Midnight at St. Benedict's

Chapter 1

Lisel Andrews had three types of vampire blood on her shoes and she wasn't even halfway through the night's onslaught of patients. As she hurried out of Exam Room 2, where she'd just extracted a piece of werewolf tooth from a a vampire's forearm, Carol, the triage nurse called out from somewhere down the hall.

"Bleed out in room three!"

"On it!" Lisel called over her shoulder. She really hated the full moon shift. She rushed into the examination room and found a vampire, clutching her side, blood gushing from a wound just below her ribcage. Obviously another werewolf encounter. Why couldn't they all just get along? A male vampire stood near the bed looking worried. Unsurprisingly, he was tall, dark and devastating. The epitome of what Lisel had come to expect from a vampire.

"What happened here?" She grabbed a chart from the end of the bed. Carol had made a couple of notes. "Wolf bite?"

"The witch out front said you'd be right in. Where the hell were you?" The male vampire pierced her with his dark gaze. Many potential victims would be dazzled by such a look. Lucky for Lisel she was very nearly immune to vampire stares.

Fighting back the urge to snap at Mr Personality, Lisel stuck her head out the door and shouted down the hall. "I'm going to need a couple of bags in here."

"Got it," Carol shouted back. They were really going to have to get the intercom system fixed. Lisel checked the chart one more time for the patient's name.

"Belinda?" She hooked the chart back on the end of the bed and walked around to the patient's side. "I'm just going to do a quick exam."

She fished in her lab coat pocket for a pair of latex gloves and pulled them on with a snap. Lisel tried to be gentle as she ran her fingers over the edges where the skin had been ripped away. Belinda cried out.

"Jax!"

The male vampire, Jax, moved closer, taking Belinda's hand.

"What are you doing to her?"

Lisel ignored the question and spoke straight to her patient. "You're going to need some stitches. Then we're going to hook you up and replace some of that blood. Ok?"

Belinda whimpered, but nodded.

Lisel went to the cabinet in the corner and began taking out the necessary items. Stitching a vampire wasn't really much different than stitching a human, except vampires didn't require anesthetic. Well, require might not be the right word. They might have liked it, but it didn't work with their biological make up.

"You're just going to do this here?" Jax looked around the exam room in distaste. The walls were water stained and the paint peeled, but it was clean and the items were sterile and that was all Lisel needed.

Besides, the rest of the building wasn't in much better shape.

"We are," she replied. "And you're going to need to hold her shoulders." Lisel picked up the needle and the suture thread. She expected more attitude, but Jax moved into place, holding Belinda's shoulders.

Lisel took a deep breath, blocking out the annoyances around her, mainly in the form of the vampire man, and began her work. She did a simple, interrupted stitch, cutting the thread between each suture. She felt the sweat trickle down her back, but continued without a break. It took a total of fifteen stitches to fully close the wound but at least the scarring would be minimal. Vampire skin had so many healing qualities.

When she finished, she took a step back, swiping her forearm over her sweating forehead.

"At least you did a decent job," Jax looked over her work with grudging admiration.

Lisel had pretty much had enough.

"That's it!" She took a step towards Jax and saw with satisfaction that he backed up. It must have been her tone that did it. Though she was by no means petite, the vampire had a good five or six inches on her.

"Maybe you didn't notice, but it's a full moon out there. And with all the vampires and werewolves tearing each other apart, we're a little busy."

To her extreme annoyance, Jax smiled.

"You done?" He asked, clearly amused.

"No, Lisel continued. "You should know I don't do 'decent work.' I do good work. Really good work."

He smiled bigger, exposing his teeth. Lisel fought the urge to slap him.

As though on cue, Carol rushed into the room with a bag of blood and an IV drip. She took in the scene in front of her.

"Everything ok?"

"Perfect," Lisel felt herself deflate. "Can you hook up that IV? She'll be fine when her blood levels get back to normal."

Carol nodded, causing her springy red curls to bounce. "You've got a werewolf with a cracked tooth in room one."

"Ugh," Lisel strongly suspected that the werewolf in Exam Room 1 had broken his tooth on the vampire in Exam Room 2. She hoped neither of them knew who was next door. It wouldn't be the first time a fight broke out in the halls, but she really didn't need more work tonight.

"I hate the full moon shift," Lisel repeated to herself as she took off her gloves on her way out the door, throwing them into a nearby garbage container.

"Hold up," Jax called from the doorway of the examination room.

She turned back and was once again on the receiving end his intense vampire stare.

"Yes?" She cleared her throat, all business.

"What are you?" He asked.

"I beg your pardon?"

Jax leaned against the door frame, really looking her over now. Lisel shifted her weight from foot to foot.

"You're not a vampire or a witch. Definitely not a werewolf. What then?"

"Oh," Lisel shrugged. "I'm human."