My Shadow, My Vampire

Chapter Four

I almost run smack into Silas in my hurry to get in our door. He reels back when he sees me, eyes wide. "Sev! Fuck!" I laugh at his belated reaction, and then again at the big bear-hug he gives me. "Thank god," he says, letting me go and taking a few steps backward, an assessing gaze sweeping over me to make sure I'm okay. "We were worried as hell. I've been beating myself up, I shouldn't have let you stay there in the storm by yourself—you're the type to get hit by lightning out there or something. Shai said no way because you'd still—but anyway, where the fuck have you been?"

"Not anywhere that fed me very much," I reply wearily, collapsing happily onto our familiar couch. I realized the moment I left Rhett's home that the little I had eaten was hardly enough. Silas, hit with inspiration, is backpedaling into the kitchen in an instant. My stomach growls in anticipation as I listen to him crash around the kitchen.

"Care to elaborate?" He shouts over at me.

"I met a boy," I reply with a sigh, leaving my explanation in that sorely lacking place until there's a warm bowl of homemade chicken soup steaming before me. A bag of gummy bears is deposited next to it.

I'm halfway through the gummy bears when Shai crashes through the door, slightly out of breath. "Sev!" She pulls me into a hug and then slaps me lightly on the knee. "You still have your phone on you and—" she turns it on— "and it still has battery. So that must mean you don't love me anymore."

"Never," I reply, guilt twisting in my stomach. "And I wasn't really gone for that long."

"She met a boy," Silas supplies helpfully from his spot on the floor beside me. He's just started up a new video game on the TV, letting me mindlessly watch him play while I eat.

"Ooooh, exciting. And about damn time. I love having a new ass to beat," Shai says, grinning. "Though I'll confess I didn't see anyone on the field before that storm."

"Because you're so known for paying close attention to men in general," I drawl.

"Point taken. They're mostly only fascinating when I get to be mad at them for something. So why do you look like you just wrestled a bear? My dad goes hunting sometimes, you know. I could probably borrow his gun..."

"No need, but much appreciated," I say, thinking about a confrontation between Shai and Rhett. I genuinely can't figure out who would win. "It was over almost as soon as it began. I'm not usually impulsive, but when I am..."

"Yeah, we know." Shai and Silas smile together.

Silas chuckles at a thought. "Remember that night in Miami? It was right after someone's twentieth—Shai's, right? And—"

"Yes, I remember," I growl, cutting him off with a laugh of my own. I turn to Shai. "And the girl...?"

Shai shrugs. "A good time I doubt I'll have again."

"Picky ladies," Silas mutters. They smack him, lightly, together.

And that's the extent we talk about it. Silas and Shai have never been particularly nosy—it's one of the things I adore about them—and I go about gathering myself for work tomorrow. While I know that I could get a day or even a week off no problem if I needed it, I find myself looking forward to the routine, and the safe, regulated environment of The Parlor. Hell, I've spent as much time in that restaurant over the past few years as I have in my own apartment.

The next morning, I find my mind unable to entirely banish the memories of last night. I can still taste him in my mouth, and—thanks to the lingering feeling of last night's dreams—I haven't forgotten what he feels like inside me, either. My mind whispers: What if I walk to work and a shadow that smells like copper and wood follows my footsteps?