A strength I couldn't fight pulled me away from Sid. I clawed at Parva's arm, but it didn't budge.

“Time to stop, Nate,” said Parva. “You're going to kill her.”

Her stench was in my nostrils as I struggled. From here I could see the bite marks on the other side of Sid's neck, the ones Parva had put there, and I knew exactly what Parva planned to do.

“Don't touch her,” I choked. Parva laughed darkly.

“I have no interest in your carrion.”

“She's not carrion!”

“She will be if you take any more blood. Greedy boy.”

I tried to wrest away from her arm. I tried to get to my feet so I could throw her off. Nothing worked, even though she was so much smaller than me. The more I fought, the more she pinned me down. She forced me onto my knees, held my hands behind me with one arm, and with the other she kept enough pressure on my throat to keep me incapacitated.

Minutes passed as she held me like that. I started to calm down. The high began to crash around me, and I could look at Sid with sane, human eyes. All at once, I understood everything I'd done to her. I'd bonded with her, even though she didn't want it. And I'd taken so much blood. So much blood.

“Let me go,” I said through the choke hold Parva had on me.

“Are you sure she'll be safe from you?”

“Let me go!”

Parva released me. I scrambled over to Sidney's side and pulled her upper body into my arms. Her head dropped off to the side. She was unconscious.

“Sidney. Sidney, please wake up.”

I patted her face, stroked her hair. I looked up at Parva. She gazed at me blankly.

“Do something,” I begged.

“She'll be fine,” Parva said. Her voice said she couldn't have cared less. “Couple days in bed, lots of fluids.”

“But---”

“Why do you think I stopped you when I did? I've escorted many, many humans to the existential point of no return, my dear. She's not there, yet.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“I never intended for her to die. I just wanted you to see what you were capable of without me here to stop you. And what it would feel like if you pushed it all the way to the end.”

I shuddered. Hell was still inside me, that indescribable chaos without Sidney. And Parva was right. Who else would be strong enough to pull me off a victim if I lost control again? Something told me she wasn't planning to do it a second time.

“There is another way,” Parva said.

I looked up at her.

“Kill the first time, before you bond. There's no pain that way. Feels fantastic, actually. Taking all the blood you want. Draining every drop. Decent alternative.”

I hated how seductive that sounded. How the monster inside me roused in its sleep at the thought of an endless, hedonistic gorge of blood. I finally knew why she was doing all this. She wanted me to understand, truly understand, why she killed. I didn't understand. I could not understand.

But I was beginning to understand.

Parva got to her feet and stretched. She said, “Time for me to go, I think.”

I noticed how her heart was still racing. She was still rank with killing intent. It had never really waned. And within myself, too, now that I was done crying over Sid, the vampire was reminding me that there was a threat, an enemy, that needed to be dealt with. Only I'd already proven that I was still nowhere near strong enough to deal with it.

It didn't matter. I placed Sidney on the floor and got to my feet. Then I faced Parva, and her eyes widened.

“You're not really going to try this now,” she said.

I took a step toward her. She backed away, then she suddenly turned and bolted through the broken door into the backyard. I chased her halfway to a line of trees that ran behind the house before she stopped, turned, and bared her teeth in an unamused grin.

“We don't do so good in close proximity,” she said. “That's why there aren't more of us. Too territorial.”

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“This is all your fault,” I said. I slowed to a walk, but I didn't stop.

“Excuse me?”

“If you hadn't pulled the gag out, Sid wouldn't have invited me in.”

“I think you're forgetting that she wouldn't have known she needed the gag if it weren't for me. Or the cuffs. Hell, if it weren't for me you would have found her at home two hours ago and bitten her in front of her whole family.”

I came to a stop right in front of her. My muscles were tensed for a fight. My breaths came faster. And Parva was responding to it, I could feel it. This was very, very stupid. I was heartbroken and I hated myself and I was about to get myself killed.

“I almost murdered Emily,” I said. “I just permanently enslaved Sidney even after she begged me not to. My mother doesn't trust me anymore, and she shouldn't because I'm always hungry and most of the time the closest human is her. Every day I have to fight not to do that . . .” I jabbed a finger toward the house, where Sidney was. “. . . to my own mother. And it's your fault. You're the one who infected me with your goddamn vampire virus!”

“Come on, Nate. It's not all my fault. I naturally assumed that, when you realized what a threat you were to your friends and family, you would do the right thing and kill yourself.”

“I tried. I begged Sidney to shoot me and she wouldn't do it.”

“Oh, so now it's her fault.”

“No, but---”

“There are things you could do without Sidney's help, you know. Driving off a cliff might work, especially if the car exploded. Fire is good. Drowning takes a while, but it'll do the trick.”

No, there was no way the vampire would let me get away with any of those things, and she knew it. The whole problem was that its sense of self-preservation was too great. It probably wouldn't have let Sid get away with shooting me, either. Maybe it was better that she hadn't tried.

Parva said, “The mistake you're making here, Nate, is that you're pretending I've imbued you with desires you didn't have before. But you know that's not true. All I did was take away your ability to lie to yourself about it.”

“No.”

“You're on the path to Enlightenment now. Isn't that nice? Maybe instead of blaming me, you should try thanking me.”

“I will never thank you for anything. You're an evil bitch and I wish you were dead.”

“You're still too inexperienced to understand how connected we are. And how much I own you. But, listen, until you figure it out, maybe you should try to show a little respect.”

Then, instead of taking another step back, she moved toward me. I was expecting an attack, so I put my hands up, but she stepped into the space between my hands and grabbed the back of my neck. Then her body was flush against me and her mouth was on mine.

For the second time in my life, I let myself be kissed by Parva the Vampire. She didn't taste like human blood this time. I might have been okay with that. No, this time she tasted like my imminent death. The primal, uncontrollable need to obliterate me from this planet. I knew the taste because she was tasting it, too.

Yet, somehow, Parva controlled it. We both controlled it. In my case, it was enough that I was frozen with shock. But I have no idea what she was thinking. I don't know how she was able to keep her lips so soft while her nails were digging into the back of my neck.

Then she broke the kiss, and her hand relinquished its grip on me. My own hands had come to rest on her waist. I tried to pull them away without being obvious about it, but Parva just laughed.

She said, “It's not time for us to kill each other, yet. I have too many lessons to teach you.”

“Why do we have to kill each other? Why can't you just go away and leave me alone?”

“Sorry, Pumpkin. It's written in the stars. I'm going to break you, and I'm going to use your girls to do it.”

I knew she was going to say something like that. And I knew she meant it.

“Parva, please. If you're going to break me, just do it. Do it right now.” I put my arms out at both sides to show her that I wasn't going to protect myself. “You don't have to hurt the girls, okay? I won't fight you.”

She sighed. “It's like you haven't learned anything.”

“What are you talking about?”

She pressed herself against me again, almost like a hug, except that I could feel how easy it would be for her to crush me. Tiny little five-nothing girl.

Then, abruptly, it was over. But before she pulled away, I heard her whisper:

“I like it when you fight.”

And then she was gone.

* * *

In the floor of the Cross's rental house, I gritted my teeth and pulled glass from my hands. My knees, too, were slashed and bloody. Glass and blood were everywhere. It couldn't be left like this.

I picked up Sidney and moved her to the living room where there was clean hardwood floor. The house was unfurnished, but I found cleaning supplies in the pantry, a broom and garbage bags and some other things. I swept up the glass and put it in a tripled-up bag and, with no other ideas, I stuck the bag in the trunk of Sidney's Lexus. I used bleach and paper towels to wipe up all the blood I could smell, and then I regretted it. Anything would have been better than bleach. The fumes burned a path like napalm into my sinuses.

All the glass and blood went into trash bags and then into the trunk. Then I carried Sid to the car and laid her down on the back seat. She was unconscious through all of this. I couldn't look at her without feeling ashamed.

I walked back through the house, taking care of any last traces of blood. After that, with nothing else to do, I drove Sidney to my house. I took her home.

Mom had gone to work early, so the garage was empty. I pulled in and closed the door before I took Sidney out. I didn't want the neighbors to see me carrying an unconscious girl into my house.

I took her upstairs to my bedroom. She was still damp with sweat and smeared with blood. I cleaned her up as best I could and tucked her into my bed. Then I sat beside her and watched her.

She was white, but at least she was breathing. She breathed in fits, though, like someone having a nightmare. Her eyes darted around under her lids. I touched her face with my fingertips. That touch alone seemed to help soothe her. I, too, felt the satisfaction of having real contact with her. We'd gone so long without it.

I got in the bed, curled up behind Sid, and buried my face in the back of her neck. She sighed and relaxed. Rest and water she needed, but also this touch. She was going to need me. For the rest of her life, she would need me.

One day, I would lose her. Emily, too. Death would take them no matter how hard I fought to keep them alive. And now I knew what that would mean. I'd tasted the pain. On the day I lost a girl, pain would consume me completely. That was the fear that made Parva kill. I hated that I could almost understand why she did it.

I wanted to cry. I wanted to bawl like I did back when I was a little kid, when my dad left and I finally figured out he was never coming back. But I couldn't do it. I was all cried out. I'd stared into the face of hell, and my tears had evaporated in the heat.