Blood on Telegram

Monday, 2:14 AM

Adrian: You've posted three times in the group and described hunger exactly the way I would. Who's been biting you, Lucy?

Lucy: No one. I've spent four years reading everything out there about vampires. I know how hunger is described in 16th-century Spanish and in Serbian.

Adrian: You don't learn that from books. You feel that.

Lucy: And how would you know?

Adrian: Because I've had that hunger inside me for three hundred years, and I recognize the voice of someone who has it too, even if they haven't turned yet.

Lucy: You're roleplaying.

Adrian: Switch to secret chat. Audio. Fifteen seconds. Close your eyes. If you still say it's an act, I'll leave you alone.

2:42 AM — secret chat activated, self-destruct 24h

Adrian: Audio. Headphones. No one else in the room.

Lucy: Headphones on.

Lucy: Holy shit. Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit.

Adrian: What did you feel?

Lucy: Two points on my neck. Cold. I checked the mirror, they're there. And everything else. I'm soaked.

Adrian: Good girl. That was just my voice from two thousand miles away. Imagine what my mouth feels like at zero inches.

Lucy: You're real.

Adrian: Sommelier at a wine bar in Chelsea, Manhattan. I work nights, obviously. Tomorrow I close at 2 AM. If you come by, I'll show you how to taste wine before it goes down the throat.

Tuesday, 1:48 AM — wine bar, 9th Avenue

Lucy: I'm at the bar. Wearing the short black dress from the forum. You left an open Albariño in front of me.

Adrian: Don't drink it. That's my excuse to take you downstairs. The cellar.

After...

Adrian: Jesus, Lucy.

Lucy: You drank from my inner thigh. I bit into the wine barrel to keep from screaming.

Adrian: You screamed anyway. I covered your mouth with my other hand. You've got the mark.

Lucy: I never imagined vampires were that big...