“I knew it,” were the first words out of Storm’s mouth. “I knew that you were either dead or … one of them. You look so different, like a statue.”
Lyric smiled tightly, not at all surprised by Storm’s reaction. “Nice to see you too, lady. Aren’t you at least happy to see me?”
“Hell yes, I am. Sorry if I don’t rush over to hug you. I’ve seen enough scary movies to know better.” Storm eyed her cautiously, but the bitter scent of fear never wafted from her.
“Oh come on, Storm, I’m still me.” Closing the apartment door, Lyric waited patiently for Storm to analyze her. “Don’t you want to know where I’ve been?”
“Dead, I’m guessing. Griffin answered your cell phone after I’d called about thirty times. He wouldn’t tell me anything other than that you were safe but MIA for a while. So I came here to stay with Frisk.” Storm waved her into the living room, careful not to take her eyes off Lyric. “Good thing you gave me your spare key.”
Following slowly, Lyric glanced around her apartment. Everything inside felt so human, so foreign, like she had been gone so much longer than she actually had.
Frisk was sleeping on the couch when she sat down on the opposite end. He shot to his feet immediately, staring at her suspiciously. A low growl rumbled in his throat, and she gently offered a hand to him. After taking a long sniff, he ceased the noise and allowed her to pet him.
“Thank you, Storm. I owe you big time for staying here with him. I was so worried about him when I realized how long I’d been away.” Lyric smiled as her feline friend leaned into her affectionate pats. She’d been afraid he would reject her entirely.
Storm perched on the arm of an easy chair on the other side of the small living room. She raised an eyebrow in question. “Yeah, no problem. Now start talking. Tell me everything. God, I can’t believe you’re sitting there all … undead. It’s fucked up, Lyric.”
Lyric took her time, repeating to her friend the events of the night she had run into Dexter at Cry. When she revealed that it had been Griffin that turned her rather than Jade, Storm’s mouth had fallen open with a, “Are you fucking kidding me?”
By the time Lyric reached the end of her tale, Storm had thrown a handful of questions at her, some of which she couldn’t answer.
“What was death like? Did you see the white light and all that stuff you always hear people talk about after a near death experience?”
“No,” Lyric began uncertainly. She still wasn’t sure she was ready to talk about it. “But, I could feel it there, waiting for me. There was definitely something pure and beautiful there on the other side. Once I tasted Griffin’s blood, it was gone.” She met Storm’s eyes, fighting back the inexplicable urge to cry.
“So, there is more.” A smile lit up Storm’s face. “I knew it.”
“Well, I’m no expert, but yeah, I think it’s safe to say that if there wasn’t, I wouldn’t even be here right now in the form that I’m in. I can’t explain it, but I feel like this was all meant to be. Everything with Jade and me. I just know it deep down.” Lyric fell silent as she debated on how much more to share with Storm. It was all so strange and new still, so much she herself didn’t understand. “I keep having these visions, the same ones. I don’t know what they mean but I keep seeing you, Storm. And Griffin.”
She described the vision then, the one of Griffin holding Storm’s limp frame in his arms as lightning rained down around them. Since becoming a vampire, Lyric had had this vision a second time. It had been bittersweet. She’d feared losing her psychic abilities, but in fact, they were sharper and more frequent. Like always, she didn’t seem to be able to put the pieces together. It was still too vague. Perhaps that would change with time.
“Me and Griffin, huh?” With pursed lips, Storm seemed to consider what she’d just heard. “I can’t say that sounds all bad. But, really, what are the odds of that happening? Your visions never reveal the details.”
“No, but what I do see comes to pass more often than not. Don’t forget that.”
With a bob of her blonde head, Storm nodded and dismissed Lyric’s concern with a shrug. “So I assume you came for your things. I don’t suppose you can ditch the daylight in a third floor apartment. What about dancing? Are you going to quit? Shit, Lyric. Is this really worth it for a vampire? He’s still just a man.”
It was spoken with love, not criticism. Lyric knew that. She also knew that Storm was right in a way. She couldn’t just give up dancing and all that she was.
“I’m still going to dance. I just need some time first. I’ll call Brit and deal with it, tell her there was a family emergency or something.”
“That’s what I told her.” Storm laughed. “It was the only way I could keep her from calling the cops to have them look for you.” Both women laughed together, which felt so good to Lyric after the past several days. Stormed stopped suddenly, her eyes wide. “Shit, what will you tell your parents?”
“Nothing.” Lyric got up and made her way to the bedroom; Storm followed at what she must have felt was a safe distance. It was almost enough to make Lyric roll her eyes. “They live across the country, and I don’t see them as much anymore since they’re getting up there in years. I’m kind of hoping they will never have to find out. My mom would take one look at me and know what I am.”
Heading straight for the closet, Lyric grabbed a suitcase and began stuffing it with clothing and personal items. Glancing over at Storm, she found her leaning in the doorway, watching her pack. Judging from the look on her face, she was thinking hard about something.
“Are you going to spit it out?” Lyric asked with an impish grin.
“What?”
“Whatever it is that you’re thinking. It’s all over your face.”
Storm ran a hand through her hair and dared to venture into the room where she sat on the end of the bed. “Do you like it? Being one of them.”
An honest answer didn’t come to Lyric right away. She was tempted to dance around a direct response. Instead, she paused while folding a pair of dress pants. “I wish I could tell you how much I hate it because I feel like that’s what I should say. It’s been scary, but being with Jade makes it all worth it.”
“Even the blood drinking?” Storm didn’t try to hide the disgust in her tone. “So you really love him, huh?”
“I really do.”
There was a pause then. Lyric kept shoving things into her suitcase, swearing when she couldn’t get it closed properly.
“Well,” Storm said after watching Lyric break the zipper in her attempts to close the stuffed bag. “I just hope you don’t come to regret any of this. But, as long as you’re happy, I’m happy.”
The overwhelming urge to hug Storm overtook Lyric, and before she knew it, she had caught Storm up in a tight embrace. Storm let out a little squeal but otherwise put up no resistance.
“Sorry.” The sweet human scent tickled Lyric’s senses, and she quickly pulled back. “I didn’t mean to freak you out.”
With a sound of irritation and a swear word for good measure, Lyric grabbed the exploding suitcase with its broken zipper. Jade was waiting downstairs for her. He hadn’t let her out of his sight since he’d come back to town.
After saying goodbye to Storm, she had gathered Frisk and her bag before heading down to Jade’s car. They would have to come back for the rest of her stuff. As Lyric made her way through the building where she had formed her independence, she knew that she would miss it. Passing through the front lobby doors on her way out felt both surreal and melancholy. Lyric couldn’t shake the feeling that she was officially closing the door on her humanity.
Epilogue
Ever since Lyric had told him about her vision of Griffin and Storm, Jade had been unable to shake the image completely from his mind. He had no way of really knowing what it meant and so he’d made the decision to keep it from Griffin for now. Since Storm had been somehow afflicted in the vision, they intended to keep a close watch over her. Just in case.
In the weeks since Lyric had first risen as a vampire, she had quickly immersed herself fully in her new world. It had been both a relief and a joy to Jade. Of course, it hadn’t all been fun and games. More than once, he’d had to restrain her physically when the bloodlust took over.
Jade knew what it was like to live with regret after a kill. In the beginning, the bloodlust was so powerful and all consuming. It was almost like donning an entirely different personality, a rabid, irrational one. He couldn’t allow Lyric to exist with the same kind of guilt that had wracked him for so many years.
Tonight was the first night that she had returned to the stage. Dancing was part of who she was, he knew that. Still, it did concern him a little. If she lost control in a crowded building filled with hundreds of living, breathing human bodies, it would be a total disaster. Surprisingly, Lyric had far better control than most newborn vampires. Jade attributed this to her psychic abilities and her exceptional will.
As much as he hated to admit it to himself, Jade kept waiting for her breakdown. But, it never came. At least, it hadn’t so far. Lyric had walked away from her human life without a look back.
Jade likely mourned the death of her human mortality far more than she did. A part of him questioned the right and wrong of it. He felt responsible for the choice that Lyric was faced with as she lay dying in Griffin’s arms.
He should have been there instead. If anyone had to bring her over, it should have been him. But, would he have been able to go through with it in time? He’d told Griffin himself that he couldn’t turn her. Perhaps it had been better this way.
The lights dimmed, and the audience reacted with sudden expectation. Tension filled him as he waited to see her step into the spotlight. It was something he could watch forever and never tire of. The hum of the crowd’s energy fueled his excitement, stimulating his senses. He was keenly aware of everything going on around him, but his main focus was all on her.
When she appeared seemingly out of nowhere before them, a collective hush fell over the audience. From the moment they laid eyes on Lyric, she held them enthralled. Mildly surprised, Jade watched as she began to move to the music. Every pair of eyes in the building was trained on her, and the entire mass of people seemed to breathe as one.
There was no doubt that Lyric had always been beautiful, but now she was ethereal and majestic, a goddess in her own right. When the rest of her dance troupe joined her, very few were able to take their eyes off the raven-haired lady with the sparkling eyes and pale as whipped cream skin. Jade didn’t blame a single one of them. He hadn’t been human for many lifetimes, and he too was held captive by the allure of his true love.
He could watch Lyric perform her seductive striptease until the end of time, and it would never lose the effect it had over him. It wasn’t long before he began to grow impatient. He wanted to take her home where he could hungrily devour her. The desire quickly became an undying need.
It came as no surprise to Jade when, after the show, Lyric announced her desire to hunt. The energy of the crowd and their steadily beating hearts had sapped the remainder of her control while feeding her hunger.
“Do you have any idea how spellbinding you are?” he asked, reaching for her hand as they strolled down a dark and seedy downtown side street.
They’d been frequenting areas of the city much like this. Jade had been careful to ensure that nobody they killed could be considered an innocent. He couldn’t allow Lyric to start off as he had. She was better than that.
Killing recklessly without question or consideration was the way Jade had always survived. He had little reason to care about his victims and thought nothing of them once finished with them. Lyric’s entry into his life had started to change that. He’d never had a reason to care before.
Truth be told, part of him still didn’t care. He’d spent centuries living that way, and he was more than happy to continue. Lyric made him stop and think about it. It was her that he cared for. Blood and death dominated the life of a vampire, but that didn’t mean that she had to be as cold and hard as he had become. She was simply too warm for that. Too genuine.
“Do you know how insanely handsome, sweet and charming you are?” She countered, giving his hand a squeeze.
Jade beamed a smile at her, enjoying the way she caused his heart to flutter. He hoped that he never got used to it. As they drew closer to a man in the shadows up ahead, her attention became riveted. The man spoke on a cell phone, low but clearly audible. Drug deal.
“Meth dealer, my love.” Jade whispered low in Lyric’s ear. “He’s all yours.” Her scent was intoxicating, and he breathed it deep into his lungs, knowing in time her human smell would fade.
In a flash, she was gone from his side. He hung back, watching with morbid fascination as Lyric approached the unsuspecting man. Her victim glanced up at her; his phone call, forgotten when he laid eyes on her. Jade loved the way everyone reacted to her. She completely embodied the hypnotic allure of the vampire.
Jade was almost disappointed when the drug dealer didn’t even try to resist Lyric’s advances. Instead, he was transfixed, staring into her with a strange combination of wonder and fear. He didn’t try to run until she reached for him, baring her fangs. And, by then it was much too late.
There wasn’t even time for Lyric’s drug peddling victim to cry out. Blood spilled, and Jade grew hard as he lost himself in the sensuality of his lover’s kill. It moved him, watching her feed. It touched the core of what made him a vampire, and as sinful as it might be, he loved it.
For the first time since Jade had left his own mortal life behind, he found new meaning, not to what he was but who he was. And, it was all because of her. After walking alone through death and darkness for centuries, only now was he truly living.
Time might bring many things their way in the future, as time always does. But, with her at his side, there was nothing that Jade couldn’t handle. Lyric’s gift to him ran deeper than the earth beneath their feet, far beyond the stars in the sky. She had freed him from himself, whether she knew it or not. Spending the rest of his existence with this woman was nothing less than a dream come true.
Jade wasn’t delusional. He wasn’t fool enough to believe that they would never face challenge or adversity in the future. Yet, he knew that whatever came their way would be nothing they couldn’t overcome.
With a low, satisfied chuckle, Jade admired his vampire beauty as she drank down the life of her victim. When she turned to him, licking the blood from her fangs, he held his arms out to her. As he beckoned her, she glided toward him as if her feet never touched the ground. Like a dark angel, she came to him, and he awaited her, yearning for her touch.
As Jade pulled Lyric into his embrace, she gazed up at him with a fire burning in her dark blue eyes. Overwhelmed by the power of their connection, he held her to him tightly, burying his face in her thick tresses.
Death would never part them. Illness would never touch them. If he could go back to the beginning and do it all again, he wouldn’t have changed a thing.
About the Author:
Trina M. Lee is best known for the urban fantasy Alexa O’Brien Huntress series. Trina lives in Alberta, Canada with her fiancé and daughter, along with their 3 cats. She loves to hear from readers via email or twitter.
For news and book information please visit:
www.TrinaMLee.com
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