by Mari Mancusi
But my stomach had other ideas.
“What time is it?” I asked, grabbing my shirt and pulling it over my head.
He glanced at his watch. “Almost morning.”
“Wow. I slept half the night?”
“You’ve had a rough couple of days. I’m glad you were able to get some sleep.”
“Yeah. Me too.” I pursed my lips, then dared look up at him. “You know, if I had known running for my life from vampire slayers was so fun, I’d have done it a long time ago.”
His expression sobered. “What?” I asked, a bit fearfully.
He rose to his feet. Grabbed his pants and shucked them on. “I should go talk to Jareth,” he said. “Find out if he learned anything about our situation tonight.”
I nodded. The concerned look on his face made the warmness of our earlier coupling cool a little. We’d been hiding out here, away from real life. But we couldn’t do that forever. The Blood Coven was only a temporary refuge. Eventually we’d have to leave. And when we did…
“I’ll come with you,” I said, hastily getting dressed.
But Logan shook his head. “No,” he said. Then he added, “I’m sorry. It’s just…we have our ways. And humans are not allowed to know them.”
“Oh.” I felt a sinking disappointment inside of me. I knew it was ridiculous—just because I’d hooked up with Logan didn’t mean I was suddenly a vampire and part of the gang. I was a girlfriend at best, but far from an equal partner.
Logan gave me a sorry look. “Come on,” he said. “Let me take you to our media room while you wait. We have every movie under the sun. You can veg out and eat popcorn while I figure things out.”
“Sure,” I said. Because what else could I say?
Logan peered at me. “You’re upset,” he observed.
“No.” I shook my head. “I’m just a little worried. I appreciate you trying to fix everything. I just wish I could be more help.”
He pulled me into his arms. I collapsed against his chest, trying not to sob. I didn’t want to be that girl, that helpless girl who needed a guy to save her. But then I also didn’t want to be that stubborn girl who went against all common sense and made things worse.
“You have no idea how much help you are,” Logan whispered in my ear. And he sounded so sincere, I felt a little better.
He took me to the media room, which was actually more like a small movie theater. He set me up with a big bowl of buttery popcorn and large soda and handed me the remote. Then he leaned down, kissing the top of my head.
“I had an amazing night,” he whispered.
I smiled up at him. “Me too,” I said. “We should do this more often.” I paused, then added, “I mean, the fun part. Not the hiding out for our lives part.”
“Let me see what I can do about that,” he said. “I’ll be back.”
I was asleep when Logan returned. I felt his hand on me, gently shaking me awake. I opened my eyes, blinking at him sleepily. Then a smile crossed my face. “Hey,” I said. “You’re back.”
He nodded slowly. There was something in his eyes. Something that resembled pain. I sat up, frowning.
“What’s wrong?”
He shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “It’s just…almost morning. I need to get back to the room to sleep. I didn’t know if I should just leave you here or…”
“I’ll come back with you,” I said, standing up.
He nodded and together we walked back to our shared bedroom. Logan was quiet on the way, which worried me a little.
“What happened?” I asked. “Did you talk to Jareth?”
He nodded. “You don’t have to worry anymore,” he said. “I’ve straightened everything out.”
“You did?” I cried. “That’s awesome.”
He gave me a small smile. But I noticed it didn’t quite meet his eyes. “Yes,” he said. “Awesome.”
We reached the room. As he closed the door behind us, I opened my mouth to ask more questions. Get more details. But Logan didn’t seem in the mood to talk. Instead, he stepped toward me, a haunted look in his eyes. Before I could ask what was wrong, he took my face in his hands, drawing me to him. Kissing me with a desperation that took my breath away.
Still kissing me, walked me over to the bed, laying me down. Then he climbed on top of me, dragging a hand down my side. I reached up, digging my fingers into his thick hair.
“Oh Hannah,” he groaned against my mouth.
Suffice to say, no one slept in the chair that morning.
17
When I woke up, I noticed three things in quick succession.
One: I was in my own bed.
Two: It was daytime, the sun streaming through my window.
Three: Logan was nowhere to be seen.
Unexpected panic slammed through me with a force of a ten-ton truck. I jerked up in bed, looking around. Everything was there, everything familiar. Yet for some reason it also looked foreign. As if it belonged to a previous life. A previous me.
I swung my feet around, out of bed. My eyes still searching for something—anything—to prove the night before wasn’t just some dream. Then my eyes locked onto a stack of papers by my computer. A printout. I ran over to it, grabbing it with trembling hands.
It was my manuscript. The pages I’d written while at Logan’s safe house. I nearly collapsed into my chair in relief. It wasn’t a dream.
Though…shouldn’t I have wanted it to have been one? We were running for our lives. Slayer, Inc. hot on our heels. My life was in danger. Was my life still in danger?
Dropping the manuscript, I searched the surface of my desk. Finally, I found what I was looking for—praying for.
A note from Logan.
* * *
Dear Hannah,
* * *
I hope you had a restful sleep. Please once again accept my apologies for stealing you away and I hope I didn’t put you too far behind in your work. In any case, I have been successful in making a deal. The vampires understand that you are innocent. They will not come after you.
I will never forget our time together. Thank you for being such a light in my dark life.
* * *
Yours,
Logan
* * *
PS Your vampires are fantastic. Don’t change a fucking thing. I only hope that my real life kind can live up to your beautiful imagination.
* * *
I stared at the note, my heart pounding in my chest. My stomach swimming with a mixture of longing and fear. I turned it over, hoping there was more, but knowing there wouldn’t be. There wouldn’t be anything more.
I would never see him again.
It didn’t say that in the note. But it seemed implied. This was a final farewell. A Dear John letter, vampire style. It was easy to read between the lines. I was to go back to my old life. And forget any of the underworld I’d seen existed.
I dropped the letter, tears streaming down my cheeks. I angrily brushed them away. What was wrong with me? I should be thrilled, ecstatic. I had been given a second chance. I no longer had to fear for my life from some rogue Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
So why was I so damned sad instead?
I stared down at the letter, reading it again. Trying to picture Logan writing it while I slept. Did he glance over at me once or twice as he wrote? Did anything stir in his heart as he did?
Stupid. I crumbled up the note, tossing it in the trash. Pathetic. What did you expect? A vampire to fall in love with you overnight? He was practically a prince. And you—you are nothing but a pathetic rape victim recluse with self-mutilation issues. What would he possibly want with someone like you?
I found myself diving in the trash to retrieve the letter, smoothing it out on my lap as the tears fell onto the paper, blurring the ink. I set it aside, out of the splash zone, then glanced over at my box. My Carpathian puzzle box. But then I shook my head. I wasn’t going to do that. Hopefully ever again. If anything positive could come from the last nights, it c
ould at least be that.
My cell phone startled me out of my reverie. Loud, piercing—when had I turned up the volume? Usually I kept it on vibrate. I dove for it, heart in my throat, praying it was someone that I knew it wouldn’t be.
Someone I would never hear from again.
Instead it was Darla. A very relieved Darla who had evidently been calling me fifty-thousand times since the party. She told me she’d left her concert early to come find me there, feeling guilty she’d allowed me to attend alone. When no one knew where I was, she’d panicked. She’d come to my house; she’d banged on my door. At one point she’d even called the police to report me missing.
She was talking so fast I barely was able to get a word in. When I did, I simply apologized. Blamed my depression. Told her the party had been too much for me and I had fled it and hid in bed for the last thirty-six hours, having turned off my phone. Sadly, this excuse was so believable, coming from my mouth, that she believed it without much question. Though she did repeat her desire for me to seek help. But then, there was nothing odd about that.
I finally got her off the phone, promising I would answer the door when the car service came to pick me up tonight. In all the craziness, I had forgotten that I was technically still on tour. Still expected to be at a neighboring bookstore to celebrate the Jonathan and Maisie chronicles with adoring fans.
I glanced over to my bookshelf. At all the copies of those books.
I only hope that my real life kind can live up to your beautiful imagination.
Logan’s words echoed through my head, as if he’d whispered them in my ear instead of putting them to paper. I closed my eyes, remembering the feel of his cool hands all over my flushed skin. His hard mouth pressing against my own. What was it he said again in that bookstore? Real men don’t kiss with the gentleness of a butterfly’s wing.
A smile crept over my face. He hadn’t been wrong about that.
But now…now it was over. Cinderella was back from the ball. Back in the rags of her own pathetic existence, created by her own hand. I looked around my apartment, remembering how much I used to love it here. How safe and secure I felt.
Now it resembled a prison.
I rose to my feet. Walked mechanically to the kitchen to make myself some coffee. I grabbed a granola bar and ripped it open. Chewed it while waiting for the coffee to brew. Then I grabbed my BB8 shaped mug and poured my coffee into it before heading over to my computer.
It was what I did every morning. A ritual I quite enjoyed. But today it brought me no happiness. And as I stared at the blank screen, I was given no words. Jonathan was not whispering in my ear anymore.
It was all Logan. But he had nothing left to say.
18
The bookstore was packed. Not surprising I supposed. They always were. The crowds pressed against one another, clutching copies of my new release in their hands. As I took my seat, they broke out into applause, as if I had performed a trick, rather than made them wait an extra fifteen minutes while I desperately gathered my nerves in the store’s back office.
I forced a smile to my lips as I scanned the room. Many of the readers had come in costume tonight—probably due to the close proximity to Halloween. There were dozens of Maisies in her signature flowing red gown. And almost as many Jonathans, in their dashing Victorian formalwear.
I felt a slow ache grow, deep inside as I remembered how magical it used to feel—to see the crowds dressed up like this. To know my simple words had inspired such devotion—such sincere fandom.
But now it just seemed like a joke somehow. Kids playing at dress-up, with no idea what they were really doing. What was really out there and how they acted in real life. As Logan had said, real vampires did not dress as holdouts from Victorian England. They lived amongst us, dressed like us. Of course they would want to fit in. The last thing they needed was some ridiculous costume to draw attention to their pale skin. Their catlike movement. Their “otherness.”
“Are you ready?” Darla asked, peering at me with concern. I blushed realizing I must have appeared in a trance. I’d been practically a zombie all day and I knew I was beginning to worry her. And so I nodded at her, then cleared my throat. Leaning into the microphone to begin my talk. Trying to make this as normal as possible. Not to mention quick. The sooner I got back to my apartment the better.
I gave a brief introduction, then I read from my book. Then Darla opened it up to questions and I answered best I could without giving away any spoilers. But my heart was not in any of it. In fact, it was almost as if someone else was in my body, going through the motions and I was having some out-of-body experience watching from above. It all seemed so stupid, so mundane. So pointless.
Logan was out there somewhere. A real vampire. And I was wasting my life celebrating a cardboard cutout with fangs.
Was he okay? I wondered for about the billionth time today as I finished the Q&A and Darla invited readers to come forward to get their books signed. He had mentioned a deal he’d made. One to keep me safe. But he had said nothing of his own safety. What if he’d turned himself in? What if he was going to face trial? What if he was convicted of killing that other vampire and was sentenced to eternal death for doing it?
I would never know. I could live my entire life not knowing what happened to him.
Except…I couldn’t. Wouldn’t. I needed to know. To know he was safe. That he had made his case and was no longer accused. That he was out there, somewhere, cooking and singing karaoke and living his best vampire life. Even if we couldn’t be together, I needed to know he was okay. After all, it was my fault he was in this mess to begin with.
I felt the girl standing before me shift uncomfortably. I looked up. “Um,” I stammered. “What’s your name again?” She was dressed like Maisie. But her costume was cheap. Homemade. She had gotten the buttons wrong. I shook my head. So what? It was just a silly costume.
“Mandy,” she said, looking a little annoyed. I blushed as I realized her name was already in the book, a little sticky note in Darla’s handwriting. This was how we did it, so I would know how to spell the names properly.
“Right. Of course. Sorry.” I scribbled something in her book. Then I handed it back to her.
“Are you okay?” she asked, peering at me with concern.
“Um, yeah. Sorry. Just a little tired.”
“She’s fine,” Darla butted in. “Now if you want a picture, make it quick. We’ve got a lot of people to get through.”
The girl—Mandy—did want a picture and so I posed, baring my teeth in my best recreation of a smile. Then Mandy said goodbye, that it was a true honor to meet me. And I felt a little guilty that I had basically slept walked through our entire encounter. A meeting she claimed she would remember for the rest of her life. And it had barely registered in my troubled brain.
She walked away and the next reader stepped up to the desk. I signed his book. I took a photo. He walked away. Over and over, rinse and repeat. The seemingly never-ending line snaking through the bookstore. I signed and signed, trying to keep focused. To not think about how pathetically unimportant this all was. Mundane and useless. Here I was, signing books about vampires. When a real vampire might be in danger—because of me.
I had made it about halfway through the line when the sensation came over me. A sudden feeling that something was wrong. I looked up, just in time to catch a strange movement by the door. Almost a blur, hard to see. The hairs of my neck stood on end and a chill tripped down my spine. My heart pounded in my chest and I tried to tell myself I was jumping at shadows.
But then I saw it again. Closer this time. Was there someone there? Someone from the other world?
And, if so, what did they want?
Panic seized me. What if it was Slayer, Inc.? What if Logan’s deal fell through and now I was back on their hit list. I was vulnerable here. A sitting duck. They could swoop in and take me away.
I dropped my pen. It fell to the floor with a clatter. Pushing back on my ch
air, I rose to my feet.
“Hannah! What are you doing?”
I could hear Darla’s voice. But it sounded as if it was coming from a vacuum. Far away and muffled. I shook my head.
“I…I have to go.”
“Now? But we have at least another hour left. All these people have been waiting—”
“I’m sorry. They’ll have to come back. I have to go! Now!”
And with that, I turned and fled the bookstore. I could hear the dismayed fans behind me. Their protests. They’d been waiting in line for hours, some of them. And I felt truly bad for disappointing them.
But I couldn’t help it. I had to get out of there. Now.
Though where I would go, I had no idea.
19
I ended up having the driver take me home. I had nowhere else to go. Darla kept calling my phone until finally I turned it off. I knew I shouldn’t worry her like that. But what was my alternative? Tell her I was afraid I was being stalked by a vampire slayer? Yeah, that would have gone over well.
Back at home, I locked all the windows and doors. Set the alarm. But that didn’t stop my heart from racing. My gaze darting to every corner of the apartment. If Slayer, Inc. could infiltrate a vampire compound, surely they’d have no problem breaking into my little apartment.
I paced the living room, not sure what to do. Several times I considered going to my Carpathian puzzle box, in an attempt to calm my nerves. But I was determined not to do that anymore. And also, what if it wasn’t Slayer, Inc. who was after me? What if it were another vampire coven? They’d pick up the scent of my blood. Which was the last thing I needed now.
I read Logan’s note over again, for the millionth time, wishing he’d left his phone number. Some way to contact him, to let him know what I feared was going on. Maybe he would have come. Maybe he would have at least sent someone else to come. As it was, I had no one to turn to. I was alone.