seriousfic (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
seriousfic) wrote2009-01-06 02:12 pm
seriousfic) wrote2009-01-06 02:12 pm
The Hollows fic: High on Unlife (Rachel/Ivy)
Title: High on Unlife
Fandom: The Hollows
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3,431
Characters/Pairings: Rachel/Ivy, mention of Rachel/Nick
Timeline: Takes place after Dead Witch Walking.
Summary: Fed up with Ivy’s flirting, Rachel gives Ivy a vial of her own blood. It didn’t work out well for Angelina Jolie either.
It’d been a few days since Francis had met his explosive end and my body had finally stopped screaming in my ear about how much pain it was in. That made for a great wake-up call, feeling my pillow instead of varied and sundry tortures. I afforded myself some decent clothes, even if they did show off almost as much bruising as they did cleavage, and went out to greet the day.
Again, things were looking up. Nick was practically on my doorstep, wrapped only in a white towel. While he apartment-hunted, he used the church as a homebase. If only it would get Ivy off my back; she was still as fixated on me as ever. I was tempted to ask Nick to wear her underwear. But it’s only fun and games until someone loses a throat.
“Oh, hello there Rachel. Feeling any better?”
“Yeah, actually I am.” But not as much as I would if you lost the towel. “Ready to go on the prowl again?”
I’d been helping Nick with his search for an apartment. Like my mother always said, you can tell a lot from a guy by where he chose to live. Besides, if I was going to maybe-possibly spend some time in the bedroom, I might as well pick it out.
But before I could get comfy in that happy place, Nick jerked me down to Cincinnati. Nasty habit of his. “Random question I know, but are you sure you and Ivy aren’t together in any way? Casual drinking or something?”
“No!”
“You just have this real couple-y vibe,” he said defensively.
“We don’t have a couple-y anything! We’re just partners! And I accidentally flirted with her some!”
“How do you accidentally flirt with someone?”
“I know! Freaking vamps,” I muttered the last part. On some level, I still wanted to present a unified front with Ivy against the human outsider.
“I’m sorry. I just thought maybe you were in the closet. But hey, if I can handle you being a witch and her being Vampirella, lesbianism is no problem.”
“Don’t call her that.”
“What?”
“Vampirella. Dracula. They’re hate words.”
“I-I didn’t know.”
I pushed past him, no longer in much of a mood to know what was under his towel. “No one does. They all think they’re so funny. You know how many times I’ve been called Elphaba?”
“Okay, I got it, chill! You’re not an Elphaba or a lesbian or a mink anymore.”
Somehow, that got a smile out of me. “What made you think I was in the closet anyway, anyway?”
“Nothing. I just heard Ivy and jinkies—“
“Jenks.”
“Jenks talking about how you breathed.”
“Don’t tell me I have garlic breath.”
“No, not how your breath smelled, more like how it sounded.”
“Sounded?” My blood ran cold, then boiled over right quick. “Wait here. Keep your shirt off.”
Had Ivy been in my room again? Emergency B&E was one thing, but the thought of her spending any significant time watching me sleep ignited a sticky warmth that gripped my insides. Wait, that wasn’t right. Crawl, skin, crawl!
Great. I was getting used to vampiric voyeurism.
I forced myself to calm down before going into the kitchen. To a vampire, strong emotions bled (har har) into each other. Love, fear, anger… to a vamp, it all read ‘come and get it!’ So I burst into the kitchen to read Ivy the riot act, but very calmly and rationally.
Ivy was back to normal. In her immaculate black silk robe with red lining, she looked like she’d stepped off the cover of Amerasians In Sleepwear, the Vamp Issue. Whereas I, who had only dressed and showered and put on the best make-up no money could buy, looked like the Before to Ivy’s After. Call now for a free sample of the vamp virus. All it costs is your immortal soul. Operators are standing by.
“Oh, good, you’re up,” she said with that judgmental trill in her voice that meant ‘finally.’ I’d returned the last three alarm clocks she’d bought me unopened. Now that I’d left IS, I intended to keep my own hours in all senses. “I made waffles.”
Blueberry. My favorite. I tried to stay mad at her through the delicious aroma. It wasn’t easy. Maybe next time I needed to win an argument with her, I should open a vein.
Nuh-uh, Rachel Mariana Morgan, you are not joking about getting bit, not even to yourself.
“Thanks, Ivy.” I sat down and let her serve me, milking my injuries for all they were worth. She did everything but hand-feed me. I just hoped she wasn’t slipping me something to sweeten my O-negative.
“How’s it taste?”
“Just like mom used to make.” I refrained from stuffing my face with syrupy goodness to ask “Hey, how well can vamps hear?”
”Why do you ask?”
“Just curious. I know talking about bloodlines,” and hence breeding, I suddenly realized. Duh, Rachel, duh! “gets you hot and bothered, but ears are safe, right?”
Ivy stood up, impossibly, a little straighter with my interest in her. “Dead vampires can use echolocation for hundreds, even thousands of yards.”
That would explain the ears, I guessed.
“Living vamps… we mainly hear howls and blood. I could decipher a Were’s call from miles away.”
“And blood?” I asked, curious despite myself. One of these days I was going to have to work on the death-wish I obviously had.
“I can hear your blood calling to me like you would hear a babbling mountain spring. It’s just the right viscosity, no thickening or excess calories, and it’s flowing as smooth. As. Silk.” She licked some spilled syrup off her finger. Once I’d promised myself that if she ever sent a panty-melter like that my way again, I’d run for the hills. That seemed like a million years ago.
I drank some milk to cover for my dry mouth. “So you could hear me, even if I was in another room?”
“I don’t eavesdrop.” She wasn’t affronted, just amused.
Okay, Elvira, try this on for size. “What if I wasn’t talking? What if I was just… breathing?”
I think that rattled her, but I wasn’t sure.
“Breathing heavily? Panting?” She couldn’t help herself. “Moaning.”
I shot up. “You’ve been listening to me sleep! And other things!”
Realizing how in the doghouse she was, Ivy resorted to her humanity. “It’s not my fault. If someone were playing music in the next room, could you help…”
“You did not just compare my snoring to music.”
“It sounds like music to me,” Ivy said plaintively. That was enough for me to start feeling guilty on a truly Catholic scale. She waited on me hand and foot and this was how I thanked her? But how else was I supposed to thank her? A mug full of my blood with little marshmallows in it?
I stood up, knowing the drama of my exit was being spoiled by my desire to stay with my waffles. “I can’t deal with this. You’re always finding some new way to pretend we’re lovers. We’re not.”
“Yet.”
I let out a short scream of frustration and left before she offered to let me spank her or whatever.
***
Out in the garden, I watched Jenks’ kids hunt aphids. They were cute little tykes. If you saw them, I doubt you’d believe they were also trained warriors. Hellfire. Between shape-shifting demon Ivy who still had a starring role in my – was there such a thing as wet nightmares? – and Kalamack, I would give anything for a properly uggo villain. I like my Phantom of the Opera with a skull instead of a hottie scar, thank you very much.
I sat down on a lawn chair and let the sun warm me up. I couldn’t keep playing defense with Ivy. I knew vamps, they got off on being the big bad sex predators. Show them some cojones and it was like ripping off Captain Kirk’s girdle. Time for some saber-rattling. I went to my room and dug out the blood kit I used for the really heavy-duty blood magic. Nothing too complex; just a tourniquet, a couple hundred clean needles, and some Oreos for that all-important blood sugar. I had brought a tall glass of milk and convinced myself the calories didn’t count if it was spellwork-related. A few minutes later I had enough blood in the bag to make me woozy. I powered through the package of Oreos, keeping good and mad at stupid sexy Ivy.
And Vampiric Charms? What kind of name was that? If it weren’t for her, me and Jenks could have a serious name like… Pixie Charms.
Shut up.
I picked up my plasma and went to show Ivy what was what.
***
Ivy was eating my waffles. As if I wasn’t angry enough. She had a selection of potential business cards spread out in front of her like a Tarot reading. One of them had a chibi Dracula on the front to go with the kawai witch on the back. I thought it was cute, but Ivy was slowly ripping it apart between bites.
I slapped my donation to the blood bank down on the table. Her eyes went as wide as a 12-year-old boy who’d just been given a year’s subscription to Playboy by Angelina Jolie.
“What’s that?” she asked, voice thick.
“Blood. So you can know what I taste like.” I smiled at her duress. “You know, satisfy your bicuriosity.”
“I’m a nonpracticing vampire. Rachel, you know that.”
“C’mon. Unlive a little.” Fangteasing Ivy had a certain scab-teasing satisfaction to it. “I was thinking of you when I drew it.”
Ivy snatched it up and stuffed it down into her cleavage, next to her barely beating heart. “Milked.” She trembled. “The proper terminology is ‘milked’.” She looked up at me with dark eyes. “You might want to leave. And take your boyfriend with you.”
***
Nick and I surveyed three apartments before he had to check out to a job interview. I wished him good luck and called Ivy, wondering if it was prudent to come home yet. All I got was our answering machine. We did sound kinda… couple-y. I’d have to change it.
Maybe taunting Ivy like that hadn’t been the best idea. I just wanted things to go back to normal. Back at IS, I never had to worry about my partner doing ingenious things with strategically-placed fangs. But then, we hadn’t exactly been friends.
So I valued her friendship – easy enough when she had saved my life even more times than she had put it in jeopardy. And it wasn’t like I wasn’t used to friends who wouldn’t mind being more than. Hell, I’d known enough Weres to even be used to the possibility that a friend could rip my throat out; nothing personal. So what was it about Ivy that sounded my red alert?
Maybe it was that she kept insisting for unrequited feelings weren’t so unrequited. Which was ridiculous. I had a boyfriend. Sort of. Even if I had only known him a few days, counting time spent as rodents. And yet I was thinking of moving in with him.
Couldn’t be gay panic, since I wasn’t gay. I’d had boyfriends! Boyfriend. A friend who was a boy. It was just that, with them, I’d never felt that exhilarating, heart-stopping, yes, scary feeling I got with Ivy. I kept telling myself that my little provocations of Ivy were accidents, but what if they were my subconscious playing matchmaker? I’d been a runner for years; surely, somewhere I knew that the way to a vamp’s heart was through their nostrils: and yet, I was a total scent ho.
OK, not having this conversation even with myself. Just because Ivy had tapped into a morsel of bicuriosity did not make me a vamp chewtoy. I went back home, blissfully unaware that Ivy had kicked out the pix and drawn all the curtains. “Hope you enjoyed the sampler, Ivy, cuz that’s the last taste you’ll get!”
Ivy’s moan echoed through the empty church. “Rachel? You’re hoooome…”
And just like that, I was back to being creeped out and possibly aroused. Nevertheless, I went up to our rooms. If I backed down now, I would never live it down.
The door to Ivy’s room was cracked open, little sighs and almost-pained moans pouring out. I took one step, one heartbeat, and the door tore off its hinges. Ivy spilled out of the doorway, twirling along the wall like a blonde who’d had too much to drink. She was wearing my robe. And nothing else.
I could tell because the belt wasn’t done up. To seduce or because she didn’t presently have the facilities to tie it? The robe fell open some more and I saw my blood, slick down her breasts and soft stomach and lower, all the way down. Ivy absently rubbed some into her cleavage. So I wasn’t just lunch, I was an exfoliate.
“Rachel, you’re home,” she drawled. Her eyes, black as they were, looked more glazed than feral. Maybe it was the dopey, toothy grin saying ‘how you doin’?’ to me.
“Are you high?”
“High on life!” she giggled. “You taste greeeeeat, by the way. My compliments to the chef!” She slapped my hip. “What your momma gave you, yeah!”
“This isn’t funny, Ivy. Vamps don’t get high from drinking blood, I know that!”
“As a rule, sure. But when they’ve done without for a very long time… and when it’s your blood, pretty mama…” She howled.
Great. Good one, Morgan. You’ve turned your friend into both Cheech and Chong. “Okay, Ivy, time to go beddy-bye. You need to sleep this off.”
“Sleep it off!?” She drew my robe around her in a huff. That was better. I was starting to dwell on what little difference there was between yucky blood and sexy sexy body paint. “But I haven’t given you your present?”
“My present…?” Oh, right. “I’m sure it can wait until you wake up.”
“Oh, no, it can’t wait. You’re in pain.” She nodded to herself. “I can’t let you be in pain. You’re my best friend!” And suddenly she was pressed up against me, nipples-touching close, to whisper in my ear. “Plus, you give me stuff to think about while I schlick.”
“Schlick?” Saying it out loud gave me the idea. “I don’t wanna know that!”
“Yes you do. Wait!” She held up a finger. “Did you know, Rachel, that vampire saliva contains a painkiller?”
“Oh?”
“How else could we get people to keep being bitten by us? See, watch…”
Before I could stop her, she had grabbed my arm, pulled my sleeve up to my elbow, and started licking at a very purple bruise. Ivy’s tongue was at the same time deep as an Asian massage and as teasing as a light caress, promising the hardened penetration of her fangs.
“Okay, Ivy, I don’t need that. I have a pain amulet. I’m fine.” I ignored the throbbing between my thighs that was insisting, surprisingly emphatically, that I did need it. Oh, how I ever needed it.
She pouted. “Is it because it’s spit?”
“Maybe a little.”
“I keep my mouth very clean. Floss every night.”
“I’m sure you do. C’mon, Ivy, there’s a soft bed calling your name.”
“Will you sleep with me?”
“Yes,” I bluffed.
She grabbed my hand and dragged me at Barry Allen speed to her bedroom, where I tumbled onto her bed. My arm felt like it had been torn out of the socket. As I massaged it, she raised a hand to her mouth.
“Oh no! I didn’t mean to--!”
“That’s okay,” I groaned, standing up.
“No, it’s not okay!” She pushed me back down. “I’m a very bad vamp. First I drank blood, then I hurt you. I hate hurting you. I like making you feel good.”
“You do!” I assured her, probably not the wisest of moves. She had ripped my top open, letting cool air touch everything from my armpit to my bra strap, so she could tongue-massage my bruised shoulder. “Ivy, wait…”
“Sleep with me, Rachel.” She licked at my cut-up face, all the little nicks and scratches that only hurt when I laughed. “You love sleeping with people. Sleep with me.”
What the hell had I gotten myself into? “Okay, but only if you promise to go right to sleep.”
“Will you hold me?”
What. The HELL. Had I gotten myself into? Get smarter, Rachel, anytime now. “Sure. Why not.”
Squealing with excitement, she buried her face in my cleavage. I pushed her back, turned her around, and maneuvered us into a PG-13 sorta spooning. She scooted back until we were married from crotch to chin, the smell of her hair wafting into my nose. I kicked off my shoes and pulled the sheets over us. It was going to be a long night.
***
“Ivy? Ivy? Ivy, you’re drooling on my arm.”
Ivy woke up slowly, rolling over and yawning explosively. I regained the use of my arms.
“Sleep well?” I asked bitterly.
“Very well, thank you.” She gave me what I was starting to think of as her Vampyros Lesbos look. “You’re an excellent pillow.”
“Gee, thanks.” I did a quick check of my hair in Ivy’s antique mirror. Sleeping with a handsy vamp had done it no favors. “At least tell me you drank all that blood. I don’t want to do this again.”
She smiled at me, crossing her arms. “Actually, I poured it down the drain.”
“You…” I blinked. Three full seconds. “What?”
“I’m a nonpracticing vamp, Rachel. No exceptions. If and when I do start drinking again, it’ll be for a lot more than drinking out of a vial.”
“Then you weren’t high.”
Her smile was very white. “No.”
“That was all an act!?”
“Considering what could have come from tempting an addict, I’d say you got off light.”
Hearing my own thoughts parroted back to me was no good. I wanted to be mad, damnit, I wanted righteous fury! Instead, I’d gotten my own medicine. Stupid vamps. Stupid Ivy. Stupid me.
She sauntered closer to me, smug as hell. Had I enjoyed it? Maybe. I liked warm bodies and Ivy was a lot more… snuggly… than most of the hardbodies I’d spent the night with. Smelled better too. And she knew that I liked it. And I knew that she knew that I liked it.
“My offer still stands.” Huh? She licked her lips, clarifying. Oh. “Works much better than a pain amulet.”
“I’ll manage.” I pushed past her, trying for a body-check. I might as well have shouldered concrete. “All your flirting and you pass up a pint of my blood, no strings attached? I’m insulted,” I said as I headed out the door, never looking at her…
…until she called my name. “Rachel.” I turned around. My blood had dried on her, all over that perfect chest and silky smooth abdomen. So she had allowed herself a little leaning off the wagon. “When I start drinking again, I’ll be getting your blood warm and fresh from the source.”
“Never going to happen,” I said confidently, trying to ignore the tingle deep inside me.
“And I suppose you’ll never sleep with me either?” Her robe hung open as she slunk closer to me. “We are who we are. I’m a vampire. You’re a lesbian. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
“Says the nonpracticing vamp.”
“Some people don’t believe in sex before marriage. I’m the same way. I’ve seen what indiscriminate drinking can do. I don’t want that. I want you. When the time comes, I’ll show you how beautiful drinking blood and making love can be. And it’ll be your choice.” Her lips parted inches from mine. Even though I couldn’t look away from her jet-black eyes, I knew her fangs were gleaming. “Once you get away from these bullshit fears you have, you’ll feel like a new woman. And I’ll be there every step of the way, showing you pleasures no one else can, molding you into a stronger woman, worshipping you as you deserve to be worshipped…”
She backed away, the whites returning to her eyes as she closed up her robe. “But you have to ask first.”
I desperately tried to work saliva from my dry throat. With nothing to say to that, I left. Damn vamps.
I wondered how long Ivy would keep romancing me. I wondered how long I could resist.
Fandom: The Hollows
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3,431
Characters/Pairings: Rachel/Ivy, mention of Rachel/Nick
Timeline: Takes place after Dead Witch Walking.
Summary: Fed up with Ivy’s flirting, Rachel gives Ivy a vial of her own blood. It didn’t work out well for Angelina Jolie either.
It’d been a few days since Francis had met his explosive end and my body had finally stopped screaming in my ear about how much pain it was in. That made for a great wake-up call, feeling my pillow instead of varied and sundry tortures. I afforded myself some decent clothes, even if they did show off almost as much bruising as they did cleavage, and went out to greet the day.
Again, things were looking up. Nick was practically on my doorstep, wrapped only in a white towel. While he apartment-hunted, he used the church as a homebase. If only it would get Ivy off my back; she was still as fixated on me as ever. I was tempted to ask Nick to wear her underwear. But it’s only fun and games until someone loses a throat.
“Oh, hello there Rachel. Feeling any better?”
“Yeah, actually I am.” But not as much as I would if you lost the towel. “Ready to go on the prowl again?”
I’d been helping Nick with his search for an apartment. Like my mother always said, you can tell a lot from a guy by where he chose to live. Besides, if I was going to maybe-possibly spend some time in the bedroom, I might as well pick it out.
But before I could get comfy in that happy place, Nick jerked me down to Cincinnati. Nasty habit of his. “Random question I know, but are you sure you and Ivy aren’t together in any way? Casual drinking or something?”
“No!”
“You just have this real couple-y vibe,” he said defensively.
“We don’t have a couple-y anything! We’re just partners! And I accidentally flirted with her some!”
“How do you accidentally flirt with someone?”
“I know! Freaking vamps,” I muttered the last part. On some level, I still wanted to present a unified front with Ivy against the human outsider.
“I’m sorry. I just thought maybe you were in the closet. But hey, if I can handle you being a witch and her being Vampirella, lesbianism is no problem.”
“Don’t call her that.”
“What?”
“Vampirella. Dracula. They’re hate words.”
“I-I didn’t know.”
I pushed past him, no longer in much of a mood to know what was under his towel. “No one does. They all think they’re so funny. You know how many times I’ve been called Elphaba?”
“Okay, I got it, chill! You’re not an Elphaba or a lesbian or a mink anymore.”
Somehow, that got a smile out of me. “What made you think I was in the closet anyway, anyway?”
“Nothing. I just heard Ivy and jinkies—“
“Jenks.”
“Jenks talking about how you breathed.”
“Don’t tell me I have garlic breath.”
“No, not how your breath smelled, more like how it sounded.”
“Sounded?” My blood ran cold, then boiled over right quick. “Wait here. Keep your shirt off.”
Had Ivy been in my room again? Emergency B&E was one thing, but the thought of her spending any significant time watching me sleep ignited a sticky warmth that gripped my insides. Wait, that wasn’t right. Crawl, skin, crawl!
Great. I was getting used to vampiric voyeurism.
I forced myself to calm down before going into the kitchen. To a vampire, strong emotions bled (har har) into each other. Love, fear, anger… to a vamp, it all read ‘come and get it!’ So I burst into the kitchen to read Ivy the riot act, but very calmly and rationally.
Ivy was back to normal. In her immaculate black silk robe with red lining, she looked like she’d stepped off the cover of Amerasians In Sleepwear, the Vamp Issue. Whereas I, who had only dressed and showered and put on the best make-up no money could buy, looked like the Before to Ivy’s After. Call now for a free sample of the vamp virus. All it costs is your immortal soul. Operators are standing by.
“Oh, good, you’re up,” she said with that judgmental trill in her voice that meant ‘finally.’ I’d returned the last three alarm clocks she’d bought me unopened. Now that I’d left IS, I intended to keep my own hours in all senses. “I made waffles.”
Blueberry. My favorite. I tried to stay mad at her through the delicious aroma. It wasn’t easy. Maybe next time I needed to win an argument with her, I should open a vein.
Nuh-uh, Rachel Mariana Morgan, you are not joking about getting bit, not even to yourself.
“Thanks, Ivy.” I sat down and let her serve me, milking my injuries for all they were worth. She did everything but hand-feed me. I just hoped she wasn’t slipping me something to sweeten my O-negative.
“How’s it taste?”
“Just like mom used to make.” I refrained from stuffing my face with syrupy goodness to ask “Hey, how well can vamps hear?”
”Why do you ask?”
“Just curious. I know talking about bloodlines,” and hence breeding, I suddenly realized. Duh, Rachel, duh! “gets you hot and bothered, but ears are safe, right?”
Ivy stood up, impossibly, a little straighter with my interest in her. “Dead vampires can use echolocation for hundreds, even thousands of yards.”
That would explain the ears, I guessed.
“Living vamps… we mainly hear howls and blood. I could decipher a Were’s call from miles away.”
“And blood?” I asked, curious despite myself. One of these days I was going to have to work on the death-wish I obviously had.
“I can hear your blood calling to me like you would hear a babbling mountain spring. It’s just the right viscosity, no thickening or excess calories, and it’s flowing as smooth. As. Silk.” She licked some spilled syrup off her finger. Once I’d promised myself that if she ever sent a panty-melter like that my way again, I’d run for the hills. That seemed like a million years ago.
I drank some milk to cover for my dry mouth. “So you could hear me, even if I was in another room?”
“I don’t eavesdrop.” She wasn’t affronted, just amused.
Okay, Elvira, try this on for size. “What if I wasn’t talking? What if I was just… breathing?”
I think that rattled her, but I wasn’t sure.
“Breathing heavily? Panting?” She couldn’t help herself. “Moaning.”
I shot up. “You’ve been listening to me sleep! And other things!”
Realizing how in the doghouse she was, Ivy resorted to her humanity. “It’s not my fault. If someone were playing music in the next room, could you help…”
“You did not just compare my snoring to music.”
“It sounds like music to me,” Ivy said plaintively. That was enough for me to start feeling guilty on a truly Catholic scale. She waited on me hand and foot and this was how I thanked her? But how else was I supposed to thank her? A mug full of my blood with little marshmallows in it?
I stood up, knowing the drama of my exit was being spoiled by my desire to stay with my waffles. “I can’t deal with this. You’re always finding some new way to pretend we’re lovers. We’re not.”
“Yet.”
I let out a short scream of frustration and left before she offered to let me spank her or whatever.
***
Out in the garden, I watched Jenks’ kids hunt aphids. They were cute little tykes. If you saw them, I doubt you’d believe they were also trained warriors. Hellfire. Between shape-shifting demon Ivy who still had a starring role in my – was there such a thing as wet nightmares? – and Kalamack, I would give anything for a properly uggo villain. I like my Phantom of the Opera with a skull instead of a hottie scar, thank you very much.
I sat down on a lawn chair and let the sun warm me up. I couldn’t keep playing defense with Ivy. I knew vamps, they got off on being the big bad sex predators. Show them some cojones and it was like ripping off Captain Kirk’s girdle. Time for some saber-rattling. I went to my room and dug out the blood kit I used for the really heavy-duty blood magic. Nothing too complex; just a tourniquet, a couple hundred clean needles, and some Oreos for that all-important blood sugar. I had brought a tall glass of milk and convinced myself the calories didn’t count if it was spellwork-related. A few minutes later I had enough blood in the bag to make me woozy. I powered through the package of Oreos, keeping good and mad at stupid sexy Ivy.
And Vampiric Charms? What kind of name was that? If it weren’t for her, me and Jenks could have a serious name like… Pixie Charms.
Shut up.
I picked up my plasma and went to show Ivy what was what.
***
Ivy was eating my waffles. As if I wasn’t angry enough. She had a selection of potential business cards spread out in front of her like a Tarot reading. One of them had a chibi Dracula on the front to go with the kawai witch on the back. I thought it was cute, but Ivy was slowly ripping it apart between bites.
I slapped my donation to the blood bank down on the table. Her eyes went as wide as a 12-year-old boy who’d just been given a year’s subscription to Playboy by Angelina Jolie.
“What’s that?” she asked, voice thick.
“Blood. So you can know what I taste like.” I smiled at her duress. “You know, satisfy your bicuriosity.”
“I’m a nonpracticing vampire. Rachel, you know that.”
“C’mon. Unlive a little.” Fangteasing Ivy had a certain scab-teasing satisfaction to it. “I was thinking of you when I drew it.”
Ivy snatched it up and stuffed it down into her cleavage, next to her barely beating heart. “Milked.” She trembled. “The proper terminology is ‘milked’.” She looked up at me with dark eyes. “You might want to leave. And take your boyfriend with you.”
***
Nick and I surveyed three apartments before he had to check out to a job interview. I wished him good luck and called Ivy, wondering if it was prudent to come home yet. All I got was our answering machine. We did sound kinda… couple-y. I’d have to change it.
Maybe taunting Ivy like that hadn’t been the best idea. I just wanted things to go back to normal. Back at IS, I never had to worry about my partner doing ingenious things with strategically-placed fangs. But then, we hadn’t exactly been friends.
So I valued her friendship – easy enough when she had saved my life even more times than she had put it in jeopardy. And it wasn’t like I wasn’t used to friends who wouldn’t mind being more than. Hell, I’d known enough Weres to even be used to the possibility that a friend could rip my throat out; nothing personal. So what was it about Ivy that sounded my red alert?
Maybe it was that she kept insisting for unrequited feelings weren’t so unrequited. Which was ridiculous. I had a boyfriend. Sort of. Even if I had only known him a few days, counting time spent as rodents. And yet I was thinking of moving in with him.
Couldn’t be gay panic, since I wasn’t gay. I’d had boyfriends! Boyfriend. A friend who was a boy. It was just that, with them, I’d never felt that exhilarating, heart-stopping, yes, scary feeling I got with Ivy. I kept telling myself that my little provocations of Ivy were accidents, but what if they were my subconscious playing matchmaker? I’d been a runner for years; surely, somewhere I knew that the way to a vamp’s heart was through their nostrils: and yet, I was a total scent ho.
OK, not having this conversation even with myself. Just because Ivy had tapped into a morsel of bicuriosity did not make me a vamp chewtoy. I went back home, blissfully unaware that Ivy had kicked out the pix and drawn all the curtains. “Hope you enjoyed the sampler, Ivy, cuz that’s the last taste you’ll get!”
Ivy’s moan echoed through the empty church. “Rachel? You’re hoooome…”
And just like that, I was back to being creeped out and possibly aroused. Nevertheless, I went up to our rooms. If I backed down now, I would never live it down.
The door to Ivy’s room was cracked open, little sighs and almost-pained moans pouring out. I took one step, one heartbeat, and the door tore off its hinges. Ivy spilled out of the doorway, twirling along the wall like a blonde who’d had too much to drink. She was wearing my robe. And nothing else.
I could tell because the belt wasn’t done up. To seduce or because she didn’t presently have the facilities to tie it? The robe fell open some more and I saw my blood, slick down her breasts and soft stomach and lower, all the way down. Ivy absently rubbed some into her cleavage. So I wasn’t just lunch, I was an exfoliate.
“Rachel, you’re home,” she drawled. Her eyes, black as they were, looked more glazed than feral. Maybe it was the dopey, toothy grin saying ‘how you doin’?’ to me.
“Are you high?”
“High on life!” she giggled. “You taste greeeeeat, by the way. My compliments to the chef!” She slapped my hip. “What your momma gave you, yeah!”
“This isn’t funny, Ivy. Vamps don’t get high from drinking blood, I know that!”
“As a rule, sure. But when they’ve done without for a very long time… and when it’s your blood, pretty mama…” She howled.
Great. Good one, Morgan. You’ve turned your friend into both Cheech and Chong. “Okay, Ivy, time to go beddy-bye. You need to sleep this off.”
“Sleep it off!?” She drew my robe around her in a huff. That was better. I was starting to dwell on what little difference there was between yucky blood and sexy sexy body paint. “But I haven’t given you your present?”
“My present…?” Oh, right. “I’m sure it can wait until you wake up.”
“Oh, no, it can’t wait. You’re in pain.” She nodded to herself. “I can’t let you be in pain. You’re my best friend!” And suddenly she was pressed up against me, nipples-touching close, to whisper in my ear. “Plus, you give me stuff to think about while I schlick.”
“Schlick?” Saying it out loud gave me the idea. “I don’t wanna know that!”
“Yes you do. Wait!” She held up a finger. “Did you know, Rachel, that vampire saliva contains a painkiller?”
“Oh?”
“How else could we get people to keep being bitten by us? See, watch…”
Before I could stop her, she had grabbed my arm, pulled my sleeve up to my elbow, and started licking at a very purple bruise. Ivy’s tongue was at the same time deep as an Asian massage and as teasing as a light caress, promising the hardened penetration of her fangs.
“Okay, Ivy, I don’t need that. I have a pain amulet. I’m fine.” I ignored the throbbing between my thighs that was insisting, surprisingly emphatically, that I did need it. Oh, how I ever needed it.
She pouted. “Is it because it’s spit?”
“Maybe a little.”
“I keep my mouth very clean. Floss every night.”
“I’m sure you do. C’mon, Ivy, there’s a soft bed calling your name.”
“Will you sleep with me?”
“Yes,” I bluffed.
She grabbed my hand and dragged me at Barry Allen speed to her bedroom, where I tumbled onto her bed. My arm felt like it had been torn out of the socket. As I massaged it, she raised a hand to her mouth.
“Oh no! I didn’t mean to--!”
“That’s okay,” I groaned, standing up.
“No, it’s not okay!” She pushed me back down. “I’m a very bad vamp. First I drank blood, then I hurt you. I hate hurting you. I like making you feel good.”
“You do!” I assured her, probably not the wisest of moves. She had ripped my top open, letting cool air touch everything from my armpit to my bra strap, so she could tongue-massage my bruised shoulder. “Ivy, wait…”
“Sleep with me, Rachel.” She licked at my cut-up face, all the little nicks and scratches that only hurt when I laughed. “You love sleeping with people. Sleep with me.”
What the hell had I gotten myself into? “Okay, but only if you promise to go right to sleep.”
“Will you hold me?”
What. The HELL. Had I gotten myself into? Get smarter, Rachel, anytime now. “Sure. Why not.”
Squealing with excitement, she buried her face in my cleavage. I pushed her back, turned her around, and maneuvered us into a PG-13 sorta spooning. She scooted back until we were married from crotch to chin, the smell of her hair wafting into my nose. I kicked off my shoes and pulled the sheets over us. It was going to be a long night.
***
“Ivy? Ivy? Ivy, you’re drooling on my arm.”
Ivy woke up slowly, rolling over and yawning explosively. I regained the use of my arms.
“Sleep well?” I asked bitterly.
“Very well, thank you.” She gave me what I was starting to think of as her Vampyros Lesbos look. “You’re an excellent pillow.”
“Gee, thanks.” I did a quick check of my hair in Ivy’s antique mirror. Sleeping with a handsy vamp had done it no favors. “At least tell me you drank all that blood. I don’t want to do this again.”
She smiled at me, crossing her arms. “Actually, I poured it down the drain.”
“You…” I blinked. Three full seconds. “What?”
“I’m a nonpracticing vamp, Rachel. No exceptions. If and when I do start drinking again, it’ll be for a lot more than drinking out of a vial.”
“Then you weren’t high.”
Her smile was very white. “No.”
“That was all an act!?”
“Considering what could have come from tempting an addict, I’d say you got off light.”
Hearing my own thoughts parroted back to me was no good. I wanted to be mad, damnit, I wanted righteous fury! Instead, I’d gotten my own medicine. Stupid vamps. Stupid Ivy. Stupid me.
She sauntered closer to me, smug as hell. Had I enjoyed it? Maybe. I liked warm bodies and Ivy was a lot more… snuggly… than most of the hardbodies I’d spent the night with. Smelled better too. And she knew that I liked it. And I knew that she knew that I liked it.
“My offer still stands.” Huh? She licked her lips, clarifying. Oh. “Works much better than a pain amulet.”
“I’ll manage.” I pushed past her, trying for a body-check. I might as well have shouldered concrete. “All your flirting and you pass up a pint of my blood, no strings attached? I’m insulted,” I said as I headed out the door, never looking at her…
…until she called my name. “Rachel.” I turned around. My blood had dried on her, all over that perfect chest and silky smooth abdomen. So she had allowed herself a little leaning off the wagon. “When I start drinking again, I’ll be getting your blood warm and fresh from the source.”
“Never going to happen,” I said confidently, trying to ignore the tingle deep inside me.
“And I suppose you’ll never sleep with me either?” Her robe hung open as she slunk closer to me. “We are who we are. I’m a vampire. You’re a lesbian. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
“Says the nonpracticing vamp.”
“Some people don’t believe in sex before marriage. I’m the same way. I’ve seen what indiscriminate drinking can do. I don’t want that. I want you. When the time comes, I’ll show you how beautiful drinking blood and making love can be. And it’ll be your choice.” Her lips parted inches from mine. Even though I couldn’t look away from her jet-black eyes, I knew her fangs were gleaming. “Once you get away from these bullshit fears you have, you’ll feel like a new woman. And I’ll be there every step of the way, showing you pleasures no one else can, molding you into a stronger woman, worshipping you as you deserve to be worshipped…”
She backed away, the whites returning to her eyes as she closed up her robe. “But you have to ask first.”
I desperately tried to work saliva from my dry throat. With nothing to say to that, I left. Damn vamps.
I wondered how long Ivy would keep romancing me. I wondered how long I could resist.