Free Blood Oranges (9781101594858) by Caitlin R. Kathleen; Kiernan Tierney

juice reminded me of the woman’s throat I’d torn open a couple of hours earlier.
    â€œOkay, so I save Bobby Ng’s ass six months ago by killing Mercy Brown’s special lady friend. Only Mercy can’t tell time, what with being dead and all, so out of the blue she saves me from a werewolf—sort of, but not really—and then, exacting her revenge, she turns me. But it’s not
only
about vengeance. It also has something to do with a debt she owes—fuck only knows to who or to what—and by making me a vampire—”
    â€œâ€”who’s also a werewolf—” Mr. B interjected, then popped another section of orange into his mouth.
    â€œYeah—fuck you—who’s also a werewolf, by doing that, she’s breaking some unspeakable bloodsucker taboo, and this matters how?”
    â€œOh. I haven’t a goddamn clue. Not the foggiest. But don’t forget she also called you her
pet
.”
    â€œWhen she said that, I half expected I was about to wind up in a cage or boarded at a kennel or something.”
    â€œShe didn’t even have the decency to give you a collar and tags, or see to it you were vaccinated for rabies.”
    â€œYou are so not funny,” I said, picked up a strip of orange peel, and threw it at him. He didn’t even flinch, just brushed it off his right shoulder.
    â€œReally? I think I’m a scream,” he said and bit off the last bloodred section.
    Not much else to say about that night at the bar. He finished his orange right as Jack the Bartender was shooing people out the front door. The bartenders, they never shoo Mean Mr. B. But he never keeps them waiting, either. So, a minute past two a.m., we’re standing on the sidewalk outside Babe’s on the Sunnyside. I’m watching Jack wipe down the bar and tables with a soppy gray rag. Mr. B, he lights a cigarette, the Nat Shermans he smokes, cigarettes in all the colors of the rainbow. He offers me one, and then lights it for me. There’s a chill in the air, and I wonder for the first time if vampires are supposed to feel the cold.
    â€œSo, dear,” he says, smoke leaking from his nostrils, “here’s where we part company for the evening.”
    â€œWait. There’s something else she told me.”
    â€œWho?”
    â€œMercy Brown. The goddamn Bride. Who do you think?”
    â€œI wouldn’t want to be presumptuous.” Mr. B takes another drag off his cigarette; then he asks me, “So, what, pray tell, was this something else she said, this something else that has me standing on the sidewalk outside a closed bar instead of walking home to the comfort of my bed?”
    â€œCan you stop being a jerk for like two minutes?”
    â€œNot bloody likely.”
    I tapped ash onto the cement at my feet and watched Jack, still busy with his bar rag.
    â€œShe said I was a weapon. That she was making me to be a weapon.”
    Mr. B seemed to consider this a moment. I only
say
considered, because who the hell ever knows what’s going through his head. But he chewed at his lip in a thoughtful way, so I figured it was a safe enough bet that he was considering what I’d said.
    â€œSo, you’re her vengeance for the death of Cregan, and also you’re the breaking of a taboo,
and
you’re her pet, but you’re also a weapon that she’s fashioning. That’s quite a bit of multitasking, wouldn’t you say? The all-purpose werepire.”
    â€œWerepire?”
    â€œWould you prefer vampwolf, dear? By the way, there’s blood in your hair. You should really do something about that.”
    â€œYou’re not even going to
try
to give me advice?”
    He chewed his lip some more, smoked his Nat Sherman, and finally said, “Lay low. Keep your head down. You’ll need to feed every couple of nights, but, of course, you already know that. Don’t make messes you can’t clean up. I’ll ask