Bleeding Love (9 page)

“Adrienne, are
you there?” Xavier tried again.

She kept quiet,
thinking of what to do—what she had to do. She couldn't face Xavier since she
couldn't stand it if he embarrassed her again by telling her that sulking
wasn't going to solve any of her problems. It was logical of him to say that,
she realized.

“Logical my ass,”
she said in a tone that was barely above a whisper, but Xavier, being a
vampire, heard it as if she had used a megaphone.

He immediately
opened the door and saw piles of clothes strewn across the floor in disarray, a
box of tissue on her bed, her blankets and a pillow that were wet with tears,
but there was no Adrienne. He looked farther into her room and noticed the
opened window, the curtains swaying with the cool breeze. She didn't run away
since he was sure she had no time to pack her belongings. She was just simply
avoiding him. Yvonne was right about her, about humans—they were too emotional,
and she'd been living with them for too long.

“So you and Ethan
are dunzo, huh?” Brianna asked a few moments after Adrienne had finished her
story about the break-up.

Adrienne had escaped
from the mansion and found friendship and serenity in Brianna's humble abode.
Her best friend welcomed her with open arms and listened to the long
heartbreaking story. When Adrienne finished, Brianna looked quite sad. She knew
this had to hurt her friend.

“
So
 dunzo.”
Adrienne looked away and rolled her eyes.

“That's a shame,”
said Brianna to herself. “You guys were the cutest.”

The two sat in
silence for a few minutes, until Adrienne came up with something. Knowing Ethan
and his wild ways, he was probably having fun tonight while she was feeling sad
over him. She thought that she should do the same—have fun and get wild.

“Hey Bree, is
anyone throwing a party tonight?”

At the mention of
the word party, Brianna Kim turned her head sharply to face her friend who was
in deep thought and thinking—to party or not to party?

“Charlotte's
having one.” Brianna looked suspicious. “You're planning on drinking your ass
off because of him, aren't you?”

Adrienne shook
her head, and Brianna saw right through her friend's mask. She saw guilt.

“You are!”
Brianna shouted accusatorily. “Adie, you can't!”

A skeptical
eyebrow was raised by the vampire. “And why can't I?”

Not even thinking
before speaking, Brianna answered,” Obviously because once he finds out you're
sulking and drinking over him, the more his ego will grow, and as twisted as it
sounds, he'll feel good and like the fact that he was able to get you to act
that way.” Bree breathed a sigh. “Whew! That was tiring to say,” and with that,
Adrienne laughed softly.

Brianna was
right, Adrienne realized, and she couldn't help but rethink the things that
were going on inside her head. All she wanted to happen was for her to get over
Ethan and move on as painlessly as possible, but of course she knew that the hell
known as high school wasn't going to let that happen. Her friends were Ethan's
friends; they were in the same small, but elite, circle of friends, and to add
to that, there was Xavier. Adrienne knew he was going to consistently and
hurtfully remind her how much of a fool she was to have fallen for someone like
Ethan.

She buried her
face in her hands, and after, she looked up and grinned.

“We're going to
go to Charlotte's, we're going to party, we're going to go wild, and we're
definitely drinking our asses off.”

“Adrienne! What
did I just say a while ago?” Brianna asked, her voice much louder than before.

Adrienne only
smirked in return. “We have to celebrate the fact that I'm single again.” They
both looked mischievously at each other.

“Now that's what
I would call a good reason.”

October rolled by
quickly, and before Adrienne knew it, she was busily making preparations for
her school's annual Halloween carnival and dance. Having been part of the
Student Council her entire high school life, she knew the gist of dances and
fairs, so organizing them wasn't a strenuous task anymore. What made it
tiresome for her this year was the fact that the whole female student body of
her school was bugging her to make the carnival and the dance a joint project
with the Night Class. She quickly dismissed the idea, but her peers were persistent.

“Weren't you all
about change when you made your campaign speech last year?” the Secretary of
the council asked. “I think this idea is a good start for change, and I'm sure
the rest agree with me.”

A few heads
nodded. They just didn't understand what was so dangerous about pulling the
Night Class in with the Day Class.

“We suggested the
idea last year, and Principal Stahl hastily rejected it.”

“But you're his
daughter, and you're the president now.” A few heads turned to watch the
discussion. “You can do anything.”

“Just because I'm
daddy's little girl?” Adrienne bit her bottom lip. “Hell no. We can organize
the dance and the fair ourselves. We don't need their help.”

A few groans
erupted from here and there, and to cut it short, the treasurer, the secretary,
the vice president, and the class representatives glared at Adrienne Stahl. It
didn’t matter that she was just looking out for them, protecting them from the
Bloodsuckers since they weren't like her. They needed blood to survive, and
there was going to be 
lots
 of blood running through the Day
Class veins on the nights of the carnival and the dance.

“Come on Adie,
just talk to your dad,” Katherine, the freshmen's representative, pleaded
complete with a pout and almost-watery eyes. “It doesn't have to be the whole
Night Class.”

A few others
agreed with her.

“It's fine with
everyone if we just invite the males,” another one supplied, and with that,
Adrienne couldn't help but snicker.

The guys
countered the girls' proposition.

“No! The Night
chicks are sexy as hell. They have to come too even if some of them are geeks
and dweebs.”

The head of them
all—the president—pursed her lips in dissatisfaction with what was happening
right in front of her. Her school just wanted the Night Class to come because
of the physical benefits they could offer, and she didn't like that—the
inferiority complex of her human friends with the vampires. She’d met a few of
the Night group students, and they were pompous as hell.

Adrienne didn't
want them to mix with the humans because she knew how much their egos would
boost even more if that happened.

“You're
underestimating us, people.” Adrienne looked down at them. “You have a stupid
reason for wanting to merge the Day and the Night Classes. If you can give me a
better motive, then maybe I can rethink my decision and talk to the principal—my
dad.”

Better reason or
not, Adrienne was staying firm to her first and last verdict—that the Night
Class was not going to go anywhere near the Day Class. She smiled triumphantly
to herself; no one was going to make her change her mind.

She was extremely
wrong. Very, very wrong. Did she actually think that Constance's Day Class
would let the opportunity of being with the Night Class just slide like that?
The moment the council meeting ended, its members, Adrienne excluded, rushed to
their respective class groups and quickly thought of good enough reasons for
Adrienne to allow the integration of the two classes.

By the end of the
day, at least a few hundred people had come up to her, shooting lengthy but
sensible speeches at her. A few them had actually been good—a call for change, unity
amidst diversity, for the betterment of school society, etc, etc. She couldn't
believe it, but at seven o'clock in the evening she was in her father's office
and was giving him the proposal.

“I didn't want
to, but everyone, seriously Dad, 
everyone
 was against me! And
can you believe it? Even Brianna thought I was being melodramatic and
overprotective!” Adrienne's voice rose and sounded irritated. “Well, I'm sorry
if I just don't want them to get eaten by a bunch of vampires!”

“Don't forget.
You're one of us too.”

An all-too
familiar voice joined the conversation, and Adrienne pursed her lips.

“Xavier.”

Adrienne didn't
turn to face him or even acknowledge him. She was still deeply wounded with the
way he consistently embarrassed and degraded her, usually when he was in front
of his friends. She had never been treated by anyone the way he treated her.

“Still mending
your broken heart?” His voice wasn't teasing, nor was there that usual tone of
arrogance. It was…emotionless.

Adrienne nodded
at what she considered proof of her theory, he just probably asked the question
for the sake of bringing up a topic she didn't want to talk about. Heartless
bastard.

“It's healed,” she
partly lied and thanked God he couldn't read her mind or else he'd know how
false that statement was. She may not have feelings for her ex anymore, but she
still felt her emotions rise and heat up whenever Ethan talked to her and
flirted around with other girls. Yes, flirted, and he was now pursuing
Charlotte Daniels—the head cheerleader.

“You don't have to
move on so quickly.” Now, he sounded teasing. “You have your whole immortal
life to do that.”

Her vampire
instincts coming to the fore, Adrienne let out a deep growl from the pit of her
stomach.

Xavier knew right
then and there to shut up. Xavier was threatening her, hurting her pride, and
he knew what would happen if he continued. She'd use her psychic gifts against
him—again.

“Xavier. I called
you not to discuss my daughter's love life but to talk about a proposal she
made.”

The teenage, male
vampire smirked. “Vampire or not, isn't the guy supposed to propose to the
woman?”

Adrienne's eyes
turned into a shade of brown that could almost be considered black.

“Oh, the
twenty-first century! I love its equality.” Xavier grinned.

“Real arrogant,
are you?” she said, not at all amused with how laid-back and lighthearted her
fiancé was being. “And I wasn't talking about a marriage proposal.”

Xavier's lips
thinned and Adrienne thought he looked extremely sexy doing that. Hell,
whatever he did was sexy.

“I came to talk
about the upcoming carnival and the dance our school's holding.”

“
Our 
school?”

Adrienne sighed
exasperatedly. “You heard me right.” There was no holding back now. “I want the
Night Class to be part of our plans.”

“Are there any
hidden agendas as to why you came up with that idea?” He was quirking his brows
suggestively, and again, he looked incredibly hot. “You know if that happens,
we're going to be spending large amounts of time together.”

Bewildered. That
was the only way to describe Adrienne's expression when she put two and two
together. “You—you're the president of the Night Class?” Her gasp was openly
seen not only by Xavier but by her father as well.

With her shocked
expression, Xavier knew that she hadn’t known, that she really wasn’t doing this
to spend more time with him. Damn. But it was interesting that he had been able
to render her speechless, embarrassing her again. He took a step forward,
closer to her, and another, and then one more until they stood so close
together only a single sheet of paper could fit in between them.

 In view of their
school's principal and Adrienne's dad, Xavier bent his head down very closely
to Adrienne's ear smoothly saying, “I'm president. You're president.”

She looked
straight ahead of her, not daring to face him. Adrienne could even feel the
strands of his jet-black hair brushing against her skin, and it was making her
hot, 
very
 hot actually.

“Don't you see?
We're perfect for each other.”

And with that,
she stiffened. Her eyes losing their ability to see, she just felt. And let his
voice move through her.

Triumphant at
being able to affect her, he grinned. But he had forgotten that they were not
alone.

“Just don't cross
the line, Xavier,” said the principal, eyes turning crimson as he read the
vampire prince's thoughts. Carter shook his head. Even though his wisdom went
beyond the ages, he still couldn't understand Xavier's feelings when it came to
Adrienne. All the older Stahl knew was that Xavier loved his daughter despite
all the teasing and degradation he piled on her. He certainly showed love in
weird ways.

“I've watched
over her for more than a hundred years—way before she started to age—and I’ve never
once stepped out of line, correct?”

Carter Stahl
nodded,” You never did.”

Adrienne may have
been in a little trance, but she still heard the serious conversation between
the two. She couldn't help but feel warm attraction for Xavier. She spent
hundreds of years living the life of a human child, and because of that, she
had no memory of her extensive past. Now she knew Xavier had been a part of
that past, watching over her. She heard the honesty in his voice when he said
he had watched her, and she believed him. She smiled at the revelation before
jutting her bottom lip out into a pout. No doubt the teasing and the
embarrassment were still going to continue.