Adam hadn't slept in days.
He couldn't stop thinking about her, about those eyes that reminded him of the last sunrise he ever saw, centuries ago, from atop a cliff in a town that no longer existed. Sometimes, if he closed his eyes and focused, he could still taste her blood, thick and laced with nicotine, on his tongue. Fuck. How could he let this happen?
That night, Ian showed up on his porch for the third time this week. He asked about her the last time Adam answered and he slammed the door in the younger man's face. He didn't want to talk about her. He didn't even want to think about her, all warmth and fucking poetry and music. Fuck her. But even telling her to fuck off in his mind made him just want to fuck her again. To taste her. God, she had tasted exquisite.
Tonight, Adam finally relented. He opened the door to find Ian standing there. He was about to say something but Adam interrupted immediately. "Coffee. Now."
Ian's face lit in a boyish grin. "Sure, man. Coffee. Whatever you want. I'm just happy to see you."
Adam drove. Ian talked about everything and nothing and Adam completely ignored him which Ian didn't seem to mind at all. They pulled up alongside the diner and Adam took a deep breath. If he'd had a heartbeat, it would have been pounding but instead his insides just ached.
"I can't blame you. She was," Ian made a low whistling sound, "damn, she was hot."
Adam lunged across to the passenger side and roughly grabbed Ian by the throat. His fingers dug into the man's flesh. Ian's pulse quickened under his fingertips and his eyes were wide with fear and confusion. "Talk about her again," Adam growled, "And I will rip your heart out through your throat."
Ian raised his hands in surrender and Adam let go. "Sorry. I'm sorry. You're right. I'll stop. Seriously though, man, that was metal as fuck. Have you ever considered doing metal?"
Adam groaned and leaned back in his seat. He stared down at his pale, veinless hands. He hadn't even bothered to put gloves on. What was the point? He exited the car. A light drizzle fell. The rain reminded him of Eve. Her face always lit up and she would spin and dance beneath the drops. He asked her why once and she said, "Feel it, love. It breathes the life back into you." He scoffed at her. He hadn't understood, not then. He wished he still hadn't.
He paused outside the diner. He could see her through the glass door, moving among the patrons. Ian headed inside, rubbing at the marks on his throat, but Adam wasn't ready, not yet. He knew, as soon as he went through the door, everything would change. Right now, she was still a nameless zombie and he could keep it that way. All he had to do was resist the temptation. Walk away. Just fucking walk away.
She felt his stare and looked up. Their gazes met and Adam's stomach lurched. They stared at each other motionless, silently challenging the other to make a move. The rain came down harder, dampening Adam's black hair, matting it against his face. The drops pattered rhythmically on the pavement creating a soundtrack to their standoff.
And then she was coming and his opportunity to leave came and went. She exited the diner out into the rain and stopped in front of him. She looked up at him silently. Droplets glistened on her skin in the lamp light.
She was the first to break the silence. "I thought I'd never—"
Adam brought a long finger to rest over her full lips. "Don't."
She quieted and he just stood there watching the light play with the amber flecks in her eyes. They conjured memories of candlelight from days long ago, back before the world went to shit. His lips were on hers before he could talk himself out of it. He fucking missed her and he hated that he did.
One arm encircled her waist, pressing her flush against him. The other tangled in her hair and cradled her head. His tongue pushed through her lips and found hers. Her mouth tasted of coffee and cigarettes and was equally addictive. Her arms wrapped about his neck and Adam felt hungry, desperate, as if her kisses were laden with blood. Adam was torn in two, consumed by passion yet halted by experience, fully aware that living where life and death were one in the same brings an inconsolable loneliness.
He tore himself off her lips. He grabbed her hard by the arms and jerked her close. "Why?" He demanded.
"Why? Isn't it obvious?" She called over the noise of the rain. She wiggled from his grip and took a step back. Her arms opened wide and her head dipped backwards. Rain splattered on her cheeks, turning them rosy from the cold. She opened her mouth and drank it in, licking the moisture from her lips. "Everything I love is endless. Poetry is immortal and when I have read it all there will be more. The seasons will cycle on a beautiful, infinite loop. History will be made and remade. And the rain. God, the rain will always come again, breathing new life into everything." She spun and kicked up water from the puddle beneath her feet. And in her movements, for a fleeting moment, Adam saw Eve dancing there instead.
Adam rushed to her, pulling her into a soggy embrace before grasping her arm and leading her towards the dark alleyway adjacent to the diner. Unceremoniously, he slammed her against the brick building. He yearned for Eve and her as if they were one. He tore at her wet clothes and she did the same with his. Hot breath fogged from her nostrils and mouth creating ghostly shapes in the newly-turned autumn air. Goosebumps rose on her bare flesh. He ran his hands all over her, trying to feel them all beneath his palms, fascinated by the skin's ability to react to the elements. Her nipples were already taut, whether from his caresses or the cold, he did not know or care. His fingertips ghosted over them, ripping a gasp from her lips. Her hands ran the length of his bare torso, slick with rainwater, and stopped to undo his fly. She reached in and removed his rigid length. Adam couldn't help himself as his fangs descended at the will of her touch.
"Do it," she urged. And he did. He bit her neck without the hesitance of their last encounter. Her blood was sweeter than he remembered and mixed with the refreshing taste of fallen rain. He resisted the urge to gulp it down instead letting it settle on his tongue, relishing in the flavor of her, needing to remember every delicate undertone. It parched a thirst he didn't even know he had.
All the while she stroked his cock, up and down, letting her fingers trail over the sensitive head, running her touch slowly along the underside. Adam played with her swollen nipple while he drank, pinching it, rolling it between thumb and forefinger, letting it drag across the inside of his palm.
"Fuck me while you feed," she moaned. He broke away from her neck to reach down and pull her legs around him. She guided his stiff cock inside her. He groaned loudly as he slid into her warm wetness. His mouth went for her neck but halfway there, he stopped, captivated by the sight of her. The rain had matted her hair across her face and dripped down her shoulders, chest, and breasts. The glow of the city lights turned her skin luminescent gold. Her beautiful lips parted to accommodate her ragged breathing. Her chest rose and fell in time with his thrusts. She was living, breathing art.
"Please," she begged, her voice almost lost in the din of the storm. "Give me to eternity."
Adam rammed into her, knocking her back against the wall until it stole the breath from her. He hated her then, hated how good she felt, how good she tasted, but most of all how much he wanted it. Wanted her. He released a savage cry, a mix of animalistic rage and unbridled passion. Her inner walls tensed around his cock to signal her undoing. His lower stomach tightened at the sensation.
She dug her nails into the skin of his shoulders, and clenched her legs tighter around his midsection. Her body trembled as Adam's thrusting became more desperate. He pushed as deep as he could, right down to her core, making her cry out wildly. "Now!" She screamed as she came. His fangs went back to her neck, digging farther into her flesh. He drank deeply, urgently, drunk on her taste and her warmth.
Still inside her, Adam pulled her away from the wall and down onto the concrete. Her hair fanned out around her as running groundwater pulled it in a thousand directions at once. Her heart pounded against him, so hard that he pretended it was his own, beating strongly in his chest and it felt like living; for one brief, glorious second he was living. He forced himself away long enough to kiss her, painting the inside of her mouth with his blood-drenched tongue. When he pulled away, he murmured against her lips, "A gift, for when you wake," before returning to her neck.
He grabbed her wrist, placing his thumb over her weakening pulse. He bucked his hips against hers and fed. His appetite for her was ravenous. His cock shuddered and one more hard thrust had him coming just as her pulse faded. And then stopped. He lapped at the last few drops, tasting with it the saltiness of her skin and the rain. He savored it, wishing it would never end, that somehow in death she would become an endlessly flowing fountain that belonged to him and only to him. But it was done. His erection softened inside her.
Adam sighed and propped himself up to inspect her. The color drained from her skin, leaving her as pale as white porcelain. Her own bright red blood stained her beautiful lips. And her eyes. They were more dusk than dawn, darker yet somehow brighter as if reflecting the last rays of sun before twilight. How it was possible that in death she was even more captivating, he didn't know. As much as he hated to admit it, he had been wrong. Death did suit her.
He wanted to leave her there, in permanent death, rather than lead her into the nightmare of living death. It was easier for both of them. He started to get up but found himself already hard again inside her. "Bloody fucking hell," he cursed. He had already made his choice and it wasn't the right one.
It was time. Still straddling her, still feeling the fading warmth of her cunt on his hardening length, Adam bit his own wrist and winced as two puncture marks oozed with a viscous substance. It wasn't blood, not really. It was thicker and almost black like tar. Eve liked to call it their essence but that was too fucking pretentious for Adam to use. Whatever it was called, he parted her lips and let it seep into her mouth.
Suddenly, her eyes ignited, burning bright orange like the business end of a cigarette. If Adam could breathe, his breath would have caught in his throat. He'd never seen eyes the color of fire until now. She coughed violently, her body convulsing underneath him. Slowly, recognition found her. Her tongue darted out to lick her blood, the last remaining bit of her humanity, from her lips. Her wild eyes, full of ember and ash, gave her an animal-like appearance. Adam's erection jerked inside her. Fuck, if she wasn't even more attractive now.
A savage growl tore from her throat. She lifted up enough to wrap her arms around Adam and fling him to the wet pavement. She mounted him; his length slid into her slick opening. She pushed on his shoulders for leverage, riding his rigid cock. His hands instinctively went to her hips, urging her to go harder, faster. Her tongue was on her lips again, searching for any sign of missed blood and it was the most erotic thing Adam had ever witnessed. She came down and attacked his mouth with hers. Her tongue explored his mouth, lapping up whatever blood she could find there. Her swollen tits slid up and down his wet torso with her every movement. He moaned loudly and felt the familiar pulsing in his lower stomach, the telltale tightening of his cock. Her inner muscles contracted against him and they both came simultaneously while the rain continued to pour.
Somewhere in the recesses of his mind, across a hundred lifetimes, Adam remembered fucking Eve the night she turned him. He'd never been so ravenous, so afraid, so excited, so alive. All of it was there, in the waitress's burning gaze. "One day you'll remember this night and you will hate me," he promised.
She lifted off of him and stood. Her head angled towards the sky. Somewhere, stars hid behind storm clouds, light pollution and smog. She stared like she could see them anyway. "Maybe. Perhaps an eternity from now," she said.
"A day. A year. A fucking eternity. It's all the same."
She wasn't listening, instead marveling at the prospect of eternity, breaking it down into the number of dances, the pages of a book, the lines of a poem, the notes of a song.
"Oh for fuck's sake," Adam muttered. He found their drenched, wrinkled clothing and replaced his. His shirt alone was soaked with twenty pounds of water and his mood reflected it. "Hey, get with the fucking program," he called to her, annoyed.
When she looked his way, Adam tossed her the items and she put them on. She looked like a rag doll in her saturated uniform, vulnerable and tired. A pang of pity leapt through Adam's stomach but he shrugged it off. She'd brought this on herself and soon enough she'd realize her mistake.
"Do you have a name?" Adam asked irritably, as they rounded the corner towards his car and the diner.
"Delilah."
"Delilah." He repeated, flatly. From the book of Judges, the woman whom Samson loved; the woman who inevitably caused his downfall. "Of course it is. Fucking perfect."
"What now?" She asked.
"You meet Eve." And Adam knew that Eve would love her. What the fuck had he done?
Ian met them at the door. His brows knit together with concern. "Oh shit, are you guys alright? Did you get mugged or something?" Ian asked.
Adam brought his fingers up to his lips. When he looked at them, rain splattered against blood, sending red trails down his hand.
" Bloody nose," Adam said.
Ian smiled wide and nodded. "Oh okay, good. I mean, not good but better than something worse, I guess right?" Ian's gaze found Delilah and his eyes went wider. "And uh, her too?"
Adam's stare flicked to Delilah who looked in much worse shape, blood smeared across her colorless face. She licked her lips, staring at Ian as if he were a delicacy. "Just get in the fucking car," Adam finally growled at Ian, getting more aggravated by the second.
Ian nodded and hurried away. Adam grabbed Delilah roughly by the upper arm. "Behave. Or I'll fucking stake you myself, understand?" She nodded her consent but her fiery eyes were still predatory.
"God, this is a fucking nightmare," he grumbled, pushing her towards the car.