Taken (Book #2 of the Vampire Legends)

t
aken

(book #2 of the Vampire
Legends)

emma knight

Books by Emma Knight

SWORN (Book #1 of the Vampire Legends)
TAKEN (Book #2 of the Vampire Legends)
BITTEN (Book #3 of the Vampire Legends)
CHOSEN (Book #4 of the Vampire Legends)
AWAKENED (Book #5 of the Vampire Legends)

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Copyright
© 2011 by Emma Knight

All
rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no
part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any
form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the
prior permission of the author.

This
ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be
re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book
with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If
you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for
your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for
respecting the hard work of this author.

This
is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places,
events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are
used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.

Chapter One

Benji leaned towards Rachel and clasped
her warm hands. He worried what she would say when he told her his secret. He
wavered, trying to determine if he wanted to tell her the truth about himself,
or make something up.

He looked into her green eyes and with
his free hand, brushed her hair from her face.

“Swear again,” Benji said, his voice
quivering. “Promise me you won’t tell.”

“I swear. I
swear
,” Rachel
replied, staring back at him with her large eyes.

Benji took a deep breath and exhaled,
closing his eyes for a moment. He had never shared his secret with anybody
before, especially not a human, and he was working through an inner struggle,
debating how to tell her. He looked around the covered bridge to make sure
nobody else was around.

He looked back at Rachel, still staring
at him, and felt her hand get clammy. He knew she was getting more nervous with
each moment of anticipation.

“I’ve never told anybody this before,”
Benji began. “I hope you will still think of me the same way after I tell you.”

He stopped speaking, closed his mouth
and swallowed. He felt his voice getting weak. He didn’t want to continue, but
knew he had to at this point.

“What is it? Just tell me already!”
Rachel said.

Benji inhaled. “I’m a vampire.”

*

Rachel stared back at him with a
confused look on her face. He felt her warm hand slide out of his, as she took
a step backwards. Silence filled the air as they both stood there, staring at
each other.

Benji didn’t know what to do. Should he
tell her more, or should he wait for her to say something? He couldn’t tell
what she was thinking, but it wasn’t the response he was hoping for. He was
angry with himself for letting their relationship get this far, and angry that
he told her his secret. He knew it was a bad idea all along, but she gave him
no choice. He knew she would leave him if he hadn’t.

 Standing there on the covered bridge,
Benji watched as Rachel began to shake her head in disbelief. She looked him up
and down as if he were some sort of alien.

“Vampire?” Rachel said. “Stop lying.
Tell me the truth.”

Benji didn’t know how to respond. He
could tell her it was a lie and make up something else: something less scary
and more believable. He thought for a moment but knew he had to stick to the
truth.

“I am telling you the truth. I’m a
vampire. I haven’t been completely honest with you about everything, but I want
to make it right now. I will tell you everything,” Benji said, looking at her,
trying to read her changing expressions.

Rachel took another step backwards and
said, “No! This can’t be. Vampires don’t exist.”

Benji could see her body begin to shake
as she moved even further away from him. He wanted to comfort her and tell her
everything was going to be OK, but he couldn’t get close to her.

“Please hear me out,” Benji said, trying
to salvage the remaining bits of their relationship. “I was born 3,000 years
ago. I live in a castle, but have to flee when danger nears,” Benji said,
trying to help Rachel make sense of it all.

“Stop saying these things. You aren’t
making any sense,” Rachel said, waving her hands in the air.

“I told you I lived with my parents in a
house near AHS, but I don’t. I don’t have parents and I don’t live in a house.
I live at Lyndvia Castle,” Benji said.

“This is crazy. I feel like I know
nothing about you. I can’t do this,” Rachel said as she turned away.

“Wait, let me finish. I won’t hurt you,
I promise. I don’t feed on humans.”

“Stop! Don’t come near me. I need to go
now,” Rachel shouted as she began to walk quickly away from Benji and the
covered bridge.

Benji stood there, and watched Rachel
leave him behind.

“Stop, don’t go! I promise I can explain
it all,” he yelled after her.

He started running towards her, which
made Rachel run even faster. “You swore you wouldn’t tell!” Benji screamed.

Benji stopped running, realizing it was
useless to follow her. He knew she was scared and didn’t want to be with him
anymore.

He came to a stop along the side of a
dirt road and sat down. He replayed what had just happened over in his head,
but still couldn’t believe it.

Did he really just tell his secret?

Part of him was glad he shared it with
her. But a part of him felt regret. He wondered if he had just made the biggest
mistake of his life.

Chapter Two

Rachel peered over her shoulder as she
ran down her block, checking to see if Benji was still following. She was
scared and out of breath. She had never run so fast, or as far, as she’d run tonight.

As Rachel neared her house she saw the
flashing blue-and-red lights of a police car in her driveway.  When she looked
closer, she saw her parents standing at her front door with the police. Now
Rachel was even more worried and scared. Why were the police at her house?

Rachel stopped and watched as her
parents stood there, gesturing to the police officers. She couldn’t make out
what they were saying, but they didn’t look happy. She stood there watching, as
she caught her breath. She composed herself, and began to walk towards the
house.

As she neared the front lawn, the motion
sensor light lit up her face. She stood there like a deer in headlights as the
police officers and her parents turned their heads and stared right at her.

“Is this her?” one of the policemen
asked.

“Yes, this is Rachel,” her dad said. 

Rachel’s heart began to beat faster, and
all she could think about was turning and running in the other direction. She
didn’t want to deal with this situation, whatever it would bring. She couldn’t
understand what the police could possibly want with her.

Rachel continued walking towards the
front stoop, as the two police officers stared her down.

“Rachel Wood?” the police officer asked,
as he looked down at his papers.

“Yes,” Rachel said.

“Do you know anything about a Robert
Greene?”

The two police officers stood there and
waited for her to respond.

“Um… yes,” Rachel said in a quiet voice.
“He goes to my school.”

“Yes, he does go to your school. We know
that. We want to know what you know about the fight tonight. Witnesses said you
were in the middle of it.”

Rachel didn’t know what to do. She didn’t
know how to answer. She was in the middle of it, but she didn’t want to confess
everything that she had found out tonight. She was just beginning to process it
all.

“I wasn’t really in the middle of it,”
Rachel said back, “but I did see it.”

“We need to know all the information you
have on this. A few football players at AHS are in very serious condition at
Westchester North Hospital.”

Rachel felt her heart sink. She didn’t
know what to do.

“We need to know who beat them up. Can
you tell us who you were with?”

Rachel couldn’t lie to the police.

“Benji> He’s another student at AHS.”

The police officers looked at each
other, and then one began to write in his notebook. She saw him write Benji’s
name.

“Where does Benji live?” the officer
asked.

Rachel didn’t know what to say. Should
she tell them he is a vampire and lives in a castle?

“I’m not sure,” Rachel replied.

“You don’t know where your friend lives?”
the officer questioned.

“Well, we are not really
friends
,”
Rachel said.  “We just met.”

The two police officers looked at her
with questioning eyes. “What is the nature of your relationship?” the officer
asked.

Rachel didn’t know how to respond. She
didn’t know what they were. Were they friends? Enemies? Boyfriend and
girlfriend? She didn’t know.

“I said we’ve only just met. We were
becoming friends, but I don’t think I want to be his friend anymore,” Rachel
answered in a sharp tone.

“Why not?” the police officer asked.

“Because he’s not who I thought he was,”
Rachel replied.

The police officer shook his head in
agreement, as if he knew what she was talking about. “Do you know anything else
about the fight?” the police officers asked again.

“No, I don’t believe I do,” Rachel said.

“Thank you for your time. If you hear
from Benji call the station right away. We have a search team out for him. All
we have is one blurry cell phone picture of him, but can’t make out his face. 
Oh, and if you think of anything else, please let us know,” the officer
finished.

“Ok,” Rachel said, feeling worried.

“Thank you officers,” Rachel’s dad said,
a serious look on his face.

“Come inside Dear,” Rachel’s mom said. “I
think we need to have a little family meeting.”

*

Rachel’s heart was thumping out of her
chest and her hands were sweating. She followed her parents into the living
room and sat down on the couch.

“Who is this Benji character?” her dad
asked, as he made himself comfortable on the couch across from Rachel.

“Some guy I know from school,” Rachel
said.

“How old is he and what grade is he in?”
her mom asked.

“Well, he’s a senior, he’s 18 I think,
not really sure,” Rachel replied in a soft voice.

“18!” her dad screeched out. “What are
you doing with an 18 year old guy?”

“I’m not doing
anything
with him!
I told you I just met him, I barely know him,” Rachel said, defending herself.

“You’re fifteen years old, Missy. You
have no business with an eighteen-year-old guy. Especially an eighteen year old
criminal,” her dad added.

“Honey, I think you’ve taken this too
far. She’s only just met the boy, give her some slack,” Rachel’s mom
interjected.

Rachel smiled at her mom and they looked
at each other with knowing eyes.

“I trust you, sweetie. I know you didn’t
have anything to do with this fight,” Rachel’s mom said. “But is there anything
else you aren’t telling us?” Rachel’s mom questioned.

Rachel waited a moment, swallowed as if
to hide what she really wanted to say and then said, “No, that’s all. There’s
nothing else.”

Rachel instantly felt guilty. Her mother
had been so naive and trusting about the whole situation, and she hated lying
to her. She wanted to tell her parents the whole truth about Benji, but after
what had happened tonight, she knew she couldn’t. She figured it was better if
they didn’t know.

“Meeting adjourned,” her dad said, as he
stood up from the couch.

Rachel went upstairs to her bedroom and
shut the door behind her.  She stood there for a minute, trying to process what
had just happened. She walked into her bathroom, put her face in the sink, and
splashed cold water over it with her hands. She stayed there for a few minutes,
leaning into her arms, glancing at her face in the mirror. Did that really
happen?

As she stood in her bathroom, she ran
the night over and over in her head—her conversation with her parents, being
interrogated by the police officers, the fight, and Benji’s secret. Her mind
was flooded with information and all she could think about was Benji.

Vampire?

Rachel tried to convince herself that
she misheard him, but knew she didn’t. Rachel didn’t know what to do. She didn’t
know anything about vampires, except for what she saw on TV at Halloween. She
wondered for a fleeting moment, if it could be possible, and decided she had to
find out more.

She walked downstairs to her family
computer and typed into the Google search bar:
“What is a vampire?”

33 million hits came back. She clicked
on the first and read it.

“A vampire is a being who rises from his
grave at night and lives off of the blood of humans by biting into their necks
with their long, pointed canine teeth.”

Rachel stared at the computer screen.
She couldn’t believe it. Benji couldn’t be a vampire. He didn’t have long,
pointed canine teeth and he didn’t rise from his grave -- or at least she didn’t
think he did. She remembered Benji had said he didn’t feed on humans. If so,
what kind of a vampire was he?

Rachel cleared her Google search and
entered a new one:
“Are there different kinds of vampires?”

7 millions hits came back. Rachel
glanced at all the headings, trying to figure out which one to read first. She
sat there, her hands shaking as she directed the mouse over a site called,
The
Many Types of Vampires in the World today.
Rachel read on, and she couldn’t
believe her eyes.