by Vremont, Ann
Two hours later we had the skirt pants in a lightweight black velvet and matching velvet boots, with low heels so I wouldn't embarrass myself too badly trying to dance.
Assuming I still had a date, which was pretty unlikely given the look on Chris's face as he had left seventh period.
I hate feeling sorry for myself - I really do. Growing up, it wasn't permitted. Tears, no matter the genuine cause for them, meant I was a cry baby. I had internalized the mocking - even if it didn't sound like my step-father Paul in my head, the words and venom were his.
As much as I didn't want to be a cry baby, I still went to bed that night sobbing inside. My closet held a new, expensive outfit that I was sure I wouldn't have a chance to wear to the Leavers' Ball. Chris clearly had started his retreat that afternoon and one or the other of us would call the date off before Friday. Shortly after that, Danny would be pushing me out of his life, too.
I wasn't worried about providing for myself. I didn't have to worry about heat or food. Just blood - and, unsavory as the thought was, it would be easy for me to get it out on my own.
What hurt was, for almost ten short weeks, I had known what it was like to be cared about after almost eighteen years in an emotional wilderness. Sandy and Paul had kept me away from her family - all the better to keep the secret. Paul's family treated me like a servant. Despite Paul's mother having no blood grandchildren, I was the only one referred to as "my son's step-daughter." After spending hundreds of dollars on each step-grandchild for Christmas and birthdays, she would give me only coloring books and paper dolls, until I got too old for those and the gifts stopped altogether. I had moved through school a nobody, unable to form friendships because I never knew where I would be living from one week to the next, and I couldn't risk Paul going after any of the girls.
Knowing nothing better, I had learned to live with it. Now I felt like walking into the desert, burrowing down beneath the surface and staying there until I found out how long it took a vampire to starve to death.
Chapter Five
Chris led me over to our usual table at lunch the next day. I sat next to him, only the lunch monitor happy that we had finally left enough room for God. Like me, he wasn't eating. I gave him a soft nudge in the side of his stomach.
"I thought I was the only one on a diet."
Unresponsive, he took another sip of his lemonade. Still handsome, he looked like crap. The circles under his eyes were a little bigger and darker than usual. He looked like he hadn't slept at all last night. His breathing was shallow.
"Chris?" I put my hand on the bench between us, just barely touching the side of his leg. Lifting the pinkie, I brushed his denim jeans a couple of times. "Why'd you lead me over here if you aren't going to talk to me?"
He put his drink down, clasped his hands together on the table in front of him.
Here it comes, break up number two.
"I want an even chance with you, Lee." He kept staring straight ahead, the muscles of his arms pumped up as he fought to hold still. "I don't know if I deserve it, but I want it."
His words squeezing at my chest, I closed the distance between us. I placed my chin on his shoulder and rested my hand against his back. "No one deserves it more, Chris."
He shook his head, not convinced.
"I mean it."
"I know." He dropped one hand to his lap and I grabbed hold of it. "It's just I don't know what kind of future I can offer you."
I squeezed his hand. "What, are they still hassling you over the scholarship?"
He waited a few seconds too many before nodding his head. He wouldn't even say the lie out loud. He'd lost the scholarship.
But why? I wondered to myself.
It wasn't drugs. I would have smelled them on him. I could tell from across the hall who at school was doing meth, pot or worse, or which jock was juicing. He was clean all around. And it wasn't any kind of academic cheating. Not only would he not do that, but the school already would have kicked him off the team and stripped him of his team jacket, which he was still wearing.
"Look, even if you don't get it, there are all kinds of ways to pay for school and living expenses. Grants, subsidized loans, you name it. I've got all the forms memorized by now. We'll sit down and figure it out -"
"I'm not worried about that, Lee. I just want a real shot at our being together. I'm only with you at school, and only for a few hours. Nights and weekends..."
Nights and weekends I was trying to convince Danny it was okay to want me. Shamed, I dropped my forehead against Chris's shoulder. "How do we start?"
"A date. Skating...tomorrow."
"Okay." I smiled. "Like normal people."
***
It took very little to convince Danny to let me go. I had to promise him regular texts or calls on the hour while it was still light out, on the half hour after sunset and home by 10pm. And when Chris came to pick me up after school, Danny ran him through a security briefing. All in the name of my safety.
"De la Royo is still out there," he warned, stopping at the edge of his lawn and watching Chris open the door for me.
I nodded. I knew as well as anyone else.
A few blocks from the house, Chris tapped my hand. "So, is this Royo dude the one who kidnapped you from school?"
"Yeah." Oscar was the last person I wanted to talk about.
"C'mon, Lee. What do you know about him - I thought he was our age?"
"Somewhat older." I answered. Danny figured he was about 23 and had been running hits since he was in his early teens. From the visions Oscar's blood gave me, I figured he was more than 300 years old. His father had been a wealthy Spaniard deep in Mexico's interior. His father had alternately fawned over and abused him - one day a gift from abroad, the next day a back hand that would send him sprawling. At least I thought these were Oscar's memories. They could have been a victim or those of the vampire who had created him. If they were his memories, then I knew "Oscar" was yet another alias. To the woman who had tucked him into bed as a child and the father who had beaten him, he was Sandalio.
It had taken me weeks to dig those memories out, and so far I still had no more than fragments of the "real" Oscar. The other stuff - the kidnappings, the blood kills, extortion, drug hits, cartel meetings ... I could have fed Danny enough information to fill his hard drive if doing so wouldn't have meant his certain death.
Chris nudged me. "You gotta give me more than that, Lee. Why does Gutierrez think this guy's such a bad ass?"
"He supposedly does hits for a Mexican cartel." That part of Oscar's background was true, but I didn't want to worry Chris any more. Oscar found it easier to travel at will and launder his money with the help of drug lords. In exchange, he took out their enemies.
Chris looked over, eyes wide. "Seriously?"
"That's what Danny said."
Pulling into the skate arena, he threw the Mustang into park and turned towards me, smiling wide. "The beautiful ones are always the most dangerous."
I knew he jokingly meant me, but it was just as true with Oscar. Pushing down the last vague threat de la Royo had made, I waited while Chris came around and opened my door.
Inside the rink, we lined up to get our skates. They had the old fashioned style with four wheels in addition to the inline style. I took the old fashioned skates and Chris followed suit.
"I haven't skated since..." I stopped, remembering the house we'd rented for the summer with a full, open basement and a used pair of skates that must have belonged to some other little girl whose parents also wouldn't let her leave the house. The skates had been a tight fit on my ten-year-old feet, but I'd skated almost every day down in the basement that summer. "Well, a long time. I'm probably going to fall all over you."
Smiling, he held my hand and stepped onto the skate floor. "I hope so."
No matter how fast or slow the song, we skated slow, close together, his arm around my waist. For the first half hour, I almost fell half a dozen times (and here I thought vampires coul
dn't be clumsy). He caught me each time, laughing, cinching me tighter to him. When I was steadier on my feet, he skated behind me, his chest against my back and his hands on my hips or around my waist.
It was insanely thrilling feeling him up against me like that, our bodies moving together as we skated around the rink.
We stopped each hour, so I could make my text to Danny. But Chris's lips would be at my throat while I was talking to Danny, or his hand would be resting just beneath my breast on the outside of the light knit top I wore.
After skating for a few hours, we found a barely lit booth to take refuge in. We sat tight, my backside pressed against him and his arms around me as we watched other skaters on the floor. A girl close to my age went sprawling as the guy she was skating with let go.
"Ouch," I whispered. "She needs a boyfriend who'll catch her."
He nuzzled my neck. "Good thing you learn fast, I wasn't sure how many more times I could catch you."
I looked back. "As many times as I needed you to, I'm sure." I couldn't see the blood rise up to his cheeks but I could sense it, and I twisted until I could kiss him softly on the mouth.
He buried his face against the back of my neck. "I'm supposed to have you back by ten, safe and sound."
Nudging my hair to the side, he kissed my neck. His hand slid up under my shirt, one finger running a circle between my bra and top until my nipple hardened and he could give it a firm tweak. A sweet sucking bite from him where my neck turned to shoulder had my knees knocking together.
"It's nine." My voice was trembling as hard as my thighs. Picking up the cell phone, I gave Danny his next to last text and then turned in Chris's arms. "We should turn in our skates...and, uhm, head back to the car."
He nodded, slowly, his lids heavy. He let me lead him to the skate turn in and then out through the parking lot. The light near the Mustang was out and I tried to walk a little ahead of him to make sure no one was lurking in the bushes, but he maneuvered me until I was behind him.
"I screwed up," he said, sliding his key into the lock. "He said park close to the building."
"Danny was just being paranoid. You didn't screw up." I got in and he closed the door and walked around to the driver's side. Once he was in, I stopped him from putting the key in the ignition. "We still have half an hour before we need to drive back."
I put the cell phone on the dash, slid my bucket seat as far forward as it would go and tumbled into the back. Chris tumbled in after me. It took only a few seconds for his hands and mouth to find me. Kissing me, he unhooked my bra and pushed it and my top up.
His mouth closed around my nipple as his hands moved lower. He unhooked my sandals and tossed them onto the front passenger floor, and then he quickly stripped my jeans off, leaving the bottom half of my body clothed only in a pair of thong panties - just a small triangle of cotton covering my pubic hair.
He couldn't see, but he could feel how small the panties were and he let out a gurgling moan of "Yes" as he slid as far down the bench seat as he could, his legs on the floor. Instead of stripping my panties away, he pushed the string and small triangle to one side to brush his mouth against my hair. Then his thumbs parted my lips and I felt the first tentative swipe of his tongue.
"Wider, Lee," he pleaded.
I put one leg between the bucket seats, the other up high along the back seat. When I was as wide open as I could be, his mouth covered my clit and he slid his fingers into me.
He froze, feeling me tense, feeling the resistance.
"Oh, god, Lee, I thought..."
"Shh...it's..." I didn't know what to say to coax the guilt from his voice. Certainly I couldn't tell him the truth. "Please, Chris, I want this...with you. Please don't stop."
Moaning, I closed my eyes and moved against him. Had I meant it to go this far? Had I intended a little less or a little more or all the way? The number of fingers in me thickened and his mouth covered me again. I stopped second guessing myself and started pumping my hips so I could ride his lips and hard tongue. Every time he pulled his fingers back to the rim of my pussy, he flexed them and I would cry out, calling his name. He had me coming inside of seconds and I told him so, told him how good it felt.
His fingers still in me, he moved up my body, kissing me. I licked his lips, sucked on his tongue. When I undid his jeans, he tried to stop me.
"I didn't bring anything."
"You don't have to be in me." I was biting at his neck, careful not to use my blood fangs. "I just want to touch you, feel you against me."
I wrapped my hands around his cock, moaning at how hard it was. Little beads of pre-cum were already slickening the tip and I smeared them along the shaft before rubbing my hands between my legs and spreading my juices along his erection. With one hand between his cock and his stomach, I lifted my hips and started to rock against the other side of his shaft and head.
He pulled a little too hard on my panties to push them aside. They broke, neither of us realizing until after. And then his cock was between my pussy lips, riding the spine of my clit. I covered the thick tip of his cock with my fist and held him tight as he fucked my palm.
"I'm gonna..." I started and then stopped talking as another climax sizzled along my nerves.
Panting in my ear, Chris leaned heavy against me, his hand searching for something along the floor. I felt the stiff brush of a napkin against my skin and remembered the Subway bag on the floor behind the driver's seat.
"Move. Your. Hand."
I hesitated. He was right. It wouldn't do for him to come all over my stomach, even though I wanted him to.
"Lee. Please."
I let go just in time for him to cover himself and then bury his face against my neck, softly biting and kissing me as he came.
I laughed as he handed me my jeans. "Damn it, Kennedy, my ears are buzzing."
"That's the phone, Lee." He reached into the front of the car and swiped it from the dash where I'd left it.
9:33pm.
Chris climbed into the driver's seat and turned the engine over, while I hit the screen and put the phone up to my ear. "We're just leaving the parking lot now."
"9:30 means 9:30."
"I know," I answered, searching for my panties and finding the side strap broken. "I got caught up in leaving." Leaving, coming - close enough to the truth that it didn't sound like a lie when I said it.
I said good-bye and hung up before Danny could say anything else. With my jeans back on, I climbed up front.
"You tore my panties," I said, kissing Chris on the cheek and showing him the string.
"I...uh..."
"No worries." I kissed him again and then opened his glove box. "But you know the rule - you rip them, you keep them."
Chapter Six
By Friday morning, Oscar was a weeks' old memory whose threats were aging badly compared to the tangible threat of losing Danny, Chris or both. Still, I walked into school ready to enjoy my last day inside Maryvale's noisy, paper filled halls. With the Leavers' Ball only hours away, everyone had stopped hating me over prom being cancelled. Girls who had been calling me a "bitch" after my kidnapping were asking me to sign their year books and exchange emails and friend profiles.
Even Danny had offered me a friendly shoulder squeeze and a smile as I was getting out of the car. It was probably some kind of Stockholm Syndrome response now that he was mere days from getting rid of me, but I didn't let that half of the equation bother me.
Life - or after life, whatever - was pretty good when I wasn't worrying over affairs of the heart.
...Until Claire Hadley walked into second period with a note ordering me to the principal's office. I followed dutifully, a fist tightening in my chest as I wondered what new turn life was going to bring.
It wasn't what I expected. Nor was it good.
"Paul?"
Sitting at one of the chairs in front of the principal's desk, my step-father looked over his shoulder and smirked his hello at me.
"I'm not leavi
ng with him," I blurted. "I'm eighteen and I don't have to."
The principal tapped her pen on her desk a couple of times and looked uncomfortably at Paul. "She's right. Even if there was no general protection order against releasing Lee to the custody of anyone other than Officer Gutierrez--"
Paul raised his hand, cutting Mrs. Valdez off while he looked me up and down. "I know all about Officer Gutierrez's 'protection.'" Turning back to the principal, he offered the woman a sickly smile. "If I can have just a few minutes to speak with my daughter in private."
"Sandy's dead - I'm not your anything any more and I never was your daughter."
Mrs. Valdez rose to her full five-foot-three height and came around her desk to stand in front of me. Keeping her voice low, she tried to convince me to give Paul a few minutes.
"We don't really want a scene on the last day, Lee."
Crossing my arms, I glared at her.
"Anything delaying dismissal time..."
As threats went, it was pretty lame.
She raised the blinds on her office windows. "I'll be right outside the door and so will school security."
I lifted a brow at her. The only security necessary would be to keep me from ripping Paul's throat out. But she couldn't know that. She was willing to leave me in the room with him even though she thought security might be necessary.
"Lee, the family misses you."
I turned my hard stare from Mrs. Valdez to Paul. Words bubbled up but I swallowed them back down. She really would toss me into an hour of after school detention if I said a tenth of the words running through my head.
"The family wants me to bring you home, Kiddo."
I frowned, not understanding this bullshit he was spouting about "family." I already knew Sandy's family wanted nothing to do with me since the second kidnapping and Paul's family had always shunned me.
"Have you thought about what you're going to do after school, Lee?" Mrs. Valdez touched my shoulder, almost losing her hand but I caught myself at the last minute. "I mean, you can't stay with Officer Gutierrez forever -- it's not like he's a relative."