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MERCER

Mercer wasn’t wrong, was he?

He’d told Rahil they weren’t strangers. Told him he’d think about doing the impossible.

He’d also told Leah he’d be fine alone with Lydia, to go out for the night because she deserved it. When he’d said it, he hadn’t meant he’d be fine alone with her forever. Alone, without his wife to help build the life they’d always dreamed of, to raise the child they’d made together, to love and be loved until they were both old, their curls no longer separated into her red and his black but both of them equally gray.

Mercer had been wrong before.

Every time his reality TV watching spiraled into therapy videos analyzing contestants’ behavior, he wondered if that was what he was truly afraid of—not the loss or the grief, but that it would be his fault.

Mercer kept his ears peeled for the sound of Lydia shifting in her room as he walked the length of the house and back, as though each step he took might reclaim some of the space William Douglas had violated. It didn’t. Instead, it made a subtle ache spring into his temples. He was too tired and stressed to lay down and hydrate.

He, Mercer Jacques Bloncourt, had told a vampire he’d think about being bitten . Bitten.

The idea sent a shiver down his spine and formed a tingle deep in his gut. A flood of shame came with it. This was just an act of intimacy like any other—not that those came particularly easy to him either. And it would be Rahil, after all, loyal and optimistic and brilliant Rahil, who looked at Mercer like he was the most beautiful thing that had ever existed. And here Mercer was… leading him on?

Was he?

Oh God, he didn’t know anymore. He didn’t know what he was okay with, what he wanted, where he saw his future going. All he knew for certain was that he needed to keep Lydia safe, and he really didn’t want to lose Rahil at the end of their working relationship either.

Mercer dropped onto his bed, pressing his fingers to the bridge of his nose as he groaned. When he finally opened his eyes again, his gaze went to one of the few mementos of Leah he could bear to keep around the house—a little squirrel sculpture he’d bought on their third date after they’d spent their entire trip to the local animal rescue sitting in front of what appeared to be the world’s most empty wolf enclosure, chatting about anything and everything. When something had finally moved under the pine trees, she’d grabbed his arm in excitement and he’d jumped with tension, only for them both to burst into laughter as the mysterious creature emerged with a bushy tail and an acorn. Her head had fit so well in the crook of his neck, her lithe body trembling with hilarity as she teased him.

She would tell him he deserved every kind of love he wanted, and then some, right before licking up the length of his cock with a smirk. Mercer didn’t know what it was that made that act, one that had often felt so awkward in real life, burst like a firecracker in his mind.

He shuddered and pressed his palm to the seam of his pants in a slow, cautious motion. The aching that greeted him was enough to make the pain growing behind his eyes dim for a moment. He rubbed again, firmer and more committed, then paused long enough to push the door closed and take himself properly in his hand. He closed his eyes and tried to think only of Leah: her long, lean body, nearly as tall as his, and her firm small breasts, and the cheeky way she’d smile at him before giving him everything he didn’t know how to ask for, how even to want . He refused to let her lips morph into Rahil’s or her short curls to his long braid or her blunt teeth nibbling at his skin to points that could sink in. What would that feel like? He knew that there were people who liked it, even craved it.

That was not what this was, he told himself, stroking harder and faster as the blissful pressure in his cock intensified. It was not this.

He came with a muffled grunt, peaking so hot that for a moment nothing existed but him in his body, and the thought of fangs.

Three hours later, and both his desire and shame had been forced to the background as Mercer stared at his email chain with William Douglas.

Dear William Douglas,

If I agree to forge three fresh pieces of holy silver for you, will you leave my family alone?

V/R,

Mercer Bloncourt

Mr. Bloncourt

So long as the product lasts, I’ll have no reason to return. I’d like to discuss the details in person, though. Just you and me. I’ll be watching.

With love,

William

It made Mercer shake internally, an incessant, deep-seated anxiety that rattled in his bones. His vision tunneled on the sides, the world wavering every time he lost focus. Somehow, he managed to type:

Mr. Douglas,

I will meet you in the far patio area of Van Gogh Park at 8:30pm tonight.

Mercer

He reread the email over and over, yet the moment he pressed send he had to check it again, sure he’d made some mistake. It looked fine. But often things looked fine up until the moment they weren’t. Mercer rubbed his temples and forced himself to breathe. He could hear Lydia’s cackle from down the hall, and he held onto that.

The vibration of William’s incoming email still startled Mercer’s heart into his throat.

See you then.

With love,

William

Mercer closed his eyes and prayed: let this not be a trap . He had been the one to propose it, he knew, but he also didn’t put it past William to twist the situation to his own benefit. What other choice did he have, though? He’d flipped through the news in between drafting his first email, just to be sure of himself.

The cycle alternated between the current war across the seas—the newest one, anyway—and whispers of a press release coming from Vitalis-Barron, alongside statements from Wesley Smith-Garcia’s lawyer—some woman named after a Greek hero, though Mercer could never remember which one—and the drabble of endless everyday life: gun violence and police violence. It hadn’t taken him long to find an article about a detective in Las Vegas who’d used holy silver to get a confession out of a vampire she’d arrested. The woman received a week of suspension; a week during which the vampire had died in a holding cell of causes reported to have nothing to do with the police who held the keys to his room.

The Lydia-sized child inside Mercer wanted more than anything to find someone to take over this situation and save the day, but if there were going to be heroes here, they would have to be himself—himself and Rahil, with the ghost of Leah’s genius guiding the vampire’s hands.

He forced his feet under him, his phone into his pocket, and his lungs to expand, then contract, expand, then contract. There was one more hurdle to climb before the Everest he’d be summiting at 8:30 tonight, this one a little bundle of sass with a beanie and probably a fresh bag of Cheetos. He paused in front of her door, just listening for a moment to her muffled motions, the occasional line from whatever teenage thriller-romance she was into and the grumbles of her protesting the character’s utterly baffling choices. Maybe someday she’d come back to watching quirky reality dating shows with him.

Or maybe, he’d ask if he could join in on her shows.

Maybe then, she’d even say yes.

Mercer closed his eyes, preparing himself for the worst. “Hey, Puck, can we talk?”