Blood Ties Bundle: Blood Ties Book One: The Turning / Blood Ties Book Two: Possession / Blood Ties Book Three: Ashes to Ashes / Blood Ties Book Four: All Souls' Night

Nathan turned around, his expression dark. “Fine. I’ll make sausage instead.”

I clenched my good fist. “You know what I’m talking about.”

He opened the fridge and pulled out eggs and milk, pointedly turning the side of the carton labeled Z away from himself. “I do. And I told you before, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Well, I do!” I stamped my foot.

Nathan poured the milk and the pancake mix into the bowl without measuring, the way a mother would after years of preparing breakfast for her family. Except I’d never seen a mother with such a murderous scowl. Nathan suddenly threw down the wooden spoon in his hand. It bounced off the rim of the glass bowl and splattered half-mixed batter everywhere. “Just because I don’t want to stand here and have a Hallmark moment with you doesn’t mean I didn’t love Ziggy. I cared about him more than somebody like you could ever understand!”

“Somebody like me?” I hated the shrillness of my voice when I was mad. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

He folded his arms across his chest. “You tell me. What exactly did you have to do to keep him safe, Carrie? And so I can appreciate how indebted to you I should be, how much did you enjoy it?”

His remark twisted like a knife in my heart, just as he’d intended. Rage set my limbs trembling. I lashed out. “I did what I had to do! Unlike some people in this room!”

“What are you talking about?”

“Why didn’t you give Ziggy your blood? You could have saved him. All it would have taken was a little of your blood! Why didn’t you do it?”

The question had hung between us since the moment we left the mansion. It had been the cause for the tension we’d felt all morning.

Nathan looked at me, his eyes filled with confusion. “You think I let him die?”

The pain in his voice stole my will to fight. “Do you think you let him die?”

With a growl of fury, he shoved all the dishes and utensils off the counter. The glass bowl shattered at his feet, and the clang of metal nearly deafened me as the pans collided with linoleum. Nathan stalked forward, and I took a step back out of reflex more than fear. He wouldn’t hurt me. No matter how tough he tried to appear, he wasn’t the type to abuse someone weaker than himself.

“I would rather have him dead than be one of us!” he shouted, so close to my face that his cold breath stirred my hair. “You only know your change. You got to stay the same person you were before. Not everyone is so lucky. The blood has different effects on people. It does something to you, it makes you do things you wouldn’t normally do.”

I looked down, all too aware that I could have just as easily saved Ziggy with my own blood.

“You saw that, that thing.” Nathan spat the word, as though no reference to his sire could ever accurately describe his hideousness. “His blood is in mine. How could I put that into my son? How could I make him…”

He was running out of anger, and all that was left for him was despair. “How could I make him like me?” On the last word, his face went ashen and his shoulders sagged in defeat. He crumpled to the floor with a cry of anguish.

Faced with a man’s tears, I reacted much in the way a male would to a woman crying. I stood silently and watched his misery, feeling helpless in the awkwardness of the moment. Then I realized I had to do something, so I knelt on the floor of the tiny kitchen and put my arms around him. “Nathan, you’re nothing like them.”

I thought he’d push me away, but he returned my embrace, clinging to me like a drowning man to a piece of driftwood. “You don’t know me, Carrie. You don’t know what I’ve done.”

I wondered how long it had been since he’d let himself cry or talk to anyone or, God, even feel. Unable to think of any better way to comfort him, I held him while his cold tears wet the front of my shirt and his back shook with unrestrained sobs.

A long time later, when he’d composed himself, we salvaged the dishes that had survived his wrath. As if nothing had happened, we set about making breakfast side by side in the tiny kitchen.

Because there was nothing else to talk about, I asked about Ziggy.

At first, Nathan resisted, giving short, perfunctory answers. I’m not sure if it was talking through the tragedy that soothed him, or making breakfast, but he soon fell into an easy pattern of storytelling. “Ziggy was a runaway. He left home when he was nine. Can you believe that?”

I shook my head sympathetically and let him continue.

“His mom was on drugs, his dad was in jail. His stepdad beat him so badly that he had two broken ribs when I found him. Every few months, I’d do the rounds at the Goth clubs. I’d look for wannabes and vampire hunters, and kids who got into the role-playing and took it too seriously. Usually, I’d give them a good scare and send them home.” He motioned for me to flip the bacon I’d arranged in a frying pan, and leaned to turn down the heat.

“Ziggy had fallen in with some pretty stupid kids. They were in their early teens, but they let him hang around. They called themselves vampire hunters, but I’m glad I got to them before they could get in any actual trouble. These kids had no idea how to fight. They all ran from me. Except Ziggy. We stood in that alley for two hours, staring each other down. I even did the whole—” He waved his hands in front of his face. “He just kept insisting he was going to kill me and rid the world of, I think the term he used was ‘hell spawn.’”

I imagined a nine-year-old Ziggy staring down a killer vampire, and it brought a smile to my face. “What did you do?”

“I would have washed his mouth out with soap, if I’d known he’d had a gift for that kind of language. I took him to Denny’s to get some pie.” He smiled at the memory. “He hadn’t eaten in days. He was so skinny, you could have turned on a flashlight on one side of him and it would have shone through to the other. I asked if he had a place to stay, and he tried to play it off like he had all sorts of options. I told him he could stay with me, and he’s lived here ever since.”

He paused, clearly noticing he’d used the present tense. But he didn’t correct himself. “You know, I feel like any second now he could walk through that door.”

Before he could get too emotional again, he reached for a whisk and set to mixing the pancake batter. “He was only my donor for about a year. I don’t want you to think I was taking advantage of him.”

“I didn’t.”

“And I don’t want you to think I didn’t love him because of what happened before he left. I followed him. I looked all over town for him until the sun came up and I had to come back here. I had a hell of a burn.”

“I’ll bet.”

Without saying anything further, I got two plates and laid out some silverware. I wasn’t sure pancakes would hit the spot in the absence of blood, but cooking seemed to be therapeutic for Nathan. By the time we finished, we had pancakes, eggs Benedict, sausage and bacon. He had just gone rummaging through the cupboard, muttering under his breath about muffin mix, when I stopped him.

“I’m sure this will be enough. I mean, I don’t know if vampires can gain weight, but I really don’t want to take a chance.”

He laughed softly. “I’m sorry. I’m used to cooking for a teenage boy. It’ll take me a while to get used to this.”

Not sure how he’d react, but needing the contact to reassure me, I laid my hand over his as he reached for a plate of bacon. “Nathan, you don’t have to put on an act about this. Not with me.”

“Hey, forget about it. But I’m glad to know you’re there if I need you.” When he smiled, I recognized the Nathan I knew. The calm surface stretched over a terrifying riptide of emotions. It was a depth he probably didn’t visit, for fear of drowning in his past.

By the time eleven-thirty rolled around and we headed downstairs for the meeting, we’d sunk into an easy pattern of speaking without saying anything.

The shop looked much better than I’d expected. Last time I’d seen it, it had been full of burnt, smoke-damaged merchandise. Now it was a totally different store. New shelves were empty and draped with plastic. Sawdust covered the floor and made the air hazy, making it seem as if workmen had just left.

“It looks good,” I said, touching the freshly painted trim. I wiped my hands surreptitiously on my jeans and hoped he hadn’t noticed.

Nathan inspected the new countertop and ran his fingers over it. “The firemen said it was faulty wiring and I wasn’t going to tell him that a crazy witch was actually responsible for the fire. Insurance covered the remodel. It’ll be a shame to leave. This place looks better than it did when I first bought it. Maybe I should send Dahlia a thank-you card.”

A lump rose in my throat at the thought of him leaving. He was the only friend I had in the city. “You’re leaving?”

Nathan nodded. “I’ve been here fifteen years, Carrie. My customers are starting to comment on how well I’ve aged. It’s one of the first signs that I need to go. That, and someone called offering to teach power yoga in the back room. Power yoga. I don’t think I have the strength to put in another decade here.”

“Where will you go?” I asked, willing myself to sound casual. “Back to Scotland?”

“No, not there. I haven’t given it much thought.” He quirked an eyebrow. “Why? Are you going to miss me?”

“Ha, ha.” I tried to change the subject. “What do we have to do to set up this meeting? Do we need coffee and doughnuts?”

He smiled, a little wickedly, in my opinion. “How’s your arm?”

I lifted it uncertainly. It was sore, but practically healed. “It’s okay. Why?”