by Myers, AJ
He opened his mouth to respond and then snapped it shut again with a growl. For a second, we just glared at each other, both of us too angry to say a word. No matter what we said, it wasn’t going to be pretty. We were past all of that. There was too much hurt and anger between us, too many misconceptions and broken promises.
I nearly died of fright when he let out a frustrated roar. Before I could defend myself, I found myself pinned to the wall behind me.
“You will go back to Kim’s and you will stay there,” he breathed against my ear. “You will not go to school. You will not go out clubbing. You will do exactly what I tell you to do, Ember, or, so help me God, I will chain your ass to a wall somewhere. Do you understand me?”
Oh, he had nerve! Just who the hell did he think he was? I wasn’t going to do anything he told me to do. I was going to do exactly what I wanted to, and that meant doing pretty much everything he had just told me not to.
“Bite me, Nathan! If you want to order someone around, go find your skank. I’m sure Stacy would be happy to do anything you wanted her to do. As for me, I couldn’t care less what you want.”
As I glared up at him, I saw something in his eyes change. The anger faded out of them to be replaced by something seriously unpleasant.
“Bite you, huh? I’ve already had the pleasure of that experience, remember?” he whispered, his nose sliding down the line of my jaw as he took a deep breath. “You do remember, don’t you, Ember? I do. I remember the way you felt against me, the way you tasted, the way you moaned and begged me not to stop.”
I stiffened against him as a wave of pain and anger swept through me, leaving nothing behind but the urge to hurt him as much as he had just hurt me. Yeah, I remembered that night very well. I had a permanent reminder of it, on my neck, that made it kind of hard to forget.
I had asked Kim if there was a way to remove my mark and she had totally freaked. Once a vampire marks you, you’re stuck with it forever. If you remove it, you die.
I just looked at him for a second, noticing how his silvery aura had started to light up. To make matters worse, the scent of his essence had started to envelope me. I closed my eyes, trying not to feel the hunger beginning to burn in my stomach.
But why should I fight anymore? He was right. He had fed on me. Twice. Why shouldn’t I return the favor? Hell, he owed me a taste.
I stopped that thought right where it was—then stopped breathing. I had tied myself to him in enough ways as it was. I would shrivel up into a little prune and die before I’d feed from him.
“Yes, Nathan, I remember,” I said, my voice so frosty I was surprised icicles didn’t form in midair from my very breath. “I remember everything. I remember that I was stupid enough to believe in you. I remember that I was stupid enough to love you. I remember that I was stupid enough to give you everything I had so you could throw it back in my face when you were finished playing with me. Does that answer your question, or should I keep going?”
He lifted his head slowly, and I thought I saw a shadow of hurt cross his eyes before he hid it behind an unpleasant smirk. He had been around Zan too long. He was picking up his facial expressions.
And his perverted nature, too, apparently.
“I’m not,” he purred, using his body to press me closer to the wall and letting his hand slide down to grip my hip.
“You’re not what?” I snapped.
“I’m not finished playing with you,” he breathed, his other hand moving up my side.
When his hand slid past the hem of my skirt and started pushing it up, I felt my first tingle of fear. I was finally able to name that unpleasant gleam in his eyes when he trapped my gaze in his just as his hand caressed my bare hip. It was cruelty, plain and simple. He wanted to hurt me.
When the thumb of his other hand brushed the underside of my breast I turned away, feeling something I had never felt with him in all the time I had known him. In that moment, I felt dirty, cheap, and violated.
“If you’re going to display your charms, you have to expect someone to take you up on the offer,” he whispered in my ear when I turned my head and closed my eyes. “You belong to me, Ember. I don’t share my toys. And the next time you touch what doesn’t belong to you, Jordan, I’m going to rip your damn head off.”
I opened my eyes to see Tyler standing right behind Nathan, his expression murderous. His shimmering, aura was lit up so bright that it was hard to look at. The angrier he got the clearer it became—and the hungrier I became. I had to get away from them, both of them, and I needed to do it ASAP.
Before I did something I wouldn’t be around to regret.
“Take your hands off of her, Ashley.”
The calm tone of Tyler’s voice was more chilling than if he had yelled the order. The Tyler standing before me wasn’t the Tyler I knew. There was a sense of leashed violence about him that kind of scared the hell out of me, to be honest. Seeing the transformation from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde when it’s someone you think you know can be like that sometimes.
With another dark smile, Nathan slowly removed his hands, making sure to touch as much as possible as he did, and backed away. I tried to cover myself with my arms, so full of shame I felt sick, and Tyler immediately reached for me. Pulling me close to his side, he took off his jacket and wrapped it around my shoulders, hiding me from Nathan’s leering gaze. Even then I kept my eyes down, too ashamed to look at either of them, especially Nathan.
I hated him. I hated him for the way he had just treated me. I hated him for thinking I still belonged to him even after he had tossed me like I was less important than yesterday’s newspaper. I just hated him, period.
“Are you all right, beautiful?” Tyler asked softly, tilting my chin up with his thumbs.
I don’t know what he saw in my eyes, but one second he was standing there holding my face in his hands, and the next he was across the space dividing him and Nathan. He slammed him into the wall and then slammed his fist into Nathan’s face. It was the opportunity Nathan had been waiting for, apparently, because the fight was on.
“Stop it!” I screamed, running toward them just as Zan and Ainsley, followed by Kim and Blake, came tearing around the corner. When they ignored me and just kept punching each other, I ran faster and managed to get between them just as Nathan took another swing.
The side of my face felt like I had been hit by a train and the world exploded in a burst of light and color. He had put everything he had behind that punch and, had I still been human, I probably would have had a crushed skull. Undead or not, though, I was still going to be in some serious pain. My cheekbone was on fire and, judging by the way my jaw clicked when I tried to grit my teeth so I wouldn’t scream, I figured it was probably broken, too.
“Ember! Baby, I’m sorry!” Nathan cried, forgetting all about Tyler, when I screamed anyway and grabbed the side of my face. When he reached for me, I jerked away from him and backed up as fast as I could.
“Don’t touch me!” I hissed while trying not to move my mouth any more than necessary.
He took another step toward me, and I backed away faster, tripping on my stupid heels. I looked over my shoulder when someone broke my fall to find Kim glaring at Nathan, her eyes full of the reflection of the Witch Fire crackling all over her body.
“Blake, get Em out of here,” she hissed, never taking her eyes off Nathan.
“No, Kim!” She was out for blood. If I didn’t do something, she was going to kill Nathan. As much as he might have deserved it, I couldn’t let her do that. “He’s not worth it. Just take me home.” When she just kept glaring at Nathan, I basically begged. “Please, Kim!”
“Oh, no! What did you do?” Ainsley whispered in horror, her gaze darting back and forth between my swelling face and Nathan’s stricken expression. “Nate! What the hell did you do?”
“Shut up, Ainsley,” Zan growled. When Nathan started toward me, he placed a firm hand against his chest and held him back, shaking his head. “Bad idea, bro. Just
let her go.”
“Ember, he didn’t mean it,” Ainsley said, sounding close to tears. “He didn’t. You know he wouldn’t…”
I didn't know, though. After the way he had just treated me, I wasn't sure what he was capable of anymore. All I did know was that I wasn't going to stick around to find out.
I was just about to teleport Kim, Blake, Tyler and I out of there when I got the strangest feeling. I couldn’t explain it, but it wasn’t good.
Ainsley's head jerked up to stare at the rooftop above us just as a shot rang out. In the silence that followed she looked at me, her eyes wide, and then down at herself. I gasped when I saw blood blossoming from a hole in her midsection. She stumbled back a step, her mouth working but no sound coming out. Her eyes found mine again and held them even as she began to fall.
“Jordan! Get Ember out of here!” Nathan roared, already moving, as Zan caught Ainsley around the waist and lowered her gently to the ground.
I couldn’t tear my eyes from Ainsley’s face. She was still staring at me, her mouth working in that awful soundless way. When Tyler reached for me, I dodged him and ran forward instead. I had to know what she was saying. I had to hear what she was trying, with her dying breath, to tell me. I knew instinctively that it was more important than anything else.
From my first step, bullets rained down on all of us. When Nathan darted forward to intercept me, I dodged him, too. A bullet barely missed my skull, grazing my already screaming cheek instead, as I threw myself down next to Zan and Ainsley. He was literally protecting her with his own body.
If Zan seemed shocked when I appeared next to him, he seemed downright frightened when I pushed him off Ainsley’s limp form. I heard him growl at me when I wrapped my hand around Ainsley’s and teleported us out of there, but I couldn’t have cared less. He would just have to get over it. He could get out. The others could get out. Ainsley couldn’t. I had to save Ainsley.
And there was only one person I knew who could do that.
∞§∞§∞§∞
“Grams! Grams, help me!” I screamed, reappearing in the kitchen of Winters’ Bed & Breakfast where Grams had been staying since returning to town.
Given that my powers were still coming back after the bind she had put on me, I decided I’d been a little reckless. My head was spinning like a top and I felt really weird, lighter, like I’d expended too much energy too quickly. It only lasted a few seconds, but it was enough to send a little spasm of fear shooting through me that maybe I’d done something wrong.
I glanced down at Ainsley, hoping I wasn’t going to find only half of her draped in my arms. I felt my stomach tie itself in knots when I saw that she was almost gray and her lips had started to turn blue. Seeing her like that was enough to give me the added strength to lift her up onto the table. Blood was still pumping from the wound in her stomach and I backed away, trying not to be sick, as I screamed for Grams again, this time my voice shrill enough to shatter glass.
“Ember? What on earth are you doing here? Are you all right, child?”
I turned around to find Mrs. Amelia’s stooped little form standing in the kitchen door with nothing on but her nightgown. I frowned, wondering what the hell had happened to her. There was something distinctly unhealthy about her, and I wondered if she was sick. She seemed smaller to me than she’d been the last time I’d seen her—and at less than five feet tall, she’d been tiny enough to start with. It was like she was shrinking into herself or something. Patches of her tightly curled hair were gone, leaving nothing but flaky white scalp where they’d been. Her skin was paler than mine, which was really saying something, and it seemed to hang on her bones like it was just waiting for the opportunity to slide off.
What really threw me, though, was her aura. It was a sickly mish mash of colors that didn’t look right. The scent coming off of her was enough to turn my stomach, and I quickly held my breath, trying not to breathe it in.
“I need Grams,” I told her quickly, hoping I didn’t sound as disgusted as I suddenly felt. “My friend is hurt. I need Grams to heal her.”
She looked past me at the girl on the table and I saw her eyes widen in shock when she saw the blood pooling on her shiny mahogany table top. Before she could ask why there was a girl bleeding to death in her kitchen, I heard the sound of quickly approaching footsteps and breathed a sigh of relief when Grams appeared behind her, her cheeks still flushed with sleep and her eyes wide with fear.
“Help her!” I begged, turning my head in an effort to keep her from seeing the damage to my face. I was sure we’d get around to that eventually, but for the moment I needed her to concentrate on Ainsley. “Please, Grams! Please help her!”
Grams hurried over to the table and Ainsley’s tiny form with Mrs. Amelia trailing after her. Making sure to keep my head turned as much as possible, I watched the two older witches examine the gunshot wound in Ainsley’s stomach. I heard their soft voices as they talked about what would have to be done, but I tuned them out. The only thing I wanted to hear was that the girl would live. That was all that mattered. She had to live. I had to know what she was trying to tell me. Nothing else mattered.
I tried to ignore all of the blood pooled around Ainsley’s body, but the longer she laid there, the harder it became to look away. She was so pale and so small. How could anyone so small lose that much blood? It didn’t seem possible that she could even have that much blood to lose.
Grams and Mrs. Amelia kept up a running commentary as they worked, their experienced fingers moving quickly and efficiently. Even with both of them trying to save her, it still took them forever. There had been something different about the bullets the hunters were using, Grams told me during her examination, something that kept the blood from clotting.
“You can’t save her?” I asked in a whisper, staring at Ainsley’s pale face and blue-tinged lips. She was too young to die. She couldn’t have been more than twenty, for God’s sake!
“Yes, I can save her,” Grams said with a frown. “It’s just going to take a little longer because I don’t know what they used.”
By the time Grams and Mrs. Amelia had done all they could do for the tiny girl on the table, I had started to pace the kitchen like a caged animal at the zoo. I was making my way past her for what seemed like the millionth time when Grams turned to give me an irritated look—Grams hated it when people paced. I tried to turn my head, but I wasn’t quick enough. I saw her eyes flare wide at the sight of my bruised and swollen cheek, but rather than start screaming like a banshee, she just turned back to her patient.
“Perhaps you should step outside and get some fresh air, sweetheart,” she suggested without turning her attention from Ainsley. “My coat is hanging on the hook next to the door. We won’t be much longer here. I’ll come get you when we’re done.”
Her hand was held over the wound and it was glowing with bright golden light, so she didn’t see me nod. When I saw the way it was trembling, I knew her forced calm was all an act. Just as I cracked the door open, Grams’ voice rang out again, breaking the silence.
“And Ember? When I finish with your young friend here, I want to know what happened to you.”
That’s going to be a pleasant conversation, I thought.
I wouldn’t be able to get out of telling her what had happened to my face. That would lead to what had caused the fight between Tyler and Nathan in the first place. And that would lead to Grams trying to kill Nathan when she found him and me getting another wound when I tried to stop her. It was a vicious cycle, one I had a feeling I was just going to keep having to repeat.
I walked a little ways into the garden behind Mrs. Amelia’s house and found a convenient bench to sit down on. I inhaled deeply of the clean scent of the flowers around me, flowers that should have been long dead in the middle of winter. Yet there they were. All I can say is that Mrs. Amelia must have been one hell of a witch to keep that garden in full bloom all winter long. No wonder she was looking wrecked. I didn’t even want to
think about how much energy that had to take.
I could smell the fresh scent of snow in the air and shivered as my head fell back and my eyes drifted closed. You can, you know? Smell snow, that is. I can remember hanging out of my bedroom window as a kid, just sucking up that clean scent as I waited for the first snowflake to fall. The memory made me smile. What I wouldn’t give to go back to that time, to when monsters didn’t exist, and I wasn’t one of them.
It wasn’t long before Grams called me back inside—and it wasn’t a moment too soon, seeing as I had started to feel like a breathing Slushie again. Ainsley wasn’t on the table when I walked in and Mrs. Amelia was nowhere to be seen. There was only Grams, giving me a knowing look that was filled with regret.
“Did she…die?” I asked in a slurred whisper, trying to understand the expression on Grams’ face even as I tried not to see how bright and pretty her aura looked all the sudden. But, to my surprise, there was no scent to Grams, which meant there was nothing for my demon to focus on and salivate over.
“No, sweetheart, your friend is going to be fine. I put her in my room so I can keep an eye on her through the night.” That said, she just stood there, watching me like she could get the story of my unpleasant evening from my face alone. And my bruised and swollen face was probably telling quite the tale. “Ember, I want you stay here with me tonight. I’m worried about you. There’s something wrong here, and I can’t put my finger on what it is. All I know is that I have never felt the kind of sadness and despair that I feel coming from you.”
“I’m fine, Grams,” I mumbled, trying to make myself believe that. “I’ve just had a long night.”
Instead of continuing to press the matter, Grams walked over and enfolded me in a warm hug. I let her hold me, needing her comfort more than I needed the warmth of her skin. Because I wasn’t fine.
I was shattered, broken beyond repair.
There was nothing left for me to hold on to. Hope? Yeah, that was long gone. Faith? What a joke. All I had left was a lot of painful memories and a broken heart.