by Amy Sparling
“You shouldn’t have tried to take it off,” Alexo says plainly, like she’s the one in the wrong here.
“I know your secret,” Jayla says, sounding like she’s talking through gritted teeth. “I found out what you did.” She takes a ragged breath and I lean in close. “You’re a succubus!”
“Am I?” Alexo says, clearly amused. “Do explain how you figured that out.”
“I knew you were hiding something. I followed you, and I saw that you have secret meetings with a woman who wears a necklace that looks just like my bracelet.”
The room goes silent, and Alexo’s shoes shift on the floor. I think Jayla is onto something. More importantly, she might have found who Alexo works for.
I wish I had brought my phone so I could record all of this and take it back to Riley. But since I don’t have it, I strain and focus to remember every word I hear.
“You’re a demon!” Jayla says. “I looked it up online. You make us wear bracelets so you can stay here on earth and if we try to remove the bracelets, we die!”
Alexo chuckles now, but Jayla talks over him. “The internet told me all about you. You’re evil!”
“I think that’s enough talking for now,” Alexo says. He turns and walks away from her, directly toward me. I freeze, right here like a sitting duck on my hands and knees on the staircase. His shoes get closer and closer, and then they turn toward the wooden desk. I breathe a sigh of relief as Alexo leans down, inserts a key into one of the desk drawers, and opens it. He retrieves a syringe. My stomach flips over.
He walks back to Jayla. It sounds like she’s started crying, but I can’t see her face.
“You are wrong,” Alexo says, his voice like venom. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you that you can’t believe anything on the internet? Demons don’t exist, child. But immortals do.”
Jayla cries out in pain. Within seconds, her body goes limp, sinking to the floor. Russell steps backward to avoid the fall, and Jayla’s long black hair splays out all over the shiny hardwood floors.
Alexo just killed her.
“Now,” Alexo says, clapping his hands together in front of his chest. “Russell, you’ll need to head into town and hire a new recruit. We can’t be down a lifeblood for very long.”
“Yes, sir,” Russell says. “There’s a women’s shelter about seventy miles from here. No one would miss someone from a shelter.”
“Just make sure she’s not a drug addict,” Alexo says. “Kyle—” Tears spring to my eyes as I watch Alexo’s shiny shoes turn toward my friend who has been silent this whole time. “Take the body to the east balcony. Throw her off. We’ll say she slipped.”
Kyle sighs. “I wish there was another way.”
“Fine with me,” Alexo says. “You can create an elaborate death scene if you want. Just get it done and make it believable.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Kyle says, his voice low. “I don’t think she needed to die. She just—we could have bribed her or something. Made her keep quiet and let her live out her remaining days here.”
“Humans don’t keep quiet,” Alexo says. “Teenage girls have no integrity in them at all. You are young, but you’ll learn. If they break the rules, they die.” Alexo turns on his heel. “Dispose of this damned body. I need a drink.”
He saunters off toward the bar in his room. Kyle bends down to pick up Jayla, gingerly cradling her lifeless body in his arms.
“Use the back exit,” Russell says, gesturing toward the hidden door. Toward me.
Kyle’s shoes turn in my direction. I spring into action, climbing back down the stairs backwards on my hands and knees. When my heels press against the door behind me, I turn and yank it open, then push it closed as quietly as possible. Kyle and Russell will be at the top of the stairs any moment. I have to get the hell out of here.
I look around. I’m in a hallway that looks nearly identical to the first hallway that leads to all the guy’s rooms, only this is the only door, and the hall is narrow like a service hallway. There are no windows, no place to hide, just a metal door at the far end of the hallway.
I take off running toward the door. I run like my life depends on it, because it probably does. If I’m caught, I can’t lie my way out of this. I fly down the hall, my socks sliding on the thin carpeting. Once I reach the door, I push it open and burst outside into the humid, hot summer air. The bottle of whiskey flies out of my hand, but I leave it. There’s no time to waste. There’s a wooded area next to the fence that runs along this side of the house all the way up to the garage. I run toward the garage, my socks getting covered in dirt and leaves along the way. When I reach the front of the house, I tuck around the corner, then lean against the closed garage door, panting for breath. They can’t see me now.
My legs are shaky and worn out as I walk across the front of the mansion, the cobblestone driveway hot on my feet. I pass up the front door because a servant would welcome me inside if I went that way. Instead, I keep walking until I get to the gardens. I need time alone. I need to cool off and compose myself before I even think of stepping foot inside that house again.
Jayla is dead.
Jayla has been murdered.
Jayla knows that Alexo meets with a woman.
What if the man in charge of the Rosewater clan is actually a woman?
My thoughts spin in a vortex of fear and curiosity as I walk aimlessly through the garden. I try to take deep breaths but they all come out ragged. My chest aches in a way it’s never felt before. I just watched a girl get killed for doing exactly what I did that day with Theo. She tried removing her bracelet and discovered that something was very wrong.
Now she’s dead.
I turn the corner of the garden, past a line of rose bushes. In my dazed state, I walk straight into someone.
Nia yelps, then turns around. Her short brown hair is sleek and cute today. I stare at the butterfly tattoos on her shoulders because I can’t meet her eyes.
“Sorry, I thought I was alone,” Nia says.
“I should apologize to you,” I manage to say. “I just walked right into you.”
“The gardens are so pretty, it’s easy to get distracted.”
I nod, fearing that the lump in my throat might cut off my airway any second now.
“Listen,” Nia says. “Um, have you seen Jayla today?”
I stare at her so long she asks the question again. “Yeah,” I breathe. All the sounds of nature outside have been replaced with the pounding of my heartbeat inside of my ears. “I uh, saw her in the library this morning.”
Nia’s eyebrows lift. “You did? What was she doing?”
The poor girl’s face has so much hope on it now, that I wish I hadn’t said anything. I shrug. “She looked kind of upset, I guess. I tried talking to her but she didn’t want to talk to me. She just…wanted to be left alone.”
I realize in the moment that I’m describing a girl who’s depressed. That if Kyle goes along with the body dumping, it’ll look like Jayla committed suicide. No one should be blamed for their own death when they were actually murdered.
But what can I do? If I say anything, I’ll be next. Nia will be killed, too. They’ll take all of us out and find five new unsuspecting girls to give their mortality way.
I have to keep quiet.
Nia smiles. “Well, she’s been weird lately but at least she finally left her room, you know? I think maybe she’s homesick.”
“Yeah,” I say, exhaling as I turn around, ready to get the hell out of this conversation. “Maybe she is.”
Chapter 21
My entire world is upside down. I’ve never seen anyone die in front of my own eyes before. And this wasn’t just a death. It was murder.
My vision is blurry, my pulse is racing, and my mouth is dry. I don’t know how I manage to make it all the way back inside the mansion and up to my room. My legs work on autopilot, making me move even though my brain is freaking the hell out.
This is bad. This is so bad.
&nb
sp; Poor Jayla, dead because of the clan. They caught her snooping around. They found out that she knew something was up.
That doesn’t look good for Riley and me. We’ve been so careful but suddenly it doesn’t seem careful enough. The whispers and dry erase board—it’s not good enough. They’re going to find us.
They will kill us too.
I burst into my room so quickly that Riley jumps. She’s sitting on my floor, laptop in front of her and the book in her lap, just like how I’d left her earlier this morning.
“Jesus, Cara,” Riley says, putting a hand to her chest. “You scared the hell out of me.”
“I just—” I stop talking. I clamp a hand over my mouth. I want so badly to tell her every gory and horrific detail of what just happened, but I can’t say a damn word of it in this house. I have to get out of here. The walls feel like they’re closing in on me. I pull off Theo’s sunglasses and toss them on my bed, then put the DVD on my nightstand. Several deep breaths don’t slow my racing heart.
Riley lifts an eyebrow and then nods toward my nightstand. “Theo called you.”
“I don’t care.”
My voice sounds like someone else’s. Riley’s eyebrows pull together and she stands up, eyeing me like I’ve gone insane. “What’s going on?” she asks. “Did you two get in a fight?”
My heart is screaming at me to play it cool. Act normal. If the clan spies on us through the tablets in the wall, they might be on high alert right now because of Jayla. Maybe they’re worried she told one of us something. I have to be calm. Act normal.
“No, not really,” I say, trying to keep my voice calm. “He’s just always gone so I’m kind of over it.”
Lies. It’s all a lie.
And Riley knows it.
Her eyes widen and she puts a finger over her lips to silence me. She looks around, finding the dry erase board and then she scribbles something on it.
What’s going on? I know you’re lying
we need to get the hell out of here, I write back. We need to talk—privately!!!
“Wanna go for a ride on the motorcycle?” Riley says.
I shake my head, but then I think twice. If we have the driver drop us off somewhere, I know I won’t be able to maintain a normal act in front of him. The only other way to leave is of our own accord so no one can tell I am positively freaking out.
“Yeah,” I say. “Let’s go for a bike ride. Maybe get some ice cream?” My stomach churns at the thought of food. I don’t think I can ever eat again.
The wind whips my clothing and hair as we zoom through the country roads that lead away from the mansion. Riley holds onto my stomach tightly, but if she’s scared she hasn’t said anything. My eyes sting with the threat of tears and I have to keep blinking them away. Every time I think about Jayla, about this impossible situation, I want to cry.
Crying won’t solve anything though, so I push on, driving my motorcycle farther than I’ve ever been. We go past the diner, past the high school. We cross through an intersection and I just keep on driving until half an hour has passed.
“We stopping any time soon?” Riley calls out when we slow down for a stop sign.
I don’t know where to stop. Fields fill my vision as far as I can see. Pastures and farm land and slanted hilly terrain stretch on forever by this old two lane county road.
I put the bike in first gear and push on, driving a little further until I see a large oak tree on the side of the road. I pull over and park my bike under the tree, rolling it so that the tree blocks most of it. I don’t know who I’m kidding though—if the clan has my bike GPS tracked, they’ll know exactly where I am.
Riley pulls off her helmet and shakes out her hair. “What the hell is going on?”
I shake my head. “Not here,” I whisper.
I start walking, the motorcycle key gripped in my palm. I cross under the barbed wire fence of whatever farmland is in front of us and I walk.
The bike could be tracked, or bugged, or fitted with hidden cameras for all I know. I can’t risk it, so I walk, my shoes trudging through the high grass that’s as tall as my waist. Riley follows behind me, no doubt annoyed, but she doesn’t say anything.
When we’re so far into the field that my bike is just a tiny dot near the old oak tree, I stop walking and turn to her.
“Jayla is dead.”
Riley stares at me for a long moment, her dark hair whishing softly in the breeze. In all my years of knowing her, I don’t think she’s ever been this quiet.
A tear falls down my cheek. I am mourning the loss of an innocent girl, the loss of our mortality. The fear of losing everything on top of all we’ve already lost. Riley just watches me for a long moment, neither of us saying anything.
Then I tell her everything.
“Holy shit,” Riley breathes, closing her eyes for a moment. We stare at each other, both of us dumbfounded and terrified, and I just nod.
“Holy shit is right,” I say. “I don’t know what to do. I keep wondering if I could have prevented this, if I’d only stayed with her in the library or tried to help her or something.”
Riley shakes her head and pulls a long blade of grass out of the ground. She twists it around her finger. “Clearly she’d already known something was up by the time you found her in the library. If you’d stayed, they might have thought you were in on it, too.”
“She’s dead, Riley.” I blink away tears. “I can’t believe this happened.”
Riley exhales. “What do we do now? We need a plan.”
“We have to act normal. We have to pretend to be happy and carefree and not give off even the slightest hint that we know anything.”
She nods. “We can do it.”
“And…the book,” I say, biting my lip. “Maybe we should delete the photos and clear out the computer and just forget about that for now. It’s too risky if we get caught.”
Riley’s face contorts, and I know it’s not what she wants to hear right now. Finally, she nods. “Yeah, it’s too risky. I haven’t translated enough information to learn anything anyway.”
“As for Alexo,” I say, remembering what Jayla had said. “We should find out who this woman is that he meets with.”
“Absolutely not,” Riley says, dropping the blade of grass she’d been playing with. “No more spying, no more playing detective. We’ll let Theo handle it all.”
“He doesn’t have time to do it all,” I say, groaning in frustration. “We have to help.”
“If we get caught, we’ll end up like Jayla.”
“And if we don’t do something, we will end up like her anyway. Dead in a year with no future whatsoever.”
Riley can’t argue with that. “We’ll be careful. I’ll talk to Kyle…maybe I’ll say something like why aren’t there any women in the clan and I’ll give him this girl power guilt trip. Maybe he’ll tell me about the woman in an effort to let me know that there are women in power here.”
“That could work,” I say, but thinking of Kyle makes me remember what he had to do today. Theo is right; Kyle is a good guy underneath it all. He’s just stuck in the clan like the rest of us.
“I wonder what Jayla found online,” I say, thinking back to what she’d said just before she died. “She thought Alexo was some kind of evil creature, but she mentioned that they talked about the bracelet on some message board. What if there’s information out there about how to remove it?”
Riley seems skeptical. “You’d think the immortal clan leaders would make sure that wasn’t online.”
“I don’t know,” I say as optimism awakens inside of me. “If the clans use lifebloods but never tell them what they’re actually being used for, maybe they don’t look online for people talking about it. They’re all old as hell, after all. I don’t even think Alexo knows how to use the internet. We could get a secret computer, like a library somewhere or something, and search for bracelets you can’t remove.”
“We would need to do it far, far away from here,” Riley sa
ys. “Who knows how far their tracking goes.”
“I have an idea,” I say, shivering from the wave of nausea the idea gives me. “It’s…well…it’s kind of a bad idea.”
Riley folds her arms across her chest. “What is it?”
“Jayla did all this research on her own before she got caught. We should figure out what she knew. Maybe it’ll make our search easier.”
“How can we get information from a dead girl?” Riley asks.
“Easy,” I say, reaching for my motorcycle keys from my pocket. “We search her room.”
Chapter 22
When we’re back at the mansion, Riley’s phone beeps. I park the motorcycle in its spot in the garage and put my helmet on the shelf. Riley makes a weird hmm sound while she looks at her phone.
“Theo just texted me,” she says quietly as if she’s afraid he’s hiding in the garage and will hear us. “He wants to know if you’re okay because he can’t get ahold of you.”
I sigh and try to think of what to say to him. I’m crazy about him, as much as you can be crazy about someone, but this is something I need to be alone for right now. Well, not alone. I need Riley, and we need answers. If Theo knew what we were up to, he’d put a stop to it. As much as I’m dying to see him and curl up in his arms, we have to take care of this first.
“Tell him I’m sleeping,” I say. “Say we were up late last night and I’m still asleep and you’ll have me call him when I’m up.”
She nods as her thumbs fly across the screen, sending him the text. “He’s here, you know,” she says as she slides her phone back in her pocket. “He could see us walk inside.”
“That’s why you’ll go first,” I say, feeling so guilty I could die. “Look around and then wave for me to follow you if the coast is clear.”
“Maybe you should just tell him,” she says as we enter into the garage through the service hallway.
I shake my head. Jayla is dead, killed at the hands of the man in control of the clan. Theo has spent the last few days on a secret trip with that same man, doing God knows what. I need to figure out as much information as I can before I see him, or I might crack from the weight of it all and fall apart the moment we see each other again. Plus, I can’t shake the thought that Theo has bad news from Alexo. Like maybe Alexo talked him into leaving me because I’m just a pathetic human. Maybe it’s something worse. I have no idea what happened with Theo and Alexo, and I just can’t bear to face him right now.
