28. Amy
Chapter 28
Amy
I practically skipped my way back to Novak’s place, swinging an overnight bag filled with toiletries and the few changes of clothes I had back at the Blood ‘til Dawn compound. Tavia didn’t seem all that surprised when I told her I was moving in, or that Novak and I were blood mates.
“I had a feeling,” she’d mused. “In the beginning I was worried, but it makes so much sense now, looking back. Cyan and I chatted with him for a while, did he tell you that?”
“He did. He’s a big fan of your wine. And he said Cyan doesn’t seem like a bad guy.”
“Such a high compliment.” Tavia laughed. “Cy said the same thing about him. Very reluctantly, I might add.” She watched me pack thoughtfully. “I do like him for you. It just kinda sucks that we’ll live separately again.”
“Oh please, I’m like a mile down the road.” I zipped the bag closed, then turned to her. “It is different, but this is good. I need my own life, and you need yours.”
Tavia nodded and I saw the emotion she tried to hide behind a tough face. “I’m really proud of you, you know.”
“Aw, Tav.” We clasped each other in a tight hug, the two of us sniffling.
“This is so dumb.” She laughed into my shoulder. “You’ll be so close, we can still see each other every day.”
“I know. But I’m leaving your nest, mama bird.”
She gave me one more squeeze before releasing me. “Text me when you get there. I’d insist on coming along, but I have a million wine bottles to fill.”
“We’ll have you over soon,” I promised, shouldering the bag. “You and Cyan.” Saying we felt presumptuous but also good. Novak made it sound like he would share everything equally with me.
Tavia snorted. “That’ll be something.”
I thought back to that conversation as I came to Novak’s and knocked on his front door. He’d said his bed was ours. Did that also extend to the whole house? Did I have the right to walk in like I owned the place?
Someone opened the door before I could think more of it, and I came face-to-face with a man I’d never seen before.
“Oh, hello,” I said in surprise. “Is Novak home?” He didn’t mention having any other guests over.
This man looked obscenely rich, from his clothes—including the ornate crest pinned to his jacket—to the mild disgust at the sight of me on his clean-shaven face. He was handsome in a cold, severe way. He looked a decade or so older than Novak, with fine lines around his deep crimson eyes, but there was no telling how old he actually was.
“The heir of Rathka’s Order is occupied,” the man said after giving me a long, disapproving once-over. “What business does a brusang have with him?”
The way he said brusang made it clear he considered me beneath any full-blood vampire. Confusion made a nervous laugh drift out of my mouth and I glanced around to make sure I didn’t accidentally knock at the wrong door. Surely Novak wouldn’t have a guest like this in his house? Not after he denounced Rathka’s Order completely.
“Sorry sir, I feel like we’re misunderstanding each other,” I said as politely as I could manage. “Novak is expecting me. Can I just slip past you really quickly? Thanks.”
The man’s body angled just slightly and I took the opportunity to push my way into the foyer. My feet stopped dead in my tracks before I could even process what I saw next.
Novak stood against the banister of the main staircase, his shirt wrinkled with the sleeves rolled up and top buttons undone, one bare foot propped on the bottom step. A fully nude woman stood in front of him, her hand around the back of his neck in a comfortable, intimate way. She was tall, all long legs and slender curves, and able to reach him easily from a normal standing position.
It felt like I’d been punched three seconds ago, but time had frozen and I hadn’t felt the full impact of the blow yet.
“Novak?” My voice was high and betrayed all the confusion I felt. “What’s going on? Who’s that?”
His eyes slid from her face to me, his expression cold. “Ah, you again. Just barging into my house now, are you?”
The delayed gut punch hit me right then, forcing all the air from my lungs. He’d never ever spoken to me like that, or looked at me like I was beneath him.
“What are you talking about?” I demanded.
The man at the door walked past me through the foyer. “Show some respect, brusang. She is my daughter, Inessa of Carpe Noctem. You’re barging into a sacred joining of two powerful clans, not that an undead human would know anything about that.” He glared at Novak. “Who is this brusang to you?”
“No one.”
The calm delivery of that statement killed any hope of him setting the record straight, of explaining why these people were in his home. In what I thought would be our home.
“Novak?” His name came out like broken, jagged glass. “How… how can you say that?”
“She’s just a former blood pet who started having lofty demands, so I kicked her out.” He never looked at me directly as he spoke. His gaze seemed to be traveling over the naked woman instead.
“Poor delusional thing,” the other man said with zero sympathy. “This is why you can’t fuck humans, pre-turned or after. They always want to mix with the pure vampires when it’s not their place.”
The woman turned slightly as if to see what all the fuss was about, and the front side of her, what Novak had been looking at, made me feel even worse. She was perfectly proportioned with utterly flawless skin, like a porcelain doll. Not a blemish or even a freckle in sight.
“Is the brusang going to watch us conceive an heir as well?” she asked as though my presence was incredibly inconvenient.
“Conceive a… ” I was too stunned to finish the sentence, my mouth gaping open like a fish.
Confusion, hurt, and betrayal didn’t scratch the surface of what I was experiencing. I felt like I’d stepped into a mirror world where everything looked the same, but in reverse. What else could explain Novak’s disdainful tone now when he’d spoke with such love and affection earlier in the evening?
“Was any of it true?” I heard myself ask. “What you told me at dusk, and in your office last night? Did you mean a single word of what you said to me?”
His expression barely changed as he took the woman’s hand from around his neck. He brought her fingers to his lips, and she let out a soft, surprised breath as he bit her fingertip. When he licked the resulting blood droplet where I could plainly see, he might as well had kissed her. Might as well have shed his clothing and penetrated her right in front of me, for how much it hurt.
What Tom Harrison did to me didn’t hold a candle to how utterly fucking painful this was.
I thought I knew pain. I thought I knew heartache and constant rejection and never being good enough. Watching the vampire who I thought wanted a family with me, a life with me, who I finally believed had accepted and loved me, scars and all, drink someone else’s blood was beyond heartbreaking.
I felt my heart die.
“You should go, Amy.” It was a cold dismissal from the same mouth that asked me to move in with him just a few hours ago.
I was numb, empty. Still trying to figure out what the hell had gone wrong, but my body responded like an automaton. I turned and left the house. Someone must have opened the door, and then I was outside.
My feet moved but I had no sense of direction. I felt severed, exposed. Cut off from what made me feel safe and grounded, and now floating aimlessly through space.
“Amy?”
I didn’t know how much time had passed before I heard my name. For all I knew, it could have been minutes or weeks.
My eyes focused on a familiar face with a harsh, concerned expression.
“Amy? Are you all right?”
“Man, look at her. Something’s damn wrong.”
Two voices. Male. Familiar. My brain processed this information incredibly slowly, like a computer from the last century. Their names came to me moments after their faces registered.
Thorne and Rhain.
The two Blood ‘til Dawn vampires blocked my path, the size of them together practically surrounding me.
Rhain leaned over to meet my eye level. “Amy, why are you walking like a zombie? Are you hurt?”
“No.” That one word seemed to take more energy than I had.
Thorne hung further back, but I felt his gaze on me like a weight on my shoulders.
“Novak?” He said it like he already knew the answer.
That name, his name, broke though all the numbness and sent my systems crashing. A broken, ugly sob left my throat, the sound a perfect reflection of everything I felt.
“Take her bag, Rhain.” Something was removed from my hands, and then I felt a real arm over my shoulders, urging me gently to walk. “Let’s get you home.” Fingers squeezed sympathetically around my shoulder. “Guess you found out. I know we haven’t talked much, but you’re one of ours and I am sorry he played you.”
I looked up at Thorne in surprise. “You knew?”
“About his deal with Carpe Noctem? Yes. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, hoped he’d tell you before things got serious. Guess he really is of Rathka’s Order after all.”
“Let me guess,” I said bitterly. “Everyone knew except me.”
“No, that’s definitely not true. I just have eyes and ears inside every clan.” He gave me another shoulder squeeze. “Novak’s bloodline made an art out of betrayal and deception. Don’t blame yourself.”
“So fucked up,” Rhain muttered, but otherwise kept silent on the walk to the compound.
I was mostly able to keep my composure until I saw Tavia. She didn’t see me at first, too busy controlling the chaos in the kitchen. Wine bottles covered the central island. Buckets and carboys lined the counters with long tubes coming out of them. She employed Cyan, Laith, and Desmond to help bottle her latest batch, the three of them sanitizing, filling, and corking in a smooth assembly line. On top of all that, it looked like she had a test batch of something boiling on the stove.
“Put those with the crate going to Carnassian’s, please,” Tavia instructed. “Cy, don’t overfill! I didn’t bust my ass for this batch to give away free samples.”
“Sorry, love. How’s this?” Cyan held up a bottle for her inspection, his grin a mix of sheepish and adoring.
“Better, thank you.” Tavia leaned over and kissed him, the two of them smiling, gazes warm and loving when they separated.
That was the moment my composure broke, when the brittle outer layer of numbness finally shattered to expose all of the raw, ugly hurt underneath.
Because I would never, ever have what they had. The easy, quiet knowing that you had your person, and knowing they were devoted to you like it was a basic fact of life. I’d never have that feeling of steadfast support, love, and desire. I’d never be special to anyone.
I thought I found it. I thought I was so close to my happily ever after. But I’d only been duped again. Silly, weak little Amy always fell for it.
“Amy? Oh my God!”
Tavia rushed over and crushed me in a protective bear hug. She smelled like grape juice. I must have been sobbing, but it felt like fighting for air against a saw slicing open my heart and ribs.
“What did he do?” She petted my hair while holding me to her like she always used to. “I’m gonna fucking kill him. Cyan? Thorne? I can do that, right?”
“Can’t allow it, as much as I’d like to.” Thorne sounded legitimately disappointed. “Being a two-timing piece of shit isn’t a crime.”
“What the fuck?”
I couldn’t see with my face buried in Tavia’s shirt, but I pictured the bewildered look that she and Cyan shared. They had shared a bottle of wine with Novak, had even begun to like him.
He fooled them too. He played us all. But for what?
That was the biggest piece that I couldn’t make sense of. Why? Why tell me so many elaborate lies? Why start a friendship with me, pretend for weeks that he cared about me? Why convince me to show him my scars if he never wanted me in the first place? Just for the conquest?
I knew some people enjoyed being cruel, enjoyed the torment and humiliation of others. But not even Tom Harrison tried this hard to make me trust him.
“Come on.”
Tavia turned me around, leading me through the great room toward the underground apartments.
“I’m gonna burrito you up in a blanket, you’re gonna drink as much wine as you want, and you’re gonna tell me what happened, okay?”
My only answer was a shaky, rattling breath.