by K. A. Last
She smiled. “Hi, Josh.”
“You try to kill my girlfriend and all you have to say is hi?”
She frowned and I immediately wanted to take my words back. How could I say something to make her look so sad?
What was I talking about? I didn’t even know her.
“You do know me,” she said. “Angelica took your memory.”
“Because I knew you in my past doesn’t change the fact I don’t know you now.”
“Josh.” Grace said my name on the end of a long breath. As if it hurt for her to say it.
I squeezed her shoulders. Her palms lay flat on my chest, her touch spreading warmth into me. Feelings I never knew I could feel bubbled to the surface. Some of them were so unfamiliar I didn’t have names for them.
Grace smiled.
And I smiled back.
“Oh my God, you are making me gag,” Lilith said. She got up and rubbed the leg Grace had broken. The bone would have already healed.
I ignored her and went back to staring at Grace. Her lips were a rosy pink, and all I wanted to do was kiss them until they bled.
Grace cleared her throat. “Um … there are at least two people here who can hear every thought you’re thinking. Me included.”
“Would you get off the ground?” Lilith said.
“Hey, Grace has been waiting a long time for this. Let her have her moment,” the guy I didn’t know said.
Grace laughed and it sounded like music drifting on a light breeze. “You’re not going to kiss me then?”
“I don’t know you,” I said. “I think I should get to know you first.”
She leant down and pressed her lips to mine in a chaste kiss. Lilith had never kissed me like that, and it was better than any kiss I could remember.
“I know you,” Grace said. “So I think it’s okay.”
She rolled off me and pulled me to my feet. Her strength surprised me, for someone so small. When she let go of my hand, reality came crashing down around me. It was as if she took the happiness away with her touch. I wanted to touch her again to see if the feeling would come back. Without her hand in mine, all I felt was emptiness.
I looked at Lilith, and reality slapped me again. How could I kiss another girl in front of her?
The smile fell from Grace’s face. “Josh?” She took a step towards me.
“No. Don’t touch me.” Even though I want it so badly.
“What’s wrong?”
I clenched my fists in an attempt not to lose my temper, but it was no use.
“I don’t know you!”
Grace flinched. “You do, Josh … Try to remember.”
“I can’t, okay?” I ran a hand through my hair and grabbed a chunk of it in my fist. “She took everything. I don’t remember you. I don’t love you. So you need to go.”
“That’s not true. I know it’s not. You can ask Archer and Ryan. They all know you love me.”
“What does it matter?” I walked right up to Grace and towered over her, our noses only centimetres apart. “You never told me you loved me back.”
A tear slipped down Grace’s cheek, but she didn’t deny what I’d said.
“Please,” she said. “Fight it. Try to remember.”
“I have!” I yelled in her face.
“You need to fight harder.”
Apart from what I’d been told, and what Angelica had planted in my head, I knew nothing about my history with Grace. Something bad must have happened between us, or we’d be together and not standing in a park arguing. Did I want to remember? Did I want to put myself through pain unnecessarily?
Like all my memories, Grace stood beyond my reach.
“Why should I fight? Give me one good reason,” I said.
Grace faltered. Her mouth opened, but no words came out and she closed it again.
“See?” I said. “You can’t even tell me if we have anything worth saving. How can I fight for you when I don’t know what I’m fighting for?”
TWENTY
Grace
Josh and I stared at each other while everyone else stared at us. I wanted them all to go away so we could talk alone. With so much negative energy bouncing around it was hard to find the happy in amongst the pain.
Hope and Justice were strung out, studying the movement of every shadow. Ryan sat on the grass, leaning against a tree. He needed rest badly. And Archer was like the ever-faithful puppy, not far from my side. It was nice some things hadn’t changed. At least I could rely on him to always be who he was.
The vampire chick launched at me for the second time. I heard her coming, but I didn’t have the emotional capacity to care. The others would never let her get the upper hand. I was surprised she tried to attack me with so many hunters around. She grabbed my shoulders and threw me to the ground. Archer ran and jumped, kicking her in the back, and she stumbled until she fell next to me.
I couldn’t believe Josh was dating a vampire, especially one so stupidly jealous.
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t put a stake in you right now,” I said, getting to my feet.
“You touch her, and I’ll hurt you,” Josh said.
Archer laughed. “I’d like to see you try. You really have lost your memory.”
“Why are you dating a vampire, Josh?” I got up, and dirt rained onto the ground as I dusted myself off. “You hate vampires.”
“Or at least you did when you were human,” Ryan said. He sat with his knees up, chin resting on them.
Josh ran a hand down his face. “Lilith has helped me. Leave her alone.”
The only way I’d be leaving her alone was if she became a vegetarian. I couldn’t see that happening any time soon. The only vamps I knew who didn’t eat people were Charlotte and Josh. Even Josh’s eating habits had become questionable. If he’d lost his memory, he could also have forgotten he didn’t eat humans.
“I don’t like her.” I stared at Lilith, who had taken up a position beside Josh.
“You don’t have to like her,” Josh said. “It’s not up to you who I date. I don’t even know you. I don’t know any of you. Well, except for Hope and Justice, but it’s not like we’re friends or anything.”
“Well, I know you,” I said. “And you would never be with someone like her.”
“What? I’d be with someone like you?” Josh pulled a piece of paper from his back pocket and unfolded it. “You even admitted you couldn’t say it back.” He thrust the photo in my face. Then he tore it in half and let it flutter to the ground. “Something was wrong then, and I think it’s still wrong now.”
My cheeks flamed, and I looked away. What could I say to convince him, when I couldn’t convince myself?
“This is getting us nowhere,” Archer said. “We’ve found him, Gracie. Now what?”
Everyone looked at me.
I shifted my weight from one foot to the other and fidgeted with the hem of my top. “We take him home.”
Josh turned his back on me and walked away. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“Don’t you want to know why I came looking for you?” I said.
Lilith stopped and faced me. “That would be nice, actually. Since you don’t really love him.”
“What?” I glared at her. “I—”
“No, you don’t. If you did, you would have told him by now.” She smirked. “You had the opportunity right before the ‘I don’t know what I’m fighting for’ speech.”
Being able to read minds was hard. You’d think I’d be able to find out everything I needed to know by looking in everyone’s heads, but it wasn’t always that simple. I could only read immediate thoughts, not memories, and right then Lilith was focused on two things: hating Lucas, and hating me. The hatred was so strong it overpowered everything else, and I couldn’t see past its fog. I wondered what had happened to make her so bitter. Then again, I’d never met a happy vampire.
“Your dad is worried about you,” I said, ignoring Lilith. “He’s got the police involved.�
��
Josh doubled back towards us. His eyes darkened as his brow knitted together into a frown. “They won’t find me.”
“I know. But when he said you’d stopped calling, I had to come and see if you were okay.”
Josh laughed, and the sound echoed around the empty park. Dawn wasn’t far off, the city slept as much as a city could. Lilith looked around, her eyes darting to the horizon. She was nervous about the rising sun—as I would be if I were her.
Josh stopped and fixed his gaze on mine. “I am the furthest thing from okay that you could possibly get.”
“Then let me help you,” I said.
“The last person who tried to help got taken away.”
Josh’s thoughts filled with images of Charlotte. “You’ve seen Charlotte?”
He frowned.
“Where is she?” Archer asked, a little too enthusiastically.
Lilith smirked, and I was getting sick of it. I had to stop myself from punching her.
“You won’t find her,” she said. “At least, not until Angelica wants you to.”
Oh, crap.
“Angelica has Charlotte?” Archer asked.
“Yes, and she said to give you a message,” Lilith said. “You have something she wants. If you don’t give it to her, Charlotte is dead.”
It seemed the battle against the vampire army was not the only war we were fighting. What I wouldn’t give for Angelica to leave me, and everyone I knew, alone. She wanted Annie’s ring. All she had to do was ask and I’d give it to her but Angelica, being the power-hungry bitch that she was, had to play dirty instead.
Josh grabbed Lilith’s hand and pulled her away. She winked at me before taking the lead, and they disappeared into the trees.
I wanted to go after them, but all I took was one step before Archer grabbed my arm. “Let them go. We have other problems.”
“Like psycho angels with hidden agendas,” I said. Then something occurred to me and I turned to Hope. “If Charlotte is from here, and this is your city, why didn’t you kill her?”
“Because she left.” Hope shrugged. “Out of our jurisdiction.”
She made it sound like something from a crime TV show.
“Come on. We need time for everyone to heal fully,” I said. “There’s no point following Josh. He won’t listen to me right now.”
“Grace has a point,” Hope said. “Some of us need sleep. The vamps won’t be out again until dark, so we should be safe.”
I snorted and shook my head. “You have no idea what you’re up against, do you?”
“I’m up against this sort of thing every day.” Hope put her hands on her hips. “They will still be there tonight. And now they can’t get Charlotte because Angelica has her, so no blood, no army of sun-walking vamps.”
“Should you tell her, or should I?” Archer asked.
I put my hands on my hips, too. “Charlotte is Josh’s creator.”
“Ah, damn.” Archer slapped his leg. “I wanted to tell her.”
It took a moment for realisation to dawn on Hope and Justice’s faces, and when it did their expressions went from shocked to angry in a few seconds.
“His blood is the same as hers?” Justice asked.
Archer clapped him on the shoulder. “As far as we know, Josh can walk around in the sun.”
“Crap.” Justice pinched the bridge of his nose. “Does Lucas know?”
“Let’s hope the answer to that is no,” I said.
Justice rubbed his face. “This keeps getting worse with every passing minute.”
I couldn’t have agreed more.
TWENTY-ONE
Josh
Lilith led me through the train station and into the subway tunnel. We managed to avoid sunrise by about ten minutes. We’d never cut it that fine before, and it was the first time we hadn’t made it back to the terrace to wait out the day.
In a way I was glad not to be sitting in my wing chair with hours of waiting ahead of me, but I was also nervous about being away from the safety of the terrace while the sun was up.
Lilith stopped in the doorway that went into the cavity behind the tunnel.
“I don’t think we should go back in there,” I said.
“We have to fight Lucas.”
“Why?” I stared at Lilith. “Let’s get out of here. We can leave the city and never look back.”
I wasn’t sure if I believed the words that came out of my mouth. A beautiful girl stood in front of me, one who had been there for me when no one else had, and all I could think about was Grace. If I ran away with Lilith, would I ever stop thinking about the fallen angel from my past? I didn’t remember her, and I hated it, but I also didn’t know if I wanted to remember.
“If we run, he will hunt us down … He’ll never stop,” Lilith said.
“We can’t attack them ourselves. We need Charlotte.”
Lilith hesitated. She didn’t usually hesitate. “We’ll think of something.”
Lilith disappeared into the wall and I had no option but to follow. This time, I paid more attention to where we were going. I pushed Grace out of my mind and focused on Lilith in front of me, because I wanted to be able to get out again if I had to. The rock walls were cold beneath my fingertips as I trailed my hands along them, cataloguing every turn we made until we reached the small stone room.
I stopped in the doorway, all sorts of thoughts racing through my head.
“What’s wrong?” Lilith faced me, the light from the naked bulb dancing in her eyes.
“Can I trust you?” I searched her face for anything that would tell me no.
“Josh, baby. Of course.” Lilith stroked my chest in the dim light.
I pushed her hand away. “I mean it. When the shit hits everything, can I trust you?”
Everyone had been telling me for the past few days that I had to trust them. Well, now was the time I really needed to know.
“I will do whatever it takes to get my city back,” Lilith said. “They’re my vamps in that lair, not Lucas’s. I created him; I should be leading him. Not the other way around.”
“But will you have my back?”
“Will you have mine?” she asked. “If it’s anyone who should be sceptical, it’s me. You’re the one with the hunter for an ex.”
“I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree,” I said.
Lilith pressed her foot to the stone on the floor and the door grinded as it slid open. We entered the passage that led to the platform overlooking the cavern. Lilith was about to walk onto the metal when I heard someone say her name. I grabbed her arm and held her back, pressing her against the wall. Footsteps clanged on the metal stairs.
“He told me he was going to kill her,” Cain said.
“Who, Lucas? He wouldn’t … She made him.”
“Doesn’t matter … She wants the city.”
“How do you know?”
“Wouldn’t you?” Cain said. “I’m not stupid … Something’s going to go down when she turns up.”
I tugged Lilith down the passage back towards the stone room.
“We need to get out of here,” I whispered in Lilith’s ear.
Lucas couldn’t be trusted. None of them could.
She jammed her foot down on the stone that opened the door from the passage, and it slid open. The sound seemed so much louder than it had when we’d come in.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Lucas stood in the doorway.
Lilith turned around to go back towards the platform, but Cain and another vamp were headed our way. Lilith backed away from them until she bumped into me. There was no room in the passage for us to get past anyone in either direction.
“Charlotte isn’t with you?” Lucas asked. “That’s a shame.”
“We had a little trouble,” Lilith said. “Angelica got to her.”
Lucas raised his eyebrows. His lips curled back from his teeth and he snarled. “How could you let that happen? You’re useless.”
I stood betwe
en Lucas and Lilith, acting braver than I felt. “She is stronger than us. It couldn’t be helped.”
“It looks like I’ll need you then.” Lucas took a step towards me, but he stumbled and fell at my feet.
Charlotte stared at me from the doorway to the stone room.
“Don’t stand there,” she said. “Run!”
I leapt over Lucas before he could get up, glancing over my shoulder to see if Lilith was coming, but Cain had her in a headlock.
“Come and get her.” He bared his teeth, saliva dripping from the ends of his fangs. It made me ashamed to be like him.
Lilith’s eyes widened and I wanted to get to her, but Charlotte shoved me into the room and stood in the doorway, holding me back.
“Don’t be stupid, Josh. She isn’t worth dying for.”
“How did you get free?” I asked.
“Angelica isn’t as powerful as she thinks she is.”
Lucas faced Charlotte. “Looks like I didn’t need these two to bring you here. You were smart enough to do that yourself.”
“And now I’m here, you can let Josh go,” Charlotte said.
I tried to push around her, but she stood as firm as a brick wall.
“I guess that’s a fair trade.” Lucas grinned.
There was no way this would be over. He may be allowing me to go, but some time, some other way, he’d get to me.
“Go find Grace,” Charlotte said, not turning to look at me. “She’ll be home.”
How was I supposed to do that? The sun was up. I wasn’t convinced I could wander through the city in broad daylight. The tunnels would only get me so far. And where the hell was home?
“Trust me, Josh. Remember what I told you.” Charlotte pushed me into the room. “You’ll be fine.”
This time she did turn to quickly look at me, and there was something in her eyes that made me believe her. She stamped her foot on the floor and the door closed, blocking me off from her and Lilith.
I never got the chance to find out the details of how Charlotte got away from Angelica. I’d have to ask later when there was more time. I pounded the rock with my fist and contemplated opening the door again to go back in. The hot-headed side of me wanted to, but the rational side knew I needed to get out of there.