by Tish Thawer
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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Head East
(Rose)
I couldn't stand to watch my dad sit there with that bitch for a second longer. Now that it was obvious there would be no shopping and no movie in my near future, I pulled out my cell phone and dialed Jillian. "Hey can you please come pick me up at the northwest corner of the business district? I have to get the fuck out of here NOW!"
Jillian started to question me about what was wrong, but I just didn't have the patience to explain it to her over the phone. After grasping my level of frustration she agreed to come pick me up right away.
"I can't believe your dad is actually seeing someone and didn't even tell you about it." Her shock was genuine, but I was too mad to discuss it.
"Can we just not talk about it?" I asked. "I would love it if we could just go for a drive. I'll pay for the gas. I just need some time to get rid of this angry feeling before I can process any of this."
"You got it. Where do you wanna go?"
"I don't care. Let's just head east I guess." I really didn't have a specific destination in mind, but it was beautiful this time of year, and the idea of taking in a little of the countryside sounded just about perfect right now.
Jillian hummed along to the radio as we drove and I stared out the window watching the trees go by. I kept thinking about all those overnight trips that Dad had made to Masen. It was pretty damn obvious that he had spent them with her, and I couldn't help but wonder how long it had been going on. It still pissed me off to think that he had just jumped into a relationship right after Mom had died, and I still didn't understand the statement he had made about me not knowing everything he'd gone through. What the hell was that supposed to mean anyway?
I was lost in my thoughts as I tried to process everything that had happened since Meredith's visit: the way she had scooted closer to Dad on the couch, seeing him in that ridiculous "hip" outfit that was obviously meant to impress her, and then watching her comfort him at the café. But what had really struck me as odd, was the strange, almost angry look that Meredith had given me as I ran by her table today.
I could understand that I probably looked a bit distressed, but then wouldn't you think that she would have had a surprised or concerned look on her face instead of an angry one? What the fuck did she have to be angry at me about? She was the one who was secretly sleeping with my dad, so if anyone had the right to be angry, it was me! This line of thinking wasn't helping me calm down, instead I was starting to get even more pissed off, but then a bump in the road jostled my attention back to the present.
"Hey, where are we?" I asked Jillian. I didn't recognize the road we were now traveling down.
"I turned off the highway a little ways back. It's almost dark and this is the town Justin is from. I thought that since we were this close, I'd drive through and check it out."
Jillian's answer surprised me. I had forgotten all about her new vampire boyfriend. Of course it hadn't surprised me that he'd made some sort of excuse to be unavailable until after dark.
Thinking about Justin pulled my thoughts back to my incident at the apartment complex. After having my melt down at that pool, all the images from my first encounter with a vampire had started to replay in my head.
It had been only about seven and a half months ago, right after I had started seeing Christian, when I had made plans with Mom to stay late after school in order to get some research done in the library. She was supposed to come pick me up after her swim lesson was over, but instead, she had called saying that her lesson was going to run late and that I should take the bus to meet her. She had given me the address of the training facility, and by the time I arrived, it was just barely after dark.
As I approached the pool, I didn't hear anything, but instead saw thrashing waves in the pool. Once I looked closer, I saw my mom and a guy struggling underwater. Instead of throwing my bags to the ground and diving in like I should have, I completely froze. I couldn't move or scream, and after a moment the waves in the water started to clear. What I saw was enough to scare me into hiding. I ran back around the corner of the building and watched as the man climbed out of the pool carrying my mother in his arms with his mouth plastered to the side of her neck.
At first, I had thought, "Holy shit, my mom is having an affair," but once I looked closer I could tell that he wasn't kissing the side of her neck. He had sharp teeth that appeared to be piercing her instead. I quickly realized that what I had first thought were sensual kisses were actually long drags of sucking. This man was drinking from my mother.
I had sunk to the ground not knowing what to do or think. I remembered feeling like I was going to pass out. But as I continued to watch, the man finally removed what could only be called fangs from my mom's neck. He then laid her on one of the chaise lounges next to the pool and gently brushed the hair out of her eyes. She sat up with a smile on her face and waved as the man started to walk away. I was so relieved to see that she was okay that I sucked in a quick breath. The man's head spun in my direction and he stared me down with intense, dark eyes.
After a moment, he crooked his finger at me, indicating for me to come to him. I was still frozen in fear and literally couldn't move. The next thing I knew he was standing right in front of me. Only a split-second had passed and I hadn't even seen him move, but there he was, dripping wet, towering over me with a cocky smirk on his face.
"Hi. You must be the daughter." His voice was deep and sexy, just like the rest of him. I couldn't believe that I had had those thoughts about a man who had just been holding my mother so intimately, but I couldn't deny reality. The guy appeared to be in his mid-thirties, with dark brown hair and eyes to match. He was tan and muscular, and probably about 6' 4". He looked like sex-on-a-stick.
"Yes, I'm her daughter. Who the hell are you?" I had finally gotten myself under control and stood up to face him.
"I think the question you want to ask is 'What are you?', am I right?" He had a mocking glint in his eye, and that damn cocky grin was still plastered to his face.
"I'm not stupid. I know what you are." Whether I wanted to believe it or not, it was obvious that this man was..."You're a vampire."
His grin widened. "Are you scared?"
"Should I be?" I tried to bolster myself so that the fear I was feeling wouldn't come across in my shaking voice.
He stared at me for a long time then gave a slight hmph. "No, beautiful, you have nothing to fear from me. One a night is all I can handle."
I hated that his one had been my mom, but I was damn glad that he would be leaving me alone. "Did you hurt her?" Now that I felt somewhat safe, I had a shit-ton of questions that I was dying to ask him. Well, maybe dying wasn't the right word to use.
"No, I didn't hurt her, and she won't remember anything about tonight," he explained. "What about you? Should I bite you and make you forget?" He seemed genuine in his question.
I tried not to shiver, and the goose bumps his question produced spread up my arms. "No. I don't want to forget. Actually, I have a lot of questions that I would love to ask you. I'm a history major and I can't tell you what an amazing paper I could write with your help." Seriously. I had just asked a vampire to help me get a good grade on my history paper.
He turned around and saw that my mom had gotten up from her chaise and was starting to gather her things. "Why don't you meet me back here tomorrow night and I'll answer some of your questions."
"Really? Or is this some kind of trick to get me here so I can be the one you feed from tomorrow?" I was excited but not stupid. I wondered if crosses or stakes would actually work on this guy. Not that I'm Buffy, but a girl could try.
"No trick. I do, however, enjoy the taste of your mother's blood. It's different than any other that I've ever experienced. So once you spend the evening with her and realize that I'm telling the truth and that I didn't hurt her in any way, as long as I can continue to feed from your mom...I'll be willing to answer your questions.
Is that something that you can handle?" He extended his hand as if preparing to shake on a deal.
"Okay. But if Mom shows any signs of being hurt or acting weird, then you'll never see us here again." It was a lame threat because he could probably just follow us home or find us whenever he wanted, but I had to make sure he understood that if he had hurt my mom in any way, the deal was off.
"Deal." He shook my hand and then started to walk away. "Oh. One more thing. What's your name?"
"My name is Rose. What's yours?"
"Terrance. My name is Terrance."
* * * * *
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Bad Night
(Christian)
After we finished closing the club, we all gathered around waiting for Evie to share what she had learned from Balam.
"What I have to tell you is going to come as quite a shock," she stated. "I'm not going to recount the entire history of the how's or why's, but what we've come to figure out is that a woman that Terrance fed from, the woman I saw in his thoughts, is a zôt–or what you would call a demon."
Gasps and curses filled the room. Dax collapsed into a chair and Evie placed a hand on his shoulder. "The zôt's blood is the reason behind his odd behavior. It acts like a poison and literally infects him. It's what is causing his memory loss and his thoughts to become fuzzy whenever he tries to think of her. Apparently the demon's blood has something like a built-in protection feature. It is how they have kept themselves hidden throughout history. It's also what is causing him to drift permanently dark." The sadness in her voice was the first indication that this was going to be a bad night.
"So, if this is an infection, is there any way to cure him?" Bobby asked.
"No, honey. Not that we know of." Evie's eyes filled with tears as she took a seat next to Dax.
"Okay. If this woman is a zôt, or demon, or what-the-fuck-ever, but we can't figure out who she is because of the automatic brain-fuck her blood causes, then how the hell are we supposed to find her? I, for one, do not want to accidentally feed on some fucking demon." Tori's hair was drifting from light red to a seriously deep maroon color. She was pissed and had never been one to hold back her feelings.
"Until we get to the bottom of this, I think it's for the best if we only feed from people that we have previously fed from before since we know them to already be safe. I'm thinking that throughout the night we can each take a turn and invite a previous guest to one of the private rooms. This way we can remain safe inside the club and not risk running across another zôt while hunting outside. Just make sure that when you feed from them you use your sedative to get them to come back again and again." She didn't look happy about this idea, but continued anyway. "Also...no one is to go near Terrance from now on. Apparently, once an infected vampire permanently drifts dark, they can infect other vampires." She looked at me with a look on her face that could only be described as disheartened.
"I have faith that we will get to the bottom of this, but until we do, I'm not going to deliver the true death to Terrance. I want him around in case we find the woman. Maybe by some miracle, locating her can provide the answers we need, or perhaps even a cure we don't yet know about." She stood and with the command in her voice said once again, "No one is to go near Terrance from now on." Evie wasn't stupid and I'm sure she realized that we all planned to interrogate Terrance the first chance we got.
She must have been scanning us because the next thing she said was, "I am going to be questioning Terrance again, and explaining what we've learned. All of you are more than welcome to witness this."
As Evie and Dax headed towards her office, the rest of us just sat there in silence. Finally Dom broke the tension. "Have any of you ever heard of anything like this? Of demons actually existing?"
"No. But I guess it shouldn't come as a huge surprise. I mean, who'd believe that vampires really existed either?" Bobby asked.
He was being way more relaxed about this than I was. I wish I could ask Evie some more questions, but figured we had better head down so we didn't miss her questioning Terrance again. "Come on. Let's get below and see what Terrance has to say about all this." I hit the switch to unlock the stage.
Once we were all downstairs and gathered outside of Terrance's cell, Evie stepped up to the opening and stopped. Obviously she was serious about not getting close to him. "Terrance, I have some news as to what's happened to you."
"Oh, goody. Please then, share with the class." He was being sarcastic and had an almost menacing look on his face.
"You've been infected by demon blood." Evie's statement dropped like a bomb.
Terrance just looked at her, huffed, and shook his head. "Wow, is that the best you can do? I know you want to have a clear conscience when you deliver the true death, but making up bullshit reasons as to why you have to kill me is pretty fucking lame."
"Why is he acting like that?" Tori whispered.
Evie turned around and said in a low voice, "I think it has to do with the poison. It literally makes him act dark and then wipes the memories of it from him."
Turning around she continued, "First of all, I don't have to justify delivering the true death to you at all. You've drifted permanently dark, and you know that is grounds for immediate execution. Secondly, I wanted you to know what has happened to you, so that you would understand why you are having trouble remembering things and why your thoughts become fuzzy when you think of that woman. It's her that is the demon. She's the one who has infected you."
Terrance sat there with an angry look on his face. I didn't think he was buying what Evie was trying to explain to him, but then suddenly the lines on his face smoothed out and his eyes seemed to lighten just slightly. "Are you telling me that I'm infected with demon blood for real?"
"Yes, my friend. That is exactly what I'm telling you. We are hoping that once we find her she can provide a cure." Evie's voice carried the hope that we were all feeling.
"Oh, thank God. I just couldn't understand why I had lost it, but I guess now it all makes sense. I never even knew that demons really existed. How in the hell did I run across one?" Terrance seemed to almost be back to his old self, except that his hair remained completely black.
As Evie started to move into the cell, obviously feeling confident in Terrance's breakthrough, I suddenly got the sense that something was terribly wrong. I sprung into the cell, grabbing Evie just as Terrance lunged for her, pulling his chains tight. His eyes were again completely black to match his hair, and his lips were pulled back revealing his fangs as he growled at us.
Dax was up in a flash and carrying Evie out of the cell. "Son of a bitch, Evie. What the fuck were you doing? You're the one who said to stay away from him, and now we know why. He's lost it. He almost bit you."
"It's okay. I know what I'm doing." Evie wiggled free of Dax's arms. She took a moment to glance at everyone. "That, my dears, was a test. And you're right, Terrance has lost it. I wanted you to see why it's so important to stay away from him. He's completely lost to us, and will try to manipulate anyone he gets close to from now on. But I am immune from his bite. I am the only one with the poison of true death, and because of that I can't be infected."
We all stood there completely stunned. "You could have warned me." Dax said.
"No, I couldn't have. I wasn't sure it was going to work." Evie had a timid smile on her face and shrugged her shoulders. Sometimes it was hard to remember that she was over twelve hundred years old.
We all turned and stared at Terrance, who was still baring his fangs and snapping at us. I couldn't believe how quickly he had deteriorated.
"I hope we can quickly figure out who this woman is. I can't stand to see him like this," Dax said. The sad note in his voice mirrored the look on his face. He hung his head and started to walk off. "I'm going to bed."
Everyone else said their goodnights and headed towards their respective rooms until it was just Evie and myself standing outside the cell. "It happened again didn't it? You knew somet
hing bad was going to happen when I entered the cell, didn't you?" Evie prodded as we started down the hall.
I guess I couldn't deny it any longer. "Yes. I got an overwhelming sense that something was wrong. But I just can't believe that I'm supposed to become your successor. It's completely unreal to me."
"It could have been anybody in the clan, but I'm glad it's you Christian. You're going to make a wonderful Sire." Evie hugged me.
"How am I supposed to use any of these new skills to help figure out who this woman is? It's not like I can control it." I was feeling so unsure of myself and the things that were apparently now happening as part of my triggering. I had no idea what to do.
"The first thing I would suggest is that when the darkness claims you tonight, let your last thought be of your emerging powers. Concentrate on them and how they make you feel when they happen. Maybe that will trigger something in your subconscious." Evie touched my cheek then headed for her room.
I supposed anything was worth a try. Evie certainly had experience dealing with the subconscious, so maybe she was onto something. Though it was going to be very strange to not have Rose be the last thing I thought of that night, since it had been my ritual for a little over nine months. But just the thought of Rose and the possibility of spending eternity with her was enough motivation to try anything to gain control of my powers. I wanted to be the best Sire and consort to her that I could possibly be.
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CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Hanging Out with Justin
(Rose)
After Jillian explained that this little town was where Justin was from, I couldn't help but think to myself that if we could find him this would be the perfect opportunity to see if Justin could be of any use to me. I had a surprise for Christian–not only was I going to be moving out, but soon I was also going to be a vampire just like him so we could be together forever.
