Chapter Ten – Jack #2
He took so long to respond, I would’ve feared him dead already if I couldn’t hear his heartbeat. “Are you one of them?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“And they left a child in your care?” He sounded incredulous.
“I get that a lot.”
I heard chains shifting—I had no doubt he was tied down to a table similar to the one in the room with the Sleeper. “There’s a lighter in my pocket. I want to see you.”
I walked up to the table fearlessly—there was nothing he could do to hurt me here. I patted him down, found his stomach wet—blood, or worse?—and then found the outline of a lighter in his jeans. I tugged it out and flicked it on.
He had been an attractive man before all this began.
In size, he was somewhere between Mark and I, well-muscled, with an assortment of tattoos—including two huge swords streaking down each forearm.
He had shoulder-length hair, brown or black, hard to tell, it was damp with blood—and there was a huge gash across the front of his chest, down to his stomach, like he’d fought a car-sized cat.
I had a feeling his guts would pop out if he coughed wrong.
“Are you telling me the truth?” he asked. One of his eyes was swollen shut, the other inspected me for signs of lying.
“I am.” I brushed some of his wet hair off of his face.
“And you would never hurt Sam?” He strained his head forward.
“Whoever they are, I promise.” The flame went out, and I flicked it on again. “I’d cross my heart, but I don’t think you’d believe me. Where can I find them?”
“You won’t have to. Sam’ll find you. Trust me.” He sagged his head back against the stone. “What’s the kid’s name?”
“Rabbit.”
He laughed again, sick and wet. “Yeah. You wouldn’t make up a name like that.”
“No, sir, I would not. What’s yours?” My free hand found his and held it. It wouldn’t be long now.
“Bryan. And I just put a string of explosives around the perimeter of the boulders. We’ve been watching this nest for weeks.”
I blinked and leaned forward.
“Saw it get busy last night and today. Weapons coming in, believers wandering about. Thought we’d take it out tonight.
Burn everyone inside and blow the tunnels.
But none of our intel said anything about a human child.
” His eyes stared straight up, he was using all his strength to speak. “It is human—right?”
“Yeah.” Rabbit was close enough. “Why’re you telling me all this?”
“Not allowed to kill bystanders. Sacred pact.” His voice fell to a whisper. And I realized that seen from a certain angle, as the lighter’s flame played over his skin, the swords on his arms looked a hell of a lot like crosses.
“Even if it means that vampires escape?”
“Sam’ll handle it. No one escapes Sam.” A mysterious smile played across his lips and then he was dead. His heart spasmed, searching for blood to pump, and finding none, eventually stilled.
The lighter was burning me, I didn’t notice it—until I smelled the stench of burning flesh. I let it go out and licked my thumb, knowing it would quickly heal.
I put the lighter in my pocket, and left the man behind.
As I leapt into the trailer’s living room, I heard a car drive off. “Rabbit?” I said without thinking.
“Still asleep,” Tamo said, from the couch. He’d turned the TV on—this shithole somehow had satellite. “Maya went back.”
I picked up the coffee table’s top and set it down, like I was recorking a bottle of wine, and then moved to stand as far away from him as possible.
“What, you don’t like me?” He popped his feet onto the table and straightened out his Hawaiian shirt. “What’s not to love?”
“Don’t pretend we’re friends, Tamo.”
“Why wouldn’t we be?” The look he gave me then—it went on half-a-second too long. “I mean, we both work for Rosalie,” he went on, and gave a self-deprecating laugh. “Some of us harder than others.”
“The only person I actually work for is his mother,” I said, jerking a thumb back to the room where Rabbit slept. “Your—girlfriend? That’s more like slavery.”
“You keep saying things like that. Rosalie’s right. You’re never going to appreciate the gift that you’ve been given.”
I crossed my arms and leaned back against the kitchen counter behind me. “Probably not.”
“That still doesn’t mean that we can’t be friends, though, Jack.
Forever’s a very long time. Forever gets lonely.
” He sank deeper into the couch and gave me a pitying look.
“I mean, it is what it is now—you’re one of us, even if you don’t want to be.
And it’s not all bad. I mean, if you were still human what kind of help would you be to your wolf-woman? ”
I refused to respond, even if he was right.
“And this might be the first time you’ve ever been financially helpful to Rosalie. So it’s a win-win, really.”
“It didn’t help her when I took out the Nevada Thirteen?”
“That was a one-time deal. Whereas this new club—it promises to be lu-crat-ive.” He said each individual syllable like it was its own word.
“This is a tougher town than it seems, Jack. Rosalie’s already reinvented Vermillion a few times, but it’s hard—either steam runs out, or you push too hard and risk exposure.
Add in the hassles of upcoming technology, and Rosalie needs to make money to invest now, while the getting’s good. ”
“So what—in twenty years, she’ll disappear and then return, pretending to be her own daughter?”
“Something like that,” he said and shrugged. “Or she’ll go elsewhere and start again. And take me, of course.”
I squinted at him. “And the rest of us?”
“I don’t think you’ll live that long,” Tamo said, and then laughed and laughed.