Crave

  Am I really getting weaker faster? Do I need the blood so often? Or am I just jonesing and so I convince myself that I’m weaker so I can get a hit? God, even knowing what Gabriel has planned, I still want his blood.

  The blood is a complete rush. It’s like I can feel every vein glowing inside me as Gabriel’s blood is pumped through my body. Maybe that doesn’t sound good—but it feels amazing. Sometimes I can even feel individual blood cells bouncing off the walls of the veins. I guess not just veins. Arteries and capillaries, too. It’s kind of like that song. The “it tickles my nose” one.

  But the visions … They weren’t all happy and feel-good. The one where Gabriel saw Ernst kill a human was horrific. Even Gabriel thought so. And then, the vision of the cave that night—I don’t even know if I can describe it in words. Annihilation. Genocide. Extermination. Obliteration. They all apply, but they don’t give the emotion I felt when I—I mean, Gabriel—witnessed almost his whole family wiped out.

  How can he not understand that I will feel everything he did if he kills my mother and Martin? Maybe not everything. Gabriel saw so many slaughtered. But not one of his parents. The thought of losing Mom—I can hardly take it in. It’s like my brain jerks away from it.

  I guess you can’t compare one kind of grief with another. Or at least it’s pointless if you do. But I expected Gabriel to realize what he’d be doing to me. I’m sure there are people he’d do anything to keep alive. Sam, and Ernst. Can’t he understand that it’s why my mother and Martin did what they did?

  Or maybe not Martin. Gabriel says Martin was using me. But how can I trust anything Gabriel says? He pretended everything was all right between us. He even kissed me back, and all the time he was planning to use me as bait.

  What I do know is that Martin was always kind to me. No matter what he did to Gabriel, he treated me well.

  And my mother … I know with absolute certainty that whatever she did, she did to keep me alive. Her entire life has been about me for seventeen years. And now her death will be about me too.

  Mom told me Gabriel was a killer. Maybe I should have taken her more seriously.

  Shay’s cell rang again. Sixteenth time. But this time was different. This time Gabriel heard the phone. He didn’t say anything, but she could feel his body tense as he lay next to her.

  He rolled onto his side, so he was facing her, and quickly untied the knot that held their wrists together. He had her feet free a moment later.

  “I have to return that call,” Shay told him, her voice rough because her throat was so dry after the endless day.

  Gabriel raised one eyebrow. Shay translated the eyebrow move as—who are you to demand anything?

  Shay changed her approach. “Gabriel, I asked my best friend to give my mom some fake information. She told my mother that I was going to Miami to have some fun before I die.”

  “When?”

  “When what? When did I talk to her?” Shay asked. Gabriel gave a brief nod. “That would be during the days when you were dead asleep and I could’ve taken off any time I wanted to. But I didn’t.”

  “Why did you come back?” He sounded almost as if he wished she hadn’t.

  “I told you already. I wanted to make sure you were safe,” Shay told him. “I thought I owed you something, because all of this was about getting blood for me.”

  She felt anger swell up inside her again.

  “Listen, I don’t care if you want to throw my phone in the trash. I just thought you should know that the only way Olivia would help me was if I promised to check in every day. I’m the Sick Girl, remember? My friends want to know that I’m okay. I’m not sure what she’ll do if I don’t call her back. Maybe she’ll alert the police; I don’t know.”

  Gabriel picked up her cell and handed it to her. “Put it on speaker and play the messages.”

  The first three calls were from Olivia, like Shay had thought they would be. They were all variations of “Call me.”

  What can I say if Gabriel lets me call her back? He’ll definitely have the whole call on speaker, but maybe I can find some way to sneak in a coded message, Shay thought. Olivia knew so much about her. At the very least, Shay should be able to signal that everything was not okay, even if she couldn’t tell her she was at the Skyview Motel in Shawsville, Virginia, being held captive by a vampire.

  The next message yanked Shay away from her thoughts. Tears sprang up in Shay’s eyes as soon as she heard the familiar voice.

  “Shay? It’s Mommy,” the message said. “I’m staying at the Royal Palm. I’m not leaving Miami without you. Call me, sweetheart. We have to talk. I have to make you understand. I’m here, Shay. I’m here for you. Call my cell or call me here.” Her mother rattled off the phone number at the hotel. “I love you, baby,” she added before the voice mail cut off.

  “I guess your friend followed through with your plan,” Gabriel commented. He was rubbing his finger around a white water ring on the dresser, as if the thing fascinated him.

  “Of course she did,” Shay answered, not mentioning that she’d had her own doubts about whether Olivia would be too worried about Shay to do what Shay had asked.

  Gabriel gestured for her to continue playing the messages, still not quite looking at her. Message after message was from Olivia. Still basically “Call me” messages, some angry, some worried, some threatening, some pleading.

  Then came something different. It was another message from Olivia, but her voice was urgent and she spoke so quickly that it was a little hard to understand her.

  “Shay, oh my God. Martin just came over. He pretty much interrogated me. He thinks I know something, and he kept telling me you would die without medical care,” Olivia said in a burst. “What’s going on, Shay? Are you okay? I’m picturing you passed out somewhere without me to pick you up. The cops found Martin’s car in Virginia someplace. He reported it stolen. I should have said that first, sorry. He said you took his car, but he reported it yesterday because he’s getting desperate. He says if you die, it’ll be my fault because I won’t tell him where you are. Shay, call me. Are you in Virginia? I think Martin might come for you.”

  Virginia! Martin knew they were in Virginia. Please let him be on the way, Shay thought, with the hawthorn that will knock Gabriel out. She didn’t want Gabriel chained up back in Martin’s lab, but she needed him disabled for a while, long enough for her to explain to her mom and Martin that Gabriel wanted to kill them. She had to save her mother’s life.

  Gabriel strode to the window. Shay followed, listening to the end of Olivia’s message. “I hope that you’re safe. Call me. You have to call me.”

  “Range Rover’s gone,” Gabriel announced. “We’re leaving. Now.”

  Had Martin taken the car? Or had the police just towed it? Stay calm, Shay told herself. Stay focused. This is going to be the time to escape. If Gabriel had to choose between getting captured again and letting her go, he’d have to let her go.

  Gabriel grabbed her by the hand, jerked open the door, and ran out into the dark parking lot. In the same moment, the door of the motel office swung open. And Martin walked out.

  “Martin!” Shay screamed. She wanted Martin’s attention and she wanted an audience. She wanted Gabriel to run. And she wanted to get into Martin’s car and go home. Home!

  The clerk stepped out of the office behind Martin. Good. Shay tried to twist her hand out of Gabriel’s iron grasp. “Let me go!” she shrieked. “It’s over! You go back to your family and let me go back to mine.”

  “You need me to call the cops?” the clerk asked Martin.

  “I’ve got it covered. Go back inside,” Martin ordered. He started toward them, and Shay saw the flash of a syringe in his hand.

  “He’s got hawthorn. Just go,” Shay begged Gabriel. “Please.”

  Gabriel abruptly released her hand, and for one miraculous second, Shay thought he was going to do what she’d said and walk away. That this could end without Martin dying or Gabriel being recaptured.<
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  Then, with a hiss, Gabriel’s fangs extended, and he began moving toward Martin.

  No. Shay wasn’t going to let this happen. She hurled herself at her stepfather, slamming both hands into his chest. He staggered back a step. “He’s going to kill you. We have to get out of here. Now! That’s your rental car, right?” She started toward the sleek sedan parked in front of the office.

  Martin didn’t follow her. He kept striding toward Gabriel as if he hadn’t even seen or heard her. Shay didn’t think. She just reacted, putting herself between Gabriel and Martin right before they reached each other. Again, she planted her hands on Martin’s chest. “Martin, I know everything. I’m sorry if it ruins your chance to make a big breakthrough, but I don’t want this. Even if you get Gabriel back in the lab, I’m not taking his blood. I know you want to save me, and that’s the only way to do it, but I won’t. Let’s leave. More people are watching.” It was true, she’d seen a curtain flick open in one of the rooms. “There’s no way for this to end well.”

  “Get out of the way,” Martin told her.

  “Get out of the way, Shay,” Gabriel echoed.

  “No.” Shay tightened her fingers on Martin’s lapels and tried to push him toward the car. It was like pushing on a brick wall. Martin was the size of a linebacker, and Shay was small and thin. “Martin,” she begged.

  He looked down at her for one brief second, his eyes meeting hers. Then he backhanded her across the face.

  Shay fell to her knees, her head slamming against a beat-up car parked next to her. She blinked, stunned. How could Martin have done that, Martin who had always been so gentle with every procedure she’d needed?

  “Stay there. This isn’t about you,” Martin ordered. He raised the syringe, and he and Gabriel began to circle each other.

  Shay climbed to her feet and stumbled between Martin and Gabriel again, the world spinning wildly around her. “Stop it. This is insane.”

  “Move!” Martin shouted. “I won’t tell you again.”

  Shay’s knees buckled, and she fought to stay on her feet. She didn’t know if it was from the pain in her head—she could feel blood coursing from her forehead down her cheek and chin—or from shock. Gabriel had said that Martin didn’t care about her. He’d said Martin was obsessed with his scientific prize. With his vampire. Shay hadn’t wanted to believe it, even though her own brain and instincts had begun whispering the same thing.

  She was a part of Martin’s research too. That’s what she was to him, another lab rat. Maybe that’s why he’d even married her mom—so he could have Shay at his disposal. But she was expendable. There were other people with other blood disorders he could use in his experiments. It would be a lot harder to get another vampire.

  Martin darted around her, hypodermic held high. Shay threw herself at him and grabbed his wrist with both hands, trying to keep the needle immobilized. “Gabriel, go! Go to your family. Please!”

  Like begging him would do anything. He was as obsessed as Martin. All Gabriel wanted was vengeance. All Martin wanted was glory.

  “Goddamn you, Shay. Let go!” Martin pried one of her hands away, bending back the fingers until Shay screamed from the pain. She heard Gabriel hiss with fury. Martin kept his grip on her hand and used it to fling her away from him. Shay braced herself to slam into the cement again, but it didn’t happen.

  Instead, she was rising up. Gabriel had caught her in his arms. He turned and ran to the opposite end of the parking lot. Martin was behind them, but he wasn’t nearly as fast.

  Gabriel used his fist to smash in the window of an old Plymouth Barracuda. He put Shay inside, the gash on his hand already healing as he climbed into the driver’s seat beside her. Martin was almost to them as Gabriel yanked a panel under the steering wheel free and pulled out two red wires.

  Martin reached through the smashed window with the hypodermic. Gabriel twisted away, shoving an elbow into Martin’s arm. The syringe went flying, and Martin scrambled after it. Gabriel stripped the ends of the wires, twisted them together, then touched them with the end of a brown wire. The engine started. Gabriel slammed down on the gas. Martin stumbled out of the way as the car sped out of the parking lot.

  “Are you all right, Shay? Are you okay?” Gabriel demanded. Shay lightly touched her forehead. It was still bleeding, but that was supposed to happen a lot with scalp wounds, wasn’t it?

  “I think so.” Shay was still trying to process what had happened with Martin. He was supposed to come and save her.

  But instead it had been Gabriel who saved her.

  CHAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  “SEE IF THERE’S A MAP in the glove compartment,” Gabriel instructed as they traveled down the highway at exactly 65 miles per hour. He’d slowed to regulation speed almost as soon as they’d gotten out of Martin’s line of sight. Shay figured it was because he didn’t want any chance of getting pulled over, what with the car being stolen and her being kidnapped.

  Shay was glad to have a nice simple task. “Yeah, there’s one,” Shay answered. Whoever owned this car was on the anal side. The glove compartment didn’t have a stray piece of lint or a stick of gum. It was empty except for the map, the car’s registration, a little notebook that had CAR MAINTENANCE written on the front, and a small package of tissues. Shay pressed a wad of tissues against her forehead and took out the map.

  “We need to get on a back road. Fast,” Gabriel said.

  We. For a while they’d been a we, back when she was nursing him. But now? She felt so confused. Gabriel had been planning to use her for bait. Maybe that was still his strategy. He’d wanted to get Martin and her mother to his family compound.

  But she knew the abilities of his body. She knew how strong he was, how fast. Without the element of surprise, Martin would never have been able to subdue Gabriel. Gabriel could have taken his vengeance right there. Shay knew how deep his fury ran. She was sure he was aching to rip Martin apart. But instead, Gabriel had chosen to protect Shay.

  She’d been wrong. She’d thought Gabriel and Martin were equally obsessed, but Gabriel had at least momentarily put aside his obsession—for her.

  “Shay! Map!” Gabriel said.

  “On it,” Shay answered. She flicked on the overhead light and studied the map. “Take Exit 72. It’s about ten miles up. Then make a right.”

  “Good.”

  Shay noticed that Gabriel’s eyes kept flicking to the rearview mirror. She looked over her shoulder. She didn’t spot Martin in his rental car.

  “See anything?” Gabriel asked.

  “No. No Martin. No cops,” Shay told him.

  “He’s not going to call the cops,” Gabriel said.

  “Yeah, you’re right,” Shay agreed. “If the cops took you in, at some point the truth would get out.”

  “And Martin wouldn’t get his blood supply,” Gabriel replied.

  “Somebody else might have called, though. The desk clerk.” She took another look behind them. Still good.

  “You were right about Martin,” Shay said, still shocked. “I’ve never seen him like that. So cold. He was like a monster.”

  “That’s who he always was, with me,” Gabriel replied. “He didn’t bother putting a nice face on it for my benefit.”

  “So it was never about me,” Shay said slowly. “He was studying both of us—your blood and its effect on my blood. It was never about making me better. Well, except for the part where making me better would mean success for him.”

  Gabriel didn’t answer.

  “But my mother wouldn’t have gone along with that,” Shay said. “My mother would never let me be used as a lab rat.”

  “She let me—” Gabriel started.

  “Because she doesn’t love you,” Shay cut him off. “She didn’t even think of you as human.”

  “No kidding. She hated me,” Gabriel said.

  “What?” Shay cried.

  “Every time she looked at me, it was with hatred,” Gabriel said. “With Martin,
it wasn’t personal like that. He treated me like I was an element in an experiment. A thing, not a person.”

  “Maybe she was afraid,” Shay said. “Fear could look like anger or hate.”

  “It was hate. I could smell it. It’s a completely different scent from fear.” Gabriel’s voice was icy, but Shay knew he was telling the truth. He’d told her the truth about Martin, too, she just hadn’t wanted to believe it.

  “Did you … did you see her a lot?” Shay asked, wrapping her arms around herself. She didn’t really want to know, but she had to. How much had her mother done to Gabriel? And why?

  Love was the one reason Shay could understand. She would never have a daughter of her own. But she still knew, if she did, she would never put the life of a stranger, a stranger who was something out of a horror movie, above the life of her child.

  But hatred didn’t make sense. It would be more in character for Mom to try to make friends with him, to get to know him and ask him for his blood.

  “Gabriel, please just tell me,” she said. She needed reassurance that her mother was still her mother. That although Mom had lied to her and done a horrible thing, that she wasn’t like Martin, that she wasn’t evil.

  Gabriel sighed. “Your mother was there when I was captured. She was the one who pretended to meet me, to talk in person. Martin came up from behind. Other than that, she was in the room with me maybe a few times.”

  Mom was bait, sort of, Shay thought as Gabriel took the exit off the highway. Just like I am now.

  Is that what she still was? Had Gabriel simply put off his moment of revenge? She’d thought they were a team once before and had been so wrong. Was she helping him use her right now, by giving him instructions on how to get away?