Page 40 of Suck This

I was turned in his arms, and with one look into his eyes, I realized my mistake.

I was treating him as a person. One who played by the rules.

Constantine, although he had been a human at one point in time, wasn’t anymore. Nor was he the type to play by the rules.

“Fine,” I whispered roughly. “I’ll sit.”

And I did.

Like a nice little girl.

I watched as the men crowded around the body bag that held Chen. I watched as my brother milled about outside the office door not even six feet away, eyes scanning over a video feed.

I watched some more as my brother got a phone call, and his face turned purple.

He must’ve just gotten the call that Chen’s body was stolen.

If I had to guess, Pavlov likely didn’t even leave a trail.

Likely, one second he was there, and the next not. Cameras were probably even rolling the entire time.

My brother was going to have a coronary.

“You doing it or am I?”

I returned my gaze to the men to see Pavlov, Abraham, and Constantine standing over the coffee table. Constantine was shrugging out of his dress shirt, and underneath he had on a simple white t-shirt that clung to every curve and dip of his chest.

Pavlov had been the one to speak, and he’d been in the process of removing his own dress shirt.

Constantine waved him off. “I got it.”

Pavlov nodded his head, and Abraham used his fingers to press on his jaw. Chen’s mangled mouth dropped opened

This really was the creepiest thing I’d ever seen.

Then, without further ado, Constantine slit his wrists with a silver blade he produced out of nowhere and forced it over Chen’s mouth.

Pavlov stuck his finger between Constantine’s wrist and Chen’s mouth, then forced his fingers down the dead man’s throat.

I guess to force the man to take the blood whether he wanted to or not.

Which, I guess since he was dead, wanting and not wanting were moot points.

Blood from Constantine’s wrist, a surprising amount of it, leaked out of the sides of Chen’s mouth and started to fall to the white carpet underneath the three men’s feet.

It also rolled onto the couch, collecting into a pool underneath Chen’s head.

My stomach wanted to revolt, but I managed to stay still, even though everything inside of me urged me to run out of the room and never look back.

And still, nothing happened.

“He’s been gone too long,” Abraham said, sorrow filling his voice. “If your blood couldn’t bring him back, then he’s not going to come back.”

“Acadia,” Constantine snapped. “Bring me a bag of blood out of my fridge.”

I blinked, struggling to comprehend what he’d just asked me.

Then, woodenly, I got up and walked to the small refrigerator that was located in one corner of the room, opened the door, and reached for a bag of blood. The only bag of blood.