Chapter 25 #3
I glanced down at where her talons had sliced into my skin, relieved to see the wounds weren’t deep.
Fortunately for me, her rage-fueled attack was sloppy, and she’d merely grazed me, only one of the cuts more serious than a cat scratch.
I heaved a ragged sigh, my relief cut short when a hand came down onto my shoulder.
I spun around, dagger raised and brought it down toward my attacker, but he intercepted my wrist, stopping me from driving the blade into his heart.
A single sob shook me when I recognized the beloved face before me even through the blood and gore that covered it. “Whit.”
I threw my arms around his neck, holding him for a moment, his weight heavy when he sagged against me, his strength waning.
When I released him, he took my face in his hands and kissed me, the salt on my lips—whether from his tears or mine, I couldn’t be sure—stinging where my lip had split at some point.
“I love you,” I said, my words confirming what my heart already knew.
He kissed me again, long and hard, then took my hand and pulled me with him toward the basement stairs. The fire had spread to the tapestries and was now catching the wooden beams above us. But as we attempted to ascend the stairs, his knees buckled and he stumbled, landing hard on the steps.
“Come on,” I urged, squinting against the smoke that burned my eyes, assaulted my lungs.
I grabbed his arm and pulled it over my shoulders.
Still gripping the dagger, I wrapped my other arm around his waist, trying to avoid the worst of his wounds and keep from adding to them. “Don’t you dare give up on me now.”
We’d just reached the top of the stairs when a hulking figure appeared in the doorway, blocking our escape.
Billy Wayne.
With a low growl, Whit sprang up the last few steps, taking down Billy Wayne before the man could react. “Go!” Whit shouted. “Run!”
This time, the word was like the crack of a starter’s gun. I shot forward but only made it up a single step before a hand grabbed my ankle and yanked my foot out from under me. I fell against the steps, lightning hot pain radiating from my shoulder.
I tried to pull my foot free, but the grasp only tightened and dragged me down two steps before I could roll over and kick with my other leg, nailing Chase in the face. He snarled and lunged upward at me at the same moment I brought my dagger down, driving it through his skull.
Not bothering to retrieve the weapon, I raced up the rest of the stairs. Billy Wayne lay motionless on the ground, his head twisted at an awkward angle. Whit pushed himself up from his hands and knees, his head hanging between his shoulders as he tried to stand on shaky legs.
I rushed to him and grabbed him around the waist, pulling his arm over my shoulders again, hurrying him toward the door of what I now realized was the carriage house. When we were safely outside and in the night air of the courtyard, a different kind of terror enveloped me.
“Merilee has Henry,” I told Whit, frantic. “She was taking him to Netty.”
“Zellie,” Whit said, his voice thin with pain.
“I don’t know why,” I continued without missing a beat. “We have to get to him before she does anything to him—”
“Zellie.”
This time, his voice was harsh, bringing me up short. “You have to keep going,” I told him. “I can’t do this without you.”
His lips curved up in one corner in a weak smile. “I think you can do just about anything after what I saw in there.”
I shook my head. “No, I need you, Whit. I don’t know what to do, how to stop her.”
I started forward, but he resisted. “I’ve lost too much blood, Zellie. I have to replace it to heal.”
I searched his face in confusion. Then understanding sunk in. “You need my blood.”
He nodded, his legs buckling and making us both stumble. I landed hard on my knees and nearly fell onto him but somehow kept from toppling over.
“Okay,” I said with a determined nod, desperate to save him. “Okay, what do I do?”
His eyes flicked toward my forearm. Without hesitating, I held it out to him. He took hold of my hand gently and held my gaze as if asking my permission, making sure I was okay with what was about to happen.
I swallowed hard, my pulse kicking up with fear, but nodded.
In the next moment, his fangs sank into my skin, and his lips latched on around the wound, gently suckling. I gasped, the sensation surprisingly erotic and one I would’ve been happy to sink into if our son wasn’t being held hostage by a murderous bitch.
He released me abruptly just a few seconds later. His head fell back, his eyes closed as he let my blood do its work.
“Now me,” I whispered.
His eyes snapped open, the bright amber glow taking me off-guard. “I can’t reverse what will happen,” he told me. “They’ve been prepping you for months. And now that I’ve taken your blood, as soon as you take mine, it’s forever.”
Instead of answering, I bent forward, intending to take blood from one of his open wounds, but he stopped me and shook his head. “It isn’t clean.” Then he punctured his wrist and held it out to me.
The moment he offered his arm, I knew an urgent hunger, a deep, soul shaking need I’d never experienced.
I grasped his arm and drank in greedy gulps.
When he groaned as if in pain, I abruptly broke away on a gasp.
Heat flooded my body, the gift he’d given me buzzing like electricity in my veins.
But there was more than that. All of the memories Whit had taken to protect Henry and me came back all at once like a movie reel playing at warp speed.
And I knew. Everything he’d said about our past together was true. And the rush of emotion that hit me nearly knocked me on my ass.
“My God,” I breathed.
“You’ll need more to fully become,” he panted, perhaps not realizing what had just occurred with my memories, “but I’m too weak to give you any more right now. That will be enough to make you stronger. Just find Henry.”
I nodded then kissed him briefly. I’d tell him about my memories returning later, after we got Henry back. I pressed my forehead to his and closed my eyes, letting my mind drift, instinctively reaching out for our son. And then I saw him in my mind, a bright light guiding my way.
Suddenly sensing we were no longer alone, my eyes snapped open, drawn to the doorway of Dawes House.
There, staring back at me, was Alice, her expression at last at peace, her eyes no longer vacant, black holes, but wide blue eyes filled with purpose.
She turned around and walked back into the house.
“I know where Henry is,” I told Whit. “I have to follow her.”
He nodded. “Go. I’ll be right behind you.”
I scrambled to my feet and ran after Alice, the pounding of my heart a deafening war drum.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends…
When I entered the foyer, I took in the area with a rapid glance, searching for where Alice had gone. And then I saw her slowly ascending the stairs, her fingertips brushing along the banister, leaving a trail of fire in their wake.
“Oh, shit.”
My stomach sank as I realized what was happening. She was planning to burn down the house like one of her predecessors had done with the first house that had stood on these grounds.
I ran up the stairs behind her, passed her, not stopping until I’d made it to Merilee’s and Netty’s apartment. I was just reaching for the knob, when the door flung open with such force, it tore from the hinges. There was Merilee on the couch, Henry in her lap, now wide awake and crying quietly.
“Henry!” I called, my voice hoarse with emotion.
When he saw me, he tried to leap from Merilee’s lap and run to me, but she easily kept him where he was.
“Mama!” he sobbed, reaching for me with both arms.
I shook with rage and frustration, my thoughts racing as I tried to figure out what to do, how I could kill that fucking bitch without harming Henry.
Then Merilee’s mouth curved into a knowing grin. “Why, Zellie-girl,” she drawled, “you’ve changed.”
“Let him go,” I ground out, my hands balling into fists at my side.
“Or what?” she laughed. “Do you really think you can best me? I’ve lived for over a hundred years, Zellie-girl. You’ve been one of us for, what? Five minutes?”
As I glared at her, trying to figure out which option I was going to choose from the violent ideas I had for tearing her apart, a swirl of white mist began to form behind Merilee, and then another and another until there were too many to count.
Within the mist, faces took form. I recognized Susanna and Eliza Dawes, the lady in the wall, and the woman who I’d seen murdered in my dream.
But there were many others—nameless, forgotten.
Suddenly, their faces twisted into terrifying death masks, rotten, putrid, screaming with vengeance. I gasped, and stumbled back a few steps, my eyes going wide.
Merilee’s brows twitched together in a confused frown when she saw my reaction. “What the—”
Whatever she’d planned to say was abruptly cut short by a ragged scream as the spirits of the victims of the horrors at Dawes House attacked, tearing into her with ghostly fingers.
She released Henry to claw at her skin, ripping off her own flesh in her frenzied attempt to pull her assailants off her.
Henry vaulted from her lap and ran to me. I scooped him up and pivoted to run from the apartment, but caught sight of Ms. Netty, sitting in her wheelchair in the doorway of her bedroom.
Her shoulders sagged, her eyes taking in the scene with detached resignation. She turned her head to me and held my gaze briefly. “Run, girl,” she told me, her voice flat, emotionless. “Go now before it’s too late.”
I’d come back for her, I decided. As soon as I got Henry to safety, I’d come back.
I raced down the servants’ stairs, reaching the foyer as the floors above began to creak and collapse, the flames spreading with unnatural speed.
I ran with Henry to June and Earl’s apartment.
Finding the door standing open, the doorframe splintered from someone breaking in, I rushed inside, yelling for Addie, but not finding her in her bedroom.
“Addie, honey!” I screamed. “Where are you?”
“Outside, Mama!” Henry told me, bouncing a little in my arms, urging me back toward the doorway.
Not stopping to question his assertion, I hurried out of the house and down the steps. Addie stood at the gate to the yard, holding a little stuffed doll in her arms and sobbing. My heart fluttered with relief at seeing her safe. I rushed to her and dropped to my knees, gathering her close.
“It’s okay, baby,” I assured her. “I’ve got you. It’s okay.”
In the distance, sirens rapidly approached. I looked around, searching for Whit.
“Addie, where’s Whit? Did you see him?”
She nodded, hiccupping as her sobs slowed. “He brought me here. Then he went to look for you and Henry.”
My head snapped back toward the house, now completely engulfed. “No,” I breathed, fear squeezing my heart. “Oh, God, no.”
Then motion at the door on the fourth floor caught my attention. Ms. Netty stood in the open doorway, flames already catching her clothes and hair. Before I could do more than cry out, she spread her arms and fell forward—just as Alice had done so many decades before.
I turned the kids into me, shielding them from the end of Netty’s suffering.
“Ma’am!” someone called, pulling gently at my arm, helping me to my feet. “Ma’am, you need to come with me.”
As the firefighter dragged me away, I stared at the conflagration consuming Dawes House, the carriage house.
They were already collapsing in upon themselves as the structures weakened and gave way.
I craned my neck around the fire equipment, straining to see what was happening, hoping that at any moment, Whit would emerge unscathed, that he would pull us into his arms and tell us it was over, that everything would be fine now.
Even as Henry and Addie and I were loaded into the ambulances and treated for shock and smoke inhalation, I searched for him, insisting that they keep the ambulance door open for just a few more minutes.
But he never came.
“We need to take you to the hospital now, ma’am,” one of the paramedics said gently.
As we drove away, I stared out the back window, tears streaming silently down my cheeks, watching the flames dance like a million little rejoicing devils, and mourned the dreams that died along with the family I’d always wanted, thought I finally had.
As we turned the corner, I closed my eyes and focused on the tug at the center of my chest, praying it was real and not a manifestation of hope that refused to die.