I turn off the main road and find a sheltered parking lot near a nature walk. Weakness radiates up my arms. I’m super dizzy. I open the door and dry heave a little, but my stomach is empty. I flop back and shut the door, locking the Lambo before reclining the seat. I’m not driving anymore today. My body feels like it’s been beaten and encased in lead.
I dump my purse out, reach for the burner phone. I should call Declan and figure out what leads he has on my pack, but I’m too tired. I lie back and and pull the towel over my face. Just a little sleep. Just a little…
Lucius
COLD AIR WAFTS over my face. This time of night, I’d be preparing for bed, checking my security, closing my crypt.
Tonight I sit like a statue, my first curled on my knee.
She left me.
I text Declan: From now on, report directly to Selene. I give him the burner number and let the phone clatter to the floor.
My crypt is still open, but I don’t care. It’s time to sleep. A month of heaven, and I am back to feeling like one of the damned.
My life stretches before me, dark as a night with no moon.
Selene
AS SOON AS my head hits the headrest, the dream envelops me like it’s been waiting for me. I’m back in the battered activity room of my pack’s hangout. Old pool table in the corner. Ansel Adam’s print peeling off the wall. There are voices coming from all around. Outside and in the kitchen. The whole pack’s about to come here and eat, talk, play games, wile the night away.
Someone’s calling my name. A woman’s voice, soft and light. My mother. I haven’t heard in over a decade. I step through the door–and end up in my bedroom. I haven’t been here since the night my family died. The room tilts–I’m sitting in my bed, upright, rigid, waiting. Someone’s outside. An intruder.
“Who’s there?” my dad calls gruffly. My parent’s door opens. He’s going to confront the intruder.
No, I open my mouth to scream. Don’t go–he’ll kill you!
“Selene?” My mother opens the door to my bedroom to check on me. A thud and my father falls in the living room. My mother turns, the door swinging wide enough for me to watch the vampire blur to her side. He’s on her before she can turn. Her voice cuts off and she falls, her head at a funny angle. Broken.
The vampire comes into my bedroom. I’m frozen in my bed, my mind screaming, my muscles refusing to respond as the vampire crosses the room to my bed. His huge body looms over mine. “Georgianna,” he says, and reaches out to touch my hair. And I see his face clearly–
I scream and throw myself out of bed, but he’s too fast. He’s going to catch me–
The room fades and I’m back in the pack club house. Bodies all over the floor. An old woman in the corner, rocking. “It was him,” she says. “It was the one-eyed vampire.”
I come awake. My whole body chilled, like I’ve been plunged into ice water. All around me, shadow dance, lengthened. It’s not dawn, but sunset. I’ve slept the day away.
I slept and I finally dreamed–
A clanging noise breaks the silence, makes me jump. My phone is going berserk.
I answer before I know what I’m doing.
“Hiya–is this tae wolf lass?”
It takes second for me to untangle the meaning of the accented words. “What? Yes. It’s me. Selene.”
“Thank fuck,” Declan mutters. “Been calling ya all day!”
I glance at the car seat where the burner lay. “Yeah, I fell asleep. I was super tired.” I must have been exhausted to pass out all day and not hear the ringer.
“You with Lucius?”
“No. I left him.”
Declan pauses a beat. A car enters the parking lot and does a slow roll past the Lambo. I twist in my seat, following its trajectory. It’s a black sedan with windows tinted enough I can’t see the driver. Something about it makes me tense, but it doesn’t stop or park, just glides past and exits. Must have been a wrong turn.
Declan’s talking again, so I focus. “Frangelico wanted us to tell ya. We found a woman from your old pack.”
“What?”
“She survived the massacre. Was picked up by another pack, lived out her days there. But she told the story of the attack to the leaders of her new pack. I can send ya the recording.”
“That’d be good. Did you listen to it? What did she say? ”
“We did, lass,” he says in a gentle voice.
I swallow, my mouth is so dry. I still feel weak. “Tell me.”
“It was a vampire attack. Just one, but he was strong.”
“He?”
“She describes him.”
My gut cramps so hard I double over. “Yes?” I gasp. Please don’t say it’s Lucius. Please.
“It’s not Lucius,” Declan says as if he can read my mind. I slump back in my seat, my head so light it could float away. It wasn’t him.
My stomach clenches but the pains are weaker. My emotions are wreaking havoc on my body. Either that, or I ate something bad… over twenty four hours ago. I shouldn’t be reacting so strongly.
My first instinct shouldn’t be to clear Lucius’ name, but there’s no changing how I feel.
“At least, I don’t think it was,” Declan continues. “She described a big, powerful vampire, but this one had only one eye.”
The dizziness is back. “What?” I snap, my hand gripping the phone so hard the plastic cracks. “One eye? You’re sure?”
“He wore an eye patch, but in the struggle a wolf ripped it away. There was nothing where his eye should be.”
The image from my dream blows up in my mind’s eye. The dark shape in my childhood bedroom, stalking me after killing my parent’s. The one-eyed vampire. Xavier.
“You’re sure?” I whisper. If this is true, it changes everything.