Envious Of Fire (Kissing With Teeth #2)

11. Countless Other Nights to Play.

—?—

Kyle sucks his tongue as he wipes down the counter. The bar is quiet, only three at a table in the back, no one at the front counter, a morose tune lazily playing from the jukebox.

It’s only been two days since Lazarus paid them a visit, yet it feels like it was weeks ago. Like the events at the House of Vegasyn, everything is pushed away from Kyle’s mind, pushed far away, as if to deny any of these things actually happening, as if Lazarus poses no further threat, as if Jessica was just a dream, as if Tristan is still dead and gone.

How much longer can he keep pretending he’s okay?

“Nah, I’m fine, Leland’s got me,” says the café owner from down the street, who is usually here drinking away his marital woes, but instead seems focused on the TV and whatever game is rerunning at this hour. “Nah, really, no refill, said I’m fine.”

His eyes shift, barely looking at Kyle, his fingers drumming anxiously along the rim of his glass. His heart rate is increased. Perspiration on his palms. Kyle senses these things, too.

“Alright,” says Kyle, then moves away.

And his eyes catch two others in the back, the curly-haired sisters who run the bakery. They look up, spot him, then look away and resume whispering to each other.

Kyle washes a glass, tries not to sense their fear as well.

The glass snaps in his hands. Shards dropping into the sink.

When he looks up, everyone else is looking at him, silent, wide-eyed—even a man in the corner booth Kyle had assumed was asleep. Is this something Kyle has been ignoring? That maybe the lovely citizens of Nowhere aren’t quite as comfortable with him as previously thought? That maybe after the night just a week ago when he confessed his secret to everyone here in town, people have gotten to talking and spreading rumors?

“No, Kyle, you’re overthinking,” says Cade over the top of her laptop. “If there were rumors bouncing around, I’d be the first to hear. Everyone loves you. Well, except for maybe the chief,” she quickly adds, “but he doesn’t love anyone except his Jer Bear. Oh, while I’ve got you …” She spins her laptop around, lifts it up, puts the screen next to her face. “Do we look alike? This woman and I? Even a tiny itty-bitty bit? She shares my gran’s maiden name.”

No matter what Cade says, Kyle can’t shake the feeling. He sits in the park long after the bar closes, on a bench that faces a sad patch of land that now and then tries to grow grass, but is mostly just dirt and dust, which the playful night wind picks up every few minutes in a swirl before his face. There were a handful of kids here just the other evening throwing around a football. It landed at Kyle’s feet. He picked it up and threw it back, and one of the kids shouted, “You got a great throw, sir!” It made Kyle think about his life in Texas, his teammates, his childhood with Brock, and everything else that seemed bent on crushing his heart. Then one of their parents came rushing over to usher her kid away, glancing back warily at Kyle.

It isn’t just paranoia. Kyle can literally feel everyone’s fear. It seems recent, as if the love he felt in this town just last week has been poisoned. Something has changed. Or perhaps it was just inevitable. Something in his eyes that people feared.

This late at night, the park looks dark and threatening. It seems like everything looks dark and threatening lately. Kyle can’t even trust that a simple shadow isn’t another monster. He isn’t sitting here in this park to relax. Or to think about football or the good days. He’s watchdogging. Convinced Wendy and Tristan and all the evils of the Vegasyn domain don’t give a shit about Nowhere or its people. Probably would be in Vegasyn’s best interest for the humans of Nowhere to be picked off one by one by the likes of Lazarus and whoever else desires a taste. Lord Markadian is likely laughing at the news, delighting in Kyle’s slow demise. Maybe next time, it’ll be a pack of coyotes possessed by Satan that come by. Or an evil leprechaun, if they’re really lucky.

Kyle needs to keep his eyes open and his Reach awake at all times, if he hopes to stop anything else from showing up and terrorizing his friends—or worse.

“You’re home so late,” says Elias when Kyle finally comes through the door. “Did you stay behind to help Cade again?”

It was Kyle’s excuse last night as well. “I need a shower.”

Elias cuts him off in the hall, grinning. “Before you eat?”

Kyle looks at him. “Nothing fazes you, huh? At all? After what happened, you’re still ready to get down?”

“You’re crazy if you think I’m letting one incident destroy our fun.” He grabs Kyle by the hips, pulls their bodies together. “I want you to tie me down real good tonight, real, real good, and then sink your teeth in wherever you please.” When Kyle’s throat puckers, at once aware of Elias’s eagerly pulsing veins, he wonders if his thirst isn’t just one more thing he pretends is under control.

Minutes later when Kyle ties Elias to the bed—facedown—Elias lifts his head to add, “Maybe tie me a little looser, just so I can squirm better.” Kyle can’t help but wonder if his request is actually a precaution—just in case Elias needs to escape, despite his fantasy of having no chance of it.

But then when Kyle crawls atop his back and grazes his lips teasingly over Elias’s sensitive skin, choosing the perfect spot to bite, Elias suddenly bucks, fidgets, then turns his head. “Sorry. Maybe we, uh …” He shakes it off. “Never mind. Keep going.”

“What is it?” asks Kyle.

“Nothing, really, keep going. Bite me, babe.”

There’s no hiding the fear that still swells within Elias like cold waters, prickling and relentless. It isn’t the excitement that he usually feels when anticipating Kyle’s teeth. It’s something else entirely—something bad.

“No, no, wait,” protests Elias as Kyle begins untying him. “Stop. What’re you doing?”

“It’s too soon.”

“It’s not, it’s really not! I’m fine. I want us to have some fun tonight, babe. Haven’t we been through enough? Hey, tie my hands up again! What the fuck?”

Kyle has already gotten to Elias’s ankles, releasing them. “I can bite you just as easily without restraining you.”

“But I wanted—”

“Another time.” Kyle crawls atop the newly-freed Elias, now face-up. “We’ll have countless other nights to play.”

Elias frowns. “Can you at least bite my favorite spot?”

Kyle brings a hand to Elias’s hair, smiles. “Of course.”

When Kyle brings his lips to that perfect spot which makes Elias’s insides bubble with excitement, he finds himself kissing it first, tenderly, sweetly. “Yeah,” moans Elias. “I like that, mmm, I really like that.” Kyle brings out his tongue, laps at Elias’s neck. Even without being tied down, Elias enjoys the feeling of being pinned to the bed by Kyle’s strength. “I’m all yours, my neck, my body, my blood …” He squirms beneath Kyle, his neck playing upon Kyle’s lips, teasingly, invitingly. “I want it so bad …”

Kyle hesitates, fights a misgiving, then unleashes his teeth—and can’t bite. No matter how he spins it in his head. No matter his actual thirst. No matter Elias’s reassurances. “Sorry,” breathes Kyle as he rolls off, drops to the bed, puts a hand over his eyes.

The worst part is feeling Elias’s disappointment, heavy and sticky and peppered with the natural ire of sexual frustration. It is quickly put out by a sudden wave of empathy. “It’s okay,” he says, and then come his big arms, wrapping around Kyle and holding him on the bed. “Just lie here with me … we can just lie here.”

A brief moment later, however, Elias slides his hand down Kyle’s body and stops at his waist. After a minute’s hesitation, Elias slips his fingers under the waistband of Kyle’s pants, makes the pleasant discovery of Kyle’s cock, and slowly begins to wrap his fingers around it.

The appetite reawakens in Elias.

Which in turn reawakens Kyle’s. “Elias …”

“What?” asks Elias innocently. He slides down the bed and opens Kyle’s pants, freeing his cock, then begins to wake it up with long, even strokes. “Doesn’t mean we can’t do other stuff.”

Kyle struggles to protest. It feels too good. Amazing, even. Their bodies are holding so much tension lately. Isn’t it totally reasonable to want a little relief from it?

“Apparently you want it more than you think,” says Elias, noting that Kyle has gotten rock hard in seconds. “Maybe it isn’t my neck that needs sucking on tonight …”

Kyle puts up little resistance the second Elias’s tongue runs up the side of his cock. The sensitivity of such a small touch is multiplied with Elias’s sexual hunger, still pent-up from having not been bitten, and Kyle can’t hold back his moaning. Maybe Elias’s frustration makes the experience even more powerful for Kyle, as he feels both of their desires building up with every lick of Elias’s tongue up and down his length.

Then Elias’s mouth wraps around the head, and Kyle is lost to the symphony of pleasure now surging through his body.

Nothing more can trouble his mind, not when a part of his body so easily becomes under Elias’s control. Inside his man’s mouth, he feels a thousand undeserved pleasures.

Elias turns every movement into art, his mouth running up and down with increasing pace, muscles in his back contracting, flexing, squirming gracefully in his efforts. Kyle has no strength nor desire to resist him anymore, already racing toward an edge he was certain he’d never find tonight.

Through the unremitting waves of pleasure, Kyle picks up something else in his boyfriend. A swelling sense of safety and comfort—as well as control. Maybe this is what Elias really needs.

Even if it forgoes what he seems to want.

The moment Kyle has the thought, Elias lets go of his cock abruptly, then sits up and straddles Kyle’s stomach. A different desire takes Elias over, surprising Kyle, entirely unrecognizable from the first. Their connection is strong tonight, giving Kyle every spark of inspiration now igniting in Elias.

“I’ve got you,” Elias assures him, as he takes hold of Kyle’s cock again, then directs it between his plump cheeks with ease. “I’ve got you so good,” he adds in a teasing tone as he lowers himself onto Kyle’s cock. There’s a moment of pressure before Kyle’s cock slips inside, and Elias’s lips curl with satisfaction.

Kyle takes hold of Elias by the hips—is he being led by his own desire or Elias’s?—and moves in motion with Elias’s gentle rocking, as he slides further and further inside.

While Elias loses himself to the rush of their bodies being joined, Kyle finds himself peering at the curtained window, and though he sees nothing, no silhouette in the night, no shadow lurking, he can’t help but see the fear that still lives in him that no amount of activity on a bed can push away completely.

Until Elias’s finger finds Kyle’s chin and turns him forward again, smirking. “Nope,” he says. “We’re not even gonna think about that window for the rest of the night.”

“Babe …”

Elias leans forward, still rocking atop Kyle’s body without missing a beat, and brings his forearm in front of Kyle’s face. “I know the perfect distraction for you, too.”

Kyle narrows his eyes.

“What?” Elias chuckles. “You only keep me around for my blood, right? Fuck that guy. He doesn’t have to understand what we have, what we are.” The firm and muscular flesh of Elias’s arm presses against Kyle’s lips. “Bite.”

With a rush of sexual pleasure below and the echo of Elias’s desire back into Kyle, it’s difficult to resist anything. He wants it as badly as Elias does, even despite the circumstances, which seem to get worse no matter their efforts.

Lazarus’s face appears before Kyle, with maddened eyes, needle-thin pupils, his long pale hand pressed to Kyle’s face—“ Drink ,” Lazarus demands, just as he did before, and Kyle gulps his fill with a dark and terrible pleasure.

Suddenly Kyle’s hands fly to his face, covering his eyes.

Elias stops at once. “Kyle?”

“Sorry,” he groans behind his hands. “Sorry, babe … my … my mind is just … I can’t …”

“I get it. I’m … I’m sorry.” Elias slides off of Kyle at once, sits next to him on the bed, gently caresses the side of Kyle’s face. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s okay,” Kyle insists, words muffled behind his hands. “I just need … I think I just need a minute, just a minute to calm down, or to get out of my own head, or—”

“No, Kyle. Don’t force yourself.” Elias lies next to Kyle at once, puts an arm around him again, rubs him. “We don’t have to do anything tonight. I … I guess I wasn’t the only one who was attacked by that fangy asshole. You need time, too.” Elias kisses Kyle’s cheek, his ear, then rests his head by Kyle’s on the pillow. “I pushed you too much. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, it’s okay, don’t be sorry,” says Kyle, unsure if he’s telling Elias or himself, “we’ll be fine, totally fine.”

“I know we will be,” agrees Elias softly, then not much else is said as the men lie there cuddled next to each other. After a while passes, Elias suggests a shower, Kyle agrees, and the two rise from the bed together and head for the bathroom to clean up. “We can try another night,” says Elias after their shower as they cuddle for sleep. Kyle nods, whispers, “Another night,” then nothing more is said as the dark blue of morning pushes through the curtains.

But the next night, Kyle stays in the park even longer, with his wary eyes scanning the area like a radar, ready for any sign of danger. And this is after another strange night at the bar with even less customers. Is he becoming bad for business, too?

“Nope, I’m fine,” said the café owner earlier, arms crossed on the counter, eyes on the TV, “Becks got me earlier.” And when Kyle went to Cade’s office, she was still too obsessed with her research to hear Kyle’s worries. “Now does she look like me?” she asked, yet another photo of a possible relative brought up on her laptop, a side-by-side. “I think I can see it in her eyes, maybe, kinda, sort of. Am I reaching? Does it seem like I’m reaching? Ugh, I’m totally reaching. Wanna hang with me for a while? Leland’s been wanting to practice bartending lately, he can take over. He gets so restless in the kitchen.” And Kyle only stared back at her, not daring to ask if there was another reason Leland’s taking over, too stuck in his mood. He just nodded, dropped into a chair, then listened to Cade explain how she is almost, totally, not quite, but most certainly convinced she may have a relation to some famous “Norwood Coven”. Kyle couldn’t follow her all that well, his mind too crowded, his emotions everywhere.

Nothing feels good. Nothing feels comfortable anymore.

Everything is wrong.

When Elias holds him in bed later that same night after a brief make-out session that involved a bit of frustrated groping, Kyle feels Elias’s racing heart, the gentle grind of Elias’s legs upon his own, and picks up every subtle hint that Elias is more than ready whenever Kyle is. Yet still, there is no desire in Kyle to bite Elias tonight or initiate any further activity.

Is the desire gone completely, giving way to fear?

Who is he anymore?

What is happening?

“Vampire,” murmurs Kyle into the silence, long after Elias has fallen asleep, testing the word. “Vampire.” He keeps trying to see if it will ever feel natural to utter, if it will someday stop feeling wrong. He wonders if Tristan has ever let himself say it.

Vampire.

It’s Saturday night at the bar, now four days since Lazarus appeared, four long nights of no further threat, and Kyle can’t stop thinking about the cheery, hopeful smile on Elias’s face as he kissed him goodbye on his way out the door for work. “The deck isn’t coming along as fast as we wanted, I know,” Elias had said, “but good things always take time, and before you know it, we’ll be relaxed outside on a pair of rusty lawn chairs, protected from the sun, in the middle of the day, just like a pair of boring, normal people.” Kyle lingered at the door a second longer than usual imagining that concept: being a boring, normal person. It followed him on the way to work, when he peered down every alley and checked every out-of-place shadow. A boring, normal person. Elias’s cheery smile, acting like some wall between their happy-ever-after and the nightmare that won’t let them go.

“It’s important we find out everything we can about our true selves,” says Cade at the bar after making a comment about how “totally deadsville” it is for a Saturday. “I may be concluding jack shit about jack shit, but it sure feels like an adventure each time I explore my family tree. I may have landed a number I can call tomorrow morning, see if I can’t connect a couple puzzle pieces.”

Kyle is eyeing a table in the back, where Jeremy and Layna are playing some card game, slapping heart after diamond after club after spade onto the table, now and then laughing, now and then playfully arguing over who won which round. They’re the other reason Cade stepped out of her office—the unspoken third reason being a particular song that came on the jukebox and pulled her out from under the pile on her desk.

“Do you … ever grow curious, Kyle?” she asks, her voice a touch quieter. “About … y’know … others like you?”

Kyle meets her eyes. Cade may be the only other person in this town who could understand a fraction of how he feels.

“I still regret saying all that the other night,” she mumbles.

Kyle’s brow creases. “About what?”

“My vision. The burning house and all that. It was so out of line. I know,” she says quickly, lifting a hand, “you encouraged me anyway, told me not to give up, shared about that deranged fortune teller you went to one Halloween with your brother and friend as kids … and I am amazed, sure, that she got some facts right, two out of three isn’t bad, if we don’t want to assume it was all just a bunch of self-fulfilling prophesy and manifestation with a bit of luck … but … I just want to say, I’m sorry. It was insensitive of me. Yes, I’m one of those types, I haven’t stopped thinking about it since I let the words out of my mouth.”

Jeremy throws up his hands when Layna slaps down the final card with a triumphant laugh, winning their game. Kyle wonders if they consider themselves “boring, normal people”. If anyone in this bar sees themselves as boring or normal. If, when described with such words, anyone else would feel as much joy as Kyle would, as much relief, clinging to those terrible words.

“You haven’t looked me up yet, have you,” says Kyle, hands busy cleaning a glass, “the real me … how I allegedly died.”

Cade is struck by that notion. “Why the heck would I?”

“Because then you’d read a story about a mother, a father, and their two sons who died in a freak fire in the 90s.” Kyle sets the glass aside, reaches for another, while Cade stares at him with her lips parted. “And yes,” he adds, “I am curious about others like me. Very. Just as you are about where your visions come from. They definitely are coming from somewhere.” He sets the glass aside with the rag, lets out a sigh. “The trouble is, do we really wanna know the truth about what we are? Do we really wanna know where it all comes from? … or where it’s all headed …?”

“Are you about to do something crazy?”

Kyle’s eyes snap to hers, caught off-guard. “What?”

“Did you discover … more … like you?” She comes closer. “Is that why you’re saying all of this? Are you about to go and do something super fucking crazy?”

Kyle drops his gaze to the counter, stunned.

Cade takes his hand at once. “Listen. I know, all of that shit I just said about my visions being bullshit, and then you dropping that bomb on me about your family and the fire, but you should really be careful.” She comes even closer to him, whispering now. “I had another vision. A pale face, long body, long black hair, like a real fucking Dracula type …”

The words turn Kyle’s heart into a pounding drum.

“He wasn’t alone. ‘ Dracula’ had some freaky friends. One of them looked like a normal person, but some … not so much. And they couldn’t see me … but I saw them. And I felt cold. And I couldn’t see well because it was all dark … all the sounds were echoing around me, hurting my ears … and then I saw you.”

The drum in his chest continues to pound and pound. Do vampire hearts race like this, too? Or will Kyle’s someday stop?

“You were standing in front of a deep, dark hole. You were scared. In danger. But then you jumped in.”

Jeremy and Layna let out another burst of laughter, now at the jukebox. Kyle is only distracted for a second, glancing their way, before wincing in discomfort. The telling of Cade’s story is twisted worse by her own emotional account of it, both her words and her feelings stabbing Kyle like a cold, evil blade.

“If any of this means anything, if it someday comes to mean anything, I just want you to know. I want to be useful. I want to be helpful, especially if … if you really are planning to …” Her hands are warm as she holds his. “… to do something nuts.”

“Thanks,” Kyle chokes out, his lungs squeezed.

“Be careful. I mean it.” She closes her eyes and squeezes his hands tightly, then whispers, “May your burdens prove smaller than they feel, your path prove clearer than it seems, your soul be strong, bones be sturdy, and heart be willing to see beauty in things big, tall, tiny and small, and nothing at all.”

Cade’s special words, something her gran always said, like a ritual to wish someone well. Kyle finds an unexpected sense of comfort in hearing them, even if some part of him feels utterly incapable of being saved or protected right now.

Not until he deals with the issue head-on.

Not until …

Kyle walks into his house to find Elias asleep prematurely on the couch, perhaps having tried (and failed) to stay up late for Kyle to come home.

But Elias isn’t snoring. His breaths are sharp and jagged, and from his body, Kyle feels only fear.

Elias is having a nightmare.

“Elias,” murmurs Kyle as gently as he can. He draws to the couch, crouches down, puts a hand on Elias’s back.

Elias jerks away with a gasp, eyes flapping open, cold sweat dressing his forehead, sweat soaking through his tank top. His wild eyes find Kyle’s through the semidarkness, with just a dull light that was left on spilling in from the kitchen. “It’s okay,” says Kyle, “it’s just me, you’re okay.” It takes Elias a moment to realize he’s awake, to trust Kyle’s words. Then he changes his demeanor at once, face softening. “Was the craziest thing,” says Elias, trying to laugh off the nightmare, “had this dream where I was stuck gambling at this stupid penny slot, and then it came alive and started spitting tokens at me, except the tokens were, like, bees or something—I swear I’m not high—and then …”

Kyle smiles, listening to him go on. But the smile becomes strained as he listens more, until at last Elias goes to make some dinner, and Kyle is left by the couch in a daze, listening mildly to the sounds in the kitchen, alone with his thoughts. They eat together—Kyle enjoying the smallest bit of human food, all he needs each day to get by when he isn’t drinking blood—then they take a shower together to wash away the evening. Then comes that inevitable time of night when Elias tests the waters of whether Kyle is ready to have some fun.

Except tonight, Elias doesn’t even ask. “Ready to sleep?”

Kyle lies on the bed next to him, wondering if he’s already given up. Or if he’s still just being kind, respecting Kyle’s space.

And Kyle wonders what Elias’s nightmare was really about.

Had Lazarus come for him again in his dreams?

Did he let out his fangs, this faceless monster Elias has never seen, to take another taste of Elias while he slept so peacefully?

What if it wasn’t Lazarus in Elias’s dream?

What if it was Kyle?

It’s long after midnight that Kyle slips from Elias’s arms, stands at the bedroom door, watches his boyfriend sleep. Elias is dreaming calmly now … unlike before on the couch. Kyle wishes he could ensure that Elias always sleeps so calmly, with no nightmares hiding in the shadows. Kyle would happily give anything to guarantee their safety.

It’s why Kyle decides to put on a t-shirt and pair of jeans. Shoes. Write a note. Put it on the kitchen table next to Elias’s favorite coffee mug, the one with “R.I.P. SLEEP” written in small block letters across the middle.

Then slip out of the house, unheard.