Betrayal: Book 2 of the Non-Vampire Series

by Jennie Taylor

  Betrayal

  Book 2 of the Non-Vampire Series

  Betrayal

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters and locations are either figments of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

  ©2014, 2015 Jennie Taylor

  All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without written permission from the author.

  This is again dedicated to

  Maggie, my reason for living.

  Thank you for inspiring and

  encouraging me every day

  in everything you do and are.

  I love you, my Maggie!

  Saturday, May 17

  “Can you believe our girls are high school graduates?” Peggy asked Ted.

  “Don't get too excited,” I told her. “I've graduated several times.”

  “Well, Brynne, that may be, but this is Jessica's first time, so I'm still excited.”

  “We're proud of you two.” Ted told me and Jess.

  We just got home from our graduation ceremony, where we had walked across the stage wearing hideous green robes and gotten our diplomas. It was weird to hear cheers when they announced my name. That never happened any of the other times I graduated. But the Sloans were cheering as loudly for me as they did Jess, I think.

  Since moving in with them a year ago, I really think I've become closer to them than I ever was my own family when they were still alive. The Sloans are my family now, really.

  “Where is Barney?” Jess asked. “He was supposed to have my car back by now.”

  “He's off with Shelly.” Peggy told her, smiling.

  “She seems like a nice girl.” Ted added, with a smile to match.

  “So I finally get my license and he has my car all the time.” Jess complained. “Why can't he get his own car? Or does his crap job not pay enough to make payments?”

  He loads trucks for a shipping company here in Hanton. His first real job. It's just part time, but at least it is real work. He runs a forklift part of the time, but a lot of the time he has to manually pack the boxes into the trailers. None of them would ever have to work again if they would just let me pay for things, but Ted shot that down. He believes in hard work and pride in a job well done. I kind of respect that, really.

  “Can we borrow your car, Dad?” Jess asked Ted. “There's a party we're suppose to be at, and who knows when Barney will get back.”

  “No drinking.” he said, holding the keys out to her.

  “Yeah, yeah.” she said, laughing. “Does alcohol affect vampires, Brynne?”

  “I'm not a vampire!” I told her. “How many times do I have to tell you this? We're not vampires.”

  “Whatever we are, does alcohol affect us?”

  “It doesn't matter.” Peggy said. “You're too young to drink.”

  “I didn't say we would,” Jess told her. “I was just curious if we would even react to it at all.”

  “Well stay away from that stuff tonight.”

  “And stay away from the boys.” Ted told her. “And girls.” he added for me.

  “Right, so we go to a party and stay away from all the boys and girls.” Jess said. “So as long as there is someone there who isn't either a boy or a girl we can talk to them, right?”

  “Jessica,”

  “Don't worry,” I said. “We're just going to hang out for a little while. We'll be back early.”

  “Speak for yourself.” Jess whined.

  “I don't want to stay late anyway, Jess.” I don't even like most of the people we go to school with, honestly.

  “I know, honey.” she said, ruffling my hair. “We'll leave early.”

  Jessica is supposed to be listening to me, doing as I say. She agreed to that last June, when I changed her. Life is different when you're like us, and she doesn't know enough about it yet to stay out of trouble. But I find it very difficult to get her to pay attention to me. She just ruffles my hair and smiles, then does what she wants anyway. I love her dearly, but it upsets me when she does that.

  We hurried out to Ted & Peggy's car. Jess stuck the key in the ignition and was turning it when my cell phone rang. I answered it, though I didn't recognize the number.

  “Hello,” I said, curious who may be calling.

  “Good evening, Miss Brynne.” he said in a heavy Italian accent.

  “Oh.” I said, recognizing the voice. “Hi.”

  “Who is it?” Jess asked.

  “I am in Kansas City, visiting a colleague.” he said. “We would like to visit with you at your earliest convenience. What time tomorrow should we expect you?”

  “Um,” I looked over at Jess, at how curious she was about my caller. “I don't know if we can make it tomorrow, we...”

  “Miss Brynne, must I remind you of our agreement?”

  Our agreement. The Venator Inmortuorum, a secret group ran by the Vatican, whose mission it is to hunt down and kill vampires. The agreement is to let me and Jess live, and even provide us a monthly supply of blood, as long as we stay out of trouble and agree to assist them when they ask for our help. But it has been almost a year, and this is the first time they've contacted us.

  “We'll be there.” I said, sighing.

  “Before noon.” he told me. “I will text to you the location.”

  “Alright.”

  “It is my understanding that congratulations are in order for Miss Jessica and yourself?”

  “Um,”

  “Please give her my regards.”

  “She heard, I think.” I said.

  “We will see you tomorrow, Miss Brynne. Ciao.”

  Jess looked more upset than I even was. I was not awake when this agreement was made, it was all her doing. Not that they left her any choice, really. We either agreed to play nice and help them or they would execute us on the spot. Not much of a choice.

  “Paolo sends his regards.” I mumbled.

  “I don't feel like partying anymore.” she told me. She pulled the keys from the ignition.

  “This sucks.”

  We went back inside and told Peggy and Ted about the call. After that, we went up to our room and I climbed into the top bunk while Jess sat at the desk and googled directions to the address Paolo gave us.

  “The last time we went up there was with Tony and Teresa.” I said.

  “Yeah.” she replied. “I talked to Tony a few days ago. He said to say hi.”

  “I thought you two were still broken up.”

  “I ran into him at the store.”

  “Oh.”

  Those two have been on again, off again for years now. The thing is, he's a very nice guy, and she has fun with him, but they don't ever seem to get past the movie buddy phase. She's always the one breaking up with him, too. The poor guy must feel like a yoyo, the way she yanks him around. I don't know what the hangup is, either. She just doesn't seem to be all that into him.

  “I asked about her.” she said. She was still staring at the computer screen.

  “And?” I miss her. There's this ache down inside that hasn't gone away in all the months since Teresa broke up with me because of what I am.

  “She's doing good.”

  “I'm glad.” I said, wiping the tears away. “Really glad.”

  “Tony said she is with some other girl now.”

  “Oh.” Great Jess, ruin my evening even more. “Good for her.”

  “Honey, you two just weren't meant to be, that's all.”

  “I know.”

  “Some day you will find someone new, and when you do you're going to forget all about Teresa and how m
uch she hurt you.”

  “Maybe.” Not a chance.

  “See, we should have gone to that party.” She stood and stepped over beside the bed. “There were at least two other gay girls I know of who were going to be there. Maybe if you spent time with them,”

  “Lisa and Candace?” I asked.

  “Brynne, if you just gave them a chance...”

  “The last time you tried to set me up with one of them...”

  “Well you walked out in the middle of dinner!” she snapped. “Lisa was really upset, too.”

  “Jess,”

  “I'm just trying to...”

  “Don't help, okay? Please stop trying to set me up on dates.”

  “Honey,”

  “Please.”

  She didn't agree, but she did stop talking about it. Instead, she returned to her computer and watched some of her favorite music videos. I managed to block them out well enough to get to sleep.

  Sunday, May 18

  “I don't like this idea at all.” Barney told me. He hefted my bag into the trunk. He's trying to be nice, but I can probably carry five times as much as he can. “Brynne, this stinks of being a trap.”

  “Why would they need a trap? They know where we live.” I said.“We'll be careful.” I assured him.

  “You better be. Are you sure I can't come along?”

  “We'll be fine, Barney. Thank you.”

  He stomped inside, muttering to himself about how we were just setting ourselves up, and he hoped we wouldn't be killed. The guy is still a little on the creepy side at times, but he doesn't leer at me anymore. He has kind of moved on, I think. Finally. But he seems to have this weird big brother attitude toward me now, and it's annoying. I mean I'm over a hundred years older than him!

  Jess came out, and she got behind the wheel of her little red car. We headed out of town, toward KC and our meeting with the Venator Inmortuorum. Barney is right, it felt like a trap. I can't think of any way it would be, it wouldn't make sense, but it felt like it.

  “I can't believe we're done with high school.” Jess said.

  “Ya know, I've probably spent eighty years in school.” I told her.

  “Such a waste.” she laughed.

  “I have always enjoyed it. And anyway, if you hate learning so much then why are we moving to Illinois next month? I thought that was all for your college?”

  “It is. But it's different when you don't have to go, when you choose to.”

  “I choose to go to high school.”

  “Yeah but... not the same thing, honey.”

  Not the same. Right. So it's okay for her to go to school because she wants to learn and improve herself, and more likely party with other kids around her age, but it's not okay for me to want to go to school to learn and to meet and hang out with kids who are my apparent age? That's fair.

  “I had a dream last night about her.” I said.

  “What happened?” she asked, not needing to ask who her was.

  “I dreamed that she was angry at me, that she came looking for me and pretended to want to get back with me.”

  “Brynne,”

  “And then when we were alone in her house she brings in this other girl and introduces me to her. The other girl and her are dating, and they laugh when I get upset. And then they kill me.”

  “Honey, you've got to stop obsessing over her.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “It's not healthy.”

  “I love her.”

  “You barely knew her.”

  “But Jess,”

  “You've got to put that behind you and get back on the horse. Even if you just go on dates with girls you know you'll never stay with, it's good to get out and see that life goes on.”

  “Easy for you to say.” I said, poking her in the side with my finger. “What about you and Tony? You drop him every time he even seems to want to be more than just casual.”

  “I'm not going back with him.”

  “You've said that before.” I pointed out.

  “I mean it this time. There's just... I mean there's nothing there.”

  There's never anything there at all. But she tried dating a couple of other guys in the past year, and there was nothing there at all with them either. I think she just doesn't know what she wants yet. Tony would do anything for her, and he's a really nice guy, but if she isn't feeling any connection then I guess she can't force herself.

  When we arrived at the location where we were supposed to meet Paolo it was a huge building. There were at least 20 floors, but the office we were going to was on the second. I couldn't help feel a little like I was walking to my death, and leading Jess to hers, as we headed toward the outer door.

  I paused before entering. If this was a trap, as Barney suspected, Jess could die. That wasn't a risk I was willing to take. But I know if they wanted us dead we would be before now. I struggled, but I managed to force myself to open the door and enter. Everything was nondescript inside, sort of like a low budget doctor's office.

  “Good morning.” a skinny blonde woman said from behind her desk. “You ladies are expected.”

  “Hi.” I said. I noticed Jess staring at a man to our left. He was dressed in fatigues and had an automatic rifle in his hands, but he wasn't pointing it at us. “Um... who are... these?” I asked, pointing at the man Jess was watching and another similarly outfitted on our right.

  “Security.” the woman answered. She stood. “If you would come this way.”

  She guided us through a set of doors on the right, and our little security detail fell in line behind us as we went down a drably colored, unlit hallway to another set of doors. She swung them open and went inside.

  It was a huge room, warm colors and soft lighting, with a huge curved conference table in the middle. Along the walls of the room stood another six armed men, all carefully watching us. On the opposite side of the table sat Paolo. To Paolo's right sat a hulk of a man with thinning gray hair and mean eyes the color of boiled peas. To that man's right sat a young woman, probably in her twenties, with jet black hair that hung straight and long, and cute little pink glasses that did nothing to block the view of her big brown eyes. She wore a blazer over a white button down shirt, none of which did anything to hide her slender, muscular frame.

  “Thank you Grace.” Paolo said in his heavy Italian accent. “Please excuse us now.”

  “Yes sir.” she said, retreating from the room quickly.

  “Miss Brynne, Miss Jessica, it is so nice to see you again.” he said sincerely.

  “How have you been?” Jess asked him, giving a smile.

  “Well. Please,” he indicated the seats before us. “Make yourselves comfortable.”

  “Pfft.” the man next to Paolo snorted out.

  “Yes, well,” Paolo said, shooting him a glare. “This is my colleague, Field Agent Sandford Marcus, and then we have Special Agent Celeste Marcus.”

  The man grunted again, clearly not in a good mood today for some reason. His... wife, or daughter?, smiled brightly and nodded toward us. She can't be his wife, can she? She's very young, and it would just be gross.

  “Pleased to meet you.” Jess said to them, as we sat.

  “What's with all the guns?” I asked Paolo.

  “Ah, yes,” he looked at the elder Marcus. “Agent Marcus, perhaps we could...”

  “I don't trust them.” he mumbled.

  “What was that, Agent...”

  “I don't trust them!” he shouted, slamming his fist on the table. “Especially this one.” he said, pointing a meaty finger my way.

  “Dad,” the woman said. “Agent Marcus,” she corrected. “They have a proven track record of...”

  “I don't care!” He pounded the table again. “I don't like this. This, my friend,” he told Paolo, pointing a meaty finger his way. “Is not going to work.”

  “Have faith, my friend. We will make it work.” Paolo assured him.


  “What is this about?” Jess asked.

  “We have...”

  “Before we discuss anything,” I interrupted him. “I would really rather you send the militia men out.”

  “Absolutely not!” Agent Marcus said, once again taking his anger out on the furniture.

  “Sandy,” Paolo said calmly. He placed his hand on the other man's arm. “I trust these two. If you trust me, then you must trust them also.”

  “I...” he looked around, apparently as confused by Paolo's logic as I was. “Very well.” he huffed. “But one wrong move...”

  “Thank you.” I said.

  We waited as the men with guns slowly made their way from the room. It felt like each one was making a point of making eye contact with me, like they were warning me. I guess, given the situation, I can understand that, but it still was... um, well, intimidating.

  “We have a request for you two.” Paolo said. “A mission.”

  “Oh cool!” Jess said. “Does it involve sneaking into a secret foreign base and finding the plans for their new doomsday weapon that will turn everyone into zombies?”

  “Seriously, Jess?” I asked her.

  “Hey,” she shrugged. “Just asking.”