Darlings of Paranormal Romance (Anthology)

by Chrissy Peebles

  Closing her eyes, Tessa tried to retrieve the memory of what had bothered her. She'd managed to see the attackers through both her kinds of vision. What had been so different? "Their energy lines."

  Silence.

  Serus reared back, then scoffed at her, "Energy lines. What are you talking about?"

  Rhia spun back to Tessa. "You can see energy lines?" Shock and disbelief couldn't cover the interest running through her voice.

  "I think that's what they're called. When I open my vampire vision at the same time as my human vision, I can see the energy pulsating through everyone."

  David interrupted. "Everyone?"

  She nodded. "Yes, everyone. At least I think so. I haven't tried it all that often, but I see both vampire and human energy, alike."

  Goran and Serus exchanged glances. Some silent message moved between them.

  "Like that," Tessa said, nodding toward them. "I can see the energy move between you two as you communicate."

  Rhia spun around to face the two elders. "You were mind-speaking?" she asked incredulously. "I thought you said you couldn't do that?"

  Both men looked uncomfortable, but both looked down their long noses at Rhia. "We've been able to do it since we were kids, but only with each other."

  Rhia narrowed her gaze at Serus. "We will speak of this later. But for now…"

  All three adults spun around to stare at Tessa. She shrugged and leaned back to close her eyes. Her headache was returning. And so what if she could open both visions at the same time to see energy? It's not like it helped her in any way. In fact, it made her even more 'odd.' Great.

  "Could you identify the men by these energy lines?" Rhia stared at Tessa, confusion lighting her dark eyes.

  "I think so, and by their smell." Tessa shrugged. She couldn't explain it.

  "You can differentiate the smell of human from vampire and from other animals?" Rhia's gaze widened again, making her eyes appear jet black.

  "Of course, so can you," Tessa said wearily. "These two smelled more like an unusual animal species. I didn't recognize it, but it wasn't human or vampire. The two men had smells distinct from vampires, but also from each other."

  Literally everyone in the room stared at her. She glared from one to the other. "What?"

  It was David who filled her in. "Vampire sense of smell isn't very acute, if you remember. It's mostly blood that stirs up our olfactory senses. And, of course, our senses are strongest when we need to drink."

  Tessa stared at him in puzzlement. "So?"

  "We can recognize an animal from a vampire, but I highly doubt most of us would be able to tell any individual animals apart within one species. For us," he motioned to those in the room and then at her, "and for you, humans are animals. That you can smell the differences between them is very unusual."

  It didn't seem unusual to her. "That would be from my human throwback genes then," she murmured quietly.

  "No, I'm not so sure about that." Rhia walked over to stand in front of Tessa. She stood there for a long second, her finger tapping her chin thoughtfully. "How long have you known you could do these things?"

  "Mom, I never noticed. They are natural to me. I've always done them."

  "Hmmm." She pursed her lips thoughtfully. "Have you tried to fly?"

  "Ah, I'm missing something important here, Mom – wings, remember?" Geesh, everyone was looking at her oddly now. Even her father.

  "What?" she snapped, hating the attention. "Why are you all staring at me? Don't I get gawked at enough without having to put up with it in my own home?"

  "Who gawks at you?" Serus bristled.

  "Oh Dad, everyone does. Even you."

  Tessa slumped back and stared out the window. What difference did all this make? They'd grab any excuse to stay off topic. Jared might already be dead for all she knew.

  Exhaustion settled in on her shoulders. She wanted to weep. How could she be this tired? What good was she to Jared if she didn't have the energy to go out again and rescue him?

  "Where's the house, Cody?" Goran asked, all businesslike.

  Cody filled them in on the details, adding in the warning he'd been given – that this situation was bigger than it appeared and that he wouldn't get away with interfering in their business.

  Goran frowned at the threat.

  Though the conversation flowed on around her, she blanked it all out. It's not like anyone would do anything tonight. Everyone would talk about it and then discuss it some more. How could she find those assholes?

  They hadn't been able to fly, yet they'd had wheels. She couldn't drive. The rest of her family could though. In the background, she dimly heard Cody ask her mom about the flying stuff. Like what kind of question was that? Cody had wings, thus Cody could fly. Tessa had no wings, thus Tessa couldn't fly.

  Easy.

  Rhia spoke to her. "My great grandmother on my father's side was a Leant. One of the originals. She couldn't fly, but she jumped like you wouldn't believe."

  Jumped? Tessa sat up straighter.

  "I never saw her, but apparently she could jump to the tops of trees and rooftops. Something to do with her spine and leg joints. She was hell on wheels, that woman. Serus is classed as a glider, whereas she'd be classed as a jumper – with a style all her own."

  "Where is she now?" Vampires were notoriously long-lived, so where was she and why was Tessa just hearing about her now. She desperately wanted to meet this relative.

  "She, along with most of her family, was killed during one of the uprisings. The townsfolk administered some kind of sleeping drug during a big celebration, then they went in and sliced off all their heads." Rhia paused, her face pulling at the painful memories. "She was a beautiful woman."

  "Tessa jumps." Cody spoke up helpfully.

  "What?" Rhia spun around to look down at her. "Do you? Really?"

  "No, not really." When her mother's face fell she couldn't help modify her statement, unable to let go of that little bit of pride in her mother's face. "At least not that well. According to Cody here, I kind of crab walk through life." She glared at him and his remembered insult.

  He grinned back at her. "It's pretty freaky looking. If I hadn't seen it before, I'd have thought we had a new breed of vampire out there."

  "Maybe it's not a new breed as much as the return of an old breed." Rhia brightened with excitement. "I must speak with someone."

  "Mom, wait." But she was already gone.

  Tessa watched her scuttle into the next room, before turning her frustration on Cody. "Now look what you've done. She's going to think I have some kind of special talent, and you and I both know how stupid my jumping is. Hardly a talent…more like a handicap."

  "Stop knocking yourself. You could have all sorts of talents. You're at the right age for them to show up. Who knows? Maybe being a throwback means you're more like the originals."

  "Whatever that means," Tessa muttered. Serus and Goran were arguing. She raised her voice, calling out, "Is anyone going to do anything about Jared? Or do I have to go back out?"

  Cody straightened, automatically placing a restraining hand on her shoulder. "Whoa. Hang on there. You're not going anywhere. I didn't bring you home so you could take off again."

  "Then you should have left me there. If they'd taken me prisoner, then maybe they'd have kept me with Jared and maybe I could have found a way to get both of us free." She stared down at her long fingernails in disgust. She'd been so concerned earlier about the right color to wear on them. Now that part of her life seemed so long ago. It all seemed so frivolous now, so useless. "I feel like I'm deserting him."

  "Don't talk like that," he snapped. "They'll help."

  Tessa stared around the room at the small clutches of people sitting and talking like this was a great social visit. Enough already. She stood up.

  "No, they won't. It might put them out somehow. If they don't acknowledge there's a problem, then they don't have to feel guilty about not doing anything about it." She studied the vari
ous close and distant family groups. Not one of them was likely to help. She wondered about her human friends. They'd all want to call the police. And what about calling the police? Was that such a bad thing to do? Could they help?

  Or would the vampires eat them alive? She wandered in the direction of the kitchen in search of water. That room was full too. Sighing, she stared out the open doors to the large back patio. As expected, the patio was jammed with other people gossiping the time away. No one cared. Jared was only a human, after all.

  She poured herself a glass of water and took a long drink. She rinsed the glass and turned to leave––

  Dr. Taz stood in her way. Her mother and Sian, Taz's partner, hovered nearby. From everyone's positions, Tessa assumed they thought she'd try to run. Rolling her eyes at the gorgeous hunk of doctor grinning at her, she said, "Honest, I'm fine."

  "Then let me check you over and everyone will feel better about it."

  Tessa nodded at his words. "Fine. But I'm not going to lie down. You can check my head here in the kitchen." She pulled out a chair and, with a long-suffering sigh she sat down and accepted his ministrations.

  While Taz checked her over, her mind spun off in a dozen different tangents. Her own injury reminded her that Jared could be in worse shape.

  How could she find the assholes that had taken him? They had to have some help. Surely that house belonged to someone important. It was a huge estate. How could she find out who owned it or who was living in it? Was there a housing registration office for vampires or some such thing? Did they have to report in as to where they lived? Not likely. Humans did, though. Or at least a certain segment of them did, like criminals or half criminals. She didn't really understand how that worked, but didn't think there was a vampire equivalent.

  She hated that the entire subject of Jared had become a nonissue. That just might be one of the biggest downsides to the vampires she knew – their lack of willingness to get involved. All vampires lived in a secular world, one that revolved around them.

  She couldn't just sit and do nothing. Jared had to be scared out of his mind.

  ***

  Jared drifted in and out of consciousness. He could no longer tell if it was day or night. Or how long he'd been there. Time had become meaningless. Had to be from the drugs. He'd thought he'd heard Tessa's voice earlier, and now her voice wove in and out of his consciousness. His life would end soon – he knew that now. He hadn't seen anyone else die, but the prisoners here probably would prefer death.

  On his way to this holding cell, he'd been led through the warehouse full of hundreds, maybe thousands of suspended humans. They were in some sort of stasis while their bodies pumped out valuable blood.

  Reality hadn't been long in coming. That was the fate awaiting him.

  How sad. He'd planned on going into engineering after graduation. Jared didn't want to spend the rest of his life in this half-alive state like the others.

  A few minutes ago he'd been asked a series of medical questions about his health and that of his father and mother. Some sort of selection process, he presumed, to check on his family history. Hooked up in that warehouse, any young human would easily live fifty, sixty or maybe…given the lack of wear, a hundred years. Just the thought of his life being lived out in this blood factory made him want to vomit.

  He'd rather kill himself first. Only he didn't think he could anymore. He was no longer chained. That was one good thing. Then again, restraints were no longer required. They'd given him drugs, strong ones. Drugs that tugged at him even now, pulling him back under. His last thoughts were of Tessa. Where was she? What was she doing right now?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Cody leaned back against the wall and wondered again how his vampire clan had survived. He felt they played at the game of living. They had no vengeance left in them, no fight – and for most of them now, no flight. Few chose to have children and of those that were interested, fewer than half were capable. Their ability to reproduce was being bred right out of them. Maybe they were becoming obsolete. But when you could live forever why would you choose to overcrowd your living conditions by reproducing? There were so few youngsters that they tended to stick together.

  He frowned, thinking about what Tessa had said. It couldn't have been easy on her if she'd been shunned by the others. Not with such a small group her age. No wonder she'd turned to humans for companionship.

  She had learned compassion and caring at their hands. Vampires were more selfish – hence the lack of action tonight. Unless their vampire way of life was attacked, they'd do nothing. Unlike the old days, when vampires were the aggressors.

  Tessa, on the other hand, appeared to have more fight in her than all her vampire family put together.

  And where had she gone, anyway? He'd seen Sian and Taz arrive a while ago. Surely checking Tessa's head wouldn't have taken that long… Glancing around, he found both fathers in conference with several other elders. And no sign of Tessa.

  David was joking with Jewel, the girl he was sweet on, and Ian, another good friend to both of them. He walked over and spoke to David. "Hey, where's your sister?"

  "I thought she was with you?"

  "Nope." The two spun around, searching the crowd.

  "She might have gone to bed on Taz's orders."

  Cody slid him a sidelong look. David shrugged. "Okay, so maybe not. Then where the hell is she?"

  "I'm concerned she'll take off again."

  David glanced over at him and shook his head. "I doubt it. And what's with that, anyways? I've never known her to be so intense about humans." He looked down at Jewel, who lifted her shoulders in a shrug.

  "They accepted her when her vampire peers wouldn't." Cody watched as David internalized that. "She feels responsible for what happened to this one."

  David frowned, and said. "That's dangerous. We have to have the Council on board to accomplish anything on a large scale. There's little she can do on her own."

  Ian had yet to speak but at David's comment he nodded in agreement.

  "She believes the Council won't do anything until it's too late and someone else gets killed." Cody searched the area. He was unable to shake the worry that Tessa could be planning to take off again.

  "The problem here isn't that no one will do anything, but that they can't figure out what to do. The vehicles have been seen around, although no one seems to know who owns them," David said. "Some people know of the house but said it changed hands a couple decades ago, and they don't know who owns it now."

  Cody grinned as Wendy and Jacob joined them. Wendy was cool. Good in school and didn't have quite as much attitude as many of their peers. She was a glider. Jacob was too. He was okay – a bit arrogant, but then weren't they all.

  "Hey, like this is so messed up." Jacob grinned, his excitement lighting up the place. Jacob could always be found in the center of any trouble brewing.

  Jewel stepped closer to David. "Cody, did you really see a dead person?"

  At Cody's nod, horror filled her gaze, and she slid closer to David. "That's so terrible."

  David grinned and winked at Cody.

  Cody tried not to smile. David had been panting after Jewel for a long time now. About time he made some headway. Jewel was a decent sort. Not critical and harsh like many of the younger set nowadays. Cody was happy for his friend. And damn, that brought Tessa right back into his mind.

  "What are we going to do about this?" Soberly, Ian jammed his hands deep into his pockets while he waited for an answer.

  "That's what we're trying to figure out." Cody turned around, looking for Tessa. "Has anyone seen Tessa lately?"

  "Outside," Jewel answered. "I saw her go out a moment ago."

  "Shit." Cody bolted out the closest door. "Tessa, where are you?"

  David raced out behind him, their friends spilling out the door in their wake.

  "Tessa!"

  "I'm here. Stop yelling."

  As one, the group followed her voice, craning their necks to
find her in the trees above the house.

  "What are you doing up there?" David snapped.

  Goran, Serus, and Rhia raced outside to stand beside the younger group. The adults looked up at her, frowns settling on the men while her mother gasped in shock.

  Rhia stepped closer as if to catch Tessa if she did fall. "Tessa, no! Get down here right now before you fall. You've got a head injury, remember?"

  "I'm fine, Mom. I just came outside for a little peace and quiet."

  David shifted closer. "Huh…Mom, ordering her around isn't likely to get her cooperation."

  "Cooperation? She's recovering from two head injuries. She's liable to fall out of that damn tree any minute." Rhia's voice grew until she was practically screaming. "Serus, please, go up and get her."

  "I can get down on my own you know," Tessa called down.

  "And you might fall, too, damn it."

  "I'll go." Cody didn't wait for anyone's approval or discussion. He understood how Tessa must feel. She'd want to get out of this on her own; however, should anything go wrong… He couldn't let that happen. There appeared to be a slight improvement in the adults' mindset, but a mishap at this point would destroy that.

  With a graceful leap, Cody cleared the heads of those standing close to him before spreading his wings. He reached Tessa's side in one full stroke.

  "Come to rescue me again, Cody? Or doing their bidding?"

  "Neither. I thought I could give you a graceful exit down. Then, maybe we could get some help to go find Jared."

  Tessa's eyes widened. "Really?" Hope crept into her voice.

  It hurt Cody to see Tessa's doubt and lack of faith. Vampires were clannish and generally their decision-making process took time, but once the decision was made they charged forward. "David and some of our friends have gathered together. I'm sure the elders will want to join the fray, if for no other reason than to keep us younglings safe." He couldn't quite keep the derisive sarcasm from his voice.

  He needn't have worried. Tessa grinned. "Isn't it great when everyone thinks you're too young to know anything?"

  "That's the truth. Come on. Let's get this show on the road." He held out a hand. She took it and the two jumped to the ground in a graceful leap.