The Eternal Kiss: Vampire Tales of Blood and Desire

“Back this way.”

Miranda pulled me to the side of the room. There, behind a blind corner, was the open window through which I’d originally heard the boys partying.

Pennywell knew his chance was slipping away. He sidestepped and lunged, and Michael twisted and caught him in midair. They’d already turned over twice, ripping at each other, before they hit the ground and rolled. I looked back, breathless, terrified for Michael. He was young, and Pennywell was playing for keeps.

On our way to the window, Miranda ducked and picked up something in the shadows. My cell phone. I grabbed it and flipped it open, speed-dialing Shane’s number.

“Yo,” he said. I could hear the jocks pounding on the car. “I hope you’re insured.”

“Now would be a good time for rescue,” I said, and yanked open the window.

“Well, I can either ask real nice if they’ll move the cars, or jump the curb. Which do you want?”

“You’re kidding. I’ve got about ten seconds to live.”

He stopped playing. “Which way?”

“South side of the building. There’s three of us. Shane—”

“Coming,” Shane said, and hung up. I heard the sudden roar of an engine out in the parking lot, and the surprised drunken yells of the jocks as they tumbled off the hood of my car.

I began to shimmy out the window, but an iron grip closed around my left ankle, holding me in place. I looked back to see Mr. Ransom, eyes shining silver.

“I was trying to bring you help,” he said. “Did I do wrong?”

“You know, now’s not really the time—” He didn’t take the hint. Of course. I heard the approaching growl of the car engine. Shane was driving over the grass, tires shredding it on the way. I could hear other engines starting up—the football jocks. I wondered if they had any clue that half their team was doing broken-field running against a vampire right now. I hoped they had a good second string ready to play the next game.

Mr. Ransom wanted an answer. I took a deep breath and forced myself to calm down. “Asking Pennywell probably wasn’t your best idea ever,” I said. “But hey, good effort, okay? Now let go so I’m not the main course!”

“If you’d accepted my offer of Protection, you wouldn’t have to worry,” he pointed out, and turned his gaze on poor Miranda. Before he could blurt out his sales pitch to her—and quite possibly succeed—I backed out of the window, hustled her up, and neatly guided her out just as my big, black sedan slid to a stop three feet away. The back door popped open, and Claire, fairy wings all a-flutter, pulled Miranda inside. It was like a military operation, only with one hundred percent less camouflage.

Mr. Ransom looked wounded at my initiative, but he shrugged and let me go. “Michael!” I yelled. He was down, blood on his face. Pennywell had the upper hand, and as Mr. Ransom turned away, he lunged for me.

Michael grabbed the vampire’s knees and held on like a bulldog as Pennywell tried to get to me.

“Stake me!” I yelled to Shane, who rolled down the window and tossed me an iron spike.

A silver-coated iron railroad spike, that is. Shane had electroplated it himself, using a fishtank, a car battery, and some chemicals. As weapons went, it was heavy duty and multi-purpose. As Mr. Pennywell ripped himself loose from Michael’s grasp, he turned right into me. I smacked him upside the head with the blunt end of the silver spike.

Where the silver touched, he burned. Pennywell howled, rolled, and scrambled away from me as I reversed my hold on the spike so the sharper end faced him. I released the catch on my whip with my left hand and unrolled it with a snap of my wrist.

“Wanna try again?” I asked, and gave him a full-toothed smile. “Nobody touches up my boyfriend, you jerk. Or tries to bite me.”

He did one of those scary open-mouthed snarls, the kind that made him look all teeth and eyes. But I’d seen that movie. I glared right back. “Michael?” I asked. He rolled to his feet, wiping blood from his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt. Like me, he didn’t take his eyes off Pennywell. “All in one piece?”

“Sure,” he said, and cast a very quick glance at me. “Damn, Eve. Hot.”

“What? The whip?”

“You.”

I felt a bubble of joy burst inside. “Out the window, you silver-tongued devil,” I told Michael. “Shane’s wasting gas.” He was. He was revving the engine, apparently trying to bring a sense of drama to the occasion.

Michael didn’t you first me, mainly because I had a big silver stake and I obviously wasn’t afraid to use it. He slipped past me, only getting a little handsy, and was out the window and dropping lightly on the grass in about two seconds flat.

Leaving me facing Pennywell. All of a sudden, the stake didn’t seem all that intimidating.

Mr. Ransom wandered in between the two of us, as if he’d just forgotten we were there. “Leave,” he told me. “Hurry.”

I quickly tossed my whip through the window, grabbed the frame with my free hand, and swung out into the cool night air. Michael grabbed me by the waist and set me down, light as a feather, safe in the circle of his arms. I squeaked and made sure to keep the silver stake far away from him. It had hurt Pennywell, and it’d hurt Michael a whole lot worse.

“I’ll take it,” Shane said. He shoved the spike back under the driver’s seat. “Well? Are you two just going to make out or what?”

Not that we weren’t tempted, but Michael hustled me into the car, slammed the door, and Shane hit the gas. We fishtailed in the grass for a few seconds, spinning tires, and then he got traction and the big car zoomed forward in a long arc around the field house, heading back toward the parking lot. Oncoming jocks dodged out of the way.

Pennywell showed up in our headlights about five seconds later, and he didn’t move.

“Don’t stop!” Michael said, and Shane threw him a harassed look in the rearview.

“Yeah, not my first night in Morganville,” he said. “No shit.” He pressed the accelerator instead. Pennywell dodged aside at the last minute, a matador with a bull, and when I looked back he was standing in the parking lot, watching us leave. I didn’t blink, and I watched until he turned his back on us and went after someone else.

I didn’t want to watch, after that.

We’d only gone about halfway home when Michael said, raggedly, “Stop the car.”

“Not happening,” Shane said. We were still in a not-great part of town, all too frequently used by unsavory characters, including vamps.

Michael just opened the door and threatened to bail. That made Shane hit the brakes, and the car shuddered and skidded to a stop under a streetlight. Michael stumbled away and put his hands flat on the brick of a boarded-up building. I could see him shuddering.

“Michael, get in the car!” I called. “Come on, it’s not far! You can make it!”

“Can’t.” He stepped back, and I realized his eyes were that same scary hell-red as Pennywell’s. “Too hungry. I’m running out of time.” And so were we, because Pennywell could easily catch up to us, if he knew we’d stopped.

“We really don’t have time for this,” Shane said. “Michael, I’ll drop you at the blood bank. Get in.”

He shook his head. “I’ll walk.”

Oh, the hell he would. Not like this.

I got out of the car and stepped up to him. “Can you stop?” I asked him. He blinked. “If I tell you to stop, will you stop?”

“Eve—”

“Don’t even start with all the angst. You need it; I have it. I just need to know you can stop.”

His fangs came out, flipping down like a snake’s, and for a second, I was sure this was a really, really bad idea. Then he said, “Yes. I can stop.”

“You’d better.”

“I—” He didn’t seem to know what to say. I was afraid he’d think of something, something good, and I’d chicken right out.

“Just do it,” I whispered. “Before I change my mind, okay?”

Shane was saying something, and it sounded like he wasn’t a fan of my solution, but we were all out of time, and anyway it was too late. Michael took my wrist, and with one slice of his fangs, opened the vein. It didn’t hurt,