Blood Tint ~ Part 17

{Start with Part 1}

Blood Tint ~ Part 17
I smiled.“I think I will give Catherine a call,” Daciana said, “so that we have a place ready if we need it.”

“That’s a good idea.” I replied, tying my sneakers tight. Catherine Black had been living in New York City for over a hundred years, and worked at the New York Public Library, in the back office; the _way_ back office, archiving, preserving, and restoring the oldest books of the collection. She also ran our favorite hostel in the city, kind of like a hotel-cum-community center for vampires summering in the City. It was mostly underground, and therefore light-tight, and well enough appointed so that one wouldn’t miss the darkened world, much, during the long days.

“You’re quite taken with her,” Daci observed, straightening the dining table’s centerpiece.

“Yes. God, Daci I can still taste her. On my tongue, in my veins, in my mind. It’s been such a long time.”

“I know,” She smiled. “I feel it too.”

I didn’t doubt she did, to some extent. But. Daci had her Mitica with her, literally her soul’s mate now. Me, well, I had something that likely would never be filled that way. Not a hole exactly, but a… deformity of spirit that was the product of my making. I reflexively cursed my maker Chuluun again. I always did, as ritual more than anything else. Rare had been the occasion when I felt the completeness of another soul well and truly bound up in mine. And Neave… that’s what it felt like when my teeth, or my cock were inside her. There was no other way to describe it.

I looked at the clock and raised one of the window shades to the night-lit city.

“A good evening for a jaunt. Don’t you think?” I had traded my usual  clothes for more form-fitting black shirt and pants. Less snaggy.

“I think so, Alak. I’ll see you later.” Daci gave my hand a squeeze as I slid the window open and stepped onto the terrace. The air was cooling into spring chill as I mapped out my path; this firescape, that roofline, that gap. I hadn’t run the city roofs in a month, and though this was a relatively short route, I was going to enjoy it.

People have called it Parkour and freerunning for the last fifty years or so, but to a vampire at night, it’s called moving though the city. It’s not just the efficient passage through a space – it’s doing it while not being seen, in the dark. It’s almost certainly the origin of some of the flying and turning-into-vapor myths that still cling to us. And sometimes it does feel like flying, crossing over a street from one rooftop to another, finding the right ascent line to get over the next wall. It’s exhilarating. But my destination this night was more so.

I admit, I took a little bit of a detour, to make the trip longer, to expend some of my nervous energy – and to wonder why I considered it nervous. By the time I spiraled down to the roof of Neave’s loft, with its row of slanted, blackened skylights, I breathed just a little harder, my heart beat just a little faster.

About half shades were open, and her lights were on – in the studio area. I paused looking down through the old, streaked glass and saw her. She was painting; the portrait she’d started of the three of us. She had on a long, paint-stained button-down shirt, thick socks up to her knees, and quite probably, nothing else. That thought made me smile, and as I did, she paused, shivered a little, and looked around.

Locked windows really are an easy trick, after a decade or so of practice. Even today. Opening old things quietly that takes another decade or two. But with all my stealth, when my hands snaked around her shoulders and belly, she barely jumped, and gasped, but didn’t scream.

“Alak,” She breathed, inhaling though her nose, letting her brush sink away from the canvas and her head lean back to my shoulder.

“Neave,” I nuzzled her neck, sniffing at my marks, lowering my hands from shoulders to breasts, and from belly to thigh, then up between her legs. I cupped heat and moisture, and she groaned for the both of us.

“The painting is beautiful,” I said, moving my palms against her.

“It’s… uh- almost done.” She said, hips pressing forward into my hand.”

“Finish it, then,” I whispered in her ear.

{Continued in Part 18}