“You did not do anything.” Milo was so completely incredulous that I looked over at him. “They love you over there, like crazy love. Mae talked nonstop about you, and Jack looks at you like you walk on water. It’s a little sickening actually.”
“Really?” That made me feel a little better, but Jack still hadn’t called, so I wasn’t over-the-top better.
“Yeah.” He nodded, then looked down at my hands and wrinkled his nose.
“Your nails are chipped really bad. Why don’t I repaint them while you wait for Jack to wake up?”
“You think he’s still sleeping?” I asked hopefully, and let my brother take my hands. I had left my make up bag splayed out on the coffee table, and Milo leaned over and grabbed the nail polish remover, cotton balls, and dark blue nail polish.
“We left at like two-thirty in the morning, and everybody in that house was wide awake. Plus, he’s some rich, young playboy that doesn’t have a job.
What does he really have to get up for?” He did have a point, and I finally started to relax. It was just too easy to get worked up into a frenzy when I thought about being away from Peter or Jack for any length of time.
“Considering this isn’t the first time you’ve painted my nails, I probably should’ve figure out sooner that you were gay,” I teased him. Milo had been painting my nails for as long as he could paint anything. When I really looked back at life with him, there were a lot of really obvious hints that I should’ve picked up on.
“Probably,” he agreed. He was pressing hard on my nails with the cotton balls to get off the remainders of my chipped nail polish. “You really need to stop biting your nails. It’s a horrible habit.”
After he finished painting my nails, he sat with me on the couch. He talked a little bit about how much he liked Mae and everybody, and that he hoped that I wouldn’t mind if he went back over there again. Honestly, I didn’t mind at all. It was nice being able to be around him and Jack at the same time. Then he pointed out that he’d never met Peter, and we both thought that was strange.
He hadn’t come down from his room all night, and Mae hadn’t given Milo a tour of the upstairs. Like they were purposely trying to keep them apart. Then my heart pounded painfully when I realized that Peter might actually be dangerous, and maybe it wasn’t the safest place for Milo to be hanging out. I considered saying something to that effect when my phone rang.
“Hey, sorry, I didn’t call you sooner,” Jack said when I arrived. Just hearing his voice made me elated, but then I realized there was a tightness to it.
Something was bothering him. “I ended up having a really late night last night, so I just woke up.”
“Sorry. I hope none of its my fault.” But I knew it was my fault. I had done something wrong last night.
“No, it’s not,” Jack reassured me warmly. “It was just … a little family crisis, I guess.”
“What happened?” Anxiety gripped me, and Milo shot me a confused, concerned look, but I just shook my head at him. I couldn’t explain it now, and maybe not ever.
“Um… I’ll tell you when I pick you up, okay? Will you be ready soon?” He was definitely keeping something from me.
“I’m ready now.” I was really glad that I had gotten up and gotten ready before he called. If I had heard this when I first woke up, I would’ve rushed to his house in last night’s clothes with greasy hair.
“Good. I’ll be there soon.” He hung up, probably to prevent me from asking more questions, so I flipped my phone shut.
“What happened?” Milo’s worried expression mirrored my own, but I was too frazzled to really answer him. Hurriedly, I slipped on shoes and grabbed my dark blue cardigan to throw on. “Alice?”
“I don’t know. He wouldn’t tell me.” Why did I have to feel like crying? I swear, I didn’t really cry this much. Most of the time, I was a really sane, normal person. But something about Jack and Peter made me want to burst into tears all the time. My emotions just seemed to be on overdrive. It was like I had lived my whole life using just the bare minimum, and now this family had switched them into max and I couldn’t get a handle on them.
“Is everyone okay?” Milo leaned over the back of the couch, watching me rush about. I probably had everything I needed, but I kept feeling like I was forgetting something, then running back to make sure I had it.
“I don’t know, Milo!” I snapped. “He didn’t tell me anything!”
“Sorry.” He sounded hurt, and I wanted to apologize, but I didn’t have time. Jack would be here “soon,” which could mean anywhere from five seconds to fifteen minutes in his time. “Do you want me to come with?”
“Not today.” I finally managed an apologetic smile, and he slumped down in the couch. “Another time, I promise. Just… not today, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, just go.”
“Sorry. I’ll talk to you later.” And with that, I was out the door. I know I should’ve said more, but I couldn’t even wait for the elevator today. I pushed the call button, and when the doors didn’t immediately open, I ran down the stairs. It didn’t feel right to sit still anyway. My mind was reeling about the possibilities of what a family crisis could mean for them.
Even in the rush I had been in, Jack had still managed to beat me outside.
He’d driven the Jeep, and I practically dove into it. Then I looked at him expectantly, and he just smiled grimly at me.
“What happened?” I demanded as we pulled away from my apartment building.
“And a ‘how do you do’ to you too,” Jack replied dryly.
“Jack!”
“Sorry.” He stared out straight ahead but kept taking sidelong glances at me. “So… last night, after you left… Peter left.”
“What do you mean ‘left?’” My heart had already started pounding and my stomach twisted in knots, and Jack just groaned. “Jack? Where’d he go?
Why’d he leave? Because of me?”
“You have to calm down,” Jack sighed. “This is why I didn’t do it over the phone, but maybe I should’ve.” Then he looked at me somberly, his eyes pleading with me. “Please calm down.”
“I will if you just tell me what’s going on!” Just the same, I tried to slow my breathing and the frantic beating of my heart.
“We don’t really know where he went.” He had waited for me to calm down a bit, but he kept his eyes fixed on the road, like he was trying really hard not to be distracted by me. His knuckles had gone white from the way he gripped the steering wheel. “Ezra has some ideas because…” He trailed off and rubbed his temple. “He left because of… You can’t take this wrong way. I know that you will, though. You always take everything the wrong way. If I said, ‘hey you look nice today,’ you’d say, ‘and what I don’t look nice everyday?’”
“Jack, please focus.” I wanted to yell at him and make him just hurry up and tell me what was going on, but I thought that would just drag out the process even more.
“Yeah.” He quickly glanced at me, but I didn’t understand what he meant so I just stared at him. “Yes. Peter left because of you. Because of what happened, well, almost happened yesterday. But its not because you did anything wrong, or there’s anything wrong with you. Peter’s just going through his own thing and I don’t know. I think he’s just being an ass, but Ezra says…”
He trailed off, probably realizing that he hadn’t really said anything but he’d almost said too much.
My eyes had welled with tears. No matter what Jack said, Peter left because of me, because of something that I had or hadn’t done, and it was devastating. Everything about me craved him, and the fact that anything about me drove him away was completely unforgivable.
“What did almost happen yesterday?” I asked quietly.
“Well…” Jack laughed hollowly, and his hand gripped the wheel even tighter. “What do you think happened yesterday?”
“I don’t know. Honestly, it’s hard to remember. When I try to think about it, I just remember being in his ro
om and feeling this incredible pull towards him and this… yearning.”
I tried hard to focus on what had sent me in a tailspin, but it felt so foggy.
I could remember Peter’s eyes and the way he smelled and wanting him so much it hurt. My heart was racing, throbbing painfully, and I had gotten short of breath. Just thinking about Peter caused a psychosomatic reaction.
“Stop, Alice,” Jack whimpered, and he was in total agony. His blue eyes had gone almost translucent, and they had that hungry look that was very reminiscent of the one that Peter had given me last night.
“Stop what?” I asked breathlessly. He groaned and looked away from me, and I was about press him further, but then the Jeep started skidding horribly across the road.
“Ah, hell.” Jack gripped the wheel and tried to correct it, but I felt it start to tilt to the side, and he gave me a frantic look.
Before I could really understand what was happening, he lunged at me, wrapping his arms tightly around me and pressing me against him. I closed my eyes and buried my face in his chest, and I felt his body curl protectively around me. There was the sensation of moving and I felt cold wind whip through my hair. The sound of crunching metal and shattering glass and this sickening thud filled my ears, but I could barely hear anything over the pounding of my heart.
Then I finally felt Jack’s arm relax around me, and I lifted my head, looking at him in the face. He was worried and scared for me, but there was still that underlying hunger.
“Are you okay?” Jack asked, pushing the hair from eyes to inspect for wounds.
“I think so,” I nodded. I felt dazed and scared, but nothing really hurt.
“Good. Then I need you to get away from me for a minute,” Jack said, not unkindly.
I hurried to do as he asked, pushing myself off of him and standing up. He jumped up quickly and took several steps back from me. For the first time, I looked around. We were on the shoulder of the highway, and there were bits of broken glass and metal all over the road. Another car had been crushed against the cement divider in the middle, and there was an SUV farther down that looked like it had some minor damage. Headlights of stopped cars blinded me.
At first, I couldn’t figure out where the Jeep was, and then I saw it. About thirty feet back from us, the crushed remnants of Jeep, setting on its top, were engulfed in flames. I gasped, realizing that if Jack hadn’t grabbed me, I either would’ve stayed in that car to get smashed and burned up, or I would’ve been thrown from the Jeep going well over a hundred miles an hour and landed on the pavement.
“Are you okay?” I looked back at him.
Jack had taken the brunt force of everything, and if he hadn’t, I surely would’ve been killed. My body was much more fragile than his, but he had to have sustained some wounds.
“Yeah, I’m just great.” He was trying to compose himself and looking at the carnage around us.
There appeared to be some cuts on his arm, and when he turned away, I saw the back of his shirt was completely shredded and covered in blood. When he’d hit the road, he must’ve landed on his back and then skidded for awhile.
“You’re covered in blood!” I exclaimed and took a step closer to him, trying to inspect his wounds, but he just waved me off. I remembered the dog bite, and how the major wounds had looked so minor. I wasn’t really worried about this, but he had just been thrown from the car.
“I’m fine.” He held his arm out for me to see. There was a thick line of blood from where a gash should be, but there wasn’t one. In fact, there wasn’t even a raised red mark.
“What about your back?” I asked, but he shook his head.
“It tingles. It’ll be fine in a minute.” All the skin and the muscles should’ve been ripped from his back, but it would be fine in a minute. My mind still couldn’t wrap itself around him, or what he could do.
“You saved my life. Again.” I wrapped my arms tightly around myself. The adrenaline and confusion and Peter’s sedative all mixed through me, on top of Jack’s apprehension and fading hunger. I knew I was on the verge of hysterics.
“Well, this time, I almost killed you too. So… it kinda evens out.” Jack meant he’d almost killed me by driving too fast and crashing the Jeep, but I could still feel how hungry he was and remembered that ominous conversation he’d had with Ezra about how this all wouldn’t last much longer.
“Why do you keep saving my life?” My voice trembled and I could feel hot tears sliding down my cheeks. Jack looked at me like he didn’t understand what I meant, but I went on talking, and the more I talked, the harder I cried. “I just don’t get it! Why do you keep saving me if you’re just going to kill me? Why don’t you just hurry up and get it over with already? Is this some kind of sick game for you? Do you always have to play with your food before you eat it?” His jaw dropped and his eyes widened with shock and hurt.
“Do you know…” Jack trailed off, trying to get a handle on what I meant.
“We’re not going to kill you.”
“Then what’s going on?” I was almost shrieking by then, and Jack was debating on whether or not he should move closer to me or move away from me. “What the hell are you and what do you want with me?!” He gave me a long look, but then decided that I probably couldn’t hold it together much longer, so he answered me.
“Alice, we’re vampires.” Jack gave me an even look, and I almost burst out laughing, but then I realized that he was completely serious. I lapsed into a stunned silence, which was just as well, because suddenly there was the wailing sirens and flashing lights of the police and ambulance.
The paramedics felt that I was definitely in shock, and if I had been able to speak, I probably would’ve agreed. They couldn’t explain how either of us were alive, or where the blood all over Jack’s body had come from. They wanted to put us in an ambulance and send us downtown, but since Jack wouldn’t pass any kind of medical test, he fought them until they finally relented. He allowed them to check me over, but when they said I was fine, except for the shock, he demanded a ride home in a police car.
He sat next to me in the backseat, and while he whispered my name several times, I never responded. I just stared out the window and tried to make sense of his confession. Some things fit. Like his superhuman strength, his miraculous ability to heal, the way they never ate or drank anything, and I’d only ever seen any of them at night. But they were all tan (except for Mae, but she was British), and I’d actually heard Jack’s heartbeat last night. He didn’t have fangs, and he hadn’t eaten me. That did kind of explain what had happened with Peter, except why did they want him to eat me? What was so damn important about that? Couldn’t anybody just eat anybody?
Mae must’ve seen the police car, because she was at the front door waiting for us when the police dropped us off. Jack had thanked the officers when we got out of the car, and he took the time to wave at them when we walked in the house. Matilda jumped all over him, but he wasn’t in the mood, so he pushed her off.
“Jack, what happened?” Mae was talking to him, but she was looking me over. I didn’t even have a scratch on me, but when I’d caught my reflection in the rearview mirror of the squad car, I was completely white and my eyes were frantic and red-rimmed from sobbing.
“I totaled the Jeep,” Jack answered vaguely. We were still standing in the entryway, but he pulled off his shirt, revealing his muscled chest, and started wiping off the blood with his ruined shirt.
“Again?” Mae sounded exasperated and looked over at him. “Jack, you’ve really-”
“She knows,” Jack cut her off. He looked at me, then quickly looked away.
Even though there were still patches of blood on his back, he’d given up on that and balled his up his tee shirt, then walked into the kitchen.
“What?” Mae turned back to me, her face unsure.
“He told me that you’re vampires.” It was the first time I’d spoken since he told me, and my voice sounded hoarse and foreign to me. Mae let out a long shaky b
reath and looked down.
“Oh.” That was all she said. She didn’t tell me that Jack was insane, as I had hoped and half-expected, or expound on it
“So its true?” I asked. The words came out even, but I knew there were hysterics hiding behind them.
“Your throat sounds dry.” Mae forced a smile and gently put her arm around me, but she did it like she was expecting me to push her away. I didn’t, but I knew that I probably should’ve. “Why don’t we go in the kitchen and get you some water and we’ll talk in there?”
“I’m already on it,” Jack informed us as she led me into the kitchen. “The paramedics said she’s probably gone into shock, so she’ll be really thirsty. They also said that she shouldn’t drink anything, in case she needs surgery, but she’s fine, and she’s not going to the hospital tonight.”
He had filled a giant glass with cold water and ice cubes from the Pür filter in the fridge. He handed it to me, but I stopped and opened the fridge first. Just as Milo had predicted, it was completely empty. I stared into it for a minute, then Jack prompted me to drink the water.
“Jack, I really wish you’ve waited for when Ezra was home, or Peter even.”
Mae told him quietly. I shut the fridge and greedily downed the water. The thirst had kicked in, like Jack had said, and I turned to look at them. Jack was shirtless, leaning against the island, and Mae was wringing her hands, but both of them were watching me.
“It couldn’t wait anymore,” Jack explained dully.
“I know, but Ezra and Peter know so much more.” Mae exchanged a nervous look with Jack, and then smiled at me again and pulled out a stool.
“Here, love, why don’t you sit down?”
“Where’s Ezra?” I got on the stool and decided to start with the simplest questions first, the ones that seemed sane and rational. Not like, so, do you guys wanna suck my blood? That was the kind of thing I definitely didn’t want to think about.
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