I Fell For My Boss at the Blood Bank—And He's a Vampire

The heavy glass door whispered shut behind you, and the sounds of the city—the distant sirens, the hum of traffic—vanished completely. You were left in a silence so absolute it felt like a pressure against your ears. The lobby of Aeterna Vitae was nothing like the drab, functional clinics you had imagined. It was a cavern of polished white marble and dark, gleaming wood, lit by soft, recessed lights that made the space feel both sacred and sterile. It smelled of ozone and something vaguely medicinal, but clean, like cold mountain air. There was no receptionist, no waiting area, just a single, monolithic desk of black granite that stood empty.

For a moment, you thought you were alone. You shifted your weight, the soft scuff of your sensible shoes echoing in the vast quiet.

“You’re punctual.”

The voice came from the shadows beside the desk. You startled, your hand flying to your chest as a man detached himself from the darkness. He moved with a liquid grace that was at odds with his complete stillness moments before. He was tall and lean, dressed in a perfectly tailored black suit that made him seem more like a CEO than a lab supervisor. His face was a collection of sharp angles and pale skin, dominated by dark eyes that seemed to absorb the light around them. He didn’t smile. He simply watched you approach, his gaze so direct and unwavering it felt like a physical touch.

“Emma,” you said, your voice sounding small in the cavernous room. “My first night.”

“I am aware.” He gestured toward the granite desk, his movements economical and precise. “I am Julian, your supervisor.” He stood on the opposite side of the desk, creating a formal barrier between you. “Your duties here will be straightforward. You will be responsible for the nightly inventory audit, cataloging all new arrivals against their manifests. You will monitor the primary and secondary refrigeration units, ensuring all temperatures remain within optimal parameters. Finally, you will prepare the designated outbound shipments for the morning couriers.”

He spoke with a detached clarity, each word delivered as if it had been carefully measured. There was no warmth in his tone, no invitation for small talk. His eyes never left your face, and you had the distinct and unnerving sensation that he was not just looking at you, but reading you, taking in every detail from the nervous way you held your bag to the faint tremor in your hands. You felt exposed, scrutinized, and yet, in a way you couldn't explain, you also felt seen. He finished his clipped explanation and paused, the silence stretching between you once more, thick with unspoken things.

“Follow me,” he commanded, and turned, his black suit melting back into the shadows from which he had emerged. You followed him through a heavy door that clicked shut with the satisfying weight of a bank vault. The corridor beyond was lined with frosted glass and stainless steel, the air humming with the low, constant thrum of refrigeration units.

He led you into the main laboratory. It was a vast, cold room, dominated by rows upon rows of tall, stainless-steel freezers. The clinical scent was stronger here, sharp and clean. You saw immediately that security was more than just a locked front door; every access point had a keypad, and what looked like a biometric scanner glowed with a small green light next to the doorframe.

Julian walked you down an aisle, his polished shoes making no sound on the poured concrete floor. “These are the primary storage units,” he said, his voice a low monotone that barely carried over the hum. “Standard inventory. A-positive, O-negative. Everything is barcoded and logged. Your duties will primarily concern these.”

As you passed the units, you saw the familiar labels for local hospitals and clinics: Mercy General, St. Jude’s Medical Center. But then you noticed a separate, smaller section of freezers at the far end of the room, set apart from the others. The labels on these were different. They weren’t hospital names. They were alphanumeric codes, stark and cryptic against the steel. LC-17B-Apo. G-44-Rhe. They meant nothing to you, yet they seemed to radiate a sense of importance.

Julian stopped and turned to face you. He held out a sleek, black tablet. “The inventory software is proprietary, but intuitive. All of your work will be logged through this.”

You reached for it, and as you took the device, his fingers brushed against yours. A shock, sharp and electric, shot up your arm. His skin was cold. Not just cool from the room’s ambient temperature, but unnaturally, profoundly cold, like marble that had been stored in a deep freeze. Your breath caught in your throat, and you instinctively pulled your hand back, the tablet feeling heavy and foreign in your grasp.

He didn't acknowledge the jolt, but his dark eyes held yours for a fraction of a second too long, a flicker of something unreadable in their depths before it was gone. He didn’t move away. Instead, he gestured with his chin toward a heavy, reinforced door at the bottom of a short flight of steel stairs. It looked more like the entrance to a bunker than a storage area.

“Everything in this room is your domain,” he said, his voice dropping, losing its detached quality and taking on a hard, serious edge. “Everything except for what is down there. That is the sub-level vault. It houses the Legacy Collection.” He paused, letting the weight of his words settle in the cold air. “You will not access it. You will not attempt to log its contents. You will not inquire about it. Under any circumstances. Is that understood?”

The finality in his voice was a steel door slamming shut. You just nodded, the word “understood” catching in your dry throat. He gave you one last, lingering look before turning and walking away, leaving you alone in the vast, humming laboratory with the cold weight of the tablet in your hands and the ghost of his touch on your skin.

For the next few hours, you worked. You followed the protocols he’d outlined, your movements becoming more confident as you cross-referenced manifests and scanned barcodes. The work was methodical, almost mindless, and it gave your racing thoughts a place to settle. But even as you focused on the screen, your awareness was split. Part of you was cataloging units of A-negative, while the other was hyper-aware of the silence, the cold, and the heavy, reinforced door leading to the Legacy Collection.

With an hour left in your shift, your assigned tasks were complete. You sat at the main console, the large monitor glowing in the otherwise dim lab. The hum of the refrigerators was the only sound, a constant, low thrum that vibrated through the floor. On a whim, you navigated to the public-facing donor database, the one accessible on the company’s main website. It was a simple, anonymized list of local volunteers. You scrolled through pages of entries: Male, 42, B-Positive, Donated 11/02. Female, 28, O-Negative, Donated 10/30. It was mundane, impersonal, exactly what you’d expect.

But your curiosity was a persistent itch. The memory of those cryptic labels—LC-17B-Apo—surfaced in your mind. Julian’s warning echoed with it, his voice low and absolute. You will not inquire about it. It was a direct order, the one inviolable rule of this place. Your fingers hovered over the keyboard. It was a closed system. What could it hurt to just look?

Your heart began to beat a little faster, a frantic rhythm against your ribs. You told yourself it was foolish, a surefire way to get fired on your first night. But the question was louder than your caution. You typed the code you remembered into the system’s internal search bar.

LC-17B-Apo.

You hesitated for a second, your finger hovering over the enter key, then pressed it.

The reaction was instantaneous and violent. The entire screen flashed a blinding, hostile red. A black box materialized in the center of the monitor, the words stark and severe.

ACCESS DENIED. UNAUTHORIZED INQUIRY LOGGED. ADMINISTRATOR NOTIFIED.

A cold dread washed through you, so intense it made you feel nauseous. You scrambled for the mouse, clicking the ‘OK’ button on the warning box with a trembling hand. The screen returned to the benign donor database, but the damage was done. Administrator notified. Julian. He would know.

You shoved your chair back from the console, the legs scraping loudly against the concrete. You stood up, wrapping your arms around yourself, suddenly feeling the deep chill of the room in your bones. The steady, monotonous hum of the freezers no longer sounded passive. It sounded like a guard, a low growl that filled the space, protecting the secrets locked behind all that steel. The pristine lab, the hushed lobby, Julian’s impossible stillness and cold skin—it all began to connect in your mind, forming a picture you couldn’t yet fully see. This wasn't just a high-end blood bank. It was a fortress. And you had just rattled the gate.