Chapter 16
My hands were shaking. If I were still alive, my heart would have been pounding so hard that I would have been able to taste my heart in the back of my throat. But I wasn’t alive any longer. All I could taste my tonight’s dinner as it fought its way back up my throat. It was nice to know that I could probably still vomit from nerves. You’d think that death would get rid of such things, but I guess not.
Time was ticking down. Just two minutes until eleven. I’d spent the past three nights in Venice, sneaking around and generally making myself as invisible as possible. Not a single human laid an eye on me. And as for the nightwalkers, I kept as far from them as possible, which wasn’t the easiest of things to accomplish. While Jedrzejow had only six nightwalkers in the entire city, Venice was overflowing with them. There were so many that if I didn’t rein in my own meager powers, I was instantly hit with a blinding headache. My forays into Venice were limited to only a couple hours here and there before I retreated back to Verona to hide. I couldn’t risk Stefan getting word that I was in town until I was ready. I was handling this on my own terms for as long as I could.
For the most part, the few nightwalkers I encountered where eager to keep away from me. From what little I could pick up from them, most instantly jumped to the conclusion that I was a dangerous older nightwalker because they couldn’t read my mind. That worked for me.
A minute before eleven, I forced myself to put down the cell phone I’d recently purchased and take a step back. Two hours earlier, I’d left a matching phone under Stefan’s chair in the Coven meeting hall. That little excursion had been the dangerous part of my mission so far, but I’d been lucky. The hall had been empty. Apparently everyone had been out hunting in anticipation of the meeting at ten o’clock. With any luck, no one had spotted the phone yet and no one would notice it until the alarm I set went off at exactly eleven.
I jumped when the cell phone started ringing. The LED display showed the number of drop phone I had left with Stefan. At least someone had noticed the phone and the message I’d left on the main screen.
Swallowing back dinner, I picked up the phone and answered the call but didn’t say a word as I held it to my ear.
“Is she alive?” Stefan’s snarled voice vibrated menace and barely controlled rage.
I smiled. “Walk out the front doors of the Main Hall. If you’re alone I will call you back.” Pushing the end call button, I turned toward the laptop computer set up beside me while turning off the first phone. The screen held a video feed from a small camera I had hidden in a tree outside the Main Hall, giving me an excellent view of everyone who went in and out of the building from the front and side entrances.
I had to wait only a few seconds before the doors burst open, startling both the human guards standing there. Stefan zoomed down the stairs before barking something at the humans. The two men scrambled inside the building, closing the doors behind him. I didn’t have sound with my video feed, but I could clearly see Stefan attempting to use the phone, likely calling the first number he had used but it didn’t work.
Tears blurred my vision for a second and I fought the initial urge to just tell him exactly where I was. But I swallowed those words. I needed to protect myself. Stefan had attempted to do just that and it had ended disastrously.
When I was in control again, I dialed the only number programmed into my second phone. Stefan answered before the phone finished ringing the first time.
“Where is Erin?” Stefan snarled, looking as if he were about to explode.
“I’m somewhere safe, Stefan.”
I could see the tension instantly drain from his hunched shoulders and he actually swayed for a second as if suddenly unsteady. “Erin?” he whispered.
“Yes.”
“Where are you?”
“Do you remember where we first met? I’ll call you again when you’re there.” And I hung up again. Dropping the phone immediately on the small table beside the laptop, I wrapped my arms around my middle to keep from picking up the phone again while I watched him on the screen. He seemed to hesitate for a second, looking confused, before he zipped off out of the view of the camera. With a shaking hand, I moved the cursor and switched the camera view to a landing in Dosoduro. It was just a couple blocks from the apartment I had rented and was where the water taxi had dropped me off that rainy night I had first taken his hand.
I waited, willing him to remember that first moment. I wanted him to remember, needed it to be as important to him as it was to me. A part of me was afraid the phone would ring before he appeared on the camera. To me, that would mean that he didn’t remember. That he was lost. But then, maybe he was already lost to me and I just didn’t realize it.
A broken sob jumped from my throat when Stefan appeared on the sidewalk, searching for me on the empty street. He looked more than a little worried and angry when he couldn’t see me. Using the second phone, I dialed his number again.
“Where are you?” he demanded before I could speak.
“Somewhere safe.”
“But not here with me?”
“Not exactly. I can see you though.”
Stefan slowly turned around, his eyes narrowed as he inspected each window of the buildings around him. I relaxed, knowing that he wouldn’t find me. I was nowhere near that landing. “Why are you playing these games?” he growled, growing more irritated by the second.
“This isn’t a game. It’s about being safe. It’s —”
“Has someone hurt you?”
I tapped down a sigh and frowned at his image on the laptop. How did I even answer that question? Right now, I didn’t. “It’s about making sure that you’re not being followed.”
Stefan stiffened, becoming completely immobile for several seconds. I had a feeling that he was using his powers to search the immediate area for nightwalkers.
“There is no one else here.”
“I hope you’re right,” I murmured, talking mostly to myself. “Did you discover who framed me?”
“No. A day after you disappeared, there were rumors that surfaced of your death. I... I...”
“You didn’t believe them,” I whispered. I watched as Stefan shook his head. He turned, facing the camera I had set up so that I could see the pain and fear clearly etched on his face. “I could hear you calling for me. I heard it almost every night. You didn’t give up.”
“Tell me where you are? Let me come to you. I need to hold you. It is the only way I will know that you are safe and unharmed.”
I clenched my teeth, fighting to stay silent. A part of me longed to tell him, but the other part wished to shout that I wasn’t safe and I certainly wasn’t unharmed. But in the end, I didn’t say either of those things.
“Did you discover who is trying to harm you?” I demanded, struggling to keep all emotion from my voice.
“No.”
My shoulders slumped. I figured as much, but I was still disappointed. “I’ll call you tomorrow night. Same time. Be alone when I call.”
“Erin, don’t!”
“I need time to think.” I hung up the phone and quickly turned it off so that I couldn’t give in to the temptation to tell him exactly where I was. Stepping back, I watched him search the immediate area for the next fifteen minutes, searching for any sign of me, but he never found the camera. As I had guessed, it was the weakness of the older nightwalkers — technology. My parents had been the same way. The older they got, the more they struggled with smart phones, tablets, DVD players, and their laptop. They couldn’t keep up with the technology and in truth, they didn’t want to. Stefan had never struck me as a creature who much cared for the latest gadgets. He wasn’t the type to notice a tiny wireless camera about the size of my fist placed on top of a broken lamp. It was weakness I had to exploit as long as possible.
In the end, he slumped on a bench not more than ten feet from out meeting spot and stared out at the lagoon. I sat on the floor, staring up at the laptop, watching him. There was
something so lost in his posture. I couldn’t tell if he was angry or worried or afraid. Maybe it was all of the above. For now, he thought I was still human and he cared for that human, I had no doubt of that. But I hoped that a part of him at least now started to mentally wander down those dark roads of what if. I didn’t want my new state of being to be a complete shock to him. I wanted him to consider it as well as consider what he valued most about me. Was it me or merely my mortality?
With no easy answers forthcoming, I turned off the computer and settled down into the darkness. I was safe in my little hiding place in Verona, more than an hour’s drive from Venice, though I hadn’t a clue as to how fast Stefan could make the trip. It didn’t matter. With any luck, he thought I was in Venice.
I was permitted only a few minutes of downtime before my third and final phone started vibrating in my back pocket. This one Daphne had forced on me days ago when I left Poland. When I glanced at the screen, her smiling face was shining back at me.
“How goes it, my friend?” I said with forced cheerfulness.
“A lot more boring now that you’ve gone,” Daphne complained. “You sure you don’t want to come back?”
My smile turned more genuine and I relaxed, leaning against the wall. “It’s tempting but you know I’ve got to get this settled.”
She gave a scornful snort. “You know you don’t have to do this. You need to let this silly sense of human justice die. Nightwalkers don’t suffer from it. Just come back.”
“I don’t think Ignacio wants me back.”
“Fuck Ignacio.”
“Daffy,” I grumbled in warning.
My friend sighed. When she spoke again, she’d lost some of her bluster. “He wouldn’t care. “
I perked up at her words. This was strange and unexpected. “Something’s changed?”
There was soft noise that I could identify and then Ignacio spoke, surprising me. “Yes.”
Fear clenched in my chest. “What’s wrong? Is Danaus there causing problems?” I’d left Poland as quickly as possible so as to protect the few people who had risked helping me. I didn’t want them getting hurt because they knew me.
“Yes and no,” he hedged.
“Ignacio, no games.”
“The Hunter arrived in town in the early evening as best as we can determine. I actually saw him downtown. He’s more frightening in person.” I grunted in agreement. There was something that radiated danger from that man. “I think he may have even spotted me, but he stopped suddenly and answered his phone. A second later, Mira appeared before him and then they were both gone.”
The fear in my chest returned. “How long ago did this happen?”
“About fifteen minutes.”
Rising up on my knees, I tapped the laptop to bring it out of snooze to check the time. It was quarter after eleven. Mira suspected that I had contacted Stefan and brought Danaus back to Venice so he could continue his search closer to home. The big question was whether he suspected that I was a nightwalker? I didn’t know which answer would speed the Hunter’s search, but I hoped that I still have one night left to talk to Stefan alone.
“Thanks for the information.”
“Come back to Jedrzejow, Erin.”
“You know I can’t. As soon as they’re sure I’m not in Venice, Danaus will start his search again. I can’t live my very long life on the run.”
“You won’t have a long life if you stay,” he said grimly.
“Thanks,” I murmured and hung up the phone. He was right, but I had to take a chance.
Chapter 17
Come find me, Stefan. I’ll be keeping watch with Juliet.
I squatted down in the deepest shadows I could find, half hidden against the brick wall. Vines crept down the wall, their dark green leaves helping to conceal me. My cell phone was tucked in the pocket of my oversized black hoodie with it set on vibrate. He had an hour to reach me and then I would leave, find some other spot in Italy to hide, while I thought of a new plan. I needed to keep moving. After Ignacio’s warning the night before, I felt too vulnerable being so close to Mira and Danaus. Sure, there was a chance that they weren’t my enemy, but I was afraid to risk it. Their ignorance was my only edge in this game.
In the waning moonlight, I glanced up at the stone balcony overlooking the small square. People liked to say that it was Juliet Capulet’s balcony and Romeo had whispered sweet words while staring up at that balcony. It was all bullshit, but it seemed a good place. Maybe the ghost of poor Juliet would help me through this night. I was certainly hoping to avoid her tragic ending, but it seemed more unlikely with each passing night.
Stefan stunned me by suddenly appearing after the passage of less than fifteen minutes. He stood in the middle of the square, the moonlight causing his pale skin to glow. The nightwalker seemed bigger, more powerful, and certainly more menacing than I remembered. He glanced up at the statue of Juliet in the center of the square for only a moment before dismissing it. I stayed completely still, hoping that he would overlook me. He didn’t notice me with his eyes, but I felt his powers cut through me as he scanned the area. Jerking around, a low hiss slithered from him as he glared at me.
“Leave! You’re not welcome here,” he growled in Italian.
Something in my heart broke at his words. He recognized me as a nightwalker, but his brief search had not revealed to him my identity. He didn’t know the woman he searched for was the nightwalker before him. Maybe he wasn’t behind Vanko’s kidnapping of me, but it certainly didn’t mean that he was going to accept me when he discovered the truth.
Very slowly, I stood and took one step toward him, my knees threatening to give out. He glared at me, looking as if he was going to rip my throat out if I didn’t leave the area immediately. With shaking hands, I reached up and pushed back the deep hood so that he could clearly see my face.
“Erin?” he whispered, joy filling his eyes as he took a step toward me, but he froze as his brain connected that last of the dots. His joy instantly gave way to horror. A low moan tumbled from his part lips, the sound seeming to echo from the depths of his soul. He stumbled back, shaking his head as he refused to accept what all his senses were telling him. The human he had come to care for was dead and gone forever. I was now just a creature that resembled that woman.
Pain sliced through me until I wasn’t sure how I was still standing. It was like losing my parents all over again. I hurt for Stefan and I hurt for myself. I hurt for what we’d lost. I didn’t know what future we could have had as a nightwalker and a human, but now we’d never know.
It was several minutes of tense silence before Stefan managed to get control of his raging emotions. At long last, he looked at me with only anger. “Why did you do this?”
“What?” I gasped, stunned by his accusation.
“Have yourself turned,” he snarled in answer. “Why did you do this?”
My shoulder slumped with those horrible words, my hope that he might feel some compassion toward me still dying a quick death. He didn’t want me now. He’d only wanted the human and her fragility. I was just chum to him now.
“Go back to Venice, Stefan,” I muttered in a flat voice. “We have nothing more to say to each other. Just tell the Coven that you found my body. Tell them I’m dead.” I was going back to Poland. Daphne was right. This had been a big fucking mistake.
When I tried to walk away from him, heading toward the small iron gate at the back of the square, Stefan grabbed my elbow. I jumped at his touch, instantly jerking away from him at the same time hissing loudly while exposing my fangs. There had been no thought in that moment. Only a survival instinct that swam to the forefront of my mind. The second thought returned, I gasped, clapping a hand over my mouth as if to hide my fangs in shame.
“I’m sorry,” I said quickly in a wavering voice. “You-You surprised me and I-I didn’t think. I’m sorry. I’m still trying to figure this stupid nightwalker shit out.” Not looking at him, I started for the gate again, but in
a blur of movement, Stefan had slipped around me and was now standing in front of the gate with his hand extended toward me.
“Wait, please,” he whispered. He paused, his expression twisting in pain and frustration. “I’m … I’m handling this wrong.” He pushed away from the gate and took a slow step toward me. I took at matching step backward toward the center of the courtyard. I didn’t think he meant to harm me, but I just felt safer keeping some distance between us.
“Look, I just came back to … to tell you not to worry about me any longer. I – I can look out for myself. I’d just appreciate it if you’d let everyone else think I was dead and gone. I don’t want any more trouble.”
“And that’s it? You pulled me out of Venice just to tell me you’re not dead.”
“What more do you want, Stefan?” I snapped, finally losing my hold on my emotions and my tongue. “I’ve already died for you. What else is there?”
The nightwalker flinched at the lash of my words and I instantly regretted them. I didn’t want to hurt him. I was scared and confused. We were doing a better job of hurting each other as we both struggled with this unexpected development than finding a middle ground of compassion and understanding. Our relationship had been too new and fragile to try to handle something so horrible. It was cracking under the weight.
“What happened?” Stefan asked, his voice soft and even as he fought valiantly to bring his emotions under control.
Looking down at my hand, I felt a wave of disgust slip through me as the memory rose to the forefront of my mind. “I was grabbed by a pair of shifters, though I didn’t know it at the time. I was taken north to Poland where I was held by a nightwalker called Vanko. He said you told him to change me to a nightwalker. He said that Mira was trying to get rid of you through me.”
“Lies,” he growled in a low voice. “All of it was lies. I would never have just handed you over to someone like that and I had no desire to see you changed.”
“Yeah, that’s what I figured,” I said with a smirk. “I bought myself some time and escaped.” I paused, feeling utterly lost and useless for a second. “But as you can tell, I didn’t get far enough. Vanko caught me. He ... he...”
Stefan (Lost Nights Series Book 1) Page 20