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WHY IS ROMAN sitting on the counter?" Virgil d'Argent asked with a yawn as he walked into the kitchen, absently scratching at his scalp and trying to tug his hair into some semblance of orderly. It was a lost cause, never managing to make it look any neater than "attractively tousled" as one of his long-passed peers had put it, but it never stopped him from trying.
It was a fair question to ask, too. While Virgil himself often eschewed conventional seating arrangements (seriously, what was the point of having freaky supernatural flexibility and a tangential relationship with gravity if you were just gonna sit in a chair like everyone else?) and even his beloved personal assistant and protege, Janus Maddox, tended to prefer lounging sideways across chairs and couches to merely sitting in them, Roman Payne, their most recent friend and tenant in the spare suite of the townhouse, usually tried to present more of an air of sophistication and refinement than either of the two vampires he currently lived with, which usually would not include sitting on kitchen counters.
"He said something about being treated like the 'premium grade snack' that he is," Janus said with a little shrug as if to declaim any understanding of what was going through Roman's mind. He passed Virgil a mug, which Virgil could already tell just by the scent was only about a one-to-four ratio of blood to coffee. They were running low on their monthly allotted donation reserves, then, and would probably need to ration further if they didn't want to risk drawing attention by hunting too often…. It wasn't illegal, exactly, especially with specifically designated bars and clubs set up for vampires to chat up the more casual "thrill-seekers" who might want to test the waters of being bitten without making a lifestyle of it, but those places were closely monitored which played hell on Virgil's nerves. Hazards of being old enough to remember the Inquisition….
"He is also sitting right here and able to be asked questions and answer them perfectly well," Roman spoke up tartly, folding his arms across his chest.
Virgil raised an eyebrow at him as he sipped from the mug and pretended he wasn't being incredibly obvious about checking out the flex of those arm muscles or the toned athletic legs that were drawn up and crossed on the counter's surface. For whatever reason that had compelled Roman to act out in this manner, he had also chosen to wear a pair of red gym shorts and a white t-shirt with red trim on the neck and sleeve cuffs with the provocative message of "I Ride Pole" on the front. Normally Virgil was able to be respectful about only surreptitiously ogling the attractive human unless specifically invited, but if he was going to put himself on display like this….
Roman met Virgil's eyes and, to Virgil's surprise and piqued interest, he blushed. Virgil lowered the mug slowly, licking his lips, and watched as Roman's eyes tracked the movement automatically and his blush darkened. Interesting….
"Sorry 'bout that," Virgil murmured, recalling belatedly that Roman had protested being spoken of and for when he was right there. "You're right, I should just ask you directly why you're sitting on the counter." Though Janus had said something about Roman wanting to be treated like a snack, and he was wearing that rather provocative outfit, almost like he was seeking validation for his own attractiveness…. "Did something happen? Bad audition, asshole on the bus…?"
"No!" Roman protested, then winced, biting his lower lip. Virgil raised his mug again as he tried not to stare. "Well, I mean... I had another call with Patton this morning...."
"Ugh, the church mouse," Janus muttered under his breath in disgust, nimbly dancing away from Virgil's half-hearted admonishing swat. It may have been mean-spirited, but it was still a pretty fair descriptor for Roman's deeply Catholic cousin who chattered incessantly and squeaked when he was frightened by something unexpected.
Which was often, at least around Virgil and Janus. Patton Sanders-Payne had not been thrilled when he learned that Roman was renting his room from a couple of vampires, though for some reason he thought Virgil was the younger of the pair and regarded Janus as a predatory bad influence. He always brought fliers for "conversion centers", places that claimed to be able to cure vampirism, to leave around the house every time he'd visit Roman and at least some part of every call they had Patton would mention some other apartment listing somewhere. The few times Virgil crossed paths with him, Patton had repeatedly called him "kiddo" and assured him there was "still hope for your soul", as if Virgil wasn't both several hundred years older than Patton and a confirmed atheist. The one time he had offered to pray for them both, Janus had politely told him not to bother, which Patton had not taken well.
That was still no reason to be rude about him to Roman, but Janus was hardly at his most tactful first thing in the afternoons. "More of the same, or did your conscientious cousin have something new to harp on?"
"He made an appointment for me behind my back with a donor crisis counseling center," Roman muttered, looking down at the floor.
Virgil's grip tightened around his mug and he had to work hard to swallow his mouthful of coffee normally and not choke on it. What?! When he was certain none of the liquid would go down the wrong pipe (it wouldn't kill him, but it still felt awful) he managed a somewhat strained, "You aren't a registered donor, though."
He wasn't. It had been part of the rental contract that if any of their tenants were not registered donors then Virgil and Janus were strictly prohibited from feeding on them without a separately negotiated contract. Janus and Virgil had devised that portion of the contract specifically to help their human tenants feel safer having vampire housemates and landlords, and if any of their tenants ever were registered donors there was an entirely separate subsection of the contract that laid out the exact conditions under which either Janus or Virgil could accept a donation, as well as them shouldering the responsibility for medical treatment costs even if they never drank a drop!
"I know," Roman groaned, unfolding his arms and dropping his head into his hands. "Which is why I was completely caught off-guard when I saw the email about the appointment! And when I called them to cancel it because I'm not a registered donor, the receptionist said that the appointment was made for me by a family member due to 'reasonable suspicion of abuse' so I couldn't cancel and should also not be late or law enforcement will come collect me and take me to the hospital on an involuntary psychiatric hold. The appointment is tomorrow."
Well, that certainly sounded unpleasant and stressful, though Virgil could see the sense in having precautions like that in cases of actual abuse from a vampire towards a human, or even just abuse of a human by another human. He was rather miffed at him and/or Janus being accused by proxy of abusing Roman simply because he lived with them, but it wasn't true and even the most cursory examination by a legitimate crisis center would prove it easily. Yeah, Patton going behind Roman's back to do this was shitty, and the threat of Roman being taken for an involuntary psychiatric hold was alarming, but it was also easily mitigated by just keeping the appointment tomorrow and proving the claim false once he was there. Was there something else about the situation that Virgil was missing?
"I fail to see the issue," Janus said after a moment, sounding as puzzled as Virgil felt. "It's a trivial matter to just go to the appointment, even if it is a waste of time and could take a slot away from someone who does need their services, but since you are not a donor and have obviously not been bitten by anyone, least of all one of us—"
Janus's words cut off and Virgil nearly dropped his mug as Roman looked up at them again with an expression of abject misery on his face.
"Tomorrow," Roman said heavily, "the two of you will have gone out, because your reserve is low after your friend Logan's visit, and I will have missed my chance. Again."
Silence. Virgil stared at Roman, willing the words to align themselves in his brain in a way that made sense. Beside him, Janus opened his mouth, then closed it again, apparently at a loss. After a few minutes where neither vampire managed to speak, Roman looked away again and lowered his head.
"I was going to try and bring it up this evening," he muttered towards the floor, quietly enough that Virgil actually had to strain to hear him a little. "Asking you to… to bite me, I mean. Feed from me. It's in our rental agreement that our personal relationships are separate from the landlord/tenant agreement… that I can ask you both for things that aren't contract-specified accommodations…."
"Biting you would specifically be a breach of contract," Virgil couldn't help but point out, his thoughts racing. Sure, Roman had been flirting with him and Janus off and on for a few months, even teasing at being down for more than just flirting, but this was… was Roman really…?
"Only without the secondary contract in place," Roman said, glancing up and then away again. "I don't want to be a registered donor… just your donor."
"And the church mouse knows this," Janus said flatly, causing Virgil to hiss softly and Roman to cringe.
"He said that if I was so determined to throw my life and soul away, I shouldn't expect him to just stand by and let me kill myself," their human friend said bitterly. "I told him that if he was so determined to think the worst of you and act like I'm already halfway in my grave, he should consider himself out of my will and lose my number."
This… was going to need more than coffee, Virgil realized with a purely internal sigh as Janus turned to look at him for direction. He swiftly downed the rest of his mug and set it down on the kitchen island before approaching the counter where Roman sat. This close, it was even more apparent that Roman had chosen his current outfit with intent, likely before he had received that email, the clothes close-fitting and offering easy access to every primary pulse point on his body. He'd even used unscented soap even though Virgil knew Roman preferred something citrus and minty, leaving his scent completely natural and open.
"Come down off the counter, sweet one," Virgil murmured, reaching up to Roman to help. Roman's eyes shot up to meet his, wide and wet and achingly vulnerable, but he swallowed and uncrossed his legs to scoot closer to the edge. His warm hands rested on Virgil's shoulders as Virgil held him around the waist and lifted him down. With his feet on the floor again, it was abundantly obvious that Roman, much like Janus, was taller than Virgil by a good four inches, which now that he thought about it probably contributed to people thinking he was younger than he was. Shoving that thought aside for the moment, he reached down to take one of Roman's hands in his and smiled gently. "Let's go sit down in the parlour to chat, alright? You, me, and Janus."
"Okay," Roman whispered.
"Okay," Virgil murmured back.
Janus fell into step behind them as Virgil led Roman out of the kitchen and across the hall, through the receiving room and into the parlour where Virgil and Janus entertained any vampire visitors they had. It was usually off-limits to Roman because of that as a measure to keep him safe since that was also where they kept the liquor, and drunk vampires aren't always careful and respectful vampires. Janus went straight to the decanter to pour as Virgil brought Roman over to the couch and urged him to take a seat.
"Alright now," Virgil said gently as he took a seat beside Roman, not close enough to touch but still close enough that he could feel the radiating warmth from Roman's bare leg through his yoga pants. "I'm guessing from what you said in the kitchen about 'missing your chance again' that this isn't some new whim or curiosity for you." Roman shook his head mutely. "How long have you been thinking about this, Roman?"
"Months," Roman admitted in a whisper. "I don't know if you…. I have a twin, you see. Remus. And while Mom and Dad did their best to treat us equally, it's been pretty much the cliche of 'good twin, bad twin' for us with our extended family, except everyone thinks I'm the so-called 'good twin'."
"You don't agree?" Janus asked, coming over with three glasses a third of the way filled with (Virgil sniffed surreptitiously) blackberry brandy.
"I'm in theatre," Roman huffed, rolling his eyes. He took the glass he was handed without question, but didn't drink from it, choosing instead to continue, "And I'm not such a choir boy as to think being in theatre is automatically a sin or something, but I dropped out of college to pursue acting while Remus went and got an actual full-on medical degree for nursing. But because his stories are all gross medical things and weird patients while mine are auditions and musical numbers and prop mix-ups, none of our aunts and uncles and cousins paid him much attention, until he started working part time at La Vie en Sang."
"We've been there a couple of times," Virgil offered as he accepted his own glass from Janus, who sat down on the ottoman in front of Roman. "Nice place, very considerate of all their patrons, careful to keep an eye on things and make sure nobody's drinking too heavily."
"I know," Roman nodded, smiling a little wanly. "You wouldn't have seen Remus since he stays up in the security office watching the cameras unless there's an incident as he calls it, but… he recognized you from my texts. And decided to tell me everything."
Many times over the last few centuries Virgil had been quietly, fervently grateful that as a vampire he could no longer blush noticeably like he had as a human, but perhaps none so much as in that moment. Everything, Roman said. Virgil knew how his evenings at those clubs, rare though they were, tended to play out, having the brooding and darkly mysterious thing going for him as he nursed a single drink in a dark corner, waiting for whichever hopeful person got brave enough to venture close and ask him for a bite… drawing them into his lap, teasing just a little as he asked where they wanted it, the gasps and soft whimpers when he finally gave them what they wanted and took his "price" for their pleasure in a mouthful or two before licking the wound clean and escorting them to the bar to be checked over by the staff and marked off the available list…. He exchanged a quick look with Janus, reading a similar flare of discomfiture in his eyes, then turned back to Roman. "I gather his description left an impression."
"You could say that," Roman gave a short, humorless laugh. "I was… I'd only been living here for two and a half months at that point, so even though I knew you both are vampires and I'd seen the marked dispenser bags in the fridge, I didn't really know. You know? Like, in my head I understood it, but I was a lot more concerned with keeping a lid on my gay panic around you both. Well… trying to. I don't think I was very good at it."
"Are we… meant to feel flattered about this?" Janus asked hesitantly as he glanced at Virgil, his posture very still in that way Virgil had come to recognize meant he was holding himself back from flailing.
"I mean, I feel pretty flattered," Virgil offered with a half-shrug. And he did, knowing that Roman had been interested in them so quickly, except…. "You've been living with us almost ten months now, but you didn't start actively flirting with us until six months ago."
"I had a small existential crisis in between then and when Remus told me what he had seen the two of you doing," Roman muttered, looking down at the glass of brandy in his hand. "The number of times I thought 'God, I wish that was me with them' during Remus's call, and then it would hit me that I wanted to be in the place of someone being…."
"Bitten by a vampire?" Janus filled in blandly. "Used as a supplementary food source?"
"Practically seduced by my incredibly hot housemates," Roman corrected sharply. "And yes, okay, the whole 'being food' thing tripped me up a little until Remus compared it to swallowing when giving a blowjob."
Ohh… that was going to be tripping Virgil up the next time he went out. He carefully rested his hand with his glass on his leg with his arm just across his lap. "That's, uh... certainly one way to look at it, I guess."
"Yes, well… as you mentioned, I only gathered up the nerve to start actively flirting with you both six months ago," Roman sighed. "By that point I had been living here long enough that I felt pretty confident in knowing your rhythms, what would have you going out, and… please correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems you only ever go to… one of those places… when something has come up, either health-wise or with an unexpected guest and the monthly council-issued delivery is not enough."
"We call it 'hunting'," Janus said carefully. Roman swallowed a little and nodded, and Virgil caught the shift in his scent even as he pressed his legs together. "And you do have the right of it, over all. I go a little more often than Virgil does, usually at the end of a stressful week as a treat, but neither of us is particularly gluttonous."
"I'm not usually a fan of going out in general," Virgil admitted with another shrug. "I make exceptions for work and going to see you perform, or for hunting when the circumstances call for it, but you know I'd be happy enough to hole up here indefinitely if I could get away with it."
He always felt too exposed and vulnerable, walking around where people knew not only that vampires existed, but that he was one, when for so much of his life discovery had been the death knell….
Roman nodded again, turning the glass in his fingers, then looked up and met Virgil's eyes before shifting to look at Janus as well as he tilted his head to pointedly bare his neck. "I'm right here."
Fuck…!
"Let's… back up a step real quick," Virgil said, taking a deep breath in through his mouth to hopefully get a little less of that enticing scent of Roman that was apparently very much on offer. "How did your cousin learn that you were considering, er, renegotiating your tenant contract? Given his usual attitude towards us, I can't imagine you willingly told him."
"Definitely not," Roman grimaced. "Patton and I used to be close, but with how passive-aggressively anti-vampire he's been lately I just haven't trusted him enough to really confide in him, even before I started thinking about… that secondary contract… and after he pulled this shit it'll be a cold day in Hell before I trust him again! I still needed to talk to someone close to me about it, though, so I talked to Remus and he got me a bunch of those pamphlets La Vie en Sang has for prospective donors. I hid them in my room, but I think Patton must have seen one when he came over to bring cookies last week."
Virgil felt himself relaxing a little bit at the mention of the pamphlets. Presumably as both a nurse and Roman's brother, Remus would know which ones to give out so Roman would be able to have as much of the information as he needed before actually talking to them about it, and if he was giving Roman the pamphlets after having told him whatever details of Virgil and Janus's "hunts" that he saw in the club's security cameras, he probably didn't disapprove of Roman's choices too much.
Janus apparently agreed, as he said, "Perhaps you should invite your brother over to visit sometime. I'm a little surprised he hasn't come by before now, actually, with how often your cousin has been here."
"Hospital hours, plus the part time job means he doesn't have a lot of free time," Roman admitted with a sigh. "Also, Remus actually trusts me to be telling the truth when I say I'm fine, you're both wonderful and respectful of my boundaries and personal space when I need you to be, and I'm not secretly being snacked on in the middle of the night." He hesitated, then added in a quieter voice, "If you want to go ahead and forbid Patton entry onto your property under section four of the tenant agreement, I can give you some of his hair for the spell."
That's the clause about ritually forbidding those visitors who prove to be a direct hazard to any member of the household and binding them against entry, Virgil thought, eyes going wide. That must have been some fight Roman and Patton had on the phone while Jay and I were still asleep….
"I think we can hold off on the full binding for a bit," Janus said after a long look shared with Virgil. "For now, we should discuss what we are and are not going to be doing for the next few days."
"Not doing?" Roman asked, something fragile in his tone that made Virgil reach out and take his free hand again.
"We are not going to bite you tonight," he emphasized gently. "You have that appointment tomorrow, and it will be a much more effective and impactful statement for you to arrive in pristine, unbitten condition and with the ability to say truthfully that we have never had even a drop of your blood, willingly or by force."
"You will also then be in a strong position to have the crisis center start a donor file for you, which you should do anyway just in case," Janus added. "Then you can add a specification that Remus be your primary human emergency contact, and that Patton Sanders-Payne is not allowed to make decisions on your behalf since he's already filed one false report of abuse."
"But what about you and Virgil?" Roman protested. "Your next box from the council doesn't arrive until Saturday!"
"We can handle rationing for a couple of days," Virgil said firmly, squeezing Roman's hand gently. "Tomorrow after you've had your appointment and gotten an official donor file created, we can sit down together again and go through the secondary contract, make sure you understand it all and are comfortable with everything in it. Then, if we're all satisfied with the agreement and you decide this is really what you want, the day after tomorrow we will go to the county clerk's office to sign the contract with a notarized witness signature and file it along with the amended tenant contract."
"We'll probably have a visit from a council representative on Friday to interview us before the next delivery to get on record that you've joined our household as an emergency donor," Janus continued. He'd pulled out his cell phone and was using this thumb to scroll along the screen for something. Registry details, probably. Virgil really did love his efficiency. "And I specify 'emergency' because that means our delivery allotment won't be reduced and it gets you a free monthly delivery of council-brewed emergency blood replenisher potions in case of a full on life-threatening situation."
"We'd all like to hope it won't ever be needed," Virgil added, stroking the back of Roman's hand with his thumb, "but it's good to have all our bases covered. Speaking of which, if you want you can invite your parents and brother over for dinner on either Wednesday or Thursday. I know when your parents helped you move in, your father made noises about wanting to pick my brain about what the revolution was like from my perspective after learning I'm old enough to have lived through it."
"Which one?" Janus drawled teasingly.
"Yes," Virgil deadpanned.
"I can leave a message for Remus to call me back when he has a free moment to say which day is good for him before calling Mom and Dad," Roman offered, smiling a little hesitantly. "He'll be thrilled to be invited, though he's probably gonna have a bunch of really inappropriate questions that he's not allowed to ask club patrons or patients."
"More inappropriate than your castmate who asked if I was your 'sugar daddy' when I dropped you off for rehearsal two months ago?" Janus asked.
"He keeps asking me how I think sex works for you when you don't have blood," Roman said bluntly.
"Didn't you say he's a nurse?" Virgil said once he'd gotten the urge to swallow his tongue under control, grateful that he had yet to take a sip of his brandy. "He should know what our circulatory system runs on instead of regular blood."
"Especially after all the experiments performed by that psychopath Mengele - may his soul rot in the void - back in the forties," Janus added with a shudder, downing his own glass of brandy in two large swallows.
"Textbooks apparently don't do the subject justice the way a first-hand account would," Roman muttered, blushing again. "Feel free to tell him to get his own vampire boyfriend if he's so curious."
"Duly noted," Virgil hummed, lifting his glass. His eyes caught on the face of his watch sitting over the inside of his wrist and he grimaced and lowered the glass again, handing it to Janus. "Now, though, it's getting close to five and Jay and I need to get to work. Since I'm apparently driving us, I don't mind dropping you off at the theatre on our way if you have rehearsal…?"
"Not until seven," Roman said, glancing down and blinking at himself before blushing darker. "And I should probably change before I leave the house…."
"Oh, so this delicious— excuse me, delightful ensemble is purely for our enjoyment?" Janus asked teasingly as he took Virgil's glass, draining it as well before getting up. He glanced down at Roman's still untouched glass, then back up again with a raised eyebrow, which prompted Roman to eye the glass and bring it up to sniff.
"What is this?" he asked cautiously, causing Virgil to smile a bit. Good, he wasn't so trusting of them as to accept and drink something without asking what it was.
"Brandy," he answered. "Not a lot, nor strong enough to really cloud your judgment, especially if you've remembered to eat today, just enough to steady rattled nerves if needed."
"Better not, then," Roman said reluctantly, handing the glass back to Janus. "I've been so twisted up after that call with Patton that I couldn't eat anything."
"I'll make you a sandwich while you get changed, then," Virgil offered as he got up and gave Roman his other hand to help him up. When Roman stood and actually looked at him, gratitude in his eyes, Virgil couldn't resist lifting the hand he still held to brush his lips over Roman's knuckles. "We can talk tomorrow about exactly what you want from us going forward, sweet one."
"Starting a collection of pretty boys to enjoy, are you?" Janus murmured to Virgil as Roman left for his room to get changed and they walked back through to the kitchen.
"I already have you as part of that collection, don't I?" Virgil murmured back with a sideways look and a slow smirk that made Janus swallow tightly and nod. "Don't worry, I won't keep him all to myself… or neglect you, either."
"I never imagined you would, sir," Janus breathed softly, bending obediently when Virgil quirked a finger and sighing into the slow and tender kiss that just barely nicked his lip with one of Virgil's fangs, a flick of his tongue healing the wound again. Things would change, they both knew, but they had both had a feeling this was coming since that delectable little human had begun flirting with them with intent six months ago. Virgil may have been good at denying himself things he wanted, but he knew better than to refuse a treat this sweet when it was offered up to him on a polished marble countertop.
Soon, sang within him as he released Janus and started pulling out ingredients for Roman's sandwich. Soon….