Chapter 7
Ego
“Ego, are you listening to me?” Lysandro asked sharply.
No, actually, I wasn’t because I’d heard it all before. Lysandro had been coming every evening for the last two weeks, giving me his blood and lecturing me on the same things over and over.
You need to get off the couch, Ego. You have to test your new abilities, Ego. You should call your cousin so he can support you, Ego. You need to drink from my wrist, Ego. It was the same song and dance every damn night.
“Ego,” he rasped, a darker hint of his vampire nature coming through.
There was a time that would’ve scared me, but not anymore. First of all, no matter how frustrated Lysandro got with me, he was too nice a guy to hurt me. Truth be told, it was hard to picture him hurting a fly. He was the polar opposite of the dickhead who turned me.
Secondly, and by far most importantly, he’d be doing me a favor if his agitation with me led him to take me out. This nightmare would be over once and for all. Sky would mourn me, maybe even some of his found family, but that would be better than him having to deal with what I’d become.
And last but not least, I really just didn’t care. Eventually, he’d get sick of feeding me or he’d deem me ready to drink from a human—as if—and he’d quit coming around, and I’d go into that comatose state he kept warning me about.
Whatever. It didn’t matter. I didn’t know if I’d been born under a bad sign or what, but my life had always been less than picture-perfect.
More like a horror film, to be honest, so it made sense that right when everything actually seemed to be going my way, it would all be ruined by an attack that shouldn’t have even been real.
“Dro, listen—”
“Please quit calling me Dro,” he said, cutting me off. “I’ve told you before, it sounds weird.”
“Lys?” I asked, finding mild amusement at the affronted wrinkle of his nose.
Not dignifying my attempt at a nickname with an answer, he sat down primly in the chair across from me. “Ego, I’m being serious. I’m worried about you.”
Squeezing my eyes shut to block out the genuine concern on his face, I shook my head. “Maybe you shouldn’t waste your time on me. I know this isn’t—”
Loud pounding at my front door, followed by the Westminster chimes going off repeatedly as someone jabbed at my doorbell, cut me off. Wide-eyed, I stared at Lysandro.
“Did you tell anyone I was here?”
Affronted, he sat up straighter, which hadn’t actually seemed possible. “Of course not. You asked for your privacy, and I’ve respected that, even though I think you’re wrong.”
“Is your car parked out front? Is that why whoever it is thinks someone’s in here?” I asked, panicking as the person continued their pounding.
Lysandro rolled his eyes. “This is why you need to pay attention to me. Why would I drive here when it’s quicker to run?”
My brain stuttered. Quicker to run? Was he serious?”
He shook his head, clearly irritated. “You need to learn about your nature. You can’t keep yourself…” He trailed off as the banging on the door increased in volume. “Oh my. Someone certainly wants to get in here.”
“But why?” I asked, feeling panicked. My place was set so far off the main road that most people didn’t even know it was here. Lysandro said he hadn’t told anyone I was here, and I most certainly didn’t, so who was out there? And why were they being so aggressive?
“Could it be…you know?” I asked softly, a little scared and glad that I wasn’t here alone.
“Your Master?” Lysandro asked. He went still as a statue, tilting his head in that curious way that he had. After a moment, he shook his head. “No, there’s a heartbeat. Although, there’s something familiar…”
Like he’d forgotten I was even here, or that this was my house, he got up and wandered slowly out of the room.
“Lysandro,” I hissed repeatedly, but he didn’t look back.
Unsure what to do, and now more worried that it was my cousin, Sky, out there, I crept across the room and out into the hall to hide behind the pillar, much like I did on Lysandro’s first visit.
“Don’t open that door,” I hissed at him.
Putting his hand on the wood, he shot me a glance out of the corner of his eye, before his lips curled slowly up into a smile. Before I could threaten him with…I didn’t even know what, he yanked open the door.
“Lysandro?” a questioning voice asked from outside, sounding confused.
And it wasn’t just any voice. It was the sound of the man I’d fantasized about before all of this happened.
The guy who I’d desperately tried to pretend that it didn’t matter to me that he didn’t like me.
The one person outside of Sky that I was most terrified of finding out what had happened to me. He’d probably think I had it coming.
“Scotty, my boy. It’s such a pleasure to see you!” the old vampire exclaimed happily.
“Uh. What are you doing here? Where’s Ego?”
Where’s Ego? Why on Earth would he expect me to be here? Surely the others had told him I was gone. Or maybe he didn’t know because he’d never bothered to ask. He hated me, after all. But then, why was he here? Anxiety coursed through me, and I wanted to run and hide under my bed.
“Oh, he’s hiding behind the pillar,” Lysandro said.
Holy shit. Damn. Damn. Damn. Why’d he tell him that? He should’ve said I wasn’t here. Not that it would explain why he was here, but that was a him problem. No, he shouldn’t have answered the door in the first place.
“It figures he’d be hiding.” The disdain in Scotty’s voice was clear, and he didn’t even know I’d managed to become part of the undead yet.
“Would you like to come in?” Lysandro asked politely.
Outraged, I stepped out and glared at my supposed mentor. “Traitor.”
He looked back at me blankly. “I don’t know what you mean. Scotty’s my friend. You don’t expect me to be rude when he’s come all this way.”
“It’s not that far. And how are you even friends?” I asked, hurt. It appeared that Scotty was willing to be friends with everyone but me.
Dwelling on that fact wasn’t even an option. The younger man in question stormed over to me with fire blazing in his eyes. “Where the fuck have you been?” he asked, poking me in the chest.
I gazed down at his finger, noticing how small and cute his hands were—a feature that had always appealed to me—and then back up at his face, which was twisted in fury.
His diamond nose piercing twinkled under the light in the hall like it was winking at me, and I noticed that he’d changed the color of the dyed stripe in his shaggy brown hair to purple. Man, he looked good.
His luminous brown eyes flashed with irritation as I just stood there, taking him in. “Ego!” he barked.
Coming out of my Scotty-induced stupor, I took a step back. “You can’t be here.”
“Why the hell not?” His eyes narrowed as Lysandro stepped up beside me, and I didn’t know how it was possible, but he suddenly appeared even more pissed off. “This is why you haven’t told anyone you’re home?”
Confused, I glanced at Lysandro, who merely shrugged back. “What? What are you talking about?”
He waved a finger back and forth between me and the old vampire. “Are you two, like…hooking up or something?”
Lysandro barked out a laugh. “Certainly not,” he said, sounding like it was the most propitious thing he’d ever heard.
Listen, I wasn’t even slightly attracted to the old guy, but damn. Offensive much? “Why’d you say it like that?”
Lysandro opened his mouth to answer, but Scotty beat him to the punch. “Why do you care?”
Uh, well, wasn’t that interesting. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you sound jealous.”
He scowled. “You wish, diva. Contrary to what you may think, not everyone’s under the illusion that you’re the hottest thing walking.”
Mhm. Did he protest too much? Maybe he didn’t hate me as much as he pretended to. That line between love and hate was awfully narrow, after all.
Lysandro smiled. “But from my research on the worldwide web, you do seem to have quite a few who’d let you eat them alive.” He quirked a brow. “It should serve you well going forward.”
And just like that, my hope that Scotty might actually be interested in me popped like a balloon struck by lightning.
The image of eating anyone alive—which I hoped he just meant sucking some poor human fan’s blood—nauseated me to the point where the blood Lysandro had given me to drink tonight rose up in my throat, and I had to gag it back down.
Scotty planted his hands on his hips and turned his ire toward Lysandro.
“What does that mean? What should serve him well?” He shook his head in frustration.
“I don’t even care.” He stormed past me into my great room.
“You’re going to tell me why you’re avoiding everyone, Ego, and I’m not leaving here until you do. ”
I turned to Lysandro, completely dumbfounded by Scotty’s impertinence, but the old vampire merely smirked at me. How did I end up alone with the two most confounding men I knew? Well, I guessed Lysandro wasn’t a man, but was he half-man or no…wait. Ugh. I hated all of this so much.
Exasperated, I followed Scotty into the other room to find him sitting in my spot. “Can you move…please?” I asked as nicely as possible.
His gaze trailed around the room to the other sofa, the two wingback chairs, and even the other end of the couch he was on. “Uh, why?”
“That’s my spot,” I admitted stiffly, feeling a little dumb. I knew it shouldn’t matter, but it did. Everything in my life blew up in one night. I’d been transformed, and not for the better, and who knew how long it would take me to create a new normal for myself.
However, that spot right there had become a place of safety. It had my pillow, and a silk throw blanket hung across the back for when I needed to feel the softness against my skin. And I was very much feeling like I might need that comfort right now.
Scotty stared at me for what felt like forever, but was probably only a minute, before he huffed and got up, moving to the wingback chair next to the one Lysandro had sunk into.