I saw Bo’s arms wrap around me and I felt his lips on my skin. I felt his thick hair running through my fingers and his rough palms against my bare breasts.
Warmth poured through my veins as I lost myself to the fantasy. When Bo spoke, his voice startled me.
“Ridley, if we’re gonna make it out of here, you’re gonna have to stop thinking about stuff like that.”
I felt heat rush into my cheeks. How could he know what I was thinking?
“Stuff like what?”
“Stuff like what you were thinking. This is hard enough for me as it is, without that,” he said.
“How could you possibly know what I was thinking?”
“I can smell it on you. It saturates your blood with hormones and heats it up,” he explained. “And it’s driving me crazy.”
If possible, even more heat scorched my cheeks. I’m sure they were probably beet red.
“I- I—” I stuttered, not knowing what to say.
I saw his shimmer as he stood. He was so close I knew that I could nip his chin with my teeth without moving more than an inch.
“And knowing that my blood is pumping through your body, that a part of me is inside you,” he paused, his sigh a shaky puff of air that tickled my face. “It’s killing me.”
His words poured through my veins like lava, making my knees weak and my skin flush.
“Bo,” I groaned.
I felt it when he stepped back.
Bo thrust his shirt at me. “Here, put this on and get to the road. They’re coming.”
In the quiet, I could hear the wail of sirens from far away. As I pulled Bo’s shirt on, I heard him turn and walk through the woods and then I saw his pile of clothes rise into the air, as if by magic.
“I’ll see you later,” he called softly and then he was gone.
When I could hear Bo no longer, I turned and made my way toward Drew’s car. I had no trouble finding it; I could smell it. He’d always kept a cherry scented air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror and I followed the aroma through the forest like a trail of bread crumbs.
I jogged easily through the woods, feeling more energetic than ever. Once I got to within a few hundred yards of the car, I could see it—clearly, as if I was standing near it in the bright light of day, even though dusk had almost given way to night.
The ambulance pulled up a couple of minutes after I arrived at the car and, as Bo suspected, they immediately wanted to give me a thorough once-over. Luckily, because I was walking around and making sense and I didn’t appear to be bleeding, they didn’t dig too deeply (like underneath my clothes). One of the cops who accompanied the EMTs did, however, dig into my story as he drove me back to my house.
When a cop dropped me off at the house, I got the fifth degree from Mom and Dad, which surprised me. I think it brought back terrible memories for them. I’m sure they were terrified of losing another child in a car accident, even if that child was like a phantom houseguest to them most of the time.
When they finally fulfilled their parental obligations, they let me go to my room. I pushed the door shut behind me and leaned back against it, closing my eyes and breathing a sigh of relief. My room was my sanctuary.
The air smelled stagnant and made me feel claustrophobic, so I walked to my window to raise it. Before I reached it, I heard the screech of wood scraping against a metal track as my window rose.
My feet faltered and I slowed, creeping closer to the window. Just as I stopped in front of it, the intoxicating scent of Bo assailed me and I felt that bone-deep yearning that so often overcame me when he was near.
“Bo?”
“I’m here,” he said from somewhere outside my window.
“Did you just—”
I trailed off. Of course he did. How else would my window get raised?
“What?”
“Nothing,” I said.
I saw the screen pop out and then heard the shuffling sounds of him crawling through the window. I wondered about how he’d gotten the window up through the screen, but the thought was lost as soon as Bo started walking toward me. I couldn’t see him, but my nerves stirred with every step he took in my direction. It made the hairs on my arms stand at attention.
“I wanted to make sure you were alright,” he said, coming to stand in front of me. He was so close, I could feel the coolness of his body radiating toward me, like standing in front of an open refrigerator door.
“I’m fine.” And that was entirely true now that he was here. “I see that you didn’t go home,” I said, referring to his transparency.
“I wanted to keep any eye on you until you got home safely.” Gently, he rubbed the backs of his fingers over my side, where I’d been impaled. Even through his shirt, my skin felt chilled. “How does it feel?”
“Fine, like it always has. It doesn’t even hurt,” I assured him. I left out any mention of how his touch was affecting the rest of me.
Bo lifted up the edge of his shirt and slid his fingertips along my skin.
“Yow! Your hands are like ice,” I yelped.
Bo jerked his hand back as if I’d slapped him. “Sorry,” he mumbled.
I felt him step back from me, and I instantly regretted my reaction. I stepped toward him to close the gap between us. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed my body to his, goose bumps breaking out all over my skin. I steeled myself against the cold, determined not to shiver.
“Bo, you’re freezing. How long can you stay like this? Without food?”
“A while.”
I could hear the weakness in his voice, feel the little tremor that vibrated through his body.
A solution occurred to me, one that brought a hint of fear and dread, but one that I felt compelled to offer.
“Could you, um, drink from me?”
Again, Bo jerked back as if I’d hurt him. “No!”
His reaction made me feel dirty or unsavory, like the thought of drinking my blood was somehow repugnant to him.
“Why?” I couldn’t keep the hurt from my voice.
“I will never do that,” he spat.
“But why? You need blood. I can give you that, just like you gave me yours.”
“I don’t drink from humans. Only killers and monsters do that.”