Rose tossed her jeans in the laundry hamper. “I’m fine, Audrey.”
Audrey scowled worriedly. “You already had a concussion, and now…”
“And now, I have a few more bruises,” Rose finished, shrugging, as she grabbed her pajama pants from the counter. “I’ll be fine. Besides, it would be stupid to waste time in the hospital while a killer is out there, looking for me.”
“I guess you’re right,” Audrey admitted. She leaned against the door.
Rose pulled on her pants. “Did you finish packing?”
“No, no, no, missy,” Audrey scolded, wagging her finger. “We’re talking about you and Mr. Tall-Hunky-Scary-Guy first. Did you get his number?”
She rolled her eyes as she grabbed her pajama shirt from the counter. “His name is Kallias. And no, I didn’t get his number. Why would I do that?”
“To call him,” Audrey said, “and ask him out on a date, obviously.”
Rose shook her head as she slipped her arms through the flannel shirt. “I already told you: I don’t like him. Why would I want to go on a date with him?”
“Because you’re wrong,” Audrey said. “You’re obviously hot for him.”
“I am not hot for him, whatever that means,” Rose muttered indignantly.
“Oh?” Audrey said, raising an eyebrow in disbelief, as she sipped her tea. “Then what do you feel for him? Because you obviously feel something for him.”
“Yeah. Hate,” Rose muttered as she buttoned her flannel shirt.
“Uh-huh,” Audrey said skeptically, leaning lazily against the door.
Rose grabbed her toothbrush from the counter. “I’m serious,” she said as she squeezed toothpaste onto the toothbrush. “He’s a jerk. I can’t stand him.”
“Well, when will you see him again?” Audrey asked.
“I won’t,” Rose mumbled with a mouthful of toothpaste.
Audrey straightened, her eyes widening. “What? Why not?”
Rose shrugged nonchalantly as she continued to brush her teeth. She leaned over the sink and spit out the toothpaste so she could speak clearly. “Tell me the truth,” she said, glancing at Audrey. “What do you think of him?”
“I think he’s the sexiest man I have ever seen,” Audrey answered.
Rose pursed her lips. “I was being serious.”
“So was I,” Audrey responded easily.
Rose leaned back against the bathroom counter and rolled her eyes. “I’m not looking for your expert opinion on his attractiveness,” she teased. She sighed, suddenly falling serious. “I want to know if you think he seems…dangerous.”
Audrey sobered at the sudden seriousness she heard in Rose’s voice. “I mean, yeah, he does seem pretty scary, but that probably has a lot to do with the fact that he’s a hundred feet tall and muscular.” She shrugged. “Besides, an animal is dangerous when it needs to be, but that doesn’t mean it’ll ever harm you.”
Rose nodded, considering that. “I don’t know. I just get this feeling when I’m around him that there’s something off about him, something dangerous.”
“He saved your life twice, Rose,” Audrey reminded her.
“Yeah, I know,” Rose sighed. “But you didn’t see the way he fought.”
“Being able to fight doesn’t make him evil either,” Audrey argued.
“And he’s secretive,” Rose added. “He refused to answer my questions.”
Audrey winced. “In his defense, you do ask a lot of questions.”
Rose pursed her lips. “He’s hiding something, something bad. I know it.”
“Okay,” Audrey said with a slight edge to her voice. She walked into the bathroom and stood in front of Rose. She crossed her arms. “What was his reaction when you told him that you have a dead mother and a brother in prison?”
Rose frowned. “Why would I tell him that? I just met him.”
“Exactly,” Audrey said. “Rose, you open your heart to so many people, and you trust so easily. And yet, when your mother died, you told everyone that you were going to visit her, not bury her. And each month, when you visit your brother at the prison, you tell everyone that you’re just going to an appointment.”
Rose bit her lip. “Technically, it is an appointment.”
“You have your own dark secrets, Rose,” Audrey reminded her.
“I just don’t need people judging me or feeling sorry for me,” Rose said.
Audrey leaned against the counter, beside Rose, and crossed her arms. “Don’t you think that he’s probably hiding his secrets for the same reasons?”
“But I wouldn’t judge him,” Rose argued. “I’m not that kind of person.”
“He doesn’t know that. He just met you,” Audrey reminded her.
Rose sighed. “Okay, I see your point,” she admitted shamefully. “And I suppose I have been pretty uncharacteristically judgmental toward him already.”
“See?” Audrey said, smiling. “Maybe he’s actually just a good guy.”
Rose stepped away from the counter and left the bathroom, walking over to the bookshelf to look for a book. She trailed her finger across the worn book spines. “I don’t know. He seemed pretty determined to convince me otherwise.”
Audrey followed her into the room. “That’s a good sign. The ones you really want to watch out for are the ones that try to make you think they’re good.”
“I forgot that I have my very own bad-boy expert living with me,” Rose muttered dryly as she tugged down a tattered horror novel from the top shelf.
“Oh, you mock now, but when you see that I’m right…” Audrey said, pointing her finger playfully. She scowled as she saw the horror novel in Rose’s hand, one of the many books from the bookshelf that Rose had already read a hundred times. “How many times are you going to read the exact same books?”
Rose crawled into bed, pulling the quilts up to her waist and wiggling her toes to get comfortable. She flipped open the familiar book and smiled at Audrey. “You can never read a book too many times. Each time is like a new experience.”
Audrey rolled her eyes. “You know what else is like a new experience?” Without waiting for an answer, she provided, “An actual new experience.”
“Ha. Ha. You’re hilarious,” Rose said sarcastically.
“I know I am,” Audrey sang. She hopped on the other side of the bed and snatched the novel from Rose’s hand. “So, what exactly happened tonight?”
Rose pouted. “I need my book.”
Audrey patted Rose on top of the head, as if Rose were a puppy. “You’ll be okay. I have faith in you,” she teased. “Now, tell me what happened.”
Rose sighed and shifted in the bed, leaning against the headboard. She then proceeded to describe the events of the night, exactly as they happened, even the parts that were difficult to relive. Audrey listened quietly until Rose finished.
“Eww! You stabbed him in the eye?” Audrey groaned in disgust.
Rose stared blankly at her. “Is that all you heard?”
“Why would you do something so disgusting?” Audrey whined.
“I’m sorry. Next time, I’ll choose a less disgusting way to defend myself against a psychotic murderer,” Rose said caustically, “because your weak stomach is far more pertinent in my mind than the threat of my impending death.”
“Hey, my weak stomach takes offense to that sarcastic tone,” Audrey complained. Then, she suddenly fell serious. “But your teacher…is she really…”
Rose’s smile faded, and her gaze immediately fell to her entangled hands that set idly in her lap. “Apparently,” she sighed. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to let herself cry again. “I kept hoping I’d feel a pulse, but…”
“Rose, I’m really sorry,” Audrey said. “I know how much you liked her.”
“What am I supposed to do, Audrey? She has a family,” Rose said, her voice cracking. “Kallias said that I shouldn’t call the police. He said it would do more harm than good. And I can’t be responsible for more people getting killed.”
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“Then, it sounds to me like you should listen to him,” Audrey advised.
“But is that right?” Rose asked, looking at Audrey.
“Well, it doesn’t seem wrong,” Audrey offered, shrugging. “If it keeps more innocent people from dying, to me, it seems like the right thing to do.”
“But it’s against the law,” Rose reminded Audrey.
Audrey rolled her eyes. “You know, for a woman from a family full of felons, you sure do have a strong respect for the law,” she muttered, earning an irritated glare from Rose. “Okay, think about it this way. The worst case scenario is that Theron is still there with the dead body, and in that case, if the police were to arrive, he would just kill them. The best case scenario is that Theron disposed of the dead body like Kallias said and then disappeared, and in that case, the police would just think that you are insane. Neither one of those options sound good.”
“But they’d realize I’m right when they see that she’s missing,” Rose said.
“Or they would think you had something to do with it,” Audrey argued.
Rose leaned forward and rested her face in her hands. She sighed, tiredly massaging the bridge of her nose. “Yeah, I guess it would look suspicious.”
“No one wants to believe in things that scare them,” Audrey said. “Take it from the girl who dreams about people dying before it happens. People would rather just assume that you’re insane than consider the possibility that you might be right. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that some things are best left quiet. If you tell them about vampires, you’ll end up in a mental institution before the night ends.”
“Maybe that’s where I should be. Maybe I am losing my mind,” she said.
Audrey glared at her. “Are you kidding me? You’re not losing your mind, Rose. You saw the vampire. And I saw him, too, remember? In my dream.”
“How reassuring,” Rose said sarcastically. “My friend who sees the future saw the vampire in a dream. What if you’re a figment of my imagination, too?”
Audrey rolled her eyes. “Okay, now, you are losing it,” she laughed. “You really think you’ve just been imagining my existence for four years? If you are, your imagination really sucks, because I could use some improvement. Imagine me with boobs, please. And money. And a hot boyfriend.”
Rose stared at her blankly. “Those are your three choices?”
“See? I’m shallow,” Audrey pointed out. “I need improvement.”
“Maybe I’d be safer in a mental institution,” Rose offered bitterly.
“I doubt it,” Audrey said. “He nearly killed you at the University.”
“You’re right,” Rose acknowledged finally. “This really isn’t the best time to get locked up in a padded room. I have an important exam in the morning.”
Audrey scowled. “Your priorities are so messed up.”
“Speaking of priorities,” Rose said, “give me back my book.”
—
As dawn crept closer, a quietness settled throughout the city, marking that short stretch of time between the late hour when the night owls finally stumble into bed and the early hour when the early risers stumble out of bed. It was during that time that vampires could usually take their victims with less fear of being seen, that dark hour when no human should ever stray into the streets.
With all the shops already closed, the only sound echoing through the street was the low, dull thud of his boots as Kallias searched for Theron. Rose’s scent clung to his jacket even though she’d worn it for only a short time, and as the warm breeze ruffled his hair and swayed the corners of his jacket, her scent seemed to envelop him. He clenched his jaw as he suppressed the animalistic urge to return to the source of the scent and take her blood.
Kallias froze as the scent of fresh blood flooded his senses. Without making the conscious decision to do so, he followed the scent with the supernatural speed of a vampire, traveling in a fluid blur of movement, rather than the tedious step-by-step pace of a human. The scent led him to a dark parking garage.
Kallias stopped just past the parking garage’s entrance, keeping to the shadows as he watched the silhouette of a woman and a man in a tight embrace, leaning against a lone car on the first level. With his sensitive eyesight, he could discern the two figures in the darkness. The stout male leaned limply against the side of the car as the slim, tall female clung to him, her legs and arms wrapped around him, as she mercilessly drained his body of blood. Kallias cleared his throat loudly.
The female suddenly pulled away from the man, drawn out of the all-consuming hunger by Kallias’s interruption. Her dark eyes shifted toward him. Her black hair brushed her chin, not quite reaching her neck, and a short, black dress hugged her tall, slim figure. Her appearance held the unnatural, seductive attractiveness of a vampire, her perfect features marred only by the blood that coated her face. Her bloodstained lips curved as Kallias approached them.
“Kallias of Athens,” the vampire cooed with an obvious Spanish accent.
“Sofia Pérez,” Kallias replied curtly, coming to a stop a few feet away.
The human glanced back and forth from the blood-coated vampire to Kallias with the blank eyes of someone who was not completely aware of his surroundings. Blood stained the collar of the human’s tan button-down shirt, flowing slowly from the wound in his neck that was already beginning to heal. His short brown hair curled at his ears, his body that of a college athlete.
“It’s been a long time since I saw you,” the Spanish vampire said.
“You should consider yourself lucky,” Kallias told her.
She stiffened at the hostility in his tone, as if it surprised her. She glanced nervously at the human. “I wasn’t going to kill him, if that’s what you thought.”
“Hmm,” Kallias said skeptically. “You cut it awfully close, didn’t you?”
Sofia swallowed nervously. “I may have taken a little too much,” she admitted. She smiled, slowly and seductively. “But I have an insatiable appetite sometimes, and it’s so hard to stop once I’ve started. I’m sure you understand.”
“Not really,” Kallias said rudely. “I have something called self-control.”
Her smiled faded. “Where is your empath? He was far more charming.”
“By charming, I assume you mean gullible and ready to sleep with anyone,” Kallias said. “And Erik’s whereabouts are none of your business.”
She smiled bitterly. “Anyone?” she repeated, obviously offended. She pursed her lips, her brown eyes darkening. She trailed a manicured fingernail along the zipper of his black leather jacket. “Different country, different language, different century, but you’re still the same rude, mysterious vampire, permanently in a bad mood. Of course, mysteriousness does have a certain appeal.”
Kallias grasped her wrist suddenly to stop her. “Refrain from touching me,” he snarled. His eyes narrowed with suspicion. “What are you doing here?”
“Am I not supposed to be here?” Sofia asked. “Is this your territory?”
“I don’t have territory. I’m not an animal,” he said.
Sofia laughed, a soft, derisive laugh. “But of course you are, just as I am.”
Growing impatient, Kallias sighed, “Are you working with Theron?”
Sofia tapped her finger against her chin. “Theron? Never heard of him.”
Kallias leaned closer to her. “I think you’re lying. Theron is over twenty-six hundred years old. You’ve heard of him. I think he is the reason you’re here. Why else would you be here? As a matter of fact, I think you were the one I saw by the fence earlier tonight. Tell me. Does the name Rose Foster ring a bell?”
“Why?” Sofia whispered, smiling seductively. “Does she taste good?”
The human man suddenly began to stir. “What…I don’t understand…” the man stammered, suddenly aware. His eyes widened as he realized that it was his blood that coated Sofia’s face. “You… You bit me? What is happening?”
“Well, shit,” Sofi
a muttered, grimacing at the terrified human.
As the man began to pull desperately at his car door handle, Kallias reached out and grasped the man’s forearm. He jerked the human around to face him, and the human gulped audibly, his eyes widening with fright as he realized that he couldn’t pull his arm free from Kallias’s grasp. “Please, man, I don’t know what you are, but I…I have parents and…a girlfriend… I should’ve been home hours ago… Please…” the human begged, his voice weak from the blood loss.
Kallias took control of the boy’s mind. “Calm down,” he commanded.
The human stilled, his eyes suddenly blank. “Okay.”
Kallias pulled his dagger from its sheath and sliced open the human’s arm, tensing as the scent of more fresh blood filled his senses, intensifying his already ravenous hunger. As blood flowed down the boy’s arm, Kallias continued to use his telepathic abilities on him. “You’ve lost a little too much blood. You need to go to the hospital, and tell them that you cut yourself, that it was an accident. Tell them that you think you’ve lost too much blood,” he commanded.
“Hospital. Yes,” the human replied in an eerie, emotionless tone.
“Forget what happened. Forget even seeing us,” Kallias continued.
“Of course,” the human man responded easily.
“Good,” Kallias commanded, releasing the man’s arm. “Go. Now.”
The human turned and left, walking out of the parking garage.
Sofia stared at Kallias in shock. “So the rumors are true!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands together like a child. “You are a telepath! I heard stories, but I never believed them. I’ve never met a telepath before. Oh, Theron will be so…”
Her sentence ended in a sharp cry as Kallias shoved her against the car, his hand closing around her throat. “So you do know Theron,” Kallias growled.
Sofia pulled at his hand, but his hand didn’t budge. “Let go of me.”
“Tell me where he is,” Kallias demanded.
“Damn… You’re…so…strong,” Sofia wheezed.
Losing patience, he used his telepathic control on her. “Where is he?”
“He has already taken shelter for the day. He refused to tell anyone where,” she answered honestly, her voice suddenly lacking personality and will.
The Stone of the Eklektos Page 19