I opened my mouth to reply, but no words came out.
He smelled so good, even better than I'd remembered.
"Sav? You look a little strange."
"You smell great." My feet were shuffling me right over to him. Was that a bad thing? It seemed only natural at the moment.
His sleepy, little-boy smile contrasted with the blondish-brown stubble on his cheeks and around his mouth. I wanted to run my hands over it.
"Uh, okay, thanks. Now are you going to free me or what?" He flopped his hands to indicate the handcuffs.
Mmm, yes, I should free him. I could use that scalpel to pick the locks. Then he could get up and wrap his arms around me, and I could stand on tiptoe and lick the blood...
Blood? Oh, yuck. Whoa. Wait. What was I doing this close to him? Only a foot remained between us!
I stumbled backward until my hands found the cinder-block wall. I slid down the wall until my butt met the equally cold cement floor. But he wasn't safe enough yet. I could still crawl over to him. I pressed my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around my shaking limbs.
Oh, crap. I was dangerous to him. This wasn't a dream or a nightmare. This was really me fighting my fully-awake self against the urge to drink Tristan's blood. And I didn't just want to drink a little. I wanted to drain him dry, to take every bit of his energy into me so I could keep him with me forever.
"Did they brainwash you or something?" he muttered, the words coming out more smoothly now. The drugs must be wearing off.
"No. I'm being tested."
"With what, the urge to free me?"
"It's okay. All I have to do is sit here and stay calm. Once the test is over, I'm sure they'll take you home. No one wants another war between the species."
"Species? What are you talking about? What species?"
"Ours. Yours and mine."
He stared at me. "You're making zero sense. Is this about last night?"
"A little, yes. Remember the watchers? They're with this...group. You could call them all one big family." A family of monsters. And I was one of them.
My feet slid forward as if they had a mind of their own. I dragged them back up against me.
"Vampires," he whispered.
I nodded and focused on trying not to breathe through my nose. But the room was small and the scent of his blood was rapidly filling the tiny space.
Whimpering, I pinched my nose shut with one hand, kept the other arm like a chain around my legs and closed my eyes. Ah, better. But pinching my nose shut trapped the smell inside me so that it filled me up, tickling at the insides of my nose and throat.
"Sav, what is going on?" If he'd been rude or angry, I could have ignored him. But I couldn't block out that warm, low voice when it softly pleaded with me.
I had to tell him the truth.
"I'm half vampire." My voice came out flat, as dead as I felt inside, but it couldn't be helped. "My father is an incubus, a demon-vampire hybrid that can drink blood or drain you with a kiss. Apparently I can, too. It's the reason for my eyes changing color and the gaze daze. And why you feel weak after we kiss, and why we're drawn to each other...some sort of built-in suicidal attraction between the species." I looked at him, meeting his gaze, needing him to see the honesty in my next words. "I'm so sorry I didn't tell you before. I...I forgot about the draining-through-a-kiss thing. I thought as long as I never bit you, you'd be safe around me. I should have told you anyway, but I just wanted you to keep liking me."
I expected to find shock and horror in his eyes. Instead, I found...warmth. Caring. Impossible. He should at least be a little bit surprised. How many people heard their girlfriends announce that they were half vampire?
"You already knew, didn't you?" I whispered. "You knew and never told me?"
He flinched. "Emily and I guessed."
"How long?"
"When the bracelet nearly killed you."
"And you knew about the draining-kiss ability, too?"
He nodded.
He'd known for months. Months I'd spent feeling guilty for not telling him. And all that time, while I'd been kissing him, unaware that I was draining him, he'd known...and hadn't cared.
"Are you an idiot?" My arm loosened from around my knees. "How could you keep seeing me? Kissing me?" I rose up on my knees, so furious the cement didn't even hurt. "Do you have some kind of a death wish? Do you want to die?" I was nearly shouting now. And the angrier I became, the more irresistible he smelled.
From the other room came a heightened mixture of fear and the faintest hint of smugness. Oh, crap. I was giving them exactly what they wanted, losing control right before their eyes. Moaning, I pinched my nose shut again. Dad was right, emotions might make me more human, but they also definitely made the bloodlust worse. Calm, I had to stay calm. I sat back down against the wall.
"I didn't say anything because I love you. I didn't want you to run away from me, from us." The sadness in his voice created an echoing ache in my stomach.
He loved me. Even though he knew I was a dangerous monster.
I couldn't decide if I wanted to bite him, slap him or kiss him. "Do you know why we're in here? Why they kidnapped you? Because you are my test. There's a reason why the vampires are the Clann's worst enemy. That blood running down your neck is the ultimate test for me. You're the son of the Clann's most powerful family. They know you're like an addiction for me, the one person I'll crave above all others, even other descendants."
"Well, same here," he growled. "It doesn't matter what you are. Don't you have any idea how much I love you? How much I've always loved you? And I always will, no matter who or what you come from. So what if you take some of my energy when we kiss? Don't you get it? It's worth it to me, just to be with you."
He made craving someone sound romantic, like a symptom of love. The need I felt for his blood right now was anything but romantic. How could it be romantic to want to kill some one? A sharp laugh escaped me. "What we have here isn't love. It's just the monster's drive for survival."
He cursed and jerked at the cuffs, the tendons in his neck standing out. "Damn it, you're not a monster!" The blood dripped a little faster toward the collar of his shirt.
Oh, God. I couldn't do this anymore. His words, his voice and the furious ache within it, were ripping me apart. I couldn't talk to him, love him, want to hold him and want to drain him dry all at the same time. This wasn't love. Love was that sweet glow of warmth I'd always felt for him even when we were little kids. This was bloodlust. And it was threatening to destroy what little humanity I had left.