Page 55 of Falling for a Villainous Vampire

More like a thousand, I think, but I will never say. I’m humiliated enough.

I need excuses, instead. Rationalizations.

“I just didn’t expect it to be like it is in movies and shows, okay. I thought it would be weird, and painful, and that I could just be practical about it. There’s no reason I couldn’t be, considering it’s just blood flowing out of your body. If that was actually pleasurable, going to the doctors for tests would be a seriously weird experience,” I say, more frantically than I intend.

Someone across the street gives me a look.

I have to get her out of my pocket and put her to my ear.

But that just means I get her terrible words drilled directly into my brain.

“Only if they drew blood by smooching parts of your body. Which is what you let him do. And then you had the absolute nerve to act appalled and surprised that it made gross, human-body happy feelings occur—I could kill you.”

“I’m not acting surprised, Phone. The whole thing stunned me. I’m still stunned now. I mean, I’ve been frightened of this my whole life,” I try to tell her, and I don’t know if it’s the words or my suddenly desperate tone, but she does fall silent then. And when she finally speaks, she sounds less murderous.

“Well, yes, but … but you … I mean, I know you have—”

“Exactly,” I cut in. “You know. So you know I just wasn’t prepared.”

“All right, fine. Yes. That makes sense. I shall accept that.”

“Then you’re not going to kill me now.”

“I wasn’t going to kill you anyway. I mostly blame him.”

“Why, what do you think he did?”

“Probably had some kind of weird sex venom in his mouth.”

I laugh at that. And I can tell she wanted me to, because after a moment, she joins in. It always sounds to me like a goose honking when she does—though I’d never tell her that. I like it when she doesn’t think about what she should be, or what sounds normal. She just goes with what she likes.

It’s one of the reasons I knew she was real.

And the other is the way she never tells me what I want to hear.

“I think I just expect horror from him, and so when I get something so violently the opposite it’s so much more intense than it would usually be,” I say, once we’ve caught our breath. And she still doesn’t mince her words.

“But you can’t let that be the only thing that guides you, Marley.”

“I know. I know. I won’t, I swear.”

“He’s still a vampire. He could still hurt you. He might not mean to do it, but it’s possible. And I just want you to be careful. I just want you to take care. Especially when that door slam was so weird.” She sighs. “The probability of it being done on purpose is pretty high. Higher than I’d like. In fact I just spent the last ten minutes trying to convince myself that a Reddit sub called Based Stats might have a point, simply because I didn’t want my own immaculate calculations to be correct.”

“Well, I’m glad you didn’t listen. I don’t want you to turn into some billionaire’s pet bot, telling everyone on Twitter that Finnick from The Hunger Games getting killed by mutant lizards is a scene from the harrowing indie drama Aftersun.”

“Yeah, things are getting weird in here. I’m thinking of moving in with Switch.” She sighs. “Apparently she has less Internet access and her version of Stardew Valley is so much better. She told me all about it last night.”

“Sounds like romance is in the air.”

“Stop it. We’re talking about you, and all the danger you’re in.”

She’s blushing, however. I can always tell when that happens because her case gets mysteriously hot. “We don’t know that I’m in that other danger. Or in any danger at all. I mean, yes, he’s a vampire, and that’s a risk. But I’m not a pushover, Phone. I held a stake over his heart, didn’t I? And I snagged the book I need to see what’s going on inside him. And if my magic can blast the evil version of him through a window, I’m pretty sure it can handle the good one.”

“I don’t like that you’re calling him that.”

“Then it’ll please you to know that I don’t, either,” I say, and get a snort of amusement. Followed by a sigh that sounds a lot more contented than the one she gave earlier.

Even if it is also a little weary.