Bad Vampire by Lauren Dawes (read aloud books txt) 📕

for the blood. I’m not sorry if that’s how we can find this vampire. I’m sorry for the other thing.”

I forced my eyes to widen, deciding to play dumb. “Other thing?”

“The distraction I provided?”

“You mean touching me?”

Sawyer shook his head, his gray eyes clear and unbeguiling. “Other than your arm, I didn’t touch you,” he replied.

What the hell was he talking about? As if my body wanted to scream at him that it remembered being touched, a bolt of lust shot through me. I shifted in my seat, the reality of his words sinking home. “You manipulated my mind into thinking…” Jesus, I couldn’t even bring myself to say the words.

He nodded, never taking his eyes off his work. “I could see that you were terrified, and I needed to relax you. Believe me, I would never intentionally use my powers to influence you unless it was absolutely necessary.” Dumping the bloody gauze onto the table, he opened up a bandage and some more non-stick pads. “I think you should know what species I am.”

“You’re an incubus,” I told him. I shouldn’t have enjoyed how much I’d clearly taken him by surprise, but I did. I felt like I was lost in this supernatural world, always the one with the wool pulled over her eyes, so it was nice to be on the other end, even if it was for something as small as this.

“How did you…? Faline,” he growled.

“Yes, Faline, but don’t be pissed off with her. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“Hold this.” I pressed the non-stick pad in place as he unwound a little of the bandage. “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to throw me under the fucking bus if we got into trouble.”

“Buses aren’t my style. I prefer taxis. Those drivers are savage.” He stared at me, and I shrugged. “I know what you mean. I was a loose cannon. I’d watched my partner get murdered and didn’t do a damn thing to stop it. Or help.”

He nodded, still working the bandage around my forearm. “If you could do that to a human partner, I didn’t want to think about what you would do to a supernatural one.”

“I would never…” Pausing, I thought about the words I was about to say, about what I’d told Faline. “We’re partners, Sawyer. You being an incubus doesn’t change that.”

“And you being human doesn’t change that for me either,” he replied softly, amusement glittering in his gray eyes.

“Are we bonding, Sawyer?”

His mouth flexed into a small smile, the one I knew showed his genuine amusement. “In our own strange way.”

I sighed through my nose and said, “Okay, you’re an incubus. So did you use your pussy-soaking whammy on me?”

I got a loud laugh that time. “Pussy-soaking whammy?” he asked.

“Yeah, you know, that thing you do to make women pant all over you. I saw the way that woman in the coffee shop reacted. She looked like she wanted to claw my eyes out for standing close to you.” Eh, it was a stretch of the truth.

Sawyer looked confused, then when it finally dawned on him, he said, “That was you? The woman in front of me?”

I huffed. Don’t let it sting. “Yeah. Am I so unforgettable?”

He had the good grace to look chagrined. “I don’t know what to say. I went in there to get coffee. I was in a bad mood because I was getting a new partner and I’d lost the bet.”

“Bet?”

“Yeah. We had a pool going about who they would send and who they would be assigned to. I got shafted twice.”

I tried not to laugh. Really, I did. “Alright, so bad mood Sawyer,” I pressed, hurrying him on because thinking about him hating me made my chest hurt.

“Bad mood Sawyer equals slightly misdirected energy. I needed to feed before I met you, so I took a hit at the coffee shop. I didn’t even notice who was there. All I knew was there were three women in there, and I needed something. That woman in line behind us and the barista were soaked for me. I could smell it. You, on the other hand…”

“Me?”

He stood up, collecting the gauze and packaging as he did, then disappeared into my kitchen. “You,” he said as he returned, shivering. “You are something else.”

“I have a feeling I’m not going to like what you’re going to say next.”

He sat down beside me on the couch, and I shifted my body around, facing him. My arm throbbed dully, and I held it on top of my leg carefully. I studied his face. He looked so torn, so I decided to save him from saying anything more.

“So with the witch, that was all in my head?”

He nodded. “I’m sorry if I overstepped.”

I didn’t care that he’d tapped my mind like an overripe watermelon. I hadn’t been able to make the cut, so he did. If we caught the vampire now, it was because he was there to help me.

“I’ll call it even if you tell me why you don’t have fangs like Faline.”

“Only female sex demons have fangs.”

“Sex demons? Woah, I thought you said you were an incubus.”

“I am. We’re a species of sex demon—well, what humans call demons. For us, it’s just a different race. You have black, Caucasian, Asian, and so on. We have our own classification system.”

“Alright, so females get fangs. What do male sex demons get? A twelve-inch dick? Orgasm-inducing cum? Your finger turns into a vibrator?”

He laughed, throwing his head back as he did. One point to me. I needed to lighten the mood. Seriously though, I knew he had the twelve-inch dick package when he’d gotten into the shower with me after the accident, but was there anything else?

“So, are we good? You know…” He gestured to my bandaged arm.

“Yeah, we’re good. Although, now I kind of wished I’d used my necklace instead.” I glared at the shard of mirror on the table.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Less stabby,” I replied absently.

He conceded my statement with