He pulled the spoon out of his mouth. “Yeah. Okay.”
“I don’t need a babysitter,” Rose complained angrily.
“Well, that’s a relief because I would not be a good babysitter,” Erik commented as he continued to eat whatever was in the bowl. “Once, when I was human, my mother asked me to babysit my sister. I nearly killed her. But come on. How was I supposed to know that newborn babies couldn’t eat wild boar?”
Rose stared at the blonde vampire, her eyes wide with horror.
Kallias sighed, “He’s not a babysitter. Think of him as…a bodyguard.”
“Now, that, I can do,” Erik said. “Much less hazardous job.”
“I’m not staying here with him,” she said firmly.
“Ah, come on. I’m the fun one,” Erik whined.
“If you’re that uncomfortable with it, I can call Emma,” Kallias offered.
Rose glanced thoughtfully at Erik as an idea suddenly occurred to her. “Actually, no. I think I’ll be fine with Erik,” she told Kallias, nodding confidently.
Kallias smiled. “Okay. Good.”
Erik slumped into one of the wooden chairs at the dining room table and set the bowl of mushy, pink, strawberry-scented dessert on the table.
Rose frowned as she saw the contents of the bowl. “Is that ice cream?”
“Yeah. You want some?” Erik asked. He held out the spoon.
She scowled at the proffered spoon that had literally just been in his mouth. “Uh, no thanks,” she said with a grimace. “How much ice cream is that?”
Erik shrugged and took another bite. “About…a gallon and a half.”
Her eyes widened. “You’re going to put yourself into a diabetic coma.”
Erik snorted. “Vampire, remember?” he said, flashing his fangs at her.
“Oh, yeah,” she said, still scowling at the obscene amount of ice cream.
“Where did you even get all of that?” Kallias asked. “There hasn’t been any ice cream in the freezer in months, not since those five gallons disappeared.”
“Oh, those didn’t disappear,” Erik said as he took another bite.
They both just stared at him expectantly, waiting for the rest of that story.
He glanced up at them. “I put the five gallons of ice cream in that deep freezer in my room,” he explained, “where I keep all of my sex-related desserts.”
Rose looked at Kallias. “On second thought…don’t leave me with him.”
“Erik, do you see what you’ve done?” Kallias sighed.
“What? I don’t know what she’s so worried about,” Erik muttered defensively. “It’s not like I said I was going to use the desserts on her.”
“Can this conversation get any more inappropriate?” Rose complained.
“Yes,” Erik answered seriously.
Kallias ran his hand through his hair, the exasperation visible in his expression. He glared at Erik. “If you make her uncomfortable, I’ll kick your ass.”
Erik waved his hand dismissively. “Yeah, yeah, I know. I’ll behave.”
—
Rose sighed and closed her book, letting it fall onto her stomach. She stared at the ceiling as she lounged on the leather sofa, trying to decide whether to find another book to read or to find Erik, instead, and ask him about what happened earlier. Her curiosity won. She set the book aside and left the library.
She found Erik in the living room. He sat on the sofa in front of the TV with his legs stretched out, his boots propped on the coffee table. Another massive bowl sat in his lap, overflowing with popcorn, as he watched television.
“I was afraid you’d never leave that library,” Erik complained.
She sunk down on the sofa next to him. “Oh, yeah, because watching television is so much more productive,” she muttered sarcastically.
He held out the bowl of popcorn. “Want some popcorn?”
“You have no concept of germs, do you?” Rose asked.
“Nope,” he said, grinning.
She sighed, glancing at the television. “I have a question.”
Erik shoved a handful of popcorn in his mouth. “Questions are boring.”
She sighed and stood up to leave. “Fine. Never mind.”
“Whoa, wait a minute,” Erik called. “You have my attention. What is it?”
Rose turned back toward him. “Earlier, when you gave Kallias that strange look, he said that you read too much into things, that you were wrong.”
Erik laughed, “Of course he did.”
“I want to know what that was about,” she added.
Erik leaned forward and sighed, scratching his clean-shaven chin. “Kallias heard my thoughts. If he were comfortable with you knowing my…observation…he would have told you. He’s my best friend, Rose.”
She sighed guiltily, “You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”
“What I will tell you,” he said, his green eyes shifting to meet her gaze, “is that Kallias protects the people he cares about. He may act like an asshole sometimes, but the truth is that he doesn’t like to see people hurt. Protecting you is how Kallias shows that he cares. Sure, he’ll get between a vampire and a random human to protect the innocent human every night, but that kind of protectiveness goes no further than physical protection. It is when he begins to protect someone emotionally that you know he has really begun to care for the person.”
Rose stared at him as she processed what he was telling her. Her mind flashed back to how he’d defended her earlier, insisted that she was a person, not a weapon or an opportunity. “Are you saying that you think he cares about me?”
He snorted, “If that were all I was saying, I’d only be stating the obvious.”
“Am I supposed to understand this gibberish you’re speaking?” she asked.
He laughed and leaned back against the back of the sofa, propping up his legs on the coffee table again. “Sorry, babe. You will have to figure out the rest on your own,” he said, winking at her. He patted the spot next to him. “Sit down, and watch something with me. Watching television by myself is boring.”
“Is everything boring to you?” she laughed.
“No, not everything,” Erik said, his eyes on the TV screen. “Sex is fun.”
Rose rolled her eyes. “I really should have expected that answer.”
He waved the remote control. “What do you want to watch?”
She shrugged. “I’d rather just read.”
“Ah, come on,” Erik whined. “We don’t have to watch TV. We can do whatever you want. It is insulting that you prefer that boring library over me.”
“There is nothing boring about a library,” Rose informed him.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Erik muttered. “Surely there is something else you want to do. We can do whatever you want. I’m the fun one, remember?”
“Fine,” she sighed. “I have another question. Hypothetically, if I did have telekinetic abilities, do you really think that I could use them to fight Theron?”
“I think, at the very least, you could hurt him a little,” Erik answered.
“Because…I hate feeling helpless,” she added in explanation. “I’m not a damsel in distress, and I don’t like depending on people. I like to fight my own battles. If there is any way for me to fight Theron, I would like to know how.”
Erik studied her curiously. “What exactly are you asking me, Rose?”
“I’m not saying that I believe you about me having a psychic ability,” she sighed, “but if I do have telekinetic abilities, will you show me how to use them?”
Erik leaned forward and set the bowl of popcorn on the table in front of him. He rested his elbows on his knees. “I’m an empath, Rose. My abilities deal with emotions, the heart, or the…soul, really. Telekinesis deals with the physical plane of existence. The body. My ability is drastically different from yours.”
She nodded disappointedly. “Okay. I understand,” she sighed. She turned to walk back to the library and gas
ped as she walked directly into someone. She placed her hand over her chest, feeling her racing pulse beneath her palm. She looked up at Erik, her eyes widening in shock. “I didn’t even see you move!”
Erik grinned. “I’m good at what I do.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Oh, really? Well, in that case, why don’t you show me how good you are at moving out of my way?” she muttered irritably.
“You misunderstood me. I never said I wouldn’t try to help you,” he said.
“Oh,” she said, blinking in surprise. She chewed on her lip. “I mean, this is all just hypothetical, still. I don’t believe in telekinesis, much less that I could…”
“Move that glass,” Erik interrupted, gesturing toward a glass on the table.
Rose frowned and turned to look at the glass. It was a small, square glass, full of a brownish-amber liquid. “I must be insane to even be considering this.”
He leaned closer, close enough that she smelled the whiskey and popcorn on his breath. “You will never know how powerful you are, if you don’t try.”
She sighed and walked toward the coffee table, where the glass set, a ring of water around it. “Now what?” She waved her hand in the air sarcastically, mimicking a storybook witch. “Move, glass! Abracadabra and other silly words!”
Erik laughed at her sarcasm and moved to stand behind her. “If you want it to work, you have to take it seriously. Look at the glass, and will it to move.”
“You make it sound so simple,” Rose muttered sarcastically. She inhaled deeply and stared at the glass. She concentrated on it, imagined it moving, everything…but nothing worked. Finally, she threw her hands up in defeat. “See? Nothing is happening. I told you. I don’t have freaking psychic…”
She froze as Erik placed his hands her shoulders. Before she could ask what he was doing, an intense, icy, spine-chilling wave of terror worked its way through her body, setting her nerves on edge and sending her pulse skyrocketing. Her entire body trembled so intensely that it felt as if she were convulsing. Her lungs felt constricted. Her stomach lurched. She felt as if she were dying. As she began to scream, the sound of shattering glass echoed through the room.
Erik suddenly released her and stepped back. Rose doubled over, her head between her legs, as she tried to get control of her rapid, shallow breathing before she passed out. Her entire body throbbed in time with her rapid pulse.
She spun toward him, spots still dancing before her eyes. She leveled him with a murderous glare. “What the heck was that?” she yelled, her voice cracking.
He stared at the floor, avoiding her gaze. “Terror.”
“Why would you do that to me?” Rose asked, her hands still trembling.
“I just wanted to see if it would work,” he answered quietly.
“You made me feel that as a freaking experiment?!!!” she snarled.
“I’m sorry,” he said. He held out his hands. “Let me calm you.”
“Are you insane? Like actually insane?” Rose snapped. She backed away from him. “I’m not going to let you touch me again, not after that! I’m not stupid!”
Erik dropped his hands. “But at least now, you know it’s real.”
She frowned. “What do you mean? No, I don’t. It didn’t work.”
He raised an eyebrow, his lips curving into an amused smile. He pointed at the coffee table. “Then, how do you explain what happened to the glass?”
Rose turned around. Her eyes widened as she realized that the glass was gone. The only sign that it had ever been on the table was the thin ring of water where it had been sitting. “That’s not possible,” she mumbled. “Where is it?”
He grinned and pointed at the opposite wall. “Keep looking.”
Her face paled as she noticed the wet spot on the wall. She glanced down at the floor beneath it to find what was left of the glass: hundreds of tiny, broken fragments. “That’s not possible. I didn’t do that. I couldn’t have done that.”
“Yes, you did,” Erik stated easily. “You must have been terrified when you threw Theron across the room. So, I acted on a hunch and recreated the emotion. I know it felt like torture, but…you needed to see yourself do this.”
She turned toward him, her eyes still wide. “Is it possible to control it?”
Erik shrugged. “Power is always difficult to control.”
“But you can control yours, and Kallias can control his,” Rose argued.
“It took me decades to learn to control my power, and it took Kallias centuries to gain control of his,” Erik explained. “The more power someone has, the harder it is to control. And you possess more power than either of us.”
She scoffed at that. “No, I don’t.”
He shrugged. “Believe what you will, but I know what power smells like.”
“Do it again,” Rose said, turning toward him. “The terror thing.”
His jaw dropped. “Are you crazy?! I just tortured you, and now, you are asking me to do it again?! What next? Do you want me to cause a heart attack?”
“I hate feeling helpless,” she said again. “I want to be able to fight him.”
Erik sighed sympathetically, “Your pulse hasn’t even slowed yet.”
“I feel fine. I feel strong, actually,” Rose told him.
“That’s the adrenaline,” Erik told her. “I can smell it in your blood.”
“So,” Rose said impatiently, “will you help me or not?”
He smiled. “Yeah, okay,” he sighed. He stepped past her and motioned for her to follow him. “But your abilities are a little too destructive to have you using them near something as important as my TV. So, let’s go to the gym first.”
Rose frowned as she followed him into the hallway. “You have a gym?”
When they reached the end of the downstairs hallway, Rose found another set of stairs. A basement, just as she’d suspected. She followed him down the steps until they reached a metal door that looked out of place in the old house. Erik opened a plastic box beside the steel door to reveal a set of number buttons.
He typed four numbers into the keyless entry lock, and the door slid open. “The passcode is 2-5-1-1, if you decide to come down here by yourself.”
“Kallias’s age?” Rose asked, frowning.
Erik shrugged. “He changes it ever year, but you have to admit, no random human is going to guess that correctly.” He led the way into the room, flicking on the dim lanterns that lined the walls of the room. “Watch your step.”
“What’s with the spike in security? Is this where you hide your victims or something?” she joked as she stepped down into the cold, dark basement.
He snorted, “If we did have victims, we wouldn’t leave them in our basement to decompose and stink up the house. We’d properly dispose of them.”
“It’s so comforting when someone assures you that they can properly dispose of corpses as they take you into their creepy basement,” Rose muttered.
As they stepped into the basement, the cold air in the dark, empty gym chilled her skin, raising chill bumps on her arms. She rubbed her arms to warm them as she followed him further into the room. The walls and floors of the gym were painted black and made of rough concrete. Aside from the dim lanterns along each wall, the room was empty, which left the room feeling cold and creepy.
“This is the safest room in the house if you’re a vampire,” Erik commented. “If, for instance, the rest of the house is destroyed in the middle of the day by some type of natural disaster, we might survive the natural disaster, but we wouldn’t survive the sunlight. Down here, though, we’d be safe.”
Rose frowned, confused by the strange concern. “This is New York, not Alabama. It’s not like you have a ton of tornadoes ripping through here.”
“It was just an example,” Erik said. “More importantly, if, for some reason, vampires ever come under attack by humans, we will be vulnerable during the day. If they decide to blast holes in the side of the house in the middle of the day, we’re dead. That’s why
we had this built into the house. If that ever happened, we would be vulnerable upstairs, but we would be safe underground.”
“If you’re ever attacked by humans?” she repeated, her frown deepening.
“Because not only do they need to know the code to open those doors,” Erik continued, ignoring her interruption. He stepped back into the hallway and ascended the steps again. Rose followed him, watching curiously. He reached up and pulled a handle that seemed to be attached to the wall at the top of the steps. The handle pulled a solid piece of flooring over them, closing off the stairs and the basement from the rest of the house. He smiled as he knocked on the hardwood flooring above them and finished, “they will never even know to check for a basement. With that closed, it will look like this house has no basement.”
Rose lifted her eyebrows at the insane amount of thought put into this. “Is that something you actually think could happen? That humans are just going to decide to attack vampires one day? I mean, that doesn’t even sound smart.”
“Generally, humans aren’t smart. Generally, they’re scared,” Erik stated.
“Um…human…standing right here,” Rose said, pointing to herself.
“I said generally,” Erik said with a playful grin. He sighed, falling serious again. “The thing about the human race is that when they get scared, they try to kill what scares them. Humans love war. History has proven that. I have no doubt that if they knew that we existed, their first move would be to declare war and hunt us down like animals. They’ve already tried that, after all, in the 1700s.”
“Good point,” Rose admitted.
“Besides, underground is always safest from sunlight,” Erik added.
She followed him as he returned to the gym. “Is that why there are all of those myths about you guys sleeping in coffins and graves and cemeteries?”
He laughed, “I actually know the vampire that started those myths.”
Rose frowned. “Really? Who?”
“Aaron,” Erik answered.
Her frown deepened. “Kallias mentioned him.”
He nodded. “He is the oldest vampire alive, as far as I know, at least.”
“How was Aaron responsible for the myths?” Rose asked curiously.
The Stone of the Eklektos Page 58