by Cege Smith
“You did a bang-up job with that,” Violet muttered.
Riveka’s eyebrow shot up, but she didn’t reply to Violet’s comment. “I’ve spent a great deal of time studying Nicholas’s family journals. I think that I know as much as is possible to know about the Montroses and the Wards. Regardless of what Jeremiah believes, the Wards never formed anything other than an uneasy truce with the Montrose Coven after Jeremiah killed Bruckhart Ward, and that was only in an attempt to finally get away from them. Betrayal like murder isn’t forgotten so easily, especially when it involves blood. I think it’s quite possible that this whole story about a cure was a way to appease them, although all it seemed to do was ensure Jeremiah’s continued interest in our family. Over the years, a very peculiar thing emerged, though, as I studied them.”
“What?” Violet asked.
Riveka sighed. “Not long after their eighteenth birthday, every Ward female that survived over the years met with an unfortunate end.”
Violet felt her stomach drop. “An unfortunate end? How?”
“I believe that they kill them, Violet. Whatever it is that the Montroses are trying to draw you into is deadly. It will kill you.”
Violet decided at that moment that it wasn’t the best time to let her grandmother in on her little glowing secret. She appeared to have bigger things to worry about.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Violet and her grandmother rode in silence after that. Her mind was swirling with everything Riveka had said. There were things that fit with what Margo and Jonah had told her, and then there were other things that just didn’t feel right. It irritated her that Jeremiah Montrose had managed to worm under her skin in such a short amount of time. She should be smitten with a boy her own age, not a thousand-year-old vampire. But his face kept dancing in her mind. However, she wasn’t so dumb that she would deliberately dismiss Riveka’s story and warning. Everything seemed to key off of Violet’s eighteenth birthday.
It seemed like a long while later when the car rolled to a stop. The car door opened, and Riveka climbed out of the car followed by her grandfather, who had finally woken up. He smiled gently at her and shrugged. Violet wanted just a few minutes alone with him to ask him if Riveka’s story was true, but she knew Riveka wouldn’t allow it.
Her dress made it difficult for Violet to gracefully get out of the car. She squirmed to the edge of the leather seat and swung her legs outside and stood. She winced as she heard the material rip. Although it looked killer on her, she was afraid it was too tight. One more thing ruined for the evening. Looking around, she saw that they were in front of what appeared to be a train station. She glanced around the parking lot and found it was deserted. Tall trees surrounded them on every side. She knew she shouldn’t be afraid, but the setting had an eerie, haunted feel about it.
“Where are we?” she asked.
“The southern tip of North Carolina,” Riveka said. “We went quite a bit out of the way to try to travel with a low profile. Your grandfather’s family has always kept some private travel options open in case of just such an event as this, so you should be grateful. The Montrose boys have their fingers in too many things these days and after talking to Elysa, it seems their influence is more far reaching than even I understood. I’m afraid that they will try something stupid like trying to come after you.”
Would that be so stupid? Violet thought, her heart starting to pound against her chest. She scolded herself. Jeremiah was dangerous, yet she found herself hoping that he would appear, if for nothing else than to prove that everything he had told her wasn’t some made-up story to manipulate her.
“What are we going to do if he does?” she asked.
A figure wrapped in black leather appeared at her side. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head about Jeremiah Montrose.” Violet didn’t know why she had thought that she would have seen the last of Elysa. “I’ve got lots of experience dealing with those Montrose boys. You be a good little girl and listen to your grandmother.”
The outright disdain in Elysa’s voice made Violet angry. She may be naive, but she knew that Elysa’s motivations had nothing to do with helping her family and everything to do with getting back at Jeremiah. Violet didn’t trust her or her intentions, especially when she saw the dislike for her that Elysa wasn’t even bothering to hide. A gym bag appeared out of nowhere and hit Violet in the chest, almost causing her double over.
“Oops, sorry,” Elysa said with a sly grin. At Riveka’s scowl, she shrugged. “Your grandmother packed a few things for you. There’s a restroom right inside the station. Let me escort you.”
“I don’t need a babysitter,” Violet retorted.
A strong hand encircled her arm and Violet felt herself jerked forward. Elysa’s grip caused Violet to go up on her tippy toes and she had to bite her lip to keep from crying at the pain flashing up her arm. She looked to her grandmother for help, but saw that Riveka was tapping away on the screen of her smartphone.
“You will find that I am not one of those saps you’ve been hanging around who is willing to let you believe that you have a say or an opinion, Violet. Your grandmother asked me to make sure that Jeremiah doesn’t lay a finger on you, and that’s what I will do.” Violet found herself dragged up the stairs and into the train station, which like outside was oddly empty. Moments later they were in the restroom and she was being shoved into a stall. When Elysa released her, Violet rubbed the area on her upper arm, wishing the pain away. She glared at Elysa, who looked pleased with herself.
“I notice that you didn’t include yourself in that statement,” Violet said warily.
Elysa laughed. The noise was so loud that it seemed to be coming from all areas of the room. “Consider yourself fortunate. Unlike some others of my kind, I’m not into scrawny little high school girls no matter how good you smell.”
Violet flushed as she crossed her arms over herself. She didn’t want to compare herself to Elysa, but it was inevitable. Elysa must have been older when she became a vampire, and that mature beauty was on display now. Violet had a ways to go. She twisted a face at Elysa and then slammed the door in the vampire’s face, locking the door before backing away. The room was silent.
“Just so you know, doors won’t keep me out if I want to come in,” Elysa’s voice floated down to her.
Violet spun around and found Elysa crouching across the span of the of the bathroom stall like a spider waiting to capture its prey. Her fangs were on full display. Violet’s back hit the door and she started fumbling with the lock.
Elysa rolled her eyes. “As if. Hurry up. I’m waiting for you right outside.”
Violet blinked and then Elysa was gone. Her hand crept up to her chest to feel her heart. She wasn’t sure where the desire to rebel against Elysa came from, although she suspected it had to do with the fact that Jeremiah had once had a relationship with her. It wasn’t in Violet’s nature to question. She usually kept her head down and did exactly what she was told. But tonight she didn’t want to. It seemed unfortunate that at the moment she decided she wanted to make her own choices, she was confronted with a vengeful vampire who was going to use Violet for her own purposes.
Violet slid out of the beautiful red dress and sighed. When she had stood in front of the mirror earlier with Margo, she had no idea that her evening was going to end like this. Her mind was swimming. She felt exhausted. She tossed the dress over the door so it would hang and not wrinkle, and then dug into the duffel bag. Inside, she found jeans, a loose T-shirt, and a pair of brown sandals. She pulled them out. She wanted to be comfortable, and by slipping on clothes that were more in line with what she wore every day when she wasn’t in her school uniform, she felt more like herself.
There was a small make-up bag inside as well that she took out and set beside the bag. She threw the high heels in the bag and stepped out of the stall, expecting to find Elysa waiting for her. She was alone. Violet made her way over to the mirror. In the small bag, she found a ponytail holder and a sm
all bottle of lip gloss. Sweeping her hair up into a high ponytail, she saw that her cheeks were pale. Her eyes were wide and haunted. Reluctantly, she completed the look with a touch of lip gloss.
This was the face she knew well, but it was the old Violet. Try as she may, after the events of the last twenty-four hours, she didn’t think that she was going to be able to go back to being that girl. Too much had happened. She felt different. So who did that make her now? She didn’t know and it was unsettling.
Unwilling to leave the red dress or stuff it into the duffel bag, she slid it off the door of the stall door and put it over her arm. Taking a deep breath, she walked back out in the main corridor of the station. Again she was struck by how empty it was. Her grandparents clearly had more resources than she imagined, and it just illuminated all of the things that she still didn’t know.
Elysa was leaning against the wall just outside the bathroom, filing her nails and looking bored. At Violet’s reappearance, she pushed away and stepped close to Violet. She shuddered as she felt Elysa smell her hair.
“I thought you said you weren’t into girls like me,” Violet said, trying to keep the quiver of fear out of her voice.
“That’s true, but you do smell delicious. Virgin blood is so tasty,” Elysa whispered with longing in her voice.
“Elysa!” Riveka’s voice boomed off the brick walls and Violet jumped. For once she was grateful to see her grandmother’s face. “Unless you have forgotten, this train leaves in less than five minutes. I suggest we make our way to it. Now.”
Elysa stepped around Violet and grinned down at her. Without her heels on, Elysa towered over her.
“Let’s go, Vi. Chop, chop. Don’t want to piss off your grandmother,” Elysa said with a smirk. “I’m looking forward to getting better acquainted. Later.”
Violet didn’t like the look in Elysa’s eyes one bit. “I’ll follow you,” she said, gesturing for the vampire to go first. Elysa chuckled. Violet didn’t want Elysa anywhere where she couldn’t see her. Elysa curled her index finger at Violet and then spun around. The clicking of her boots on the tiled floor was the only sound in the large room. Violet followed after her slowly.
Outside the door, Elysa turned to the right and walked on a pathway nestled next to the building. Violet kept close to the wall in the light, and saw the railroad tracks spread out in front of them. They reached the edge of the train platform, and Violet was surprised to see that there were two railroad cars sitting there waiting, an engine and a passenger car.
Her grandparents were already waiting on the platform underneath a small wooden sign that Violet couldn’t read. Nicholas seemed to be admiring the train, which didn’t surprise Violet. Of all of her memories of her grandfather, most of them involved him sitting in his study taking apart different mechanical parts and then putting them back together. It made Violet smile to see that if nothing else, her grandfather was acting true to form.
Riveka saw them coming and looked annoyed.
“You always were one to dawdle,” she said, looking Violet up and down. “You look more like you now.” Violet had no way of knowing if that was a compliment or an insult. If she were to guess, she’d pick the latter. Then Riveka looked at Elysa. “So you are sure this is the right thing to do? I feel like we’re running away.”
“Of course we are doing the right thing. Jeremiah is going to be obsessed with trying to get Violet back. But he’s going to assume we are traveling north. He won’t figure out that we went south until it’s much too late for him to do anything about it,” Elysa said with a dark chuckle.
Violet tried to focus on what they were talking about, but then she saw two dark shadows emerge from the darkness behind her grandparents. She had a moment of pure conflict. On one hand, she didn’t want to go anywhere with Elysa, but on the other, no matter how awful her grandmother was, she didn’t want any harm to come to her. Then she saw features emerge on the faces, and she realized with a dizzying disappointment they weren’t the faces that she was hoping to see. These were strangers; huge, ugly, menacing strangers.
“Grandmother, watch out!” she cried out.
Riveka looked over her shoulder and grimaced. “Really, Elysa?” She didn’t look the least bit threatened or concerned. If anything, she looked more annoyed.
“If you expect me to stay a step ahead of the Montrose brothers AND keep your granddaughter safe, Riveka, I had to call in reinforcements.” Elysa put her hands on her hips, and she and Riveka glared at each other. Finally Riveka looked away and sniffed. “Fine, but they aren’t riding with us. The passenger car is small enough already.”
Violet was in awe at her grandmother’s spunk. Riveka was fearless. It made Violet feel a small wedge of admiration. She realized that she didn’t know a lot about Riveka at all, but a lot of that had to do with the fact that her grandmother didn’t like to talk about her background. She had told Violet once during one of the rare visits when Violet was young that it wasn’t the past that defined you, but the path you chose for yourself.
Nicholas had already sprung up to the exterior platform of the passenger car. “C’mon, Riveka. Surely you can yell more inside. It’s time to go.” He grinned as he leaned out and Violet was surprised to see her grandmother purse her lips, but say nothing. Riveka took her husband’s hand and gingerly stepped across the gap and onto the railcar.
Violet looked around and realized that she had been left alone on the platform with three vampires. The two recent arrivals were eyeing her in a way that didn’t make her comfortable at all. Quickly she rushed over to the passenger car and threw her duffel onto the floor of the car behind her grandfather. She gratefully accepted his hand to pull her onboard. He gave her a small hug before pushing her toward the door.
She looked over her shoulder at him, but he gestured for her to go ahead. Then Violet made her way through the small doorway. Once inside, she looked through the large window and saw that Elysa was still on the platform talking with the two men and gesturing toward the passenger car. That didn’t make Violet feel the slight bit comforted.
“Elysa seems to be a good girl, but she spends entirely too much time with the wrong crowd,” Riveka said, settling herself onto one of the cushioned sofas. Violet saw that the front part of the car was set up as a small sitting room with a plush sofas separated from two wingback chairs by a small coffee table. As one moved toward the back of the car, there were two booths, one on each side, and a kitchenette area along the back wall. Past the kitchenette was a small hallway that led to the door at the back of the car. It was luxurious and cozy all at the same time.
Violet sat down on the edge of a sofa, facing her grandmother, and set the dress down on the cushion beside her. “I’ve never been on a train before,” she said, not meaning to speak the words out loud. She heard a loud whistle that pierced her eardrums and made her wince. She felt the slow rocking as the car began to move. She looked back at the platform and saw that trio of vampires were gone. It made her uneasy wondering where on the train they had settled.
Her grandfather slipped inside and immediately headed to the back of the car to pour himself a drink. Violet desperately wanted one at that moment. She looked back at her grandmother and found Riveka studying her with a glint in her eyes.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Under her grandmother’s intense stare, Violet felt extremely uncomfortable. She shifted in her seat, and then felt like the railcar, even though it had just the three of them in it, was suddenly small and confining. She stood up and walked to the front of the car.
“I need some air,” she shot over her shoulder. She expected Riveka to say something to stop her, but then Violet realized that they were on a moving train picking up speed rapidly. As much as she may want to get away from her grandmother, they both knew she wasn’t going to throw herself off of it. There were only so many places that she could go.
Violet pushed the door open. The sound of the train was much louder outside, but after all of the silence she welco
med anything that could drown out her thoughts. She stepped out into the cool night air, which was made all the colder by the fact that it was rushing past her body. She shivered and wished for a sweater, but she wasn’t about to go back inside to see if she could dig one up. Violet stepped to the railing and stared at the engine in front of her. She couldn’t see anything through the smoky glass other than a few hulking dark figures. It appeared that Elysa’s companions were hanging out up front with the conductor.
Violet rested her hip against the railing and focused on the trees that were rushing by on the right side. She expected to see open spaces, towns, houses at least, but there was nothing but thick trees that seemed to hide the rest of the world. She wondered if the vampires had somehow made the rest of the world disappear. Having grown up in well-populated cities, this plunge into isolation was strange. Nonetheless, she was grateful to finally be alone. She had time to think.
Her life had been completely turned upside down in a shockingly short amount of time. She started to catalog everything that she had been told. Two days ago, the most stressful thing in her life was worrying about writing her term paper and passing her finals. Now she was a chess piece in a game that spanned centuries. She wished she truly understood her part in all of it. The idea that she was some kind of critical missing piece was slightly cool. Violet was still stunned that everything that had happened had all been because of her.
But beyond that, she had met a man who set her pulse racing and made her head spin. She wasn’t completely naive to having guys interested in her. She had a few brief flirtations. But Jeremiah Montrose wasn’t a boy. While she found Jonah equally handsome, it was Jeremiah who set her blood ablaze. He was a man in every sense of the word, and so much more than that. Jeremiah’s life spanned centuries. Although he seemed to be interested in her, she found herself hoping that there was more to it than just a desire to get her to join his cause. Certainly he had found many charming and beautiful women to captivate his attention over the years; Elysa being a very relevant example. That led her back to the conclusion that Jeremiah’s interest had to be something other than her charming personality. It had to do with what she represented; what he could use her for. The idea made her frown.