I rested my forehead on his chest.
“And until recently, this stupid curse was never an issue. Until you, there was never anyone I cared about enough for it to make a difference.”
That didn’t make this situation any easier. Hesitantly, I put my hands on his waist and looked up into his handsome face. Even though I hadn’t known him long, and even though he was a vampire, he made me feel things no one else ever had. He made me feel safe and loved. He made me want to live. My breath hitched.
I was in love with Trent.
But there was no future for us. Unless… “Is there a way to break the curse?” Hope filled my chest. “There has to be a way, right?”
“There’s only one way to break the curse.”
I straightened, and a sudden burst of energy brightened my mood. “What is it? Whatever it is, let’s do it.”
He stepped away from me and rubbed at his neck again.
My heart sank. This wasn’t going to be good.
“The only way to break the curse is to unite the three bloodlines. We need to find a direct female descendant of Rector Zoya and Annmarie Lewis and change her into a Halstead vampire.”
My hope and excitement deflated, and my shoulders slumped.
“We’ve looked everywhere, and the Zoya-Lewis bloodline died with the baby. The Zoya ensured there would never be a descendant. Believe me, we’ve tried finding one.” He paced. “When Rector invoked the power of his ancestors, he tipped the magical balance. All the good, responsible witches were angry, and one of them sought us out.”
Trent’s movements were fluid and hypnotic as I watched him pace the same two-foot path in front of me.
“She said she was aware of the curse and had been watching closely, waiting for us to reset the balance. But her coven had been weakened by the Zoya magic, and she couldn’t continue to do nothing. So, she offered to help us find a descendant, and she claims she found one, but she wouldn’t tell us who or where. She wanted to seek her out without the Zoya knowing, so she left. We never saw her again.”
“What happened to her?”
He shrugged. “We don’t know for sure. I think her lead turned out to be a dead end, and she was too afraid to tell us, so she disappeared. Sean thinks the Zoya found her.”
I shuddered. No wonder Trent was so adamant that I stay away from Isach. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on edge. Suddenly, I didn’t want any more answers. I didn’t want to know anything else. I wanted to rewind time to an hour ago when I didn’t know anything about any of this. I wanted to be blissfully ignorant.
And then a horrifying thought slammed into my mind. My eyes widened. “Abby…” My heart thundered in my ears, deafening me to any other sounds. “She was involved with Marc. And the other day, I saw her flirting with Isach. Oh, God. I have to warn her.” I moved to get off the tailgate, but Trent was in front of me quicker than I could get down.
He pulled me toward him, our mouths inches apart. “You can’t.” He lifted me off the tailgate and set me on the ground, but he didn’t release me.
“What?” I shouted, trying to wiggle free from his hold. “I have to. I can’t sit around and do nothing. If I can tell her the truth about him, she’ll leave him alone, and then—”
“And then they’ll come after you more than they already have, Chloe.” His words stopped me cold. “And if you tell her about Isach, you’ll have to tell her about me.”
I’d promised I wouldn’t tell anyone about him, and I couldn’t break that promise. But I couldn’t not tell Abby, either. I swallowed back the bile rising up my throat. There had to be a way I could warn her about Isach without spilling Trent’s secret.
“I can’t let her get hurt,” I said, desperation in my tone.
“I know, but you can’t stop it, either,” he said, his tone soothing. He released his hold on me, and I didn’t make an effort to move. “You’ve seen what they can do. With a single look, a few whispered words, they can hypnotize and disorient people. They can make you see things that aren’t there.”
“The hallway and the cemetery.” Fear clutched my chest at the memory. “And then earlier, when Isach had his arms around me, it was like I was paralyzed or something.”
“I’m so sorry. I never wanted you in the middle of this.”
Something nagged at the back of my mind. I felt like I was close to an epiphany, a breakthrough when all of this would make sense and I would understand everything. But it was out of my reach, close but not quite close enough. My head ached, and my throat burned.
“I can’t do this anymore,” I mumbled.
Trent’s eyes widened. “What?”
“I’ve been gone too long. I’m sure Abby and Ellie are worried. Can we go back to the party?”
“Of course.” Hesitantly, he approached me again and pulled me to him, wrapping his arms around my back.
I buried my face against his chest.
“Will you still give me the two days we talked about? I think if you spend some time with me, I can show you this isn’t as bad as it seems.” He stroked my hair, tugging me closer.
My immediate reaction was to say yes, but when I took a moment to think about it, I wondered if no was a better answer. What was the point of spending more time with him? All that would do was make me love him more, and we had no future together. There was no version of this where we’d live happily ever after.
“Chloe?” Trent leaned away and tilted my head back. “Please?” He placed a soft, lingering kiss on my lips. A perfectly normal kiss without any strange visions or overwhelming emotions.
“Yes,” I whispered.
Because despite everything, I couldn’t bear the thought of not having Trent in my life. There was still a lot I didn’t understand, questions that I hadn’t asked. And who was I to make a life changing decision without having all the facts?
“But I need to know something,” I said.
“Anything,” he said without hesitation.
“Do you regret any of this? Telling me the truth? Kissing me?” My voice dipped low on those last couple of words.
“Regret it?” Trent took my face into his hands. “The only thing I regret is putting you in a position where the Zoya know who you are.”
I smiled.
“C’mon, let’s get you back to your friends.” He took my hand, but before we could make it into his truck, Trent pulled me into his arms and hugged me tight.
I wrapped my arms around him, loving how safe and warm his embrace was, how complete I felt in his arms, and I rested my head on his chest. “How are you always so warm? Aren’t vampires usually cold?”
He laughed. “You really need to stop getting all your information from movies.”
I nudged him. “It’s not like there’s a vampire handbook laying around or anything.”
When Trent and I arrived back at Bushnell Falls, twice as many people were there. I had trouble believing all of them were from Keene Central School. He held my hand as we walked around the party looking for Ellie.
Jax found us first, though. “So, you tell her all our dirty family secrets?” he asked Trent, arms crossed.
Seriously, why did Jax always sound so angry? Why did he seem to hate me so much?
Trent’s hold on my hand tightened, and he stepped closer, as if he were trying to protect me from his brother. “She knows about the curse,” Trent said.
“Hmm.” Jax’s dark gaze slid over to me, and he blinked a few times. His eyes morphed into the same clear blue shade as Trent’s. “And yet, here she is.” He nodded subtly toward my and Trent’s clasped hands.
I stood perfectly still, refusing to be the first to look away. My heart thrashed in my chest.
“Well, either you’re incredibly stubborn, or you’re just stupid,” Jax said to me.
“Jax!” Trent snapped.
I narrowed my eyes and glared at Jax. “Stubborn or stupid, huh? I’d take either of those choices over being a jerk like you.”
Trent whipped aro
und to stare at me, disbelief playing across his face.
Jax’s lips tipped up in a faint smirk, and his eyes sparked with mischief. He leaned toward me, and I didn’t so much as flinch. I wasn’t going to let him think he intimidated me, even if he did. The scent of his spicy cologne wafted toward me, and I resisted the urge to inhale deeply. Despite his terrible attitude, he did smell good.
“Sweetheart, you haven’t seen me be a jerk. Yet.” He straightened.
“All right. That’s enough.” Trent put his hand on Jax’s chest and shoved him away from me. “C’mon, let’s go.”
Trent gave Jax a dirty look, then led me away, but I could feel Jax’s gaze on me, and it took every ounce of willpower I possessed not to turn around and look back at him. My heart hammered faster with each step I took, and my breaths were hard and slightly painful. Facing off with Jax like that had a thrill shooting through me. Maybe he was right—maybe I was stupid.
“You really need to stop doing that,” Trent said. He stopped and faced me.
“Doing what?”
He glanced around, and I did the same, wondering what he was looking at, or possibly looking for. We were several feet away from the heart of the party, and no one seemed to notice or care that we were there.
“Arguing.” He leveled his gaze back on me.
“Excuse me?” My brows rose. “Are you seriously telling me to stop arguing with Jax?”
“Yes. And with me.”
I yanked my hand from his and crossed my arms. “If you think for one second that I’m just going to shut up and go along with whatever you say, maybe you’re the stupid one here.”
He scowled, jaw clenched, eyes dark. Then he took a step toward me, our bodies nearly touching. His eyes morphed into black puddles, and I sucked in a sharp breath.
“Bloodlust isn’t just a side effect of the curse. Everyone like me has it. It’s just who we are. When we feed, we’re in bloodlust. We become hyper-focused on the hunt, finding our prey, feeding. Nothing can deter us.”
I stared up into his eyes, too afraid to move, too terrified to speak.
“Certain things can trigger our bloodlust. The smell of fear. When someone tries to run from us. Arguing.” He said that last word with anger.
I couldn’t believe what he was telling me, though I didn’t know why I was shocked. It was the least crazy thing he’d said all night.
“We’re predators, Chloe.” He closed what little distance remained between us. “And while we can control ourselves, certain things make it extremely difficult to do so.”
I swallowed hard. “So, what? You expect me never to disagree with you?”
“No, of course not.” His eyes shifted back to blue, and a hint of a smile played across his lips. “But you need to be aware of what it does to me when we argue.”
“It makes you want to… feed on me?” My stomach clenched, and I inhaled deeply to fight back the urge to vomit. “I thought you only fed on animals.”
“We do.” Tenderly, he trailed the back of his hand down the side of my face. I stood perfectly still. “But there’s a lot more to it that you don’t know yet. It makes me—”
“It’s about time,” Ellie snapped as she marched up to me. “I thought you’d ditched us or something.”
I smiled apologetically. “Sorry, Ellie. I didn’t mean to go MIA like that. Trent and I had some stuff we needed to work out.”
Her gaze lingered where Trent’s hand rested on the side of my face. A little of the anger eased from her expression, but I was going to have to do a lot of groveling to make this up to her.
“Well, we need to get home before my mom figures out we lied to her.” Ellie clutched her keys tightly in her hand.
“Yeah, okay. I’m ready to go,” I said eagerly, hoping my enthusiasm would be contagious. It wasn’t.
Ellie continued to glare at Trent as if he were somehow responsible for ruining her entire night.
“Where’s Abby?” I asked, glancing around.
“She wasn’t feeling well so Isach took her home. She said you can drive her car home tomorrow,” Ellie said.
My heart dropped to the ground, and my ears rang. Abby left with Isach. I knew she wasn’t going home. Now all I wanted to do was go after Abby, drag her back to Ellie’s house, and never let her out of my sight again.
“C’mon, we’ve really got to go. My mom already called once, and I told her we ran into some friends at the movie theater. She’s not going to buy another lie,” Ellie said.
It was then that I realized Gina and Tonya were standing right behind Ellie. Tonya chewed on her fingernails, her gaze trained on her fingers like she was bored and all of this was nothing more than an inconvenience to her. Gina had a grin from ear to ear. I had a feeling it was going to be a long night and that my disappearing act with Trent was going to be the sole topic of discussion.
“Okay,” I said.
And then a shrill scream pierced the air, silencing the party.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE:
Sleepover
“THEY’RE DEAD!” SOMEONE SHOUTED. “All of them!”
The metallic tang of blood hung thick in the air. I whipped around to where the screams had come from. The water ran red, and a heap of bodies was piled in the shallow pool at the base of the falls. Clothes torn to shreds. Arms bent at unnatural angles. Hair clumped around pale faces. Necks ripped open.
I gagged.
Chaos broke out. People screamed and ran. But I was frozen, unable to look away. The crowd pushed and shoved anything or anyone who stood in their way. Someone slammed into me hard enough to knock me back a few steps. I stumbled. Wild, red hair caught my attention.
No…
My heart beat erratically, the thundering staccato pounding in my ears so loud it was deafening. I had to get a closer look. I had to know if it was anyone I knew. What if it was Abby? Please don’t let it be Abby. Eyes wide, I forced my way through the mass of bodies. I knew Isach hadn’t taken her home. Fear and panic fought for dominance in my chest.
“Move. Get out of my way,” I said each time I pushed someone from my path. Aunt Beth would never forgive me for lying to her and bringing Abby here to ultimately die. “Abby?” I hollered, my voice frantic. This was not happening. It had to be a nightmare.
“Chloe.” That sounded like Ellie’s voice, but she was too far away.
“Chloe.” Trent grabbed hold of my shoulders, giving me a firm shake. “Chloe?” He moved his hands to my face, his gaze imploring. “Did you hear me?”
“I have to get to Abby.” I pushed against his hold, but he didn’t release me. “Let go of me! I have to make sure Abby is okay.” Why was he just standing there?
He wrapped his arms around me in a bear hug and spun me around so my back was to his chest. “Abby isn’t here. She left, remember?” His voice was low at my ear. “It’s not real, Chloe. Whatever you’re seeing, it’s not real,” he repeated.
I blinked, and slowly, everything came into sharp focus. The party raged on as if nothing had happened. My gaze darted to the waterfall. No blood-red water. No bodies. I whimpered and attempted to take a step back, bringing me closer to Trent.
“What…?” I glanced around.
Everything was normal. Ellie, Tonya, and Gina stood a few feet away, staring at me with concerned expressions.
“Is she okay?” Ellie asked.
“I think you should take her home,” Trent said. His hold eased, and I moved away from him.
The surge of adrenaline I had moments ago disappeared, leaving me weak and shaky. I flexed my fingers and tucked my hands under my armpits. What just happened? How had I hallucinated again when Isach wasn’t here? Every other time this happened, he’d been in my line of sight. This time, he was nowhere to be seen.
Ellie nodded. “Yeah, we should really get home.”
“Okay,” I said. My mind was fuzzy, and I was having trouble grasping my thoughts. I needed to get out of here.
“It’s going to be okay.” Trent pl
aced a lingering kiss on my lips. “Go home and rest. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“C’mon, let’s go.” Ellie headed toward her car.
Gina and Tonya were right on her heels, and I rushed to catch up. I climbed into the backseat and wracked my mind trying to make sense of the last few minutes.
Ellie started the car and backed out of her parking spot. Then she glanced at me in the rearview mirror. “If you want to go home, it’s okay.”
“No.” I forced a smile. “Home is the last place I want to be.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Ellie gave a quick nod and returned her attention to the road.
“Seriously, Chloe, are you sure you’re all right?” Tonya asked.
I was so tired of getting asked that question. “Yes, I’m fine.”
“Okay.” Tonya drew out the word as if she didn’t believe me and was waiting for me to interrupt her and change my mind.
“I’m sorry, but you’re not okay, Chloe.” Gina twisted around in her seat to look at me. “You totally freaked out back there, just like you did at Rachel’s funeral. So, what gives?”
“Gina,” Ellie snapped.
“What?” Gina shrugged. “It’s not my fault I’m the only one willing to speak the truth.”
Tonya rolled her eyes and flashed me an apologetic smile.
“It’s okay.” I sighed. “Gina’s right. I freaked out.” I twisted my hands in my lap. How was I supposed to explain this to them? “Ever since my mom died, I haven’t been sleeping, and I’ve been having these… episodes. My doctor called them panic attacks.” I glanced at each of them, praying they would accept my explanation so we could drop it. When no one spoke, I added, “I’m really sorry I freaked out again and scared you guys.”
“You can talk to us, Chloe. About anything,” Ellie said.
“I know.” But she was wrong. I couldn’t talk to anyone about the things I knew.
“Okay, enough with all the heavy stuff,” Tonya said, angling her body toward me. “So, you and Trent, huh? You know you have to give us all the details, right?”
My eyes widened. “What?”
Eternal Curse: (The Cursed Series, Book 1) Page 20