From Her Vein to the Floor

"I won't turn around, can't be afraid.
Takin' you all the way back home.
Innocence gone; can't be the same.
Takin' you all the way back home.

Will the world still be the same
Even if you're gone?
When the pillars start to fade,
And the room's just walls?

Don't you think you've had enough?
Do their claws make sores?
Take my hand and come away,
And I'll take you home."
- Cold

The room was silent, not even the ticking of a clock or the noise of the neighbors to create a bit of white noise. A vampire stared at Torryn from across the low coffee table, gazing at her inquisitively. She looked back at him, confused and frightened and exhausted.

"You don't look like someone Antony would bring around," the boy remarked quizzically, cocking his head to one side like a confused bird, his shaggy brown hair shifting like feathers atop his head. "I mean, you're a bit too clothed for him, and you're not in the Sex Shack riding him like a crazy cowgirl."

She shouldn't ask. There was no reason to. But... "The Sex Shack?"

The boy nodded vigorously, dark plumage swaying violently. "It's a closet with a mattress in it," was all he said, as if that was all there was to it.

She opened her mouth to question even further, but she caught herself before she made that mistake. She did not need to know. Instead, she asked, "Where did Antony go?"

"Upstairs." Short, simple, and completely not what she'd meant.

"Why?"

"He doesn't think he should be around you for a while." Again, his head bobbed away, feathery locks waving at her voraciously.

"But he was just around me," she argued without really arguing, her tone more dejected than vicious, "and he seemed fine." Except for the dilated pupils and the extended fangs and the general creepiness that he exuded, but that didn't have anything to do with her. As far as she knew, anyway.

The boy sighed and flopped back on the couch, head lying on the arm rest. "Do I really have to say it? He doesn't want to be around you until he can figure out whether he's undead or not."

The statement was like a slap in the face, but it didn't elicit a verbal or physical response from her. It was all inside, in the clenching of her gut and tightening of her throat. She dropped her gaze to her lap and gritted her teeth, holding back tears she hadn't expected.

What if he was dead? What if his father had killed him? And why was it taking him so long to figure this out?

With a gust of cool air came the boy, suddenly dropping onto the couch beside her. "It's okay," he said with a soft smile, resting a hand gently on her knee. It was pale and smooth, she saw, just like Antony's. "Even if he's undead, he'll still want you."

But will I want him? She didn't voice the thought, imagining that it would cause some less-than-favorable reaction in the living vampire, and instead, she just looked up at him with a halfhearted smile of her own. "Thank you."

He frowned suddenly, head tilting lightly to the left, and reached out one of those Antony-esque hands to touch her cheek. It was a ginger touch, his fingers barely brushing her flesh, but she instantly jerked back with a hiss of pain.

"It's swollen," he told her, "and badly bruised." His head cocked the other way, and he asked, "Did you not notice it before?"

"Not really," she muttered as she lowered her gaze once more, prodding the puffiness of her cheek to send a jagged spike of pain through her entire face. "I've been a bit preoccupied lately."

"That's probably for the best," he remarked, a mischievous smirk quirking the corners of his pale pink lips, "'cause you look u-u-ugly-y-y!" And with that, he darted from the couch and sprinted up the stairs, tittering to himself all the while.

"I didn't know Antony was friends with the special people," Torryn mumbled once he had gone, prodding her cheek once more. A soft hiss slithered from between her pain-clenched teeth, and she told herself not to poke the bulge again.

Lowering her hand, she glanced around the living room, leaning forward a bit to see through the nearby kitchen doorway. She saw and heard no one, so, deeming herself alone, she got to her feet and entered the kitchen.

It was a quaint little space, if a bit dreary. There was a dingy white refrigerator, an old oven, and only a foot or so of counter space, plus a couple of overhead cupboards made of cherry wood with deep gouges in the sides. It was odd to see everything so unkempt and dinged up, but considering that these vamps – there had to be more than one lonely bachelor here, right? – probably lived like Antony without the maids, it shouldn't have surprised her. Party, party, sex, party, sex, party, party...The lifestyle didn't lend itself well to tidy living spaces.

She crossed the scuffed white tile and pulled open the refrigerator door. Her hopes of finding sustenance were dashed as she spotted nothing but wine bottles filled with something too thick to be wine, and she closed the door with a sigh. If only she liked chilled blood...

"Torryn?" The gravelly voice jerked her around like a spinning top. There stood Antony in the doorway, his eyes still pupil black and his fangs still much longer than they should've been. An icy tendril of fear slid through her.

"Antony," she whispered, taking a hesitant step toward him. She was swept up in his arms in a heartbeat, held tightly to his chest and to his shirt, which still reeked of his blood.

"I'm sorry about what happened to your face," he murmured in her ear, but she heard so much more than that. In those words lay the sorrow and the guilt of everything that happened to the both of them only any hour ago, of everything that had happened to them in the weeks before. To hear him speak like that, to hear him abandon his arrogant demeanor so fully...

Her throat tightened again, and she fought all of the unshed tears that were demanding to be let free, beating at the floodgate that caught all of her emotions. "Are you alive?" she asked in a raspy whisper.

At that, he pulled back, his hands sliding to her small shoulders as he gazed intently into her gray eyes. The smallest smile curved his lips. "Very," he murmured, and she grabbed his face and pulled his still-bloodied lips to hers without a second thought.

His too-long fangs cut through the skin of her lower lip, and the taste of her own blood soon seeped onto her tongue to mingle with the taste of his. His tongue ran over the cuts once, then he latched onto her lip and began to pull greedily, his blackened eyes slipping shut. His arms snaked around her waist to hold her against him, and she let her hands rest on the back of his head, sliding through his blood-matted hair slowly, deliberately, feeling all of the damage that Caesar had done.

But he wasn't dead. God, he wasn't dead!

He released her lip with a painful, practiced slowness, then placed a gentle kiss on her cheek, and another on her jaw, and another on her neck, slowly trailing downward. When his fangs suddenly entered her throat with that same deliberate slowness, she let loose a soft sigh. It was like a long-lost friend coming back to visit her – the kind of friend you want to drag into your bedroom and ravage one hot summer's night.

He growled softly, and she shuddered as it rumbled through his chest and into hers. His pulls from her vein grew rougher, faster, more desperate, and as his saliva filled her, she couldn't help giving a hard tug at his hair. The rising air of ecstasy made her feel meaner, naughtier, like she needed to respond to his roughness in kind. Another growl rolled through his chest like thunder, and his hands slid to her stomach to hastily guide her backward until her back hit the refrigerator. It sent a shock of pleasure-pain through her, and she moaned softly. This brought forth another low growl, and she chuckled just as lowly.

His fingers slid up her shirt, smooth skin trailing along her stomach until he reached her breasts, left bare beneath her borrowed T-shirt. He grunted quietly, pleased, and cupped them, thumbs brushing her nipples teasingly. She groaned and took hold of his tangled hair, roughly pulling his fangs from her neck. She felt the warm stickiness of blood rolling down her throat as she pulled his lips to hers once again.

Their lips parted, the taste of her own blood strong in her mouth once more as his tongue slid against hers. His fangs nicked her lower lip again, bringing even more of the coppery flavor to her taste buds, and she moaned into his mouth. This was all so...erotic.

She felt a sudden cool breeze against her side, then a gentle, tickling touch along the side of her bleeding neck. Her eyes opened just as Antony lashed out with a single clenched fist, sending the vampire boy from earlier flying across the room and right through the kitchen doorway. Other than that one arm, Antony's posture didn't change, though a snarl pulled at his upper lip.

"Don't touch her," he growled to the boy, his hand sliding from Torryn's breast to the small of her back, everything in his stance becoming possessive though he barely moved. "She's not yours to taste."

The boy laughed lightly as he got to his feet, acting as if he'd merely tripped instead of getting decked by a wired vampire. "Relax, man. I was just curious. She just smelled so good."

All thoughts of sex seeped from her as the vampire saliva left her vein, leaving her drained and just as exhausted as before. Antony was looking better, though. His eyes were angry, lip still pulled back in a possessive snarl, but his pupils had returned to a normal size, and his fangs had been reduced to sharper-than-normal canines that fit perfectly in his mouth. All he'd needed was blood. He was really okay.

The feeling of relief was so immense that it only tired her more, and she let her head fall to rest on his shoulder. His arms slipped around her protectively, and his low voice rolled through her when he spoke. "I don't care how good she smells. Keep your hands off of her."

"Fine, fine," the boy said airily. A taunting smile curved his lips as he licked what little Progeny blood he'd managed to snag from the tips of his fingers. "You should really consider sharing her, though. She's not just one of your humans. She actually has quality blood."

"I'm not one for sharing," Antony muttered, turning his gaze back to Torryn, who turned her head on his shoulder to look up at him.

"You always shared your humans," the boy pointed out, but his words went ignored.

"We need to get moving," Antony told Torryn, his hands sliding away from her to leave her cold. She lifted her head, and the small space between them made her feel even colder. "My father will be looking for us here."

Your father? she thought, and a rush of bitter frustration suddenly flooded her mind. He tried to kill you, and you still call him your father?

"Why didn't you kill him?" she asked almost before she'd even finished her own thought. The words were blunt, harsh, boldly accusatory, and her gaze was just the same. He looked taken aback by it all, but she didn't let up. "You had a knife in your hand. You'd already killed Samuel. Why didn't you finish Caesar?"

She was angry, but should she have been? Some niggling little voice at the back of her mind – the very same voice that had encouraged her to fight Caesar off only an hour before – told her that Caesar was Antony's father, and while still an ass, that didn't override the obvious bond between them, the bond of cold, dead blood. But come on! She had to run now – they both did – and fight and stress even more than before when, in one freaking second, Antony could have ended it all. Not to mention the man had nearly killed his own son and not given a rat's ass about it.

Should she have been angry? Fuck yes.

"I, uh, I," he stammered, gawking down at her like she'd just asked the craziest thing in the world – of course, "Why didn't you kill your dad?" was kind of a crazy question...

She sighed, and her harsh face sagged into a dreary expression of exhaustion. "Never mind," she grumbled, beginning to rub at the sticky blood on her neck. "Just forget about it." Turning from him to glance around the room, she asked, "Can I at least take a quick shower before we go?"

"I don't know if we'll have time," he answered, though she was already on her way out of the kitchen, heading toward the boy who still watched with a smile from the living room.

"Where's your bathroom?" she asked as she stopped before him, then threw in, "And what's your name?"

"I'm Will," he said, his smiling turning creepier and creepier the longer he stared down at her. "The bathroom's upstairs, first door on your left. Take as long as you need."

"Thanks," she said with a halfhearted smile, then headed up the stairs, still rubbing absently at her bloodied neck.

She found that the bathroom was just as bare as the kitchen had been, though a few...interesting reddish-brown stains decorated the white tile of this particular space. There was a grayish-white toilet, a grayish-white sink, and a grayish-white bathtub to match. She shut the door behind her with a soft click, pausing to lean her back heavily against the scratched wood and stare vacantly into space.

There was so much to do now, so much to think. She needed to give her mom a heads up, and she needed to call Skylar, and she needed to get help, someone's help, and she needed to find a safe place to stay...

Why didn't Antony just kill his father!

A rough grunt left her as she pushed herself away from the door with the creak of old wood. She began to tear her borrowed clothes from her body, throwing them to the floor as the scent of Skylar wafted into the air all around her. Something inside her ached, something deep in her chest, and she let out another grunt, a sadder grunt, a soft acknowledgment of the things she'd lost and would probably never get back.

She wished that she had the penguin necklace he'd gotten her for their anniversary. She wished she was lying in bed with him, napping the afternoon away like they'd done so often in the old days. She wished he was with her – that she was with him.

The salt of her tears met a cut on her bruised cheek with a sharp sting, and she wiped at her face hastily. How pathetic she was, alone in a total stranger's bathroom, naked and crying.

She walked forward, purposely ignoring the mirror as she passed it, and stepped into the bathtub. The porcelain was blessedly cool against her bare feet, and the scraping of the shower curtain's hooks as she pulled them across the curtain rod was painfully loud in the silence. Her soft sobs were lost beneath it, then lost beneath the rush of water when she turned on the tap, then too loud to be lost as she pulled the tab to start the shower.

The water stung her cheek and her rug-burned palms and all of her other injuries, but she kept on just the same. She'd just begun to run her fingers through her tangled hair when she heard the door open and a tentative call of "Torryn?" It was Antony. And she was still sobbing. Oh, joy.

"What?" she asked in what was supposed to be a controlled voice but was really just another sob.

She heard the door close, then Antony asked softly, "What's wrong?"

"What the fuck do you think is wrong?" she snapped, beginning to scrub roughly at her neck with her hand. It hurt the puncture wounds and the section of rug burn, but she was too far gone to care at this point. Rage and fear and sorrow didn't combine to make anything a normal person would be able to focus through, even to feel through.

There was a pause, a couple of false starts, then honestly, blatantly, sadly – "I don't understand."

A fit of aggravated rage sent her injured palms flying at the wet white wall in front of her with a loud thud. "How can you not understand?" She wanted to yell it, to scream it like a banshee at the top of her lungs, but she settled with a raspy whisper in a cracking voice. "How can you not understand, Antony?"

His smooth white hand snaked in between the edge of the shower curtain and the wall she had her hands resting on, her nails scraping at the slippery whiteness as if she wanted to dig an angry hole through it and maybe find happiness on the other side. He turned the handle, and the water ceased to fall on her. Somehow, this act infuriated her even more, and she glared down at his hand while resisting the urge to break it.

He pulled the curtain aside and looked at her white body, hunched and wet, there in the shower. "I don't understand why you're so sad." It sounded like something a child would say, and she alternately wanted to laugh and wanted to cry.

But she settled with hanging her head, putting her full weight into her hands as if she expected to break through that damn wall at any moment and find the peace she'd been digging for. "My life is ruined, Antony," she whispered, and her voice jerked as a sob slipped through. "You ruined my life by coming into it, and you've ruined it even more by letting your father continue to live." She wouldn't look at him, but she could imagine the look of hurt on his face, those beautiful blue eyes wide in shock and those pretty pink lips curved the wrong way in a frown.

She heard a door creak open, and out of the corner of her eye, she could see him pulling a towel from the nearby closet. It was pale blue and thin, a few holes here and there, but she was still grateful for it when he draped it around her wet shoulders. His look was nothing like she'd imagined, though, his eyes not wide and his lips merely tightened into a straight line. She turned to look up at him fully, trying to decipher what emotion that was, though she didn't stop her assault on the wall.

"I may have fucked up by not killing my father," he began, that arrogant spark to his tone that she'd been missing back in full force, "but I did not ruin your life by coming into it. Don't try to feed me that bullshit." She leaned away from the wall and turned to face him, lips parted in surprise. "Your life wasn't what it was meant to be before I showed up. It was boring, it wasn't right for you, and we both know that." He glared at her, and she resisted the urge to shrink back from his rage. "And to be completely honest, it hurts that you don't consider me a good part of your life. It hurts that you blame me for all of your problems. It hurts that you cared more for Skylar than you seem to care for me. If you want me out of your life, say so. I don't want to waste my time saving someone who doesn't even want me here."

She could only stare up at him, at his tight lips and coldly emotional eyes, taken aback even though she should've seen this coming. Was she really out of line here? Was she really treating him that badly? Was she...Was she maybe the one who had ruined his life?

She noticed a bit of movement out of the corner of her eye, and she looked down to find that he was clenching and unclenching his fists with quick, jerky motions. He seemed to notice her noticing, as he swiftly clenched his fists and kept them clenched, running his thumbs over the tops of his fingers. Her eyes flicked to his. Was he nervous? Or was he just really, really angry?

"I didn't mean to make you feel that way," she finally said, her voice soft and careful, and she pulled the thin towel tight around her shoulders. "I...I don't mean to feel the way I do. It's just..." She paused and averted her gaze, her eyes soon settling on one of the brownish stains on the floor. "It's hard not to find somewhere to place the blame, you know?" And in her mind, Antony was and always would be the cause of all of this, no matter how much he argued and how much she wished he wasn't.

He unclenched a fist and rubbed at the dried blood caking the dark stubble along his jaw. She didn't even notice the hair until just then, hearing the rough scratching of it against his palm. His eyes slid down her naked frame, droplets of water still rolling across her milky white skin from her hair, trapped beneath the towel, and she saw his pupils dilate just a bit.

"I know something you could do to make up for it," he told her with a suggestive arching of his eyebrows. All of his rage or his nervousness or whatever it was had melted away, leaving behind only his natural cocky playfulness.

She smiled in spite of herself. "I don't think we have time for that," she said, but he was already sliding his grimy shirt off. Even bloody and bruised as he was, there was no way she could deny those abs and those muscled arms. "Well, maybe just a quickie."

He chuckled lowly and gave her a wicked sexy smile, kicking his shoes off. "I thought you'd understand." He undid his pants and quickly slipped them off, and they landed to make a pile atop his shoes. "Would you consider this make-up sex?" His boxers were soon added to the heap, then each of his socks. He was already rock hard, smirking at her in that evilly seductive way, with those damn abs of his...She became deliciously hot all over, the puncture wounds on the side of her neck tingling at the mere thought of having his fangs in her again.

He tore the towel from around her shoulders, throwing it across the room even as he stepped over the edge of the bathtub and into the shower. A squeal of delight left her as he pushed her back against the wall, lips meeting hers in an aggressively passionate kiss. She felt his stubble against her chin, but she barely registered the slight scratching pain as their tongues fell together in a familiar sliding rhythm. A hand left her arm, and the soft squeak of the knob turning just barely preceded a deluge from the shower head above. The water was cool but not cold, hitting him full force while only the occasional drop found her arm or slipped down between their bodies.

His hand found her hip, then slid slowly between them until his fingers found her clit. He rubbed her slowly, gently, teasingly, and she sighed, half enjoying it and half wanting more. His lips left hers while his fingers continued their taunting rhythm, and he began to place nibbling kisses along the side of her neck, the side he hadn't yet bitten. Her bite wounds twinged; goosebumps sprang up along her arms – it was so odd to think that only weeks ago, the thought of being bitten would have instilled intense fear in her instead of this insatiable desire.

When his fangs finally pierced her neck, she moaned and ran her fingers over his toned back, savoring the moment. Her eyes slipped shut as she tried to decide which sensation to focus on – the feeling of his muscles beneath her hands? The feeling of his teeth in her throat? The feeling of his fingers sliding between her legs?

His fingers delved deep into her, coaxing another soft groan from her lips. They kept a smooth, gentle rhythm, a sharp contrast to his frenzied pulls from her vein. The amount of pleasure they brought was equal, however, as his saliva flowed through her veins alongside her blood, soothing her into ecstasy. She took hold of him, still rock hard, and tugged him toward where his fingers still taunted.

"This is supposed to be a quickie, remember?" she purred, and a deep chuckle left his throat as he gripped her thigh and propped her leg up on the edge of the tub. His fingers left her, and he slipped himself out of her hand to quickly fill her in their place.

His thrusts were rough and quick, just as they always were, and she braced herself against the wall, though he had an arm carefully around her waist. His fangs left her neck with a harsh tear that sent a thrill of pleasure through her, a pleasure that mingled with the pulsing between her legs. Already, she was on the brink of orgasm, and she wished that she could suppress it, but she knew that the vampire saliva would never let that happen. She couldn't help suspecting that some pheromones were in the mix, too. Everything just felt too good.

"You're terrible," she murmured breathlessly, just before his lips came crashing into hers. He tried to nibble at her lower lip, but she beat him to it, taking his lip between her teeth and tugging roughly. He grunt-growled, pleased, and dug his nails into her skin, sending another jolt of pleasure through her. It was enough to send her over the edge, though she wanted to fight it, and she cried out as the most intense pleasure she'd ever felt pulsed through her groin and into the rest of her body. The bite wounds on either side of her neck throbbed violently, and she moaned again, her nails cutting into his back to draw blood.

Somehow, his thrusts became even more aggressive, a deep growl turning into a low groan as his nails dug even more deeply into her skin. That feeling of pleasure continued to roll through her in waves, and she continued to cry out in ecstasy. It was pure bliss, something she'd never even dreamed of feeling – her neck twinging and her groin throbbing and the claw marks along her side tingling. She knew he'd joined her in bliss when his screams of pleasure had risen in volume to cover her own, his bellowing cry echoing through the bathroom.

His voice soon died away, and she allowed hers to do the same, though that blissful feeling still thrilled through her. He stilled and leaned against her, his hands on the wall to either side of her, and his chest pressed against hers with each panting breath. Yes, breath – he was alive! She laughed at the suddenness of the thought, her arms tight around him. The joy was enough to cloud even the fuzziness of the bliss, and the combination of the two completely separate sensations was enough to overwhelm her for a moment. Her vision blurred under the weight of it all.

"Was I that bad?" he asked with a chuckle, and his grinning face soon came into focus as the feelings began to ebb.

"Of course not." She smiled and buried her face in his shoulder, the water from the shower head redampening her hair. "I'm just so happy that you're alive," she whispered, placing a gentle kiss upon the side of his neck from where her head lay.

His arm slipped between her back and wall, and he pulled her close. He kissed the top of her head and murmured into her hair, "I think I love you, Torryn."

She went rigid against him, though her stance remained the same otherwise. "What did you say?"

"I said," he began in a whisper, leaning away from her to get a look at her face, "I think I love you, Torryn." She searched his face for any sign of doubt or insincerity, something to give away his uncertainty more than the "I think" tacked on to the beginning, but there was a sweet earnestness to his eyes that she just couldn't deny.

"Antony," she breathed, gazing up at him with wide gray eyes. "I..."

There was a crash before she could go on, however, then the sound of the door banging against the wall as someone entered in a hurry. "Antony!" came the voice of that weird vampire, Will. "You need-" But his words died in a gruesome gurgle, and a quiet thump followed, then a laugh, a laugh that was much too familiar.

"Antony, my boy!" Caesar called cheerfully, and a chill tiptoed its way down Torryn's spine. Antony's body tensed against hers. They should've gone when he'd said so. She shouldn't have stopped to take a freaking shower! "Is Torryn in there with you? Ah, don't bother answering. I can smell her blood from here!"

She looked up at Antony, and he looked down at her. She watched as he swallowed, hard.

"We will get out of here," he whispered as if he were answering a question, raw determination darkening his tone. "I won't let him have you." His arms slipped from around her waist, and he leaped through the gap they'd left in the curtain, rushing into battle naked and dripping wet – her knight in not-so-shining armor. But she didn't need a damn knight; she never had.

Without a second thought, she followed Antony out of the shower.

She'd be damned if she let anyone save her ass again.

And she'd be damned if she let him die after dropping the L-bomb on her.