by Rye Brewer
“Only a few more blocks,” Raze promised, and I was fairly certain my feet throbbed in response. It would be a relief to relax for even a single day.
Which, naturally, was when the sound of crying met my ears.
Gage heard it, too. “What is that?” He paused, his head moving on a swivel as he looked around.
“We need to hurry,” Raze whispered.
“Don’t you hear it?” I tried to figure out where it was coming from and followed a fresh set of cries to an old statue, half-crumbled, beneath a broken lamp—whether the lamp was broken before or after someone had been chained under it was something I could only guess at.
A broken lamp meant there would be no light shining on the weak, weeping woman who could barely raise her head when I dashed over to her.
“What are you doing?” Raze called out behind me. “Are you crazy?”
There was nothing crazy about me or what I was doing. I knew this woman. I had seen her only hours earlier.
“Naomi?” I knelt beside her, lifting her head as gently as I could and gazing into her familiar eyes.
Eyes that were dimmer than I’d ever seen them.
“What are you doing here?” Gage asked when he reached us.
She peered up at him, but the act of lifting her eyes exhausted her. She swooned a little, leaning against me. “They… they chained me… Left… me to die…” Her head fell back against my shoulder, revealing her throat and the trickle of dried blood which ran down from the puncture wounds.
She’d been drained. That was why she couldn’t free herself, why she couldn’t manage to sit up. Why her voice was little more than the crunching of leaves underfoot.
“Who?” I hissed, torn between wanting to save her and wanting revenge on those who had left her to die.
She shook her head. “Micah’s…”
“That doesn’t make sense,” I cut her off. She was too weak to waste words, anyway. “They helped you. They killed him—didn’t they?”
She let out a sigh. “There were… more. A few. Not all… agreed…”
“Cari, we have to get out of here, now,” Raze urged as he crouched beside me. “We need to get under cover before the sun rises.”
“They left you here to die in the sun,” I murmured. The cruelty would be unbelievable if we were talking about anybody but Micah and his minions.
She nodded. “They drained me, so I could not escape.” Her head lolled against my shoulder.
I looked up at Gage. “We have to help her. I would still be under Micah’s thumb if it weren’t for her. And you would still be—”
“I know where I would still be,” he muttered. “Of course. We can’t leave her hear to die.”
“We might have twenty minutes, at the most,” Raze hissed.
I was just about to tell him where to stick his twenty minutes when two dark figures rushed toward us from the shadows. “Do not touch her!” one of them shrieked. A woman. Both were women, and both were insane with determination to see Naomi die a terrible death.
One leapt onto Raze’s back, arms and legs around him, intent on taking him down. The other threw herself at Gage and me, claws out and slashing. “She has to die!” the vampire screeched, fangs bared, eyes red with blood lust and rage.
She made a mistake, attacking the two of us at once. Gage might have been weak, but I wasn’t. Catching a glimpse of Naomi from the corner of my eye was all I needed to spur me on.
I caught her by the shoulders and threw her to the ground, giving Gage the chance to pounce on her. She kicked and scratched, screaming into his face, but was quickly silenced when his fangs tore into her throat while I tore out her beating heart and tossed it aside like the garbage it was.
Raze was doing the same as I turned to check his progress, dropping his attacker to the ground before wiping her blood from his lips. Both of them were careful not to drink, I noticed. I wouldn’t have drunk from either of those two if I’d been starving to death.
The sun would take care of them. They would combust, just like Naomi was supposed to combust once the sun had turned its full power on.
“Come on,” Raze panted, winded from the fight. “We have to get her out of here.”
“She’s too weak,” I fretted, one eye on the sky. Time was against us, especially with the time we’d wasted fighting.
One look at Naomi proved how right I was. We’d have to carry her wherever we went, and that would slow us down.
There was no time to deliberate.
Raze dropped to one knee and drew one of his claws across the inside of his wrist. “Here. Drink. Hurry.”
I could hardly believe it. One minute, he was irked we would stop to help her—the next, he offered her his wrist to save her life. She drank greedily, sloppily, the sort of drinking only a vampire who had truly been drained to the point of near-death would do.
When she raised her head, her eyes were clearer and brighter than before, her skin a little more radiant. Nowhere near full health, but enough to get her through.
Raze got to work breaking the chains, which crumbled like the statue they were wrapped around. “All right, then,” he muttered, his head darting back and forth. “We need to get out of here, fast.”
“Where are we going?” she asked as the three of us hurried her away.
“This is Raze,” I said, feeling beyond silly at introducing her to someone she had just fed from. It seemed like introductions should have been made first. “He has a group of friends he is taking us to. Someplace we can be safe.”
“No. I won’t do that.” Naomi took a few steps away from us.
“We have to hurry!” Raze pointed to the sky, which sure enough was not nearly as dark as it had been just a minute earlier.
“I can’t go with you! You saw what happened; what if Micah has another friend there, in your group? I cannot take that chance. I’m sorry.” She turned and stumbled away.
Where she thought she was going, I had no idea.
“I’ll protect you!” he called out, but his words fell on deaf ears. She continued to stumble weakly through the park then across the street.
“I can’t leave her,” I whispered to Gage before running after her. “She saved us both!”
Gage muttered a curse then followed me. He saw how right I was, I could tell, but that didn’t mean he agreed that we should run after her instead of taking shelter with Raze.
Where the three of us would find a place to stay, I had no idea. We were in a seedy part of town, full of ramshackle buildings with stained stucco and boarded windows. There might be an abandoned room we could stay in until sunset, I guessed. I hoped.
“Come on, then.” I hadn’t noticed Raze catching up and eventually overtaking me. “I have a place on the next block. I was hoping we wouldn’t have to go this route, but it’ll do the trick for a day or two.”
Naomi paused, turned around. “We will be alone there?”
“Yes. You’ll be perfectly safe.” He took her hand, pulling her close before draping her arm around his neck and helping her move faster. To a passerby, she would look like a girl who’d had too much fun while out with her friends.
It was a hotel. A terrible, seedy, disgusting hotel tucked between two larger buildings. Anyone passing by wouldn’t even notice it, which I was sure was why Raze had chosen it as a hiding spot. He helped Naomi through the doorway and into the lobby, which smelled like urine and stale cigarettes.
“Yeesh,” Gage whispered, picking his way over the stained and broken tile—where there was tile, as much of it had been pulled up
The peeling wallpaper had been once bright and cheerful, I guessed. It had faded until the flowers on it were hardly visible. I turned away in disgust when I recognized a splash of dried phlegm on it.
I heard someone vomiting in one of the rooms above us as Raze led the way up a narrow staircase littered with cigarette butts. Funny how I had just torn the heart from a vampire but wouldn’t touch the rust-speckled railing. Even supernatural b
eings have standards. The urine smell was worse on the landings than it had been in the lobby, as though the guests of the hotel couldn’t be bothered to use their bathrooms. If they had any.
It was better not to look around, to focus on Raze’s back and hope his room was nicer than what we had seen so far. Gage kept a hand on my shoulder as we climbed, reminding me that he was there. It was a much-needed comfort.
“The third floor,” Raze announced, before leading us to the end of the hall. He unlocked the chipped wooden door—I couldn’t help noticing the condition of the lock and wondering how safe this place was—and stepped inside, still helping Naomi.
It wasn’t much, but I hadn’t been expecting much. A small room with a smaller room off to the side which I guessed was a bathroom. A tiny closet. A bed with a bedspread I wouldn’t have slept on or under for all the money in the world.
The windows were covered tight, not allowing so much as a speck of light through. That was what mattered.
“This is an emergency hideout from humans and other vampires,” he explained. “I don’t use it much, or else it wouldn’t be a secret anymore. I rent it permanently. No one else can take it.”
“It’s perfect.” I reminded myself to be grateful though the sounds of someone coughing up a lung in the room next door sent a chill up my spine. The walls had to be paper thin.
To my surprise, Raze smiled. “Just wait and see.”
He opened the closet door and pulled a string, turning on a bare lightbulb. exposing the clothes hung up inside. He pushed them aside, and, without saying a word, he used three keys to open three locks.
I held my breath as a door swung open, revealing a narrower staircase than the one we’d climbed. We had to go single file with our arms tucked tight at our sides.
“Oh, my God!” I couldn’t help but laugh when I reached the top and looked around. “Are you freaking serious?”
Before me was the entire fourth floor of the hotel, and we might as well have been in a different world.
“Make yourselves at home,” he said, arms spread wide as he crossed the large, open living room on his way to the kitchen.
“This is yours?” Gage asked, eyes narrowed.
“Yeah, I rent it out along with the third floor. Nobody but me has been up here since the renovations were completed. I took out the extra walls to give myself some space, but there are still three bedrooms blocked off.” He came out holding a bag of blood which he handed to Naomi. “Here. I keep a supply in the fridge so I don’t have to go out—or kill anybody to get what I need.”
Yes, that would only arouse suspicion, even if he chose his victims from the hapless wretches downstairs.
Not that I would drink their blood, for fear of what was in it.
“Thank you,” she nearly wept before falling back onto the sofa and drinking deep.
The living room was simple, with only a TV and a computer, but it was worlds away from what we’d seen elsewhere in the building. And it was clean. It didn’t reek, the floors were spotless, the walls free of bodily fluids.
And the windows were as studiously boarded up as they’d been in the room downstairs.
I felt as though I could breathe freely for the first time since Gage’s disappearance.
“Do you have internet and everything?” I asked, eyeing up the computer. It had been so long since I had any contact with the outside world…
“Sure. Cable TV, the works. Fresh linens, clean towels, whatever you need.” Raze disposed of the empty bag, which Naomi had drained in a hurry, before sitting down beside her.
“How did you manage this?” Gage asked as he glanced around. “I didn’t think you had been in Europe for that long; I remember seeing you at a League meeting.”
Raze only shrugged. “I have a friend or two.” That was as much as he’d say on the matter, and I shot Gage a sharp look of warning. The last thing we needed was to pry and make ourselves another enemy.
Raze turned to Naomi, who appeared better after feeding again, but she still rested her head against the back of the sofa. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired,” she murmured, but managed a slight smile. “But alive, and much better than before. I know you all took a terrible chance, hanging back to save me the way you did. I can’t thank you enough.”
“Why don’t I show you to one of the bedrooms, where you can be more comfortable?” He helped her to her feet.
“I would kill for a shower,” Gage announced, looking down at himself. There was only so much his quick attempt at cleaning up before leaving the old prison could have done for him.
Raze pointed down the hall. “Help yourself.”
That left me alone in the living room, wondering what to do with myself while I waited. Raze and Naomi had a quiet conversation while the sounds of Gage’s shower carried down the hall.
My eyes kept going back to the computer.
What could it hurt, checking my email? I wouldn’t reply to anything. I only wanted to know if anyone cared that I was missing. It had been weeks since I had last seen anybody from my old life. Months, even.
I had no idea.
It occurred to me that I had completely lost track of time. How was it possible? Had everything that used to mean something to me stopped mattering all at once? I guessed so.
Logging in felt foreign. Like I was hacking into somebody else’s life, a life that wasn’t mine. It only used to be.
Seeing the list of familiar names brought tears to my eyes. Nicole wanted to know why I hadn’t been returning her calls. Dante from the office—who I had flirted with off-and-on for around six months—reached out to see if I was okay. Marissa was worried, judging by the ten worry-faced emojis she’d attached to her message.
The emails had stopped coming in the last few weeks. I wondered if they had all given up on me then decided it would be better for them if they had. Nothing good would come from them getting a glimpse into my life.
I almost wished I hadn’t logged in at all. Better to separate myself from the past.
Until I saw an unfamiliar-yet-familiar name in the list of senders.
“Dad?” I whispered, frowning. What were the odds? I was just thinking about him… Granted, his email was weeks old, but still.
I clicked on the message, my heart in my throat.
Cari,
Where are you? I received word that you were missing and have been worried. No one from work has seen or heard from you, your friends are frantic. You didn’t respond to messages on your birthday.
Oh. Yes. I had a birthday, didn’t I? A month ago. I used to look forward to my birthday, even when I didn’t do anything particularly special.
And then, it hit me: I was going to have a lot of birthdays. More than anyone I had grown up with, more than my parents ever would. The day would eventually go by unnoticed because there would be no one to notice it. They would all die, and there would be no one left who remembered me the way that I was back in my human days. Like I had never existed.
I shivered and wrapped my arms around myself, as though that would help warm a chill deep inside me.
Cari, you know I have the ability to find people when they’ve disappeared. I’ve had men searching for you.
Oh, no.
I know you’ve left the country.
Oh, no, no.
I cannot presume to know why you would take such drastic steps, why you might run away from your life and disappear overseas. And I don’t yet know where you are, what you’re doing. But I will not rest until I find you.
I closed the email and pushed away from the desk as the room spun around me. He was looking for me? Who would’ve thought? I certainly wouldn’t have, not ever. Who told him I was missing? I smacked the heel of my hand against my forehead again and again.
“What’s wrong?”
I hadn’t heard Gage enter the room, still wet from his shower. He knelt beside the chair.
“Cari, what happened?”
I pointed to the screen, now o
nly displaying Raze’s desktop. “My father’s been looking for me. I shouldn’t have checked my email, maybe, but I’m glad I did, or I wouldn’t have known.”
He didn’t seem to think this was as big a deal as I thought it was. “All right. Didn’t you expect something like this might happen? Or did you assume everyone in your life would write you off as a lost cause?”
“My father isn’t just anybody. He has connections. Powerful ones. And he lives somewhere here in Europe. Italy, the last I heard.”
“A whole other country.” He stroked my hair before patting my back. “The odds of him ever being able to find you are slim to none.”
He was right. I was overreacting. A few deep breaths later, I was able to think more clearly. “You’re right. It’s just a surprise, is all. You asked if I thought everybody would write me off—well, my father basically did, a long time ago. We have no relationship whatsoever.”
“But he still loves you,” Gage whispered. “Not that I blame him. I guess it goes to show that no matter how terrible we think things are with our parents, they’re still our parents.”
“You’re making me feel awful right now,” I whispered, but with a tiny smile. “I’ve thought some pretty terrible things about him in the not-so-distant past.”
“Knowing you, he deserved every last bit of it.” Gage stood, bringing me with him then wrapping me in a hug. “At least you know he cared, through everything.”
Nonetheless, it didn’t make me feel better. No, I would never write him back or call him, in spite of his phone number being at the bottom of the message. That would be the worst idea ever.
But still…
“I couldn’t let him see me like this,” I whispered, burying my face in his chest.
“Like what? Like the way we are?”
I winced. “I didn’t mean it as an insult, I swear.”
“I know you didn’t; and I can’t blame you for hesitating. He wouldn’t take it well if he knew what you’ve become. Humans never do.”