A Dark Night (Book One of The Grandor Descendant series) (16 page)

“
Two rum and cokes,” a dark haired man next to her said, then after looking Ari up and down, added, “and whatever the lady wants.”

Ari looked down at her outfit too. She had to admit, Sandra and Larissa had done an amazing job; she almost didn’t recognise herself.

Hoping that Ragon was listening, she said, “The same thanks.”

The
dark haired man smiled widely at Ari, and held out his hand to pass her the drink that the bar tender had poured.

“Want to chase this with a tequila shot?” he asked, sipping at the dark liquid and calling once again for the barman’s attention.

Ari considered this for a moment. She was desperate to look behind her shoulder and see if her actions had been noticed.

“Why the hell not,” she replied.

If this was going to be her only outing for the next little while, then she was damn well going to enjoy herself. Besides, she thought, licking her hand which was now sprinkled in salt, it wasn’t like her and Ragon were dating; why shouldn’t she be allowed to socialise?

When Ari finally left the bar, three shots later and more than a little tipsy, she glanced around the dance floor looking for the others. For one panicked moment she thought that they had left her. She was just about to start searching for them, when Ragon appeared behind her.

“Having fun?” he asked, his teeth abnormally clenched.

“Yea,” she replied, her breath strong with liquor. “Where is everyone?”

“Hunting,”
said Ragon.

“Why aren’t you hunting
then?” asked Ari, the alcohol causing her to sway a little on the spot.

“Who say’s I’m not,” he said, a slight wicked edge to his voice.

Ari ignored the snip and spied Patrick. He was walking up the stairs to another area of the club, and after looking from him and back to the dancing floor, decided to follow suit.

Pushing the door open, Ari walked quickly from the club and towards the serenity of the outside smoking area. It was a large paved courtyard surrounded by a small garden, where palms and a large water feature masked the cigarette smoke being blown by the patrons. She had seen Patrick move over to a group of guys, asking for a light.

“So
… what are we doing for Halloween?” asked Patrick, sipping on a martini glass and chasing it with a puff of his cigarette.

“Nikolas and William invited us to one of their balls,” said Ragon
.

“
Oh well, you can’t refuse them. I guess it is a good thing that one of the coven members arrived late. Now I’ll be able to keep an eye on Ari,” said Patrick, before returning to his drink, and sucking hard on the thick liquid through a coiled straw.

Ragon l
ooked meaningfully at Ari and said, “We haven’t decided if Ari is coming with us yet. Kiara might make a fuss about my breaking the Final Death Laws.”

Patrick’s eyebrows were instantly halfway up his forehead. His eyes were wide, and the straw which had been in his mouth previously, had fallen out to land on the floor.

“Excuse me?” said Patrick. “Kiara couldn’t possibly know Ari hasn’t been lulled. You’re not seriously going to take her with you.”

“Oh she knows,”
said Ragon, and Ari’s arms became dead weights at her side, recalling how Kiara had ordered Paige to strip search her for bite marks. “Besides, I have no idea how many fledglings Kiara has. If we leave her they might attack. She would be safer with us at the Elder’s party.”

“Yea,” said Patrick, taking a meaning puff on his cigarette. “Assuming Kiara hasn’t told them that you
broke our laws.”

It had been the same full circle argument they had been having since first the letter arrived. Everyone in the coven, bar Sameth
and apparently Patrick, thought that she should go. Only Ragon was on the fence; Ari was just wondering if his last statement meant that he had made up his mind, when someone shouted her name.

“Ari!”

Ari turned to look around.

“Ryder,”
she said back loudly, trying to be heard over the music that still managed to waft out from the dance floor.

In an instant she had jumped up and ran over to her childhood friend. Ryder was one year younger than her, making him
twenty-three. He had a pleasant oval face, which in the past had been filled with puppy fat, but now was drawn tight across high cheek bones and prominent dimpled chin. His dark brown hair was parted to the left, and like Ari, he had blue eyes. He had no facial hair at all, but was clean shaven, and though his skin now appeared pale, there were still small, un-faded freckles, that she could just make out dotting his cheeks and nose, remnant of his time spent in the sun as a child.   

“Long time, no see,” said Ryder, hugging her quickly.

This was very true. For about ten months, when Ari was in the 9
th
grade, Ryder had been her foster brother. Everywhere the pair went people thought they were brother and sister. Maybe it was because they both had blue eyes and brown hair. Or maybe it was because they were two peas in pod. Either way, Ari loved feeling like she had a brother, or at least she did, while it had lasted. She had never been formally adopted by his parents, only fostered, which made it easy for them to return her when they realised they no longer wanted to look after a second child.

Still, being returned by parents who didn’t want her may not have been the best thing to happen to her, but it certainly wasn’t the worst. Ari had never been fortunate enough to be adopted. Each time she had gone to a new family hopeful
, and each time she had left disappointed. After her stint with Ryder, Ari had sworn that she would never again risk hoping for a family of her own.

As Ari looked at Ryder, she couldn’t help but ogle his black dress pants and pink shirt.

“I didn’t know you were gay?” she said a little boldly.

Once again she must ha
ve partaken in too much alcohol; her statement was testimony to that.

Ryder laughed out loud
, saying, “Neither do my parents,” before clinking glasses with her and then sweeping her into a warm embrace.

She was surprised at how happy she was to see him and took him by the arm, forcing him to follow her
back to where Ryder and Patrick were still sitting.

“Wow,” said Ryder, his eyes locking on Patrick and Ragon. “Please tell me we are walking towards those two.”

Ragon s
tood and moved to stand protectively in front of Ari, eying the hand that still grasped Ryder’s disdainfully.

Both Ari and Ryder swooned, while Ryder said under his breath, “Oh my god, I hate you so much right now!”

“This is Ryder,” said Ari, shoving him in the ribs to get him to shut up. “I lived with his family for a while back in high school.”

Ryder shook ha
nds with Ragon first before turning to face Patrick, and Ari said, “And this is Patrick.”

When Ari looked back over to Ryder, she saw
that he and Patrick were staring, puppy eyed at one another.

“Well Ryder, want to get a drink, maybe stretch your legs on the dance floor?” asked Patrick.

Ryder shrugged, but then followed Patrick back down the stairs a little too eagerly, glancing back at Ari, where a huge grin was threatening to take over his entire face. It wasn’t until Patrick turned back to smile at Ari also, that she realised what was wrong with this situation.

“Holly hell,” she said, taking Ragon by the elbow
and making to follow after them, “what’s Patrick going to do to Ryder?”

“Keep your voice down,”
said Ragon, looking up to see Sandra and Larissa walking over towards them.

“But…” Ari began.

“What’s wrong sugar?” asked Sandra.

Sandra’s cheeks were pink
and flushed, and Ari realised that she must have just fed.

“Patrick just found a friend of mine,” she muttered,
storming off to follow them into the club.

Ari raced down the steps that would lead back to the main club. Twice she paced the club, searching desperately for Ryder, but he was nowhere to be seen. Her efforts had made her sweaty and on her second trip past the bar, she spied a long hallway, where a lightly glowing female sign, shone like a beacon to the girl’s bathroom. Everything around her felt chaotic, like she was on a merry-go-round and all she wanted to do was get off. Quickly she raced for it, pushing the door open with ease.

Once inside she stared at her reflection. Her face was scorching and she splashed cold water onto her cheeks, hoping to relieve the burning. The bathroom, though being humid, provided a nice relief from the club, whose combination of loud music an
d dim lighting had left her feeling claustrophobic. But all too soon the nagging worry about what Patrick would do to Ryder came back to her, and she knew she had to find him.

Leaving the bathroom, she walked further down the hallway, past the men’s room, until she found a
large exit sign and pushed. She thought perhaps that Ryder and Patrick might have left the club, or else gone somewhere private to... Quickly Ari shook her head, she couldn’t think like that.

The feeling of the cool night air on her cheeks was revitalizing, and she relished in its refreshment, until she looked up. The sight that met her eyes stopped her dead in her tracks. Ari opened her mouth in horror. A young girl, barely twenty, was being forced against the brick wall that formed part of the alleyway. Her eyes were bulged and desperate, and Ari realised that the dark haired man forcing himself on her, was the same guy who had been buying Ari shots at the start of the night.

Thick black stains ran down the girls eyes, though she still looked beautiful and innocent. With one hand the man was pulling the grey dress that she wore up past her waist, while the other pinned her to the wall and covered her mouth. Apart from the three of them, the alleyway was deserted. There were large dumpsters lining the walls with foul rubbish spilling from them. An alley cat sat perched on one of these
, watching the events, its iridescent yellow eyes reflecting the scene before it. The brute had his back to Ari, and so she raked the alleyway, desperate to find something that she could use as a weapon against him.

Another small scream escaped the girl, and Ari turned to realise that the man had removed his belt
and was stringing it around her throat.

“Scream and your dead,” he said.

The girl nodded, still sobbing silently, but stopped struggling; she was completely defeated. Without thinking, Ari threw her body onto the man’s back, desperate to stop him from further violating the girl. Instantly the man relinquished his hold on his victim. Ari’s attack had surprised him, and he swayed where he stood, before baking up and forcing his back against the brick wall, winding Ari as she fell heavily to the ground.

“Bitch,” said the man, taking Ari by the hair and throwing her once more against the wall.

Ari felt her head smash against the hard brick and then she stared up in horror at the dark haired man.

“Two for the price of one,”
he said greedily.

Ari
sucked in hard, about to scream, until she looked up and saw… Ragon. His green eyes were bulged and livid, and there was a wild untamed look to him which greatly contrasted with the crisp white shirt he wore. She watched mesmerised, as with one hand he clamped his fingers around the struggling man’s throat and lifted him into the air, so that he was dangling by his feet. The dark haired man clutched at Ragon’s fingers uselessly, while his lips slowly became blue at the edges. Without hesitation, Ragon forced his victim’s neck to the side before reaching into his pocket for something. Taking a small gleaming silver knife, he slit a deep cut into the man’s throat. Thick red blood gushed from the wound, spraying across Ragon’s face and leaving a scarlet stain on his skin and clothes. Ari shivered, watching the monster within take over.

It took no more than a minute for Ragon to drain him. When he was finished, he threw the man aside as though he was garbage and rushed to Ari.
Crouching besides her, his mad eyes focused on the swollen bruise which had formed across her cheek. He made to touch her but Ari moved away, unable to stop herself. Ragon blinked in fear and the two remained frozen, staring at one another for several more seconds.

Leaving Ari, Ragon quickly swept over to
the girl, touched his icy fingers to her pulse and said, “She will be ok, thanks to you.”

Ari looked once at the semi-unconscious girl and back to Ragon.

“Why?” she asked, unable to stop herself from asking the one question she had wanted to since she first met Ragon.

“He was a bad man; he was hurting you-” Ragon began, but Ari cut him off.

“-no, why me?” she asked, and when Ragon looked puzzled she added, “Do you know how many girls are attacked every day? How many creeps there are just waiting to prey on them?”

“I know,” answered Ragon, a low growl lending a slight edge to his voice.