Family Secrets (Young Adult Edition) (Davenport Manor (Young Adult Edition)) (15 page)

She could feel her assailant pushing
his groin into her back. “We should have some fun with this pretty,
little thing,” he laughed to his buddies, who all started to
surround her. One grabbed her chest and another tried to forcefully
kiss her mouth. She pursed her mouth shut and turned her head,
trying to squirm away from his face that reeked of beer. The
defensive rage was rapidly building in her and she didn’t know how
much longer she could “play human”. Todd struggled to get up,
fiercely trying to protect her.

“You just don’t know how to stay down,
do you?” The original said through his teeth and turned back to
Todd. Once again, they began to kick and beat him
furiously.

Emma’s natural instinct took over and
she no longer allowed herself to fight it. If she held on to her
self-control, Todd was likely to get beaten to death. She opened
her mouth, descended her fangs, and let her fury explode. She flung
her arms upward in a flash, breaking the man’s grip on her,
startling him. She turned around and savagely kicked him in the
stomach, causing him to fly backwards twenty feet.

Emma crouched, ready to attach as a
growl built in her chest and roared unlike any beast they had ever
heard. It blasted through the cold, quiet night air causing Todd to
stop writhing in pain for a moment. Todd’s attackers stopped with
shock and fear in their eyes, mouths dumbly hanging open. She moved
at a speed that was blind to the human eye and Todd watched through
blurry eyes as each man collapsed to the ground, one by one like
dominos. Emma had snapped each of their necks. She flitted over to
her own assailant who was still lying in the grass, but
conscious.

“Look at me…” she hissed as he tried
to back away in fear. “You will go to the police in one hour and
tell them that you snapped the necks of all your buddies there. You
will admit to murdering all of them. You understand?”

He dumbly nodded and agreed, “I killed
them.”

“Yes, you did…and you’ll forget you
ever saw my friend and me. Now go.”

The man took off in a staggering run
back toward the city, holding his aching gut. Emma ran back over to
Todd, who was badly injured and bleeding both externally and
internally. He looked at her with complete fear in his eyes; no
longer the soft look of what could have been love. His face was
badly beaten; both eyes were beginning to swell shut, abrasions on
his cheek and forehead, and a fat lip.

She approached him slowly and
carefully, desperately not wanting him to be frightened. “Todd,
please don’t be afraid. This is what I am.”

He couldn’t speak and she heard the
gurgling inside him getting worse, but the terror in his eyes spoke
more than words could have said.

“You have to trust me, I would never
hurt you,” she said as lifted her wrist to her mouth and bit it,
causing blood to pour out. “Drink my blood, you’ll heal quickly and
completely.”

Todd tried to turn his head and pursed
his lips closed with disgust and confusion, but he was too weak
against her. She forced his mouth open and allowed her blood to
flow into his mouth.

“Drink it, love. If you don’t, you’ll
die. I can hear it inside you,” she continued to speak gently to
him.

Reluctantly, he began to swallow all
the blood that she was pouring into his mouth. She put her wrist up
to his mouth and commanded him to suck on it, to which he obliged.
Within minutes he began to feel stronger and the pain was quickly
fading away. Once she knew he had enough, she pulled her wrist away
and licked it clean while the holes sealed up. Emma retracted her
fangs as Todd sat up, still slightly weary, but healing with each
passing second. She could hear his heart beating strong again and
the gurgling had gone. The swelling of his face rapidly diminished
and the cuts healed over with fresh skin.

There was a long silence, neither knew
what to say to the other. Todd was in shock, but the realization of
what she was began to sink in. Once he felt strong enough, he stood
up and was amazed at how great he felt. It was as though nothing
had happened. The only reminder that the attack occurred were the
five dead guys scattered around them with broken necks. Emma stood
up as well, but didn’t say anything, she wanted him to be the one
to speak first. She knew he was going to start asking a lot of
questions once he found his words.

“So…what are we going to do about
these guys?” He awkwardly asked.

“It’s taken care of, that guy that I
let go is going to be sitting in prison for a long time,” she spoke
softly.

He slowly began to walk in the
direction they had originally come from. He slightly turned around
and said, “Should we go get the car and head home?”

“Sure,” she said as she did a little
jog to catch up with him. The ‘date’ part of the evening was
definitely over. She so badly wanted to link arms with him as they
walked, but she didn’t think that would be welcome right now as his
hands were jammed into his pockets.

They carried on in a long,
awkward silence along the lakefront even though Todd had a thousand
questions screaming in his head. His long legs took lengthy
strides, causing him to subconsciously speed walk with Emma
practically trotting next to him. Once they were on Michigan Avenue
once again, he felt the light was at the end of the tunnel. He just
wanted to get in the car and go back to the Manor. He thought about
packing up his suitcase and staying in a hotel, but he didn’t want
to be
that
guy.
All he knew was that he had had enough ‘weird’ in the past 24 hours
that could fill a lifetime.

They got in the car and
once they shut the doors all the sounds of the bustling city were
silenced. It was
too
silent
.

Emma couldn’t stand it anymore and had
to speak up, “I know you’re in shock right now, but I hope you’re
not afraid of me. I’m the same person on the inside, I’m
just…”

“A vampire?” Todd interrupted with
raised eyebrows.

“A vampire,” she bluntly repeated. She
put the car into drive and drove toward Interstate 94, which would
ultimately take them north to Davenport.

They were on the highway for several
minutes when Todd finally spoke again, “This explains a lot of
things…”

“Like what?” She was curious of what
out-of-the-ordinary things he had noticed.

“You’re cold all the
time…I have never seen you eat…” Suddenly a light bulb turned on in
his head. “
That’s
why you always ditched me during meal times!”

She couldn’t help but chuckle and nod
her head. “I almost had to choke down human food this morning. You
know, feel free to ask me questions, I don’t mind.”

Now Todd was beginning to feel
fascinated and slightly more comfortable with her. He knew the
question he wanted to ask, but he hesitated. She could feel him
wanting to ask her something, so she waved her hand at him to bring
it on.

“How old are you, if you don’t mind me
asking?”

“Anatomically or biologically?” She
replied.

“Both…”

“Anatomically, I’m twenty-five years
old.” She took in a deep breath, “Biologically, I’m two-hundred and
twenty-two. I was born in 1790, turned vampire in 1815.”

Todd sat silently for a
moment while he absorbed that information when he suddenly had
flashes in his mind. He recognized the years from the Davenport
crypt in the cemetery, he remembered the portrait of the original
Emma Davenport and the uncanny resemblance, and her distinct
knowledge of the history there. “
You’re
the original Emma Davenport,
aren’t you?”

She took her eyes off the road for a
moment to look at him and with a shrug she sweetly answered, “I
am.”

He shifted in his seat and ran both
hands through his hair. He was captivated at the thought of sitting
beside someone who was a piece of history, someone who had seen so
much. His brain created several more questions to ask. “And
Daniel?”

“No, Daniel is human. He is my
sixth-great nephew, a descendent of my brother, Christopher. But,
out of all of the generations that I have come to know through the
years, I have never been as close to any of them like I am with
Daniel. I dare say I am closer to him than I was my own
brother.”

Todd thought some more as he pieced
the puzzle together. “You’re ‘history’ with Zachariah…” he said
using air quotes with his fingers.

Emma’s face turned solemn before she
answered, trying to think of a delicate way to explain his story.
“Zachariah is vampire as well…I turned him in 1839. He lived in
town and was orphaned by the age of sixteen, so we allowed him to
live in the little house that used to be next to the stables.
Remember I showed you where it once was? Well, he was our stable
boy. I was oddly attracted to him, something I had never felt for a
human. For several years we courted; he never knew what I really
was until the night I turned him.

“He was the only human I
have ever been in love with; the only one I have ever pursued. When
he was twenty-five he was dying from pneumonia and I made the
selfish decision to turn him. I just…couldn’t let him go.” She
spoke quietly as she always felt guilty about making Zachariah
immortal. She came back to the present and added, “That’s why he
behaves the way he does around you. He doesn’t dislike you…well,
he’s a
little
jealous, but that’s only because he remembers what happened
to the last human I had a relationship with…
him
.”

Todd was not expecting
that response and it took him by surprise. He was beginning to feel
uneasy with her again now that he knew what had happened to
Zachariah, whose words were now echoing in his head.
“I noticed you seem a bit smitten by Emma, it’s
not a good idea to pursue it…Emma is a lot more complicated than
you think…You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into…Take
it from me, you do not want to go down that path.”

As they walked in the back door, Emma
muttered under her breath so only the vampires could hear, “He
knows.” They continued down the corridor that led to the foyer
where Zachariah was standing like a statue with his hands in his
pockets. His face was expressionless as he stared a hole through
Todd.

He dramatically perked up and with a
snarky tone he asked, “Have a good date?”

Todd looked at Emma and simply stated,
“I’m going to bed. Good night, Emma.”

As he started to walk up the stairs,
she called after him, “Todd! Please don’t think differently of me.
I’m still the same person…”

He nodded as he continued his way up
to his room without replying to her.

She turned to Zachariah with a huff
and rolled her eyes. “That went well!”

They sat down by the fireplace in the
parlor where she told him everything that had happened that
evening. He agreed that she had no choice in what she did, but
reminded her that she could have charmed Todd to forget everything
he had seen. Of course she knew that, but she didn’t use her
charming abilities unless it was an emergency situation. Todd
finding out that she was a vampire certainly was not a matter of
life or death, instead it all came down to if he still liked her or
not.

Vivienne and Declan walked into the
parlor, each carrying an extra glass of blood for Zachariah and
Emma. They couldn’t help but overhear everything that they had
talked about.

“You know it’s for the best, Emma,”
Declan said as he handed her a glass. “But, you know you’re going
to have to charm him a little bit before he leaves. You shouldn’t
risk him running to the press and telling them that Daniel
Davenport’s ‘sister’ is actually a 200-year old
vampire.”

She knew he had a point. It was easier
to charm the source instead of having to do damage control once it
went viral. She hated doing it, even though it was in her nature.
“There has been talk of us coming out in the open, but it has to be
carefully planned. It can’t happen because of a human going to the
press. Although, they’d probably laugh at him.”

Zachariah sensed her hesitation with
the idea of charming Todd and spoke up, “I’ll do it.” He didn’t
want to sound like he was overstepping her and held her hand,
“That’s if, you don’t want to. I can do it for you.”

Emma decided to think about it since
they still had time before he left. She reminded them that Todd
signed the contract before coming to the Manor and that she could
easily put the legalities into play if it came down to
it.

“Whatever you decide, we’re behind
you.” Vivienne said before tipping her glass back for the last drop
of blood.

They heard bare footsteps upstairs
that were walking into the portrait hallway. Emma got up and
motioned for everyone to stay put. She sprinted up the stairs, but
when she got to the top she walked at a human speed. She turned the
corner of the hallway to find Todd standing in front of her
painting, his arms folded in front of him.

He jumped when he saw her from the
corner of his eye and opened his mouth to speak, but closed it shut
again. She strolled over next to him and looked up at her picture
along with him. He looked at her once again, then back at her image
that was painted over two-hundred years earlier.