Chapter 47
M atteo was missing. People were dead. I needed a distraction. I needed to think, so with Mia asleep on my couch and Lilith still out hunting vampires, I headed to the gym. When I found Dan there, baring twin scars on his throat, I winced.
“Hey, Dan,” I smiled, hoping guilt wasn’t written all over my face.
“Hey, mate, I figured you’d still be away with that artist bloke of yours, so I started a couple of minutes without you,” he replied.
“Sweet as, guess I have to catch up.” I set the treadmill to a comfortable pace.
We ran in silence for twenty minutes before he stopped, out of breath.
“Stopping already?” I asked, focusing ahead of me. “You okay?”
He heaved out a loud exhalation. “Yeah, I’ve been lacking energy for the last week. I don’t know why.”
I glanced over at him. My eyes were drawn to the puncture marks on his throat again. He had no memory of what had happened. Matteo had taken care of that. “Do you want to stop? Or keep going?” I grinned at him.
“Oh, challenge accepted!” he laughed, taking to a slow jog again.
He stopped another five minutes later. “Yeah, nah I think I’m done. Don’t let me slow you down though, you’re in good form. You bring me to shame.”
I stopped the treadmill, eyeing Dan. I’d once told myself he was the safe option, and there was attraction between us. I needed to get past my feelings for Matteo. There had been no update from the police on if he’d been found yet, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that something had happened.
“How about breakfast?” I asked before I could think about what I was doing.
My response took him by surprise. “Breakfast? Really?”
“Yeah, why not? I do like a big breakfast after my run.”
His jaw dropped, but he recovered and gave me a wide smile. “Uhh, sure, come on then. How do you like your coffee?”
He led the way to his apartment on the eighteenth floor.
I glanced around in admiration. He had bookshelves full of books, comics, and DVDs.
“I’m out of bacon,” he said from the fridge. “What about pancakes?”
“Dan, you spent all this time trying to get me in bed, do you really think I came here for breakfast?” Before I could talk myself out of it, I pulled my tank top over my head and threw it at him.
My top hit him in the back of his head and he turned around, his eyes wide as he took in my bare stomach. “Uhhh…”
“Why don’t you show me the way to that bed?” I murmured.
He walked to his bedroom without a word, then turned to face me. “Are we really doing this?” His entire face was lit up with hope.
Only then did I feel awkward and ask myself what I was doing. This isn’t me. But I had committed and was already half-naked. I moved to take his tee-shirt from him, and he didn’t hesitate to discard his shorts. He pulled me in for a kiss, his tongue pressing past my lips. My hands moved over his firm abs and up to his chest. He pulled at my leggings and then we were naked, pressed against each other.
“Lie back,” I whispered.
He didn’t hesitate, watching me with interest from the bed. I crawled towards him, kissing his torso. He sucked in a breath, his hands on my head. As I trailed my way up, he groaned. I pressed my lips to his collarbone, brushing them over his neck, his breathing ragged, and his hard-on pressed against me. I reached the puncture wounds Matteo had left.
This sight of Matteo emerged before me, fangs on display, eyes red and his anger at finding Dan in my apartment. I pulled back, staring at Dan in horror. As he smiled back at me, his head tilted as I had done to Matteo .
“What are you doing?” I asked.
He frowned. “I… don’t really know. Don’t stop.”
It was too late though, I couldn’t get Matteo out of my head. Missing or not, I couldn’t do this to him. He’d claimed me, and it was everything to him that I’d claimed him in return.
I pulled away. “I can’t,” I admitted. “This was a mistake.”
He didn’t answer, and I realised he’d fallen asleep.
“Well, you really know how to flatter a girl,” I muttered and pulled myself from his bed. I’d been about to do something I couldn’t undo, and my heart had not released Matteo yet. “Sorry Dan, I don’t think this was supposed to happen.” I still didn’t understand what had possessed me to do this in the first place. Was I that hurt, that I would climb into another’s bed?
I pulled on my leggings and retrieved my tank top from where it had landed in his kitchen.
Without glancing back, I closed his door behind me and headed towards the twentieth floor.
When I reached my apartment, I heard Mia’s panicked voice, followed by Lilith’s trying to calm her. “I don’t know where she is! She clearly left while I was asleep!” She lowered her voice. “Do you think she went looking for him?”
I sighed and opened the door. “Nope, I’m right here!”
Mia gasped. “Oh my god! Where were you?!”
“I went to the gym,” I said. “I needed to clear my head.”
Lilith scanned my face. “Is that all?”
I glared. “What do you mean is that all? I went for a run.” She didn’t turn her gaze from me, her eyes concerned. “Alright, fine. I was at Dan’s,” I relented.
Mia squealed and burst out laughing. “I always knew you’d get down and dirty with him. How was he? You weren’t gone long.” She gasped. “Oh, no, was he that fast?”
“Nothing happened,” I admitted. “I couldn’t do it, but he kind of fell asleep.” I turned my attention to Lilith. “So? Miss vampire hunter. What’s the story?”
Her shoulders stiffened. “I know you’re only asking because you’re worried about Matteo. But no, we didn’t kill any vampires. In fact, there is not a single vampire on the streets right now. It’s like they’ve all gone into hiding.”
Relief flooded through me.
“None?” Mia asked. “Where are they? Quinn herself said that there are at least thirty here.”
Lilith shrugged. “I don’t know. After those people died, and the gallery burned down, I’d say they’re aware that we’re looking for them.”
I let the two of them talk while my mind wandered. Maybe if I tried to find him, I’d have better luck. Or Carlos might know how to find him. Maybe I should try his house.
Lilith’s eyes were on me, hard and cold. “I know what you’re planning. I want to show you something.”
She held her phone up to me, and a drawing of what was clearly Matteo was on her screen. “He was what they called ‘the vampiro Veneziano ’ from more than six hundred years ago. Over the space of three years, he killed hundreds of people before they sought out hunters, my ancestors, to help them. Unfortunately, he vanished before they could eliminate him.” She put her phone away. “He’s among the worst of them, Quinn. There are killing sprees all across Italy that we link to sightings of him. Until about two hundred years ago, when he left Italy, and the same pattern started showing up in other countries. Switzerland, Austria, France, Germany. ”
I couldn’t find words.
“Wait, if you had a drawing of him, why didn’t you recognise Matteo?” Mia asked.
“Because it wasn’t until his killing spree that Dad felt the need to dig through hunter records and find it. No one in the family thought that such a cold-blooded vampire from Italy would be here.”
I knew then that it would be hard to get away from Lilith and Mia. I wanted to find Matteo, but if I sought him out, I’d bring her entire family down on him.