I have an idea. I pierce my finger with my fang, slide a drop of blood onto the glass, and put a drop of the serum on top.
“What are you doing?” Miriam asks.
“He is older and stronger. Therefore the white blood cells should attack the virus in my blood.”
“You can see a virus with that microscope?”
“No. It is not powerful enough, but I am not seeing a change in color of my own blood cells. There should be red and black spots together.” The entire glob of blood on the slide turns a charcoal gray. My blood disintegrated. “Nothing. His blood has no effect on mine. I don’t understand. It should pulverize the virus.”
“Oh God.” Miriam groans. “I think I know the issue.” She gets up and walks over, glaring down at Nice. “I should have known. I should have put the pieces together.”
“What?”
“While we were in Miami, after you had mouth sex with Nice—”
“What?” I bark.
Miriam’s brown eyes go wide. “Did I forget to mention that?”
I glare.
“I’m sorry, okay?” she says. “But you were dying, and I didn’t know I could just force-feed you with my mouth.”
I make a sour face. “So you let Nice do it?”
Her mouth pulls to one side. “Only two bags’ worth.”
Dear gods! I had mouth sex with Nice twice? I feel so dirty.
“I’m really, really sorry,” Miriam says. “I had no clue there was a whole intimate connotation to it.”
“Guys,” Freddy interrupts, “can you work out your feelings later? We have much bigger problems.”
“Sorry. Right.” Miriam shakes her head. “I was about to make a point that Nice took me to the theater, but he spoke like a normal guy with only one accent. He even dressed in a plain suit and didn’t act all crazy.”
This is very strange. “So perhaps he wanted to impress you in some way.”
“No,” she replies. “He said that his whole cuckoo routine was an act to scare other vampires. He said it was the only way to have true power—to make other vampires scared.”
“I am still not understanding.”
“He’s a fake,” she says. “And not just the whole crazy goth psycho person. I think he’s not actually ancient at all. He slipped up during our conversation and said something about being a kid three hundred years ago. I wasn’t really paying attention—I was too worried about you back in the hotel room.”
“But…but that’s not possible,” I say. “Mr. Nice was around long before me.”
“When did you first meet him?” she asks.
“I do not actually recall. It may have been after the Great War.”
“So you don’t know for sure he’s older than that. Hell, maybe he’s not even the original Mr. Nice. Who would know, since all of the older vampires who could identify him are dead? And, if he is older, that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s stronger, Michael. Nice could actually be a tenth-, twentieth-, or fiftieth-generation vampire. It all depends who made him. The point is, Mr. Nice is all smoke and mirrors packaged in a crazy wrapper.”
“But the stories and rumors and…” I scratch the back of my head. “It would explain why the serum isn’t working. He’s not actually more powerful than me. But I saw him, Miriam. I saw him kill Clive.”
She shrugs. “I’m telling you that in addition to being evil and insane, that man is a charlatan. And he probably just got lucky when he killed Clive. He had the element of surprise on his side. I mean, the Keepers killed quite a few first-generation vampires that way. And second and third and so on. Surprise was always their weapon.”
“I did not know that the Keepers killed so many of our kind. I thought they only helped remove those who were a threat, with Clive’s blessing.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know. They had their own objectives, and one was to kill off the powerful vampires. Even you were on my list.”
“I was?”
She nods. “I quit and became a librarian before I could find out who you really were and catch up to you—the Executioner.”
So Stella was not joking when she said I was on Miriam’s kill list. This is a shock. “I don’t know what to say.”
Miriam takes my hand. “I say it means we were always meant to be together. And if it’s as vampire and vampire, I’m okay with that.”
I love this woman. I truly do.
I look over at the machine. I drop her hand and get the needle and the chamber.
“What are you doing?” Freddy asks.
“Yeah. What are you doing?” Miriam says.
“The serum will work. Just not on me.”
“Michael…” Miriam growls.
“You were never meant to be a vampire. Just let me do this for you,” I say, and jam the needle into the vein on my wrist.
“But what about you?” she says.
“Someday I will find a vampire whose blood is stronger, and then I will join you.”
“But I might be sixty or seventy years old.”
I smile. “I will still love you just as I have since the day we met.” I fill the chamber, pop it onto the machine, and hit the on switch. While it’s humming and turning, I go for a clean vial prefilled with plasma from the tiny fridge below the counter. I place the vial in just in time to catch the drops of clear liquid.
Holding the vial, I grab a clean dropper and fill it with precisely one dose. “Open your mouth, Miriam.”
“Michael, are you sure? It means that things will go back to the way they were. You a vampire and me a human.”
I smile. “I do not care. Just as long as we are together.”
Her eyes tear up.
“Take the cure,” I urge.
Miriam walks over and opens her mouth.
Just as I am about to squeeze the rubber bulb at the end of the dropper, I am broadsided. The vial in my hand is snatched away.
I
