“Vampire?”
We made it out to the parking lot in the streaming sun, into the afternoon glare.
“Yes.”
His father opened a door to his super expensive car, and I got in.
Eight
This was really happening.I was in the car with Rowan’s father, who was a vampire. He’d bit me. I stared at the wound. It was small and closed. I probably wouldn’t even see it tomorrow.
“It’s his saliva.” Rowan stared at me, looking where I did, straight at my wrist. “It has properties to heal the wound fast, but it’s also what makes people addicted.”
I gasped. This was news to me. “What?” The last thing I wanted was to be addicted to anything.
He put his hand on my arm. “It’s okay. You’ve only been bitten once. You’re not addicted, but you’re probably feeling a little bit…a little bit like you’re feeling no pain. Not good, per se, but not bad. Numb, right? Like what happened this morning matters less to you now.”
Rowan was absolutely right. I couldn’t even get startled about that. Even the idea of being addicted, which moments earlier had made me gasp, faded to unimportance. “Yes. I see what you mean.”
“I know you do. Now, imagine you’re a person who needs to feel this way all the time. Just not to feel it, whatever it is that you don’t want to feel, so you seek out the bite again and again until you absolutely can’t live without it. I think I’ve heard it takes about ten times.”
His father eyed him in the rearview mirror. “Don’t be ridiculous. Most humans can’t withstand five bites before they’re ours. But they’re ours before that too. We don’t let people who know about us come and go. Everyone is carefully watched, as you know.”
That begged the next question. “So you’re a vampire. All five of you are? I guess, since you can walk in the daylight, there is no way to tell.”
This was so bizarre. The whole situation seemed unreal, and yet it was absolutely happening. Vampires were somehow real, and I was in the car with two of them.
“No, I’m not yet a vampire.” He took my hand and squeezed it. “Feel me? I’m warm. If you touched my father, he’d be cold.”
Okay, I amended my thought.One vampire.I am in the car withonevampire.
Hold on. “What? Notyeta vampire?”
“I’ll explain all of it. I promise I will. I told you, I hate lying. Here’s how it works—when I was born—”
His father cut him off. “You will, but not yet. I have things to say first. And, Maci…” He said my name like it tasted bad. “Only elder vampires can day walk. It takes hundreds of years. The younger vampires are not able to do it. You are going to want to listen very carefully and do just as I say. If anything happens to Rowan, it will be on your head.”
“What?” Rowan and I spoke at the same time.What does that even mean?
My friend, who had been carrying a much bigger lie than I ever imagined, sat forward. “I don’t know what you’re pulling here, but—”
“Quiet.”
We both sat back in our seats. His father, a vampire who had bitten me on the wrist, drove the car. Maybe being drugged by his saliva kept me from throwing myself out the window.
Rowan stroked his hand down my face and whispered the words, “I’m sorry. So sorry.”
I believed him. The question was how sorry was he going to be, and just how much trouble was I in for ever having said something to Rowan and the others in the library that day?
* * *
I wasn’table to do anything but follow Rowan’s father into his house and up the stairs to what turned out to be Rowan’s very big bedroom. I hurried to keep up. Rowan put himself between his father and me. He remained silent, his back stiff, but he abruptly came to a stop when we reached his bedroom. I could immediately see why. On their knees, on the floor facing us, were the other four guys.
Closest to me was Tanner. He actually jolted when he saw me. Next to him was Ace, and on his other side, Caesar. Griffin was the farthest away.
Tanner closed his eyes like they hurt him. “No.”
“It’s bad,” Rowan spoke to him as he crossed the room to get on his knees next to Griffin. I couldn’t be sure, but it seemed they had been in this order before. Rowan knew right where to go.