“Yes, I felt a connection with you, and with Milo,” Leif went on. “But I didn’t realize who you were until I heard you arguing with Jack a few weeks ago. And as soon as I found out, I knew I had to do everything in my power to make it up to you. I just hadn’t found a way to tell you yet.”
“I know you’re a vampire but… why did you leave?” I crossed my arms over my chest and wiped at my eyes again.
“Your mother was barely nineteen when I met her, and I loved her the moment I saw her.” Leif’s eyes stayed on me, and he never looked away as he talked. “She didn’t know I was a vampire. I meant to tell her, but she got pregnant with you right away. I couldn’t tell her then because I didn’t want her to do something drastic, like run away or have an abortion.
“I got her an apartment, and I stayed with her most of the time. I made up stories about work, but I took care of her the best I could,” he continued. “I didn’t think I could love anything more than I loved her, until you were born. I would’ve given anything to watch you grow up.”
“You didn’t though,” I said pointedly, and he nodded.
“The day before I left, Anna was standing in front of a mirror,” he said. “She had just started showing with Milo, and she had her shirt pulled up, rubbing the baby bump. I walked over to her and put my arms around and told her how beautiful she looked.
“She said, ‘Don’t lie. I’ve gotten so fat, and you haven’t changed a bit since the day we met.’” He closed his eyes on the memory. “She laughed when she said it, but I knew then that I only had a few more years before it would be too noticeable. She would get older, and I would be forever young.”
“So?” I asked. “Turn her. Or don’t. Tell her you’re a vampire. We could’ve moved before anybody noticed.”
“I thought of that,” he nodded. “I thought of turning her after she had Milo. I had wonderful fantasies of us running away together, living happily ever after. Anna and I young and beautiful forever, raising our children all over the world.
“But if I raised you that way, I knew you’d want this. I never wanted this life for you.” Leif’s smile only got more pained. “I wanted you to live. To have a real life. I couldn’t give you that if I stayed. I didn’t want you to end up like me.”
“Well, good thing you left, because I totally didn’t end up as a vampire,” I said. “Oh wait. Yes, I did. I just grew up without a father.”
“Everything I did, I did for you,” Leif said emphatically. “You don’t have to believe me, but it’s true. I left when I did because I didn’t want you to remember me or miss me. I wanted you to forget me and move on with your life.”
“It didn’t work, Dad!” I snapped. “I still missed you! When I was little, I used to cry myself to sleep, and Milo would ask me all these questions about you, and I would make stuff up to make him feel better. And Mom, she never got over you! She has been unhappy and bitter and… you left us alone with her!”
“I’m sorry.” Leif’s eyes welled with tears. “I didn’t know. I didn’t…” He looked down. “I was trying to protect you. I only wanted you to be happy.
“It destroyed me to leave you, Alice.” Leif pursed his lips. “That’s why I ended with the lycans. I thought they would kill me.”
“Was Mom your one?” I asked. “The one you were meant for?” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jack look at me when I said that.
“Yes,” Leif said quietly. “She was. She is.”
I chewed my lip. I knew the ache of growing up with a father and why he didn’t love me enough to stay. And I knew the horrendous pain of losing someone I loved. My fight with Jack was so raw, I could barely speak and breathe.
Yet Leif had chosen that pain willingly. He’d left my mother, my unborn brother, and me knowing how much pain it would cause him, and he did it to protect us. He had been willing to sacrifice himself for our happiness.
In the time I had known Leif, he’d been nothing but kind. He’d risked his own life more than once to help me and my friends. And until I found out that he’d abandoned me when I was an infant, I had really liked him.
“You’re not gonna leave now, are you?” I asked.
“No, of course not,” he shook his head. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Then we’d better tell Milo,” I said.
Even though Milo was still healing and needed his rest, I woke him up for this. The swelling and discoloration of his skin had gone, but he moved slowly. I didn’t tell him why he had to get up, but I managed to drag him downstairs. Bobby kept telling me I was being mean, so I elbowed him in the stomach, and he shut up.
I sat on the couch next to Milo, with my arm around him. I’m not sure if he needed it, but I knew I did. Leif pulled a chair in front of us and sat down, preparing to explain the whole thing. Ezra stayed in the room to oversee things, and that did make me feel better.
Jack tried so sit next to me on the couch, but I wouldn’t have it.
“No,” I told him. “You don’t get to do that.”
“Do what?” Jack asked.
“Try to be all… supportive.” I glared at him. “You broke up with me, remember?”
“What?” Milo asked, looking at me.
“Never mind,” I said, and Jack moved to a chair on the side of the room, muttering something about how he could be supportive of Milo. “Leif has something more important to tell you, Milo.”
Leif told Milo the whole story, and it went about the same way it had gone with me. Stunned at first, then disbelief, then angry when he remembered that Leif had left us. Milo took it better than I did, though. He had less anger about the whole thing, but that tended to be the case with everything.
“Wow,” Bobby sat on the floor by Milo’s feet and looked in awe. “You’re so Luke Skywalker right now.”
“Leif is not Darth Vader,” Milo said, then he cocked his head. “Do I call you Leif? Or do I call you Dad?”
“Call me whatever you like,” Leif shrugged. “I’m just happy to be a part of your life.”
“I still don’t understand.” Milo’s face scrunched up in concentration, reminding me of the way he looked when he’d still been human. “How… Well, just how?”
“Are you asking how I fathered you?” Leif asked carefully. “I did it the same anyone fathers a child.” He looked uncomfortable and shifted in the chair. “I’m sure you understand the mechanics of reproduction.”
“Yeah, I understand human reproduction,” Milo said. “But I didn’t think vampires could reproduce, not like actual offspring, fruit of their loins.” He looked over at me. “Did you know they could do that?”
“No. Why would I know that?” I shrugged.
“I have seen it before.” Ezra stepped forward from the side of the room. I think he’d been giving us space to talk over things, but his presence reassured me. “Only twice, but it’s common enough that there’s a term for it. Dhampyr.”
“A what now?” I asked.
“The offspring of a vampire father and a human mother,” Ezra explained, and Leif turned to watch him. “It does explain a lot of the peculiarities that we’ve encountered with you. Your strong connection and attraction to vampires, and in turn, their affinity for you. Your ability to transform into a vampire with relative ease, and now, you’re superior strength and control.”
“Wait, wait,” Bobby interrupted, snapping his fingers. “I’ve heard that before. That’s like what Blade is, right? Wesley Snipes was a vampire hunter, but he was like super strong and badass from being a half-breed.” He glanced back at Milo. “You weren’t like that when you were human, were you?”
“No, I got my ass kicked all the time,” Milo grimaced at the memory of his human self.
“So how come they weren’t all like Blade?” Bobby asked, turning back to Ezra.
“Because it’s a movie, Bobby,” I said dryly. “Movies aren’t the same as real life.”
“It varies, from dhampyr to dhampyr,” Ezra said. “From what I’ve heard, some are st
ronger than others, but the only constant is that they’re drawn to vampires. Most end up as vampires.”
“We’re drawn to vampires?” I asked, and something about that made my stomach queasy.
“Yes, you are,” Ezra nodded.
I didn’t want to look over at Jack, but I could feel him staring at me. I still had my arm around Milo, and I held onto him tighter, this time for my own support.
My father was a vampire. I’d been born with part of that virus inside me, mutating my blood, so I was drawn to vampires. I’d been made to seek them out, and they sought after me, too.
What if that’s all my connection with Jack had ever been? Or Peter? Some byproduct of a virus I’d gotten before I was born. Maybe I’d never really been bonded to either of them, to anyone.
Mae had told me something once, and I hadn’t thought much of it at the time, but now it played over and over in my head. It’d been when one night when I was still mortal, and Mae had taken me out to cheer me up.
“I’m trying to understand your ancestry, because you and Milo are both so unique. I’m wondering if we’ve been looking at this all wrong. Maybe you weren’t meant for Peter. Maybe you were just meant to be a vampire,” Mae said, looking faraway. “We’re just a means to an end for you.”
“Alice?” Leif asked, leaning forward. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah,” I said numbly, and my mouth didn’t want to work. Nothing did.
“Are you sure?” Milo asked. “All the color drained from your face.”
“No, I’m fine. I just… I had a really long night.” I tried to force a smile, but I knew it fell completely flat. I stood up, relieved that my legs didn’t give out under me. “I need to… I need to get some sleep.”
“Do you need help?” Ezra asked, his brow furrowed with concern.
“Nope.” I shook my head. “No. I’m absolutely…” I trailed off. I didn’t know what I was.
Milo got up and tried to help me, but I refused to let him. He needed to stay and talk to Leif and sort things out. I couldn’t sort anything out anymore. My brain barely worked.
It was after one in the afternoon, and I had yet to sleep. Last night had been the longest night of my life. I remembered feeling my best friend dying, we’d been attacked by vampire hunters, my boyfriend broke up with me, and I found out my dad was a vampire. It was all a bit much.
I staggered upstairs to the bedroom I shared with Jack, but I couldn’t let myself think about him, or wonder where I’d sleep tomorrow. I couldn’t even change out of my clothes. I just collapsed on the bed. As I drifted off, I just kept hearing Mae’s words playing in my head over and over again.
“We’re just a means to an end for you.”
22
Wiping the steam from the mirror, I was surprised by how normal my reflection looked. I felt like I’d been in a train wreck, even after a night’s sleep and a hot shower, but I looked just like I always did.
The breakup hurt even worse. I’d expected it to dull, the way the shock about Leif had, but it didn’t. It throbbed painfully inside me, like a festering wound. I hadn’t cried yet today, but I suspected that last night had completely dried me out of tears for a while.
I couldn’t get Mae out of my head. What if she had been right? What if I’d just been meant to be a vampire? If I’d never been meant for Jack or Peter, had I ever really loved either of them?
I felt like throwing up every time I even thought about the fight with Jack last night, and my life looked like a giant vortex without him. That desperation for him, because of him, that had to happen because I loved him. I really and truly loved him. That couldn’t just be a biological response ingrained in me so I’d become a vampire. Could it?
Not that it mattered anymore how much I loved Jack or not. He’d broken up with me.
“Alice,” Jack opened the bathroom door without knocking.
“Jack!” I yelled. I had a towel wrapped around me, but I hadn’t gotten dressed yet. When he walked in, I jumped and pulled the towel tighter.
“What?” Jack asked, surprised by my attempts at modesty. “It’s not like I haven’t seen you naked before.”
“Yeah, well, you dumped me,” I reminded him. “You don’t get to see me naked anymore.”
“You’re in my bathroom,” he countered.
“You still don’t get to see me naked. Now will you get out so I can get dressed?”
He left the bathroom without further protests, and as soon as he shut the door behind him, I leaned against the bathroom sink and tried to catch my breath. I swallowed hard and told myself I could do this.
“So, Alice, I just…” Jack said from the other side of the bathroom door. “I wanted to talk.”
I got dressed in a hurry because I wasn’t sure how long he would wait. He tended to get impatient, and maybe what he wanted to talk about was something good. Like he realized how unfair he was being last night. Sure, I had lied to him, but it wasn’t that big of a thing.
With my hair still damp, I stepped out of the bathroom. Jack stood by the end of his bed with his arms crossed over his chest, and he didn’t really look at me when I came out.
Being close to him normally filled me with a warm, fluttery feeling. Not like butterflies, either. It happened after I’d turned into a vampire, after we had a blood bond. I could feel him, like a tether attached my heart to his. Without any effort on my part, my body always naturally tilted to his. My blood had become magnetized to him.
But not now. I only felt an ache, a dark cloud growing inside me, overshadowing our bond. A vice gripped my heart, clenching it too tightly for me to feel the invisible tether that held us together.
“What do you wanna talk about?” I asked, biting my lip.
“Um…” Rubbing the back of his neck, he shifted his weight. “I just wanted to make sure you were alright. After last night.”
“You mean because you broke up with me over something really, really stupid?” I asked.
“It’s not stupid, Alice.” He sighed and shook his head. “And no, I didn’t mean that. I meant, you know… about Leif and everything too.”
“Well…” I wrapped my arms around myself, and my mouth felt dry. My stomach dropped, and I didn’t even know how to answer his question. “Why?”
“Why what?” Jack looked up at me, but I wouldn’t meet his eyes. I could feel him appraising me, making sure I was alright, and that hurt all the more.
“You don’t get to do this, Jack.” I ran a hand through my tangles of damp hair, and I put my hand on my side, pressing hard, as if I could hold the sadness in that way. “You don’t get to break my heart and pick up the pieces.”
“Alice.” His entire face fell and his shoulders slumped as he stared helplessly at me. “I didn’t… I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You’re an even bigger liar than I am.” I rolled my eyes to keep back the tears.
I hated being the in same room with him, feeling the way he felt. His own confused pain permeated through the air, like a thick fog, and I couldn’t stand to feel it along with my own.
“How am I a liar?” Jack asked, his hurt expression growing defensive. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I know that!” I yelled, and I didn’t mean to yell. I shook my head, and when I spoke again, I tried to lower my voice. “But you said you’d love me forever, and then I did something really dumb and relatively minor, and … I mean, let’s be honest, kissing Peter was way worse than this.”
“No, it wasn’t.” He chewed the inside of his cheek and furrowed his brow. “That was bad. But this… I asked you what you were doing. I told you I felt a distance between us. I was so honest with you, and you didn’t correct me. You didn’t… You couldn’t trust me with this part of you.”
“I just didn’t want you to worry,” I told him emphatically. “I didn’t want to fight about this because we’ve been fighting about so much other stuff lately. I wanted to have one less argument.”
“But that is the proble
m, Alice.” He looked at me seriously. “We’ve been arguing, and there’s been something going on with you. You’re restless and distracted, and this whole thing is just a symptom of that. Something is going on with you that I can’t fix.”
“Jack, you don’t need to fix me,” I shook my head. “And yes, I know I’m going through some stuff. But that doesn’t mean we should end this. We should work through it.”
He smiled, one of his pained smiles that broke my heart even more. He lowered his head and ran his hand through his hair, and for a while, he didn’t say anything.
“I’ve been trying so hard to be everything you wanted. To give you everything you could ever want. And you’re not happy.” He took a deep breath, and let his words hang in the air. “So now I’m going to be what you need.”
My phone rang in my pocket, but I ignored it.
“What does that even mean?” I asked, and he shook his head.
“Answer your phone.” He nodded at me and turned to walk away. I said his name, but he left the bedroom without looking back.
“Hello?” I answered my phone with a heavy sigh.
“Alice?” Olivia said.
“Olivia? Are you back? I’ve been looking for you.”
“I need to talk to you,” Olivia said, forgoing her usually rambled greetings. She sounded clear and clipped, and that made me nervous. “When can you get to my place?”
“When do you need me?”
“As soon as you can.” Without waiting for my answer, she hung up.
I checked my phone to be sure it wasn’t a dropped call, and it wasn’t. I thought about calling her back, but if Olivia said she wanted me over there now, it was probably important. I didn’t need to waste time making unnecessary phone calls.
Wisdom (My Blood Approves series) Page 23