My Blood Approves

Chapter 11

The hot Jacuzzi wasn’t quite as magic as Mae had professed it would be, but it really did help relax me at least. It probably helped that I had the added comfort of knowing that Jack hadn’t done anything ridiculous to himself and that Peter hadn’t fallen off the face of the earth. All of this seemed so bizarre. In a time not so long ago, I hadn’t even known these people, and now it would be impossible to imagine the rest of my life without them, however long that life might end up being.

When I finally pulled myself out of the relaxing waters of the tub, I wrapped myself in one of their insanely soft, gigantic plush towels. To help ease my worries, Mae had filled her bedroom with lilac scented candles, and it was all aglow with candle light. I owned very few candles myself, because I believed that I would most likely end up burning down the entire apartment building, but here, with them, I knew that I was perfectly safe.

Laid out on the white satin bedspread, Mae had left some clothes of hers that I could wear. She had decided on flowered silk pajama pants and a thin blue cotton shirt. Since their house generally ran cold, I put my hoodie on over it, but it almost felt like sacrilege to put on something so ordinary with her extravagance. They lived on a whole other plane from me, in every way possible.

“I’m just saying that you rolled the Jeep.” Ezra’s words wafted warmly down the hall towards me when I opened their bedroom door. “It’s not asking that much that you pay for it.”

“You just want me out of the house more,” Jack grumbled.

“That wouldn’t hurt you either,” Ezra replied gently.

I had made my way down the hall, and they all instantly stopped talking when they saw me. Mae was standing in the kitchen amongst a mass of dishes and food splayed out all over the counter tops. She had white powder on her cheeks and some kind of red sauce dripped all over an elegant white apron. Jack had a stool pulled up to the counter, and I’m sure he fancied himself helping, but I’d imagine that he spent more time playing with the ingredients than helping. As it was, he was juggling a tomato and a lemon when I walked in. Ezra had his back pressed against the wall, leaning gracefully back, like a king surveying his kingdom.

“Oh, you look so much better!” Mae beamed at me. Jack dropped the tomato on the counter and very deliberately looked away from me. “Wasn’t that bath fabulous?”

“Yeah, it was pretty great.” I ran my fingers through my tangles of wet hair, and I could almost see Mae longing to play with it. Walking over to the mess Mae was making, I was careful to keep a distance from Jack. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to make you some kind of comfort food,” Mae smiled grimly at me. “I used to be an amazing cook, I swear! Everyone in my neighborhood loved my cooking!” Jack snorted skeptically, and she reached across the counter to slap him on the arm. “I was! You would’ve been thrilled to eat anything I made!”

“Whatever you say.” Jack leaned back in the stool, moving farther out of arm’s length, in case Mae decided to swat him again.

“It’s just been so long since I’ve cooked anything.” Mae looked sourly at the mess around her, which consisted of everything from cucumbers to pears to pie crusts, and I couldn’t even begin to fathom what she had in mind. “I’ve just forgotten what everything tastes like.”

“I bet you could make a mean blood pudding,” Jack offered, waggling his eyebrows at her.

“I know you’re just being an ass, but I really could.” Her voice took on one of pride and she puffed out her chest again. “I am from England, you know. We invented blood pudding.”

“Really?” I asked, looking up at her, and she, in turn, looked to Ezra for help.

“Maybe. It’s European, definitely, but it has a very Scottish flare to it. That could be just because I’m thinking of haggis, though.” Ezra shrugged.

“Well, you’re no help,” Mae pouted. There was a spoon in a bowl of something red, and she gave it one superficial swirl, then looked apologetically at me. “I don’t think that I’ve made anything that you can actually eat.”

“What about this tomato?” Jack held up the tomato towards me, but I just shook my head.

“I’m okay. I’m not even hungry.”

“Oh!” Mae exclaimed, her eyes glittering. “Your brother is a cook, isn’t he?”

“Not professionally, but yeah, he’s really good,” I told her hesitatingly. I liked Milo and all, but there was too much going on over here, and I didn’t really want him to come over. At least not tonight.

“Oh fantastic! And I’m sure he knows all of your favorite recipes!” She was overflowing her own genius, and I didn’t really want to burst her bubble. “Here.

Why don’t you just give me his phone number and I’ll give him a call. Oh, what time is it? It’s not too late is it?” She glanced around for a clock, and it was only a quarter to nine. “He’s still awake, isn’t he?”

“He should be.” There was no real way of knowing with him, though, especially on a school night.

Mae whipped her phone out of her pocket, and I gave her his number.

When she dialed the number, I had never seen anyone look quite so excited for someone to answer the phone.

“Oh, Milo!” Mae was smiling so wide, it looked almost painful. “I’m so glad you answered! Oh, I didn’t wake you, did I? I’m sorry, love. I don’t want to disturb you.” He must’ve answered with something positive, because she laughed lightly, and continued on about making me the perfect meal to make me feel better.

“I’m really not very hungry.” I had lowered my voice considerably, just in case Mae might hear, but she was talking very animatedly to Milo and swooping around the kitchen, gathering pots and pans and whatever she thought she’d needed. “Why do you guys have pots and pans anyway?”

“It makes us look more normal.” Jack rolled his shoulders, like he didn’t think it really mattered that much. “I mean, we don’t really need kitchens, and in a household of four people, we have seven bathrooms.”

“Bathrooms add resale value!” From Ezra’s tone, I gathered that this wasn’t the first time they’d had this argument. “We’re not going to live here for that long, so its best if we get our money’s worth.”

“What do you mean you’re not gonna live here long?” I had been leaning on the counter, but I snapped my head sharply and looked over at him. They had built this gorgeous house that was so completely meant for them, I couldn’t imagine them moving. But more than that, I couldn’t stand the thought of them being farther away from me.

“I can only be twenty-six for so long before the neighbors start to notice,” Ezra elaborated, but it still took a minute for it to sink it. They were never going to age, but everyone around them would, and they’d see them remain perfect forever. “We move every five years so, but we’ve been staying in the Minneapolis area for quite awhile.”

“In fact, I’ve never lived anywhere else,” Jack added.

“You were born here?” I gave him an odd look. For no real reason, I had just always kind of imagined that he was a transplant from California or Vegas or something like that.

“Well, Stillwater, actually, but it still makes it tricky living that close to my family.” He had said it casually, like it was no big thing, but something had just dawned on me, and he noticed the shift in my expression. He sighed and realized that he’d probably said a little too much. “We can’t see our families. We change, at first, to look better, and then we don’t change at all.”

“And it’s too hard watching them grow old.” Ezra had somehow managed to take something that was really terrible sound at least vaguely soothing, but my heart still clenched. I looked over at Mae, standing over the stove and chatting amicably with my brother, and realized the full ramification of what he was saying. “It’s better to cut ties sooner rather than later.”

“It’s not as bad as it sounds.” Jack put his hand on my shoulder to comfort me, but I just shrugged it off.

There were things that I hadn’t thought about when I got involved with them, and I’m sure there would be even more things that would come up later.

Nothing about this was going to be easy.

As if to solidify my point, Peter suddenly walked into the kitchen. His jeans and shirt were slim fit, revealing the slender lines of his gorgeous body. His blazing green eyes landed on mine, for just a second, then flitted away, like he couldn’t stand to look at me. He tucked a flyaway hair behind his ear and surveyed the mess in the kitchen. Just being this close to him made my skin tremble and my blood pound heavily in my ears. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Jack flinch, but for once, I didn’t feel it. When Peter was around, he eclipsed everything else, including the feelings that I sometimes borrowed from Jack.

“What’s all this?” Peter gestured to Mae’s attempts at cooking. She’d been too distracted with her food preparation to notice him walk in, but when he spoke, she shot him a nervous, startled look.

“I’ll call you back,” Mae muttered into the phone, then quickly hung up and dropped it in her pocket. “Peter, you’re home!”

“I am.” He chewed the inside of his cheek, and I could tell how deliberately he had to keep from looking at me. Desperately, I wanted him to look at me, though, and I wondered how he could even fight the urge. For me, it was so overpowering that I could barely breathe. “Am I to assume this is a feast for my return?”

“Peter, she knows,” Ezra told him quietly.

His eyes turned on me sharply, sending a rush through me so rapidly that I felt dizzy. Behind me, I heard a stool clatter to the floor, but I didn’t look back to see Jack storming out of the room. Peter didn’t really seem to notice either but walked slowly over to me, his eyes never leaving mine.

“So, you’re feeding her now?” Peter was looking at me, but he was asking someone else, not that anyone bothered to answer. He reached out and touched a wet strand of my hair and breathed in deeply. “And she’s showering here too. Is she living here now?”

“No.” Ezra let the word hang in the air, and Peter just kept staring at me.

In the back of my mind, I was aware that there were other people in the room, and it should be embarrassing that Peter was looking at me so intently in front of them, but somehow, it wasn’t.

“So you know we’re vampires?” Even though he started to smile at me, there was an underlying edge to his voice. “You know that we kill? You could’ve just as easily been food for us, but with a bit of luck and chance, you’re standing here instead.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. I could feel heat radiate from his body in a way that the others seemed incapable of. My skin tingled and that tugging feeling had encircled my heart. Every single part of my body screamed out for him, and painfully, I was starting to believe that he didn’t feel the same way.

“Why are you here?” Peter asked huskily.

“I–I-I want to be,” I stumbled. He had occupied my brain and it was all but impossible for me to form a competent answer. His scent, tangy and tantalizing, washed over me, blinding almost all my other senses.

“You want to be,” Peter repeated flatly. “You want this?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but then I felt his hand around my throat.

There was a rush of air and then I felt something hard slam into my back. It took me a while to realize that he’d picked me up by my neck and pressed me against a wall. His eyes burned with conflicting passions, but all I could really feel were his fingers on my throat, and the way my pulse felt pumping underneath them. His eyes were ravenous, and I knew he had the exact same thought.

“This is really what you want?” he snarled.

This time I couldn’t answer because his hand was so tight on my throat. I couldn’t even breathe, but I barely noticed. He was pressed up against me and I could feel the hard contours of his body against mine, and his intoxicating smell suffocated me. If I stayed like that for too long, I would probably die, but it seemed completely worth it.

Without warning, Jack slammed into Peter, sending him flying across the room. My lungs burned as they filled with air, and I leaned back against the wall, gasping. Peter had stumbled back into the fridge, but he quickly regained his footing and flew at Jack. Jack was ready for it though and lunged back towards Peter, pushing him back away from me once again.

“Jack!” Mae wailed, sounding utterly panicked.

Ezra stepped forward to intervene, so Peter backed down but only slightly.

Jack stood between Peter and I, his body unbearably shielding me from Peter.

For his part, Peter had a look of barely controlled rage contorting his beautiful features. He held his fists tightly clenched at his sides, and he glared past Jack at me.

“He’s not going to hurt her!” Ezra hissed at Jack, and both of them stepped back a little bit, but neither was willing to relinquish his stand entirely.

“He had his hand around her throat! She couldn’t breathe!” Jack insisted.

“I would never let her die!” Peter shouted incredulously. “I could feel her heartbeat and it never waned!” Then something occurred to him, and he took a step closer to Jack. “What do you even care? How did you even know she wasn’t breathing? What did you do?”

“Stop!” Mae screamed and ran in between the two of them. Ezra had still been standing off to the side, trying to let them sort it out on their own, but Mae put one of her hands on each of their chests. “Nothing happened, okay?

Nothing!”

“What the hell is going on?” Peter looked to Ezra for an explanation. “Why does he care about her? Something’s wrong. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be.”

“We don’t really know what’s going on,” Ezra admitted quietly, casting a look back at me. “This is unlike anything I’ve ever encountered.”

Peter studied me curiously, and my heart started to speed up. I saw his eyes register it, and then I heard Jack moan. Instantly, Peter’s eye flicked over to him.

“You’re reacting to her!” Peter didn’t sound angry so much as bewildered.

He leaned in closer to Jack, eyeing him up. “You didn’t bite her?”

“No!” Jack groaned, exasperated.

“How is this even possible?” Peter was totally amazed. When he looked back at me, his eyes softened and grew even more confused. That didn’t help slow my already quickened pulse.

“Alice!” Jack snapped.

“I can’t help it!” I lamented.

“Jack, go over there,” Mae commanded, pointing to the far side of the dining room. He grumbled something in protest but did as he was told. She walked over to me, looping around me and hugging me to her.

“She might have… somehow become attached to Jack,” Ezra explained slowly. Pain and confusion spread over Peter’s face when he looked back and forth from me to Ezra. “She reacts the strongest with you still, but it seems that some of it may have transferred.”

“How is that even possible?” Peter repeated, and Jack scoffed.

“Why do you even care?” Jack growled. “You don’t even want her!” His words sliced through me like a knife, and I flinched, so Mae tightened her arms around me. What hurt the most is that I knew he was right. Peter only felt things for me because his body made him. He didn’t feel anything real for me at all.

Peter snarled, and Ezra took a step closer to him, just to make he sure he wouldn’t lunge at Jack. “Enough!” I shouted. They were going to kill each other over something as stupid as me, and I wouldn’t stand for it. “If one of you could please just take me home, I’ll be happy to leave you all alone for the rest of my miserable life!”

“Alice, none of us want that.” Mae had started stroking my hair again and held as me close to her as I would allow. “We don’t want you to go.”

“We’re just trying to sort this all out.” Ezra had turned towards me, his eyes settling warmly on me.

“I’m going for a drive,” Jack announced suddenly and strode swiftly across the kitchen. “I’m taking the Lamborghini.”

“Just be careful!” Ezra called after him. The garage door slammed in response, and he stared after it indecisively. “Maybe I should go with him.” He looked over at Mae, who nodded in approval, and he started hurrying after Jack.

“I’ll have my cell if you need me.”

Peter leaned back against the counter, staring awkwardly at his feet. Mae still had her arm around me, and I knew that she would be one of those mom’s that would never let go. One of the benefits to being a vampire was that she’d never really have an empty nest, although she’d never exactly have a full one either. It was obvious that she played mother and nursemaid to the boys, but in reality, they were grown men and actually needed very little of her. The great appeal of me was that I was very fragile and dependant, and on top of that, a girl. For her, I was some kind of enchanted doll, and that explained the great deal of time she spent playing with my hair.

“I still need to make you supper!” Mae burst into life and rushed over to the stove. Fortunately, she had yet to actually turn it on, or whatever she would’ve been cooking would’ve been completely burnt.

“I’m really not that hungry,” I repeated for the tenth time.

“Nonsense!” Mae had her back to me and was already flitting about with ingredients. “Why don’t you go in the other room and relax, and I’ll call you when the food is done.”

“It’s easier to just go along with what she wants,” Peter told me. He took a step away from the counter, towards the living room, and paused, waiting for me. “Come on. We need to talk.” He was right, and even though I knew very little of what we talked about would be pleasant, it thrilled me exponentially.

I walked with him into the living room, breathing in how wonderful he smelled. My body felt relieved just to be so close to him. It was exhausting staying away from him. Every part of me felt pulled to him, and I had to use all my strength to keep me any distance.

“How is your throat?” Peter asked sadly, admiring my neck.

“It’s okay,” I lied. It felt like I had terrible whiplash, but I didn’t want him to feel bad about hurting me. I sat down on the couch, so very purposefully, he sat in the chair on the far side from me.

“I’m sorry.” He looked at me sorrowfully, then dropped his eyes. “I shouldn’t have done that. But you should know that’s what I’m like.” When he spoke again, his voice was barely audible. “I’m not very nice.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You should.” He met my eyes evenly. “You’d be so much better off with Jack. I’m…” He shook his head, unable or unwilling to say exactly what he was.

“But I want to be with you,” I insisted fiercely, and something about my voice startled him into softening a bit. But he quickly recovered, and his face hardened again.

“You don’t know who I am.” He knew how I felt about him, and that I had no control over it even if I’d wanted to, and yet he was still trying to convince me that he was a bad choice. It had already been made, and whether he was good for me or not was of little consequence. “I’m not like them. I’m not good.”

“How are you different?”

I hated that he was so far away from me, and it had finally gotten to be too much. I got up and walked over to him, kneeling directly in front of him. He smiled at me, a rather sweet, sincere one, then reached out and touched my cheek gently, brushing back my hair. His touch sent shivers of pleasure through me, but I fought to keep my eyes open, to keep them locked on his.

“You should be so afraid of me, but you’re not,” he murmured, bemused.

He studied my face, his hand resting wonderfully on cheek. “If you weren’t…”

He licked his lip and sighed. “If I didn’t feel this way about you, I wouldn’t hesitate to kill you. Do you fully understand?” I’m not sure if I would’ve told him that I did or not, but I had started trembling too much to speak. He leaned in closer to me, and his hand moved back, so he was burying his finger in the thickness of my hair. “I am a real vampire. I’ve killed people.”

“You… you have?” I whispered. My heart, which still pounded desperately for him, felt twisted with fear and revulsion.

“Mmm.” He sighed again, this time more resignedly. “They didn’t tell you.

I’m surprised Jack didn’t, but Ezra always tries to protect me. After…” Pain so raw it hurt flashed over his eyes. “Elise died, I went on a rampage of sorts.

Eventually, I got myself under control, but there’s still that thirst. Not just for blood, but for death.”

“But that was a very long time ago,” I protested softly.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” All of his resistance shattered, and his vulnerability made him look impossibly young.

“You won’t,” I pleaded with him.

He stared at me for a minute, and then unexpectedly, he forcefully kissed me. His mouth pressed so tightly it almost hurt and his hand knotted painfully in my hair. Just the same, my body exploded with pleasure. I loved the insistent way he held me to him. Then, just as abruptly as he started kissing me, he stopped and pushed me back. Peter moaned and jumped away from me. Then he turned and left the room Every part of me wanted to follow after him, but I just laid back on the hard wood floor and stared up at the ceiling. My body completely ached for him, and even as my head was reeling with the ecstasy of his kiss, I realized that I didn’t want to feel this way about him. Peter was just going to keep hurting me and pushing me away until there was nothing left. Something in me had been chosen for him, but I was starting to wonder if it had been a mistake.

Mae came in a few minutes later to tell me supper was ready, looking distressed but not surprised that I was alone. She had made some kind of pasta that I recognized as Milo’s recipe, but hers didn’t really do it justice. Considering she hadn’t tasted any of it, I really didn’t think it was that bad, though, and I ate it all with a smile on my face.

After I had finished, Mae cleaned up the kitchen, and I helped her as much as she would let me. Every now and again, I’d hear Peter upstairs, and I’d feel a sharp pain in my side. The fact that he was so close but refused to be with me was completely devastating. I hid it as best as I could, but I’m sure Mae easily saw through my façade.

In the living room, Mae put on the Beatles, claiming that they could heal any mood, and sat on the couch. I sat on the floor in front of her and allowed her to play with my hair. Theoretically, I think it was meant to comfort me, but like the meal she had just made, it was done more as a way for her to get her mothering out. All the while, there was a constant stream of soothing words coming from her mouth, telling me how everything would work out.

When Ezra appeared in the living room sometime later, I felt an unrelenting sense of relief. He kissed Mae warmly, and I found my chance to escape. I slipped out from her and made my way over to Jack. He had crouched down on the floor to rub Matilda’s belly, and I stood in front of him, wrapping my arms around me.

“Did you have a nice drive?” I asked Jack.

He looked up at me, then glanced over at Mae and Ezra, who were busy in their world, murmuring things to one another. At that moment, I hated them for being so easily in love. There was so much drama going on around them, but they could just curl up on the couch together and pretend none of it was there.

“Yeah. Did you have a nice time with Peter?” He raised an eyebrow at me, trying to seem playful, but I saw the hurt behind it. More than that, I felt it, like a burning regret in the back of my throat.

“I’ve had better.” His smile came more naturally after that, and I felt some of the tension ease up between us. Giving Matilda one last pat, he stood up and looked down at me. “Do you want to give me a ride home?”

“I do…” Jack trailed off, and looked up at the ceiling, towards Peter’s room, and then he shook his head. “I don’t think I should. At least not right now.”

“Are you like banned from ever picking me up again?” I had never thought that I would really miss his speedy trips around the city, especially after he almost killed me last time, but it saddened me to think that it might never happen again.

“No,” Jack scoffed, as if anybody could ever ban him from anything. “I just think it’d be better if I didn’t for awhile. He needs to figure out what he’s doing, and so do you.”

“I didn’t think I really had a choice in the matter,” I admitted honestly. My understanding of things was that I was completely at the whim of Peter and Jack. I would be whatever they would let me be as long as it was in their lives.

“Everyone has free will.” He leaned in a little closer to me, looking at me earnestly. “Even you.”

“You really think so?”

“I have to.” His hopeful smile faltered, and he turned to Ezra. “Alice is ready to go home.”

“Sure.” Ezra jumped up from the couch, smiling at me. “Sometimes I forget that you don’t live here.”

Putting his hand on the small of my back, Ezra gently ushered me away from Jack. Looking back over my shoulder at Jack, I wished that things could just go back to the way they were. I wished I didn’t know about vampires or Peter or that my blood had ever been meant for anybody.