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MERCER

It should not have hurt like this.

Rahil was just looking out for his community, just trying to protect those he cared about—but his people were vague and huge, and Mercer’s was his own goddamned daughter. The only person he had left in the world. The only person he’d had before Rahil had come barging into his life, at least.

That thought made him cringe, his mind replaying the harshness of his own words, reactive where he’d meant to be logical. This was exactly how he felt at the end of every argument with Lydia—like he’d said all the wrong things, despite walking into the conversation convinced that this time, finally, he’d explain his feelings calmly and have the serenity to listen in return. But instead he’d been scared and the fear had made him snappy, probably even cruel, though as he thought it, he couldn’t remember exactly what he’d said, just how it had felt: like he’d been trying to quickly throw up a protective wall and accidently lobbed bricks straight at Rahil in the process.

His mind was still reeling hard enough to ache behind his eyes, deep into the space between his temples, and he barely noticed Lydia hovering over his still-open lockbox when he first reentered the shed. He might have walked right past her if she didn’t call for him directly.

“Yo, Dad, why does the mold in your lockbox look kind of like Rahil’s fangs?” She snorted, rolling her eyes in the way he was always only seventy percent sure was teasing. “Like, I want to ship you, but that’s so creepy.”

He braced himself, hoping to see the cast he’d taken of Rahil’s fangs and not the finished fang caps—he’d explained the basic concept of kink to her recently, but he was not prepared to get into these kinds of specifics, not now and hopefully not ever; that was what fanfiction was for. But the mold she casually held up to the light, squinting at it as she made a dramatic face, was neither of those. It was a silver metal, its weathered box discarded on the counter: long, lean fangs Mercer had spent years staring at, then even more years trying to forget. But even if he could forget their specifics, he knew he could never forget the day he’d crafted them, the blackened blood he’d cleaned off their edges after pulling them, so gently, from the cast of his wife’s corpse.

Mercer froze.

The floor seemed to cave out from under him, leaving his head floating in a haze of panic. That was—but it couldn’t have been. Rahil’s fangs looked similar, certainly, but Mercer would know if they were the same —and Rahil wouldn’t have—he couldn’t be. This just—

Wasn’t.

It wasn’t.

Mercer couldn’t breathe suddenly, his gaze darting from the mold to Rahil, who’d slowed in the shed’s entrance, his expression unreadable. His fangs were bared. Long, lean, and a little curved. Mercer had thought they’d looked familiar.

He laughed, too loud, too harsh, as he reached for the model in Lydia’s hands. “No, I uh, see the resemblance but they’re—”

“Mine,” Rahil cut in. “They’re mine.”

“They’re not,” Mercer corrected him. “Your mold is in the back cupboard. These are… these…” Mercer spun the model between his hands. One of the fangs nicked his fingers. “Ah.”

Rahil caught his wrist, gently wiping away the blood. He was shaking too. Maybe the whole world was shaking now.

Mercer didn’t know.

“These are also mine,” Rahil whispered.

Mercer didn’t know .

He remembered, like a memory of a dream, that Rahil had been prepared to tell him something about Leah’s death last night, but not this —this wasn’t—this couldn’t—this—

His heart beat in his ears, and it sounded like a banging on a distant door. Thud-thud-thud .

He could vaguely hear Anthony speak over the drowning. “Lydia, would you step inside the house with me? I’d like to run our annual panel early, to ensure you’re doing alright with the current dosage—if your father approves?”

Mercer didn’t feel like Lydia’s father. He felt like nothing and everything. Like a black hole, all-consuming, and all-consumed.

A voice rang in his head: “Is Leah Bloncourt your wife?”

Somehow, he forced himself to nod. “Yes. Go on. Be good.”

Amidst the desolation in his body, he was aware of how Rahil tracked their leaving—of the unholy gold vanishing inside Anthony’s jacket—but Rahil held to Mercer’s hand instead of following. Held, until Mercer shook him off.

He sucked in a breath. It didn’t feel like enough air. “You—” He had to dig her name out of the pit of his soul, carving through his heart as he said it: “ Leah .”

“Yes,” was all Rahil said. “This was what I wanted to tell you.”

He had tried, hadn’t he? But what was a truth or a lie when compared to this? Mercer leaned back against the counter. Not enough air. “So, you—you bit her.”

That was how it worked. He’d imagined the scenario playing out ten thousand different ways, each more horrible than the last, her screams suffocated by huge hands, her last conscious moments an assault of pain and terror as someone ruthless and thoughtless tore her away from this world. Now suddenly, he couldn’t see it at all. There was no space in his fears for this.

This hell.

“Leah came to me .” Rahil said it like it was an explanation . But it made no sense. None of this made any damn sense.

“And you… killed her.” Killed didn’t seem like a real word. Dead . Leah was dead. Had been dead for ten years, her last heartbeat fading into nothing as she drooped in Mercer’s arms. Because of Rahil .

“She asked to be turned.” His voice was so rough and distant. “I should have said no.”

“No.” Mercer shook his head. He could not fucking breathe. He knew the way her eyes had bled, her mouth had bled, her body had twisted and contorted in pain. “No, she didn’t.”

Why would she have? It didn’t make sense. It was a lie, and if that was a lie, then maybe the whole thing—

“She brought scans with her,” Rahil continued. “Doctor’s notes. An inoperable tumor. She was already dying, Merc.”

“That’s— ridiculous .” The world swayed. Mercer swayed with it.

Rahil shifted—he was gone, and then he was back, pressing Leah’s notebook against Mercer’s chest. “I have the results here—she took notes—”

“I would have known!” Mercer felt himself grip the notebook instinctually, but he didn’t want it. He didn’t need it. It was all a lie—she’d told him she was fine. He’d noticed signs, but she’d told him—

“You said you’d seen her pass out? Spontaneously?” Rahil’s hands tried to hold him up, but Mercer shoved him off, shoved himself up, stumbling, catching his body on the central counter. The notebook nearly slipped from his arms, but he held to it.

“That was nothing!” Mercer choked. “She said it was nothing . They ran tests, and it was—it was some autonomic nervous system issue. She was going to be fine .”

Rahil didn’t know. Who the hell did he think he was? He hadn’t known her.

Even if he’d killed her. Even if he’d—

He’d—

Mercer shoved himself toward the shed door. “I have to check on Lydia.”

“Mercer—”

“Don’t.” He didn’t mean to shout it, but it was what came out, sharp as the stake he’d dreamed of stabbing into Leah’s murderer. Leah was murdered . Leah was— “Leave.” He couldn’t see that vampire, any vampire right now, even behind the blurry sheen of his vision and the memory of Leah’s cooling body regurgitating through his mind like an undead thing. His heart screamed, and from his lungs came the short, snapped demand: “Get out!”