Vampire at 14 Penrose Lane (re-write)

8. Feeding Haze

CHAPTER 8

Darting my eyes at him, I scrunch my nose. There's a risky undertone in his words that spikes an edge of danger. His eyes glimpsing uncertainty — a flicker that's dicey. "Why would you say that?"

He doesn't answer me, but stops walking. "We're here," he sighs. "You're home safely."

Glancing to my left, I see my pale-yellow front door. I haven't even realized we made it home already. I walk to the door with Nikolai following me with my every step. Keeping a decent distance between us. He fulfilled his side of the bargain. Now it's my turn. Opening the door, I enter my home and abruptly spin around, bumping into his hard chest that knocks me off my feet slightly.

Nikolai's fingers grip my hips to steady me as he walks past my door. My breath hitches and after the electric tickles grace my skin at his icy touch, I crease my brows. "Aren't I'm supposed to invite you, again?"

He shakes his head; his face hiding a smirk. "No, once is enough. The invite sticks."

The one defence I thought is the safest is just ripped away from me. "Oh." I flinch.

Nikolai takes a deep breath. Odd, I thought vampires can't breathe? "You can dis-invite a vampire if he is no longer welcome into your home, Isla," he says. "You just have to say, 'I withdraw my invitation into my home' and he will leave directly."

I nod faintly. "Funny enough, I didn't know that." Clearly, today was Vampire 101 lessons. I didn't realize there is so much more to learn about them. Biting? Venom? Invitations? What's next? I shudder at the thought.

Nikolai moves slowly around the living room with an effortless glide. His presence was commanding as he clasped his hands behind his back. He studies the pictures on the wall. Frames big and small filled with smiling and happy faces of my parents, grandparents and great grandmother, my brother, and me. From vacations, Christmas and Thanksgiving holidays to high school days and chess competitions.

"You captured many memories," he says with interest, gazing up close at a picture of me as a teenager. My cheeks and the front of my dungaree smudged with clay as I laughed at my attempt at being a pottery master. "Happy memories." He glances at me. I can't help but feel warmth from his gaze.

It burns me.

"Yeah, it was good times with my family," I admit softly with a sad heart, moving closer to the wall, standing behind him. My eyes avoiding my parents' pictures.

What would they have said, having a vampire welcomed in my home?

I move away, trying to shake the guilt away.

Nikolai points at a picture of a young man dressed in a muscle white vest and blue faded jeans with a big cocky smirk, posing with a baseball bat. "Who's that?"

I roll my eyes. "That's my idiot brother," I say. "He's just 18 months younger than me and thinks he's God's gift to women." I shake my head with an affectionate smile.

Nikolai huffs out a chuckle. "Seems like an interesting character."

"He's always been popular. The cool one between us. Our hometown's baseball star that every cheerleader drooled over." I sigh. "He lives in Indiana."

"Are your parents there as well?" he asks and moves his gaze to the picture of my family and me fishing on a boat.

My body clenches up. My brain shuts down. And the familiar sick feeling in my stomach returns at the terrible thought. "No, er... they died five years ago," I say with a bitter tone, staring at my parents' picture. Good times with them I'll never have again! "All that I have is my brother now."

Suddenly, old wounds emerge. Rising to the surface.

Nikolai turns his attention to me. His eyes studying me. Watching me with an impenetrable, unreadable gaze. But something is there. I see it... a trigger of my own hurt. "I'm sorry to hear that," he says. But he doesn't ask how they died. Good, I didn't want to tell him it's because of them.

I amble away from the wall towards the couch. Nikolai follows behind. His crimson copper eyes keep studying me. Reading me again. Goosebumps ripple across my chest and up my neck when I feel his heavy gaze. I can always sense it.

I sit down and he sits next to me. I want to get the feeding done. My emotions feeling fragile and I'm desperate for him not to pick it up. Pulling up my blouse's sleeve, I give him my wrist silently. He grasps it gently and his canines turn into fangs in one rapid blink. This time I look. Even though I don't want to feel it. The thrill runs deep.

Nikolai and my eyes lock. His gaze lingers as his fangs sink into my flesh, making me gasp out a breath. It stings again but goes quickly away. The pulling sensation of his fangs as he draws from my veins trembles my mind. I don't take my eyes off Nikolai as he sucks my blood. His eyes turn dark, almost obsidian. It's a strange feeling to have something so personal. So intimate, consumed. Devoured by another to give him life.

I breathe in heavily. My eyes fluttering. My head feeling a little woozy as he feeds for a further two minutes and hauls his mouth away. I can only imagine what that might feel, breaking away from my flesh. Was it difficult?

He licks the drop of blood at the corner of his mouth and exhales, as if trying to maintain his composure.

He stands up and extends his hand down to me. Unexpectedly, my hand reaches up and places it in his. His grasp is gentle and frosty as he helps me up to my feet from the couch. Although his skin was cold, it was warmly soothing. I sway lightly on my feet, feeling dizzy. He holds onto both my hands until I'm steady, secretly I wish he gripped my hips instead. My body leaning into him. Suddenly, I want to do way more than him sucking my blood tonight. This is what Billie must've meant by getting 'clingy'. But Nikolai deserts my hand.

"I'm sorry. I drank a little too much tonight." He winces. "Please eat something when I leave. Anything with iron in it. It will strengthen you."

I smile weakly. "Don't worry, I'll eat a bowl of spinach from the fridge, just like Pop-eye." I chuckle lazily. My blinks slow and deliberate. I feel like I'm drunk. And all I want right now, at this moment, is Nikolai's hands on me. His lips. His toned and slender body against mine. His tongue, sucking and licking my flesh anywhere than my wrists.

I shake my head with these sexy thoughts. Nikolai stares at me. It's like he can read everything I'm thinking.

Oh, dear...

I can see his jaw ticking as he clenches his fangs back. He jerks his head away from me and walks rigidly to the door. He opens it and turns to me with his left hand casually in his right trousers pocket. I catch up to him, my hands gripping on the door frame, checking outside into the still night.

"It's Friday. You're not working over the weekend," he grits his teeth. "If you go out, get home before sunset and stay indoors. I'll see you on Monday, again?"

I nod earnestly. "Yes, you'll see me."

Nikolai gave a nod. "Good night, Isla." Hearing my name from his mouth, this time, flashes tingles between my thighs.

I watch him walk down the glossy street to his dark double story house. But his house isn't as lifeless as before. I wrinkle my eyes and tilt my head. A light is on downstairs. The window open. And behind the floating curtains, a shadow pass across.