by Dave Ferraro
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“What are you doing, Cameron?”
Cameron gasped and ran on to the shoulder briefly before straightening his car back on to the road. Or more precisely, Shanna’s car, since his had been totaled during the werewolf attack. After he righted the car and took a few calming breaths to appease his racing heart, he glared into the rear view mirror, where Tessa had appeared in the backseat, looking back at him expectantly. Her shock of blue eyes unnerved him, as they seemed to drill into his mind, even through the reflection, as if his thoughts were naked to her. She also looked somewhat unhappy.
“This is not the timeline we agreed upon,” Tessa said, crossing her arms. “You were to wait two days time before bringing Shanna to us. The other members of La Faer Noir who must be present will not arrive-”
“It couldn’t be helped,” Cameron snapped, cutting her off. “The hunters found a way to stop your dream demon.”
Tessa sat up straight, her eyes wide. “That’s…incredible.” She nodded to herself. “They make for worthy adversaries, after all.”
“I’m glad you approve.”
“Of the other hunters, at least,” Tessa said coldly. “You, on the other hand, seem to keep making a mess of things.”
Cameron frowned. “This wasn’t my fault. You said that Shanna would be unconscious for days, that I could sneak her up here in the middle of the night, where Lupe would call off the mark and Shanna would wake up all disoriented so she would follow me into this chamber that she had to enter willingly. I have to say: Not going so smoothly.”
“How do they plan to dispatch the assassin?”
“They’re using the siren to draw him to her in their dreams, then they’ll physically hold him and awaken, drawing him out with them.”
“Clever,” Tessa smiled, tapping her lips. “Very clever.”
“So, what do I do?” Cameron asked.
“Keep driving and hope that she remains compliant when she awakens.”
“Remains compliant? How am I-”
“That’s not our problem,” Tessa told him coldly. “You either carry this out to the very end or our agreement is void and all that you’ve been through will have been for nothing.”
Cameron felt a chill go up his spine. “I’ll get her there.”
“You’d better.”
“But how will…” He let his voice trail off as he noted that Tessa was no longer visible in his rear view mirror. He took another calming breath, then glanced over at Shanna, slumped against the door in the passenger seat. She looked peaceful, still sleeping soundly. He couldn’t resist reaching out and running a hand through her golden hair, then double checking her seat belt. Safe and secure.
He sighed, and looked ahead, where the darkness shied away from his headlights as he drove along the lonely highway that would bring him to New York City, where he would deliver Shanna into the hands of the enemy.
He swallowed hard. Of course Shanna would never agree to join them, but that wouldn’t matter in the end. He would get his reward no matter what, as soon as he arrived in that room, past that stupid magickal barrier that had been the cause of all this hassle.
But everything seemed so out of control. By now, the others would have noticed Shanna missing. And it wouldn’t be too much longer before they also noted Cameron was gone. And from there, it wouldn’t take a genius to realize the connection between the assassins and himself. Maybe they wouldn’t be able to figure out what sort of part he played in all of this, but they would know that he had his hands in it. And Felicia…
He slammed his fist down onto the steering wheel, which let out a short protesting honk, before running his hand back through his hair. He could never go back. His life with the hunters was over. If they hadn’t figured out how to stop The Sandman, if Felicia hadn’t been so damn sensitive, this would have gone smoothly, and in a few days, he would be back amongst them with a smiling new face. But no, it had all gone to hell. And he had no one to blame but himself. He’d made a deal with the devil and now he would have to deal with the consequences.
“What?” Shanna sat up in her seat and brushed her hair back before stifling a yawn. She rubbed her eyes and cracked her neck, sighing contentedly at the sound it made. “I feel like I’ve been asleep for ages.”
Cameron stared at her for a moment, panicked and unsure of how to proceed, but he found a smile pulling at his lips before long. “My sleeping beauty.”
Shanna grinned over at him, then frowned as she squinted out of the windshield. “What…where are we?”
“I’m surprising you with a little vacation,” Cameron lied, his mind whirring as he scrambled to come up with a plausible excuse for why they were leaving Lime Bay. “Valor approved it. I thought it would be nice if we got away for a bit. We deserve it, after all. And she thought it would be nice for you to wake up far away from all of the trouble.”
Shanna blinked stupidly at him for a moment, but nodded slowly after a minute. “That is nice, I suppose. But what about the dream demon? Did it work? Did Serene draw him out? Is he dead?”
“It all worked out fine,” Cameron nodded. “You were just asleep longer after the fact than we expected. Didn’t wake up right away.”
“Then why am I here? Shouldn’t Jade be looking over me? And what about Felicia’s funeral? It must be soon. This doesn’t seem like a…”
She stopped and looked over at him, a look that Cameron knew at once went way beyond the point of suspicion. She knew. She knew he was lying to her.
Swallowing hard, Cameron nodded to himself. “Alright. I lied.”
“Lied?” Shanna looked hard at him. “What are you talking about? What’s going on here, Cameron?” She backed up against the door, as if she could put much space between them in the tiny vehicle.
Cameron’s cheek twitched. “La Faer Noir is calling a little truce. They want to talk to you.” He glanced over at her. “Just talk, that’s all. They want you to hear them out, no tricks, and I agreed to bring you.”
She stared at him. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did you agree to bring me?”
“Because I…” he hesitated. “They were convincing. I thought you should decide for yourself where you wanted your future to go. You saw what The Agency has to offer you. Now you can see what La Faer Noir has.”
“Cameron, La Faer Noir consists of monsters.”
Cameron nodded. “I’m not expecting you to join them…”
“Then why bring me here at…”
Shanna’s voice trailed off and Cameron glanced over at Shanna nervously, noting how pale she’d gone.
“It was you the entire time,” she said, then laughed to herself. “My god, I’ve been blind.”
“Shanna…”
“No, no,” she put out her hand to stop him. “Let me see if I have this straight. You arranged for this dream demon to…to violate me, so you could transport me to La Faer Noir.”
Cameron reached out to her. “Shanna-”
“I said no!” she slapped his hand away and glared into his eyes with such rage that he flinched. “I want to get this worked out first. You sicked this dream demon on me. And the werewolves…was that you too?”
Swallowing, Cameron nodded meekly.
“I don’t get it,” Shanna frowned. “What did they have to do with any of this?”
“They were a distraction,” Cameron said, suddenly feeling defeated. It was evident that she would understand the truth eventually, so he may as well get this over with. It felt a little like giving up, but maybe if he could convince her that he’d been acting with good intentions, then things would be alright between them in the end. Maybe she would understand. “Shanna, I never meant for it to go this far.”
“Wait, wait, wait, I got it!” Shanna clapped her hands. “Brett disappeared in the dream. He just vanished for no good reason. That must have been you untying hi
m from my hand so you could carry my unconscious body out to the car and whisk me away to the monsters! Am I getting warm?” She looked over at him expectantly. “I think I am. And it goes without saying that you knocked out Hunter and Jade.”
“They’ll be fine,” he protested quietly.
“I’m sure they will be. This all seemed to work out fine and dandy for you, didn’t it? Except that the werewolves killed Felicia. Didn’t expect things to get that out of hand, did you?”
“She wasn’t supposed to die.”
“You seem real chocked up about it.”
“I am!” He turned on her suddenly, unsure of where the anger was coming from, but needing an outlet. “I didn’t want any of this to happen! I’m not a bad guy, but I’m trying to live with the cards I’ve been dealt, okay? My glamour was fading! What the hell was I supposed to do, huh? Watch you grow even more distant? Watch you wince every time you caught a glimpse of my good side?”
“I never-”
“Don’t kid yourself, Shanna. You were disgusted with how I looked. You hated the idea of being with a disfigured boyfriend about as much as I hated being one. No denying it. I felt you suppress enough shudders when you kissed me over the past few weeks, even before you could see this blasted thing. Just knowing it was there was bad enough, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, so now this is all my fault?” Shanna asked, shaking her head. “Unbelievable. Unbe-fucking-lievable. You’re such a victim here, kidnapping an unconscious girl and marking all of your friends for assassination. Just so you can look pretty again. But you’re right, this is all on me.”
“I didn’t say it was your fault.”
“At least we can agree on that,” Shanna said. “You’re a real piece of work, Cameron.”
“I had an opportunity to make our lives better,” Cameron said, trying his best to reign in his emotions and refrain from yelling. “La Faer Noir could fix things. I accepted their offer. It’s a little chat. That’s it.”
“It was my decision to make.”
“And it still is.”
Shanna shook her head. “Cameron, you…it’s like you’re trying to justify all of this, but what you did was wrong. Plain wrong. And you know it. You…you betrayed us, again and again. Just stuck a knife right in our…backs…” She paused, then looked at him sideways. “Just how far…”
Cameron swallowed hard as he turned and met her eyes again. They stared at each other for a moment, a moment that seemed to last for hours, as something passed between them, an understanding. They both knew exactly what Cameron had done. In Shanna’s eyes, Cameron found shock, horror, disbelief and a glimmer of sympathy. But beyond all of those, he saw fear. The fear was wide and yawning and overwhelmed everything else. And in that moment, he knew that he’d lost her.
Suddenly time resumed and Cameron found the steering wheel jerking in his hands. He tried to hold fast and right the car as it swerved off of the road, but Shanna jabbed her elbow into Cameron’s chest, causing him to lose his grip and, ultimately, the battle. Slamming on the brakes to avoid killing them both, Cameron closed his eyes as the car careened off of the road and bounced hard as it dropped several feet to a grassy field. The car spun out of control, but didn’t flip as it rolled to a stop, dust and smoke obscuring Cameron’s vision as nausea threatened to overwhelm him.
He heard a car door open and suddenly a blast of cool night air seemed to slap him into action. He hastily unbuckled his seat belt and pushed open his door, stumbling to the ground in his panic to catch up to Shanna.
“Wait!” he chocked out as he got to his feet. He leaned against the car and looked around the dark field, knee-high grass swaying gently with the wind as if something significant weren’t happening to him. He took a step and his boots sank into soft dirt, damp from a recent rainfall. Then he saw Shanna running across the field toward a treeline. “Shanna, wait! I won’t…I won’t hurt you! Shanna!”
He scrambled after her, gaining on her quickly with his long legs. She was stumbling, tripping over the grass in her desperation to get away. From him. It made him sick to his stomach.
Before long, he’d reached her, well ahead of the treeline, and tackled her to the ground.
He pinned her legs down with his knees, but couldn’t stop her hands from continuing to assail him. As he tried to gain control of them, she clawed at his face, ripping into his face scar viciously, tearing his cheek open painfully.
He screamed as he put a hand up to his bloody wound, and cursed as he grabbed hold of one of her wrists with his free hand, although that didn’t stop her from attacking with her other arm.
“Stop it!” he screamed, letting go of his face and grabbing her other free hand. He shoved her arms over her head, firmly against the ground, and stared down into her face, breathing hard.
She glared up at him, teeth bared, looking feral and a little…frightening.
“You’re coming with me,” Cameron said, after he’d gained control of his voice again. “I have no choice, Shanna. I’m sorry I’ve hurt you. I’m sorry that it had to come to this. But you’re coming with me.”
Shanna stopped struggling and laid her head back against the ground, the fight going out of her. “Yeah? And what if I refuse?”
“You don’t have a choice.”
A crunching sounded from behind Cameron and he froze, tilting his head as someone said “I beg to differ.”
Cameron suddenly found himself on his back, the wind knocked out of him. He pressed a hand to his chest and tried to focus through the pain and shock. Then he stood upright as he took in the dark hair and mocking smile of a vampire. Damien Farr.
“You don’t look happy to see me,” Damien observed, flashing him a smile. “Am I interrupting something?”