Nope. Not going to happen. “Sorry, that won’t work.”
I’d never been yelled at by four vampires at the same time before, but I was then.
* * *
“What are you doing?” I approached Ace, slowly. The hard line of his face, the slight tic in his jaw—he was mad—and I didn’t want to make it worse by breaking his attention too quickly. He concentrated on whatever he stared at, even though I couldn’t see the object of his rapt attention. Ace always seemed to be the most intense of us, the most powerful. He’d deny it, but it was true. I was immensely grateful he loved me and was always on our side. If it had gone any other way, Ace would be a powerful enemy.
Without looking in my direction, he extended his hand, so I laced our fingers together. On another night, in another time, we’d go hunt together. Not to kill the humans, as there was no need for that—not when we could easily feed each other with our human companions generously providing when we needed it and not dying for their trouble. No, we sometimes liked to stalk for the fun of it.
Our prey never even knew, making the activity harmless. It gave Ace what he needed when instinct rode him hard.
But things were different at the moment. We weren’t hiding, per se but we also weren’t running around like nothing was happening. They might strike at any time, and I wasn’t entirely sure we would win. We were in the right, but there were more of them. The lure of power—not something that Fredrick or any of his cronies could really understand—was too strong for young vampires. They didn’t know those instincts that controlled them were actually gifts if they were turned the right way.
Ace could teach them, if only they would listen.
“Ace?” I asked again.
“What’s going on?”
He tilted his head. “They’re coming. Closer every rising. They’re in bloodlust, and they’re listening to him.”
I swallowed. “What do we do?”
“We fight.” He kissed my hand. “I love you. Whatever happens, I willalwayslove you, even if I have to burn every one of them to the ground.”
He really would, if it came to that. I leaned on his shoulder. “This is all about me, you know? If I stepped back and let you or Rowan lead, they’d accept that.”
“Then they really do deserve to die.”
It was that simple for Ace.
* * *
I yawned over my coffee the next morning. If I intended to pick up the book Griffin wanted and make it back in time to study for my GED, I needed to leave soon. I hadn’t brought up the errand in front of Caesar or Ace, and I’d noticed neither had Tanner or Griffin. Were there alliances that I didn’t really understand between them? Ace and Tanner shared a bed—Ace was actually asleep, I’d checked. Caesar and Griffin always did recently, too.
Maybe I was overthinking the entire situation. Maybe they did all know what was happening, and I just wasn’t privy to the discussion.That’s the most likely scenario, isn’t it?
I drummed my fingers on the counter. I doubted that Caesar and Ace would be particularly happy with me traveling so far away from them, but it didn’t matter. I was doing it. I just had to wonder if I would ever understand the ins and outs of these guys since I wasn’t a vampire myself.
Finally, as I finished my coffee, I resolved to get more sleep every night. If I wanted to keep up the unusual amount of feeding I was somehow able to do, I had to take better care of myself.
The car they got for me was fun to drive, and using the GPS on the new phone waiting on the counter for me when I’d gotten up—already set up for me, thanks to the vamps—I easily navigated to the highway and headed into the mountains.
They must have gotten—perhaps stolen?—the phone when they went out to get chairs. The stake sitting next to the phone made me smile. I still wasn’t going to strap it to my body, despite the duct tape they’d also left helpfully on the counter for me to find.Did they actually think I would duct tape a stake to my body?I rolled my eyes. It was ridiculous, and I bet it would itch if I even attempted it.
I’d keep the stake in my purse, which would have to be good enough. We still hadn’t discussed how I was supposed to stake a vampire anywhere. I didn’t imagine they’d let me stand still and guess exactly the location of their heart, so unless I found one sleeping and decided to stake it, I would be really shit out of luck.
I shook my head. It was time to go for a drive, even if everything in me wanted to never leave the house again.What is that all about?I pushed my worries away. I’d lived my whole life with an element of fear chasing me, so the drive wasn’t any different.
Fourteen
With the radio blasting in a car that I was pretty sure wasn’t about to fall apart at any second, I felt freer than ever before. The drive proved beautiful—was this how other people got to live? They could justbe? No worries because their mother might not come back and then they’d starve to death because there wasn’t an adult in a hundred mile radius who would care. No worries because vampires might make them so addicted to their venom they couldn’t survive another day. No worries that the vampires they were falling for might someday just up and leave them because they got old, and then venom addiction would just rush back and kill you.
I blinked.Okay.Apparently,Iworried about that. Thank goodness for my stream of consciousness or I’d never know what I really thought about anything.
With a song I didn’t recognize blaring on the radio, I pulled into the driveway of the address. As described, it looked like a cabin in the woods in the middle of nowhere, but weirdly, all of the trees around the cabin were gone. Not even a single shadow slanted over the house. I pulled the car to a stop and stared at it, trying to decide why I found it unsettling. I might not even notice the lack of shadows, except the ones around our house were deep. They’d never seen the house before they bought it, so it was pure coincidence, but it crossed my mind that, should the guys ever be able to stay up in daylight, they might be able to stand in the shadows to hide from the sun for a second or two.Or maybe they wouldn’t.
Regardless of my ruminations, the cabin gleamed in bright sunshine. Even on a rainy day, there’d be no hiding near this home, not until about a quarter of the way down the driveway.