keep me needing you

Hands in the pockets of his jacket, boot heels scuffing at an almost languid pace as they strolled through town. A flash of a smile at folks passing, one hand tugged free to toss a cheery little wave at one of the nurses from the hospital and the brat clinging to one of her hands. Said brat had been a snack the week before when he’d sent the anxious mama out into the hallway while he’d taken a vial or two from little Nathaniel to try and get to the bottom of his nosebleeds. Five minutes without jamming a finger up his nose might’ve helped. Mal glanced over his shoulder as they passed, caught the kid doing it as he stared at him from other his mother’s shoulder. Rammed up to the knuckle, shocker.

Snorting, Mal turned back and bounced down the curb to cross towards the little mall. Nathaniel was lucky he wasn’t older. His mining tendencies might’ve set him up well for being a wendigo, something that liked poking around in dark places and had a taste for eating things. ”One day son,” he muttered to himself, setting narrowed eyes back on the one he was following. Wasn’t exactly one day for him one one day soon.

Usually by now they’d have moved on. Failures stacked up like cord wood, the lab packed up, including their little ‘permanent guests’. Loaded up in the night to go rumbling out of town before the locals realised just what had really been going on under their noses. It was the way you did it if you wanted to stay one step ahead of the things that could put an end to your fun real quick. Fun was the word of the year too.

Mal’s grin curled at the corners as he strolled into through the entrance behind the bloke, catching sight of his own reflection in the glass doors that swung open in front of them. Maybe it was a little bit of early Christmas shopping, maybe just a stroll to hit on the brunette at the smoothie stand. A pretty face had a tendency to get you everywhere when you were eighteen but it wouldn’t do much good when you were laid on a table with tubes going in every which way. Now that was fun. The town was rife with it. Things to lure in to twist around the way the doc liked, volunteers to head back to the motel with him for a little dinner – even if they were a little reluctant to trot on out when he was done.

He closed on the kid as the mall began to get busier, the halls between the shops thickening with people. No chance of him being noticed here, the kid’s pale eyes sliding over him as he looked back. Still, as he side stepped into a toy store, Mal stopped, sinking down on a bench outside with a wince. Now, now, he was definitely too old for the dollies and giant building blocks stacked up in the window. They all held onto their childhood too long now, still sucking on their thumbs at college, clinging on to security blankets and teddies when they ended up admitted to the hospital. In his day….

Clucking his tongue, he leaned against the back of the bench and kicked his legs out, watching from a distance as the kid walked up and down the aisles, thumbing the button on every toy that had one and setting off a cacophony in his wake that had the clerk scrambling out from behind the counter. The little shit. Maybe it was a good thing he’d learn some sort of lesson soon. The kid was bolting, laughing, he slowed as he got into that flow of traffic again.

Mal shoved his way up, muttering under his breath. If that was all this was then he’d end up losing his patience before the end of the day and he’d just drag the boy out a back exit. Blow waiting like he was meant to, he’d be doing the town a favour. He went to skirt a woman with what looked like a half dozen kids around her but then he was pulled back, a hand gripping his arm. Looking back he cursed under his breath. Krista. For God’s sake. He couldn’t go anywhere these days without her turning up, slowly turning his arguments around with that quivering lower lip and the offering up of a pulsing vein like it was all it took to – alright, maybe it was.

”Love,” he muttered, frowning down at the scrap of something she’d just held up in front of him. ”Panties?” And tears apparently. Filling her hazel eyes until they were mirror bright. The crowd parted between her, two blokes looming up behind them, questions peppering her. Thieving? God, she really didn’t have any barriers. Rules went over her head like they were nothing but a breeze, ruffling her hair but not bothering her one bit. ”That excited, huh?” he asked, plucking them from her fingers to shake them out. Mal frowned down at them, looking at Krista to smirk faintly and then looked back down at them. Not her usual sort definitely. ”You boys call that stealin’, don’t ya? Someone so caught up in things they don’t pay for them before they go scurrying out the door.” He eased in to Krista, slipping his hand around to the small of her back to pull her in. ”You’re trouble, you know that love? Always sticking your nose in and then you bring me these like a puppy with a ball. Little scraps of lace, saucy.” A pain in his bloody arse too. By now his little mate would be on the other side of the mall, well beyond reach.

Tagged: KRISTA MAY * Word Count: 967

Was she expecting him to compel the security guards right here and now?

Mal looked up from the froth of fabric still snarled around his fingers into Krista’s eyes. She’d peppered him with questions during their second time around, words tumbling out of her in what had felt like a never ending spill – what had he seen, what could his kind do, like they were magicians who could snap their fingers and have the world changing. He could here, he supposed, tossing the panties up in the air to catch the gaze of the security guards before he stepped into them this way and told them to walk off in the other direction. It was an accident after all. Wouldn’t teach her a lesson though, would it?

For Krista this wasn’t a teachable experience. Her lips parted, that sadness dropped over her pretty little face. It had been luck – or maybe not given that she had fluttered right up to him – that he was here. Less lucky that he wasn’t feeling entirely benevolent. ”You accidentally tucked ‘em up your sleeve, or an accident I didn’t get to see ‘em on you the first time?” Mal asked, lips pursing for a moment. God, she was looking for him to play rescuer. Curling in to him like that, clinging on like he was gonna make it all better. Not worse. It was sod’s law weren’t it?

The little minx pressed up against him, face practically tucked into the collar of his shirt, but not to hide from what she’d done. She was … tut tut tut. Mischief right there in those hazel eyes, excuses on her lips. ”You don’t think you did already?” Mal clucked his tongue. It never took much to turn that frown around, a few words of praise enough to get her to light up before. The hand at the small of Krista’s back swivelled down, smacked lightly. Without the hired pains in the arse there he might’ve handled the punishment himself but he had a uniformed pair of hands to pay her back for not only following him around Mystic Falls but pulling him into the sort of trouble that would have the Doc shitting bricks.

Mal frowned at the guards before his brows hitched. The thick finger the panties were still wrapped around jabbed at his own chest. Forget bricks, the Doc was gonna crap out the Taj Bloody Mahal if he found out about this. ”Me? What did I do? You see what you did now love?” His mouth pinched before he shook his head. He could’ve cut it off before now but he’d had to give her that metaphorical swat on the arse for this. Mal hissed a sigh out between his teeth, pocketing the red flag of Krista’s crime in his pocket. At least in the office he’d be able to get himself out of this at least.

The big bollocks’ had nudged them on ahead – just in case they bolted with Victoria’s least kept secret flying like a kite behind them. Once they were behind the closed doors he’d sat down and sprawled with his hands in his pockets as Krista went toe to toe with security. If it hadn’t been for her show – where had all those bloody tears come from? – he might’ve stepped in and got both of them out of this but this was like a made for TV movie. All kinds of over dramatic and hysterical over a pair of panties. The guards dug in, practically pulled out every bit of her life other than the fact that she was being munched on by a vampire and her ID, threw their accusations out.

Oi!

It’d been a joke outside, his being in cahoots with the knicker thief here but suddenly it was getting serious. The guards scrambled out like they knew what was coming, the phone calls already going in. Come pick ‘em up. Charge them. Slap the cuffs on and damn him. Mal sank back down on a seat – not next to Krista. He tipped his head back, lips pursing as he stared up at the ceiling. The Doc was gonna have his fucking life. Once upon a time he’d left behind another bunch who’d got him neck deep in shit, he hadn’t intended to do it again.

There it was, that tiny plea again. Mal tucked his tongue into the pocket of his cheek as he rolled his head to look at Krista. His brows were at half mast, something expectant in his expression as he let out a chuckle. Yeah, he coulda fixed it, if he’d done it right away. He’d had to punish her though. ”You want me to save your arse love? You grabbed them, came looking to me to save said arse? Luck was it?” The laugh rolled bitter again before Mal leaned over the gap, lips twitching as he stopped an inch from her face. ”I could have a little word in their ears, have us strolling out of here in an instant but then you wouldn’t learn would ya?” He lifted his chin to the bag on the table, the one they’d practically pulled apart. ”Why wouldn’t you tell them who you were?” The kid thing should’ve had him wincing – too close to the truth, ‘specially if she was a runaway.

The slap on the wrist was getting harder by the minute. Not just the Doc being pissed but a chance of another monumental punishment. He had ways to stop the beadles now, wouldn’t end up on a bloody ship, puking his guts out over the rail until he got his sea legs again, but there were plenty of other things in this town that’d love to see him on the end of a bit of corporal punishment. Feeling the first prick of a stake at his chest, Mal shoved to his feet the minute the door opened again. A couple of arseholes in sheriff’s department brown. One hand shot out at him the minute he pushed in close. ”There you are,” he crooned, friendly as you like. Mal plucked the knickers from his pocket, dangled them from the tip of his finger at the female deputy. ”You’ve got the back, there, ain’t ya? That’ll be enough for the both of ya. You’ll let me and kid go, you’ll remember giving us a warning. Krista here won’t do it again, will ya love? All done and dusted.” He winked but the female deputy was already grimacing and flicking the panties away so they fluttered to the floor.

Cuffs, rattling off both of their belts as the other one started to gesture Krista up. ”Sorry sir, that’s not the way that it works. You’re both under arrest, under suspicion of shoplifting.” Fuck. Glancing over at Krista Mal gritted his teeth and shook his head. He was gonna bloody throttle her.

Tagged: KRISTA MAY * Word Count: 1148

Getting his date’s car towed away from Campbell’s had been sly – of course Krista’s innocent act after had been anything but – rushing out of a store with a pair of knickers in her hand and the beadles chasing her was the complete bloody opposite. It had puppy clumsy, Krista’s attempts at fixing the mess she’d made afterwards clumsier still. That expectation he’d do it when she’d failed to leaving her pouting. The apology had been far too bloody late.

Mal’s expression was sour even with his chuckle and bitter words tossed out. His lips twitched but there was something sharp in the expression. He hadn’t seen the trouble she’d ended up being the night he’d picked her up for the first time. A snack, a little brushing away of the memory of it like crumbs off a table and a pat on the arse. No more, no less than he would’ve done with the brunette at Campbell’s but he hadn’t managed because of Krista and she’d ended up more pain in his backside than handy snack.

He had to bite back the grumbling growl that wanted to burst out at the whine that rose up out of her. Marcel had never taken trouble lightly. It’d been a fucking miracle he’d never found out about what had happened in San Francisco or he might’ve been left behind like luggage on the side of the road then. Krista would’ve latched onto somebody else, whining into their ears, expecting them to shield her from all the mistakes her eagerness had her making. ”I’d say it was bad luck, ‘specially for me. It’s a big old town and in all of this, you knew just where to come find me.” Naw, that bit had been calculated, the same way as the tow truck, it was just the rest of it that’d started to crumble.

Oh Jesus, Mary and Bloody Joseph. Now it was the waterworks, the threat of a complete sobbing meltdown over someone finding out that she’d failed miserably in trying to get her hands on something pretty to wear for her … man. The word had Mal shuddering faintly. There wasn’t a better one for it he supposed but Krista was already bulling past the bounds of personal space in that innocent little way (she had to be faking at least some of that didn’t she?).

He sucked a breath it through his nose, let it out in a snort as she glared at him. That wasn’t feigned, she was really pissed that he’d questioned her. Mal hummed lightly, lifting a hand to tap a finger lightly against the tip of her nose. ”Now that’s the first thing I’ve heard you wanna hide.” He looked pointedly at the wounds on her throat, her badges of honour. ”Is it really fun finding out why my bum’s in this chair, Krista?” Dark brows hitched almost in a dare. He hadn’t exactly made it easy on the two of them, but that, he thought almost smugly, was where that lesson came in.

Behave. It wasn’t hard, was it?

If his arse wasn’t getting numb from sitting there and there wasn’t that chance of the Doc finding out and throwing a mega fit, he might’ve let her suffer longer. The minute the deputies were muscling in he was on his feet. Confidence oozed from his pores as Krista retreated into herself, a kid squeezing out some tears as punishment raised its ugly head. She perked as he glanced towards her, one hazel eye winking at her as she smiled just like she was meant to.

”What?” Mal asked sharply. He looked back at the deputies, brows furrowing before he was looking back at Krista. His eyes widened faintly, temper rolling up his throat to strangle him. ”It’s a first offence, love. That counts. She’s hardly a criminal bloody mastermind, look at her for God’s sake…” It should’ve been enough, that pitiful look of shock and guilt working its way over Krista. She was crying out, on her feet like she was going for an Oscar and if he hadn’t tried buttering the officers up maybe the tears would’ve worked. As it was … fucking click.

On the ride to the station he’d ignored the looks the deputy shot him in the rear view, looking past the smug shit to the road ahead. He couldn’t see Krista in the car behind him but he imagined her melting down in it, pouting, sobbing, falling back into that ashamed little girl role. They had him out first, dragged off to a sodding interrogation room. He hadn’t risked trying to compel the deputies again, there were people in this town who’d take that attempt and make him pay for it like hunters always tried to. Flopped back in his seat, he played dumb, finally falling into Krista’s ridiculous story with it. No, son, I didn’t tell her to do it. She’s excitable y’see, always doin’ things before she’s realised what she’s up to. She just wanted to show ‘em off. If he’d had the chance, really, he’d have dragged her back in there to pay for ‘em.’

Stowed on a bench afterwards, shoulders pinching as they’d cuffed him again, Mal wondered if a bribe would be better now. By the time Krista appeared, all big eyes and tear stains, he was almost prepared to give it a go. He tipped his head back against the wall with a thunk. ”’s’alright, love,” he grumbled. ”You didn’t know you were gonna get such a smack on the wrist for being naughty. Do me a favour, though, be a little more subtle with it next time, eh?” There was still a faintly sharp edge to his words but they had softened a little. He huffed out a breath, puffed out his lips as he rolled his head to look at her. ”Long as they don’t go causin’ a …” Stink.

Too late.

The kid was maybe a couple of years older than Krista, lanky, ballsy if the finger aimed at him was anything to go by. It strained his shoulders but Mal sat up, aiming a smile at him as he bared his teeth. ”You gonna believe everything they tell you son?” Mal clucked his tongue, his smile going honey sweet. ”Mal. A … friend … of your sister’s. Lucky for her I was there, eh? You gonna get us out of ‘ere now? These cuffs are beginnin’ to chafe.” They would’ve popped off with a flex of his arms but like the compulsion it was a red flag in a station of judgy eyes just looking to catch that sorta thing.

Tagged: KRISTA MAY * Word Count: 1109