Tainted Blood (60 page)

Oh, shit.

Kiera froze.

Needless to say, I spent the next hour fighting with Kiera, trying to explain to her that Laney and I never had sex. It was exhausting and Kiera was surprisingly frightening when she’s that angry. Thankfully, Laney had nodded off with her toaster-rabbit wrapped in her arms while we argued and we took it to the bedroom (no wicked smile this time) in the hopes of not waking her. I also hoped that when she woke she’d be normal again.

When I finally resolved the knocking-up-my-best-friend fight I went to check on Laney.

The front door was wide open and she was gone. “Oh, no,” I breathed. I instantly thought the worst. I was terrified that Oscar had come for her again but this time he had decided to keep her. I bolted out the door and into the drizzling night.

There’s an open space in front of the apartments. It’s where I usually play football with the guys, but on this particular night, Laney was in that big grass area. She was okay, physically. It didn’t appear that anyone had touched her, but she was missing her pajama bottoms.

As I approached I asked, “What are you doing out here?”

“The bunny needed to potty. I’m walking him.” And sure enough she was dragging that damn toaster around by its cord.

“Where are your pants, Laney?”

She looked down at her bare legs and shrugged.

Awesome.

I took her hand and told her that we needed to get back inside. “But the bunny wants to stay out here,” she told me and I wondered how she’d react if I took the toaster by the cord, swung it over my head, and then let it fly. Instead I told her that the bunny was going to catch a cold if we didn’t get it inside.

She bought it and we headed back up to the apartment. I’d caught movement out of the corner of my eye near the trees that bordered the open grass area. I didn’t want to find out what or who it was and I tried to hurry Laney but she was still dragging that damn toaster. When she continued to argue, I lost it. I grabbed the toaster-rabbit. She screamed because she said I was hurting it. I tucked the toaster under my arm and threw her over my shoulder while she flailed and yelled at me, her main concern being the rabbit. I hurried up the steps to our place and tossed her on the couch and told Kiera to lock the door and to get Laney back into her bottoms.

I dropped the toaster on the coffee table and then took a moment for myself. I went into my bedroom and closed my eyes, and focused on my breathing. I felt like beating my damn head on the wall. I couldn’t do this. She was wacked out of her goddamn mind! And why the hell was no one calling me back?

Kiera came into the bedroom, and without a word, she slipped her arms around me. We held each other for a few minutes, and once I felt I had calmed down enough for another round with Laney, I headed back out into the apartment to see what she was up to.

I found Laney and her “bunny” at the dinner table. Laney had the toaster in her lap and she was in the process of pouring a can of soda into a bowl of Goldfish crackers. I just watched and Kiera stood beside me doing the same. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and tried Felix, again.

Laney smiled up at us as she chewed her soda-fish. “Would you like a bowl?” she asked.

“Uh, no. I’m good,” I told her. Kiera didn’t respond but simply locked herself in the bathroom a moment later. I was pretty sure she’d had enough.

I took a seat at the table and just watched Laney. I didn’t know what else to do.

She paused with her spoon near her lips. “Did you hear that?” she asked.

“Hear what?” The only thing I’d heard was Kiera moving around in the bathroom.

“There it is again,” she said in a whisper. She was hearing Kiera in the bathroom just as I had. I set my elbows on the table and rested my head in my hands and groaned. It was going to be a long friggin’ night.

Once Laney finally finished her “snack,” I got her settled on the couch and tried to get her to focus on the TV in the hopes she’d just pass out. I sat in the chair that had been brought over from the girls’ place and watched her. I rested my feet on the coffee table and listened to her murmur to the toaster.

Then she looked over to me and I think she was covering the rabbit’s ears when she said, “I tried to devise an escape plan but he,” and she nodded to the toaster, “was going to give away your secret.” She mimed fangs and I suddenly felt very uncomfortable.

Kiera came out of the bathroom, ready for bed, and I motioned for her to get back. She silently disappeared into my room. Laney was completely delusional and I was afraid of what she was capable of.

“I’ll be right back,” I told Laney and she nodded while she continued petting the toaster. I hurried to my room.

“What’s going on?” Kiera insisted. She was tired and getting crabby. I wished I had chocolate. For the both of us.

“Do I look like I know what’s going on?” Obviously she was done, and so was I. Kiera crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her eyes. A sure sign I’d said something wrong. “Sorry,” I apologized.

Very quickly and quietly, we discussed what to do next, and since I was certain Laney had forgotten Kiera was there, we decided to keep it that way. Mostly to keep Kiera safe.

I gave Kiera my cell and convinced her to hang out in the closet for a while and keep trying to call Felix. She protested a little, but I think she was just as concerned about what Laney was capable of as I was. I knew it wasn’t a perfect plan, but if Kiera surprised Laney, I was afraid of what she and the “rabbit” would do.

“Stay in there till I come for you. And keep trying Felix. Oliver too,” I told her and slid the door closed. I didn’t close the secret panel. I’d save that. I didn’t think we were there, yet.

Laney was behind me when I turned around and I jumped. Her eyes were narrowed on me. “Who were you talking to?”

“Oh,” I said, thinking at lightning speed. “The chicken.” She cocked her head (no pun intended) at me. I slid the door open just enough to pull part of my chicken costume out and show her while at the same time hoping Kiera had scooted out of sight.

Laney eyes got huge and she hugged the toaster tight to her chest. “Keep that giant bird away from the bunny!”

I closed the door. “Of course,” I told her as I guided her from my room. I settled her back in front of the TV. “You want something to eat?” I asked her. She conversed with the toaster for a moment and then said, “Yeah, we’ll have cinnamon toast and tacos.”

Uh… “How about some chips?”

She whispered to the “bunny” again. “That will do,” she said.

I went to the kitchen and grabbed a half-empty bag of tortilla chips and offered them to her. I had been hoping to keep her occupied. Well, my plan worked… She sat on the floor and laid each chip out across the coffee table in tight little rows. Coordinating them by size.

“What are you doing?” I asked from where I sat in the chair near the coffee table.

“Making a yellow brick road,” she said very matter-of-fact.

Once she was done making her road, she set the toaster at one end of it and told it to proceed. Then she and the toaster had some sort of argument and I don’t know what she was saying because it suddenly sounded a whole lot like the Vampiric language I’d heard Felix and Oliver speak from time to time. She only spoke that way a short while but it was still quite alarming.

She continued to talking to the “rabbit.” At one point she told the rabbit she was a princess, that he was her royal subject, and that he needed to bow to her. Then I guess the rabbit turned the tables on her because she apologized and bowed to the toaster.

Wow, something was seriously wrong in her mind. And no, I didn’t just then realize this fact, it was then that I realized how extreme the situation was. I wondered if Kiera had any luck getting ahold of either Felix or Oliver and I was considering sneaking into my room to check on her when Laney said, “Carter, have you seen my knight?”

“No, I haven’t,” I told her and I wasn’t quite sure if she meant Oliver Knight or an actual knight. I didn’t have the energy to ask. Either way, I hadn’t seen either one.

“That’s a shame. I will be needing a date.” She made a pouty face and stroked the toaster that was sitting on her lap. The chip road had been demolished beneath the “rabbit’s” enormous size.

“For?” I asked.

“The royal wedding, of course!” I stared wordlessly at her. She lowered her voice and leaned closer to me. “The rabbit is getting married in the morning. But make sure there are no trolls. I don’t like what they say.”

“What’s that?” I asked out of pure curiosity.

“
Fee
-
fi
-
fo
-
fum
,” she whispered.

“I think that’s giants,” I told her.

“Oh yeah, keep them away too.”

She carried on like this for some time, engaging me in the rabbit’s wedding plans. I felt I might be next in line to go mad.

She tweaked out at one point, saying that the top-hat-wearing spider from the shower was in her shirt and she tried ripping her clothes off. She was so freaked out that she even dropped the “rabbit” and didn’t seem concerned about it being injured. I stopped her from getting naked and I had to hold her on the couch until she calmed down. I was desperately hoping Felix would show any minute. I wondered, again, if Kiera had had any luck.

There was a commercial playing on the TV and Laney perked up. “That looks yummy,” she said. There was a chocolate cake showing on the screen. I agreed that it looked good, thankful the “rabbit” wasn’t a part of the conversation. She wriggled out of my arms and headed for the kitchen. “I’ll get forks and we can share it,” she said.

“Um, Laney…” Wow, just wow…

When she returned with three forks in her hand—I can safely assume fork number three was for the toaster—the commercial was over. The cake was gone. “Did you eat it all?” she shouted at me.

“I didn’t eat any of it,” I defended. She was now crazy, angry, and wielding weapons.

“Then where did it go?” she was
really
mad.

I did something really dirty here. “It was the rabbit,” I pointed to the toaster lying on its side on the floor. “He ate the whole thing.”

She started crying. Not the reaction I’d expected. Granted, I don’t know what I’d expected, but it wasn’t complete and utter betrayal. “How could he?” she sobbed and dropped to her knees. “Why would he do this to me?” Tears streaked her overly pale face.

It was the craziest and saddest thing I’d ever seen. I picked her up off of the floor, carried her to the couch and held her in my arms as she sobbed. She cried so hard and so long it was like her heart was actually broken.

After some time, she finally passed out and I carried her to her bed. I tucked her under the covers and left the lamp on her nightstand on so that she wouldn’t wake in the dark and freak. While I checked her bedroom window she moaned like a zombie and it scared the shit out of me! Once my heart stopped racing from the zombie moan, I barricaded the front door then pulled a snoozing Kiera from the closet. I settled into bed and Kiera snuggled up against me. I was out in seconds.

I woke a while later to Laney digging in my closet.
She was wearing only her tank top, panties, and her fleece, star-covered blanket like a cape
. “What are you doing?” I asked as I sat up in my bed.

“The rabbit said I must kill the chicken. Sir Hopsalot needs a sacrifice for his bride.”

Holy shit! She had a knife!

I sprang into action. In nothing but my boxers, I wrestled my fiancé’s best friend to the ground and smacked the knife from her hand. She was stronger than she should have been. I was on top of her and she was screaming and struggling when Kiera sat up and asked, “What the hell are you two doing?” Every light in the apartment was on so she had a very clear view. This did not look good. “Why can’t you keep your hands off of her?” Kiera shouted and jumped out of bed.

I tried to explain that Laney had a knife and even pointed at it lying on the floor across the room. I admit, the two of us writhing around on my bedroom floor in our underwear looked really bad, but I wasn’t an idiot. If I was going to cheat on Kiera I wouldn’t do it in the same damn room while she slept. Not that I’d do it at all!

“Kiera, please. I can’t do this right now,” I groaned and then Laney bit me.

I yelped and jumped back, and she, still wearing her blanket as a cape, scrambled out of the room.

Thankfully, she didn’t grab the knife on her way out. It was one of the kitchen knives and I picked it up and then went to the kitchen, gathered every knife in there and brought them back to my room. I stuck them in the drawer of my nightstand then turned the nightstand around so that the drawer faced the wall. Kiera quietly watched me from the bed, and I said nothing to her. I put on a pair of shorts and went back out into the apartment, turning off my bedroom light as I left.

I found Laney crouched in front of the couch. She jumped at me when I came around the sofa. “Gotcha!” she shouted.

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s get you back to bed.”

I guided her toward her room and she said, “Sure, let’s go photo bake the turtles!”

What the…? “Uh, yeah… Let’s do that.” I was exhausted and didn’t understand why she wasn’t.