Paul looked at him blankly. “So all this is your blood’s fault? I don’t mind telling you, hermano, that’s fucked up.”
“It was the instant connection I felt when I touched you—the call of the Coeur de Sang.” Laurent gestured with one hand. “I suppose you could say that your blood called to mine and my blood answered in the only way it knew how, by attempting to tie us together permanently.”
“Yeah?” Paul growled. “Well thanks but no fucking thanks. Sorry to disappoint your blood but I’m a free agent and that’s how I want to stay.”
“So you never want another beside you? Never want to share life’s joys and sorrows?” He turned to face the were, looking the other man in the eye. “You wish an empty bed and an empty heart all your life?” Paul met his gaze for a moment and then looked down. Laurent caught a blast of discomfort from him.
“Paul?”
“It’s not that I want that so much as that’s how it has to be for me.”
“Why? Because you cannot allow yourself to look in the direction your heart leads you? To another man instead of to a woman?”
“Don’t start that shit again.” Paul looked irritated. “Stop getting off the subject. Tell me why we have to go see your old nurse. Why can’t we just call her?”
“She doesn’t have a phone or any other connection to the outside world—so says my mother.” Laurent shrugged. “She always was something of a recluse. She had spent much of her mortal life studying my kind and was overjoyed to be offered the position as my nurse in the first place. She devoted her life to me and my family and after her services were no longer needed she went into seclusion. I have only her address and nothing else—my mother does not even know if she still lives or not.”
Paul rolled his eyes. “Great. So we have to go all the way to fucking North Carolina to find your old nurse who might not even be alive.”
“I believe that she is,” Laurent said sincerely. “She was not the type to give up on life, although I can picture her withdrawing into her own world made up of books and legends.”
“Wouldn’t she at least have to go out and, uh, get something to eat?” Paul objected.
Laurent shrugged. “There are ways to get around such things. Arrangements can be made with willing human donors. And one of the advantages of being a made vampire is that she will not need to feed so often as a born vampire, like myself, must.”
Paul frowned. “What about that? Who are you going to snack on during this little trip of ours? Because no offense, ’ mano, but you sure as hell aren’t biting me again. Not after what…what happened last time.”
Laurent gave him a piercing gaze. “If you think the only reason you welcomed my advances was the fact that I was biting you at the time, you are more self-deluded than I believed. Do not worry about me, Paul. The blood I took from you last night will sustain me, at least for tonight, and after that I will find someone else to ‘snack on’ as you put it.”
He didn’t tell the other man that the bond between them would make the blood of any other mortal extremely unpalatable to him, not to mention almost worthless nutritionally. His body was attuned to Paul now—his blood wanted the were, needed him in more ways than one.
It was a problem he would just have to deal with. Once they found Nana she would be able to help them, either by making Paul see that the bond was right or severing it completely so that Laurent could drink from another.
It would be difficult to wait—especially since being so close to Paul had woken his thirst and he was already longing for another taste of the other man. Laurent sighed to himself—well, he would just have to bear the discomfort until they found Nana. How long could the trip to Asheville take, anyway?
*
“Twelve hours? Are you certain?”
Paul couldn’t figure out why the vampire looked so upset. “That’s what Mapquest says. Is that a problem?”
“I was hoping we could get there tonight.” Laurent sighed. “I just can’t believe it takes so long. You can get from Paris to Frankfurt in five or six hours.”
“Well, that’s Europe—we’re more spread out over here.” Paul studied the laptop screen in front of him intently. “Florida is a long-ass state and we’re starting at the very end of it. Then we have to go through Georgia and South Carolina before we even get to North Carolina and anywhere near Asheville.”
“All right, I believe you.” Laurent frowned. “It’s just…longer than I expected.”
“We could fly,” Paul offered. “Last-minute tickets would be pretty expensive though.”
“Yes and I do not have enough cash to cover them. I wouldn’t want to put such a thing on my credit card—it would be too easily traceable.”