Blood Like Poison (25 page)

Bo’s expression was full of guilt and regret.  “That’s what I’m afraid of,” he confessed.  He rubbed a weary hand over his face.  “I should’ve stayed away.”  Obviously frustrated, he turned away from me.

I stood and crossed to him.  I touched his shoulder, letting my hand rest there until he turned back to face me. 

“No, you shouldn’t have.  Avoidance is never the answer.  Yes, life is all about pain and trouble and frustration and anger, but it’s also about love and friendship and good days and sunshine.  You can’t have one without the other.  If you avoid pain, you avoid living.  My family has walked that road for years and, trust me, it’s no way to exist.”

He looked miserable.  “You’ve had enough pain in your life without me adding to it.”

It was my turn to shrug.  What he said was true, to a certain extent.  “But you’ve also brought me more happiness than I’ve seen in a long time.”  More like ever, though he didn’t need to know that.  But then, as I looked into his face, I realized that maybe he did.  “Actually,” I said, casting my eyes down, shy and a little embarrassed all of a sudden.  “I’m happier than I’ve ever been.  And it’s because of you, Bo.”

I was afraid to meet his gaze, heat staining my cheeks after having poured my heart out.  He drew me into his arms and I went willingly, glad to bury my burning face in his shoulder.

“It doesn’t matter.  I don’t think I could’ve stayed away from you for even one more day anyway,” he admitted quietly.

One more day?

“What do you mean?”

I felt him stiffen at my question, so I pulled back to look up into his face, to gauge his odd reaction.

I repeated, “What do you mean?”

Bo just watched me, searching my face for something.  I waited for him to explain, but he didn’t.  A sinking, breathless feeling began to gnaw at my insides.

One image flashed through my mind over and over again, like an eerie strobe.  It was the sight of Bo’s compelling eyes hovering outside the windshield of a car.  Only it wasn’t Drew’s windshield that I was remembering; it was Izzy’s.

Air slowly filled my lungs in a long gasp of comprehension.  I held it there until it burned inside my chest like a raging inferno.

“You were there,” I whispered.  “Three years ago, you were there.”

CHAPTER NINE

Several emotions flickered across Bo’s face, but neither confusion nor denial ranked among them. 

“Bo?”

He sighed, and it was a weary sound that carried a heavy weight.  “Even though it was so long ago, it seems like it happened only yesterday.” 

Bo walked to the window and stared out into the dark.  I could tell he wasn’t seeing the night, at least not this night.  His eyes had a distant look about them, the look of someone peering into the past.

“I hadn’t been turned very long and, fortunately, I slept through most of it.  I’d been in the woods for days when I woke up.  And there was this thirst—a thirst I couldn’t explain, a thirst that no food or water would quench.  That’s the day I met Lucius. 

“He’d been feeding me.  He’s an elder, but he lives a…different kind of life.  He explained what I was, what I needed.  It was like waking up to a different world.  My dad was dead.  The prime suspect in his murder had been released on a technicality.  I was turning into some kind of creature from the movies. 

“For weeks after that, I searched the woods day and night, waiting, hoping to find the person responsible.   I needed blood, but I refused to drink from humans.  I realized that I could survive on animal blood, just barely, but enough to find Dad’s killer.

“I was going into the woods one night, stalking a deer, when I heard the squeal of the brakes.  I ran back to the road and got there just before the car started rolling.  Just in time to see your face through the windshield.  For a second, I couldn’t move.  I can’t describe what it felt like, but I can still feel it when I remember that night.” 

He paused, lost in the feelings that he couldn’t articulate. 

“The sounds of metal and glass on asphalt were so loud.  I wanted to turn and run, knew that I should, but when the car hit the tree and stopped, I knew I had to get to you, to make sure you were alright.”

Though he was finally telling me how he felt—something I’d wondered about and agonized over for quite some time now—it was another thought that took center stage in my mind.  He’d come after me. 
Me.

“I had to know that you were alright,” he groaned.

“Me?”

Bo nodded.

A tiny red spot of anger penetrated the gray cloud of confusion that had settled over me.  It swelled and surged until it had enveloped me in a blinding crimson haze of fury.

“You let my sister die to save
me?”
 

Bo said nothing. 

I was beside myself, unable to contain the pain and the rage swirling inside me.  I wanted to lash out.  Drawing my arm back, I brought my hand around as hard as I could, my palm connecting with Bo’s face in an ear-splitting crack.  “How could you?  How could you do that?  How could you let her die?”

“I didn’t, Ridley.  She was already gone,” Bo explained softly, sadly.

“No she wasn’t, she—”

“Yes, she was, Ridley.  I knew when I saw her that she wouldn’t make it.  Even if I could’ve gotten my blood into her, it wouldn’t have mattered.  Her injuries were too severe.  There was no way she could’ve survived that.  There was just no way.”

It took a few seconds for his words to penetrate my addled brain.  Looking at him, Bo appeared calm and sincere, yet devastated, too.  But, strangely, he also looked somehow deserving, like he was willing to take the blame for something that wasn’t even his fault just so I could have someone to blame, someone to be angry with. 

As quickly as it had come, my anger died, leaving behind only an intense sadness.  I knew what he was saying was true.  Izzy’s head had been crushed against the tree.  Everyone knew that she was ninety percent gone as soon as it happened.  But that didn’t make it hurt any less. 

Putting a hand to my chest, as if to stop the ache that throbbed there, I apologized.  “I’m sorry, Bo.  I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he said, so forgiving and understanding it made me feel even worse.

Though I could easily get caught up in the guilt and misery of mindlessly lashing out at Bo, I couldn’t focus on that right now.  I had to know the rest of the story.

“So then what happened?”

Bo sighed.  “I pulled you out and carried you to the grass.  I could hear your heart beating, but there was so much blood,” Bo said, his face contorting in remembered pain.  He closed his eyes against it.  “And you smelled so amazing.”

“Did you- did you…” I trailed off, unable to finish the question.

Bo hung his head.  His nod was barely perceptible, but I saw it nonetheless.

“I couldn’t control myself.  It was like being taken over by some kind of demon that didn’t think or care.  It just felt.  And tasted.  I couldn’t stop myself, no matter how wrong it was,” he said. 

I didn’t know what to say to that.  I stood quietly by, watching Bo relive those moments that I couldn’t remember, the agony of it, the disgust of it.  The pleasure of it.

“How am I still alive?”

“I heard your heartbeat slow and then I remembered your face from behind that windshield.  You were so scared,” he recalled.  “But you were so beautiful.”  His lips curved into a bitter smile.  “I just couldn’t take your life.  I just couldn’t do it, so I made myself stop drinking.  I realized that I wanted to help you.  I wanted to feed you—my consciousness, my energy.  I wanted to feed you life. 
My life.  
So, I tore open my wrist and I fed you.”

I was silent for a long time, digesting what he’d said, working his words into what I knew of the accident and my recovery. 

“You saved my life,” I stated, as much for my benefit as his.  As if he hadn’t given me enough, Bo had given me back my life.  He’d saved me.

“I almost took it,” he said miserably.

“But you didn’t.”

“But I wanted to.”

“But you didn’t.”

“As you were waking up, I promised you, promised myself, that I’d never drink blood from another human.  And I haven’t.  I live on blood from the bank and nothing else.”

Listening to him, something he’d said before, when I’d asked about my mother, popped into my head. 

“You said you couldn’t stay away from me.” 

Bo nodded. 

“And I feel like I can’t breathe when you’re not around,” I stated absently. 

As I rolled the two puzzle pieces around inside my head, I stopped and looked up at Bo when, with an ominous click, they came together in my brain, showing me a picture that terrified me. 

“It’s you,” I breathed in horror.  “It’s that bond.  You’re doing this to me through that bond.”  I began backing away from Bo, betrayal and anguish rising up inside me.  “You’re doing this to me on purpose!”

“Ridley, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.  You’re making me feel this way.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes you are.”  It was easy to convince myself that the way I felt about him—the desperation that I felt to be with him, the need I felt to have him near—was manipulated, manufactured.  It was easier to believe that than to believe that feeling like I couldn’t live without him was real.

“Why, Ridley?  Why would I do that?  To what end?”

“You’re using me.  You- you’re—” I stammered, not having a good answer.

“No, I’m not!” Bo reached for me, grabbing my shoulders.  “It doesn’t work that way.  But even if it did, I would never,
never
do that to you.  What you feel is real.  Even if I wanted to, my blood is not powerful enough to control you.”

“But Mom was acting all smitten with Lars.  He was doing that to her, just like you’re doing this to me,” I accused bitterly.

Bo squeezed, his fingers biting into my arms.  I flinched and he immediately released me, dropping his hands to his sides where they curled into tight fists.

“No, I’m not.  You saw the way people reacted to Lars.  It’s because he’s so powerful, his blood is so potent.  His presence is like a drug,” he said.

I had to admit that Lars did have a very profound affect on people, one even I’d reacted to a little.  That also probably explained why Bo hadn’t thought much of my temporary thrall.  He’d known what it was.

“I’m not that strong yet.  Even with our bond, I couldn’t make you do anything that you didn’t want to.”

On the heels of that thought was one that was even worse, or at least it seemed that way to me. 

“Is that why you have feelings for me?  Because you drank my blood?”  It was bad enough to think that
my
feelings weren’t real; it was nearly intolerable to think that Bo’s weren’t. It was devastating to think that his attraction was all about my blood, not my heart, not
me,
that it was chemically-induced.

“Of course not,” he declared vehemently.  “Naturally, I crave it.  More than I can even describe, but it’s not
you. 
The way I feel about you has absolutely nothing to do with your blood.  Yes, I felt drawn to find you, probably because of the bond, but that link doesn’t make you fall in love.  If anything, it clouds my feelings for you.”