Chapter 17
TOBIAS
Tobias glowered down at his phone, pacing Alexander’s living room. He had read the message three times and still he couldn’t make sense of it. Every minute the feeling of being trapped increased.
Kate sat watching Tobias from Alexander’s sofa. She’d arrived an hour ago, shortly after he’d arrived from the soup kitchen. He’d called so that he could seem like Alexander had successfully compelled him if Alexander called to check in. Plus, he didn’t mind the company.
Regardless of how much he liked Kate, and how much he appreciated the company, he was on edge about having her there because of the danger that being in his proximity posed to her.
If he was found out, and Damianos vampires came for him, she might be collateral damage.
He knew that the strain of all of it was showing on his face from her concerned glances, but Tobias couldn’t let on to the emotional turmoil within him.
Alexander’s text weighed on him – he was back at Rothburn and might not return to Oxford in time; maybe he’d stay there until the ball, and then Tobias would be totally fucked – so now he was circling the living room, staring blankly at the screen.
“What did he say?” Kate said, resting her chin on her forearms. “Actually, if you’re sexting I don’t want to know.”
“He’s going home for a few days.” Even Tobias could hear how emotionless his voice was.
“Are you restless because you’ve been stood up?”
“No,” he snapped before he could control himself.
When she frowned, he forced himself to take a deep breath and sit beside Kate, otherwise he would’ve left scuff marks on the floor from his pacing. Tobias proceeded to type out three different replies, but couldn’t decide on the right thing to say to lure Alexander back to Oxford.
Back to him.
Frustrated, he slapped his phone on the coffee table, pushed back to standing, and continued pacing.
“I’m getting the impression that the professor has wormed his way into your heart already,” Kate added, her eyes following Tobias as he paced around. “I feel compelled to say that I did warn you.”
“Thanks for that, Kate.” Tobias shot her a look that clearly displayed a little too much monster, based on her startled look. “But that’s not helping.”
Kate leaned back, wincing, taken aback by the reaction. “Sorry. I don’t do well in awkward situations.”
Tell me about it.
“Then talk to me. Tell me what I can do. Will face masks, bottomless wine, and stuffed crust pizza fix this? Because I know when I’m fried, those all seem to help. Especially when it used to be about a man.”
“This isn’t about him.”
Out the corner of Tobias’ eye, he saw the rise of Kate’s brow.
“I wasn’t born yesterday. Take it from me, no one should be feeling this type of way because of a man, not even one as attractive as the professor.
What is it about him that’s making you so agitated?
Has he been cruel to you, or something? It’s almost like you’re afraid of him. ”
Tobias kept quiet, although his mind screamed with the desire to snap, what do you care?
Kate had come slightly too close to the truth for comfort.
Tobias knew that if he stayed cooped up in this apartment, surrounded by Alexander’s scent, it would torture him.
He would snap. Already the threads holding him together had frayed now that control over the situation had been taken from him.
He couldn’t follow Alexander into Rothburn, not with the heavy guard around the estate.
The second a vampire caught whiff of someone even remotely near the gates, they’d take him down.
It was why Tobias needed Alexander in the first place – even if that need had multiplied exponentially in the past days.
What was worse – Tobias failing at killing Vladimir, or Alexander uncovering Tobias’ deceit? The verdict was out.
He needed a way to lure Alexander back to Oxford, and quickly.
The longer he was at Rothburn alone, the greater the chance that he would put together the pieces of who was doing the attacks, and the higher the chance became that he’d not come back in time to invite Tobias to the ball.
Either way, his entire centuries-long plan for revenge would crumble.
He couldn’t re-approach Alexander a century later – he’d be remembered, and then it would be very bloody clear that he was a vampire, because he wouldn’t have aged. His cover would be blown immediately.
Tobias stood, staring into one of the mirrors on the wall, frozen like a deer in the headlights.
Oh.
Alexander was attached to him. Alexander would come back if he thought there was a specific threat to Tobias’ life. So he had to send a message, and send it fast, in a way that only Alexander would understand.
Tobias glanced sidelong over at Kate, who was scrolling on her phone.
“Hey, Kate? Maybe you’re right. Look, I’m going to pop over to my flat for a bit.
I need to pick up some stuff if I’m going to be staying here for a while until Alexander’s…
situation is resolved, okay? Maybe have a shower, ask neighbours to water the plants. You know the drill.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet, tossing one of his credit cards to her. “Fancy ordering that pizza for us to show up when I arrive back? I shouldn’t need more than three hours, tops, to get my flat sorted. Then maybe we can watch a movie?”
Kate squinted at him like she was trying to determine if she should stop him or not, but she just nodded.
Tobias guessed that she didn’t feel that they knew each other even slightly well enough for her to try to stop him from leaving, not when all she’d been given was a bit of a waffly answer about Alexander having family trouble and Tobias being upset about it and wanting company for the night.
“Sure,” she said, nodding. “Let me know if you’ll be back later than that. Sure you don’t want me to come with?”
“No,” Tobias said. “I’m good, thank you. See you soon.”
He walked out the door before she could say anything else, then got into Alexander’s car and proceeded to break every speed limit on the way to Rothburn.
Thanks to the stunning engine on the Aston Martin, Tobias arrived at the estate a little under an hour later. He parked a mile away on a side lane so that no one going to Rothburn would see the car, getting out into the chilly night and sniffing the wind.
There were deer all over the countryside, and he just had to hope that there was one not too far away.
Even though his stomach churned with guilt at the thought of harming a defenceless animal, he set out running through the trees to stalk his prey.
Precisely three hours later, Tobias walked back through the door to Alexander’s apartment to find Kate asleep on the couch.
He dropped the overnight bag he’d hastily packed at his flat and ran his hands through his still-damp hair, discreetly checking his nails to make sure he’d scrubbed all the blood out from under them during his hurried shower.
His heart was pounding, both from the frantic hunt and drive, and from the stress of wondering if the signal he’d sent was going to be received.
“Everything okay?” she mumbled as she came to, blinking. “Did you do what you needed? The pizza should be here soon.”
“I did,” he said, slumping down on the couch next to her and hoping he was right.
His reply seemed to satisfy her. Tobias fixed his gaze to the TV, trying to drown out the noise in his head with the rom-com she’d been watching.
His phone was beside him on the couch, and he waited for it to go off any second, hoping that someone at Rothburn had found the message he’d left on the front drive.
The longer the silence went on, the more Tobias thought it had all been for nothing.
Until someone shouted Tobias’ name so loudly that he startled upright.
“That’s either the delivery man, or someone’s home early,” Kate said through a yawn.
They both glanced towards the entry of the apartment, a moment before it was nearly kicked in and Alexander Damianos stood, breathless and deadly pale, in the doorway.
He looked as if he was ready to kill someone.
Tobias hoped it wasn’t him.