“Dude, not me,” said the girl. “Never me.”
The girl was young. Maybe mid-twenties. She still held the fiery passion of youth. Unfortunately, Selene was older. Much older.
“What’s your name?” asked Selene.
“Evan.”
“What did the Vampires do to you that was so horrible?”
The girl closed her mouth and stepped away from the counter. The expression on her face hardened.
“So what are you going to do now?” asked Selene. “Keep going house to house?”
“If I have to.”
“I wouldn’t count on it.” Selene popped an eggroll in her mouth.
“What does that mean?”
“It means you were confined to your room and you’re not supposed to be out here,” said a male from behind Selene.
Both turned to find William and Neeman entering the kitchen. Selene flipped open a soda and took a huge swig as Neeman approached her.
Evan looked to William and groaned. “So you’re just going to keep me locked up?”
“For now, yes. Until Lord Danika decides what to do with you.” He pointed toward the rear door.
“Dude, you can’t keep me shut up forever. I’ll get out.”
“I’m sure you will, but for now, please, let’s just go to your room.” William opened the back door and waved her outside.
Evan looked between Selene and Neeman.
“At least you get to be a slave to a cute one,” Evan said.
Selene clenched her jaw. “Like I said, I’m no one’s slave.”
Evan snorted again. “Sure, sis. You keep telling yourself that.”
William pulled on Evan’s arm but she yanked it away. “Don’t touch me, Vampire. You’re cute too, but not that cute.”
William sighed. “How many times do I have to tell you that I’m a vampyr, not a Vampire.”
“Okay, so you got bitten, not born, who cares? You still drink blood, don’t you?”
William sighed and shook his head. “Come on.”
Evan waved and headed out the door.
Selene popped another eggroll in her mouth.
“What were you two talking about?” asked Neeman.
“Girl stuff.” A piece of eggroll spit from her mouth and landed on the counter.
“I don’t want you talking to Evan.”
She gave him a hard look, picked up a piece of chicken, and pointed it at him. “You know, you telling me not to talk to people is getting old.”
“I don’t care if you talk to any other female in this house, just don’t talk to that one.”
“Why? Afraid she might turn me to the dark side?”
“No.” He shook his head. “I’m afraid you’ll make her obsession with freeing the humans worse.”
Selene’s jaw dropped. She chewed quickly and then swallowed. “Me? What did I do?”
He cocked an eyebrow. “You really need to ask?”
She advanced on him. “I’ll have you know, that though I don’t agree with humans being slaves, I do understand it. I’m not an idiot. I can see what would happen if suddenly the humans were allowed to run amuck again, let alone rule this world. You guys may have screwed it up with the V2000 virus, but at least you’re holding what little there is left together. The system isn’t perfect, but at least it isn’t total chaos.”
“I like chaos,” said her demon.
Neeman stared at her for a minute. “I don’t know if I should be flattered or offended.”
“I really don’t care which you are.” She walked to the counter and stuffed more food in her mouth.
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Are you going to tell me what’s bothering you?”
She took a long drink of soda before sucking in a breath and burping. “Nope.”
He growled and grabbed her soda. “Come on.” He picked up her plate and threw it in the trash with the drink. “Stop eating that crap. It’ll kill you.”
“Are you serious?” She trailed behind him, trying to keep up. “Where are we going?”
“Out back.”
“Is there a barbecue out there, because I’m hungry.”
“No. You’re going to teach us how to fight demons.”
“Says who?”
“Lord Danika. Just like at the compound. You want to stay, you have to help out.”
She shrugged. “Okay, then I’ll just go.”
Neeman blocked her path and planted his feet on the ground. “No.”
“But I don’t want to help out. So I have to leave.” She moved around him.
“Why are you being so stubborn? Why can’t you just do things without a fight for once?”
Selene stopped in her tracks. She glanced around at the finery of the house and the High Elder’s voice floated into her head. She couldn’t leave. She had to stay close to Danika and Mason.
“Fine,” she said finally. “Teach who?”
“Everyone.”
* * * *
Out back, trackers and house security gathered on the large lawn, assembled for her viewing pleasure. The sight of them in one large collective made her shake her head.
“What?” Neeman asked.
“How do you expect me to teach this many people to fight demons? It took me years to learn how to deal with them all. I can’t make them demon destroyers in one night. This would take months of training.”
Neeman eyed the group and then stepped closer and lowered his voice. “We don’t have months. We have no idea when they could strike next.”
“Well I’m sorry, but I’m not going to be much help,” she whispered, crossing her arms over her chest. “Why can’t Mason do this?”
“Because.” Neeman’s gaze darted away.
“Because why?”
He licked his lips. “Because they are scared of Mason.”
“And they aren’t scared of me?” She snorted. They had no idea…
Neeman pulled on his hair by the roots and rubbed his face. “Okay look. Don’t teach them to fight, teach them the weaknesses.”
She groaned. That alone would take days and that was only if they were fast studies. She didn’t want to do this. Why did she have to babysit the preschoolers? But if it meant she got a couple of hours without Neeman asking her what was wrong, she’d do it.
“Fine.” She pointed at him. “But don’t blame me if they all get killed.”
She walked to the middle of the group and looked around. She could do this.
“Hey. I’m Selene and I will be your instructor today in Demonology 101. First of all, you should know you aren’t as strong as a demon. You aren’t as fast as a demon. You aren’t even—”
“That’s not helping,” Neeman said.
She looked at him and scowled.
“Fine. The one thing you are most likely better at than a demon, is being smart. Demons tend to go on impulse. What they want, they go for, usually with no thought for the possible repercussions. So for instance, let’s say Neeman here is a quaser demon.” She grabbed Neeman by the arm and led him to the middle of the group.
She walked around him and smirked. “Quaser’s have long, tentacled arms with suction cups on them that are sticky as hell.” She flopped his arms up and down. “But they aren’t too bright.” She flicked him in the back of the head.
Neeman glared at her while several people snickered. Selene smiled and continued. She rounded Neeman till she stood behind him.
“The way to bring down a quaser is right here.” She dug her finger into the base of his spine. “You stab a quaser here, and he’ll go down for the count.”
“How many different kinds of demons are there?” someone yelled.
“Hundreds.”
There were murmurs and groans from the peanut gallery.
“You’re not helping,” Neeman replied.
“Well, then maybe I should just go.”
“Do you want everyone to die?”
She shrugged. “What do I care? I don’t know them.”
“You know me.”
Her stomach clenched at the look on his face.
“Look,” he said. “You’re obviously angry at me about something. And we can deal with that later, but right now you need to cut it out. This isn’t you. I know you don’t want everyone here to die. Put up this bitchy front all you want with me. But deep down, you care. My men told me how you saved them down there. You could have run but you didn’t. So stop making this so hard.”
She pulled from his grip and sighed. “Fine. But I’m only doing this so my conscience is clear.”
A smile flickered on his lips. “Whatever you say.”
* * * *
Neeman watched Selene spend the next two hours telling the group everything she could about different demons and their weaknesses. She explained which ones to fight and which ones to plain run from. A dozen trackers and security members came into the middle to spar with her. As much as she would never admit it, she was a born teacher.
She was patient in a way Neeman wasn’t. She took time to show them specific techniques or how to improve their defensive tactics. If they did something that wouldn’t work, she told them what would.
She’d taught them to recognize fifteen of the most common demons and the characteristics of over two dozen more. In the end, though he still wasn’t sure they would win in a fight, they were more prepared than not.
It was interesting to Neeman to see her. She’d put all attitude aside and was just herself. The her he was pretty sure few people had ever seen.
Mason came out to join them as they were finishing up.
“She’s good,” he said. “Not like me. I don’t have the aptitude for teaching. No patience.”
“She’s a natural,” Neeman replied. “She’d make an amazing tracker.”
Mason glanced at him sideways. “Maybe you should tell her that.”
Neeman shrugged. “Maybe I should.”
The group broke up and several people thanked Selene. She waved them off, but the smile on her face was genuine.
He walked up to meet her.
“So did I pass, master?” she asked.
“You were great.”
“They’re still going to die.”
He stared at her hard. “Not if you continued to teach them.”
“What? Me?” She snorted. “No thanks.”
“I’m serious. You’d make an amazing tracker and a teacher. You should think about it.”
She stared at him for a minute and her eye twitched. She rubbed at it. “Yeah, well… I don’t think I’m the right person for the job.”
“I think you’re the perfect person. And besides, what else do you have to do?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Shopping, my nails, napping—”
“Be serious. You need something to do, and we need you.”
She licked her lips. “You need me huh?”
He swallowed and glanced around. There wasn’t anyone in earshot and yet he didn’t think this was the place for a conversation of that magnitude.
“Never mind.” She turned to go.
“Stop. Yes. We need you. All of us as a collective.”
She rolled her eyes. “Whatever.”
Neeman growled in frustration. Why couldn’t things just be easy with her? What she wanted him to say was as obvious as what had set her off. The mention of Danika and their relationship had sent a frostiness over Selene to rival that of a Chicago winter.
There was only one way to do this.
He grabbed her hand. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?” She trailed behind him.
“You’ll see when we get there.” He pulled her toward the car out front.
Chapter 18
Neeman drove downtown in silence. They’d made love, and it had been amazing. He’d given her something that no man had before. And she’d given him something no woman ever had before. The blood in his veins made him once again feel alive. It connected him to her in a way he’d never connected to another.
But her discovery that he’d had a relationship with Danika threatened to ruin that. He figured the best thing to do was to try and help her understand.
He pulled his car into a vacant parking lot and stopped.
She looked out the window. “A parking lot? That’s what you wanted to show me?”
“No, smart ass. It isn’t.” He tried to keep the irritation out of his voice but man she could be a pain sometimes. Though he was starting to understand why she constantly had her defenses up.
He exited the car and she followed. The night was cool but not uncomfortable. Selene scanned the area and he walked to a one-story building with the glass front doors sitting open.
“What is this place?”
“You’ll see.” He continued through the empty entrance and down to a set of turnstiles. Dropping in a few pieces of change, he pushed the metal bar down with his hips and went through. He turned to drop in a few more coins for Selene but she jumped the turnstile instead.
“You’re not supposed to do that.”
She shrugged. “You gonna arrest me?”
He shoved the money back into his pocket. The approaching shriek of brakes against metal wheels shook the structure.
“Come on.” He laced her slender fingers in his and jogged toward the train that slowed out on the tracks.
She made for the open door of the train but he shook his head.
“Up here.” He showed her the ladder on the end of one of the cars and she smirked. He hoisted her up, getting an ample view of her perfect backside, before following her onto the roof.
The train rolled forward and they walked to the middle of the car and sat. Wind whipped her hair from side to side. She pulled a band out of her pocket and strapped her hair into a ponytail.
The smell of the cool night air made Neeman relax. It had been months since he’d ridden the train. He closed his eyes and smiled as they moved down the tracks, closer to the city center. The rhythm of the train was so familiar it felt like second nature.
“So what are we doing up here?” Selene scooted next to him.
“You wanted to know what I do for fun, so I’m showing you.”
“You ride the top of an L train for fun?”
He shrugged. “I didn’t become a vampyr by choice.” He looked out at the scenery. They passed an overgrown little league baseball field and he stared at the rusted and falling down fencing. “When I’d finally come to terms with what I’d become, I joined the Tracking Squad. It was the only thing that made me feel like I might have a purpose in this new life.”
“Okay, I get it. You’re a man with a mission.”
Neeman ran his hands through his hair. Why couldn’t she just shut up sometimes? “No. I’m not. That’s the point. Ever since I became this, work is all I had. Until Danika.”
Selene glanced at him sideways. “You don’t have to explain to me about her. It’s cool.”
“No, it’s not cool. I saw how you got when you asked me if I loved her and I’m trying to explain.”
The sudden seriousness that came over Selene’s features was something he’d never seen from her before. It made him want to reach out and touch her.
“I’m listening.”
“I didn’t know anything else but the work. Picking up humans, tracking rogue vamps, protecting Danika’s father at meetings. That was all I had until I met her. You asked if I love her. And in a way, I did. She was the first thing to really ground me in this life, to give me something other than just the job, and for that, I loved her. I hadn’t been with anyone before her except for the occasional one-nighter. It’s been that way ever since as well.”
They were coming close to their stop. If he didn’t say this now, he didn’t know that he’d ever work up the nerve again. “I’m not good at this.”
“At talking? I’ve noticed.”
“No. Yes. This.” He gestured between them. “Talking, sharing. I haven’t done it in over fifty years.”
“Even with Danika?”
“Especially with Danika. Don’t you get it yet? I hate what I am. I hate being a vampyr. Drinking from people, enslaving people, constantly craving sustenance. I hate it. How do you tell someone who was born this way that you hate that you’re like them? That you’d rather still be human.”
“I see.”
“Do you? Do you know what it’s like to worry every single day that you might kill someone? That you might turn them into someone like you and curse them with the same existence you have? To know that you’ll likely see the world end before your own life?”
She stared at him hard for a minute. “Yes. I know exactly what that’s like, only more so because of my inner demon. Were I to let her run free, I mean, really free, I can’t even fathom the kind of chaos she would set off.”
He nodded. “Maybe you do understand, but Danika never would’ve. She loves being what she is. And ultimately, it was my inability to tell her I cared for her, or how I really felt about myself and this life, that drove her away.”
“So do you? Still love her?” Selene stared at him, her eyes a mixture of hope and fear. It made his chest tighten.
“I love her as a friend. I will always care for her and her well-being. I’ll always fear for her safety, especially as your brother’s mate. But I’m not in love with her anymore.”
Selene swallowed hard. “And what about me? What do you feel for me?”
What did he feel for her? He stared at her for a long time. Her hair whipped loose from her ponytail. Her shining green eyes refused to look away.
“You? You make me feel...human again.”
She laughed. “I’m not even human.”
“Maybe not physically, but in spirit you are the embodiment of humans. You’re spontaneous and outspoken and spoiled and a pain in the—”
“Okay! I get your point.” She looked at her hands.
He lifted her chin. “But you also care about others. You could’ve left my men to die and run for it, but you didn’t. You saved them from a demon. You could have told Evan that she was right about Vampires and egged her on to go about trying to destroy the world, but you didn’t. You’re smarter than anyone gives you credit for and more loyal than just about anyone I’ve ever met. Besides your brother.”
Rise of the Fae Page 18
