Insolita Luna

by M. J. O'Shea

  I was about to reply when I heard Noah take in a sharp breath.

  “Who’s here?” I was afraid to even turn around.

  Noah’s look changed from alarmed to confused. “It’s my cousin Colin. He’s a Fitzgerald. From my mother’s side. I haven’t seen him in a couple of years.”

  A million questions popped into my head, but I knew it wasn’t the time. It was tense for the long moments it took Noah’s cousin to weave through the crowded room to our table. It was obvious he was here specifically to talk to Noah. I expected a showdown of some sort.

  Well, that wasn’t true. I honestly didn’t know what the hell to expect. What I knew for sure I wasn’t expecting was that Colin would come right up and envelop Noah in a fierce hug.

  After a few moments, they pulled apart, clapping each other on the back. Colin turned to look at me and Leila curiously.

  “Uh, this is Leila, a friend of ours, and this is Zack. He’s my boyfriend.” Noah looked a little unsure, but it obviously didn’t matter.

  Colin broke into a huge grin. “Must run in the family. Charlie’s dating guys too.”

  Noah’s mouth dropped. “Charlie? Wow, I still think of him as a kid. I guess he’s grown up too.”

  “Yep, he’s almost seventeen. And more than willing to speak his mind. It gave Mom a heart attack for a day or so, but she’s had a year to get used to it. Anyway, it’s nice to meet you, Zack.” He stuck out his hand and I shook it. So far, I was liking the Fitzgeralds a whole lot more than the Harpers.

  “What on earth are you doing here, Col?” Noah gave him a long look. I could tell that he was trying to decide how much his cousin knew.

  Colin laughed. “I know this is a vamp bar, cousin. And I know you belong in here, if you get my drift…. Don’t worry, not going to out you. Family comes before hunting business. That’s why I’m here.”

  Noah sputtered for a second before he got it together enough to answer. “So you’re not here to kill me?”

  “Nah. We’ve been watching you for a long time. You’re completely nonviolent, not that you need me to tell you that. You’re still the pansy-ass little cousin I loved to shrink wrap in blankets when we were little.”

  “You have no idea how good it is to hear you say that—even with the pansy-ass remark. You may want to watch your mouth, though. I could totally take you now.” He flashed his fangs and they both laughed. “So, I guess you’re going to tell me why you are here if it’s not to kill me?”

  “Yeah. I am. But not in this place. It’s too public. Can we go back to your apartment?”

  THE CAB ride back was like being stuck with two obnoxious puppies in a box. They punched each other and made dumb jokes. Colin would put Noah in a headlock every minute or two and Noah would have to fight his way out, accidentally elbowing me the whole time. It was slightly annoying and a little bit embarrassing to have the driver stare in the rearview mirror, but seeing Noah act so goofy and happy had to make me smile.

  I still had a ton of questions, but I was hoping to get at least a few of them answered when we got home. We piled out of the cab, the two cousins barely able to contain themselves long enough to walk to the building like adults. I laughed to myself, glad that Noah had found somebody else who still saw him as the same person he’d always been. We climbed the stairs to our third floor apartment, both of them continuing to poke and punch at each other the whole time. It wasn’t until we were all sitting in the quiet of our apartment that things got serious.

  We sat there awkwardly for about thirty seconds in complete silence. I could tell Colin was hesitant to deliver his news, and Noah had never been the type to start attacking someone with questions. I decided I was going to have to be the one who started it.

  “So what’s the deal, Colin?” My voice seemed overly loud in the heavy stillness. Noah was sitting at the kitchen table with me next to him. Colin was in the chair across from us with one of our few remaining sodas clutched in his hands.

  “Noah, what do you remember about the night you were turned?”

  Noah looked at his cousin in surprise. “I snuck out to follow that group of rogue vamps. I found them, and they obviously had no problem taking me down. My parents got there right before the vamps killed me. There was a fight, I got bitten, my parents were both on the ground dead. As soon as the paralysis wore off, I ran for help. My dad’s family came and took care of the bodies, and I’ve been hiding the fact that I’d been bitten ever since. Well, until my grandfather found out a few weeks ago.”

  “That sounds about right.” Colin took a long drink of his Dr Pepper. “Our family thought that’s what happened too. For months we assumed the Harpers were telling the truth.”

  Noah sat up straight. The room was suddenly filled with tension. “What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t know how else to say it. Your mom’s alive, Noah. The Harpers have her in captivity.”

  Noah’s eyes grew wide. The questions exploded silently in the thick night air. “Why do the Harpers have Mom, Colin?”

  “Isn’t it obvious? Your mother’s a vampire.”

  Chapter Fifteen: Across The Atlantic

  I HADN’T been on an airplane in years, not since I was five and we went to Fort Lauderdale to visit my grandma Mimi during spring break. It wasn’t my favorite pastime. I have to admit I wasn’t too keen on the thought of all that water either, stretched around us for hundreds of miles in every direction. I was having catastrophic visions of Tom Hanks and a volleyball named Wilson and being stuck in the middle of the ocean while the sun incinerated me into nothing. Flying sucked.

  The previous spring break, I’d been all set to go on a trip to Italy with my senior art class to study sculpture, but, true to form, I’d chickened out the night before the final payment was due and ended up at home all week. At least I’d gone as far as getting a passport, or my butt would be sitting in New York worrying about Noah and not being able to help at all.

  “Babe, calm down. It’s fine. The pilots have made this same trip hundreds of times.” Noah’s hand crept into mine and he twined our fingers together. He’d put the armrest up hours before. I scooted as close to him as I could and pulled our blanket tight.

  “Not a huge fan of flying.”

  He chuckled softly and nuzzled his face up to my hair. “I can tell. Only a few more hours.”

  “Really? How many?”

  “Four, I think.” I groaned, then realized I was about to start complaining and shut my mouth immediately. I had to remember how Noah was probably feeling. After months of thinking he was responsible for his mother’s death, he got the news that she was alive, only to be told she was a vampire and being held by his father’s family in England. I couldn’t even imagine what he was going through.

  “Is Colin still asleep?”

  I looked across the aisle at Noah’s cousin, who was leaning back in his seat with his mouth hanging open. I laughed quietly and nodded.

  Noah drew my hand up to his mouth and kissed my palm softly. “Thank you for coming with us. I don’t know if I could have handled this without you.”

  “Yes, you could have, but you would never have to. It’s you and me till the end, Noah Harper. Someday you’ll believe me when I say that, but I’ll keep saying it until you do.” I poked him in the belly button. “Besides, I could never leave you alone on your birthday.”

  He groaned laughingly. “At least I’m not at a dance club right now.”

  “True. I guess flying across the Atlantic to save your vampire mother from your deranged hunter grandfather is way better than being subjected to a night of Madonna and Lady Gaga.” I had to make a joke of the situation. It was really the only thing to do when something was so horrible.

  Colin had told us that he didn’t know exactly what the Harpers were doing with Noah’s mother, but he thought it had something to do with a serum they’d been hearing rumors about. The rumored serum was supposed to reverse vampire venom and essentially turn the vamps human again. The Fitzg
eralds were afraid Noah’s mother was being used as a lab rat, being injected with dangerous and possibly fatal concoctions. They knew she was still alive, but that was all. The state of her physical and mental health was a complete mystery.

  “I still can’t believe what they’re doing, to you, to her. I mean, isn’t it like Colin said? Isn’t family more important than hunting?”

  Noah shook his head. “The Fitzgeralds have always been different than my dad’s family. They’ve been in the hunting world for nearly as long, but it’s not so black and white for them. They’ve dealt with other supernaturals before, ones the Harpers would kill on sight. I was surprised by how well Colin reacted to me, though. Vampires are typically hated, even by the most liberal of hunters. Maybe this will be the start of a change.”

  “Maybe we should focus on saving your mom first. Then we can start the vampire social revolution.”

  He gave me a sad half-smile and laid his head on my shoulder.

  I reached over under the blanket with my free hand and pulled his tank out of the waist of his jeans. I sighed when I felt the velvety smoothness of his skin and let my fingers slip a little bit into his jeans and the warmth within. The gesture wasn’t meant to be sexual, just comforting to both of us. He must have been able to tell I was still upset.

  “I love you babe. Everything’s going to be fine. I promise.”

  “You can’t promise that. Just don’t leave me alone, okay? I don’t want to live forever without you.” He covered my mouth with his fingers and shook his head. His lips descended on mine in a long fierce kiss.

  “Never say that again,” he whispered. “I refuse to even consider it. Close your eyes and try to get some sleep. We’ve got a long couple of days ahead of us.”

  “Okay.” I snuggled up to him, holding on tight to the warm skin of his belly. “Love you,” I whispered. Then I closed my eyes and tried to fall asleep.

  IT WAS raining when we landed in London, which was good since we’d hopped on the first plane out the night before with baseball hats and sunglasses in hand. We’d decided we’d deal with the logistics of a daytime landing when we got there. We kind of figured we were going to have to hide in the airport bathroom or some other windowless room until sunset. As it was, that would be unnecessary, thank goodness. It seemed as if luck was on our side, or at least it seemed England liked us. Maybe it would stay that way.

  It took us a while to deal with customs and letting Colin rent transportation. I’d never dealt with all the hassles of travel, and I was glad to just shuffle along behind the other two and let them make all the arrangements. We drove to a decent hotel on the outskirts of town. It was tempting to drive straight through and go barging in on the Harper’s ancestral home. I’m sure that was what Noah wanted to do, but Colin talked us into resting and making sure we were strong and fed before we attempted any wild heroics.

  During the short ride to the hotel, I did my best to see a bit of the city I’d been dying to visit since we studied it back in elementary school. For the first time, I felt a little resentment toward the situation. Not toward Noah—never toward Noah. Only toward the stupid bloodthirsty Harpers and whatever evil Dr. Frankenstein plan they were hatching on Noah’s mother. They were ruining my first ever trip out of the country and to a place I’d always hoped to go. Of course, they were the reason I was there in the first place, but I wasn’t feeling quite reasonable enough at the moment to consider that.

  After a quick check-in and an even briefer jet-lagged good-night from Colin, we flopped down on the hotel bed and slowly stripped our clothes off. I had no idea what time it was in New York. If I even tried to start calculating it, my head started to ache. I needed sleep. The few hours of uneasy half napping on the plane hadn’t really done it for me. It probably was nowhere near my bedtime at home, but the frantic preparations and the long night on the plane had left me exhausted.

  I lay on the unfamiliar hotel bed, trying to picture the scene that would greet us. We didn’t have much in the line of strategy. The Fitzgeralds were operating on rumors and a few fleeting glances of Noah’s mother, Bianca Harper. The only thing they were sure of was that she’d been changed into a vampire and she was in England at the Harpers’ estate.

  No one had even seen her in the weeks it took the Fitzgeralds to locate us after our late-night escape to New York. I hoped for Noah’s sake that she was okay or he would never forgive himself for leaving her that night, even if he had assumed she was dead.

  Noah was squirming next to me, tossing and turning restlessly. I rolled over and pulled him as close as I could, wrapping him tightly in my arms and warming his body with mine. I kissed the back of his neck over and over, whispering about nothing at all and hoping the sounds would soothe him. He needed to be ready.

  A FEW hours later, when darkness finally fell, I woke to a soft tapping on our door. I jumped out of the bed, ready to move. It took me a few moments to register in my not-yet-awake brain that I didn’t want to throw the door open trustingly before I checked who it was.

  “Colin?”

  “Yeah, Zack, it’s me. Let me in.”

  I opened the door but motioned for him to be quiet. Noah was finally sleeping peacefully, and I wanted to give him the last few minutes of rest he could possibly get.

  “We gotta get going soon. The Harper’s estate is down on the coast, and Cornwall is a long way from London. At least four hours. If we’re going to make it there, rescue Aunt Bianca, and get to safety by sunrise, we don’t have a second to spare.”

  I nodded and went to wake Noah. Colin had made it sound so easy. I still wasn’t convinced of the likelihood that we’d all make it out alive. Sitting on the bed, I looked at Noah for a moment, hating to ruin the perfect peaceful image. I reached out and brushed his hair off his face and ran my fingertips along his jaw.

  “Wake up, babe. It’s time to get ready.” Noah’s cornflower-blue eyes fluttered open slowly. His hand covered mine, and he brought my palm to his mouth for a tired kiss.

  “Hey, Colin,” he grumbled softly at his cousin.

  I shivered a little. That sexy, just-woke-up voice of his had to be my favorite sound in the world.

  “We have to get out of here as soon as possible, little man,” Colin said. “Get up and let’s go.”

  “I’m moving, jeesh—and what’s with the ‘little man’ crap? It’s not my fault that you ended up being, like, nine feet tall.”

  “I’m six three and you’re smaller, which officially makes you the ‘little man.’” Noah snorted and tossed a pillow at Colin. Colin laughed and turned to leave. “I’ll have the car ready in fifteen minutes. See you out front.”

  THE DRIVE to Cornwall was long and frustrating. We all wanted to get the coming night over with, and having to drive for hours, getting more worried and nervous by the mile, was painful to say the least. I spent a lot of time looking out the window while the two cousins murmured in the front seat.

  Most of the time, there wasn’t a whole lot to see. I would have preferred a rainy day to the complete blackness. Unfortunately, darkness was pretty much the only part of England I was going to get to see.

  “Zack, are you awake?”

  It took a minute for me to realize they were talking to me. “Yeah. I don’t think I could sleep if I had to.”

  Noah turned and looked at me over the front seat. “We have to talk plans. Try to use what little information we have to come up with a way to save my mom.”

  “What do we know?”

  “Not much,” Colin answered. “We know she’s kept in the basement. We can only assume there is a lab of some sort down there. There’ve been rumors for years that crazy old Harper was concocting some sort of vampire venom antibody to change vampires back to humans. No one took it all that seriously, since it’s impossible as far as we know, but he seemed to be pretty sure he was onto something.”

  “And you think Noah’s mom is being used as some glorified lab rat?”

  “Yeah, that’s the basic t
heory.” Noah put his head in his hand.

  I reached up and squeezed his shoulder. “We’ll get her, Noh.”

  “From the few sightings we’ve had, it seems like they’ve kept her relatively healthy. I’m assuming she’ll be in good shape, at least physically. She’d be no good to them dead, and catching another vampire would be close to impossible. No vampire would be stupid enough to come within a hundred miles of a Harper.”

  Except us.

  “So we need to find this lab where they’re holding her and spring the locks to get her out?” It sounded nearly impossible, but at least it wasn’t very complicated.

  Noah laughed humorlessly. “You forgot the part about us three vampires getting somewhere covered by the time the sun rises.”

  Okay, it wasn’t nearly impossible. It was completely impossible. But it had to work. There was no other way.

  “What is going to happen to her after we rescue her?”

  “I don’t know,” Noah said. “I mean, my family did want to rescue her, but actually harboring a vampire may be too much even for them.” He looked at Colin, who shrugged.

  “We haven’t gotten that far. Let’s see how she’s doing when we get her the hell out of the Harper house.”

  Chapter Sixteen: Rescue

  IT WAS a little after midnight when we pulled up to the manor. It made the one back in New York look like a tree house. I couldn’t stop my mouth from dropping open. Even as far back as we were, the place was overwhelming. It had four floors that I could count and wings shooting off both sides of the massive center structure, which seemed to have been carved from a mountain. The drive that stretched in front of us was long and wide and lined with lamps that bobbed in the breeze like Victorian oil lanterns. The whole place gave me a Sherlock Holmes kind of vibe. I found myself thinking again that I wished I could have visited under different circumstances.