Frost Burn

by Erica Stevens

  Chapter Six

  Quinn had never realized how small her apartment was, until now. The group gathered within it took up almost all of the space in her living room. She slid around the back of the couch she’d picked up from the side of the road a couple of months ago. Yellow bits of stuffing poked through the gray striped fabric on the arms. One of the cushions bowed in the middle, but she avoided that side and the material didn’t smell like piss or have stains all over it, which was a noticeable upgrade from her last couch. To her, it had been the find of the decade.

  After what had happened in the bar, and having to hide the bodies somewhere they wouldn’t be discovered before the sun could hit them this morning, all she wanted to do was curl up on the couch right now and relax. That wasn’t to be as she had a pack of watchdogs nipping at her heels.

  “Would you like something to drink?” She dropped her coat on the couch and made her way toward the galley style kitchen. It didn’t bother her some closets were bigger than her kitchen; the only thing she cared about was that the fridge kept her Mountain Dew and peanut butter cups cold. They were her left over addictions from her human years; she didn’t get any nourishment from them but she still loved them.

  “You have something other than blood?” Chris inquired.

  “Mountain Dew and tap water.”

  “Poison,” Melissa muttered.

  Quinn stopped walking to stare at the young woman in confusion. “She doesn’t mean you poisoned them,” Chris hastily explained. “She’s a health freak so soda’s not really her thing, but I’ll take one.”

  “So will I,” Lou said but the others shook their heads no in response to her questioning look.

  She grabbed three sodas from the fridge and walked back into the living room to give the other two to Chris and Lou. Popping the top on her can, she took a swig before placing it on her milk crate coffee table. She didn’t know what to say or what they were all doing here, but her eyes were irresistibly drawn toward Julian as he stared around the room.

  She didn’t have many things in here; she couldn’t when she might have to leave at a moment’s notice. There was nothing that would tell anyone where she came from in this room, or anywhere else in this apartment. The only things that meant anything to her, she always kept on her. Instinctively her hand fluttered to the heart locket with two pictures inside. It had belonged to her cousin, Betsy. The coolness of the gold against her flesh was a constant reminder of those she’d lost.

  Her fingers fell away when Julian’s eyes slid to her. “Don’t spend much time here?”

  “Only my days,” she responded. “But the TV works…”

  “It does?” Lou asked in disbelief.

  She glanced at the old, fifteen-inch tube TV. It wasn’t anything fancy and had to be turned on and off by hand, but it worked well enough that she was able to watch the News and Netflix. “Yes, it does,” she informed him. “Since you’ve all insisted upon following me here, and you know what I can do, it’s only fair you tell me what you’re capable of.”

  There hadn’t been much time to talk while they’d been carrying the bodies out of the bar and cleaning up the mess. She didn’t consider this group her enemies, but she wasn’t about to let her guard down around them either. The furniture in the apartment was sparse, but she stood within a foot of the nearest hidden stake and within three feet of five more of them. It wouldn’t take her more than a second to retrieve each one and start flinging them at people.

  She also knew she could leap from this third story apartment and be out of here in less time than it would take them to blink. Granted the window had always been open when she’d practiced her escape before, she did pay for the a/c and heat here, she wasn’t about to have plastic over the window twelve months a year. The glass would slow her but not by much, and she knew this town better than Julian. He may be more powerful than her, but he wouldn’t expect her to leap out the window, she hoped. Once free of here, she could lose herself amongst the stores and homes if it became necessary. It was an escape route she’d practiced weekly over the past three years to keep herself honed and prepared if it became necessary.

  She’d been caught with her guard down once already, it would never happen again. Inadvertently, her fingers slid up to the scar running from her eyebrow to her hairline. Her hand hastily fell away when Julian’s eyes latched upon her. She threw back her shoulders and held his gaze.

  “Well,” she prompted.

  Melissa perched on the arm of the couch. “I have visions, or I suppose you could call me a Seer.”

  Quinn didn’t know how to take that revelation. “Have you seen anything about me?”

  Melissa shook her head. “Whatever was seen about you has been an entirely vampire revelation, so far.”

  She didn’t want them to know how much Melissa’s words had just unsettled her. Acting far more nonchalant than she felt, she turned to Zach. “How about you?”

  “I can control the air,” he replied.

  “I can tell things about people, sense their emotions, read them,” Chris said. “I know when they’re lying, when they’re evil or hiding something.”

  An uneasy feeling settled into Quinn’s stomach. Her whole existence was built on nothing but secrets and lies. Secrets she’d never let anyone know. Secrets two members of this group might eventually uncover if she wasn’t extremely careful around them. She kept her face impassive as she held Chris’s gaze. Questions about her past would be best avoided in his presence.

  “As Guardians, Lou and I are mere mortals,” Luther said with a laugh.

  She’d never considered the Guardians mere mortals, though she supposed they technically were. They had none of the abilities of the Hunters or vampires. She wouldn’t require a stake to take them down but her fingers itched for a weapon. They would have attacked her by now, if that had been their objective, and they most certainly wouldn’t be standing here, with him. No, there was far more to this group than met the eye, and her morbid curiosity kept her standing there.

  “You’re more than mortals,” she murmured.

  “You have knowledge of the Hunter and Guardian line?” This question was from him.

  “Doesn’t every vampire have at least some knowledge of those who hunt us?”

  “Most, yes. Your sire filled you in on the details?”

  It probably normally happened that way, but her transformation had been anything but normal. Chris can detect a lie, she reminded herself. “Sort of.” It wasn’t technically a lie; it was more a hedge.

  “Sort of?” he inquired.

  “If you’re going to reveal every detail of your life, then feel free, but I’d prefer to keep my private life private from people I don’t know.”

  His head tilted to the side before he gave her a brief nod. “Fair enough.”

  “What do you know about them?” Luther inquired.

  “I know Guardians train Hunters and keep the knowledge of their history. I know The Hunter line was created from vampire blood, through experimentation by The Commission as a way to fight against vampires. I know The Commission was the leading body of The Hunters and Guardians.” She didn’t miss the muscle twitch in Julian’s cheek when she mentioned The Commission.

  Wonder what that’s all about? She pondered but didn’t ask. She was going to keep her secrets, so she wasn’t about to start asking him to divulge his.

  “You know a lot then,” Luther muttered. “You said you’ve heard what had happened to The Elders but have you heard about The Commission?”

  “I’ve heard the rumors they’ve both been decimated,” she confirmed.

  “They were.”

  “And I suppose you had something to do with it?” She took a small step closer to her escape window as she asked the question.

  “They were monsters who had to be stopped. All of them.” Julian’s low, gravelly tone caused the hair on her nape to rise.

  Quinn’s gaze slid over the Hunters and Guardians standing with him right now. “I
never had any interaction with either group.” Again that revelation wasn’t a total lie, but not the whole truth either. If she kept this up maybe she could continue to fly below Chris’s lie-dar.

  “How did you hear the rumors?” Julian inquired.

  “I’ve been a vampire for six years now; I’ve run into more than a few of our kind since my creation. Thankfully, one of them didn’t start spouting nonsense about Seers and try to capture me until tonight.”

  His eyes narrowed on her, causing hers to do the same as she stared at him. “And the others?”

  “They were monsters who had to be stopped. All of them.” She tossed his words back at him.

  His mouth pursed. “Yes, there are some of those.”

  “The others have told me what they’re capable of, but what about you?” she inquired of him.

  “Psychometry.”

  She did a double take at the word. “What in the world is that?”

  “It’s the ability to learn about a person by touching them or an object they’ve touched.”

  The floor didn’t lurch out from under her, oh no, the whole freaking thing exploded under her feet. She was certain her knees were going to give out on her; her willpower somehow managed to keep her standing. What had he seen of her when they’d touched? What did he know? The questions clogged in her throat. She needed the answers, but what if he hadn’t seen much of her and her questions only caused him to dig further?

  “Interesting,” she forced herself to say.

  “It can be,” he drawled.

  The urge to scream filled her; it took all she had not to stomp her foot like a two year old. He wasn’t going to reveal anything he may have seen when he’d touched her. She was determined not to ask if all of her secrets had been laid bare to a man she barely knew and who could crush her skull with a flick of his wrist.

  She didn’t think he’d seen much of her, no matter how much he was trying to hint that he had. This conversation would be going in a completely different way if he had. “How old are you?” Lou inquired.

  Her attention was drawn to the lanky young human standing by her kitchen doorway. “I was turned into a vampire six years ago, at eighteen.”

  She couldn’t resist the pull of the ice colored eyes burning into the side of her head. Julian’s arms were folded over his chest; his legs stretched out before him as he leaned against the wall by her bedroom door. The fact he appeared so nonplussed, while she felt as twitchy as a murderer on death row, only put her more on edge.

  “What about you?” she demanded of him. Her tone came out far more hostile than she’d intended, but he’d just tossed her well-ordered life into the crapper.

  “I was changed when I was twenty-two, that was five hundred and seventy-six years ago.”

  Quinn was extremely proud she managed to keep her mouth from dropping. “You’re an Elder?”

  “One of the only two left.”

  Oh this whole situation kept getting better and better. Any vampire over five hundred years old moved into the Elder category and held a whole new level of supremacy over all the younger vampires. It definitely explained the power sizzling off of him and causing her skin to tingle. She had no chance of escaping him by jumping out of the window, she realized.

  “And some of The Commission may still be out there too. If they are, they will be taken care of,” Julian continued.

  “Bad experience with them?” she inquired.

  “You could say that.” Her curiosity was piqued by his clipped tone, but she didn’t press him further.

  She wistfully eyed the couch again; she didn’t even have the energy to haul her ass into her bedroom right now. A few hours to try and collect her thoughts would be awesome, instead she settled for finishing off her soda. She walked into the kitchen to grab another soda and a package of Reese’s.

  “You do know you’re a vampire right?” Chris asked her.

  “So I’ve been told,” she replied around a mouthful of melting peanut butter and chocolate that somehow failed to make her feel any better.

  “It would be best if we left this town,” Julian said. “If the ones looking for you realize vampires died here, they may come here to search for the source of the disappearance.”

  “This is my home.” It didn’t matter if she’d have to leave eventually, she wasn’t going anywhere with an Elder vampire who could learn about her by touching her, or the things she’d touched. She wondered if he could see into her life from touching the wall right now. His flesh wasn’t in contact with it, but then she didn’t know if that kind of contact would be required. “I’m not leaving.”

  Hopefully you will, she thought as she popped the second chocolate cup into her mouth.

  “Well now, Dewdrop, we’re going to have ourselves a problem then.” Quinn stopped chewing on her candy, her jaw locked as she glowered at Julian. “Because we’re not leaving you alone in this town. Not with that ability, and not with them searching for you.”

  The peanut butter went down like mud when she swallowed. “I can take care of myself.”

  “Against one or two, sure. Against a dozen or two dozen, you’ll end up as free as the birdman of Alcatraz.”

  There were a thousand responses running through her mind. Instead of speaking, she found herself simply staring at him as she tried to figure him out. She was beginning to think it might be impossible to do so. “I don’t need your help.”

  “But you do; you’re just unwilling to admit it,” he replied.

  “I don’t want your help,” she insisted.

  “And I don’t want to be stuck in this Podunk town, but I’m not leaving here until I’m sure you’re safe. We’ve all been through hell to make sure The Hunter line stays intact; I’m not about to let it all fall apart because of you.”

  Her hands fisted as she fought the urge to claw his infuriating eyes out. The pressure on her jaw caused her teeth to ache as she ground them together. “I have friends in this town. I’m not going to leave them behind to be destroyed by a bunch of vampires because you’re too scared to stand against them.”

  A strange flash of red blazed around the white band circling his pupil while the rest of his eye remained blue. It was the oddest thing she’d ever seen and yet strangely captivating. “I’m afraid of nothing and no one,” he growled. “But I don’t like putting my friends in danger unnecessarily.”

  This time she was unable to stop her mouth from parting as his aura of power rose to a whole new level. It pulsed against her in vibrant waves that caused her skin to ripple and her mouth to go dry. His obvious care for the people standing around him caused his more lethal air to break through his steel exterior. Yep, there would never be any figuring this man out, she decided.

  She would like to trust this group gathered around her, but she didn’t know them and she wasn’t going to bet her life on them. She’d made it this far by staying to herself; that wouldn’t change now.

  “Then go,” she whispered.

  He shook his head no. “Not an option.”

  He was the most infuriatingly stubborn man she’d ever encountered, but as she looked around the room, she saw the same resolve on all of the faces surrounding her. They weren’t going to leave, and she wasn’t going to go with them. Her shoulders slumped as she glanced toward her bedroom.

  “Your choice, but I’d like to get some rest now, if you don’t mind,” she grated out.

  “Not at all.” Julian walked over to her front door and pulled it open. He made a sweeping gesture with his arm to the others. “I’ll stay here.”

  “You’re not staying here!” Quinn blurted.

  That smile, no matter how adorable, really should be wiped off his face for a few hours. She could feel her right eye beginning to twitch when he closed the door behind his friends. “I’m not walking into the sun and bursting into ash either Dewdrop, so you’re stuck with me for the day.”

  Now not only was her eye twitching, but she could feel a muscle in her cheek beginning to jump
. Control your temper, she told herself. She couldn’t afford to lose control around this man. Too much would be revealed if she did.

  “You can’t stay in my apartment.” It took everything she had to keep the panic from her voice, but she couldn’t have him in here touching her things, learning about her.

  “And why not?” he inquired.

  “I’m not going to have a man I don’t know staying in my apartment.” She kept her tone reasonable but she hadn’t been able to keep an edge out of it.

  “I didn’t take you as someone to be frightened of things.”

  “I’m not, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let a stranger in my apartment while I’m sleeping.”

  “Fair enough.”

  Stunned by the lack of a fight, Quinn stared at his back as he opened the door and stepped into the hallway. She remained unmoving for a few minutes before walking over and sliding the deadbolt into place. She didn’t know where he’d gone, but she had a feeling it hadn’t gone far.

  Chapter Seven

  Julian lifted his head at the sound of footsteps in the hallway. He winced at the discomfort the movement caused his twisted neck. He’d managed to fall asleep for a couple of hours, but sitting on the faded, dirty blue rug, with his neck down, hadn’t been the best sleeping conditions. His body reminded him of that now.

  Luther fought back a grin as he stared down at him with his hand resting against the wall and a bag in his hand. “Sweet dreams?”

  “Bite me,” Julian muttered.

  Luther chuckled before sliding down the wall to sit beside him. He dropped the bag in between them. “Chris assumed you’d appreciate some clean clothes.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Our newest friend didn’t like the idea of having you in her place?” Luther asked.

  “Apparently strange men aren’t welcome in her home.”

  “At least she’s not stupid.”

  Julian leaned his head against the wall and draped his arm over his knees. He stared at the popcorn ceiling over his head. “No, she’s most certainly not stupid, but she is a rarity. She has far more power than any vampire of her tender years should.”