Chapter 9
River
The wind picked up along the edge of the park, riffling through the fallen leaves and sending them dancing across the footpath. I stood near a rickety bench, watching joggers flit by and dog walkers stumble after their leashed furry friends, waiting around for Laurie to show up.
She’d chosen this location strategically, and I couldn’t exactly blame her for wanting that extra sense of safety. If I were in her shoes, I’d probably do the same.
A woman walked by with a toddler babbling happily in a stroller and I waved at the kid when he looked my way. A burst of laughter bubbled from his lips and his mother reached down to pat his head. A small moment of infinite tenderness that had a smile tugging at my lips.
Eventually, I spotted my new associate: shoulders hunched under that worn jacket, hands shoved deep in her pockets, trudging up the path toward me. She walked quickly like she wanted to outrun any second thoughts, her gaze roving the area to check for threats.
I wondered if there was ever a moment when Laurie wasn’t tense. So far, our every interaction saw her taut like a rolled up newspaper.
“Hey,” I called softly, raising a hand in greeting and hoping like hell that she wouldn’t get cold feet before we’d even planted our asses on the park bench.
Laurie looked up at my greeting and approached with caution in every step.
Up close, her tension vibrated through the air; I felt it as a tight coil of fear, suspicion, and lingering pain.
Without meaning to, I let my power brush against her aura—subtly, gently, like approaching a skittish animal.
I could feel her terror, and it was poignant, pulsing under her skin.
This was a power I didn’t use often, something I hadn’t quite refined.
Hunter’s abilities were all about enforcing her will, compelling people to do what needed doing by forging an unspoken command. My powers were similar in that they were based on influencing other people, but they worked a little differently.
Where Hunter took control and wrestled minds into submission, I could ease someone’s anxiety or nudge them off the ledge of panic.
I could coax someone to rage, or bring them to tears.
It was a matter of sensing their emotions and guiding the tide from there.
All of it was more of a whispered suggestion than an actual order, but no less effective.
I’d done it the other night, without intending to, when Laurie came apart in my arms.
Now that I’d started, I decided to stick with it and carefully channeled that part of myself, letting a wave of calm ripple outward from me. Nothing dramatic—just a soft hush, like a hand resting lightly on Laurie’s shoulder, focusing on that tense aura that weighed her down.
“Laurie,” I said gently, waiting a few feet away so I didn’t crowd her.
She jerked a nod, eyes flicking over my shoulder to confirm I hadn’t brought backup. “Hey.” Her brow creased like she sensed I was up to something, like she could feel my influence. But then she exhaled, a shaky breath that seemed ever so slightly less barbed than before.
I relaxed a fraction, pulling back soft tendrils of power, relieved that I hadn’t spooked her. She wasn’t running from me. She also wasn’t glaring at me.
Things were going rather well.
“So…” I began, stuffing my hands in my pockets and executing a half-assed attempt to break the ice. “I’ve been meaning to ask… Is Laurie short for something, or…?”
She blinked, clearly surprised by the question. Then she scoffed and glanced aside, muttering an answer under her breath. “Lorelai.”
“Lorelai,” I repeated, trying it out on my tongue. “That’s cute. Do people ever call you Rory?”
The reaction was instantaneous: a snap of her gaze, and gritted teeth. Fierce as a cornered animal.
“I hate Rory, and I hate Lorelai too. It’s Laurie or nothing at all.” She spat the words out. For a second, I glimpsed a flash of raw fight in her eyes. Fascinating. She might have been terrified, but she wasn’t helpless. She had her convictions and she felt strongly about them.
I raised my hands, intrigued by her fire and what could provoke it. “Understood. Laurie it is.”
Silence settled for a moment. Then Laurie-not-Lorelai-and-definitely-not-Rory pivoted, nodding at the nearby bench. “Anyway. Shall we…?”
“Sure.” We approached it side by side, not speaking until we sat—me on one end, her on the other, leaving a healthy length of space between us. A jogger passed by on the path, headphones on and blaring music loud enough to reach our ears. Somewhere behind us, a dog barked.
Unsure of where to begin, I lifted my face to the sky and forced a light tone. “Thanks for meeting me.” I watched her from the corner of my eye, taking every little detail of her expression to heart.
Laurie shrugged, gaze flicking over to me for half a second before she looked away. “It’s better than you tracking me down yourself.” There was a wry edge to her voice that suggested she only kinda trusted that I wouldn’t.
I cleared my throat, searching for a neutral topic to break the tension. “I hope I didn’t, uh, pull you away from work to meet me.” It was a fumbling attempt at small talk, but at least it was something.
Laurie laughed—but not in any way that suggested real amusement. It was a dark, hollow sound, more bitter than anything else. “Work?” she echoed, shaking her head. “Kinda between jobs right now.”
That sparked my curiosity. “Oh. Well, do you… I mean, what do you usually do?”
“I get by,” she said bluntly, picking at her nails. “That’s what I do.”
Her gaze flicked to me, measuring my reaction. I kept my expression neutral, though a hint of sympathy tugged at my chest. It must be hard enough to navigate life with so much baggage; holding down a steady job probably felt impossible.
I stayed quiet, and after a tense moment Laurie sighed, realizing she’d have to elaborate or let the silence stretch indefinitely.
“Look, I’m not qualified for much. Never went to college or anything like that.
So the best I can get is retail work, or maybe some diner gig.
And dealing with customers all day?” She snorted, rubbing at the goosebumps prickling along her arms. “That’s a tall order when you’re, I don’t know… Jumpy. Paranoid. Probably insane.”
“Must be tough,” I murmured softly, looking straight ahead rather than forcing any eye contact. She seemed more open to talking when I wasn’t looking directly at her.
“Tough doesn’t cover it.” Laurie sighed. “I take too many breaks or I freak out for no reason. Eventually, they let me go. Or I leave. Either way, it doesn’t last long.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing at all.
Laurie grimaced, raking her fingers through her hair. “Anyway,” she muttered, “it’s not like you dragged me away from some pressing corporate meeting. I’ve got time.” Her tone was flat, but I sensed a flicker of resentment—maybe at the world, maybe at me. I could understand that.
“I’m sorry,” I said, low, though I knew an apology for her circumstances might only come across as pity.
She shrugged, eyes dropping to the grass at our feet. “It is what it is.”
A flock of pigeons fluttered past, pudgy bodies landing near the trash bin. Laurie watched them with a kind of longing I recognized well. That deep, desperate urge to fly away, to leave it all behind.
I decided to get to the topic at hand, before I asked too many personal questions. “So, you made a pretty dramatic exit the other night at the diner—”
“Yeah, well, you guys were acting suspicious.” Laurie’s arms crossed over her chest and she shot me a wry grimace. “You said you might be able to help me.” It wasn’t a question.
“I hope so,” I murmured, watching passersby in the park.
“You mentioned an organization that’s been tormenting humans.
I suspect they’re tied to some trouble we’ve been dealing with ourselves.
Rogue vampires are turning people without regard for consequences—attacks are escalating and it’s getting harder to cover it up and keep our world a secret. ”
Laurie lowered her head and choppy, dark hair fell over her eyes. “They’re not just turning people. They’re—” She trailed off, her lips twisting into a grimace. “Experimenting. Torturing. It’s not random.”
Experimenting. That word alone conjured horrors I could barely guess at. My nails dug into the wood of the bench but I kept my expression muted.
“I’m sorry,” I said it again and winced, “—that you had to see that.” When Laurie stiffened, even that small sympathy causing her shoulders to go rigid, I leaned a little closer. “You did see it, didn’t you? First hand?”
Her voice was taut and she kept her eyes forward, coiling her arms tighter around herself. “I don’t need your pity.”
“Not pity.” I shrugged. “Just… I want to understand.”
She snorted, one eye roll away from dismissing me entirely. “Sure you do.” But at least she didn’t get up to leave.
“Okay, how about this.” I shuffled closer to her, pausing right before she shot me a warning glare.
“You don’t trust me, I get it. So to clear the air, I’ll tell you everything I know about the recent attacks, everything we’ve found so far.
If you think my story holds, then you tell me what you know.
” I mustered the most serene smile I could find in me.
“Hopefully by the end, you’ll see that we’re on the same side. ”
Laurie watched me like a cat with its hackles raised, thinking it over. Eventually, her shoulders sagged and she shrugged. “Fine. Just… fine. I’m listening.”
So I filled her in. I got as close to the topic of my coven as possible without stating it outright.
I explained that we stuck to a code—we didn’t harm humans in the city, or anywhere for that matter.
I told her about the attacks and our investigations, and the messes we’d worked to cover up in order to keep our kind a secret.
Laurie listened with a blank stare, kicking her heel against the bench leg.
Finally, when I was finished, she sat back and blew out a breath. I wasn’t sure what to make of her expression, but the storm cloud surrounding her had receded slightly, so I took that to mean she at least believed that what I told her was the truth.
She stared at her shoes for a long, long while, and I could see her thinking it over—what to say, how much to say, how to put it. “Okay,” she murmured eventually. “Maybe we are after the same people.”
“And maybe we can work together…?” I ventured, cracking a smile that I hoped looked reassuring, careful to keep my fangs out of sight.
“Maybe we can.” Her gaze slid over to me, still suspicious, but slightly more at ease. She sat up straighter, rolled her shoulders, and braced her hands on her knees. “I’ll tell you what I can but… I just… It might take a while.”
I wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but I nodded. “All right.”
“I was… taken by the organization, when I was very young.” Laurie began, tone turning robotic like she was reciting verses. “They didn’t turn me but they… did other things. They were working toward something big. They wanted to build an army of powerful vampires—I don’t know why.”
Her words triggered warning bells in my head, alarms screaming loud and clear that this was what my visions had been warning me about. But I bit back my burning questions, letting her continue without interruption.
“I was trapped in one facility for most of my life, but I know now that there are more. I escaped two years ago…” I saw her nails dig into her knees, knuckles whitening. She sucked in a sharp breath, eyes going wide. “I—”
I recognized that look of pure panic a second too late.
Her breathing turned shallow, face growing pale, a sheen of sweat suddenly breaking across her brow.
“Laurie,” I murmured, voice hushed, trying not to spook her. My hand twitched, wanting to reach out—but I held back. She clearly had no interest in being touched unless necessary. “Hey, it’s all right. You’re safe.”
Her breath came in ragged pants. She squeezed her eyes shut, pressing her lips together like she was fighting back a scream. I could see the white hot panic tearing her apart from the inside. She was spiraling, sinking into some terrible memory like I’d witnessed her do once before.
“Laurie?” I tried again.
“Just—stop,” she croaked, hugging her elbows, hunching over her knees. She was trembling so hard the bench shook.
“It’s okay. Just… breathe,” I coaxed, my tone as gentle as I could make it. “You don’t have to talk about it now. We can stop anytime you want—It’s okay.”
Laurie jerked backward, rattling the bench, and her eyes flew open. She was a million miles away. That coiled tension hovering around her suddenly ballooned in size, swallowing her whole. I felt it enveloping me, too, a trembling pain of enormous magnitude.
Her breaths came in ragged hitches, each one a small battle. Her eyes were wide, her pupils dilated. She’s drowning. The desperation rippled off her in thick waves, and it hurt to feel it. But I refused to look away.
My own heart hammered in my ears.
Calm, I told myself. You gotta stay calm for her sake. I wasn’t going to reveal just how well I could sense her panic. That was a truth she wasn’t ready for. So instead, I kept my voice low, encouraging her to inhale, exhale, to slow her racing pulse.
I reached out with my mind, plunging invisible fingers into the swirling cloud that surrounded her.
I rooted around in that darkness, searching for her in the storm, gripping her tight.
She didn’t know what I was doing, thank the stars, or she probably would have recoiled further.
But physically, I kept still, leaning only a fraction closer, letting one palm rest on the bench between us.
I could taste her panic in the back of my throat, tangy and metallic. Laurie twitched, her mouth opening on a choked sound. A strangled whimper slid from her lips. My heart lurched, but I held steady, soothing that roiling storm without saying a word.
This was the true difference between my power and Hunter’s.
Hunter imposed her will. I offered mine. And if Laurie would only let me, I could guide her out of the dark.