“I don’t think anyone is going to believe what I say.”
“You’ll make them,” he said. He reached out and touched her cheek. “I have to go.”
This time she couldn’t argue. She weakened in his arms, but he held her up and kissed her one last time. Serenity closed her eyes, trying to commit the sensation to memory. Her heart breaking, she suddenly realized only air met her embrace.
Sebastian was gone.
A wail of anguish escaped her throat and she fell to the ground, sobbing into her hands.
Her only love was gone.
“Serenity?” a tentative voice called to her, and she looked up, heart filled with the hope that Sebastian had come back. Instead, James Bently stood before her, shell-shocked, but very much alive. In her pain, she’d forgotten him.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She wanted to say no, she would rather be dead than forced to live without the one person who had ever loved her, but he wouldn’t understand. No one would ever understand.
“My leg,” she managed. “I’ve hurt my leg and I’ve lost a lot of blood.”
“Don’t move,” he instructed her. “I’ll help you up.”
James crouched to help Serenity to her feet, but before he did, she saw a flash of memory cross his features.
“What about that woman? Is she gone?”
Serenity nodded. “Yes, I think so.”
His shoulders sagged in relief. James gathered his arms around her and lifted Serenity to her feet. Shards of pain speared up through her leg, into her hip and she winced. The events of the last twenty-four hours had left her weak and exhausted and Serenity allowed James to support her.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked again.
She nodded and saw the dark bruise spreading across one side of his face and the slick of blood wetting his hair.
“You’re hurt,” she said, reaching out to touch his face, but he jolted away.
“I’ll live, but I think you’ve got some explaining to do.”
“I thought so.”
“What the hell was that thing?” he said. “I shot her three times and it didn’t even slow her down. What the hell was she?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“I do, Serenity, and you’re going to tell me.”
Serenity sighed. She didn’t want to get into a debate about what was or wasn’t real.
“She was a vampire. That’s why the bullets didn’t hurt her.”
He blinked once. “That’s crazy. How am I supposed to believe such a thing?”
“Believe it,” she said, suddenly discovering she wanted him to believe. “What other choice do you have?”
As they stood, huddled together, trying to regain their strength and figure out what to do next, Serenity was sure they were alone.
Then she felt his breath against the back of her neck and his words were so soft they could have been the wind whispering to her. But she knew it was Sebastian, telling her goodbye.
“I love you,” he whispered. “I will always love you.”
Then he was gone.
Serenity clutched his words to her heart.
“Come on,” James said, unaware of what had just happened. “We need to get you to a hospital.”
Serenity shook her head. “Not yet. If you want to be able to sleep without seeing the vampire in your dreams, we have to wait.”
James frowned, “What for?”
“Daylight.”
He paused, his natural instinct to argue with her, but then he must have remembered what he’d seen, and nodded.
“Okay,” he said. “We wait.”
The two of them sat down on the deck of the pier and huddled together, trying to keep warm, waiting for the sky to fade from the deep black of night to a dark indigo blue.
As the hours passed, Serenity dozed. A thousand times she jerked awake, certain she heard the sound of nails scratching up the inside of the steel pipe, or a distant and hollow scream of fury, but each time she was wrong.
When eventually the night began to turn to day, James carried Serenity to his patrol car, taking her to safety.
As they reached the vehicle and the sun mounted the horizon, Serenity knew the scream of agony and rage drifting up from the bottom of the pipe was no longer her imagination.
Chapter Twenty-four
The following weeks and months were hard; sometimes impossibly so.
Unable to stand the thought of staying in the duplex, Serenity used what little money she had to rent a small apartment on the other side of the city. She had been lucky and found tenants for her place, so she didn’t need to worry about money for the moment.
Her heart, however, was broken.
For many weeks, she spent most of her time lying on the strange bed in the unfamiliar apartment, crying until her chest and head hurt—until every part of her hurt—and dulled the pain in her heart. She tortured herself by reliving every moment spent with Sebastian, of how his skin tasted, how she felt when he held her in his arms, the touch of his skin against her lips. Even worse, she imagined him with someone else. She convinced herself Sebastian hadn’t meant the things he’d said, that everything had been a lie.
On a particularly bad day, she caught a cab to Sebastian’s house in the hills, hoping to catch a sight of him, but the big wrought iron gates she’d once fought to get out of were closed with a thick chain and bolted shut.
He wasn’t there and she doubted he would ever return.
As the weeks passed, the pain dulled.
She would never have a normal life; it was impossible with the knowledge she now lived with. Serenity had been exposed to a part of life meant to be hidden from humanity. She doubted she would ever see life in a normal way again.
Serenity missed him every single day. To know he was out there somewhere, doing whatever he needed to survive, or even worse, having met someone else, tore her apart. On good days, she liked to think of him thinking of her, that they were still connected; her guardian angel in demon form.
Numerous times, Serenity thought she spotted him; the back of his head in a crowd, or his face from a car window. Each time her heart raced, but the person was never him.
He’d promised her he wouldn’t be around, he didn’t want to haunt her as he had his wife and family, and Sebastian wanted Serenity to get on with her life. His words couldn’t stop her from hoping she would see him again.
James Bently had been a constant figure in her life since Sebastian’s departure. He dropped in on her almost every day, bringing her grocery bags of fresh bread and milk, and takeout cups of hot soup. His visits finally made her aware of her unwashed state and embarrassed her enough to force her into the shower, to wash her hair and brush her teeth.
Though they hadn’t spoken about what happened that day, like Sebastian, James helped make things disappear.
He talked the owner of the BMW into dropping the charges of theft and claimed the ‘woman’ who accused Jackson of rape had retracted her statement. Apparently, victims of assault often withdrew charges; something Serenity knew all about. On this occasion though, things worked in her favor and she was finally free to live her life without repercussions.
Of course, in her heart things weren’t wiped clean so easily.
At night, alone, her memories haunted her and she dreamed.
Serenity dreamed of being a child, of her mother stroking her hair and putting her to bed. She imagined waking up alone, searching the house to discover it empty, her mother abandoning her in favor of yet another party.
An overwhelming loneliness pervaded Serenity’s subconscious.
She dreamed of Jackson hitting her, of her hitting him back. She dreamed of violence and anger and rage.
And she dreamed of Sebastian; raw, sexual dreams, where he penetrated her with his fingers, his penis, his tongue. Serenity came in her sleep, crying out in pain and pleasure. She dreamed of him leaving and she cried, waking to find the pillow saturated beneath her face
.
The dreams were so vivid she struggled to separate them from reality.
When she woke, shaking and sweating in the morning light, Serenity had to piece her life back together again, to pick apart which of her memories were dreams and which were real. If she dreamed of Sebastian, she closed her eyes again, desperately trying to get back to the place where he was real to her.
Gradually, the dreams began to fade and with them her memories of Sebastian.
Serenity was finally accepting her identity. She would have the life Sebastian wanted for her. But she was still heartbroken and couldn’t imagine having a normal life; meeting someone, getting married, having a family of her own, but she dealt with it. Serenity was her own person now. She’d stood up for herself. Sebastian had been right; no one else could save her, she needed to do that for herself.
When James Bently finally asked her out for dinner, she accepted.
Serenity struggled to think of him as anything more than a friend. James was a good man, and she was an idiot for overlooking him. He could have been the happy ending Sebastian wanted for her, but it was impossible for her to imagine him as anything else. She knew he wanted more—saw it in the awkward way he held a door open for her or accidently brushed her hand—yet with him she felt guilty. Guilty for tricking him and what she’d put him through. The emotion also came from her being with another man when there was only one person she wanted.
She told James exactly how she felt and he accepted it with a grace and humility that made her heart melt.
Perhaps he would be her happy ending, but in her heart she knew it would always be Sebastian. Time would never change that. Maybe she would see Sebastian again, maybe not, but she would always hold his love in her heart.
Things were different now. Serenity was different. She had finally learned how to be alone, to take care of herself and stand on her own two feet.
In the end, Sebastian had taught her independence. Madeline had taught her courage. Somehow, even Jackson had taught her how strong she could be.
Sometimes, you had to learn to be your own happy ending. Sometimes, she realized, it was okay to be alone.
~*~
Please continue to read for the Prologue of the sequel, Buried (Book two in the ‘Serenity’ series) which is now available to buy.
BURIED
Book Two in the ‘Serenity’ Series
Prologue
It woke to the sense of drowning; of lungs so full it was unable to take a breath. It woke to claustrophobia; compressed on every side. It woke to panic and fear.
Though the creature’s eyes were wide open, only darkness filled its sight. Its natural instinct was to take a breath, feel its chest rise and fall, but despite its struggle, nothing happened.
Its mind was a blur—a mess of darkness, pain and anger. It had no idea who it was or what had happened. Negative emotions filled the creature; fury, fear and an overwhelming desire.
Something was wrong.
The creature opened its mouth to roar in frustration and fear, but dirt poured into its gaping maw. The grainy taste of earth filled its mouth and the particles crunched between its teeth, clogging its throat.
Panic took hold and it fought against the confines. It clawed and scratched, pushed and fought until something above gave way.
With increased vigour, it burst from the earthen tomb. Dirt flew upward, spattering around in clods, as though an explosion had occurred beneath the ground.
The thing sat up, the last of the earth falling from its body, and it blinked against the sudden light. For a few moments it sat, waiting for the burst of fire in front of its eyeballs to subside, waiting to adjust. Soon enough, they did and the creature looked around with wary curiosity.
Trees towered above, creating a canopy of dappled green light. Lifting its dirt encrusted fingers, the creature shielded its eyes again, seeing none of the beauty. All around was silence. No birds sang, no insects buzzed in the air, even the wind seemed to pause in the leaves, holding its breath against the horror beneath.
Pain ripped through its body, and the thing shrieked, curling over upon itself. Every nerve ending burned. It wanted to rip the flesh from its own body, tear at itself with its teeth.
A need overwhelmed it, a thirst, something that would stop the pain. With wild eyes, the creature lifted its face to the sky and sniffed the air. What it needed was out there; it smelled it on the air like smoke from a bonfire on an autumn day. Though the thing’s muscles burned in agony, they also twitched with strength, an energy needing to be used, and it itched to get moving.
The creature unfurled from the earthen hole that had been its resting place and stretched, flexing stiff muscles. Clothes hung from its limbs in tattered pieces; the years spent buried beneath the earth decomposing them beyond recognition.
As it took the first tentative steps, flashes of thought jolted its mind like lightning strikes, memories of a life once lived. The thing stopped in its tracks, clutching at its head, confused.
But need drove it on.
Pushing its way through trees and bushes, it paid no attention to the branches whipping at its head or the brambles hooking its flesh. External pain meant nothing.
The flashes came again and it screamed at the thoughts, battering at its head with its hands, trying to drive away the images. Nothing could keep it from what it needed.
As it pushed its way through more undergrowth, the scent became overwhelming. Ahead, the thing noticed two figures, one larger than the other, both with bags strapped to their backs.
Out of an instinct coming from somewhere ancient and dark, it went for the larger one first, knowing the smaller one would do little to defend itself or its mate. The larger one—the male—didn’t even have time to scream
Sharp teeth sank into the male’s throat, tearing and biting and devouring. Overcome in its frenzy to feed, not only on the blood, but on the flesh and the fear, the creature forgot the pain for a moment. The smaller one, a female, screamed in a pitch that hurt its ears and it turned to see her eyes wide with fear.
Filled with its own sense of power and strength, its face and chest covered in warm blood, it lifted its head to the sky and roared.
The smaller one turned and ran.
The creature leaped, soaring through the air, landing directly on the smaller one’s back, knocking her to the ground. The air crushed from the female’s lungs and she didn’t get the chance to take another breath. The thing buried its face in the sweet warmth of her throat and slowly sank its teeth in, relishing every moment as she lay beneath it, defenceless and fragile as a bird. The blood came in like mother’s milk and it fed—tearing, lapping and swallowing, until only a carcass was left.
It lifted its head and sniffed the air. It could kill again if it wanted, but for the moment it needed to rest.
Something beyond the trees drew it—the noise of the city in the distance—but it would wait. It needed to grow strong, and so needed to go back beneath the ground. Using its bare hands, the creature dug its way back into the comfort of the earth, pulling the dirt back in over itself. Despite its earlier panic, the cool dark of the ground now offered peace.
As it lay down to rest, one name formed in the thing’s deranged mind.
Serenity.
~*~
About the Author
Marissa Farrar is a multi-published horror and paranormal author. She was born in Devon, England, loves to travel and has lived in both Australia and Spain. She now resides in Devon with her husband, two children, a crazy Spanish rescue dog and four hens. She has a degree in Zoology, but her true love has always been writing.
Her dark take on a vampire romance, Alone, was first published in 2009 and has now been re-launched. The second book in the series, Buried, is now available to buy. The third title, Captured, will be published March 2012. She is also the author of the horror novel, The Dark Road, and two short story collections.
Her short stories have been accepted for a number of anthologi
es including, Their Dark Masters, Red Skies Press, Masters of Horror: Damned If You Don’t, Triskaideka Books; and 2013: The Aftermath, Pill Hill Press.
If you want to know more about Marissa, then please visit her website at www.marissa-farrar.blogspot.com. You can also find her at her facebook page, www.facebook.com/marissa.farrar.author or follow her on twitter @marissafarrar.
She loves to hear from readers and can be emailed at [email protected].
Also by Marissa Farrar
Buried (Book Two in the ‘Serenity Series)
The Dark Road
The Company of the Dead
Where the Dead Live
The Body Farm
Coming March 2012... Captured (Book Three in the ‘Serenity’ Series)
Alone Page 22
