Poison

“It’s okay, Sophia,” Gin said. “Let him go.”

Then, she turned away, grabbed a knife, and started slicing a tomato. That was all that she did. She didn’t yell or scream at me, and she didn’t give me another wounded look. She just turned around and went about her business like I wasn’t even there, like I didn’t even matter to her or anyone else

She had no right to do that—no fucking right at all. This was my dad’s restaurant, not hers. He was my dad, not hers. But here she was, slowly taking over, taking away, everything that was mine.

That poisonous acid flooded my veins again, burning even hotter than before. I wasn’t going to apologize to her. Not now, not for anything—ever.

I stalked across the floor, opened the door, and left the restaurant without looking back.

* * *

I’d had too much to drink. Or maybe just enough. It was hard to tell. Everything seemed soft and hazy in the dark.

The party had been held in an abandoned building over in Southtown, the part of Ashland that was home to the vampire hookers, pimps, and homeless bums. There’d been lots of loud music, lots of girls, and lots of booze. Everything else was a bit of a blur. Now, I was walking back to the Pork Pit, planning to use my key to let myself into the restaurant so I could sleep in one of the booths for the night. Dad would give me hell in the morning for disobeying him, but going to the party had been worth it.

Getting away from Gin for the night had been worth it.

A group of us had left the abandoned building together, but one by one, my friends had peeled off, going their respective ways, until now, it was just me. I wasn’t too worried, though. I was only about ten blocks from the Pork Pit now. I could make it ten more blocks before I passed out—

One minute, I was stumbling down the street, trying not to trip over the cracks in the sidewalk. The next, I was pinned up against the side of a building by two guys, with another guy standing in front of me, holding out a knife. I still wasn’t too worried, though. Muggings were as common as sunsets in Ashland, especially down here in Southtown.

“Hey, hey,” I said, giving them a crooked smile. “There’s no need to be rough about things. Take my wallet if you want, although I’ve got to warn you, there’s not much in there.”

“Don’t worry, pretty boy,” the guy with the knife said. “We will. And we’ll take your blood too. Every last drop of it.”

He smiled, revealing two dark, tobacco-stained fangs in his mouth. Ah, hell. They were vampires. Hungry ones too, from the way they were eyeing me.

Suddenly, I was extremely worried.

If I’d been sober, I probably could have fought back, broken free from the two vampires who were holding me, and then run like hell. But I wasn’t sober and the third guy had a knife. The odds were not in my favor. Still, I started struggling anyway, but my limbs felt slow and heavy, like I was trying to fight through water. The vampires just laughed at me and tightened their grips. Damn. If I got out of this in one piece, I was never drinking again. Well, not for a month, at the very least.

“Hold him still,” the guy with the knife said.

One of the other vampires forced my head back against the cold brick, exposing my neck. The vampire with the knife licked his lips and leaned forward. I winced, waiting for the pain that I was sure to feel from his vicious bite.

“Uh.”

For some reason, instead of tearing into my neck with his teeth, the vampire let out a low grunt instead and slumped forward, his body pressing against mine.

“Blake?” one of the other vampires said, looking at his buddy. “What the hell are you doing? Quit fucking around. The rest of us want a taste too.”

He reached out and shook Blake, who flopped back and crumpled into a heap on the sidewalk.

“What the hell?” the third guy said.

I wasn’t paying attention to them anymore. Instead, I was looking at the slender figure in front of me—Gin Blanco.

She looked rather ridiculous, standing there in the dark in her baggy jeans and fleece jacket, her hair pulled back into a ponytail, a bloody knife clutched in her right hand and a clean one in her left. I recognized the silverstone knives. They were two that Dad had given her to start practicing with—and she’d just used one of them to save my life.

“Leave him alone,” Gin said in a voice that was as hard as the brick building above our heads.

And suddenly, I saw what Dad did in her—the fierce determination, the strong will, the unwavering loyalty. Even though I’d treated her like shit tonight, like shit every night since Dad had taken her in, Gin had still cared enough to follow me home from the party just to make sure that I got back to the Pork Pit okay.

I knew it as instinctively as I knew that I would never treat her bad again—ever.

The two vampires looked at each other, then at their fallen buddy, and then back at Gin. They let go of me and launched themselves at her. Gin was waiting for them. She knifed the first guy in the chest, driving the blade into his heart. He went down without another sound. But the other guy was quicker than she was. He managed to drive her to the ground and started grappling with her, trying to knock the knives out of her hands. But Gin fought him back just as hard, trying to stab him to death before he took the weapons away from her.

My head a little clearer, I stumbled forward, dug my hands into the vampire’s shirt, and pulled him off her. I forced the guy to my left and rammed his head into the brick wall. He moaned and flailed at me with his arms, so I heaved him back and then shoved him forward. Again and again, until his head was a bloody, pulpy mass of flesh. Then, I let go. He didn’t get back up.

In a minute, it was over. Gin and I stood there, breathing heavy, as the vampires’ bodies cooled at our feet. I looked up and down the street and listened, but I didn’t see or hear anyone. Good. The street being deserted had gotten me into this mess in the first place, and now, it was going to me out of it. Murders were just as common as muggings in Southtown, and I knew that the cops wouldn’t search too hard for the vampires’ killers.

Then, I looked over at Gin, with all sorts of questions in my green eyes.

“I followed you to the party,” she said. “And hid outside until you came out of the building.”

It was close to midnight now, and I’d been at the party for several hours. I couldn’t believe that she’d spent all that time just waiting for me to stumble outside. I certainly wouldn’t have had the patience for that sort of thing—or been thoughtful enough to do it in the first place. Maybe Dad was right about Gin. Maybe he was right about a lot of things.

“Why?”

She frowned, like the answer should be obvious. “Fletcher wouldn’t like it if anything happened to you. And I wouldn’t either.”

And just like that, all the poisonous jealousy that I’d felt toward her vanished. She was trying so hard—to please Dad, to please me. The least that I could do was meet her halfway, especially since she’d just saved my life. Maybe some of Jo-Jo’s Air elemental magic was rubbing off on me, but I had a funny feeling that this wouldn’t be the last time that Gin got me out of a tough spot. I only hoped that I could do the same for her someday.

“Come on, Gin,” I said, holding out my hand to her. “Let’s go home.”

She wiped off her bloody knives on one of the vampire’s shirts and slid them back up the sleeves of her jacket. Gin scrubbed her hands clean too before slipping her left one in mine. Her fingers felt small and warm and strong in my own.

We stepped over the vampires’ bodies, and together, we headed for the Pork Pit.