Infamous: (A Bad Boy Romantic Suspense) (40 page)

Two figures, pale, appeared on the shoreline from the left. Then two more, from the right. Then more. They moved fast and almost seemed to glow against the darkness below. I held my breath. Something was going to happen when these two groups met. Something bad.

They fell on each other like the tide that was rolling in, inevitable and sure and strong. They tore at one another, ripping limbs and flesh. I was too far up to be able to see that, and yet, I did. As though I was up high and down below at the same time. From on high I could see the tiny pale figures becoming a red mass. From below I could see them feeding. Consuming.

It was impossible to tell who was winning or what the sides even were. They were, however, mostly vampires. Yet I also made out werewolves, what could have been changelings, skins shifting in the meager light into terrible shapes and
things
.

I felt compelled to look away, toward the cliffs to my right. And I saw
them
. Dimitri and Robert, gazing at each other across a chasm of bodies. Their armies devouring one another. They had blank faces, terrifying in their lack of any warmth or emotion. I tried to call out to them, to tell them to stop. But my voice was pulled away by the wind, by the sound of the waves, by the battle below.

So I closed my eyes and leapt…

And was back in the hallway, doors on either side again.

Is it possible to be exhausted in a dream? Or vision? Because I was. I felt wrung out. And I was really sick of this hallway that I’d dreamed/vision’d in at least twice now. Stupid doors leading to a past I couldn’t change and a maybe-future that looked like about as much fun as wars generally do. Which is to say: none at all.

I walked down the hallway determined not to open any more of these entryways to emotional future revelations or breakfast with my mom. I mean, really. How much more manipulative and sentimental could my brain get?

The answer was, unfortunately: quite a bit.

The hallway never seemed to end. I walked and walked, feet and legs getting sore, back tired. The doors seemed to crowd together now, closing in. They stretched, warped, became like fun house mirrors.

I kept walking.

Suddenly the floor tilted and I was thrown through a door on the right. I tried to grasp at the frame but my fingers slipped. I was falling.

I was standing, this time in a warmly lit house I didn’t recognize. I was in a room that at first confused me. Then I realized: it was a nursery. There was a white crib, mobile, dresser, and soft gray carpeting. Pictures of animals hung on the walls. In my hands I held a tiny little outfit with a cow on it.

When I looked down I saw that my belly was huge, painfully so. My ankles felt swollen and I felt a kick, from inside, and gasped, clutching at myself.

Warm arms were around me, a man’s, but I couldn’t see his face.

I put my own face in my hands and whispered, “No. Not this future. Go away.”

It dissolved and I was back in the hall, still holding my belly. Still crying. And getting increasingly angry with my subconscious and its need to torture me. Shouldn’t your own brain be kinder to you?

I started to run down the hall, the doors beginning to crack and peel. I ran and ran until I found, somehow, a ladder. It only went up, so up I went. I climbed for ages, until my arms ached and my knees felt weak.

Just when I thought I couldn’t go any further, I reached the top. I pushed at the final door, round and green, with all my might. It creaked open and bright, blinding light shone down. I slipped on a rung, nearly fell. But I held on, pushed out.

I was looking at myself in a mirror and I was old. Very old. Age spots dotted my papery, creased skin. My hair was thin and white and wispy around my head. But my eyes still shone with a fierce light. When I looked at myself I could see a spider climbing up the wall behind me. I followed it as it crawled up and up, then over, then sat in a corner. And waited.

I looked back at myself, at those fierce eyes and lined skin, and thought: I will die soon.

And then I woke up.

Dimitri was looking at me strangely and so was Robert. The car was still.

“Are we there?” I asked, acting like I hadn’t just had a really weird series of dream visions. Maybe I’d talked in my sleep, given the odd looks on their faces. Or maybe they were just being weird. Vampires, am I right?

“Nearly. We’ve stopped at a spot one village over to scope things out,” said Robert. He was putting on gloves in a fussy way that made me smile.

“How far is the castle?” I asked, relacing my boots so I’d have something to do.

“About two miles. Shouldn’t take longer than an hour to get there if we take it slow,” Robert said, opening the door for me. Tina was already outside looking off beyond a pretty dense-looking crop of trees. There were a few street lamps but it was otherwise pretty dark.

“Which we should,” I said. Dimitri had his hand on the small of my back and I felt it move lower to cup my ass. I gave him a look that said, “Are you kidding? Now???”

“I’m good at taking it slow,” said Dimitri with a wink. I rolled my eyes.

Tina had put the car under the cover of some trees and overgrown bushes so that, from only a few feet away, you’d have to know it was there to see it. We crossed the small road and made our way into the woods.

Vampires and changelings must have crazy good night vision because I could barely see anything and no one was using a light. I basically had to hold on to Dimitri’s shirt back to keep up and not end up in face first in a ditch or pile of dank leaves. It was eerily quiet, too. You expect to hear birds or rustling or something. But the air was very still and only the sound of us walking could be heard. And we were being very careful.

It felt odd to me, as we walked, that we ran into absolutely nothing resembling a guard. Given the amount of werewolves that had been at the place in Naples, I felt sure we’d have seen some. Robert and Dimitri could even sense them if they were close, and Tina said she could actually smell other kinds of shifters. But none of them seemed to be getting a wavelength on anything as we went.

That worried me.

Not that I wanted to run into some massive wall of werewolf sentinels or something, but I just didn’t buy that Alexis and Stoller would let anyone get even this close. I could actually see some of the castle up ahead. There were lights on in some windows and it was a bit hard to miss such a looming, solid shape.

We were very clearly walking into a trap.

As we walked, I thought about my future. I realize that walking towards an obvious trap during a rescue mission with vampires, werewolves, and shifters is an odd time to do that, but I couldn’t see much and my mind tends to wander when I’m even mildly anxious. Right now my fear meter was off the charts. It needed a distraction. Plus, I mean, I could be walking towards my inevitable doom. You often take stock at a time like that.

I thought about my odd car vision/dreams. Possible futures, hazy past that was becoming a little Norman Rockwellian in hindsight. I mean, yes, my mom loves me and her pancakes are the best. But we had our issues. She wanted me to get married, have kids, and live next door. And I’d thought I’d wanted that. It was one of many massive lies I’d told myself for years.

But that “idyllic” life had come with a father who was emotionally complicated, distant, and barely involved. He and my mom didn’t talk much and didn’t even seem to like each other very much anymore. They were just growing old together because it was easier than not. It was a kind of complacency I no longer wanted in my life.

I’m not complaining: my life had been, you know, good. Easy. Uncomplicated.

Also, very boring. True, when most of us say we want a more exciting or interesting life we don’t mean anything supernatural. We just want, like, better clothes and a vacation by the ocean. We sometimes imagine the world is more magical, but don’t expect it to be. And we don’t really get that “magical” also means “really dangerous.”

All things I now knew having spent the past few weeks on the run. Did I want an existence that was potentially always in peril, forever?

I’d been avoiding the question of whether or not I wanted to be a vampire practically since that night in the alley. I’d been telling myself I’d get to it eventually, but I think I was really just waiting for someone else to make the call for me. Which is pretty lazy, when you think about it. It was my own life I was trying to abdicate control over. Because it was just too hard.

Well, time to get over it, me. One way or another it was going to come up, on the fly, during a crisis, or over a nice mug of tea. I was going to have to choose. Human or inhuman. Dead or Undead.

I know some people would think: what the hell is wrong with you, girl? Obviously you pick vampire! As if there are no serious consequences to consider about, you know, eternity. A concept human beings have been trying to fathom in fiction and reality for…ever. We don’t know how we feel about it. Sometimes it’s this awesome, never-ending party. More often it’s a brooding, painful burden. Is that just wishful thinking? Or a realistic look at a concept we can’t really understand because we’re so finite?

I wished I had some kind of easy answer. Some book or show that had given a definitive “it’s great!” or “it blows!” But nothing thoughtful ever does that. You have to figure it out for yourself. Dammit.

I wasn’t worried about my “soul” or whatever. That I’d be some damned creature of the night. Being around Dimitri, Robert, and even Alexis showed me that vamps had just as much control and say over their nature as humans did. I wasn’t going to stop being me if I did go that way.

And who was I? The eternal question. One I’d have an actual eternity to explore and answer. Which was, I have to say, appealing. The world is a vast place. You can’t even hope to see it all in one, two, or even three lifetimes. If I went fangy, though? I might be able to see…everything. Heady thought.

I could see all the great works of art, over and over. I could visit every city whenever I wanted, however often. I could spend centuries in Paris or London. Get to know them as few others have. I could observe the infinite variety of humanity. Witness whole lifetimes, decades, history.

Some of it would be tragic, of course. And I’d lose those I loved. But I’d lose them anyway. Me dying wouldn’t make that any easier. Or them any less mortal.

Of course, there’s the age-old argument that life only has real meaning because it’s temporary. That you strip that away if there’s no cost, no consequence, no death.

I wasn’t sure if I believed that. Or, if I did, if I wasn’t more terrified of dying than eternity.

I wanted to ask Dimitri or Robert if it was worth it. If the loss and pain was worth forever. If they ever regretted it, if they’d had a choice.

And, of course, there was the blood. Even without killing people I’d have to drink it. To walk that line between being a predator, capable of draining the life out of someone…and just taking what I needed.

In the end, though, it was just a formality. Deep down, I think I always knew what I wanted.

Why do we waste so much time pretending that we don’t?

We stopped at the edge of the woods before a wide expanse of grass that led up to the castle gates. It was kind of weird to be looking at something that so very clearly medieval. Everything was already feeling pretty overly wrought at it was. Now it felt like we were on a literal damsel-in-distress mission that might include a tower and, like, a length of hair.

I mean, the castle even had a moat! I stared at it, wondering if I’d just stepped back in time. But that was ridiculous. Vampires, changelings, sylphs, werewolves I can take. Time travel is just too complicated.

I tugged on Dimitri’s shirt to get his attention. The castle still didn’t seem to have any guards or patrols around the perimeter, which meant they were very confident, thought we were very stupid, and definitely had some massive trick up their castle-y sleeves. I needed to know the plan from here.

“What the hell are we going to do? This is clearly a trap, right?” I hissed, trying not to be loud. The other two snapped their heads and gave me looks that clearly said, “Oh my god, shut up, loud human!” I gave a little shrug, like, well, we have to communicate somehow. Tina made some emphatic gestures, one that was particularly direct and used only one finger. Across her lips to signify silence.

We made our way back a little, then huddled.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

“It’s okay, we should have probably figured out a code or something. Live and learn,” Tina said.

“Hopefully both. Although I’d really rather not get good at rescues,” I replied. She grinned.

“If you two are done with the ‘clever banter’ portion of our mission, we need to deal with this obvious trap problem and how we’re going to avoid it,” said Dimitri with some heat.

And then I had an idea.

“How about we don’t?” I asked. They all stared at me.

“No, I’m serious. Let’s not avoid the trap. Let’s fall into it spectacularly,” I said.

And then we got down to my sudden, brilliant plan.

I strolled up to the front gate like I didn’t have a care in the world. I crossed the moat, looking down into it, only to be disappointed by funky-smelling mud. I’d been hoping for some weird fish at least. Maybe a crocodile. No such luck.