Chapter c Cost

Lot's face went down toward her collarbone and his teeth dug into her just above her small breast. If he had been really thirsty he would've bit into her pulsating artery only inches higher. He was just abusing her. Becca let out a shrill moan from pain. She could feel it. All of it. There wasn't a blissful escape as the one that Iggy had experienced during his time as prey, but only a lot of pain.

Then, it dawned on him that Lot and Aster weren't venomous. They could bite without killing, and they did so, happily. However, that also meant something much larger than being able to have cruel dinner dates together. It meant that they couldn't infect others. But, he wondered, how could they have been infected in the first place?

Lot looked up at him, mischievously licking his blood red lips. "Hey, Bobby." Iggy's vision vibrated in haziness. He refocused. Lot's lips were cleaner. "Bobby?" He smiled. "Yo, you in the red, Bobby? Come on, take a taste. I'll share with you just this once."

Iggy swallowed hard. He moved his foot forward.

Lot's fingers still held her by the hair as he stepped out of the space between her legs and came around to the top of her head. Iggy came to the side of the table, peering down on her, thirsty and wanting her in every way, and took her wrists in his hands. He pressed them into her chest.

Furious tears flowed out along the corners of her eyes and soaked into her knotted hair. Her muscles tensed beneath his hold. He knew that with one bite she would give way, limp. He leaned down, smelling her better and better the closer that he came. He stuck his tongue out and licked her skin just below the bite, picking up the droplets that had escaped.

It was sweet.

Iggy drew back and watched her struggling, angrily and furious, and there, in her brown eyes he found something that was all too familiar. The will to kill everyone in the room. The rage. She was like him. A victim of the situation. A pawn of those who were infected. But, there were differences, too. In many ways, such as unpromised safety and constant rape, her situation was worse. She'd be killed before she degenerated. She glared up at him now with pure hatred, not fear. She was the bravest person that he had ever met.

With admiration, hot pressure in his wrists appeared, and he fantasized his own blood being sucked out and swimming somewhere worthy, an idea that had never come to him before. An itch only scratchable with teeth. He had the power to give it away, but he needed to end this act, so that she'd be safe for a few minutes longer.

Iggy peeled his hands off of her wrists and pulled her shirt down toward her legs, covering everything that he had so desperately wanted to touch and feel and see. Stepping back, he looked over at Aster. "This is what you call fun?" He formed a crooked smile. The kind that only other bad people enjoy. "Take me to the lil' old lady. I'll show you how to have a real good time."

Aster's eyebrows lifted and an expectant grin stretched across her face. "That's what I'm talkin' about!"

"Oh, yeah!" Lot cackled. "Spirit!" He twisted Becca's head so that she spun off of the table and landed on the floor.

Becca clamped a hand over the bite and the flesh around her eyes relaxed with relief, however her jaw dropped with surprise. No one had ever turned down the opportunity to bite her before. When she considered all the other things that he could want instead, her relief was washed out with guilt and she crumpled closer to the floor.

The three ran out of the house to the car like teenagers. Aster hopped into the driver's seat, Lot into the passenger's, and Iggy into the back. Aster had been yapping, but neither men listened to her, because both were thinking about Becca.

Iggy imagined her jagged hair wisping his face again and the warm kiss she had planted on his cheek. He pressed his fingertips to his cheek, caressing the spot as if it had just happened. He envisioned himself touching her neck and feeling the small scars. His guts tickled, yet hurt. He was excited to feed, thirsty to hunt, yet the excitement had nothing to do with the little old lady that they were driving to. He rubbed his wrists together.

"Robert!" Aster hollered through the rearview mirror, jostling him out of his head. "Were you listening to me, at all?"

He shook his head side to side. "Sorry, I wasn't. I'm very thirsty. I guess it's hard for me to concentrate like this."

She shrugged her shoulders tensely. "Sheesh. I was saying that we all need to share this lady, but you were just looking out that window. Daydreaming."

He furrowed his eyebrows. "That's not very much for three people."

Lot spun around and hung his arm over the seat. "We're all stocked up at home. You know, it's not the food that we're after. It's the hunt."

"It is illegal to feed on uninfected people outside of the clinic, obviously," Aster added lightly, as if it were a joke that everyone already knew. "But the clinic is way overpriced. We only go there on a really special occasion, like birthdays and stuff. So, we need to stay low on the radar."

"The clinic?"

Iggy could see Aster roller her eyes in the mirror. "Well, yeah. The place where you buy the virus. Come on, you know this… don't you?! They have a whole separate feeding division that you can pay to feed on a living person. It's a lot of fun. You probably just missed it. Walked right by."

"By the way," Lot chimed in, "I've been wanting to ask you how much yours cost."

"My what?"

Lot smirked. "Your virus, man. Mine costed me thirty five thousand." His lips crinkled against one another and dimples emerged in his chin. Proud. "I wanted the good stuff, so I took out two loans to pay for it. I wasn't as lucky as Aster though. Shit, she got 'ers for half the price since she was in the military and all."

Aster nodded her head with each word. "Believe it or not, I was a model for military calendars. My parents said it was a dead end job because I'd get old sooner or later-" she laughed "-I sure showed them, huh? I get to live twice as long as they did! So, what about you? How much did you pay? Don't be shy. We know the game. Most people can't afford it."

Iggy swallowed, feeling uneasy about what he was going to say. "I… it was given to me as a gift. I don't know how much anything about it costs. But… I need to know, are either of you infectious?"

Lot and Aster met eyes for a quick yet awkward moment and then Lot flipped back around and masked his face with a crooked smile. "No. Are you?" Iggy shuddered in the silence and pulled back into his seat. He shook his head, and Lot barked in laughter and slapped his thigh. "Ha! I'm just playing with you, Bobby! There ain't nobody on the street that's infectious! Hell, I bet there's never been a person with the means to do that! If there was… Just imagine the kind of money they'd make sellin' it on the streets! They could bypass the licensing and sell it at three times the clinic rate. Oh… I'd make so much money with a friend like that."

"That's enough," Aster hushed him. "We're here." The car halted at the side of the road where the area was heavily coated with thick trees and hedges. In the distance, Iggy could see the one story white house with flowers on the window sills and in the garden beds. The bulky gray car was sitting in the driveway and shining in the moonlight. Aster turned the key over and they all faced each other. "Alright babes," she smiled. "Let's go get dinner."