Greg, Darling

Two fluffy black cats—completely free of mange—greeted Isla at her door. She threw herself over the threshold and dropped to her knees to fuss over them, cooing and awing fervently. Beasts purred loud enough to wake the dead (pun intended) as they wove between her feet.

"Grumpkin!" Isla lifted one of the cats and nuzzled its black nose (something about that tied my stomach in knots), "Mommy's home! Yes! Yes, I'm home for you!"

The second cat bumped against one of her knees. She walloped him with back strokes. "Boo- Boo! Baby boy, I love you too! Yes, I do!"

"Boo-Boo?"

"Short for Grumpkin Part Deux Electric Boogaloo."

I snorted. Wild how her brain worked. Just wild. "How can you tell them apart?"

One of the cats swatted the other on the nose. Second cat hissed. Together, they chirped and pranced deeper into her apartment. By the sounds of it they were getting themselves into one hell of a tussle. Isla stood, ignoring them, and shrugged.

And that... that was that.

She stood there. Just beyond the threshold of her door. Inside her own home. And I was out here, the mope in the stuffy hall, shuffling stupidly on his own two feet. Show was over. Curtin's closed. Madame Margarita's limited engagement in my... thoughts was at the end of its intimate run. Come tomorrow evening, we squarely knew each other on a professional basis. That's all folks.

Wasn't awkward one bit.

Isla and I, at the same time, sucked in deep breaths.

"Oh."

"Ah."

"I..."

"You first."

"Okay," she swept her hair away from her bruised up face. Missed a piece. I clenched my fists in my pockets. "Thank you. Again. For everything. You're... you're a good guy, Greg."

My peacoat swallowed Isla. Her apartment was warm. Drafty, but warm. I could feel the heat wafting out. She had to be sweltering in that coat. Yet still, she hugged it snuggly around herself. Under all those layers her pulse beat steady, but she caught my eye and shivered as it quickened. My own jumped up to meet hers.

Fanging hell she was pretty. Under all the blood and dirt and bruises she was still a knockout fluttering her eyelashes at me.

I nodded. Mouth had gone too fuzzy with that wine taste of hers just then to say anything else.

Isla licked her lips. "Guess this is... goodnight?"

She leaned in. Just a touch.

I stepped back.

"The office opens at six in the evening," good job, old boy, still cocking it up like a champ, "be there, on time, weeknights, got it? I wasn't fooling with the job thing. You're on my books now, meaning my license is on the line if you fuss this up."

She cocked a brow. "Greg, darling, I strike you as the kind of lady who shows up late to her first day at a new job?"

Greg. Darling.

"Yes."

"Yeah, okay, six sharp, got it," Isla sighed. "Do I get worker's comp benefits? You know, for all the times I should be expecting to get hit in the face while on the job."

"Hmm, we'll discuss benefits after your ninety-day probationary period."

"Fab. According to Phoebe's handiwork, that's in two weeks."

"Ah, she does read the fine print."

"Well when the print is as fine as that—" Her eyes ventured south and she swallowed her voice.

"Madame, please don't make me file an HR complaint before your first day."

"It's my seventy sixth day."

There it was again. Right there. That dumb grin, chipping away at my face. Fangs just poking out over my damned lips. Couldn't help it. Fool.

I tucked my fangs back in my mouth. "Goodnight, Isla."

She sucked on her bottom lip in a way that made me want to die. "Um, before you go, I wanted to ask—and don't take this the wrong way, but why'd you bail me out?"

You'd think, as I watched Isla get pinched from the neighboring building's fire escape, I'd have felt a pinch smug. Maybe even get a kick out of the way she finally she got her comeuppance. In the last week and a half with her, I'd been maimed, staked, nearly decapitated, bribed (twice), risked my PI's license, got chased down a stairwell, vomited up a greasy cheesesteak, played Twister in a murder-van, commandeered a jukebox, laughed so hard I spit blood, developed a new appreciate for cats, made love to a beautiful woman who placed a fanging curse binding me to obey a necromancer's every whim.

Dame burned me.

But, nah. Even after all that, seeing her get slapped with those cuffs gave me no satisfaction.

She just... she looked so tired. So worn out. So frayed at the edges of her seams and her hair and nerves. Wasn't a good look on her. Running in high heels with a can of cheap wine in her hands was. Bones alight beneath her skin as she commanded a herd of undead cats to fight a pack of fanging werewolves was a good look. Wearing nothing but purple silk in a smoky room was a real good look.

"You're fun to have around."

"Aw, hate for more ghosts of lunatics possessing a reanimated corpse on a killing spree to think your unlife is boring?"

"Hate to encounter anymore ghosts of lunatics possessing a reanimated corpse on a killing spree, thanks."

"Mmm. Boring."

"Isla. Please. I'm serious."

She nodded, shoulders sagging. "Yeah, yeah, I know. Hey, you get any rest at all? I, uh, tried to work some magic," she waggled her fingers, "to let you sleep, but I don't really know what I'm doing, so..."

"Thought you were a professional?"

"Screw off." Her nostrils flared. "I... May still have some tricks to learn."

"Oh. No," I said. Huh. I chalked all my sporadic bouts of exhaustion up to the unnaturalness of the situation. Could it have been her magic, giving me a nudge, all along? "But I kept busy."

Isla waved her hand slowly over my face and chest. When she spoke, her husky voice was low and monotone. "Greg, I command you to rest on a totally normal, vampiric sleep schedule. The minute the sun comes up, you'll zonk out, and when it sets, you'll wake up again. Like a real, scary vamp."

Something inside in me, in my bones, shifted. Like a lock clicking back into place. A crack I didn't realize needed popping in my spine. I rolled my shoulders to shake the feeling.

She exhaled. "Feel any different?"

I shrugged, not wanting to reveal just how deeply her magic was hitting me.

"Maybe? I guess." I should go. Leave her alone. Let her sleep. Let me shake her from my bones. "Right, well, I should—"

"I have a plan," Isla grazed her fingers against my arm, stopping me in my tracks. We both stared at the space where we so softly touched. Was she stalling? If she didn't want me to go, she could simply order me not to—though something greasier than a cheesesteak sloshed in my gut at the very idea of Isla... disregarding me... like that. "On how to, you know, undo us—this."

Oh.

I swallowed. "Spill it."

"I think—you know how blood goes through your system, and you get dried out, and whatever. Okay, so, hear me out. I think, I think, if you just let yourself get dry and not drink from this tap again," she said, pointing at herself.

"Don't plan on it."

I pretended not to notice Isla's flinch.

"It'll wear off," she finished, softly, defeated.

"You sure about that?"

She cracked a small smile. "Only one way to find out."

That was her brilliant plan? That wasn't a plan, that was a theory. A brainstorm, at best. A complete hypothetical. Worse than hypothetical, it was nonsense. But, sigh, it was something, wasn't it? She was trying.

I pinched the bridge of my nose. "Okay, I'll keep track of my cravings so we can test your theory out."

I can think of a few ways we could test that out. She didn't say. But I imagined she thought about it. Considered flashing me another coy smile. Bat those lashes my way some more. Run a hand slowly along the veins in her neck.

Suddenly, Isla's brows furrowed. She carefully withdrew her hands from the pockets of the coat. Entwined between her fingers was a pair of stockings. Her stockings. The ones with the little polka dots and puncture marks from my teeth.

Sweet hell, did Phoebe slip them into my coat?

"I, uh, just been meaning to return those," I said, but then promptly clamped my mouth shut to hide my growing fangs.

"How thoughtful," was that a hint of amusement in her voice? She pursed her lips. "I've been thinking more about what you said the other night. About how you felt."

Confused. Embarrassed. Violated. Paranoid. Enraged. Lonely. Lovesick. Betrayed. Stupid. Giddy. Horny. Like a sucker on the edge of losing his mind, mostly. And, to be honest, I couldn't quite parse all those emotions out yet. What was the product of her curse, forcing me to spew my guts before my own noggin had a chance to process those mutating feelings, and what was, well, real, for lack of a better term.

I liked Isla. Had fun with Isla. Was attracted to Isla. Hopelessly so, that much was clear. I stupidly, selfishly, risked my damn business to pull her out of jail. I'd be even more of a fool than I most definitely already was to deny that I was sweet on the dame.

But I couldn't fanging trust her. Wasn't sure how I was supposed to reconcile with that. Not just yet, at least.

"I didn't mean it," I grunted, "Ah, I mean—I don't know what I meant. That night. I told you, I wasn't thinking straight. But you can forget it—we can forget it, right? For now? Pretend it never happened. Like professionals."

Isla trembled inside my coat. "Oh, yeah," her voice left her in a hoarse squeak, "totally. I, you know, I was just going to apologize for not being able to say the same..." she twisted the stocking wrapped 'round her fingers into little knots, "thing back. At all."

Her pulse kicked up—my pulse—when she lied.

"Of all the things, that, is not something you don't have to apologize for," I said, soft and low.

Isla parted her lips.

My limbs seized. Hadn't noticed I was moving. Leaning in, ever so slowly, focused on those lips. Not till the barrier of her home held fast against my intrusion. I tensed. She could see it, sense it probably, the way our bodies froze mere inches from each other, every muscle under my skin quaking.

She smelled good. Yeah, I mean, beneath the blood and gore. Earthy. Sweet flowers and warm dirt and smoky incense. Touch of tobacco. No coffee breath. No minty shampoo. Just her.

"Lucky penny," Isla whispered into my mouth.

"What?" I choked around my fangs.

"If you," her throat bobbed when she swallowed. "If you ever feel like I'm cursing you, or we're being unprofessional, or something. That'll be our safe word."

Safe. Word. She'd just said safe word.

My brain short circuited.

The sparks of the current rocketed through every nerve ending in my body, shooting straight into my groin.

"Mm," was my eloquent reply.

"Do you want to come in?" Isla asked, breathless, panting, lips so close and yet so, so far away.

You couldn't trust her, old boy. This was unprofessional. A mistake.

"Yes, darling."

"You're welcome anytime."

The barrier between us dissolved.

Isla grabbed me by the lapels and pulled me into a rough kiss.

The wet heat of her mouth welcomed my lips. My tongue. My fangs and she tasted good. So good. Heady wine and smoke. Her tongue grazed my teeth, and I swallowed her moans.

We bled together. Our seams. Our desires. Our bodies. Breath. Skin. Pulses. Messy and fanging fantastic. Faster and faster our heartbeats climbed in a perfectly entwined, intoxicating rhythm, until the tight, wet heat of her body welcomed me and we died, just a little, in each other's arms again that night.

Ah, fangs, what was one more mistake?

At least we had a safe word now.