“But he’ll come back, right?” Amelia asked. “Maybe he’ll be okay with it next time.”
Mabel stayed quiet for a moment and Amelia took another sip of her pop, letting the sugary syrup soothe her fears. When Mabel finally spoke, breaking the tense silence, her voice was distant, as if fighting against an unbearable pain. “No, he won’t. Humans come back because we have souls. Our souls stay intact in death. For a vampire, it’s different. Their souls leave them and find their mates. Since Angelle is a vampire, when his soul found her it joined together and ended the circle.” Mabel reached over and took Amelia’s hand, eyes glittering with tears.
“Are you saying that the only way to break our connection is for me to become a vampire and then one of us has to die?” It couldn’t be true. There had to be another way. Then an idea came to her. Did she even want to break it? She couldn’t imagine what life would be like without Mitchell.
Mabel must have seen Amelia’s inner conflict and she squeezed her hand reassuringly. “What I’m telling you is that Derek’s the only one who managed to break the bond and it didn’t turn out so good for him.” She searched Amelia’s face. “Do you hate Mitchell so much that you could not spend your life with him?”
“I don’t hate him,” Amelia said, amazed at the passion in her voice.
Mabel sighed, a long, gusty sound. “Then you fear him.”
“What if she’s not scared of him?” Tyler said and both women shot him a look. Amelia had been so involved in the story that she had completely forgotten he was there. He put up his hands. “Just hear me out. You almost killed Mitchell, right? So what about the other part of the warning? The revenge is for the weak part. What if you’re doing this so you won’t hurt him?”
“Do you really think it’s that simple?” Amelia asked.
Tyler shrugged, stood up and paced, thinking. “Maybe this whole warning is about you accepting Mitchell. Maybe the death part is you becoming a vampire. It would make sense you know. He kills you but then he also saves you by changing you.” He shot a questioning look at Mabel. “Vampires are the undead, right?”
“You’re a very bright young man,” Mabel said, getting up from her chair and walking towards the door. “I think we need to let Millie have some time to think. Please bring the tray with you, Tyler. You can help me clean up.”
“Wait.” Amelia jumped up from the chair and rushed forward. “Don’t go. Please, don’t leave me in here alone.”
“Amelia, you have the power to leave whenever you wish,” Mabel said wisely. “As the prophecy said, look inside yourself. You will know what you need to do.”
Tyler picked up the tray and collected the dirty dishes, stacking them up. “Ty, don’t go!” Amelia pleaded.
Tyler grinned, and his eyes sparkled with amusement. “Don’t worry, Millie, I’m not leaving. Mitchell moved me into one of the guest rooms until you get better. Your house is sick.” He elbowed her in the ribs and winked. “Take your time figuring all this out. I don’t mind hanging around.”
Amelia shot him a look that she hoped said she was not impressed. She must have missed the mark because he laughed and left the room.
Amelia glared at the door. It’s not fair, a voice in her head shrieked. Being a witch really wasn’t helping much. Shouldn’t she be able to wiggle her nose, point a finger and get out like Sabrina the Teenage Witch? She tried, embarrassing herself at the absurdity of the sight—the nose wiggling didn’t work.
Amelia was just about to give up when the ear-piercing ring of her cell phone went off, she rocketed upward, a good foot off the ground.
Shaking off the jitters, she let out a nervous giggle and went in search for her phone. On the fifth ring, she found it under the masses of pillows on her bed and answered it just in time. “Hello,” she squeaked, breathlessly.
“I’ve been calling you for days,” Erin’s panicked voice blasted through the phone. “Pack a bag. I’m coming to get you. You need to get out of town, fast.”
“Take a breath, Erin. What’s wrong with you?” Amelia perched on the edge of her bed.
“I can’t explain. You just need to trust me. You’re in serious danger and you’ve gotta get as far away from here as you can,” Erin blurted in a frantic frenzy.
The hairs on the back of Amelia’s neck rose and a biting chill encased her skin. ”You’re not making any sense.” She glanced back at the door and a flood of scorching fury washed over her. “And I can’t leave. I kinda locked myself in my room.”
“Unlock the stupid door and get ready,” Erin snapped.
Amelia wished it was that simple. She gritted her teeth and put all her energy into calming down, because she really didn’t want to snap at her friend. “That’s not what I meant. It’s some kinda magic. I can’t get out and none of the vamps can get in.” She knew she sounded bitter, but she was pretty sure she earned the right to be.
“Shit,” Erin puffed.
Amelia heard something that sounded like glass shatter over the line. “What’s got you so freaked?” she asked cautiously.
Erin ignored her. The line was so silent that Amelia was sure that the connection had been lost. She was just about to check the screen when Erin said, “I guess that’s actually kinda perfect.”
Amelia couldn’t hold it in any longer. “Erin!” she yelled. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“I can’t explain just please don’t leave your room until you hear from me. I’m really sorry but please believe me… I didn’t know. But I promise I’ll fix this.” The words came out in a tear soaked stream.
“Fix what? What’s going on?” Amelia yelled, but it was too late, Erin was gone and the wretched beeping of the cut-off call was all that was left.
****
Hours passed by and Amelia watched helplessly as the sun set and the darkened sky came alight with glittering stars. A shooting star streaked by, and she closed her eyes to make a wish.
“Amelia,” Mitchell said from the doorway and she turned around. She hadn’t heard him and wondered how long he had been standing there. Her heart fluttered, skipping and jumping and she felt the now familiar tug, urging her to go to him. Was she just getting used to him? A week ago she would have known he was coming. It was distressing to think that they might be drifting further apart.
Amelia smiled, lighting up like a spotlight, but he kept his expression serious, nearly blank. “I talked to Mabel,” he said. “I’ve done a lot of thinking on this. I just want you to know that if you really want to break the bond. If you really don’t want to be with me…”
“Mitch, it’s not…” Amelia cut him off and took a small step towards him. She had never felt so helpless before. He needed her and she couldn’t get to him and it was all her fault.
His frown deepened. “Just let me finish.” He looked so miserable that it broke her heart and a sting burned at her eyes. “You know what happened to Derek and Angelle. Well, I could change you if you want and once you’re a vampire I’ll sacrifice myself. I’ll do that for you, if it is what you want.”
“Mitch…?” Amelia couldn’t believe what she was hearing, and for a second she was blinded by a flash of red-hot rage. Did he really believe she wanted him dead?
“You don’t need to say anything,” he sighed. “I just want you to know that I’ll do it for you. Think about it, love.” He smiled a small, sad smile and then turned his back on her.
The anger bubbled up, boiling over. Amelia’s face felt hot, and her neck and her entire body, as if she had been consumed by flames. They licked up the back of her neck, flickering hotter and hotter. “This isn’t as black and white as you’re trying to make it, Mitch,” she seethed through clenched teeth. “You just don’t get it.”
Mitchell kept his back to her and said, “I get it.” She could hear him take a few deep breaths and his aura started to flicker, gray, darker, darker, black. “We bring out the worst in each other. Look at us. I broke Eric’s neck. I wanted to kill Tyler.” The blue veins in his neck bul
ged and he balled his fists. “I can’t control myself when it comes to you. And you… You almost killed me.”
“I don’t want to live without you.” The words seemed so wrong and so right. With everything they had been through in the last few weeks Amelia had let all the anger drag her down, but she genuinely meant it, unable to conceive of not having him.
Mitchell spun around, eyes blazing and Amelia gasped as his fangs popped down. He smashed his fist against the barrier that kept them apart. “And you obviously don’t want to live with me.” The words were snarled.
“Dammit,” Amelia yelled. “We’re supposed to be a team,” she raged. “Stop trying to make all the damn decisions. Did you ever think, just for a second, if you had asked me what I wanted it may have been different? You took the choice away from me. You forced all this on me. I’m sorry if I’m not handling it well, but what the hell did you expect?”
Mitchell softened, and his eyes slowly changed back to blue, fangs disappearing. “I expected you to love me as much as I love you.” Then, before she could say anything else, he was gone.
Amelia ran after him, bouncing off the wall, which shuddered on impact. She banged her fist against it until bruises started to show and her arms were too weak to keep going. Amelia racked her brain trying to figure out why she couldn’t leave, to locate the missing pieces. She had forgiven him, forgiven all of them. She had accepted him. She had chanted, lit candles, tried everything, but nothing worked. What good was it to be a witch if she couldn’t even get out of her own room?
Her head hurt. Her whole body hurt, and exhaustion weighted her down. Mentally, emotionally and physically. Amelia leaned against the stupid invisible wall, cursing under her breath. She sunk down to the floor and rested her chin on her knees, staring blankly out the glass doors into the night.
She was missing something, but what was it? What was stopping her from getting out? Madame Crystal had said that when the time came she would know what to do. If this wasn’t the time, then when? How much longer would she have to be stuck in here and away from him?
Amelia closed her eyes and the tears slid down her face, soaking into her already sweat dampened t-shirt and she let her mind drift to Mitchell. He was in the library with her family—they really were her family—and she smiled at the thought. Even Tyler was there. They were all working together, peacefully, trying to find an answer to the question that none of them knew. “Mitchell, you need to think this out,” Tyler was saying. They were looking at each other as if they had been friends for years. When had that happened? “I don’t think Millie wants you to die. Didn’t you see the way she lit up when you were at the door? If that’s not love man, I don’t know what is.”
“I just don’t know if there are any other options,” Mitchell said. He sounded tired as if he had already tried everything else. “If we keep this up we’ll end up killing each other.”
Amelia heard something, a banging, or knocking, and she was jerked out of Mitchell’s thoughts, back to the lonely room. Her prison. She glanced around, thinking Mabel had come in, but there was no one. She was still alone.
She was just about to let herself drift back to Mitchell when a motion light flicked on just outside her door. The banging came again; a soft thud, thud, thud and Amelia darted up from the floor. There was something, a ball of some sort, bouncing off the French doors. She couldn’t make it out and she ventured over, swinging them open.
It took Amelia a lengthy minute to figure out what she was seeing. The thing hanging from the balcony above was so beaten up it was almost unrecognizable. It was the blonde pigtails that finally made Amelia’s brain register that it was—Erin, dangling from a rope. She was gagged, hog tied, and bleeding from so many different places there was barely any trace of skin through the red smears.
“Erin!” Amelia cried and rushed forward, despite her horror at the sight before her.
CHAPTER 27
A surge of hot power sparked into her veins and Amelia hit the barrier at a sprint. She didn’t know if she could get out but she had to try. When she hit the wall, it was as if she was wrapped in plastic wrap and she couldn’t breathe. It closed in around her, sagging and straining against her and like elastic, it tried to shoot her back in.
Erin was trying to tell her something, but Amelia couldn’t hear it through the gag. Her voice was coming out in spurts of mumbled, distorted sounds.
Suddenly, like a bubble bursting, Amelia crashed onto the terrace in a crumpled heap. She scurried around, pulling herself up and lunged for Erin.
Erin’s muffled and choked voice was barely audible and Amelia fought with the gag that had been tied and duct taped in place. It seemed to take forever before she was able to get it off and when she did, Erin shrieked, “Run, Millie! It’s a trap.”
Amelia was struggling with the ropes that bound Erin’s legs and arms and was about to tell her to stop moving, when, right at that moment, something solid pounded her on the head. She staggered, then collapsed to the ground.
Erin screamed. Amelia tried to get up. Erin needed her. Erin was in trouble.
Amelia scrambled to her feet and then everything around her went dark. A rough canvas bag was wrapped around her head. Erin was still screaming but Amelia couldn’t understand what she was saying. Someone grabbed her, tossing her over a shoulder in a fireman’s carry. She kicked and pounded her fists against her attacker.
A burst of wind whipped around her as her captor picked up his pace, running, and then suddenly, Amelia was tossed onto hard-ridged plastic and the sound of metal grinding on a track slammed through her ears. Tires squealed and she rolled, crashing into the wall of the vehicle as the driver took a turn at a speed that made it wobble, teetering on two tires before straightening back out.
Strong, cold hands grabbed her arms, and the burning pinch of a needle stabbed into her vein. Amelia tried to kick and rip her arm away but it was no use. At that moment, she knew it was a vampire holding her down. Fiona? No, not Fiona, it was a man, she was sure of it. The hand holding onto her was too big.
A warm burst coursed into her, as whoever was holding her pushed down on the plunger injecting (God only knew what) into her. The drug took hold over her quickly and within seconds Amelia felt as if she was covered in wet, heavy tar. The hand let go of her and she tried to move her right arm but its sudden heaviness weighted it down.
The next thing Amelia knew, she was opening her eyes. A thick, moldy garbage smell, like rotten meat, drifted up her nose, and she gagged. She tried to cover her mouth but her hands wouldn’t move. Rope rubbed tightly against her wrists. She lifted her head up. She wasn’t alone.
Amelia blinked a few times. Her eyes couldn’t seem to focus. One second she saw ten people, the next fifteen, and then five. No, three. There were three people. Adam, she recognized him instantly, and a flash of the party came back to her. That rancid smell, she should have known that was him.
“If you’re thinking of using magic it won’t work. The drugs will keep you too disoriented for you to gather enough power,” a man said. He was tall and lanky, wearing black on black. Black jeans, black shirt, black leather jacket. Even his eyes and hair were midnight black.
“Who are you?” Amelia screamed, fighting against the rope that tied her legs and arms to a wooden chair. She lost her balance and the chair flipped backwards, and she smacked her already bleeding head onto the hard concrete floor. I’m going to have major brain damage if I don’t stop hitting my head, she thought and then fought against a building giggle. She silently scolded herself for the stupid thought and blamed it on the drugs.
Kandi stood over her, cackling, eyes blazing and fangs down. She grabbed Amelia by the hair lifting her and the chair back up. “Don’t you remember him, Amelia?” she asked. “It hasn’t been that long since you saw him last.”
“What are you talking about?” Amelia cried. Kandi yanked at her hair again and then crouched in front of her, licking the blood off her fingers. Amelia’s blood. All of a sudd
en, Amelia thought she was going to be sick and she sucked in a few breaths, trying to keep the raising bile down.
“Kandi,” the man snapped, pulling Amelia’s eyes away from the girl sucking and licking her fingers. “Step away. You’ll have plenty of time to enjoy her later.” Then he grabbed a chair, placing it in front of Amelia. “I’m a bit hurt that you don’t remember me. Especially after all the trouble I went through to make this a spitting image of the night we met.” He smiled a toothy smile and Adam and Kandi laughed. “I really thought Erin had ruined my plans when she took you to that psychic.” He shrugged. “I guess she turned out to be useful after all.” His eyes flashed red and his smile widened. “All your bodyguards thought you were so safe.”
Amelia forced herself to look around the room. What was he talking about? Who was he? What did he want with her?
The concrete floor, cold against her feet, and the concrete walls with no windows felt suffocating. She was in an unfinished basement. To her right were scattered paintings leaning haphazardly against the walls. Bright, water-colored landscapes and oil portraits. Amelia blinked, trying to clear her blurry eyes. She felt as if she was looking through a dirty, finger-smudged glass.
Slowly the paintings came into focus. “Where did you get those?” she gasped. They were her paintings, all of them. She snapped her head around to the left and a bolt of dizziness threatened to pull her into the dark. Her easel was set up and an unfinished painting of Mitchell rested against it. It was the painting she had been working on the night her parents had died. Across his face was a deep brownish dirt line. Blood. Her father’s blood. This basement was set up exactly as her basement had been the night they died, right up to the way she was tied to the chair. The painful memories came rushing in and Amelia looked at him, really looked at him, and she recognized him. The man who had killed her parents.
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