Chapter 11
Eleven
Ru
“This explanation requires a fresh pot of coffee and a super open mind.” I head to the kitchen. If I’m giving in, I’m doing it with more caffeine in my system. “I’ll handle the coffee if you can promise me the other thing.”
Zoe frowns. “Since when have I been closed-minded?”
“Since never. I know.”
“Thank you.” She leaves the couch and settles on a barstool.
“But seriously, Zo, I was trying to keep you out of this.” I fiddle with the coffee maker. I’m not sure how much I can tell her and still keep her out of danger. “Everything we discuss, it’s got to stay just between us. For your own safety.”
Her expression clouds. “For my safety? What kind of trouble are you in?”
I heave a frustrated sigh. I’m no good at lying. And if I’m going to tell her, I might as well start from the beginning. “I’m about to break so many rules right now.”
“Then break them. Wait, is it legal trouble? Maybe my dad can help.”
“No, but thanks.” Zoe’s dad is a lawyer, but not the kind who could help me and Sully. He’s a human lawyer for human people, not a preternatural lawyer. “You remember when my parents died?”
“Yeah.” She draws the word out, making it two syllables.
“Right after that happened, I was recruited by the company I work for now. I signed papers—legal documents—promising never to reveal their name or anything about them.”
“You told me you were in the engineering department of Strategic Logistics Global Distribution.”
“Yeah, that’s the company that owns the building that sits on top of the research facility I actually work for, II Tech.
It’s underground.” I can’t believe that came out of my mouth.
Part of me expects some corporate hired assassin to appear out of nowhere and put me out of my misery for saying as much.
“Okay.” She says this slowly too, prompting me to keep talking, but I’m already afraid I’ve said too much.
“Look, are you sure you want to know? I swear it’s safer if we just catch up over coffee and pretend nothing’s wrong.”
“I’m sure I want to know.”
“Sully and I shouldn’t need to stay here too long. A couple weeks, tops, then we’ll be on our way.”
“You’re stalling.”
“There’s a good chance you’ll think I’m crazy after this.”
“Too late. Start explaining.”
“Ru?” Sully’s sweet, quiet voice reminds me of his presence on the couch where he’s watching us like a hawk. “You want me to explain?”
It’s not the worst idea ever. And to be honest, I’m pretty interested in hearing his take on things. “Sure. Go ahead.”
Zoe pivots toward him.
“II Tech stands for Innovation Immortal Technologies,” he says.
“Immortal,” whispers Zoe as I cringe. This isn’t going to be an easy conversation.
Sully continues, “That’s where I lived because it’s where I was created. I first knew Ru as Dr. Martin, and he was kind to me when others weren’t.”
“Wait, so you weren’t kidding when you said you lived under a rock. You were literally underground? And what do you mean, ‘created’?”
“They run a breeding program using both human and vampire DNA to create hybrids like me.”
Oh geez. I can feel my breakfast in my throat. There are reasons we don’t tell human who aren’t in-the-know about the preternatural creatures living amongst them. It never ends well.
Sully opens his mouth, but Zoe holds up a hand. Her eyes flare wide and her gaze fixes on him. “Hold up. Are you for real telling me you’re a vampire right now.”
“Born half vampire, half human, turned full vampire at twenty-one, but I retained many of my human characteristics because of—”
“Sully, vampires are not real.” She spins to face me. “And you letting him believe all this isn’t helping him.”
“Vampires are real,” Sully and I say at once and with identical inflection. So much for keeping poor Zoe out of the loop.
A loud laugh ripples from her throat. Then silence. “That’s not funny.”
“We’re not joking.” I continue, “I told you it was crazy, but it’s the truth. Vampires are hidden from human society for the safety of both species, but I’ve always known. My parents knew. My grandparents knew.”
Zoe goes very still.
Sully and I stay quiet, me to let her process and him maybe just copying me? Or maybe he realizes the gravity of the situation too. He’s clever in his own way, even without worldly experience to go with it.
I keep my voice gentle. “We can prove it if that would help.”
“Prove it how? Gonna let your boyfriend bite me?” Nervous laughter follows.
“Of course not, and he doesn’t feed that way anyhow. Sully wouldn’t want to scare you. And he won’t harm you.”
“You’re freaking me out, Ru.”
“I know. It’s okay to be freaked out. Should we stop for a bit? Drink some coffee?”
“Yes to the coffee, no to stopping.” She turns to Sully. “Tell me how you’ll prove it before you do anything.”
“Um, I can show you my fangs?”
“Bro, that proves nothing. Dentists can give anybody fangs these days.”
“I could lift something I shouldn’t be able to lift?”
Zoe bobs her head in a series of uneasy nods. “Yeah, okay. Do that. Get off the couch and lift it. One hand.”
Sully moves slowly and deliberately. He sets the snacks on the end table, rises from the couch, kneels, and sticks his hand under the center, then lifts it as if he were holding a pizza. A super light pizza. Like it weighs nothing.
“Oh my fucking god,” says Zoe.
And yeah, that’s my reaction too. I mean, intellectually, I knew he could do something like this. Easily. But seeing him do it is another matter. It’s wild. Inhuman.
Because Sully is inhuman, and somehow, that’s become easy for me to forget.
Sully puts the couch back where it was and curls his shoulders inward, making himself small. “Please don’t be scared of me. Ru is scared of me, and I hate it.”
My heart stumble-thuds. “I’m not scared of you.”
He stares at me, seeing straight through the lie.
And he’s right.
But he’s also wrong.
Maybe sometimes I’m a bit scared of Sully, but I should be. He’s a predator by nature. And historically, I’m his ideal prey. But I know he won’t hurt me. I know it. And I don’t like the sad expression he’s sporting at the moment. Not one bit.
“Okay.” Zoe swallows hard. “Let’s say, hypothetically, that I believe you’re a vampire. I’ll hold off my hypothetical existential crises for a hot minute while you finish your story.” She clears her throat. “You were saying?”
Sully shifts from one foot to another. “Well, so, I’ve lived there my whole life. Never knew anything different. About a year after I was turned, Dr. Martin showed up. I thought he was a real doctor.”
“I am a real doctor. Just not, you know, a medical doctor.”
“Right. That. I knew he was kind, and I knew he was a doctor, so when I escaped, I ran to him for help.”
“Oh my god,” says Zoe.
“I was bleeding pretty bad. I got hurt on the way out, you see, and the sun was coming up, so—”
“Wait, you weren’t kidding when you said the sun could kill you.”
“No.”
“Oh my god.”
“I don’t believe in god,” says Sully.
I decide to take some of the heat off him because he looks so uncomfortable.
“I didn’t know what II Tech was really about when I got hired, especially that they were essentially breeding their own prisoners.
But as you can probably imagine, by the time I found out, it was too late.
I was in too deep. I’ve been trying to find a way out ever since. ”
“You have?” asks Sully, jaw slack, surprise flickering over his features.
I nod. “Been planning it for a while, but they’re dangerous. And they’ve got a lot of resources. So we’ve gotta be careful.”
The timer on the coffee pot dings. I ignore it, but Zoe taps her fingers insistently on the bar. “Coffee me. And add a shot of something from under that counter.” She points. “Irish whiskey if we have any.”
“Ooh,” says Sullivan, suddenly more lively. “I want that too.”
“He’s never had anything to drink,” I explain.
“If you’re a vampire,” says Zoe, “and that’s a big if—I’m not saying I’m ready to believe in vampires—but why would you be eating popcorn and drinking coffee? Shouldn’t you be craving, uh, blood?”
“Oh, I have some. It’s in the fridge. But because I’m a hybrid I don’t need that much.”
“Whiskey me, Ru. Any second now, please.”
She’s right, there’s Irish whiskey in the liquor cabinet. I pour three cups of coffee and, perhaps against my better judgment, add three splashes of whiskey. I slide Zoe’s to her and glide over to hand Sully his. “Go easy on this, Tiger. We don’t know how alcohol will affect you.”
His eyes light up like a kid at Christmas, and I can hardly believe I’m letting him drink. But he’s a grown man. Some of his more childlike moments aren’t his fault, they’re the result of his captivity, and damned if I’ll hold that against him.
Zoe takes a healthy gulp and closes her eyes. Opens them. Catches my gaze. “So he’s really not your boyfriend.”
“He’s really not.”
“At least not yet,” she counters.
My face heats. I hope Sully doesn’t notice. But when I glance his way, his stare is already fixed on me, the ever-present curiosity sparkling in his gaze. I can’t look away, so I watch as he tries the spiked coffee.
His nose scrunches. It’s cute. “Whoa. It burns. Why does it burn?”
“If you don’t like it, I can fix you another,” I offer.
“I didn’t say I don’t like it.” He takes another sip, slower this time. “How soon until I’m drunk?”
“We’re not getting drunk. Just taking the edge off.”
“But I want to know what it’s like being drunk.” He pouts. Which is also cute.
“Another time. After I secure a leave of absence, okay? I need to show up at work tomorrow. Disappearing now will only make me look guilty.”
Zoe slams her cup down. “You’re going back there? After knowing what they did to him?” She holds up a finger. “Again, not saying I believe you, but, you know, hypothetically.”
“I have to. Look there’s more to the story. You want the rest of it?”
“Hit me.” She takes another sip of the spiked coffee. “I can take it.”
Sully joins us at the bar, and together we fill her in on everything that’s happened.
From his day spent in my bathtub, to vampire-proofing the house, making up my parents’ room, cooking together and establishing a routine all up until the moment our peace shattered—a vampire sneaking around outside our windows.
Then the flight to Motel 6 and ultimately landing here at the cabin.
She glances from me to him as if we’re both crazy. “My question stands. Why would you go back there?”
“At the moment, they don’t know anything.
They can only suspect. If I disappear, I’ll confirm their suspicions.
However, if I request a leave of absence, through the proper channels as if nothing’s wrong, I’ll have bought us some time.
Then, with II Tech off our backs, we can figure out what to do. ”
“I don’t know. Sounds dangerous. What if they won’t let you leave?”
“They will. They have to. I’ve been thinking about that. I’ve reread the terms of my contract. And I’ve got an idea.”