Rise of Midnight

by SARA FREITES

  “Agreed,” Garrett said.

  I couldn't believe it.

  “I'll assign several groups to a citywide watch,” Thade announced. “And I'll need a smaller group to stay close to her home. Eden! Autumn!”

  I jumped. Thade stepped into the room followed by Terry, Garrett and Blake. Worried that I might have misinterpreted their conversation, I waited eagerly for Thade to speak.

  “We're concerned Arlos might know you're here,” Thade said to me. “That means you may not be so safe here anymore, especially if attacks start happening above ground like tonight. We need to reassess the situation. We also must block off some entryways tonight…and that will take some time, which leaves us open for more of them to possibly slip through. In the meantime, I’m allowing you to go home tonight but only for a short while.”

  “Are you serious?” I exclaimed. “Thank you so much! You have no idea how much this means to me.”

  “I am not doing this to ease your homesickness, Autumn,” he admitted.

  I felt like I could lift off the ground and fly as I ran to Thade. Unrestrained, I wrapped my arms around his broad chest. He cringed away, but I leaned into him, careful to avoid the haviden blood on his sleeves. I could feel his cold skin through his shirt as I squeezed his solid frame.

  “Gah. Humans,” he grumbled while awkwardly patting the top of my head.

  I smiled as Eden burst into laughter.

  Chapter 11

  Lost and Found

  “You’re faster and stronger than the rest of us and also seem quite driven to protect her,” Thade spoke calmly. “Not to mention, you’re undetectable. This is why I’m putting you on this detail. You’ll work with the team I’m stationing just outside of her home. You’ve done well to prove your loyalty to this clan, and this will be the perfect and final initiation. I do not doubt that you can do this, and I know you will make me proud.” He cleared his throat. “Are you ready, Autumn?"

  I hated being caught eavesdropping by the vampires. It was easy to forget they knew I was there even if they couldn't see me. I rounded the corner. Thade, Harper and Blake waited by the back door. An ear-piercing crack of thunder filled the air, startling me. The lights flickered. I could hear the rain hammering the concrete outside. I nodded in response to Thade, overjoyed.

  “Good,” Thade said to me. “One of our cars will drop you off a few streets away from your home. We were going to have Blake take you by rooftop, but not in this storm. The roofs will be far too treacherous in the rain.”

  “She’d be fine,” Harper sneered.

  “Blake would survive a fall if he slipped and fell. She wouldn’t,” Thade shot back at Harper and handed Blake a pair of heavily tinted sunglasses. "Wear these in public,” he said to Blake in a lowered voice. “Your eyes are a dead giveaway that you aren’t human. Autumn? You are to tell the humans you don’t remember a thing after your car accident that Friday night. Understood? Tell them you woke up at a bus station or a park bench this morning and hitchhiked home. We have a few connections to the police department. If questioned, and you probably will be, our contacts there will be sure to close the case without further investigation. Also, are those the same clothes you had on the night you were abducted by Shane’s men?”

  “Yeah, they are. I thought of that, too,” I confirmed.

  Eden had washed off the blood, rubbed in a little dirt from the backyard to make it look as if I’d worn them for over a month. I thought this was kind of funny, but we had to make it look believable. I’d also washed off my makeup and tied my hair into a big messy bun on top of my head.

  “You are permitted to go about your normal human life…for the most part,” Thade told me. “But stay in your home as much as possible. Don’t even go back to school. If anything happens that causes us to have to make a scene, we’ll bring you in immediately. We don’t want to draw any attention to you. Now, get going before I change my mind about all of this.”

  I grabbed Blake’s wrist. He flinched at my touch. I ignored his overreaction and dragged him along behind me as if he were an ill-behaved child. I was enthralled to get out of that place!

  “Wait,” Thade spoke up, interrupting our leave. “Eden?” he called to her.

  Impatient, I stopped us in our tracks.

  “I know!” Eden called back from upstairs. “I’ve got it!”

  “Here, put these on,” she advised and handed me a pair of sunglasses of my own. “You don’t want anyone to recognize you on your way home. Your picture was all over the news last month.”

  “Great,” I mumbled.

  I put the sunglasses on as she explained. “We don’t want anyone to spot you traveling with ‘some guy’ either. Then, you’ll have to explain who he is," she gestured at Blake.

  “Am I allowed to have my pocketknife back?” I asked through a hopeful smile.

  Eden looked to Thade who shook his head.

  “No. Not just yet,” he replied for her. “I can’t entirely trust that you won’t use that feline spell of yours to try escaping us again.”

  My shoulders slumped. It was as if that man could read my mind sometimes.

  “Let’s go,” I said and tugged on Blake who threw on his sunglasses.

  A gust of cold air blew against me when Blake opened the door. The rain bounced off the ground like tiny crystal pebbles dropping from the sky. Lightning flashed. The rain fell even harder. I frowned and rubbed the chill bumps that rose across my arms. Blake handed me his light jacket.

  “Thank you. What about you?” I asked him and wiggled my way into his jacket, pulling the hood over my head.

  “It won’t bother me,” he answered in a low voice.

  I went with him onto the tiny back porch where a metallic brown car idled in the small backyard. Thunder crashed once again. Blake opened the passenger door for me. I squeezed into the back seat as he got in beside the driver.

  “Keep the hood up on that jacket,” the driver advised me. “It will help hide your aura.”

  I gave him a thumbs up. I stared out of the heavily tinted windows as the car veered into the alleyway and onto the street. The city lights passed by like a moving carnival—streaks of white, red and yellow as we drove. It was already getting late. The sky above had shifted to a deep navy, peeking between flint-colored clouds. By now, the rain fell so hard I could see translucent sheets of it in the distance. They waved back and forth in the wind against the halo of city lights. It wasn’t a long ride, but I dazed in and out until Blake said my name and drew me from my thoughts. I attentively sat up.

  “What street is the closest one to your neighborhood?” he asked me quietly.

  I could see a hint of his illuminated eyes through the tint of his lenses.

  “Um, we can go to the corner of Luna Lane and Starling Road,” I suggested. “It’s just a few streets up, about a block from my house.”

  The car slowed. Butterflies fluttered in my stomach. I could hear the tires stir up a puddle while we parked. The car drove away right after we got out.

  “Here’s where we part ways for a while,” Blake said. “I’ll keep an eye on you until you get inside. Don’t want anyone to see us walk to your house together.”

  “Where are you guys going to stay?” I asked.

  “We’ll be around, like up in a tree by your bedroom window or something—”

  “That better be a joke,” I warned through my teeth with a slight smile, but I was totally serious.

  “You’d better get going,” he advised. “Thade’s men followed us here.”

  “You’re going to have to walk back,” I pointed out while handing him his coat and Eden’s sunglasses. “Your ride left you.”

  “Na,” he said, glancing around at my neighborhood. “I’ll roof-bound back.”

  “You’ll what?”

  “Roof-bound, take the rooftops back,” he reiterated.

  “Oh. Okay…well,” I stammered, unsure of what to say. “Be careful.”

  “You be careful. You’re the
human.”

  “Whatever. See ya later,” I scoffed, rolling my eyes.

  I walked away. A second later, I peered back to wave, but he’d already disappeared. I continued down Luna Lane. The minute my house came into view on the street corner, I cried, so overjoyed to see that little two-story brick house with the off-white shutters and inset porch. All I could think about was how I couldn’t wait to hug my parents, hang out with my little brother, go shopping with Jericho, crawl into my warm, comfortable bed and snuggle Bandit—insignificant things I wouldn’t have normally given a second thought to.

  Before I knew it, I was standing at my front door. It was 2:30 in the morning. The lights were out, including the one on the porch. I hoped someone was awake to let me in. I knocked before peering through the living room window. I could see the TV’s bright light through the blinds and semi-sheer curtains. I couldn’t believe they were up so late on a Thursday night. Bandit barked frantically from inside, and the porch bulbs popped on. The door slowly opened. There, behind the storm door stood my mom in her bubblegum pink robe. With her hair swept back and a pair of tortoiseshell reading glasses adorning her petite face, she squinted at me as if she’d been asleep. A second later, she stifled herself, and her eyes lit up. She swung the glass door open.

  “Oh my God! Autumn!” she exclaimed.

  We stood there, hugging each other as she cried into my hair.

  After nearly eight agonizing weeks, I was finally home. For how long, I wasn’t sure.

  *

  “Today is Friday, April 14th,” a local news reporter blared on my TV.

  I was watching the news in my bedroom, the room I’d grown up in and missed so much, when a familiar picture flashed across the screen. I almost fell off the bed. It was my yearbook picture from the year before. I knew my parents could’ve picked a better picture of me to broadcast across the city. It had rained the day the picture was taken, and my hair was frizzy and untamed from the humidity. We had a pep rally that day, and I came wearing my cheerleading outfit, but I’d forgotten to pack an extra bag of clothes for pictures. So, last minute, Gemma let me borrow a wrinkled school T-shirt that had been stuffed in the back of her locker for who knows how long.

  “A little over two months after her disappearance on the night of February 17th, seventeen-year-old Autumn Hayes found her way home early this morning, disoriented,” the reporter set the tone of her report. “Unfortunately, she is suffering from amnesia and is unable to remember the past several weeks.”

  I turned off the TV, still not feeling like myself. That morning, I’d learned Frank had passed away two weeks earlier. And for that day, that empty feeling had returned. I regretted not being there for Frank’s family during his funeral and also regretted that I didn’t get to visit him while he was in the hospital. He and my brother didn’t deserve what happened to them. Now, Arlos had indirectly taken two people out of my life.

  I was expected back at school the following week, but as Thade had requested, I told my parents I wasn’t ready to go back after everything that happened. They agreed to it, and after meeting with the school, they told us I didn’t have to come back to school for the rest of the semester. The principal suggested I take summer classes to make up my lost time so I could start school back in the fall as a senior with the rest of my class. I’d agreed to that, only it didn’t matter. I had a feeling I wouldn’t be around long enough to start summer school in June. Without school or cheer in the way, I planned to spend every waking moment with my family.

  I ended up being questioned by the police that weekend, as expected, and I told them what I’d told my parents, what Thade had instructed. On Easter Sunday, Gemma came over. It was good to see her in person after so long. We hugged for what felt like forever when she came inside. After having dinner with my parent’s and grandma, Gemma and I spent the rest of the evening talking, hanging out in my room and watching TV.

  “I wish you could remember what happened and who was involved,” she said.

  “Yeah, me too,” was all I could say.

  After all the attention I’d gotten over my disappearance, I felt guilty for withholding the truth.

  “Do you have any nightmares?” she asked. “They say when a person goes through a traumatic event and develops amnesia that they sometimes dream about what happened to them.”

  “Nope, no dreams,” I replied.

  It was a lie. Every night I’d dreamt of the vampires. I’d wake up in the night thinking I was still in that old boarded-up greystone, expecting Thade to crack the door open at any second.

  Monday afternoon, Jericho called me to pick her up early from school.

  “I hit a curb last night and my tire went flat,” she explained on the phone. “Mom took me to school this morning because Dad won’t be home to change my tire until he gets off duty tonight.”

  “You hit more curbs than anyone I know,” I teased.

  It was the second time this semester Jericho’s little silver Honda had a flat.

  “Whatever. It’s that big ass curb everyone hits on the corner of Vine Wall and Everett. You should see this thing. It’s like curb-zilla. It could probably flatten the tires on an eighteen-wheeler.”

  “Sure,” I jousted. “Why are you leaving school so early? It’s only 1:00.”

  “I’ll explain when you get here.”

  “Okay. I’ll be there in few.”

  I got off the phone and after stepping outside, I found myself going back in to get my purse. I’d gone so long without lugging it around that I knew it would take some time before I stopped forgetting it. I tried petting Bandit on my way out again. He’d still been running from me like he had before I was kidnapped. I frowned as he yelped and hid under the table. With my car totaled, my parents had the insurance switched over and gave me the keys to Jacoby’s Camaro. It had sat unused on the street since he passed away until my dad washed and cleaned it out for me. I’d always wanted Jacoby’s car but never under these circumstances. Regardless, I was thankful to have a car to drive. But it did bring with it vivid memories of my brother. Even the inside faintly smelled like his cologne. Because of this, I started the car misty-eyed.

  While pulling out of the driveway, I got a call from a number I didn’t recognize. I answered it, suspicious.

  “Where are you going?” a familiar voice asked.

  “Eden!” I burst out. “How did you get my number?”

  “Long story. Where are you going?”

  “I…uh,” I stammered, taken by surprise. “I’m picking my sister up from school. How did you—”

  “Thade just got a call that you were leaving your house. We just wanted to be sure everything was okay,” she explained. “Don’t stay out too long and try not to get out of your car. I’ll have a few guards follow you just to be safe.”

  “Okay,” I replied, feeling like I got caught doing something I wasn’t supposed to be doing.

  We said goodbye as I turned off my street.

  “Thanks!” Jericho blurted when she hopped in the passenger seat or in her case, the backseat driver’s seat. “I called Mom and told her what happened. She was right in the middle of lunch with grandma, so she asked if I could call you to pick me up instead.”

  “What happened?” I asked as I pulled out of the school’s circle drive.

  “I got in a fight,” she admitted through a fake grin and settled in her seat.

  “Another one?” I huffed. ”Who was it this time?”

  “Look. That bitchy blonde girl on your cheer squad was asking for it. Mary something…”

  “Marilee?” I asked.

  “Yeah, that’s her,” Jericho confirmed.

  Well, I mean, how long did you expect the guy to hang around when you don’t put out? Hearing Marilee’s name caused the comment she made to me right in front of everyone on the cheer squad two months earlier to rush through my head.

  “What did she do?” I wondered out loud.

  “You know that girl talks bad about everyone
, right?” Jericho asked. “It was about time someone stood up to her. If not me, it would have been some other girl who slammed her in the hallway for talking trash. She just picked the wrong person to talk about today.”

  “She was talking about you?” I pressed.

  “No, she was talking about you."

  “Me?” I reeled. “Why?”

  “She’s just jealous. That’s all it is. Her boyfriend just found out yesterday that she cheated on him with Devron at a party two months ago, and he dumped her last night. So, the first thing a person like her is going to do is try taking the spotlight off of her misfortune by capitalizing on someone else’s.”

  My stomach stirred uncontrollably. Paranoia ate me up inside.

  “What did she say about me?” I dug.

  “She was making fun of you for disappearing, saying that you probably ran away or something, that you did it all for attention. I heard her talking to one of her friends about you on my way to class and—”

  Her words stung.

  “What?” I interrupted, shocked. “I can’t believe she would make fun of me for that. I never did anything to that girl.”

  “Autumn, do you know why people do things like that?” Jericho asked as she twisted around in her seat to me. “They’re immature and don’t have a life. Period. People like that have nothing better to do, and they don’t think very highly of themselves. They feel inadequate in some area of their lives, so they put others down to feel better. Don’t ever let people like that get under your skin. She doesn’t know you, and what she thinks or says shouldn’t bother you.”