by Cara Coe
We both fell silent. My mind was too crowded for anymore questions and Alex looked beat. My emotions warred with each other; part of me wanted to soothe the worry off his face and the rest of me wanted to land a solid heel into his groin.
“I’ll get you out of the city and then you can have at me with a machete. Leave me in the dust. Go somewhere on your own. Whatever you want. I just need you to be safe.”
Weighing my options didn’t take long because I didn’t have many. Without Alex’s help: strapped to a hospital bed with a handful of vamps who want to harvest my blood for research as they resist the temptation to drain me as they starve to death. With Alex’s help: …I glanced at him. He looked concerned. And scared. Wary of my wrath. The same way he looked the last time I woke up in a hospital bed. Whatever his reasons for withholding all this from me – and he was definitely going to pay (painfully) for doing so – I had zero doubt he loved me. And I couldn’t just shut off what I felt for him.
“Will you please come with me?” he asked quietly when I took too long to respond.
I blew out a large breath and gave him a play on our running joke. “Not if you were the last vampire on earth.”
Relief flooded his eyes and he shot up to start throwing a bag together. “Liar,” he called over his shoulder.
“You got me…hey, how about letting me up first?”
He shook his head. “I will when it’s time to run. Until then, you stay put in case someone comes. Just give me a second.”
He quickly put the essentials he had within reach into his bag. He spoke low and quickly as he did it. “We’ll have to move fast. You’re going to go down to the garage and hide until I get there. I’ll make my way down the hallway to where the dogs are sleeping. Will they come with me?”
I thought about the way they’d warmed up to him over the past few weeks, even sitting at his feet sometimes instead of near me when we were hanging out in his room. It was like they sensed my attachment to him and grew attachments of their own by proxy.
“I think so. But Alex-” it hurt me to say this because I loved those three. “-I don’t want you taking that risk if it means something would happen to you. I need you to be safe, too.”
“Almost everybody thinks you’re here against your will.” He moved to the door and looked both ways before coming back to work on my restraints. “They don’t suspect that you’ll be free to go. Just wait in the garage. I can still move around wherever I want. I’ll bring the dogs and we’ll head out.”
“Okay.” I rubbed my released wrist then paused. “Wait, almost everybody?”
Alex frowned and rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, I think Jade’s caught on that it’s just a ruse.”
“Jade? Jade Jade?”
My mouth dropped open. Ex-girlfriend Jade?
“Uh…yeah.”
Fuck, she was pretty. Of course.
“Your first love is here too? Excellent. This day keeps getting better and better.”
Alex groaned. “Tasha.” He moved around the bed to stand before me, bent down and pressed a hard kiss to my mouth. I melted against him and he softened it, bringing a hand up to stroke my cheek. When he pulled away his eyes were serious. “That was the past. It’s over and done. What I have now with you? I’m trying to save that. So we’ll fight about Jade all you want. On the road.”
I felt chastised and silly. “Yeah, okay, sorry.”
“No, let’s fight about it now,” came a voice from the doorway. Alex and I turned to see that Vince guy looking back and forth between us.
“Shit,” we hissed in unison.
Chapter 34
Him
Vince stood in the doorway with Ike and Jade behind him. I shot her a dirty look and she shrugged but her eyes looked apologetic.
Vince walked over to Tasha and pulled her towards Ike who held her from behind. She struggled but his strategic grip meant that it didn’t do much good. I moved towards them angrily, but Vince put a forearm up to my chest.
“Easy way or hard way, Alex?” he asked.
I shoved him off me. “Fucking hard way!”
I raised a fist but Tasha screamed “Alex!” and I paused before I could swing. My eyes flicked to hers. She’d stopped struggling and she was holding one hand up in surrender.
“Easy way, Alex. Okay? Look, I’ll go wherever you want. Draw my blood or whatever. Just…let’s not start going to blows.”
Vince looked between the two of us and smiled. “She’s smart. What’s your name?”
Tasha’s eyes hardened as her face turned to stone. I knew that look. I knew that silence. She was locked up. Her go-to when she felt vulnerable. I didn’t want Vince to feel like he had to break her.
“Jenny,” I supplied. “Her name’s Jenny.”
“Or you could call me Retaliation,” she snapped at him. “If you bring your balls closer to my foot, I can show you how I got that nickname.”
I stifled my groan. Oh, her temper was going to make this so much harder.
Vince only chuckled. “Ike, take her down the hallway and keep an eye on her.” He turned to face me with genuine appreciation. “I like her.”
“The feeling is not mutual!” Tasha called out over her shoulder as Ike pulled her from the room.
Vince’s amusement slowly evaporated from his face and he appraised the situation. I was still glaring at him, unable to reign in my own feelings.
“I knew I couldn’t trust you anymore,” he said.
“When have you ever trusted me?” I griped kicking the foot of my bed. All the anger I had for Vince was still coiled in my muscles and I had to release it somewhere.
“There used to be a time,” Vince insisted.
“Yeah, before we lived in times of extremes. I’ve discovered we’re two very different people. I don’t believe in getting to the end by any means necessary. I don’t want to get to the end if it means a monster will stand in my place. I won’t become who they think we are.”
Vince shook his head. “And I will look out for my people. Even you.” His eyes looked sad. “We’re not going to hurt her. But we are going to survive.”
“You can’t breed her!”
“We are going to survive,” Vince repeated in a harder tone.
“I love her.”
“Clearly. All the more reason I’m going to be extra careful.”
I lunged for Vince but he dodged and I got a face full of my mattress instead. I whirled around, still swinging and managed to connect with his cheek. He stumbled backwards, stunned, but still sound enough to block my subsequent blows. I was fighting mad, not smart, just looking to hit any flesh my fist could find.
“Jesus Christ, cut it out!” Jade yelled stepping in between us and I had to reel back to avoid punching her in the face. I lowered my fist but my eyes still cut through her with my glare.
“What else was I supposed to do?” she hissed at me under her breath.
“Kept your god damn mouth shut!” I yelled back.
Her face was pinched into one of remorse but her eyes looked satisfied. Squawking to Vince was her revenge, her way of ending Tasha.
By that time Xavier and Trent had heard the commotion and they burst into my room and got a strong grip on either side of me, holding me in place. Vince straightened and adjusted his shirt.
“What I’m going to do to your human would be deplorable in any other circumstance, so I’ll let you have that hit for free,” he said, wiping the blood from his nose. “But I’m afraid we’re going to have to lock you in your lab until she can safely be moved to a secure, unknown location.” He paused and when he spoke again, there was pain in his voice. “I’m sorry, Alex.”
And then I was forcefully taken to my lab.
Chapter 35
Her
I am not alone.
I sat across from the tall red-headed vamp in a cold, unoccupied hospital room. I was cross-legged on the bed. My legs were falling asleep. We’d been in this room for hours. The vamp only rose mo
mentarily when one of his friends leaned into the doorway to speak to him in hushed tones. Still, I didn’t reposition. I didn’t drink the water he offered me. I didn’t speak to him or ask him questions, or worry about what was about to be done with me.
The only thought pulsing through my head was that I was not alone.
Alex and I weren’t it.
My paintings meant something.
Sure, Alex’s account on the world today meant my chances of finding another human were quite slim and the chances of me being eaten were quite high. But if I still made it in this vampy world, running around Tucson by myself and living day after day in solitude, then there most definitely had to be a Wichita or a Boise or a Gainsville version of me.
As that overwhelming thought settled on me and began to dissipate, it made room for my current predicament.
I eyed the vamp warily.
He eyed me back.
“What’s going to happen to Alex?”
He smiled with almost an amused twinkle. The expression looked foreign on him. I’d only known him five minutes and the serious set of his features defined his face. It looked odd, replacing them with this smile.
“That’s the first question you have for me?” he asked. “His welfare?”
“Yes.”
I stared at him and instead of responding he withdrew a crumpled paper from the pocket on the side of his pants.
“Did you draw this?” he asked.
Alex’s wrinkled face looked back at me. He wasn’t finished yet. I hadn’t completed the shading on his hair. I’d exhausted myself trying to get the eyes just right. They always had something going on in them, those eyes, and capturing it on paper was turning into one of my greatest feats. When I finally felt like I had it, the drawing and I needed a breather.
“You ruined it,” I muttered, trying to smooth it out.
“My name is Ike.”
I looked at him, feeling frustrated. “Okay. I will file that away in my brain under Things I Don’t Give a Shit About. What will happen to Alex?”
“That depends on you.”
I scowled. “I already said I’d cooperate. Poke me or test me or do whatever it is you need to do to make more food.”
“I’m not interested in that.”
I raised my eyebrows in a question.
“You have an attachment to this vamp that I don’t see often. And he to you. It’s genuine and it’s strong and I’ve come to realize this in a very short time. I’ve only been here a couple of hours.”
“And a fine mess you made of this place in that time.”
My barbs didn’t slow him down. “I read people. I’m an excellent judge of character.”
I raised my eyebrows in disbelief. “I’m supposed to gather that from your present company?”
“No, you’re supposed to realize that’s why I’m going to tell you something I don’t tell anyone.”
Now he had me. I pulled my short hair into a stub of a ponytail and watched him expectantly.
He continued.
“In a minute when things calm down, we’re going to wherever you have a gun stashed. You’re going to clock me over the head. Leave a pretty good bruise on my temple. Then you’re going to get Alex out of his lab and leave the city. I have a map for you. A settlement of humans. It’s in a place called Goose Prairie, Washington, about four hours outside of Seattle. That’s where you can go. And be safe.”
“A what of what?” I was bewildered. What was he saying?
“I’m like him. Your friend, Alex. I have a human family. I was in the military during the outbreak. When The Sweep was getting deadly, I deserted and went to Washington to save them. They were immune from the virus but my kind kept eating the surviving humans. I helped them set up a colony off the grid. Very little electricity. No cars. It’s a hard hike to get to it. Once in a while, when I come across a human who I think has the good sense not to jeopardize innocent people, I take them to the colony so they can live safely. It’s why I roam around with these idiots.”
I was stunned into silence. Ike was watching me with pursed lips. “At first, I thought I’d have to figure out how to get you out of here alone,” he continued. “But when I saw that-” he pointed to the drawing. “And when I overheard him trying to save you, I knew. That he was like me. And he’s your best option out of here.”
“I have three dogs-”
“Three German shepherds. I saw them. Vince had me lock them in their cages. They attacked us and it took all four of us to wrangle the two that were out. I loaded them into a moving truck in the garage when Vince asked me to do a perimeter search. The one we drove up in. Leave with that and take any keys to vehicles you have when you do.”
I looked at him curiously and he could read the Why? all over my face. He answered my silent question.
“If I were in Alex’s position and you were my girl, I’d want someone like me to help. This human-vamp war has stripped everything decent about us. I don’t want to lose that part of me.”
I nodded slowly, coming out of my stunned state. “So you want me to hit you?” I asked incredulously.
He nodded. “Yes. On the temple.”
“And leave a bruise?”
“Yes. It’ll look more realistic if you do it than if I try to do it to myself.” He leaned over to tighten a loose lace on his boot.
I stared at the back of his head in disbelief. Another vamp, willing to stick his neck out to help me. I ought to thank him. Once again, the words got caught in my throat. Instead, I found myself saying, “This may be the most ridiculous act of self sacrifice I’ve ever witnessed and I watched Tommy Delaney take a diving hit of a brown bag bomb for this blondie in pigtails he had a thing for.”
“That’s flaming dog shit in a brown paper bag right?” Ike asked as he tightened his other boot.
“That’s right,” I confirmed.
Ike finished tying his shoes and looked at me. “Tommy sounds like my kind of guy.”
I stood up from my spot on the bed and let out a short sigh. “Ike, is it? I’m Tasha.”
Chapter 36
Her
I used the key Ike handed me to unlock the chain on the lab then I punched in the numbers nervously.
1912.
I slipped my shoes off in the entryway and glided in quietly towards the back over the loud hum of the machines.
They were easy enough to find. Alex was at his desk dropping liquid from a dropper onto red disks and a stocky vamp was standing behind him keeping watch.
I cocked the gun and pressed the barrel up behind the vamp’s right ear. His stance went completely rigid but he didn’t turn. Alex whirled around with surprised eyes.
“Tasha?!”
“This is the part of your brain that controls regeneration, right?” I asked slowly and nudged the barrel against his scalp a little harder. I could feel his head move with a nervous gulp.
“That’d be the spot,” Alex answered in an almost cheerful tone.
“Listen, vamp, you don’t know me so let me fill you in on a little background information. My father was retired military and he had many guns. He taught me how to shoot each and every one of them. I’ve killed my own people so don’t assume I’ll take the time to think twice about blowing off your right ear. I don’t have that kind of time.”
Alex looked at me as if he were seeing a new side of me. In a way, I suppose he was. It’s one thing to describe to him the more grisly parts of my life over the phone. It’s an entirely different beast to be confronted with that side in person. I could feel the survival instinct channeling through me, down my arm, and into the hand that squeezed the butt of the gun. It didn’t shake this time. I was a little scared of the calm in the pit of my stomach. I knew if I had to fire to save Alex, I would.
“Alex, back pocket,” I instructed him and he eased around us to come up behind me and pull Ike’s present to me out of my jeans pocket. A pair of handcuffs. Alex didn’t need me to tell him what to do next. He circled back ar
ound and had the vamp hold out his hands before cuffing him to one of the thick pipes on the machine. With the threat gone, I stuck the gun back into my waistband.
A relieved sigh released itself from me as the adrenaline evaporated. If I held the gun now, it would tremble. I squeezed my fingers to keep them from starting.
Alex came over to me and rubbed my upper arms. “Are you ok?” he asked and I nodded. He swiveled and looked at the vamp.
“Sorry, Trent, I’ll leave the key where the others can find it soon enough. But we can’t stay.”
Trent glared at him. “He was doing it for your own good,” he snarled angrily. “You know Vince is right.”
Alex shook his head. “We never agreed on this kind of stuff. Take care of yourself.”
Alex put a hand to the small of my back and guided me towards the door. Their exchange left me feeling a little guilty. These vamps were just trying to survive like everyone else.
I leaned in to whisper to Alex. “Maybe I should leave a couple of pints of blood behind. I mean, they were your friends. And the tall red headed one was pretty decent.”
“They didn’t want your blood, they wanted to breed you.”
Breed me?
I yanked the gun out of the back of my waistband and whirled to head back to the vamp who was still sneering at me. The gun was straight out in front of me and pointed at his vampy little head as I walked.
“Oh, hell no!” I exclaimed as my eyes zeroed in on his smirk.
I felt Alex’s arm circle around my waist as he picked me up turned me back around. His eyes met the fire in mine as his other hand captured the gun and clicked the safety back on. He tucked it into his belt.
“Let’s go, Rambo,” he said guiding me to the door once again, with a stronger arm this time.
When we got back to the door, I shuffled back into my shoes as Alex replaced the chain, making it appear undisturbed. My heart started pounding at the thought of Vince or one of the other vamps rounding the corner and catching us.