Chapter 48
You Belong
Atap on the door dragged me from the drowsiness of sleep.
I laid still, too tired to open my eyes.
Too tired to answer. If I stayed quiet, whoever it was might go away.
My head throbbed with a dehydration ache, my mouth felt dry and my stomach felt seedy.
I had a mild hangover. I didn’t want to face anyone right now, I just wanted to go back to sleep.
“Amy,” Ethan said from behind the closed door. “Amy, can I come in?” There was a pause, then he said, “I know you’re awake, I can hear you breathing.”
I made a mental note to do something about his eardrums. Rip them out maybe.
I groaned, forced my eyes open and rubbed them with the back of my hand, blinking slowly, fighting to keep them open.
Moonlight speared through the window and the night lamp, shaped like half a moon—the most non-childish one I could find in the store—shone dully from the wall.
Gradually the night shadows peeled into focus.
A light rain pitter-pattered on the window.
“Of course I’m awake, you knocked on my door and woke me.” I yawned, rolled my head to the side, and glanced at the clock. It was 4 a.m.
Ethan opened the door. His silhouette, backlit by the hallway light, cast his face into darkness. Broad shoulders, fine hips, lingered silently like a shadow puppet. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“Couldn’t you have waited till morning?” I blinked several times into the light behind him.
He moved in and stood by the bed. “I heard you crying earlier, I . . .”
I was mortified, I was sure I cried in silence. Just how good was their hearing “What—you heard? Did everyone hear?”
He sat on the edge of the bed and looked at me with sympathy, he didn’t need to tell me they had. Dismayed, I rubbed my hands over my face.
“Karson sent Monique to stay at the bar, Michael’s staying here. I waited until he went to sleep to come and see you.” As if that made things better. I scanned his face. A few drops of rain sprinkled his hair, and his face was flushed from the wind.
I pulled myself into a seated position, a flare of frustration whipped though my veins. “Is there nothing I can do in private when I live with you?”
He looked at me blankly, and I knew the answer was no. “Once we know you’re safe, Amy, you can move out . . . if you prefer. Whatever you want to do . . . I’m sorry if I scared you.”
“You didn’t.” I reached across and grabbed a water bottle off the bedside table and sculled a few mouthfuls down. He was watching me, waiting for me to go on, so I said, “I was scared for you, not of you.”
His brow drew into deep lines. He looked as though he might want to say something, but whatever it was he held it back. I felt a stab of hurt. Didn’t he trust me enough to tell me?
“Maybe I should just leave town,” I said.
As I made the revelation, I was surprised by the sudden burst of emotion that gripped me.
My eyes stung and my stomach clenched like a vice.
“I don’t fit in here. You’re a vampire, Ethan, your friends are vampires, and I’m not.
I don’t belong.” I looked down at the comforter, running my fingers over the fabric.
“Please don’t say that, you belong.” His tone was raw and husky. “I don’t want you to be a vampire, I don’t want you to be anything like one.”
The anguish in his voice made me lift my head. I hadn’t considered the thought of me leaving would hurt him. Wishing people cared was futile, wishing I fitted in, was not something I allowed myself, it was a catalyst for pain. History had taught me that, if little else.
“Oh, come on, Ethan, you hide things from me all the time. Treat me like a child. I heard you all whispering while I was in the kitchen. Like I’m lesser, or not trustworthy, or—” a sudden lump jarred the words in my throat.
He sighed and looked up to the ceiling for a moment, like he was seeking divine guidance.
“I don’t mean to make you feel that way, we don’t tell you things because we don’t want to hurt you.
There’s things we do, things we are . . .
” He paused and dropped his head. “That you don’t need or want to know about. ”
Lies. I’d seen some horrific things. I doubted whatever they had to say could be any worse than the visuals that replayed in my head.
A tear escaped my eye. He reached out and brushed a thumb across my cheek.
“These things that fall from your eyes are part of what makes you special. It’s your completely annoying human emotions that make you who you are, and from where I stand that’s pretty perfect. ”
Another lie. I was far from perfect and I annoyed him, sometimes.
A lot. When I did things like leave my bag on the hallway table, or a trail of cereal on the bench, or an unwashed coffee mug in the sink, or when I put a load of washing in, then forgot about it.
And he hated shoes left at the front door.
To Ethan, shoes at the front door was a jailable offence.
He would comment, briskly. I would apologize and do it again.
I could leave, but go where, to who? I tried to imagine life without him, without Karson. I couldn’t imagine it now. I was repulsed by the violence and yet at the same time, and perhaps equally, entranced by all they were.
“Do you have any idea how it feels to have people you care about shut you out?”
“You’d be surprised,” he answered, a flicker of pain in his eyes and then it was gone as his eyes settled over mine. There was a long pause. Finally, he spoke, “Do you trust me?”
Trust, of all the questions. Could you ever really trust anyone?
Once, I would have said I trusted my father.
I trusted Tom, look where that got me. Ethan peeled back and watched me.
But I wasn’t dating Ethan, and I did trust him.
At least as much as I could ever really trust anyone.
He had put himself in danger for me, taken me in when I had nowhere to go.
Protected me. I didn’t know everything about him, but trust him, for now, I could do.
“Yes.” And as I said it, it felt right.
“Then trust me enough to know we are protecting you and I will tell you if you ever need to know. Okay?”
“Okay,” I agreed reluctantly. I hated secrets, they felt like lies, but I agreed.
He looked relieved.
“Did you hear back from Matt?” I asked.
“Yes, it was a hire car and a dead end. It was the Penfolds, a couple considering running the day spa. They left because Mrs Penfold is pregnant and was feeling unwell, it all checks out.”
“Back to square one then.” I couldn’t keep the sound of defeat out of my voice.
He reached across and smoothed my hair down at the side. “No such thing as square one with a vampire, Amy, we can leap over the whole board in a single bound.” He paused, then conceded, “we just need to know which direction to leap.”
I was well and truly awake now and felt restless.
My mind whirled with all that had happened in the last few weeks.
So many innocent lives ended. I got up, tucked my arms around my waist and moved over to the window, peering past the drizzle to the sky, brushed with cloud and glinting stars.
It was beautiful. He followed me over and stood beside me.
When I turned back to look at him, I couldn’t read the expression on his face.
“Thank you for sticking up for me.” I took his hands in mine, a zing shot up them, travelled up my arms, buzzing my heart. Warming everything. It was unnerving, the power he held. I released him quickly and fought the urge to shake it off.
Ethan stared at my hands. His brow flicked. “Karson has an anger that he can’t always control if he’s pushed,” he growled, “you need to be careful, if he moved in true anger, I wouldn’t be able to stop him.”
“He doesn’t scare me, Ethan.” Which was true, and false.
He grabbed my forearms. “He should scare you, Amy!” The flare of emotion was startling.
He released me and stepped back with an unsettled look.
When he spoke again his voice was gentle, “He cares for you, or I wouldn’t be standing here talking to you now.
He wanted to come up to you when he heard you cry, I said no, but you must understand I have seen what he is capable of. I hope you never do.”
I shivered.“I know, I saw him rip the head off a vampire already.”
He breathed heavily out his nose, shaking his head.
His eyes moved out the window, glazed over by some distant haunted memory.
“That’s nothing compared to what he can do.
” I didn’t ask what he’d seen, his grim voice and the look on his face was enough to tell me it wasn’t good.
“You should get some rest.” He gave me a half smile.
I gazed back to the stars, searching for an answer, the right move somewhere amongst the vast expanse of the black glittered horizon.
I’d always felt as if the night sky was sent as a silent summation of everything that’s possible, a visual illustration of the endless insurmountable possibilities awaiting discovery.
Or sometimes, in the worst of times, a reminder that the light only shines in the darkness.
How many times as I’d grown up had I stared up at the stars seeking their solace?
Hundreds, probably. Now, I stared up at it waiting for its whispers to speak to me.
When it came, I said, “Will you train me?”
“Train you?” He seemed bemused.
“To fight. Will you train me?” I’d trained a lot and was a reasonable fighter. And my dad had taught me defensive moves if someone attacked, but I needed the distraction, needed to improve my skills if I was going to stay in this world.
“Amy, you will never beat a vampire, especially not Karson, even if I do train you.”
“It’s not about beating him, Ethan, although I would like to slap his face really, really hard.”
“There’s a long queue of people who think the same.”
“I just feel so helpless. I need to somehow take some power back, even if it’s only mental. Even if all I can do is defend myself against humans, that’s something, isn’t it?”
He studied me for a few beats, considering, then shrugged and said, “Okay.”
I peered up, a smile gracing my lips. “Can we start in the morning?”
“Sure, you better get back to bed. I might even teach you how to kill a vampire if you promise not to sneak into my bedroom at night and stab me in my sleep.”
“You wish I’d sneak into your room.”
He smiled widely as he headed to the door. “I most certainly do.”
I shook my head and laughed. I remembered Michael, I probably woke him, too late now.
I went to the toilet. Aware Ethan could hear me pee.
Oh well, I guessed he was used to it. I climbed into bed and snuggled under the covers, Ethan’s words ran through my head.
Karson cared for me, and yet he’d thrown me against the wall.
No, he’d moved me against it. I didn’t touch the wall, there was no thump, no pain—a whisper fast movement, not even a tight squeeze against my arms. He didn’t intend to hurt me; of that I was certain.
It was a warning, not to push him, intended to scare me.
But the anger in his eyes, that was genuine.
Was his anger born out of my defiance? Was he attempting to stamp his authority over me.
Or was it fear that if I pushed him too hard, he might lose control and hurt me?
Maybe it was both. Whatever his rationale, for reasons I couldn’t entirely fathom, it had devastated me.
He was an intriguing man. Vampire. Man—which was he more of, I couldn’t decide.
I knew he was dangerous. My mind could process it with all the logical thought it wanted, but my blinded heart yearned for him.
Yearned to have him hold me, yearned to see the smile that could light up a thousand candles.
The revelation came slowly at first, it seeped in softly, whispering with its hot breath into my heart and my mind, but then it came like a roar of thunder.
I was in love with him.
In love with a vampire. It was ludicrous, and yet here it was.
I loved him. I couldn’t decide when it’d happened exactly.
Maybe I had been since the moment he linked his arm through mine and we walked down the dark alleyway; maybe even before that.
The first moment our eyes had connected; something had sparked inside me that day, and remained lit, glowing deeper and deeper, at every look, every smile, every word, every touch.
I laid there for a long while letting the revelation settle over me, and eventually I closed my eyes and let sleep cradle my staggered thoughts.
* * *
I dreamed. Shadow Man stood before me, but I was no longer afraid. He turned. I followed. He walked into the deep of the night through the dense black forest. The winds caught against branches and whined warnings.
‘Run, Amy, you stupid girl, run.’
I walked on.
He disappeared beneath the canopy of trees. I followed. I found him paused by the lakes edge, beams of moonlight shimmered on the silvered waters like a graveyard of ghosts. He walked into the cooled, murky depths. I paused at the lake’s edge, and he whispered, “Come, come sit with me.”
I followed.
The cold water pressed in around me. I walked on. Something slithered against my legs, I looked down, I couldn’t see anything, but it had to be a fish or a reed. I walked on. Deeper and deeper we went.
Shadow Man disappeared into the deep, dark depths below.
I followed.
Something touched my legs. Something hooked around my leg.
It dragged me under. Claws sunk and tore at my skin, holding me down and I couldn’t breathe.
I tried to scream but it was lost in coffin of water.
Small bubbles floated up and away to safety.
I clawed at the water, kicked furiously toward the surface.
I couldn’t breathe. It wouldn’t let go.
I fought and struggled, but the harder I fought, the tighter it held.
I was drowning.
Then Shadow Man appeared, and reaching out his hand he said, “Stay with me.”
My trembling fingers reached for him, his cold fingers interlocked around mine, and he smiled, and then he pulled me down deeper, and deeper.
I spiralled through the darkness, my blood colder than the lake, knowing I would never escape.