Samantha would never have thought the sight of blood would make her feel so relieved. She grinned at Tafari, who looked mildly embarrassed, or even guilty, for what he had done. “This is great,” she exclaimed. “You are pretty resourceful, aren’t you?”
“Would you mind helping Samantha carry these to her apartment?” Tafari turned to Ian. “I am certain Leisha will have need of them presently.”
“Of course, Tafari.” Ian grabbed a brown grocery sack from under the sink and filled it with the bags of blood. After he had the second one filled, he scooped them up in his arms and waited for Samantha to walk with him.
“Thanks, Tafari,” she said as they left his apartment.
When they arrived at her room, Ian plopped the two bags filled with blood on the floor and closed the door behind him without so much as glancing at Leisha.
Leisha inspected the bags and sighed. “This will do. Tell Tafari thanks for me.”
“I already did.” Samantha felt a surge of disappointment at Leisha’s lack of enthusiasm. “How long will this tide you over?”
“I am not completely sure . . . maybe a week or so.”
“But, I thought when you drank blood it would last you for a lot longer than a week!”
Leisha’s usual calm and serene mask faltered for an instant, and Samantha could see how weary the vampire truly was. She sat on the floor with her legs crossed and opened a bag to sip out the blood. “Remember how I said we take on the life source of what we drink? Well, this blood has no life source to absorb, so it will only sustain me for so long. Does that make sense?”
Samantha gave a half shrug. “I guess so.”
Leisha changed the subject. “We need to get in touch with Ptah somehow,” she said. “He’ll be getting impatient for my report.”
Samantha stayed silent, not wanting to give herself away. She had already emailed each address they had made her memorize together with a detailed report of everything that transpired during their stay with the immortals. She forced herself not to think about how much she was betraying the new friends she was making here, or how much she was betraying Leisha. Samantha had berated herself daily for being such a coward and giving Ptah exactly what he wanted, but every night she dreamed about what Annette had done to her. Even worse were the dreams in which Leisha was bloody and battered, looking at Samantha in disgust as she said, “You could have saved me this torture!” The thought of keeping Leisha safe kept her mouth closed, even if reluctantly.
She barely slept at all with the combination of her nightmares and the guilt that ate away at her. “You can’t contact him with the immortals watching every move you make.”
“But you can. I will give you his contact information and tell you what to say to him.” Leisha gave Samantha a meaningful look. “I am not intending to betray Tafari like Ptah wants me to, and I need you to report to Ptah exactly what I tell you to and no more. Do you think you could handle that for me?”
Samantha felt her stomach sink, the impulse to tell Leisha everything that had happened to her resurfacing. Instead, she stayed silent. She still was not protected from Annette’s punishments unless Leisha made her a human servant.
It was then that Samantha realized if she could convince Leisha to make her a human servant, she could tell her everything and she would receive complete protection. But she couldn’t bring it up now; it might be too obvious. Leisha would be able to connect the dots. She would bring it up later that night and figure out how to convince Leisha to mark her without giving herself away.
If she were Leisha’s human servant, Leisha would also be stronger. Maybe they could go into hiding together so Leisha wouldn’t have to face such horrendous torture alone. Samantha felt the need to protect her vampire friend from the terrors she constantly faced in her past.
In the meantime, she would have to continue to report everything to Ptah just as he demanded.
CHAPTER 23
Leisha was pacing in her room again, trying not to give in to her feeling of restlessness. The blood that Samantha delivered the other day had helped quite a bit, but she was still confined to her room. She was only tortured a few times by Esteban and Arthur—they had been discreet so Samantha wouldn’t be exposed to it. Leisha hadn’t answered any of their questions. Esteban’s torturing techniques were a cakewalk compared to Ptah’s.
She was imprisoned before in much more unforgiving circumstances. Most of them consisted of Ptah executing his grueling punishments. She knew she should be grateful she had a bed and room where she could even pace back and forth, but her body did not seem to agree with her mind.
She stopped when she heard footsteps approaching her room from down the hall. When Leisha caught Tafari’s scent, she unconsciously reached up to smooth her hair and smacked her lips together to give them more color.
Tafari stood in the doorway, his handsome features unreadable as his piercing gaze studied her.
“Yes?” she asked quietly.
“Samantha told me you will already need another supply of blood in the next week or so. Is this true?”
Leisha nodded her head and explained to him the same thing she told Samantha about absorbing a life source. He nodded grimly; no doubt, Samantha had already told him all of it before he came up to see her. “I am afraid I had not planned for this. The last time your hunger needed to be sated was almost a month ago.”
“Yes, I understand.”
“I suppose you will have to drink more of my blood when your hunger comes back. At least that will keep it at bay for some time.” His tone was dripping with something she couldn’t identify. “Hopefully, that will be the last time I will have to donate any to you.”
His attitude and the memory of what had almost transpired the last time drove Leisha to protest. “I will not drink from you if it repulses you so much. All you have to do is let me go to a bar or a club. Being in such a largely populated area, I’ve no doubt I can find a murderer, or at least a serial rapist to knock off.”
He snorted. “And you think I would allow you to take a life if I can stop it? Sorry, vampire, it will not happen.”
Leisha’s exasperation was beginning to show. “Oh please, Tafari! Like you have any right to judge? At least when I kill someone, I have the knowledge that I’m helping make the world a better place to live in. I never kill the innocent!”
Tafari stalked closer. “Even if I were to believe that, what about the other vampires? Do you tell them which humans are allowed to be killed? Do you turn your back on the innocents as you watch your fellow vamps take them? There are vampires who are more sadistic and insane than the murderers you claim to prey upon. Do you do anything about those vampires?”
He was a foot away from her now, towering over her in his anger. It would have been intimidating if Leisha had allowed it.
She narrowed her eyes and tilted her chin up at him defiantly. “Do you think I want to just sit there and let them take innocent lives? Do you think I enjoy knowing exactly what kind of sadistic rape goes on behind closed doors? I can’t do anything to stop them! If I protest in any way, the vampires demand that I be killed. But since Ptah has no desire to be rid of me, he doles out a punishment that is worse than any death imaginable. Because of my ‘example’ no other vampire has dared to defy Ptah or the way vampires have lived for centuries now!”
Face stone cold, Tafari’s eyes flashed more silver than blue, showing the rage he was fighting to contain. “Is that really true?”
Leisha turned away, not wanting to show him the vulnerability she felt. “I don’t lie if I can help it, Tafari. Yes, it’s true, and, of course, you won’t believe me. I don’t even know why I bother trying to explain myself to you.”
“I do not understand,” he said in a faraway voice. “If you do not condone taking innocent life and do not like the way the vampires live, then why the hell did you agree to become one?” He sounded genuinely perplexed.
Leisha’s spine stiffened at the question. She had thought Adanne had al
ready told him everything that had happened on that terrible night. She bit out harshly, “To save Adanne from being tortured, you idiot! Why else would I ever agree to become something so completely vile?”
She kept her back to him, trying to get her emotions under control, her usual impassive exterior slipping. Clenching her jaw, she stiffened her fingers so she didn’t pull them into fists and give herself away.
Tafari was silent for so long that Leisha was tempted to turn around and see his face. But she still couldn’t bear for him to see her heart in her eyes. He moved quickly, grabbing her arm to roughly spin her around, leaning down until their noses were almost touching. She had never seen him look so fierce, and was uncertain of what he might do. “Is this some kind of ploy?” he asked in a dangerously soft voice. “Some trick to make me trust you while you stick a knife in my back?”
Swallowing, Leisha answered in an equally soft voice. “I speak only the truth to you, Tafari. Maybe if you had given me the chance to explain two thousand years ago, we might have been able to salvage our marriage.”
He sucked in a breath as if she had physically struck him. “Adanne told me that you were standing with Ptah on some kind of platform above her while other men hurt her. She said all you did was stand there and watch while they brought a whip to her.” His tone rang with accusation that stung Leisha to her core.
She could not keep herself from showing the bitterness she felt with that memory. “Ptah forced me to watch and threatened to do worse if I did not agree to join him.”
He was shaking his head. “No, it cannot be true. Adanne told me—”
“She was only four years old, and was absolutely terrified! How could you have expected her to remember anything accurately?”
“She also had vivid nightmares of that night for years! Are you telling me that they were simply nightmares and not actual memories?”
Leisha took a deep breath to steady herself, ignoring the bruising force of his hand. “I’m sure that she dreamed of things as she remembered them, but that does not mean that they really did happen in that manner.”
“And your father? He said that you almost killed him.”
“Almost would be the operative word in that sentence.” She wrested her arm free of his grasp. “You have seen what I am like when The Hunger takes over, Tafari, and that is after centuries of working to control it. I had no way of curbing it when it arose. But I did not kill him, and I ran away so that he and Adanne would be safe from me.”
It aggrieved her to relive the memories that had apparently made her daughter hate her so. She knew Adanne could not be blamed for perceiving her own mother in that way, but it still hurt to know it. To know that even in her dying breath, she cursed her own mother.
Leisha turned her back to him again, staring at nothing out the window. “I should never have contacted you,” she murmured. “It only dredges up painful memories while we talk ourselves around in endless circles.”
She heard Tafari swallow. “I am sorry,” he whispered.
Pivoting back to him, her eyes widened. “What?”
“I am sorry, Leisha,” he said again, his face completely sincere. “I do not know if I can ever believe your story, but you are right. I did not give you a chance to explain before. I should have sought you out and asked you about it. For that, I will apologize.”
Leisha swallowed the sob that was trying to escape. She cleared her throat. “Thank you,” she said. “You don’t know what those simple words mean to me.” She paused, and then asked hesitantly, “Did Adanne have a happy life?”
This time, it was Tafari who turned away. “For the most part, she did. Your father took great care of her, and he and I both did everything we could to shower her with love.”
For several minutes, the room brimmed with a sorrowed and emotional silence. Eventually, Tafari’s shoulders sagged in defeat, shifting back to face her. “If you were to snack, as you put it, on a human, would that sustain you along with bags of donated blood?”
Leisha considered. “It could work for a while, but we would still come to this bridge again in the near future.”
“For now, I will allow you to go to a pub when the time comes for you to feed again. I will be going with you, and you will consume little bits of blood from people while under my scrutiny. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she agreed softly. She was too stunned by his willingness to give her this leeway that she said nothing else as he left her room.
Slumping onto her bed, Leisha pondered what this could possibly mean for them. It was a small step Tafari was taking, but the fact that he was taking any steps at all was miraculous. For the first time in two thousand years, Leisha allowed herself to feel a twinge of hope that she and Tafari could actually reconcile their differences. Maybe he could forgive her, after all.
CHAPTER 24
Samantha was trying to enjoy herself, but her anxiety over what Ptah had just told her was making it incredibly difficult. Just after she finished talking to him and was on her way back to the dorms the immortals occupied, she bumped into Willem. He was one of the immortals whom she sat with in the cafeteria on a regular basis. She was not sure if he could read her worried face, or if he was just being friendly, but he invited her to join him and a group of friends to watch a movie.
Samantha was not sure why she said yes. Maybe it was the idea of pretending she was in a normal environment with normal people. After all, only regular human beings got together to watch a movie and eat popcorn, right?
Well, it was almost normal. They ended up watching an action flick, and everyone was commenting on whether those fighting techniques would actually work when fighting with a vampire. It was obvious this was not the first time they’d had this discussion.
“It’s not comparable,” Rinwa said. “They used guns throughout the movie, while we fight vampires mostly with blades. We would have to get a movie that uses the same weapons as us in order for the comparison to actually have any bearing.”
“Why don’t you guys use guns?” Samantha asked.
Willem shrugged as he explained. “The only way to kill a vampire is to decapitate it. Some also like to cut out their heart, just to err on the side of caution. Anyway, the point is that it’s impractical to use a gun against a vampire when your ultimate goal is to get close enough to cut off their head. It is the same way the vampires kill us. We sometimes use guns to slow them down, but that is only when we are certain there will be a fight. Generally, it’s just too difficult to stay unnoticed by humans when you’re carrying around that type of machinery.”
“Could you ever develop bullets that can kill a vampire? Like that Underworld movie, where they had bullets that gave out ultraviolet rays?” Samantha continued her curious questions.
Rinwa gave a bored expression as she shifted next to Willem on the couch. “Trust me, we have already explored those kinds of ideas. They didn’t work. We were able to manufacture bullets that contained ultraviolet rays, but they weren’t lethal enough to have the desired effect.” She turned and studied the girl through her tinted glasses. “Why are you so interested, anyway?” The immortal smirked and rested her elbows over her knees. “Thinking of leaving the dark side to join us?”
It was asked lightly, yet Samantha felt a small amount of tension filtering into the room as the rest of the immortals turned their attention on her, awaiting her response. “I haven’t joined any side, nor do I plan to. I guess you could just say I’m a neutral party, trying to get an understanding of each side.”
Rinwa huffed, “It doesn’t work that way, little girl.” She took a breath and visibly forced herself to relax. “I like you, Samantha, I really do. All of us have gotten to know you over these past weeks, and we’ve enjoyed your company. But you are living in a fantasy if you think you can come and go between the immortals and the vampires. That’s a very deadly line you’re walking, and if you don’t join with one of us soon, you will have no protection from the things that go bump in the nigh
t when they come for you. Understand?”
With that bit of harsh advice, Rinwa stood and adjusted her black fitted shirt before saying goodbye to everyone and left the room.
Samantha felt the truth of Rinwa’s words sinking in. She had chosen a side, but she did not like her decision, especially since it was not much choice at all. Ptah had used fear to make her do exactly what he said. How was she ever going to get out of the mess she was in when Leisha flatly refused to make Samantha her human servant? Samantha and Leisha had two very uncomfortable discussions in which Samantha tried to look like she was not begging, while Leisha kept grilling her on why she would ever want such a thing. The talks went nowhere, leaving both parties incredibly frustrated.
Interrupting her thoughts, Willem said, “I’d like to tell you to disregard what Rinwa said, but I must admit she is right. You can’t sit on the fence when we are so close to war with each other. We battled before, and from what I’ve heard, that was bloody enough.” He took a swig of beer from the bottle he was holding. “This time around, though, my gut is telling me it will be far worse.” His hazel gaze was intense. “Want my advice? You better go back to where you came from and forget everything you’ve seen.”
When it was time for Samantha to leave, Willem said, “I’ll walk you to your building. Rinwa said you got lost on the campus before.”
“That was my first night here,” she defended, but he still followed her out the door. Once they were outside in the chilled night air, they settled into a comfortable silence as they sauntered over the walkway.
“Your heart seems heavy tonight,” Willem said. “Everything all right?”
“I’m a human teenager stuck between vampires and immortals. What do you think?”
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