Drink Me at Fang O'Clock (Girl's Guide to Dating Vampire)

Someday, she would be one of them.

But for now...

Juliette quickened her steps when the hairs on the back of her neck suddenly stood up, and taking a walk to avoid going home started feeling like the worst idea she had in a long, long time. Even though the sun had yet to set, and the streets were still packed with tourists and locals alike, it was already half past six in the evening, and evil preters could already be prowling in the shadows.

Seconds melded into minutes, but instead of fading, her fear only devolved into terror, and Juliette knew if she didn't go somewhere safe soon—-

Nope, nope, nope!

Juliette pushed away all thoughts of dying away and willed herself to stay calm. Relax, Juliette, and don't panic.

She forgot to use the anti-vampire scent-masking spray, which was bad, but what she did have with her was Gaël's gift on her eighteenth birthday: a necklace with a heart-shaped pendant that could actually turn into a silver-coated stake with the touch of a button.

That means you can protect yourself if you have to, she reminded herself valiantly.

But for now, it was still better to look for somewhere safe and crowded, and Juliette quickly looked around...oh thank God!

The familiar sight of a glass complex that towered over smaller buildings was like a beacon of hope, and she broke into a run just as the sun began to set. Hirsche Medical Center was only a block away, but anxiety made Juliette feel like she had miles and miles to cover, and her heart started pounding like it had done so...that day.

Juliette's eyes stung when she finally made it.

Oh, thank God, thank God, thank You, God!

But before she could even catch her breath, the doors of the center suddenly flew open, and out came...her guardian, his handsome face thunderous.

Gaël!

Juliette didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He was the last person she wanted to see right now, but maybe this was the heavens' way of telling her she was better off confronting her problem head on?

"What are you doing here?" Gaël demanded. "Are you ill? Are you hurt?"

Ah, what to say, what to say?

Her guardian raked a hand through his hair. "Well?"

Since she wasn't in the mood to reprimanded for taking a walk all on her own, Juliette then heard herself mumble, "I'm here to ask them to take my sangferia."

Snort.

Gaël stared blankly at his ward. Surely, he couldn't have heard his shy, sweet Juilette say such a thing. Impossible, he told himself, but when he was about to ask Juliette to repeat her words—-

"Do you think it's possible?"

"Possible?" He felt like a fucking idiot for repeating her words, but he simply couldn't believe he had heard her right. Had she really asked him—-

"For them to take my sangferia."

—-that?

Gaël's lips pressed together in a straight line.

Fuck!

He realized all at once that he should have seen this coming, considering what yesterday's class had been all about.

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

It was just like his Juliette to go to the extremes. She was always so damn eager to please him, and he remembered how in the first few months of his guardianship, Juliette would stay up late at night to study Caro cookbooks and wake up early in the day to personally make Gaël's breakfast.

While that side of hers was adorable as hell, Gaël's conscience had been uncomfortable with such treatment, and so he had taken pains to make his ward realize that he was no god for her to worship. It had taken almost an entire year before he had been able to convince Juliette to act less like a slave and more like the pampered ward that she should have been, but even to this day, Juliette continued to look at him with stars in her eyes.

She truly did seem to think he could do no wrong, but what if Jean Luc's words were now coming true? What if one wrong word from him could make his ward change in a snap?

"Let's talk about this privately, shall we?"

Her guardian's curtly spoken words made Juliette belatedly remember where they were, and it was only then that she noticed how the sight of them together had attracted the attention of hospital staff and visitors alike.

"Fang o'clock," she heard a female nurse whisper, and as the latter's friend giggled and blushed upon taking a peek at Gaël, Juliette wanted to do some blushing herself. Fang o'clock was a term coined for Caro-and-human couples, and she couldn't help feeling giddy that other people apparently saw them that way.

But when she glanced at Gaël, her heart sank, and her smile faded. The chiseled edges of his gorgeous face were so much harsher, and she couldn't help but wonder if it was because of how those nurses had described them. Could her guardian dislike the idea of people mistaking her as his girlfriend?