Sucker Bet (Vegas Vampires #4)(45)
Author: Erin McCarthy

It took several minutes to drain him completely and Gwenna was nauseous and panicking by the time she was finished. She almost never bit mortals anymore, not since blood bags, but when she had, there was always a flow of thoughts and emotions, human life, along with their blood when she fed.

With Nate there was nothing. It was absolute silence and that terrified her.

"We’re going to fix this, Nate, I promise." Gwenna had no real idea what she was doing, but she didn’t see any other way to go about it, so she sliced open her wrist with her teeth and dripped the blood from the wound into Nate’s open mouth. The hot liquid sort of pooled on the top of his teeth and tongue and dribbled out the corners of his mouth and down his neck.

"Shit." Gwenna pushed up on his chin and forced what would be a swallowing action if he were still alive. Maybe it was too late. Maybe a mortal had to be alive still, if only by a thread, to make the change. Without functioning organs, maybe this wouldn’t work.

Yet when she opened his jaw again, she saw the blood seemed to have dissipated, so she squeezed her wrist hard and pumped more into his mouth, filling it to his teeth. Then she shoved his mouth together, held it there for a moment, opened, and started the process all over again.

After the fourth time of filling his mouth with blood and forcing it down his throat, he bit her. Weakly, but he caught the tip of her finger with his teeth when she was prying his lips open.

Gwenna jumped in shock, than gave a sigh of relief. "Oh, Nate, God, please be okay." She forced her wrist over his mouth again, and this time he clamped on and sucked of his own volition. Sliding alongside of him to get a more comfortable position, Gwenna held her wrist up to him, but let her head drop into the crook of his arm. She needed a minute to regroup, to think, to figure out how to explain this to him, and to let go of the fear and panic that had engulfed her. She took a few shuddering breaths and relaxed her body, taking comfort in the hard pull of Nate’s mouth on her wrist. He was getting stronger, she could feel it, taking more of her blood with each subsequent suck and swallow.

It was working. His body was starting to twitch and move next to her, little jerks and spasms. She was starting to feel weak from the loss of her blood, so she detached herself, figuring she could feed him from a bag if he still needed more. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to move away from him. Hand on his chest, she felt the reassuring rise and fall of his breathing, and let the tears run down her cheeks.

Four days wasn’t a long time to know a man. Not when superimposed over the length of her life. But at the same token, those nine centuries of living had taught her to measure a person’s integrity quickly, and she knew that Nate was a solid human being. His caring and concern for his sister were evidence of the quality man he was.

Her entire life, she had been refusing to be honest with herself about Roberto. Despite his positive attributes, he was, in essence, rotten to the core. She had never wanted to admit that, had told herself that everyone was complex and multilayered and no one was perfect. She had still cared about Roberto because she had loved him once fully and completely and they had shared a life, a marriage, no matter how rocky those years had been. And she glossed over Roberto’s flaws because of her own guilt. They had created a daughter, the most obvious and enduring connection between a man and woman, and she had never told him. It didn’t seem right to cast stones at him for his behavior when she wasn’t exactly beyond reproach.

Yet the time had come to tell Roberto the truth about Isabel. And to admit to herself that a man who would order Nate shot, order Kelsey drained of blood, and earn his money via illicit drug dealings was not worth even her sentimental holding on to the past.

Because she had done just that for so long, though, Nate Thomas had taken a bullet and died. It made her feel sick, and she wouldn’t blame him if he despised her after he woke up and found himself a vampire. She would be profoundly disappointed, and yes, heartbroken, because she truly cared about Nate, but she would understand his feelings.

"Gwenna?"

She sat straight up and looked at Nate. His eyes weren’t open yet she had definitely heard him, shaky and steady, but sounding very much alive. "Yes, it’s okay, you’re fine."

"I feel like shit," he said, dragging in a ragged breath. His eyes opened briefly before fluttering shut again. "I dreamed I got shot."

"Just go back to sleep, Nate. You’ll feel better after you’ve had a few more hours of sleep, I promise."

From the looks of it, he already was. Gwenna touched his clammy and sweaty forehead. He was burning up. Undoing his shirt, she ran her finger over the puckered exit hole from the bullet. Right through the heart. It occurred to her if the bullet had gone in his back, and exited out his chest, it must have lodged somewhere in his truck. It hadn’t hit her, she was sure of it.

Standing up, she bent over and stripped him of his jacket and dress shirt. He slept straight through it. Balling the clothes up, she tossed them in his laundry room on top of the washing machine, and pulled a thin sheet out of his linen closet. She had no idea how long he would sleep, but she was guessing for a few hours. As she laid the sheet over him on the sofa, she glanced at the clock on his microwave in the kitchen. It was only five o’clock. She guessed he’d sleep until midnight or later. Then he would need to feed again. She would have to dash back to her place for some blood bags for the both of them, but she was concerned about leaving him just yet.

Wandering around his living room, she took in the vintage rock posters framed and hanging, the midcentury modern furniture and streamlined decor. It suited him and the low-ceiling ranch house. Everything was straightforward and uncomplicated, not the least bit fussy. A glance in his kitchen proved that he wasn’t much of a cook, though he did appear to be addicted to coffee. He had three different coffeepots, a French press, a grinder, and six pounds of beans in various roasts and varieties.

He was tidy. Clean. She had been in his house before and had got the same quick impression, but moving around, really looking at everything, it was obvious to her that Nate liked order in his life. She popped her head into his bedroom and saw that he had made the bed, the rust-colored duvet pulled crisply, white and beige pillows stacked in front of the dark wood headboard. The closet was open and two ties were discarded on a chair next to the dresser. She could picture him getting ready that morning, methodical, determined, even as he was torn apart with grief for his sister.

The second bedroom shocked her. She hadn’t understood that Kyra had lived with him. Yet there was the evidence in front of her in the form of a hospital bed, personal effects like books and magazines, a bulletin board with a collage of photos. Women’s clothes hanging in the half-open closet.