“So? Do you have any good tips? Just in case the next vampire I get locked in a cage with isn’t as friendly?”
He chuckled mirthlessly. “I’ve not seen many humans capable of coming out on top from an encounter with a vampire. But we do have some vulnerabilities.”
“Like silver?” I asked, thinking back to the thin chain the fanatics had tied Warin with. “As far as I know, that’s never been in any of the campaigns. I can’t believe those lunatics were better prepared than the Nightwalker Department. Will wearing a silver necklace protect me?”
“No. Nothing will protect you from a vampire, Liv. Your best defense is to avoid us at all costs.”
“Says the vampire currently walking me home in the middle of the night,” I said with a cheeky grin. “Just what any girl wants to hear.”
His laugh sounded more genuine this time. “You’re amusing when you’re intoxicated.”
“Psh.” Eloquent as always. “What about you? Do vampires not get drunk? I saw you finish several glasses.”
“You saw nothing but a well-practiced trick,” he said with a casual shrug. “We can’t ingest alcohol or other food substances. Most of my kind learn sleight of hand if they wish to blend in with humans.”
“Huh,” I said, feeling extra bad that he’d had to sit through getting mauled by my female colleagues while stone-cold sober. “Guess that’s handy—don’t know many other bars that’d let a kid drink.”
“Excuse me?”
I grimaced. “Sorry, I mean ‘young men under twenty-one.’” A moment’s clarity made me stop and squint at him. “Wait…” I mentally facepalmed. He was a goddamn vampire. Well-fucking-done, Liv. I wanted to excuse my idiocy with how drunk I was, but the truth was that I’d assumed he was very young since we met.
“You’re older than you look.”
His sculpted lips quivered once. “I am.”
I blew a raspberry, displacing my bangs with the gust of air before I resumed walking so I didn’t have to see the gleam of amusement over my idiocy in his blue gaze. “Well, don’t I feel like a tit. In my defense, it’s really hard to relate to. Do you just… freeze in time? Face-wise, I mean?”
“Something like that.” He was smirking, but at least he wasn’t rubbing my nose in it. “We have another way of estimating age than by appearances.”
“Length of fangs?” I suggested with a grin.
His laughter rumbled in the cool air around us. “Charisma.”
“Hmm…” I turned my head to look at him through narrowed eyes, trying to sense anything about his charisma that would help me put an age on him. “Thirty… two?”
“No.”
I looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to reveal the real number.
“C’mon, how old are you?” I finally moaned when he failed to bite.
A downright wicked smirk spread across his lips. “Older than you, little one.”
I made a crude noise, which brought back his laughter. “And how old am I, then, oh wise one?”
“Twenty-seven,” he said without missing a beat.
Huh. “That’s cheating, you know.”
“Would you like me to guess again with a blindfold over my eyes this time?”
He was mocking me. The infuriatingly smug vampire by my side was full-on mocking me for my lack of age-guessing superpowers.
“Yeah, well, I can drink alcohol. And eat chocolate ice cream, so there,” I huffed.
Warin crinkled his nose as if that wasn’t something to envy. Psh!
“I’d die without Ben & Jerry’s chocolate fudge brownie—it’s nothing to turn your nose up at,” I proclaimed with a dramatic flourish of my hand.
His blue eyes sparkled mischievously. “I’m already dead.”
“I’m really not sure that argument can win this discussion,” I said, voice tart.
Warin chuckled. “You truly are a strange human, aren’t you?”
“How rude,” I hummed. “You know, you told me the same thing when I was locked up in a cage and certain you’d eat me too. It’s not saying anything great about your character, you know.”
“That’s true.” He sent me a gentle smile.
Something down low in my abdomen melted in response.
“Warin…?”
“Liv?”
“Are you really older than me?”
“Is it important?” He sounded infuriatingly unconcerned.
Only if I don’t stop having perverted thoughts about you.
Which I was. As much as I wanted to give in to my booze-addled hormones, I so wasn’t going there. And who’s to even say he was interested anyway? He hadn’t so much as glanced at Skye’s or Raven’s cleavage, and I didn’t have nearly as much to offer in that department.
Maybe he was gay.
The silence stretched between us as we walked side by side along the pavements. The streets became quieter and quieter as we left Chicago’s busier areas, only the odd car passing us by. With anyone else I’d known as briefly as I had Warin, I would have felt compelled to fill the silence with smalltalk, but not with him. It was a comfortable silence, the kind I’d always imagined you could only get with friends you’d known for years.
He was the one to break it some minutes later.
“Were you raised in Denver? Your friends mentioned it.”
“Yes. Got out of there as soon as I could, though.”
He must have caught on that I didn’t want to talk about my hometown, because he changed the subject without prying further. “Have you been in Chicago long?”
“No, just about four months. I move a lot. You?”
“I’ve been here a while.”
“You don’t sound too happy about it,” I noted. “Do vampires not get to travel much?”
“Some do. I have… obligations that keep me here.”
“Secret vampire business?” I guessed from his cagey answer.
He chuckled. “You could call it that.”
I sighed as as I came to a stop, looking up toward the complex where my rental condo was located. It was a two-hour walk from the bar by Dark Dreams, but it felt like it’d only been twenty minutes.
Warin stopped too, eying the building behind me. “This is your home?”
“Yes. Well, the condo over there.” I nodded toward the ground floor apartment furthest to the left of the building. I bit my lip as I looked at the vampire in front of me, and realized I didn’t want it to be the last time I saw him.
“Will you model for me?” I blurted.
“Pardon?” His eyebrows raised half an inch.
“I want to draw you. Your portrait,” I hastily explained, not wanting him to think I was a complete pervert. “Nothing, uh, nude or anything.”
He considered me for a moment. “Could we continue talking while you did this?”
I lit up, warmth blooming in my stomach that he’d apparently also enjoyed our chat on the walk back. “Yes, of course. As long as you sit somewhat still. Uh… when do you have time?”
His eyebrows furrowed as he pulled out a smartphone from his pocket and tapped on the display a few times. “I have a couple hours free after sundown on Monday. How long would you need for this drawing?”
“Oh, we can stop and pick up as many times as needed,” I beamed. My answer was purposely noncommittal—I was planning on getting as much pencil time out of his face as possible. And as many facts about vampires as I could too.