by M. J. O'Shea
It was close to dawn when Amanda finally started to mumble in her sleep and move. Noah and I had been lounging next to each other on the bed; Colin was napping on the big cushy chair again. Bianca had gone down to the hotel gift shop for a few minutes. I got the feeling it was going to be hard for her to stay in an enclosed room for a long time. Those kinds of things took years to get over.
Amanda went from barely stirring to sitting up in about two seconds. She looked confused. I vividly remembered how different everything felt the first time I woke up as a vampire.
“What the hell?” The first words out of her mouth clashed with her angelic face. It made me laugh for a second before I smothered it.
Noah leaped up and went to sit next to her on the bed. “Hey there, how are you feeling?”
“What happened, Noah?”
“Um, Grandfather—”
Memory dawned on her beautiful face. “Oh yeah. That bastard shot me. Why am I not still hurt, and why do I feel so weird?”
“Because I turned you. It was the only way, Amanda. You would have died.”
“Turned me? You mean, I’m a vampire now?” Noah nodded. I waited for her to freak out. She hadn’t wanted it like I did. I expected tears, anger, fear. What I didn’t expect was for a huge smile to break out across her face.
“This is perfect!” She jumped up and pumped her fist in the air once before she swayed a little and sat. “I was so tired of Grandfather and all of his crap. Now they’ll stay as far away from me as they have from you. Oh, I’ve missed you so much, Noah!” She dove forward and gave him a huge hug.
I felt the relief emanating from his skin. “I missed you too, munchkin. I can’t believe how tall you’ve gotten.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m not twelve anymore. I turned eighteen last month, you know. Aren’t I older than you?”
Noah groaned. “Don’t remind me.”
I chuckled at his annoyance. Noah turned to me with a grin. “I can’t believe I forgot. Amanda, this is my boyfriend, Zack. I think you met him once a long time ago.”
“Isn’t he the one who helped you fill all my shoes with dirt?”
We both laughed out loud. That had been one of my favorite afternoons ever. “That’s me. I promise it won’t happen again.”
“Listen, Amanda. You obviously can’t go back to Grandfather’s house, and it sounds like you don’t want to anyway. Zack and I were thinking you could come stay with us in New York.”
She gave us a long look. “Is there another choice? No offense, cousin, but I don’t really want to intrude on the love nest, even if you two were nice enough to invite me.”
Noah smiled. “I think so. Let me make a phone call.”
Chapter Eighteen: Over For Now
WE WERE home. It felt like we’d been gone for months, but it hadn’t even been four days since we were sitting in the bar with our friends and teasing Noah about going dancing on his birthday. The whole world looked different through eyes that had seen all the insanity we’d experienced in the past few days.
As soon as the front door closed, we dropped our backpacks and Noah pulled me into a loose, comfortable embrace. We’d dropped Amanda off with PC and Leila and stayed for an hour or so until we were sure she was going to be fine. From what we saw, she fit in perfectly already.
“Is it really over?” I whispered.
“For now. As far as permanently, I doubt it. There will always be some lunatic hunter with a vampire death wish to deal with. And there will always be rogues to get rid of.”
“But that’s just normal stuff for us. Everyday life, right?”
“Yeah. Back to the daily grind.”
“What are we going to do?” It felt weird not to have a huge threat hanging over our heads.
“You’ve got classes starting in a few weeks, right? And I’ve still got hunting work.”
“You’re going to keep doing that?”
“I’m good at it.” He shrugged. “And it pays well. Helps with the designer jeans addiction, for sure.” I rolled my eyes at him. Designer jeans? That was a bunch of crap. His real addiction was the danger. He loved being a hunter.
“What about now that the others know you’re a vampire?”
“I have a feeling things are going to be a little different with the Fitzgeralds on our side and Amanda too. The Harpers are going to be singing a different song pretty soon. Sophie knows we’re on the right side.”
“Even so, you’re not going out alone. I’d never get a second’s sleep with you God-knows-where and in danger.”
He winked at me. “Every good hunter needs a partner, right?”
I smiled and laid my head on his shoulder. We swayed silently for a few minutes, slow dancing to nothing and not caring at all that there wasn’t any music.
“Hey, you’re dancing,” I finally whispered, leaning back to smile at him again.
“I like this kind.”
“I’m going to get you to a dance club before the summer’s over.” I swatted him gently on the butt and he laughed.
“You better work quickly. I think I can feel a chill in the air.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll have help.” I thought of something I’d been meaning to ask since we left England. “Are you sure you’re okay with your mom changing her last name back to Fitzgerald? I mean, does it feel weird for you because of your father?”
“No, I’m okay. I know she loved Dad and I understand why she’s doing it. I honestly don’t want anything to do with those bastards either, but I’ve always been Noah Harper and I don’t know what other name I would use.”
“I do.” It was out before I’d even thought it over completely. Damn mouth got me in trouble all the time. My stomach flipped violently. “Noh, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”
I was cut off by his lips crushing down on mine.
“Are you really ready for that? I mean, we’re so young,” he whispered when we pulled apart.
I laughed softly and cupped his face between my hands, shaking it a little. “I wanted to become a vampire because one lifetime would never be enough with you. You’re my love, my life, my family. Of course I’m ready. But if you’re not, then we can just pretend I never brought it up.”
He gave me a sweet lingering kiss and withdrew, smiling. “I am. I have been for a long time. By the time I was old enough to realize what love was, I knew I loved you. I want to be yours forever.”
“Hold on.”
He probably thought I was nuts, but I suddenly remembered something I’d been holding on to for a long time. I dashed to my dresser, where I’d hidden a small blue velvet pouch. When I got back, Noah was standing in the same position, looking at me curiously.
“I got this for you last year. It seems like the right time for you to have it.” I shook the little pouch and a braided silver ring fell out, gleaming on my palm. “See, it matches my necklace.”
“It’s beautiful, Zack.” He held out his hand and I slipped the ring onto his finger. Then I brought his hand up and put it against the charm on my necklace. I couldn’t believe how serious, how real, the moment felt.
“Noah Parker, I will love you until the very last breath I take.”
He shuddered and wrapped his arms around me as tight as he could. “Longer than that.” Then he took my hand and led me to our bedroom and the bed where we’d first tasted each other’s dreams and desires. He undressed me and I him, our clothes falling to the floor, our bodies colliding dreamily, languorous and slow.
We didn’t feel any urgency at first, just relief that we were both alive and together and safe for the foreseeable future. I loved his hands on me, and the small chill of the ring that hadn’t quite warmed to his body yet. Every time it brushed against me, I smiled at the reminder of the promises we’d just made. It felt different being with him after what had just happened in the hall. Every touch, every kiss, was saying mine forever, like I was branding him in a thousand invisible ways.
Afterward, we lay together silently, ju
st happy to exist. He traced the patterns in my necklace with his fingertips. I memorized his face with mine. Every once in a while, we would kiss, slow and soft, rubbing noses and cheeks together. Finally, when we couldn’t move at all, our tired but happy bodies twined together and we fell asleep smiling and whispering “I love you” as the first pale rays of sun painted the eastern sky.
Prologue
I MUST’VE been out of my mind.
I reached forward, palms up, the universal sign of nonviolence. The creature was beautiful, huge, and covered with gingery fur. He had these unblinking golden eyes that seemed to see everything. I walked slowly, closer and closer. It didn’t move.
Strangely enough, I wasn’t afraid. That’s where the part about me being out of my damned mind came in. Any sane person would be terrified of a giant wolf standing silently in a Manhattan alley in the middle of the night.
I just wanted to touch him….
Chapter 1: Waiting for Today to Happen
I WAS woken by a sharp buzzing, so loud it felt like it was coming from inside my head rather than the other side of my bed where it should be. I lunged across my mattress and slammed my hand blindly onto the nightstand, hoping to find the elusive snooze button without opening my eyes. I had to bat at the table a few times before I was successful and the room was once again filled with blissful silence. I flopped onto my back and gagged as usual. I wished I didn’t have the sickly off-gray ceiling of my dorm room to stare at, not to mention the weird growth of creepy black mold I could never seem to find anyone to get rid of. After a few minutes, I sighed and rolled back over to look at the time. Great. Eight o’clock. Too late to fall back to sleep for another snooze cycle or two.
I had to get up. It was inescapable. At least it was Friday, right? After a few more moments of staring blearily at my clock, I decided that yes, in fact, it was Friday. Didn’t matter, honestly. Friday wasn’t any better than any other day. Every morning was pretty much the same, every afternoon, and every night too. Some days were colder than others; lately I’d been freezing my butt off and wishing I could feel the west coast sun. Cold, sunny, raining, snowing—ugh. I couldn’t wait for that—it didn’t change anything. Groaning, I pulled my covers over my head and squeezed my eyes closed. I didn’t want to get up. What was the point? No matter what, it would be the same unsatisfying grind as every other day.
Finally, I resigned myself to the fact that I had to get to class and cautiously crawled out of my warm, comfortable cocoon. The bed was the only part of my apartment I really liked, and I wasn’t looking forward to the awful, cold floor. My feet recoiled when they hit the frigid hardwood, and I reminded myself for the hundredth time that I needed to get a rug for the side of my bed. The tiles in the bathroom were even worse. Ditto on the rug for that room. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and looked in the mirror. The face that greeted me was tired. Not sleepy, but tired tired. Like nothing would ever wake me up. I wasn’t sure if I had ever really been awake in my life.
I washed my face and brushed my teeth, barely aware of going through the motions, then dressed for the crisp Manhattan fall, layering on jackets and a scarf. It was going to be hours before I made it home to my closet of a dorm room. I had three long and boring Literature classes, then an advanced creative writing seminar before I headed to my closing shift at the bookstore where I worked.
I sighed. Another day, right? Maybe this would be the day something happened. Something? Jesus, anything would be nice.
NEW YORK was a disappointment. Obviously not at all what I’d expected, what I had dreamed for years it would be. I’d only been there three months, and already I thought at least four or five times every single day about dropping my classes and buying a ticket home. I missed California. I liked the beaches, the laid-back attitude, being able to walk around my neighborhood at night without fear of getting mugged for the four dollars in my pocket.
But San Diego was no place for a writer. At least, that was my excuse for wanting to leave for all those years. I’d always felt like New York was the place for me to become someone other than who I had always been. So I applied to NYU, signed up for one of those tiny single dorm rooms, and hopped on a plane back in August, trying not to watch my mother cry. I thought maybe in a new city, the city I’d always dreamed of living in, things would be different. I could be interesting and creative, live a big exciting life. Break out of the thick shell I had been shielded by for as long as I could remember. I felt deep in my bones that as soon as I landed in New York, wonderful things were going to start happening to me. I couldn’t wait for my new adventure. Unfortunately, I was still waiting.
I guess I have to give the city some credit―it was exciting and huge; there were a ton of interesting neighborhoods to explore, lots of people to meet. Maybe everything would have been exactly how I pictured if I wasn’t me. But I was. Unfortunately. Miles Rowan Hunter was the same quiet bookworm he’d been at home in California. No city could change that. Sometimes I wondered if anything could. I hoped that, if nothing else, I would someday live up to the whopper of a name Mom had stuck me with. Hadn’t happened so far.
My first few days in the city, I’d been hopeful; I looked around every corner for something new and interesting to happen to me. I’d even gone out and gotten the ridiculous (and expensive) tattoo of a rowan tree that currently grew up my side and onto my shoulder blade. I’d thought the tattoo would make me more interesting, a little wilder. It was just a tree―a very big and permanent tree, which if anything made me look more delicate. Didn’t change who I was at all. Didn’t change a single thing.
It hadn’t taken me long to give up my dream of new and exciting experiences. Within weeks, it seemed like everything was the same as it had been back home: class was still class, I didn’t really know anyone, and I spent most of my nights at this little bookstore about a mile away from campus that had the best mochas I’d ever tasted and rack after rack of books I could get lost in.
I had loved the place on sight. The floor was wooden, charmingly scarred and aged, scattered with threadbare rugs and leather footstools. One huge wall, the only one not covered by books, was painted an antiqued gold, and there was a real honest-to-God working stone fireplace that rose two stories up the aged yellow wall to a vaulted ceiling high above. The huge empty space could have felt stark, but when combined with the floors and the rugs and the cushy red velvet chairs and end tables piled with puzzles and magazines, the end result was something like how I would picture the tower of an ancient and eccentric wizard.
The bookshelves themselves were wonderfully haphazard; books organized to a point, shoved alphabetically with little thought to genre into narrow meandering rows I happily got lost in on a daily basis. A wrought iron spiral staircase curled up to the second floor loft where collector’s editions were mashed up with young adult, some of the more exotic types of manga (yaoi, hentai… uh, whoa), and a landslide of comic books, more than any nerdy teenage boy, or me, could ever look at. There were no neat plastic shelves of shiny bestsellers or Martha Stewart cookbooks displayed early for the holidays, just a barely restrained chaos that was homey and warm and everything that appealed to me.
In the front corner of the shop was a small café that served the previously mentioned mochas, great local pastries, and a smattering of sandwiches and fruit cups―whatever Megan found delicious and interesting. Megan was the in-house barista. She was fantastic at making coffee but unfortunately seemed to be in a constant state of PMS. I put up with her general daily bitchiness just for the chance to experience that one blissful moment when warm mocha slid onto my tongue and filled my mouth with the complex smoothness of chocolate capped off by a perfectly bitter coffee finish. Believe me, it was worth it.
At least Ralph, the bookshop owner, was nice. He smiled at me and didn’t mind that I read all his books and hardly ever bought one. I barely had the money for coffee most days, let alone enough cash to fund my ravenous book addiction. Ralph seemed to understand—and after a few
long discussions about Orson Scott Card over pastries and perfect coffee, we almost qualified as friends.
Sometime in the middle of September, Ralph offered me a job. He said I probably knew the content of his shelves better than he did, and he’d like to go home and eat dinner with his wife a few nights a week rather than run the shop. He’d never had an employee before, other than Megan the coffee girl. The place wasn’t big enough or profitable enough to have a cashier and someone to assist customers. He’d done it himself for years, but I could see that no matter how much Ralph loved the shop, he was getting tired.
So I said yes, figuring since I spent all my time there anyway, I might as well earn some badly needed money while I was at it. Besides, Ralph said free coffee would be one of the terms of employment. Even without the caffeine perk, that quick decision had turned into the best part of my life in the city.
In a heartbeat, the bookstore became my home, even more than it had been before. I liked it better than school, where I was just a face in the crowd, I liked it way better than my rat-trap of a dorm room, where I had to listen to the guy downstairs do Lord knows what to his girlfriend every night. It was only surrounded by books that I didn’t feel like bursting into tears and calling my mother to beg her for plane fare back to San Diego. I felt competent at the store, knowledgeable, comfortable. If I could, I would have spent every waking hour working there, which obviously would have been counterproductive to my dreams of becoming a famous author. I did manage to work almost every night, taking as many hours off Ralph as he’d allow. I didn’t really have anywhere else to go, and I loved the warm embrace of those old gold walls and the friends I’d made in the pages of his books.
