My Blood To Rise Read Free Page A

in the morning.
    Her vision wavered. A bottomless pit of darkness loomed before her, and she dangled over the precipice.
    At the very last moment, he tore his mouth away from her and stood up, leaving her there on the bed. Not an ounce of strength remained in her body.
    It took every bit of willpower for her to move her eyes to him.
    He looked down at her with satisfied smile as her lifeblood dripped from his mouth.
    She began to shiver. Without any blood in her body, the cold seeped through her flesh.
    Then Andrei did something she never expected. He covered her with a blanket and then kissed her gently on the forehead.
    A moment later, he vanished, and she sank into a black abyss.
     

Chapter Three
    Dara was slow to wake. When she realized her alarm had been going off for an hour, she shot out of bed.
    She slapped the alarm clock off, and blinked several times to make her eyes focus on the time. It was eight o’clock in the morning. She had to get up and go to work. She didn’t dare call in sick. She needed every penny just to cover her rent.
    The moment she stood up, a wave of nausea hit her. She almost puked on the carpet. Her head weighed a ton, and it took every ounce of her determination to make her limbs move.
    Then she remembered last night.
    She stared around the room in wild horror. Was Andrei still here? No.
    Her entire body was sore. What had he done to her? What kind of monster would do this to an innocent girl he met on a park bench?
    But she already knew the answer to that question. She didn’t want to admit it, but there was only one explanation. Andrei was a vampire.
    But if that were the case, why had he left her alive?
    It had to have been a bad dream. Last night’s events were her imagination playing tricks on her. Maybe she was just sick, and it had been a fevered dream.
    She threw her robe around her shoulders and staggered to the bathroom. A hollow-cheeked visage stared back at her from the mirror. Dark circles surrounded her eyes, and her colorless skin hung from her bones. And there, on her neck, surrounded by purple bruises, were two round holes.
    Dara nearly passed out. It had all been real.
    For several minutes, she stood there, unable to accept the truth.
    She couldn’t think about it right now; she was late for work.
    Hurriedly, she splashed water on her face and got dressed, throwing on a scarf to hide the bite marks in her neck. She should have taken a shower and eaten a good breakfast, but she only had time for a cup of coffee.
    Though some of her strength had returned to her, she stumbled out of the apartment and almost fell down the steps.
    The cab she meant to hail screeched to a stop to avoid running over her.
    “Are you okay?” the driver asked when she pulled the door open. “You look terrible. Do you need me to take you to a hospital?”
    Shaking her head, she said, “No, I’m just late for work.” She gave him the address to her office.
    With concern etched on his face, he got back in the taxi and eased into traffic. All the while he drove her to work, he eyed her in the rear-view mirror.
    * * *
    When she got to work, Dara went straight to her desk.
    Her cubicle-mate, Beth, glanced at her from the other side of the cubicle. “Morning—” she started to say, but then her eyes widened. “Are you all right? You look like hell.”
    Dara smiled. “I’ll be all right. I just had a long night. Didn’t get much sleep.”
    “Oh?”
    Sighing, Dara said, “I met someone on the way home. Things got a little wild.”
    Beth shook her head. “You should take it easy, you know. You’re going to get yourself in trouble one of these days.”
    Dara dropped her eyes to her desk. “I think I already did.”
    “What?”
    “This guy—” She took a deep breath, not knowing what to say next.
    “Did he…?”
    What could she say? That she’d taken a vampire home, and he’d sucked her blood?
    She looked up at Beth. “I guess I’m not that good at picking them.”
    “You should