Heart of the Vampire (Vanderlind Castle) (23 page)

I interrupted him with, “But if I was a vampire, we could be together forever.”

“Oh, Aurora.” Jessie sighed, leaning in and kissing me gently on the lips. “Spending my life with you would be the best thing I could imagine. But you don’t understand what it is to become a vampire. It can change you into something unrecognizable to anyone who knows or loves you. There’s a chance it would change who you are in a way that you can’t even conceive of right now.” He shook his head quite adamantly. “I would hate that for you. It would kill me to see you change the way some vampires do.”

“Okay,” I said slowly. “I think I understand.” But then I had to blurt, “I just hate thinking about how things are going to be when I’m Grandma Gibson’s age and you’re still…” I waved a hand at his handsome face, his perfect body, “you.”

Jessie closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against mine. “Can we just count our blessings for tonight and be thankful that we got you out of there with your heart still pumping?”

“Yes,” I said, breathing in the citrus-cloved scent of him. “We can do that.” I was happy. I would have been happy to sit on that rooftop with Jessie’s arms around me for the rest of my life.

“I should probably get you back to the villa so you can get some sleep,” he said, nuzzling my hair. “After all, we have a flight to catch tomorrow.”

“Sleep?” I could tell I was tired, but sleep sounded like such an alien concept after everything we’d been through.

“I know,” Jessie said. “I want to fly you to the moon or… I don’t even know. We should at least do something to celebrate. Is there anything I can do for you? Or… buy you or anything that would make you happy?” he asked, his gray eyes so warm and earnest.

“I am happy,” I insisted.

“Me, too, but is there a way I can make you even happier?” he asked.

I thought about it. “Well, there is something you could do that isn’t exactly for me, but it would make me very, very happy,” I told him.

Jessie narrowed his eyes in suspicion, but a grin played across his full lips. “What?”

Chapter 35

“I can never stop thanking you,” Gloria said for what felt like the seven hundredth time.

“Could you maybe thank me by stopping thanking me?” I asked. She had to stop at some point.

“You just don’t know what this means to me,” she said, crouching by my seat in first class, blocking most of the isle. It had been too late to get her a seat in anything but coach. The flight attendant had already asked her to return to her seat a couple of times, but she kept coming back to thank me again.

“Yes, I do,” I told her. “That’s why I asked Jessie to do it.”

“But I can’t believe it. I’m going to see Viggo in just a few hours. I can’t believe it. I can’t believe you did this for us.” Gloria swooped in and gave me a hug. The first time she’d done it, back at the Csorbos’ mansion, it felt like a very non-Gloria thing to do, but I was getting used to her hugs.

I’d originally asked if Jessie could buy Gloria’s freedom. I knew it was probably a ridiculous amount of money, but I thought I’d ask. Jessie was a little surprised. I’m not sure he expected me to ask for something so costly and for somebody else. And the Csorbos, of course, didn’t want to give her up. I’d fallen asleep while Jessie kept negotiating and only woke up with Gloria bursting into my room and then bursting into tears of joy.

Jessie hadn’t managed to free Gloria from her debt. There was some nonsense about vampire law and the proper way for a human debt to be repaid, blah, blah, blah, but he was able to buy out her debt so that she could come to America and serve the Vanderlinds. It wasn’t freedom, but she would be able to be with the man she loved, so it was the best I could do for her. And she was pretty happy about it, or so I gathered from her constantly wandering into first class to thank me again and again. I finally just feigned sleep and wouldn’t react, no matter how much she “accidentally” prodded me.

I wanted to do something to help Margaret as well, but didn’t know too much about her beyond that she was very nice and worked for vampires. I finally asked Jessie if I could give her the moonstone necklace he had given me for the ball. At first he was hurt, until I explained that, “I think it’s the most beautiful thing in the world, but you know I can’t keep it. My mom would find it in my room sometime, and then how would I explain things?”

Jessie narrowed his eyes at me but finally relented with, “Okay, fine. We’ll give it to Margaret. But you let her know she’s a fool if she sells it for anything less than twenty-thousand Euros.” He changed his mind, almost instantly, and said, “No, wait. You can still give it to her, but I want to be the one that talks to her about it.” He wouldn’t tell me why, but I had to agree. It was his necklace, after all.

Madame Csorbo was genuinely sad to see Gloria leave, and not just because a good servant is hard to find. She made a point of getting up from her coffin to see us off. As we were about to head out the door, she gave Gloria a big hug, and I swear there were tears in her eyes. Vilma did not make an appearance, which was a relief. I wasn’t sure I could have been gracious, even though she did, to some degree, testify on our behalf.

Once I got Gloria to leave me alone, I had some time to think about Jessie and what he’d told me about when people turned into vampires. I’d met quite a few vampires by that time, and more than a handful of them were real jerks. I had just assumed that they were jerky when they were alive and that being undead hadn’t improved the situation, but maybe that wasn’t the truth. Maybe most of them were originally nice people who had just become distorted after turning vampire. It was hard to picture someone like Vilma as ever being pleasant, but it wasn’t completely impossible.

Jessie was still the nicest and most generous person, human or vampire, that I had ever met. I didn’t know his mom very well, but she seemed pretty pleasant, and she obviously loved her children very much because she had tried very hard to save them from being turned into vampires by her own father. But Jessie’s brother, Daniel, was a complete ass. He came off as a stereotypical spoiled and selfish first-born son. Or at least that’s how they were always portrayed in romance novels. If I did end up having to go vampire at twenty-four, I wondered what kind of bloodsucker I would be.

I had to check Jessie’s coffin in at the airport and that was bizarre. It made sense to repatriate the body of a Hungarian back to his homeland, but it didn’t make sense to still have him with me on the return flight. The woman behind the ticket counter didn’t even bat an eye as I mumbled some excuse about the cemetery not accepting the body and my family deciding it was better to bury Grandpa Vanderlind back home. I guess, seeing that Budapest had such a large vampire population, they had a lot of bodies flying in and out. I was very nervous anyway, but fortunately I had Gloria there to walk me through it.

As I tried to relax in my first class seat and get into the rhythm of the flight, I thought about how there was still so much I didn’t know about being a vampire—like did they sleep during the day or was Jessie just lying awake in there looking at the inside of his coffin’s lid. Picturing him motionless and alone in a box made me frightened somehow, but also sad. I reached into my bag and fished out the envelope where I kept Jessie’s picture. Or at least, what used to be his picture. Jessie was no longer there. It was just me, grinning like an idiot, with a small orb that looked like a soap bubble floating near my head.

Going through customs and changing planes was just a lot of standing in line. Gloria had to go through a different line, seeing that she wasn’t a U.S. citizen. I had no idea how Jessie got her a visa so fast, and I probably didn’t want to know. It was nerve-wracking enough going through passport control with my own fake identification.

As the wheels of our plane touched down in Cleveland, I started shaking and had to fight back tears. I couldn’t believe I’d made it back alive. We’d made it back together. I was still breathing, and Jessie wasn’t imprisoned somewhere. The woman in the window seat next to me patted my hand and said, “I know how you feel. I just hate to fly.”

Viggo was waiting for us at baggage claim. He picked Gloria up and swung her around, almost clocking a few other passengers with her heels. They were both laughing and crying and couldn’t stop hugging each other. Then the giant gave me a turn, spinning me around baggage claim. “I had hoped you vould bring me back a letter,” Viggo said, “but this is much better. You are a vonderful girl, Miss Aurora. I vill never forget how vonderful you are.”

Viggo offered to have someone drive my car back to Tiburon for me so I could ride with Jessie, but seeing that he was still in his box and that Gloria obviously wanted time alone with her giant, I said, “No, thanks. My mom will freak if someone else shows up in my car.”

I kept the Polaroid on the dashboard of my car as I drove back to Tiburon. I couldn’t stop looking at it, the absence of Jessie’s face. I was convinced he would say it was nothing, but I was starting to know Mr. Vanderlind better than that.

“You’re home,” my mom called out as I dragged my bags in from the garage after parking my car.

“Mom,” I said, trying to keep my emotions under control. When I’d left five days earlier, I was convinced that I’d never see my mother again. Swallowing a bunch of different words that rose to my lips, I finally managed to say, “How’s Grandma Gibson?” I had to confess that I’d almost forgotten about my great grandmother’s illness as I was facing down vampires and fleeing for my life.

“Good,” Mom replied. “She’s out of the hospital. She’s been asking for you about every other second, but besides that she seems fine.”

“Asking for me or asking for her sister?” I wanted to know.

“You, actually,” Mom told me. “I know it sounds like a pain, but maybe you could swing by the home after school tomorrow. If you left right from school, you could make it for visiting hours, and I know it would make her feel a lot better.”

“Okay,” I agreed. After facing a tribunal of vampires, dealing with my future-predicting great grandmother didn’t sound all that intimidating.

“How was it at your dad’s? Did you have fun? Did Tammy give you any trouble?” Mom asked. She was probably champing at the bit to find out, but Grandma came first.

I decided the hell with it, threw my bags on the ground, and wrapped my arms around her. “I’m so sorry I went,” I said, my voice quavering. “Tammy is a giant bitch, and Dad never, ever deserved a woman as awesome as you.”

“Oh, thank you, sweetie,” Mom said. I was crying, and I could tell that she was crying a bit, too. I felt so horrible that I’d had to hurt her, but it felt so good to be home. “You never called. I was getting worried. If you weren’t back by six, I was going to call your dad.”

“Wow, you must have been worried,” I said with a laugh, giving her another squeeze and then breaking our hug so I could wipe my nose. “I’m sorry I didn’t call, but I left my charger here, and my phone ran out of juice. I guess I could have asked Dad if I could use their phone, but…”

“Don’t even worry about it,” Mom said, dabbing at her eyes. “I’m just glad you’re back safe. I’m sorry you didn’t have a very good time.”

“It wasn’t that horrible,” I said. “Tammy’s still psycho, and Dad’s, you know, Dad. I just kept wishing I’d stayed here and was having dinner with you and Aunt Sue.”

“Yeah, me too,” Mom admitted. “But I think it’s good you went.”

“Probably.” I nodded, turning my head to hide a small smirk.

“Now, don’t get all spoiled or anything, but I made all your favorite foods for dinner,” Mom told me.

“No leftover turkey?” I asked half wistfully. I’d completely missed the big meal, after all.

“No, but there’s half a pumpkin pie in the fridge that I saved for you.”

“Whipped cream in the can?” I asked.

Mom smiled. “Would I torture you with anything else?”

“I hope not.”

“Do you want a slice now?” she asked. “Because I want to hear all about what your father is up to.”

“I would love a slice now,” I told her. Eating a huge slice of pie smothered in canned dairy sounded perfect. “But do we have to talk about the whole dad thing now? I kind of want to ignore it for a bit if you don’t mind.”

Mom shrugged, a bit perplexed. “I guess I don’t mind, but are you sure you’re all right? I mean, nothing bad happened, did it? You know you can tell me anything, right?” she said, immediately donning her therapist hat.

“I know,” I assured her, sticking my head in the fridge to hunt for the pie. “I’ve just thought about the whole dad thing so much in the last week that I’m just kind of sick of it. You know what I mean? You were right, I have a crappy dad, but I’ve decided it isn’t the end of the world.” I pulled the pie out and grabbed the can of whipped cream. “I mean, that’s okay. Life is still good.”

“Okay,” Mom said, nodding her head, seemingly convinced. “So… do you want to…?” She left the words hanging out there.

“Eat food, lounge on the couch, and watch movies with my mommy? Yes, please!” I said, giving her a big smile. Just relaxing and being with Mom was about the best thing I could imagine at that moment.

“You got it,” she told me, “but I’m going to need a piece of that pie.”