Chapter 10 Crimson Nectar
Detective Morrow
Her blood tasted of rust and honey, ancient pennies dissolved in nectar. I swallowed, and the world snapped into focus, sharper than it had ever been. The mansion’s faded grandeur resolved before me—the cracks in the plaster, the dust drifting through moonlight, and the predatory stillness of Iris watching from three feet away.
Not real, I told myself, though the heat blooming in my belly insisted otherwise. Vampires belonged in case files and nightmares, not in the waking world I’d built from evidence and reason. Yet here I stood, Detective Clive Morrow, with the taste of immortality on my tongue and disbelief burning from my mind.
“You look surprised, Detective.” Her voice curled through the air like smoke, amused and ancient.
I touched my lips, half-expecting to find them crimson. They were clean. I should have refused. Every instinct, every rule of training, every echo of my father’s warnings told me to walk away.
Now, as her blood worked its way through my system, I cataloged the changes. My vision had sharpened—I could count the individual stitches in the tapestry hanging on her far wall. My hearing stretched further than seemed possible: the skitter of mice in the walls, the hum of traffic on St. Charles, the whisper of her dress when she shifted. Scents unfolded in layers—her perfume, floral with something metallic beneath it, the must of old books, the copper tang of my own sweat.
But it was the warmth that unnerved me most. I’d expected cold—vampires were cold in every story, in every line of my father’s notes. Yet her blood burned through me like bourbon, waking parts of myself I hadn’t known were dormant. I felt alive in a way that made all previous consciousness seem like sleepwalking.
“What will happen to me?”
Iris tilted her head, studying me. Her eyes were ageless, unreadable. She only shrugged.
“And if I want more?” The question escaped before I could stop it.
Her lips curved, too knowing to be called a smile. “Then you will hunt, as we all do, Detective.”
I ran a hand through my hair, trying to gather thoughts that kept slipping away like fish through nets. Focus, Morrow. I’d come here for answers, not to be seduced by the very creature I was investigating.
“The killings,” I managed.
“Back to business.” She leaned forward slightly, her black hair falling to frame her face. “The Coterie has rules, Detective. Those who break them must be dealt with. Though, we prefer to handle our own.”
“Three people are dead,” I said, my voice steadier than I felt. “That’s my jurisdiction.”
“Is it?” Her tone was soft but hit like a blow. “It may appear to be, but you are no more human than I.”
The words landed hard, and I couldn’t deny them. The system I’d sworn to serve wasn’t built for creatures like her—or for whatever I was becoming. Even if I proved her existence, what then? Exposure would burn everything down.
“What am I supposed to do now?”
Iris crossed the room to the dresser where the body still lay, retrieved a crystal decanter filled with amber liquid, and poured two measures into matching glasses.
“The Coterie values balance, Detective Morrow. We have endured here since this city’s birth because we understand the necessity of symbiosis.” She handed me a glass. “Your predecessor understood this.”
“My predecessor?”
“Your father.” The words rippled through me like stones into still water. “He served as liaison between us and your department. He kept the peace, ensured investigations never went too far, and in exchange, we offered information on more mundane criminals operating in our domains.”
The glass nearly slipped from my hand. “My father was murdered.”
“Yes.” Her expression flickered—something like regret. “By humans, not by us. Your birth father, not the man who raised you, was killed by savages.”
The room tilted. I only had one father. One mother. And this imposter was telling me both were a lie.
“You’re lying,” I said, but there was no conviction behind it.
“Am I?” she asked softly.
The warmth in my belly turned sour.
“This wasn’t meant to harm you,” she continued, voice gentler now. “It was for your protection. Being born a halfling makes you...” Her words trailed off.
I drained the glass in one swallow. The Scotch was expensive, peaty—but it tasted flat beside the memory of her blood. The glass hit the table harder than I meant it to. The sound cracked through the silence and echoed up the staircase like a shot.
“A halfling,” I said, the word unfamiliar in my mouth. “What the hell does that even mean?”
Iris didn’t answer right away. She watched me with that still, unreadable patience I was beginning to recognize as her truest weapon.
“It means what it sounds like,” she said finally. “Half of one thing, half of another. Bound to both, belonging to neither.”
I laughed—short, hollow, a sound too sharp to be real. “You’re saying I’m part vampire? My mother was human. My father—”
“Your father was a vampire,” she confirmed. “He passed for a human. He hid well. Those with his blood can, for a time.”
I stepped back, nearly tripping over the edge of a rug. “You’re insane. Do you hear yourself? This—this isn’t possible. I bleed. I eat real food. I sleep.”
“All true,” Iris said. “You were born closer to human than most of us. You walk between worlds.”
Her words sank into the cracks forming in my mind. Different. It wasn’t wrong. The faster healing, the night vision, the way I could sense lies before people spoke them. I’d written it off as instinct. Luck. Cop’s intuition.
“I solve homicides,” I said, clinging to the familiar syllables. “I follow evidence. I interview witnesses. I build cases.”
“You chase shadows,” Iris countered softly. “You read truths in the dark. You’ve been following our kind your entire career without realizing why. The blood calls to itself, Detective. It always has.”
I ran both hands through my hair, gripping the back of my neck until my fingers hurt. The world was too loud—every heartbeat, every shift of fabric, every whisper of sound ricocheting through me like static.
“This ruins everything,” I murmured. “The Bureau, the job, my life—none of it holds if what you’re saying is true.”
“Truth doesn’t wait for permission,” she replied.
I wanted to argue, but my body betrayed me. The warmth had settled into a steady pulse, radiating outward until it felt as though something ancient was pacing beneath my skin, restless and newly awakened.
“What happens now?”
“Now?” Iris stepped closer, her voice low. “You decide which world to serve.”
“I can’t stop.”
“Then you’ll bleed for both,” she said. “A thankless mission.”
I looked down at my hands. They were steady now, too steady, as though the tremor of human fear had burned itself out. I could still taste her blood on the back of my tongue, metallic and electric. A part of me wanted to wash it away. Another part wanted more.
“I need air,” I muttered.
Iris inclined her head. “The night recognizes its own.”