Chapter 34
34
Ashley
K onstantine was alive. And Ashley was banished from the vampire family forever. She was lucky she’d gotten out of there alive. She’d put these feelings in boxes, but now that she was out and moving, they pushed at their walls fighting to break free. So, Ashley let them out, just a little. Enough to channel her anger into more speed.
So, Konstantine had faked her death instead of talking to her.
So, John wanted to kick her out of the Family.
Fine. She didn’t need them. She’d found her own family. Maybe they didn’t have the access to blood banks and forged government documents that the vampires had, but she could figure that out. They would figure it out together. Because no matter what, her friends would stick up for her. Esther, August, Uther. They were a unit, and together they were untouchable.
Ashley ran, sticking to the shade of buildings and wooded areas whenever possible. Her layers were working, but her face still felt overheated. She slowed when she heard voices in the woods near the beach. Better to be spotted as a lost hiker than someone running at superhuman speeds. She recognized the voices as she grew nearer and corrected toward the sound. The tingling in her throat whenever magic was nearby was stronger than usual.
Something had August heated to be this loud. Uther was still missing. He was bound to be tightly strung. Ashley would be. She could almost see them through the trees now. But with the sun breaking from its cloud cover, she couldn’t risk the last few steps.
“Come on, Esther,” August was saying. “She’s a walking parasite. You want to be like that?”
Ashley froze. Her mind was static as August viciously listed every fault Ashley had, and Esther said nothing to contradict him. Because there was no contradicting him. She couldn’t go out in the daylight. The sunset on the other side of these trees was keeping her from joining them. She had to drink blood to survive. She could never offer Esther a life together because technically she was not alive. She’d given that away to someone who couldn’t care less about the gesture. She’d been reckless with her future, and now she had nothing to offer.
“Did you even tell her about the cure?”
The cure to what? Was Esther keeping something from her? Ashley was back in motion, moving for the tree line and the sound of voices, heedless of the setting sun. She broke through the foliage in time to see a glint of silver flying from August and Esther—a burning glint of sunlight catching it as it sailed—and land in the hands of a woman in a beige Carhartt jacket. The woman turned to Ashley before flashing out of sight.
A witch.
A witch had her blood, and there was no way Ashley could get it back or know what she would do with it.
Another piece of her that she’d entrusted to someone she loved—tossed away like it was nothing.Pure rage coursed through her body as the heat of the sun disappeared beyond the horizon, her welting skin cooling with the darkening sky. There was only one witch left on the beach, and he happened to be the one who’d thrown the necklace.
In the next second, Ashley had her hand around August’s throat as she pushed his head under the water. He didn’t even deserve deep water to drown in. Let him die in the shallows.
She’d trusted him. She’d loved him like family. She’d given up everything, and now her blood was in the hands of witches. She pushed harder until bubbles came up from the water. Fleetingly, she noticed someone pulling at her arm.
“Ashley, you’ll drown him!”
That was exactly the idea. Why didn’t he break one of her limbs like before? She heard his heart still beating, but he continued to not fight back. Why wouldn’t he fight her?
“Ashley, stop!” Esther called. “Stop, it’s my fault. I gave them the charm. Let him go.”
But she couldn’t fight Esther. And that was the whole point, wasn’t it? The water blurred out of focus as Ashley’s eyes watered, and her grip loosened. August shot up, turned on all fours, and began puking up water. He wasn’t fighting back because he knew she needed a fight and he was the only one that could take it. Esther went to check on August, and that was the last Ashley saw before she laid back under the water, letting the waves block out the sounds of encroaching twilight and the sight of the two people closest to her who had just crushed her dead heart.
She had no one now. No vampire Family, no friends, no love. She was alone. Again. Abandoned by the people closest to her and doomed to walk the world alone for all eternity. How melodramatic. She considered staying here, letting the lack of oxygen put her in a form of hibernation. But they would drag her out eventually and hurt her all over again.
Or worse. They would leave her alone.
That left her with one option. She needed to sever all ties.
She rose from the water. Esther and August had made it to shore, Esther rubbing August’s back as he continued to rasp in air. They both looked up as she approached.
“In case it wasn’t clear,” she said, directing the words to Esther. She wasn’t sure if it was lake water or tears streaming down her face, but it didn’t matter. She had to get this out. “We’re through. I knew I couldn’t trust a witch.” She directed this at August. “But I guess I can’t trust humans either. Thank you for reminding me why I’m better off alone.”
With the last of her dignity, she walked past them and into the woods. She didn’t think they could hurt her more than they already had, but the silence as she walked away sliced her in two.
Ashley
Ashley was in the woods now. Literally.
She’d stormed off, before remembering she had nowhere to go. Her tie to the vampires was burned to the ground. The love of her life and her closest friend had betrayed her and ridiculed her in the most personal way. She was exactly where she was all those years ago when she decided to follow that business card to the Family in Plattsburgh. Because her girlfriend at the time had thought staging her death was an appropriate way to break off a relationship.
So why did this time hurt so much more? She really wasn’t cut out for being a vampire. Not for the first time, Ashley cursed herself for making that decision so long ago. She was such an idiot. She’d tried so hard to measure up to expectations that never fit and continuously stumbled to maintain the bare minimum of a grasp on her life. She was sick and tired of striving for benchmarks that didn’t fit her.
Ashley walked deeper into the woods until there were only trees and underbrush before dropping to the ground and laying in the dirt. Overhead, specks of stars glinted between the branches, no longer dimmed by the town’s light. An owl hooted somewhere farther in the trees, and a single bat fluttered haphazardly through the open branches.
What was she going to do now?
As if to answer her query, a high-pitched hamster cut through the quiet night with his nonsensical singing.
A laugh bubbled up inside her. This was quite possibly the worst song for this moment. Ashley remembered listening to it with her mom when it first came out so many years ago and the two of them laughing and dancing to the silly tune. Her mom had promised it was impossible to be sad while listening to it. So maybe it was the perfect song for this moment. Ashley may be alone, but there was still one person in the world that wanted to talk to her.
“Mom?” Ashley held the phone to her ear, trying to keep her voice from wavering.
“Hey, honey, what’s wrong?”
Of course, her mom saw right through her. “I think I messed up.”
A clink came through, probably her mom setting down her coffee mug. “Tell me everything and start from the beginning.”
So, she did. Well, not everything. But she told her the important stuff. About how her mom’s disregarding comments about Ashley’s sexuality made her feel invalidated and forgotten, about convincing Esther to come home with her and pretending to be her girlfriend, and about falling for Esther for real in the end. She talked about August and how annoying and fiercely loyal he was, about Uther and his endless compassion and humor, about her roommates—roommates, not vampires, because her mom didn’t need to know that detail—and how she never quite fit in with their long-established group.
Ashley told her mom about the breakup, about hearing her friends saying the worst things about her before giving up a token that was supposed to mean their future together.
“And now I’m alone.” Ashley wiped a sleeve across her face because, if she couldn’t cry on the phone with her mom, who could she cry on the phone with? “And I don’t know where to go or how to move forward from this.”
“Ashley, honey.” Her mom took a minute before answering. “I want to apologize for my part in that. I was just joking, but I see now that my jokes were more harmful than funny. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings or make you feel forgotten. I couldn’t forget you, sweetie. I love every last bit of you. You don’t need to prove anything. Tell you what, what if we both met up in Europe somewhere and had a girls’ weekend. My treat.”
Right. Ashley still hadn’t mentioned the not-actually-in-Romania thing. But that seemed less pressing when the sun would come up in only a handful of hours and she still wasn’t any closer to a plan.
“That sounds like fun,” Ashley said. “But I’m trying to figure out what to do next first. I’ve burned all my bridges, so to speak.”
“Oh, honey. This is what you thrive under.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been in this situation before, Mom. So, I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”
“Ashybear. You’re the most organized and focused person I know. I have no idea where you got it either. Lord knows your father is a scatterbrain, and I’m always trying to juggle a million things at once. Just get that notebook of yours and make a plan.”
A list. Of course, a list was the answer. A plan would guide her back on course.
She just needed a place where she could safely start it. “But where will I go? My roommates kicked me out.”
“It sounded to me like just the one did. What if you talked to one of your other roommates? Even if it’s only temporary, I don’t doubt you’ll get back on your feet in no time. There’s no way I would have been okay with you halfway around the world if I didn’t trust your survival skills, honey. You’ll make it through this.”
She’d make it through this. “All right, I’ll come up with a plan. Thanks, Mom.”
“No problem. Call me when you’re all settled again, and we’ll discuss a girls’ weekend.”
“Sure thing, Mom. Oh! What were you calling about before I took over the conversation?”
“Just calling to catch up. It’s good to hear from you, dear.”
They exchanged a few more platitudes because she couldn’t just hang up on her mom, then Ashley started walking. She had a quarter battery on her phone, the clothes on her back, her favorite notepad, and most importantly, a heading.
She pulled out her phone and scrolled to one of the few numbers in her contacts.
Ashley
Hey. I need your help