Nightwolf

He shrugs and pours some vodka into the shaker. “That’s part of the deal when they step in here. Safety isn’t guaranteed. We’re fucking vampires for crying out loud, it’s not a petting zoo.” He gives me another sharp look and starts to shake the shaker. “Besides, you asked me to take care of your mother. The bar was unattended. You want to let your party run dry because you wanted to dance?”

At that I start looking around the room, feeling panicked. “Where is my mother?”

“She went back upstairs,” he says, pouring the drink into a martini glass and sliding it to a vampire dressed as a sad clown. “Here,” he says to him. “On the house, since you had to wait.”

Then before I can say anything, Wolf stalks off, leaving me alone to tend bar.

“Trust me, it’ll never end well,” the sad clown says across from me.

I tear my eyes off Wolf, my heart still thumping awkwardly in my chest, and look at the vampire. “I’m sorry, what?”

The sad vampire clown has a sip of his drink and shrugs. “A human falling for a vampire. It never ends well.”

I blink at him and his drawn teardrops beneath his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He gives me a dry look. “Sure you don’t. I’ve been coming to Dark Eyes for years, honey. Don’t think I don’t see anything.”

I lean across the bar and he manages to keep his eyes off my boobs. “That’s right. You don’t see anything. Wolf and I work together. That’s all.”

“Work together, live together,” the vampire says. “Semantics, really. It’s all about how you act around him. How he acts around you. The eyes tell you so much, don’t you think?”

I straighten up and grab a cloth. “I wouldn’t know. Wolf’s just a friend.”

“Even then, being friends is hard too, isn’t it?”

“So says the sad clown.”

“Pagliacci,” he explains rather indignantly. “I’m Pagliacci. Did you know I was actually at the premiere of the opera in 1892? Milan was so different then.”

“Uh huh,” I say, starting to wipe down the bar. Vampires will talk your ears off about the “old days,” and even more so when you’re their bartender. I feel like one of the reasons Solon likes to have me around is that the vampires really enjoy explaining the past to someone who hasn’t been there. Otherwise it turns into a pissing contest to who did what or saw what during what monumental part in history. I once had to listen for hours to two drunken vampires argue over who Marie Antoinette loved more.

So, I let the sad clown talk about how the opera, and life in general, has changed over the years (for the worse, it’s always for the worse), while my mind wanders over what he said about Wolf.

I’ve heard it before. From Solon, from Wolf, on how vampires and humans can never be in a healthy relationship. I’ve even seen firsthand, fellow humans falling for the vampires that feed on them. But the vampires have a hard time seeing humans as anything other than a food source, and if not, just a species to be tolerated. I’ve never seen a vampire want to be with a human in any way other than that, or a one-night stand. Primal urges are all we’re good for.

And that’s fine. In fact, if Wolf just wanted me for all his primal urges, I wouldn’t complain. I know it would make our friendship hella complicated, but it’s already kind of complicated if sad vampire clowns are telling me it’s all doomed to begin with.

I just think him acting pissy and possessive, like a jealous lover, is probably the most I’m going to get out of him.

I sigh inwardly, then get started on making more drinks for the thirsty crowd.

Chapter 4

Amethyst

I wake up to someone crying.

I lie there for a moment, eyes blinking at the dark room, wondering if perhaps I’m still asleep and this is just a dream that’s overstayed its welcome. Wouldn’t be the first time that realities have bled together in this house.

Especially on Halloween, I think to myself, holding my breath slightly to hear better. Shit always gets weird on Halloween. Samhain. When the veils between the worlds are at their thinnest. So the vampires say, anyway.

I continue to hold my breath, ears straining for the errant sound, though I feel myself being pulled back into sleep. My thoughts drift back to the party, to Wolf, to the way he looked at me, such fire in his gaze. Not just like I was something he wanted to taste, that I was something he wanted to have.

Keep.

Possession.

It makes me wish I had gotten drunk, that I had worked up the courage to do something about it. I could have talked to him somewhere quiet, let out the feelings that do nothing more than churn and churn inside myself, until I’m just this chaotic mess of hormones and unrequited lust.