touch. He tipped his head back and to the side so Zack had more area to kiss. “You should be lukewarm, practically room temperature. You’re like ice.”
“Weird,” Zack muttered against Takashi’s skin. His lust was growing into a nearly tangible thing. “Maybe I just need more blood. You and Roger are always freezing before you eat.”
“Didn’t Seamus have someone for you at your grave?” Takashi said. “It’s tradition.”
Suddenly, the building feedback loop of desire was a cut cord, and Takashi was left holding his end. The break gave him a clearer mind. There was nothing inherently wrong with what they had been doing, but Zack was fresh from his grave. To him, the fight in the hotel had been earlier in the night.I should be more careful with him. For his sake.
“I killed her,” Zack whispered. His emotions were sliding into his screaming fear of rejection. He took a step back and lowered his gaze to the floor.
Takashi put his arm around Zack and kept him close. Embracing his continuing desire for him so that Zack might feel it, he said gently, “We all kill the one at the grave.”
“Am I going to keep killing?” Zack asked.
“Humans live on death as well,” Takashi replied tenderly. “That’s what animals do. They gain energy in the destruction and continue on. We vampires are just another kind of animal.”
Zack scowled. “You’re not comparing drinking blood to eating a hamburger, are you?”
“I’m saying that even eating a salad has taken apart some piece of the world in order to propel life forward. That we don’t call the coyote or the hawk evil for eating the rabbit. We vampires have the unique opportunity of not killing our food, but that takes practice.”
“This is all messed up.” Zack pushed Takashi away. Despite Takashi’s attempt to hold on, Zack’s strength was greater, and Takashi stumbled backward a few steps before catching his balance. But Zack seemed caught up in his own mind, as if he hadn’t put much effort into the shove, and he strode across the room to a cabinet holding Blu-Rays and the like. “Seamus is fucked up. He keeps calling me hissonand acting like I should appreciate that he gave me his blood as if my choice wasn’t death or this.”
Some vampires fell into the conceit that their sirelings were a type of offspring; some turned their lovers so they could be with them forever; some found a mortal so special they wanted to preserve them; some chose to make underlings to serve them. Takashi had sired three vampires that fell into the special mortal category. He’d done his duty to them and ushered them into their new lives, teaching them what he could, but they quickly carved their own paths away from him. He didn’t resent them for it, but he never felt the bond with them that he did with his own sire.
“Nell treated me like a son,” Takashi said. “She never said the word, but she was fond of me, more than some of her other sirelings, and spent time teaching me what being a vampire means.”
“Yeah, but that’sNell. That’s not surprising,” Zack said. He gestured around the room. “Look at this shit! He put upTwilightposters. Did you tell him about this?”
“No.” Takashi went to the bookcase. Volumes upon volumes about war. Zack had been part of a plot to kill Seamus. Why on earth would they give him tactical ideas?
“Takashi—”
Takashi held up his hand to silence Zack. “You’re right. This is strange. He should want us dead. We shouldbedead. Instead, he’s kept me, and he studied you. I think he’s been observing you for a while. Money can move things along, but rooms like this take time to set up.”
Zack paused and folded his arms over his chest. “Studied me?”
“He’s read your journal and notebooks.”
“Fuck.” Zack started to reach for his hair, then rested his hand back where it had been. “He’s got my dagger. Once I get it back, we should go.”
“Why?” Takashi asked as he continued examining the various book spines in front of him. Zack was radiating fear, but he shut it out. Fear was an ambition killer, and opportunities were multiplying in front of them.
“Look, I’ll admit for a hot second, I was really tempted to stick around and find some way to kill him from the inside.” Zack neared Takashi. “But something really weird is going on here, and it’s not sitting right with me. These rooms are filled with stuff I’ve always wanted, he keeps insisting he’s my father, and he wants us at a meeting downstairs. I think it’s some kind of coven leadership session. He shouldn’t be inviting me into that.”
“But he is. There has to be a reason.”
“The reason is he’s playing mind games to torture us,” Zack replied.
“This isn’t torture. It’s seduction,” Takashi said. A few of the puzzle pieces made sense for their shape, but Takashi couldn’t grasp the full picture. “We have some value to him. Aren’t you the least bit curious why that is?”
Zack shifted uncomfortably where he stood—a very human habit that he’d eventually stop doing. Maybe Zack would never school his body to stop fidgeting like other vampires did, but he likely would. Takashi captured the moment and tucked it away in his heart for another time. Eventually, his drop of grief would expand and demand attention. The bits that made Zack mortal were gone or dying and deserved the noticing of their passing, but the core of who Zack was remained, and Takashi was too relieved and excited for any sadness.
“He’s a monster,” Zack said.
“I’m not suggesting that we become his friends,” Takashi replied. “But he wants something of us, and that gives us leverage.”
