“How… how long will that take—’til he gets that bad?”
“He left you in a pool of your own tears tonight, didn’t he?”
I folded my arms. “Fine. I’ll stay, but I don’t have to watch.”
“Oh, you’ll watch,” he noted in an annoyingly conceited tone. “You’ll watch because you won’t be able to help yourself.”
Don’t be so sure.
The room became darker then; the blue strobe stopped, giving way to a cloudy red spotlight that excited the crowd as it touched their fingertips.
“What’s happening?” I said, leaning closer to Eric.
“Diversion.”
“What’s that smell?”
He frowned. “You can smell that?”
“Yeah, what is it, it smells like… lavender?”
“That’s how the vampires know it’s time to make a kill.” He unfolded his arms and sat up to look over the red handrail running the length of the balcony. “It’s laced with a drug, something that makes the humans a little more relaxed.”
My fingers tingled. I looked down at them, watching them kind of grow thicker and thinner, while small clear circles ran over my flesh like winding vortexes. “It’s affecting me, too.”
“It won’t last long.”
“Does it affect you?”
“I get a breath of it, maybe feel a bit jollier than usual, but that’s about it.”
“You won’t eat me, will you?”
He didn’t even look at me, and I didn’t hear his response, although I was sure it was comical. My head swelled, my ears becoming thick with muddy volume all around me, like everyone was speaking under water, and moving that way too.
“You okay, kiddo?” He laughed at me.
“I feel like I’m sitting on the very top peak of a roller-coaster,” I said, not sure if I’d actually said it.
He laughed again and sat back, nodding to the far corner of the room, darkly shadowed by the lack of light. “Watch carefully over there. It’s not easy to see, since we’re pretty skilled at discretion, but just take a little look.”
In the pitch-black corner, a flash of white teeth caught my eye. Each wall was tightly packed with half-naked bodies and exposed necks. All of the victims were female.
“Are there any female vampires here, or just the victims?”
“A few.” He shrugged. “They usually pick off the women too, though.”
“Really, why?”
“Don’t know. Ask ’em.” He shrugged again, shuffling forward on his chair to watch.
“Do you eat here?” I asked so casually it almost sounded like we were discussing Betty’s Burger cafe.
“I do. But not tonight.”
“Why?”
“Because I have you with me.” He reached across and folded my fingers into his. “I won’t make the mistake of walking away from you when we’re in a room full of vampires, ever again.”
The gluggy feeling of being filled up with too much water or oxygen dissipated, leaving me slightly giddy. I sat forward, suddenly not so worried about the fact that people were about to die, a feeling I think was owed to this drug. But it cleared my head in a way that made it safe for me to watch, to look below and see the beauty in the motion—the way the vampires seemed to move like a pulse—hold their victims with what almost looked like love; to see the slender lines of the human’s throats, open and completely exposed; to understand the trust, the dedication to give their life over.
“It’s sort of…”
“Beautiful,” Eric finished for me.
I looked at him, wanting to be disgusted, but too high to process that. “Yeah. Sort of.”
We stood then and I wrapped my fingers around the red rail, feeling each nub of raised paint on it, aware of the sticky residue of sweat and maybe blood from nights gone by. “Do any of the dancing one’s ever notice?”
“Nope. And if they do, we just kill them. But mostly, everyone’s high on one thing or another. Add the vapor remedy to that”—he nodded to an air-conditioning vent—“and you pretty much get a peaceful, effortless kill.”
“Doesn’t that take away the thrill—the stalk?”
“That’s not what we crave, really. That’s kind of like, well, you know how some humans watch horror movies because they like the thrill, and the ones who watch romance think the horror-watching ones are creepy and sadistic?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, it’s like that with stalking your kill. Some do it, but it’s seen as a bit of a bizarre act—more for those who like that kind of thing.”
“Does David?”
“I don’t know his killing style, Amara. You’d be better to ask Emily.”
“How would Emily know?”
“She hunts with him.”
Oh, yeah. Right. Didn’t think of that. “So, if they’re all high”—I pointed below—“do you get high too, when you drink their drug-laced blood?”
“Yeah.” Eric rested his face on the heel of his palm, his elbow on the railing. “But the vapor remedy doesn’t make them high enough to affect us, and I’m not into drugs, so I pick off the drunk ones or the designated drivers.”
“What about David?”
Eric shrugged. “Dunno.”
“Do you think he could be here tonight?”
“Nope. This place is a little beneath council members.”
“Is public sex?” I nodded toward a vampire and a human practically fornicating in the corner, the kill still only a suggestion among the possibilities. “Do all vampires have sex with their victims?”
“You mean, is David out there right now fu—I mean, making love to some blonde?”
“Yeah.”
“Nope.” Eric shook his head. “It’s optional, but most of us do.”
“Even in public?”
“Yeah,” he said with a chuckle, his gaze floating to the couple below, now completely naked—their bodies slamming together. My ears burned, the embarrassment tied up beneath the weight of the drug but still severe enough to show itself a little.
“Is that not bound to attract attention?” I asked.
“Only if the thirty-or-so humans doing the same is.” He pointed to the dance floor. “This is just one of those places, Amara. It’s an adult club—a seedy, drug infested, rave. You’re just so sweet and naive you’ve never heard of places like this before.”
“I’ve never uh…” I felt stupid saying this. “I’ve never seen people have sex before either.” Aside from Emily and Mike, but that was so locked away it didn’t count.
His fingers went white around the railing. “Really?”
“Yeah. Is that… bad?”
It was almost like he became weightless, his body seeming to float above the ground, though he didn’t move. “I’m sorry, Amara. I didn’t realize. I’d never have brought you here if I’d known you were that sheltered.”
“I’m okay.”
“But I’ve tainted you, haven’t I?”
“Maybe a little.” I shrugged. Wasn’t like I really cared.
“I’m sorry.”
“Like I said, I’m okay.”
The spotlight flashed past again, illuminating the vampires in a splendor of blood red before plunging them into darkness again. “That’s their cue.” Eric leaned on the railing.
I picked a kill to watch, choosing the artistic appeal of a girl with long fiery-red hair, standing out among the crowd. Her perfectly white skin looked like porcelain; bare from the shoulders up, her spine arched over the arm of a vampire—his hold relaxed, but tight, like he was struggling with the weight of her slender body.
“Are they heavy?”
“Who?”
“The bodies.”
“No. Why?”
“That guy looks like he’s struggling a bit.”
Eric looked. “Oh, he’s probably not eaten for a few days.”
“Oh. Okay.” I nodded and watched, mildly aware of the lives being taken on the outskirts of this room. No one else noticed, n
o one screamed, not even the victims, though I hadn’t expected them to anyway.
I could tell from the way the redhead rolled her chin to the heavens that she was moaning, that the lips of the vampire tracing her collar and breast brought only pleasure for her. I knew the ecstasy. I’d felt it myself in David’s arms, and in his brother’s.
The vampire sliced a small cut in her artery, watching intently as the blood seeped out with her pulse, making rivers of red along her china-white flesh. He hesitated, their eyes meeting; hers pleading, his, though I could only see the back of his head, I imagined were comforting—wordlessly reassuring her that she would be okay. But she wouldn’t.
He moved quickly then, dropping to one knee. Her spine arched backward over his thigh, his lips on hers, his fingers tangled in her fiery hair. She opened her mouth to swallow his tongue, hungry for his kiss, his lips, and for her death at his hands.
The velvet drug that had made me giddy slipped backward in my chest then, leaving me suddenly more vulnerable to the emotions of my human-self. A wash of clarity and repulsion lifted my fingers to my chin as if I could cup away my own disgust.
Was that how David and I looked when we shared blood? Was I really that… deluded?
“You okay?” Eric asked.
“Just disgusted in myself.”
“Why?” He laughed.
“Because… well, I do that with David. Do I really get that… desperate?”
“It’s more fun in the act,” he said. “Like karaoke.”
“Precisely why I don’t do karaoke.”
The room moved with the beat of a heart as the vampires made final their bite, while the rage continued at the center of the dance floor for the lucky few who would go home with their lives tonight. But the victims didn’t just drop to the floor, lifeless and limp, which did surprise me.
Eric waved at a few vampires walking past with the stumbling girls on their arms, heading into a room I could only image was the last one they would ever see.
“Why are they going in there?”
“They have to dispose of the bodies somehow.”
His words chilled me. I didn’t want to know how they did that, or even if they waited until the girls actually died first before either burying them or incinerating them.
Back in the killing pit, a few vampires remained in the universe of wild and unconcealed ecstasy, except the one with the red-haired girl: he held her in his arms, her neck bowing back, his head angled down at her limp, oeuvre body.
“Eric?” I leaned closer, unable to take my eyes off him.
“Yes.”
“What’s up with that guy?” I pointed to him. “Is he a newb?”
Eric laughed, looking at the vampire. Then grabbed the railing, practically jumping a foot in the air as he leaned over it, his eyes wide. “Ah, shit—Amara, get down.”
“What? Why?” I pushed his hand from my head, looking back through the iron bars as he shoved me to the floor.
The vampire looked up from his kill and our eyes met, my mind only vaguely aware of the way he dropped the body to the floor and stood slowly, his face draining of all color.
“David?”
“Ara?” He appeared before me, hoisting me from the ground by my arm, his eyes black with blood-lust. “What are you doing here?”
Eric stood slightly between us, his shoulder against mine, focusing intently on David. “Amara? He’s dangerous right now. If I say run, you run, got it?
“Why did you bring her here?” David grabbed Eric by the shirt and slammed him against the wall.
“I didn’t know you’d be here, David. Are you crazy?” Eric shoved David’s fists off his shirt. “If you’re seen, if anyone knew who you were—”
David stood down, looking away as his fist clenched by his side. “I needed to come. I had to come.”
“Not here. There are a hundred places to go in this town.” Eric pointed elsewhere, scanning the room below with his eyes. “You need to leave before someone recognizes you and notifies the Council.”
“Relax, Eric.” David walked toward me then, his eyes returning to that brilliant green I loved—the green they became after he’d had blood; usually my blood.
“Relax?” Eric said, popping up beside me. “I’ve just subjected an innocent human girl to witness her boyfriend suck the life out someone from her own species.”
“Ara?” David’s long fingers wrapped my arms and held me still, stopping the shaking through my entire body with just one touch. “I’m sorry, my love. You were never supposed to see that.”
I opened my mouth to speak, but the shock just left an empty hole where my words were lost.
He killed her. He killed her, and worse… he kissed her.
“David.” Eric pushed him aside and grabbed my arm. “Just get back and clean up your kill. I need to get Amara home.”
I was given no choice. We walked away from David, who just stood there and watched us leave.
16
The cool night air outside hit my skin and loosened the sweat from my brow. I fell to the floor, barely noticing the gravel pierce my knees as the tears that had been held back around David finally obeyed the command to leave.
“How could he?”
“Amara, he’s a vampire.”
“He let us leave—he didn’t try to make it okay. He didn’t even try to explain.”
“What’s to explain?” Eric squatted beside me, gently touching my back. “Do you want him to apologize for being a vampire? Because, kiddo, you chose to be with him; you chose to love him. How can you ridicule him for that now—that’s not fair?”
“Did you know?” The single light in the alley flickered above us, making this whole scene look like something from an old private-eye movie. “Did you know he’d be there?”
“No.” He softened. “No, beautiful girl, I didn’t. He’s a fool. If anyone recognizes him, they could report him.”
“Did they?” The tears stopped. “I mean, did you notice if anyone saw him?”
“No. I think he got lucky.”
I looked up at his face, following his curious gaze then to the blood on my knee. “Does this bother you?”
“A little. But I won’t eat you. I promise. Besides”—he sat next to me on the ground, his wrists falling loosely over his knees—“your friend David has made it pretty clear what’ll happen if I ever touch you again.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“Weird thing is, he didn’t. He”—he scratched his chin, glancing back at the streetlamp—“he spoke to me about it.”
“Spoke to you?”
“Yeah. I think you’re making him soft, Amara.”
Spoke to him?
“Come on.” Eric stood and helped me up. “Let’s get you home.”
* * *
Sleep found me quickly. Despite trying to stay awake to talk with David when or if he returned, I felt myself slip away, tumbling backward through the darkness like I’d sat on a chair without realizing there was none there.
But I woke suddenly with my hands in long grass.
I pushed my arms straight and angled my face to the sky, feeling the glow of moonlight radiate across my skin. And a memory hit me, followed by another and another: weeks’ worth of dreams gone by coming at me like light through a fan-blade; a breath, a touch of skin, a room warmed by the orange glow of candlelight—a kiss. Each memory a thought I once owned, now a gift from the sentry of this world.
“Thanks, Jase,” I whispered quietly, standing up. I knew he hadn’t shared all our memories, and I knew I wouldn’t remember them when I woke up, but I felt whole for once, knowing the things I’d done with him—knowing, finally, they weren’t quite as immoral and deceitful as I’d imagined.
“Jason?” I called, looking toward the tree. “You here?”
No one answered, and with the full moon lighting my way, I could see further than ever before—all the way to a tree-covered hill in the distance—giving this place a kind of life, or maybe truth to i
t I never wanted to admit.
I felt more comfortable, more alive here tonight, like I’d finally been given my wits back, or like I was awake with new eyes. I took more in, noticing more than I had last time. There were trees around me on three sides, the meadow disappearing in the distance where a sound like waves crashing on rocks mixed with the subtle burn of seaweed on the breeze, reminding me of my visit to Connecticut when I was a little girl. But other than the noise, the smells and the feel of this place, I was the only other life form. Which tightened my heart with a small squeeze of disappointment.
The silvery grass dipped under my snaking fingertips as I walked through the field toward the tree.
“I’ve been waiting for you.”
I turned slowly to look at the ruggedly handsome vampire in his white button shirt, his hair messy around his unshaven face, standing there in the gentle glow of the night. He almost looked younger than his twin brother. Maybe it was a kind of sweetness behind his eyes that David had lost long ago, I wasn’t sure, but Jason, even on the night he kidnapped me, always had so much inner depth—so much innocence. It made me want to ask him what he was thinking.
“Did you know I was coming?”
He shook his head. “I just hoped you would.”
I gripped the edges of my skirt, thinking about what I said to him last time. Well, the last time I remembered coming here. “Jase, I’m really sor—”
“You don’t need to apologize, Ara. I shouldn’t have put that on you. You weren’t ready.”
I nodded. “It was a shock.”
“I know.” He smiled sympathetically. “It was for me, too.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.” He laughed lightly, his smile shy and somewhat guarded. “I’m only human, Ara—inside. I never imagined for a second that you would ever even forgive me, let alone trust me, be friends with me. Love me,” he said bashfully, looking at his feet.
I took a breath, relaxing into the dream. “I’m still not sure about that last bit, Jase.”
“I know. It’s okay.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets. “So, is David back yet?”
“Shouldn’t you know? Aren’t you always spying on me?” I laughed then sat down by the tree, scooping my skirt under my legs as I landed in the grass.
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