by Anne Malcom
And perhaps I was insane, but I trusted him to heed my commands and keep whatever happened there on lockdown. He may have a big mouth, but secrets wouldn’t slip out of it.
I was betting my afterlife on it.
Thorne stepped forward, yanking his sister into his embrace roughly, kissing her head. “You did good today, kid,” he murmured. “But I want you to go with Kathy to the safe house,” he instructed as he let her go.
A bloodstained woman in jeans and a tee stepped forward. She smiled warmly at the girl and then at Thorne with a definable twinkle in her eye.
I balled my fists.
I hated Kathy.
“Sure, Thorne. You’ve got”—she turned to me, eyes no longer bright but cold and smug. “Trash to take out.”
She snatched the girl’s hand.
Must not murder slayer.
Why? I had no idea.
Then my eyes fastened on steely gray ones.
Oh, that was why.
“Why are you here?” he asked, the word echoing in the open air.
I pretended not to notice the way the weary and bloodstained slayers hung on that question. I shrugged. “I was in the neighborhood.”
He narrowed his eyes, but then an unfamiliar human stepped forward, his face swelling with what I guessed was a broken cheekbone as he limped obviously. His clothes were ripped and there were various areas of torn skin where the red eyes had managed to latch on. It was impressive that he was still standing, let alone glowering at me with such a look of hatred that it must’ve taken physical effort to maintain.
“What does it matter why she’s here?” he hissed. “She needs to die. Just like her friends, who attacked us. Killed Brody, Susan, Alexia.”
Loss and anger were a dangerous combination.
“Friends?” I repeated softly. “Yes, the mindless vampire zombies who I just ruined my shoes killing were my friends. We just pretend to fight and murder each other, but I’ll be sharing a vein with them all back at our concrete mansion where we sacrifice goats on the regular.” I rolled my eyes. “How dense are you? I just risked my own afterlife to save your miserable one. ‘Thanks’ is the word you’re looking for. I also accept Barneys vouchers.” I knew he’d suffered a loss and should be handled with care, but I wasn’t that vampire. I saved their lives; that was downright maternal for me. Coddling them for losing people was a surefire way to foster the softness and humanity that would ensure their extinction.
He stepped forward, gripping his knife. Scott was at my side in an instant as a couple of other men tightened their bodies, poised for attack.
Thorne snatched the man from the air before he could do anything suicidal.
“No, brother,” Thorne murmured.
I gripped Scott’s wrist. “Easy,” I said, my voice too low for human ears.
He rolled forward on his heels. “They’re thinking of attacking. After we saved them.” His voice was cloaked in disbelief.
I gave him a sideways glance. “This isn’t the movies, Scotty. We don’t get thanked for our good deeds. Or medals. Or even a steak dinner. A knife in the back is the only thanks they’d give us even if we spent a hundred years doing this. We’re monsters—to them, anyway.” I shrugged. “They’re the ones who have a snapshot of time on this earth, so complicated concepts aren’t something their small brains grasp. Good versus evil is the world these people live in. It helps them forget that they’re dreadfully mortal. And the evil they’re so convinced is unique to the supernatural is much more rampant in their own race.”
Thorne’s eyes, and everyone’s in the areas, were on me.
“You want to survive?” I asked the group. “I’d suggest you learn how to fight vampires when they decide to come looking for you. Seeking them out in the shadows like you’ve done for centuries doesn’t mean a thing when something like this happens.” I held out my hands. “I’m sure your heads are too far up your own asses to realize that things are happening in the supernatural world. Things that most likely mean every single one of you has a less-than-ideal chance of surviving unless you adapt. Unless you learn.”
The woman I’d helped stepped forward, her face carefully blank. It wasn’t warm, but it was devoid of the hatred peppered through the group. “Learn what?”
I smiled at her, showing fang. “How to fight like a vampire.”
She tilted her head. “How are we meant to learn that?”
I shrugged. “Stock up on Bram Stoker, have a Twilight marathon. How should I know? I’ve done my bit for humanity.” I looked to my left. “Come on, Scotty. I’ve got a hankering for tenderloin.”
I’d been planning to leave without even glancing at Thorne, but a raspy voice stopped me.
“You can teach us.”
I turned around, my eyes catching the kid, Chace, who’d managed to survive. Kudos to him.
The air turned static and deathly quiet.
“Sorry. I didn’t go to college for a teaching degree. Only evil and murder.” I winked at them. “But I am smart enough to know that teaching slayers how to fight vampires is beyond insane, even for me, and I make Henry VIII look well-adjusted. Plus, I know a trap when I see one, and my newest cheerleader will be as likely to learn from me as he would to stick a copper blade into my temple, or die trying if your fearless leader wasn’t holding him back.”
Thorne’s gaze darted from the kid to me.
Chace stepped forward. “But you’re not like them.” He glanced to the remains of the woman Scott had killed.
I flipped my hair. “Of course I’m not. I’ve got much better taste in wine and shoes.”
Crickets.
Tough crowd.
“You said that something’s coming,” he continued. “A war.”
I raised my brow. “I didn’t use that word, but you’re not as emptyheaded as I first thought.”
I didn’t elaborate on his suggestion, like I knew they were expecting me to do.
“And you’re fighting for humans in this war,” he probed. It wasn’t a question.
I folded my arms. “No. I’m fighting for me,” I corrected. “Survival is the main goal. Saving you was an unfortunate side effect.”
Lie, but at least I did it convincingly.
Unease flickered through the group as they digested my words.
“Well then, you’re going to need all the bodies you can get to fight this war,” the women cut in.
I nodded. “Undead bodies. They’re less breakable than yours.” I gestured to a man with an obviously broken wrist, pale and looking barely conscious. “I’m not here to make new friends. Especially not with slayers. And I’m not about to hold your hands and help you do your job. This was a one-time thing. I’d advise you start practicing a lot more, or get out of dodge. I’m not coming to the rescue next time.” I gave them a pointed look. “There will be a next time.”
Chace looked as if he might open his mouth to argue, but someone pushed past the kid roughly.
I folded my arms. “No Neck. I’m surprised and, if I’m honest, a little disappointed that you didn’t get your femoral artery torn by one of these critters.” I kicked one with my ruined pump.
His returning grimace was quite a treat when coupled with one swelling black eye and his all-around ugliness. “Fuck you. You nasty vampire cunt,” he spat. “We don’t need you—”
He probably would’ve said more but me snapping through the plaster of his bloodstained cast had him stopping.
“Sticks and stones won’t break my bones,” I chanted. “But you know what will hurt you?” I rebroke the arm that had only just began to heal.
I waited a moment to bathe in his screams.
“Insulting me. You’d do well to remember that.” I eyed him. “And don’t use that word to insult any woman ever again.”
I stepped back, reveling in the open shock and disgust on most of the slayers’ faces. That was more like it.
I glanced at Scott. “Can you do me a favor and get Mother Teresa over there to the right peo
ple so they can identify her and hopefully make this not a wasted trip?” I asked him sweetly, nodding to the corpse of a vampire. “I’d move rather quickly, Scotty. The air is turning around here,” I added, noting the way the slayers seemed very pissed off over me breaking No Neck’s arm. I couldn’t fathom why; surely he couldn’t be that well liked.
Scott nodded once, darting to the body and hefting it over his shoulder. He paused, an uneasy look on his bloodstained face. “Are you going to be okay on your own?” he asked.
I rolled my eyes. “I think I’ll remain undead without your protection,” I responded dryly. “Go,” I urged, then paused. “It would be best to play up the slayer fatalities to our friend. A lot.”
It wouldn’t do well for King Rick to know we’d left slayers alive. Saved them. And it didn’t escape me that Scott was committing treason for me without blinking. After I’d been nothing but mean to him. It was touching. Not that I’d start being nice to him or anything wild.
Scott nodded once more, then was gone.
I smiled at the angry crowd. “Thanks for your patience. Now I have to talk to your leader. Try not to die in the interim.”
On that note, I snatched Thorne’s arm and dragged him into the house on the outer edges of the settlement. I’d gotten into the place where the American dream had vomited everywhere before Thorne wrenched his arm from mine, his eyes wild.
“I can’t believe you did that,” he hissed.
His fury filled the living room of the empty house.
“What, saved you and most of your friends?”
His mouth thinned. “Broke Erik’s arm in front of everyone who’d just watched their friends die.”
I sighed. “Vampire, remember? You keep waiting for me to turn good because my diet is slightly different than my contemporaries, you’re going to get gray and old.” I paused. “No, actually, wait right here for that to happen. I’d be much more able to live my death without the shadow of a slayer and the stench of his self-righteousness following me around.”
He regarded me. “You’re lying,” he growled.
“Oh, I almost always lie. But not about this.”
He stepped forward and I steeled myself from stepping back. “Everything about you is a contradiction,” he murmured. “You’re so coldblooded sometimes I think you could freeze a waterfall, but you make my fuckin’ blood turn into Hades. You’re cruel, but kindness is a side effect of that cruelty. You should be ugly to me, but fuck, are you the most beautiful creature I’ve ever laid eyes on. You should make me rear away in disgust, but it takes everything I have not to fuckin’ tear those clothes off you and taste every inch of your damned skin.” His eyes burned with desire. “You want everyone to think that you’d taste bitter, but I know for a fact it’s the sweetest honey I’ve ever had on my tongue.
“You’re some kind of twisted harmony. Everything you are, your very existence should make you gnarly and rough. Instead, you’re so fuckin’ smooth, so goddamn beautiful. That harmony makes me unable to kill you like I should do. Makes it impossible, in fact. That harmony brings you into my fuckin’ dreams, so I can’t sleep a wink without seein’ your face. That harmony’s gonna be fatal to me, and I can’t find it in me to give a shit about that.”
His lips were on mine the second he finished. His fingers tore into my hair, yanking at the roots while bruising my lips with his kiss, yanking me to him with his other hand.
I sank into it, the fire, the touch I’d been yearning for. For centuries, it seemed. Then I found sense. Reason.
I yanked myself back, darting to the middle of the room so there was a sofa between us.
“We cannot go there again,” I stated.
His eyes glowed and he made to move around the sofa.
I extended my fangs, rebelling against the body that craved him. “I’m serious. I’ve just signed my death warrant by helping you. You try to kiss me again, I will kill you.”
He stopped, never taking his eyes from me. “We can’t do this now,” he growled finally.
“We can’t do this ever,” I corrected.
He narrowed his brows. “We’ve got shit to talk about. You can’t escape that, Isla. But for now, I’ve got dead to bury, injured to tend to and a council to answer to.”
Despite my mood, my ears perked up. “Council? Here I was thinking that slayers were unorganized brutes with little to no organizational skills.”
Thorne stayed still. “In the morning. Dawn. Your apartment.”
I gave him my best glare. “I thought we’d discussed your fate should you continue the delusion that you have the right to command me,” I said, my voice a whisper that rode on the promise of death.
Or at least dismemberment.
Thorne regarded me. Then he held his muscled and bloodstained arms up straight. “You want to kill me? Do it,” he challenged, a glint in his eye.
I stared at him, at the cords in his neck, the rips and tears in his skin from the battle. The blood that sang to me throughout the entire exchange staining his skin. The scarred and muscled flesh of his arms willing me to do what was in my nature.
Nature was the problem. She may have designed us to be enemies, but she’d also made that line too close to lovers. One, once crossed, you couldn’t go back from.
Thorne’s eyes burned into mine as he lowered his arms. “Didn’t think so,” he rumbled, his voice vibrating the air. “Dawn. Your apartment,” he repeated. After one last gaze filled with promise and hellfire, he turned on his booted heel and walked out.
I WATCHED DAWN KISS THE dark horizon with its presence as the cool embrace of night circled my body.
I was at my apartment. On the balcony. Waiting for him. Like an idiot.
This was after I had spent the night ensuring Scott’s silence and then lying my ass off to Rick about what happened in the battle. The fact that I was still there to wait for Thorne instead of a memory to him said my lies were holding up. For now.
The party the following night might just be turned into the celebration of my final death if I wasn’t careful.
I was balancing on a knife’s edge. And there was only so long I could do so before I drew blood.
It would always end in blood.
Yet there I was. Waiting for dawn. Waiting for Thorne. Waiting for death.
The thrumming of a heartbeat preceded the opening and closing of my front door that I’d left unlocked. His scent filtered through the air and encircled me like a familiar lover. Not a doomed one.
There was a slight pause before the echoes of his boots mingled with the echo of his heartbeat crossed my living room and through to the balcony.
His eyes ran over me. I wasn’t clad in armor. Even my designer stuff. He could cut through it all like butter. So instead I was wearing a white tee and cotton shorts. My hair was tangled in a knot atop my head, my face free of makeup.
And the heat in his gaze told me he regarded me like I should be donning wings and walking down a catwalk.
It warmed me. To the core.
Fatal.
“You’re here,” he observed.
I raised my brow. “It’s my apartment.”
He didn’t reply, merely stepped onto the balcony and stayed a few feet away from me, refusing to acknowledge the dancing colors of the sunrise. Instead his eyes never strayed from my face.
We stayed like that for a long time. There was a lot to say, the sheer number of words perhaps the reason neither of us spoke.
But I don’t think it was that.
Because there in the stillness of a New York dawn, cabs hurtling down the street, sirens echoing through the spaces between the buildings, his steady and roaring heartbeat, that was the most quiet, the most respite we’d had in each other’s presence since we had met.
I bathed in that stillness. Let myself, even for a moment, sink into the embrace of his scent, his emotions, his presence. And gave myself a sliver of the luxury afforded to humans—simplicity.
But only a sliver.
&nbs
p; That simple silence that was only given to those who were burdened with the inevitability of death. When you didn’t have that, when eternity stretched before you, nothing was simple.
“Half of my team wants your head,” he began. “The other half wants your number.”
I smiled against the razors in my chest. “Give my number to the half that wants my head,” I told him. “Problem solved.”
He folded his arms across his chest. “This shit ain’t gonna be solved by your smart mouth.”
I stared at him. “At least it’ll make it less dull.” I clutched to my flippancy because the air around us was getting more charged, electric, like the atmosphere before a storm.
“You saved my family today,” he declared. “My sister.”
I resisted the urge to squirm with the statement. “How did they die?” I asked, instead of addressing the unspoken thanks. “Your parents.” It was a simple piece of information that brought forth the realization that I didn’t know anything about his life. Only that it would end. That should have been all I needed to know, yet I asked the question.
The taste of the air turned bitter with my words, yet his face didn’t change. “Vampires. Lucille was three. They almost got her too….” His eyes went far away. “I got there in time. Or at least not too late for her. They were long gone.” He sucked in a breath. “I’ve looked after her ever since. Training her to make sure she won’t have the same fate as our family.”
“She doesn’t live with you?” I asked, remembering only the residual scent of bubblegum at his place.
He shook his head, running his hand over his mouth. “No, not full time. It’s too dangerous for her.” He gave me a pointed look. “She lives with my dad’s sister. The only version of a mother she has left now.”
The pain lingered in his words, an echo behind them that had yet to be dulled by the passing of the years. Anger and hate had nurtured it, kept it alive.
I nodded. “Makes sense.”
He tilted his head. “What?”
“Your hatred for the entire race of vampires. They took your family from you. It’s not logical, as it could have been just as likely for a homicidal maniac to kill them, or for them to be hit by a bus, which in turn wouldn’t make you hate bus drivers for the rest of your life. In fact, it was most likely preferable for you, at least, that they be killed by something supernatural. Then you could attach hate and evil to a supernatural creature rather than admit evil doesn’t need the supernatural to exist. It’s easier to attach it to us than admit it lives within humans.” I paused. “What goes bump in the night isn’t what you should be fighting. Maybe it’s what remains when the sun comes up.” My gaze went the upcoming sunrise before flickering back to him.