37. For Grace
Chapter thirty-seven
For Grace
Nicolette
I texted Cyrus as fast as my fingers could move while Delia’s scream tore through the executive suite. My stomach dropped. I’d never heard anything like it—raw, feral, terrified.
And then Julian’s voice, sharp and commanding: “Simone, let go of her. You don’t want to do this.”
My entire body ran cold.
“It has to be done, Julian,” Simone snapped. “It’s for the good of our world. Your family and the Harts are a threat. One that must be extinguished.”
Extinguished.
The word hit me like a punch.
What did I do? What could I do? There were three vampires out there, and I was just a human.
And to make matters worse, my phone began to ping.
Someone had opened the files on my mother’s laptop, and according to my app, they had a copy of the files and the tracker said they were on the move.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t even the worst of it.
“Nicolette, come out here, my pet,” Simone taunted. “Come see what it really means to be a vampire.”
I clamped a hand over my mouth, willing myself not to scream, not to fall apart, not to give her the satisfaction.
“Touch her and you will die,” Julian warned, his voice low and lethal.
“Oh, I don’t think you’re feeling quite yourself now, are you?” Simone sang. “I think you’re a little too human to take me on. You don’t think I noticed you’ve changed? That just like her mother, Nicolette crossed a line she never should have?”
“Would you like to test that theory?” Julian dared her.
My panic hit a fever pitch.
Suddenly I feared more for Julian than for myself.
The truth was, we didn’t know the full extent of what my blood had done to him. Though he had stopped taking it and said he felt more like his old self, there was something different—something neither of us could name. And we both knew it was too dangerous to run tests.
No matter how terrified I was—and despite the fact that I was basically helpless—I wasn’t going to cower in the bathroom any longer.
I sent one more urgent plea to Cyrus, shoved my phone into my skirt pocket, and marched out like I owned the place.
Which, technically, I sort of did. I was a Rossi, after all.
And I had a sneaking suspicion Simone would have already acted if she truly meant to kill me. She was stalling. For something.
Maybe it was downloaded files.
Or maybe I was delusional.
Let’s face it—there was a good chance I would be unalived at any moment.
As soon as I walked out, Julian—with his ridiculously quick speed and reflexes—grabbed me and stepped in front of me like a shield. Of course he’d heard me leave the bathroom.
He didn’t say a word. He simply held his fighting stance, eyes locked on Simone.
Simone had taken on this wild, unhinged appearance. Still beautiful, but in a dark, dangerous way—the kind of beauty that screamed louder than yellow caution tape. She held Delia in a death grip around her neck.
Delia’s eyes were full of terror. She looked feral, like a wolf that had been caged for months and suddenly set loose.
Her transformation back into a vampire wasn’t seductive or elegant—it looked like it was eating her alive from the inside out.
She even had burns from the sun on her cheeks and arms. Poor Delia.
I wanted to yell at her that she was a vampire, that she could fight Simone off. But I didn’t know if she even knew. She’d hated what she was from the beginning. She had been so afraid of her powers, she’d probably never explored them.
“There you are,” Simone sneered. “I will give you this: You are as brave as your mother. She thought she could fight us too.”
A lump rose in my throat. My mother.
I understood her now more than ever—the terror she must have felt at the end. And she’d been alone. At least I had Julian. Though the thought of us dying together offered no comfort. I didn’t want to die with him. I wanted to live with him. Truly live. We’d barely even begun.
“But soon we will have her research that you so carelessly left lying around. And now . . .” Simone’s hand tightened around Delia’s neck. “We know who she cured. We will destroy any evidence of her work and yours. And then we will watch Hart Labs burn.”
I had a feeling she didn’t mean that figuratively. And burning to death was not on my wish list.
I had to stop this. Think. Think. Think.
They’d kept me alive long enough to uncover all my mother’s secrets. The research was only half of it—Delia was the other. It seemed Luc had downloaded the files. Well, he had a nasty surprise waiting for him.
“Too bad your boyfriend isn’t getting any of my mother’s research,” I said, forcing steel into my voice. “You think Julian and I are so careless or stupid that we’d really leave her files lying around? It was just a decoy.”
For a moment, Simone’s features fell. Her grip on Delia loosened. But she recovered quickly, her blue eyes darkening as they burned into me.
“You’re lying.”
“She’s not,” Julian said smugly.
“Then we’ll find them,” Simone spat.
“I don’t think so. But I have a few questions.”
This was the part, right? The part in the movies where you keep the bad guys talking and pray the good guys show up.
“Oh, do you want to know why?” she mocked.
“I think it’s pretty obvious. Like some of the worst people in history, you think you’re part of a superior race, meant to rule over the rest of us, blah, blah, blah. How dare anyone not want to be one of you or—worse—offer a cure for what you are. But . . .”
I shifted slightly to Julian’s side. He threw his arm out in front of me as if to say, Don’t even think about leaving my protection . No worries there. I was glued to him until death did us part. Please don’t let that be today.
“You know what?”
“What?” Simone looked about two seconds away from lunging at me.
Delia blinked rapidly—a frantic Morse code telling me to shut up.
Not happening.
“I think you’re just afraid of death. Or maybe . . . life?” I remembered Julian telling me how afraid Simone was of dying. How she’d begged them to save her. It was all making sense now. Her comments about cures being such a human obsession.
Simone’s eyes narrowed into slits.
“I think humans are actually the superior ones,” I added, smirking. “Look at all we have to do just to survive. Vampires have it easy in comparison.”
Probably not the smartest idea to taunt a vampire. But if I was going out, it wasn’t going to be while simpering.
“You don’t know anything,” Simone spat.
Oh, I was pretty sure I’d hit the nail on the head. But there was more I needed to know—just in case we survived.
“So who’s been helping you and Luc get past Julian’s protections?”
Simone laughed—a sharp, maniacal sound. “Please. We didn’t need any help.
There are other vampires who believe as Luc and I do, but they are cowards.
Unwilling to go up against the mighty Rossis.
And the Rossis are, if anything, loyal to a fault.
They would never betray one of their own. At least not on purpose.
“It was so easy to lure Cyrus away from protecting your mother that night,” Simone went on, sounding pleased with herself. “He’s always had a hard time saying no to me.”
Bile rose in my throat.
If someone else had been protecting my mother . . .
If Cyrus hadn’t been pulled away . . .
But I couldn’t go there. Not now.
“And when he offered me this job? It was perfect. I always knew where you and Julian would be. Julian had trusted me with his schedule. I think my favorite night was at the library,” she said, almost fondly.
“I knew you were going to be there, of course, because I overheard Julian tell Cyrus. Luc thought it would be fun to hide inside before closing and wait for you.”
My stomach twisted.
Daphne.
She’d told me she’d met someone super-hot at the library that day—someone who’d asked about horse-breeding books.
It had to have been him.
Poor Daphne.
She’d come face-to-face with the killer.
I had to live for her.
So Julian could protect her.
“He does love his games,” Simone sighed, sounding downright lovesick. “Stupid Amos secured the perimeter and kept guard outside, but he never thought to check inside. Luc escaped easily before you and Cyrus showed up.” She wrinkled her nose at Julian.
“But it doesn’t matter anymore. Everything is falling into place, and it’s time to right things. It is a shame, though. Nicolette, you and your mother, could have done so much for our kind, if it weren’t for your morals.”
“What does that mean?”
“Your mommy got cold feet when she realized Luc wasn’t after a cure or seeking to better humankind. She didn’t know that what he’d asked her to work on was not a vampire killer . . . but a vampire maker.”
I gripped Julian’s arm, my breath catching.
Simone smiled at my shock.
“When she finally figured it out, she tried her best to hide—to protect the secret she’d let slip. That she’d already cured someone. That she’d discovered a special protein.”
I tried not to react.
Did they know which protein?
Did they know who carried it?
“Is that why you need her research? Because you don’t know which protein it is—do you?”
Simone curled her lip—and that told me everything.
They had no idea.
Relief washed over me.
“What use is a vampire maker, as you called it?” Julian asked, his voice cool and cutting.
A good question.
“You can easily make a vampire yourself,” he added dryly.
Simone shrugged, a haughty air settling over her like a cloak.
She wasn’t going to say anything else about it. But it didn’t matter, because as if on some sick cue, the elevator doors slid open and out walked what looked like a fantasy—except he was definitely a horror show.
He moved with this unnerving, predatory stillness, like he didn’t need to breathe. Like he was listening to the heartbeat of every person on the floor.
It didn’t matter that he looked like a Theo James wannabe with chiseled everything, tight jeans, and a T-shirt stretched over tattooed arms. The kind of man who would make women at a coffee shop drop their lattes.