Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
YORICK
When I wake up, I’m filled with delight. I still have plenty of hours to terrorize Atticus. I clap my hands. “Atticus, come, boy,” I say, knowing that with his superior hearing he can hear me when I’m just one room over.
He does not, in fact, come.
So I pull out my phone and call him.
He does not answer.
So then I text him:
Me: Hurry now, we don’t want to be late.
Silence.
My brow furrows as I realize that this man very much plans to play hard to get. Why must he aggravate me this way?
I get out of bed and look down at my arms that are slowly healing.
How are they still not fully healed? Tentatively, I pull on clean clothes.
Then I wrap both of my arms and hold my hand close to me.
The bones gradually seem to be mending themselves, but why they’re not completely healed is beyond me. How can this poison be so potent?
I step out and hurry over to Atticus’s door which I push open without knocking.
“Atticus, dearie, it is time.”
Atticus is sitting on the edge of his bed staring at the wall like an absolute creeper. But because he’s handsome, it oddly looks sexy, and that annoys me a little. I should be the prettiest one in the room, but right now, I look (and feel) half dead.
“What are you doing?” I ask, curiosity getting the best of me.
“Praying for this day to end quickly.”
“I didn’t think you believed in any gods.”
“I don’t. That’s how desperate I am,” he says as he gets up and looks over at me. “What’s first?”
“We’re going somewhere super awesome. Let’s go. Just the two of us. Johnny, wherever you’re lurking, you can have the day off.”
“What, you think I keep him in the closet or something?” Atticus asks.
“I was actually assuming under the bed. Does he pick it up and vibrate it a bit for you like those fancy beds?”
Atticus scoffs. “He would if I asked.”
“I’d like you to do that for me later. Don’t let me forget,” I say while we head downstairs.
“Have you finally healed?”
“I’m all good, or good enough,” I respond as we reach the ground floor where Julian is painting something that isn’t Gustov for once.
“Julian, my dearest and bestest friend, Atticus and I are heading out together.”
“Where are you two off to? And please don’t say the cemetery.” Julian leans back from his painting long enough to get a good look at us.
“Somewhere secret. Atticus said that he’d love for me to pick where we go today.”
“Did he now? I’d sure like to know what threat you’re holding over him for that one,” Julian mumbles to himself.
“Let us go, inferior one,” I say, hurrying out to the car to sit in the passenger seat while he gets into the driver’s seat. Just as he turns the car on, something dawns on me. “Do you even know how to drive? I’ve usually only seen your ass grace the back seat where you think you’re a king.”
“I could be a king if I so chose. I could rule this entire world, yet I have not.”
“Follow the GPS for the first part of our date, Your Majesty.”
His hands tighten on the steering wheel. “When did this turn into a date?”
“It’s always been a date,” I say, giddy when he starts to drive to the location I entered into the car’s GPS.
I’m a little surprised he’s chosen to drive to it. I really thought I’d have to strong-arm him there. Does he feel guilty? Is that why he’s letting me have my way? Does he believe that I’m just going to die, so this is one last hurrah before he rolls my body into the grave?
“Are you going to attend my funeral? And you’d better pay for it. I want the best, even in death. Make sure I look pretty.”
“I’ll make sure it’s a closed cardboard casket so it disintegrates quickly,” he says.
“How sweet of you. You’d better shed a tear.”
“A tear of delight. Think of how much more money I’d have if I’d left your dying ass nearly five hundred years ago! I’d be so rich!”
“Life would be boring. You would grieve for me from the moment I’m gone until the moment you perish.”
Atticus swipes away a fake tear. “That’s as much as I can muster. I’ve been alive so long that I’m cynical and care about no one but myself. And I often struggle to find it in myself to even do that.”
“Then why do you keep hanging around us?”
“Because of Casimir. He’s the only one I turned who has made something of himself. The rest are… questionable at best.”
“What are you talking about? I’ve done so much with my life.
I became a bad guy once, and I pretended to be a sheriff for a while—that was waaaaay back when.
Then I found some old lady who thought I was her husband and she was on her last leg, but boy was she a good cook.
I did all of my husbandly duties with finesse. ”
“Did you sleep with her?”
“Of course not! She was so old. Like… okay, I was older than her at the time, but still. Then there was that time I thought I’d travel the world in an airplane back when they were doing all of that ‘Let’s travel around the world in blah blah days,’ and I thought that sure sounded fun.
And then the plane crashed over the ocean, and I floated at sea for far longer than I’d like to admit.
I had to build a little shelter with scrap from the plane and hide under it during the day while I floated off.
A shark attacked me and I had to eat it… ”
Atticus is staring at me now like the road no longer matters. “What is wrong with you?”
“Me? Because I like adventure? Because I like thrills? Nothing, nothing. I am the definition of perfect… hell, even you can’t look away from me.” I beam at him and tap his cheek with my finger.
That sure makes his face scrunch up as he remembers there’s a road in front of him and accelerates. When we pull into the parking lot of “Adventure Avenue,” his expression is indescribable.
“Please tell me why we’re here.”
“We’re here for adventures, baby,” I say before I hop out and hurry to the front gate where I expect him to pay. It’s an all-ages center with go-karts of different difficulty levels, arcade machines, rock climbing, and obstacle courses, among other things.
All I know is that I’m going to force the proper vampire who thinks he’s king to do it all.
“One ticket?” the man at the booth asks as he notices me hovering around.
“It’ll be two,” I say, turning to look at Atticus, who is still in the car. I should get him out before he drives off without me, leaving me here all by myself. I mean… how fun would this be to do alone?
I swipe his credit card that I just happen to have in my wallet and then return to the car where Atticus is looking everywhere but at me.
“Get your ass out.”
“I refuse to engage in such frivolous activities. We have important matters to attend to, and this is what you choose to do with your final day on this earth?”
“Let me tell you a secret, Atticus… if I truly had one day left on this earth, I’d want to spend it with you because nothing gives me as much joy as watching you be miserable.”
His eyes slowly shift over to lock on mine through the car window. “Many would think that of all of the people I’ve turned, Casimir would be the monster, but I know it’s you.”
I grin at him.
“That pretty face of yours can’t hide that fact.”
“You think I’m pretty?”
“Pretty annoying,” he growls as he throws the door open that I smoothly slide out of the way of, so pleased with myself for getting this man out of the car.
Since it’s after dark, the majority of people inside are teens, but there are still quite a few children. There aren’t many adults, unless they’re here with their families, but that makes me all the more excited to drag this pompous man through all of this.
“Whatever should we do first? Let’s look around and see what there is to do,” I suggest as I grab his hand and feel it instantly become stonelike.
Atticus is displeased, which pleases me all the more.
“Ooh, this room looks thrilling,” I say, pointing to the room filled with trampolines and many pillars of “rock” climbing. Most of the people climbing them are under eighteen, but he’s going to go up that pillar and ring that bell.
“Before you enter the Towers of Exhilaration, you must watch a safety video!” a worker announces. She waves us over and everyone crowds together in a small space right in the entryway.
While everyone else watches the safety video, Atticus stares at me. He’s wearing a “How dare you expect me to do any of this?” expression, and I love every second of it.
So I lean in, lips so close to his ear they nearly brush it as I whisper, “Am I just so pretty that you can’t look away?”
He scoffs so loudly that everyone turns and looks at us.
The worker is probably wondering whether something on the video has gravely offended the man and now looks rather uncertain.
The thing with Atticus is that while humans might not know that vampires exist, they sure sense that there’s something different about him.
I’m much better at blending in than an ancient vampire who is used to sitting on his throne and barking at his butler whatever nonsense he wants him to do.
The worker lets us inside and waves us over to the safety harnesses that the teenagers and children quickly pull on. There are a few adults, but it’s obvious that Atticus thinks that this is absolutely foolish and wants no part of it.
The nice thing about that is that he stands stone-still, so when I start forcing the harness on him, I get it between his legs before he does anything to stop me. I give it a good yank so it pulls on his junk, and his eyes narrow.
“Are you going to fondle me when we’re in a room full of people?”
“You wish,” I say.
He laughs like I’ve said the most ludicrous thing he’s ever heard, and I notice that everyone else is steering clear of the man who is having a mini vampire tantrum because he thinks he shouldn’t be subjected to this.
It fills me with so much glee. This really was the best idea.
Anything that causes Atticus distress causes me pleasure.
Am I a sadist?
Possibly. I would be interested in becoming one so I could watch this stoic man show me some emotion other than disdain.