by Nicola Rose
I stomped on Alex’s foot and wriggled until he let me step back.
“Why do you care? You kill people who’ve done nothing wrong!”
“I don’t care. My point is that you do… you should. Zachariah has never been what you think he is.”
“You’re clutching at straws. Are you this desperate to pull me from him? It won’t work.” I fought against the overwhelming feeling of panic, wanting me to rush away from the room, away from this madness. I couldn’t think about this now. I wouldn’t. Alex would not rattle me.
He followed me back out to the steps and closed the door.
“You’re going to leave the vampires in there?” I asked.
“Shit, you’re right, so careless!” he chirped, returning inside long enough for me to hear a crunch, then a tear, and again three more times. Stifled cries from the inmates. The door opened and he threw chunks of meat to the floor outside the room.
Hands. They were the vampires’ hands.
“That was a close one, I nearly left them a means to escape!” Alex closed the door once more and wiped blood on his jeans.
My feet wouldn’t move. My mouth wouldn’t work.
“I wonder if the human inmates will figure out how to kill the vampires before they awake? They’ve got enough info to go on now, but the odds are still stacked against them. Maybe I should even things up?” He disappeared up into the house then, without so much as a blur.
A second later he was back with a kitchen knife in his hand. He took the finger from his pocket, opened the door one last time, and threw the knife in.
“There,” he smiled, clearly pleased with himself. “My bets are still on the vampires, but it’ll make an interesting mess.”
I fled through the house and came to a stop in the living area, drawn to a black and white photo of Zac with Tobias Elwood; the man they called their father, but really he was just the man who turned them into vampires. Their own biological father had died when they were boys. The photo was faded, clearly taken decades ago, but the Zac looked just the same today, only the clothing had changed.
What had he been through when the change occurred, when he’d become this monster? Zac said that trying to resist, trying to hold out on taking the blood that called to his senses, caused him pain every day. My blood. He said my blood was at the top of the scale, nothing would taste better, and the beast inside him craved it with brutal intent.
I rarely go longer than a few days without feeding. Since you arrived, it’s daily… his voice echoed through my head. Why had I never pushed him on these issues? I was a fool, swept along by the crazy way he made me feel, brushing off all the stuff I didn’t like or understand. People locked up in his basement? I mean, seriously?! That’s some crazy, serial killer shit. Even if they were murderers, and I prayed to God that Alex was lying and they all were, even then – it was so fucked up to be keeping them like that. It somehow seemed worse than the idea of him just going out and getting it done on the street.
Another flashback came to me of Zac covered in blood after the big fight with Alex, and Eva saying, “We’ll tell you about the basement another time.” Those people were locked up under my feet all along and he’d crept down there every day to feed.
A cool breath swept down my neck as hands came around and took the photo from me. I startled at the sudden presence that had come from nowhere, but Alex had already retreated, smiling to himself.
“Tobias would be turning in his grave if he had one.” He stared intently at the picture. “The one thing he instilled in us was hatred towards the Bael, and now Zachariah is working for them.”
“He had no choice.”
“There’s always a choice.”
“They’d have killed me, or worse.”
“Probably. But now we’ll never know.”
“You’d have let them keep me?” I put my hands on my hips and he cocked his head in that infuriatingly sexy way, biting his lip and smiling.
“That wasn’t my decision to make, was it? You chose to belong to Zachariah, not me. But no, I wouldn’t let one of my possessions be taken from me so easily.”
“I don’t belong to either of you.”
“Wrong. Zachariah has handed you over to me – for your own protection, of course.”
“That’s bullshit.”
“Are you denying that the thought of being mine makes you wet, darlin’? Don’t worry, it’s a natural reaction, you’ll get used to it.” He had drawn close to me during our exchange, and now his hand trailed lazily over my hip, nudging my fingers away.
“Where is he?” my voice cracked.
He blew out a breath. “Right now, far away on business for the Bael. He’s killing whoever he’s ordered to kill, and for pleasure he’s killing anyone else that catches his attention. He’s nothing like the Zachariah that you knew and he never will be again. Start dealing with that.”
11
Jess
Alex left after, once again, reminding me of the Zac that I’d lost, and I spent an hour crying into Zac’s pillow like a lovesick baby. Then I went to the garage and found the Dodge Tomahawk – Zac’s prized motorcycle. I took it for a spin along the Strip, going so fast that my heart nearly hammered out of my ribs. But it didn’t really help, so then I went back to my apartment and cried some more.
Alex finally got what he wanted from Zac. He could have run. He should have run. And the brother who should have stayed… didn’t.
Sitting on the bed I toyed with the bipolar meds that had remained buried in a drawer. I could take them, and the other array of meds that I’d collected over the years. It would ease the pain, take the edge off. But it wasn’t illness that was making me feel like this. It was just love.
This was surely a normal reaction to the man you love just fucking off and deserting you, leaving a trail of dead bodies in his wake. I mean, come on, how is a girl supposed to deal with that?
Besides, I wasn’t actually bipolar after all, was I? All the sweeping highs and crashing lows were just the result of my magic playing havoc with my mind and soul.
I couldn’t even talk to anyone about it. Maybe a therapist? For once in my life that seemed like a reasonable idea. I could talk, and they’d listen… of course they’d probably call the police by the time I was done, or have me committed.
My phone rang, and ‘hot stalker’ flashed up on the screen. My heart somersaulted.
“Zac?” I gasped.
“Jess,” he replied, tight and strained.
A sob broke free from my throat. “Where are you?”
“Not far enough away. No matter how far I go I can still hear you. You have to let me go, Jess. I’m not coming back.” His voice was distant, cold. Utterly detached, like the words he just said meant nothing and hadn’t crushed his heart the way mine had. Tears streamed down my face.
“Please don’t do this,” I whispered. “We can get through it, you just need time. I’ll wait for you.”
“Time will change nothing. This is who I am now, and honestly, I like it. I don’t know why it took me so long.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Don’t I?
I took a calming breath. “When were you going to tell me about the prisoners in your basement? Or were you going to keep making me forget every time I thought to ask about that door?”
“That’s irrelevant now.”
“Irrelevant,” I echoed, allowing a silence to stretch out between us.
“Did you think I just found a fresh murderer on the island every day?” he finally asked.
“That’s just it – I didn’t think. I never had a burning compulsion to interrogate you on it, to find out, because you compelled me not to care.”
“Oh, no you don’t. I might have guided your thoughts away from a door a few times, but if you remained blind to everything else that was your own doing.”
“What about your magical eyes that lure girls in and make them lose their minds?”
“You still chose to ig
nore the facts I gave you. I warned you enough times.”
“Yes, you did,” I bit back more tears. “And here we are again. You pulling away, and me clinging on like a bad case of herpes.”
He didn’t reply.
“Just a few weeks ago you were telling me that you’d slay anything that tried to come between us. That we were forever. You’d never leave—” I pressed.
“I was wrong. I can’t fight this.”
“Can’t, or won’t?”
“Does it matter? The outcome is the same.”
I couldn’t handle the tone in his voice. He’d never felt further away.
“It doesn’t have to be. Just make me like you, then this will all go away. You won’t need to be afraid of hurting me. We could be together.”
Desperate. I was desperate, and embarrassing.
“Have you seriously learned nothing? You’re still going down the same roads?”
Change the topic. Keep him talking. Keep breaking yourself against the coldness of his voice, just because you can’t bear for it to go silent.
“Were the prisoners in your basement all murderers? Did they deserve to be there?” I clutched at the questions still plaguing me.
He sighed. “Mostly. We can’t always be sure we’re going to stumble across them when we need them, and other times we find ourselves with a glut, so to speak.”
It seemed suddenly quite funny to me that he spoke of them like vegetables.
“A glut?” I asked with a high pitched giggle.
“We kept them there as a back-up supply. In storage. Ready for when we needed them,” he said each word slowly with lengthy pauses.
“Like pickles?” I snorted.
“I’m glad you find it amusing. If you’d like another laugh, you could call it our pantry.”
The words sank in and I felt colder than vampire cold. “It’s too macabre keeping your victims in the basement like a horror movie. I wish you’d just told me.”
“We’re vampires. You are living in a horror movie. I’m sorry this revelation has come so late, because shit’s about to get real. Goodbye, Jess.”
I claw at my head, vaguely aware that I’m dreaming, trying to wake up, but unable to escape the terror. My father yells at me, his face red with rage. My hands are trembling. He reaches down for something. Why can’t I see what it is? Something in his hands… something is so wrong. I need to look down. I need to see, but I can’t.
Panic rises through my core and I turn to run. I need to leave this place. It doesn’t feel safe anymore. My room is dark and scary, things hiding in the shadows, once familiar surroundings are out of place. Only, I can’t tell if it’s my childhood home or my apartment on Isabel, or Zac’s mansion. It keeps changing. Pictures on the wall stare back at me with crazed eyes.
I’m running. Away, down stairs… he’s chasing me.
Alex… No, not Alex, it’s my father.
Thump-thump… thump-thump… his footsteps on the wooden floor are getting closer. I run through the hall, fear-laden energy surging into my chest.
I can’t breathe.
My fingers tingle as electric charges seem to spark from them. Buzzing fills my head. I’m still running. Running forever. I don’t ever want to stop running.
His voice makes me gasp, so close behind me, “Jessica, get back here.”
A hand grasps my shirt. I turn and kick him hard in the stomach, sending him backwards. I throw open the front door and pelt over the grass. The buzzing in my head is so loud, I think I might die. My hands feel like lead, heavy and aching, hurting.
“Jessica!” his voice comes back at me. I can’t let him get to me.
The explosion sends me flying through the air, scorching pain searing into my back. My head hits the ground and it goes dark.
But then, I’m not lying in the grass, I’m inside the house – trapped, burning. Zac is outside, his back to me, walking away. I’m screaming at him but he can’t hear me. I’m so alone, and trapped. I’m going to die here…
My fists hammer on the door, the banging is so loud and repetitive. It opens—
Then I’m awake, and the banging is outside my apartment.
A storm was in full force, whipping the complex gate on its hinges against the wall.
A glance at the clock told me it was 05:50. Still dark outside, but dawn wasn’t far away. Getting up, I found a drink of water and sank into a chair, trying to remember the dream before it drifted away into nothing. It was often the same – a re-enactment of what happened with my parents. But since training with Sofia, since she pushed me to that place of fear and back into that moment, it was changing.
Sometimes I woke up feeling like I’d glimpsed something else, some other clue as to what happened when we were fighting, but I can’t ever grasp the memory from the back of my mind. It floats there, just out of reach.
I’d had regressive hypnotherapy in the past, which was a total waste of time and money. All it succeeded in accomplishing was making my nightmares worse, more regular, and fuelling a waking anxiety that I hadn’t had before. Suddenly I was struggling to stay focussed when working, finding the fire sending floods of memory through me. It made me weak, made my moods more unstable than ever.
This time it was different. Sofia had opened up a different door, I could feel it. I just couldn’t find it again. Maybe if I could find her, she would help me.
I laughed at myself. She was probably dead, and if she wasn’t, there was no way she’d help me again.
Then I remembered the end of the dream. The new part, with Zac leaving me, and the heaviness settled back over my heart. What if he really wasn’t coming back? What was the point in anything anymore? My only family were my parents and I killed them. Anna was gone. Danny was as good as gone. Zac was gone. I didn’t have any other friends, because all I do is push people away when they get too close.
Despite the rain outside, the air was thick, and my vest clung to my sweaty body. I could feel it coming again – the panic, the breathlessness, the pain.
You’ll never be anything, Jessica. Worthless. Useless. No-one wants you around with your mood swings. It didn’t matter how long ago I killed my father, he’d haunt me forever.
I pulled on a pair of shorts and launched myself out the front door, into the rain. My hair whipped around my face… and I ran.
I ran, and I didn’t stop until my lungs were so tight I was heaving. Reaching the beach, I sank to my knees in the sand and watched the waves crashing inland. A storm surge had brought the tide much further in than normal, a thick mist rolling with it over the shore. Ominous black clouds hovered so low over the ocean I could almost touch them.
Shit’s about to get real.
That was a joke. Shit got real a long fucking time ago.
“Where are you?” I screamed, and the deafening noise of the ocean wind swallowed my words.
This is your fault… I’ve never loved you, I fucking hate you.
Tears stung my face.
Everything that he didn’t like about you has all been magnified… He needs to be away from you.
Sandy and salty wind battered me. I was so lost in his darkness. Washed along on a torrent of fear and pain, out of control, like a fucking feather in a tornado. I had no choice in where the wind took me. The Elwoods held all the power from day one. Happiness had slipped past me somewhere along the way and I couldn’t catch a foothold to anchor myself back to it. I was slipping under, unable to keep my head above water. Drowning, and there wasn’t a single thing that could help me.
Lost in whose darkness? The question went round my head. Zac’s or Alex’s?
I couldn’t answer that. They were both dragging me under, except, maybe with Alex he wasn’t dragging… I felt like running towards it. Running towards him and his darkness. Wanting to hurt Zac. Wanting to be free from my own pain and fear. Wanting to let go.
Let go.
The guilt was too much. I was to blame, for everything. For where Zac had ended up, for the loss o
f Anna, for my parents. I didn’t bring happiness to anyone. I took it from them like a leech.
I found myself on my feet, staring out to sea, at the way it had changed – the white of the waves crashing all around, except for one strip which was calm. The water seemed still, making a path through the chaos of the tide – a walkway into the depths beyond.
One foot in front of the other I walked down that path. The water lapped at my ankles, surprisingly warm, comforting. Then caressing upwards, past my knees. I waded deeper, up to my waist, and deeper still. The rip current pulled on me, I barely had to move my legs as it dragged me along, urging me to go further into its embrace.
A haze settled through my head, all the buzzing and pain became dulled. Numb. I was blissfully numb again. I let the current pull me further out and my feet could no longer touch the bottom. Only, where the path had seemed still and calming, there were now waves thrashing against me. My head went under and when I surfaced another wave was above me. I spluttered and kicked, trying to catch my breath.
Let go. You are lost in the darkness.
I stopped struggling. I took one last gulp of air and went under. It was so quiet, the crashing waves swirling me around. My lungs began to burn. My feet kicked out by themselves, willing me back to the surface, but I didn’t want to go. I pushed myself into a dive and descended further. The pain was like fire through my chest and behind my eyes.
You could be one of us. Alex’s voice was suddenly in my head, so close, so real, that he could have been right there with me. It caught me off guard and I found myself fighting to the surface and grabbing a ragged gasp of air.
The presence of a person on the beach caught my eye. The stretch of sand was completely deserted, except for one dark figure. His hands were in his pockets, his head to the side, as he seemed to stare right through me.
I began swimming back towards land, but after kicking and paddling for what felt like eternity I was no closer to the shore. If anything, I was further away. I kicked harder. The initial serenity of drowning was quickly replaced by terror. The current pulled and pulled against me, no matter how hard I fought, there was no way I could get through it. My head went under again, salty water surging down my already burning throat. My limbs were heavy. The words rip current blared loud in my head.