The Bonding Ritual (Girls Wearing Black: Book Four) (57 page)

Nicky went on a little tour of the house and closed the doors to every room, reducing the line of sight for each hidden camera, and limiting what the microphones would hear.

It was almost
time.

She walked into the parlor, where there was a single camera built into the wall, but no microphones of any kind. This was the room where it would happen.

This was the room where Sergio would find her.

He was coming. She didn’t know how she knew it, but she knew it. He was coming for her tonight, and would be here soon.

She went to one end of the room, and stood before the portrait of Sandra Rennselar. Grabbing the portrait by the frame, she slid it to the right, until it was touching the portrait next to it, completely covering the camera built into the wall.

Then she went to the middle of the room, sat down in a high-backed chair, and waited.

*****

The music blared, the disco lights spun, and the students danced.

Daciana loved prom.

It was a distinctly American tradition, a rite of passage for children on the cusp of adulthood. When Daciana first arrived in America, she was surprised at the stature the prom ritual held among the middle class. For many young women in those days, prom was their first date without a formal chaperone. For many young men, prom was the first time they were allowed to drive the family car.

Corsages for the women, boutonnières for the men, formal dress, a fancy dinner beforehand, a wild party afterwards—over the decades, the prom ritual evolved, but it never strayed from its rite-of-passage roots. That’s what she loved most about it. In a world so disrespectful of ritual and tradition, prom held strong onto the American imagination, allowing teens brimming with sexual energy a chance to express themselves in a ritual passed down through the generations.

As
Daciana watched the kids dance, she saw their parents dancing in the same gym thirty years back, and their children dancing thirty years hence. That was the power of tradition. Time marched ahead, relentlessly. The world changed. Technology and culture and language evolved, dragging society headlong into an uncertain future.

Tradition was the only way to make sense of it all. Ritual was the only piece of the past that could be carried forward.

Tonight, Thorndike would complete its most sacred ritual. The immortal was chosen. The cage was ready. Sergio was on his way to Mary’s house.

And Nicky Bloom was in place, ready to take a walk in the moonlight. She would start her walk at the Purgatory House and end it in the steel cage at the back of the dance floor.

“You were looking for me, Daciana?”

She turned to see a short boy with broad shoulders and thick black hair. Jake Castillo. One of the names she got from Mary Torrance the night before.

“Mr. Castillo. Yes, I need to ask you some questions.”

“Okay. What about?”

“You live in the Huntington Heights neighborhood, correct?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Has Annika Fleming ever been to your house?”

He hesitated. Daciana grabbed the back of his head and stared into his eyes.

“Has Annika Fleming ever been to your house?”

His mind blubbered around back there like jello—this kid wasn’t the brightest boy at school—but the truth was easy enough to find.

“I had a party last fall,” he said. “She came for a few hours.”

“I don’t care about last fall,” said Daciana. “What about last month? Annika Fleming returned to Washington a few weeks ago. She visited someone in Huntington Heights. Was it you?”

“No ma’am.”

“Who was it then? Who did she go see?”

“Probably Jill.”

“Jill Wentworth?”

“Yes ma’am. She and Annika were tight, that is, after Shannon died.”

“Find her for me,” Daciana said. “Tell her to come see me at once.”

*****

For the second time that night, Alvin took the delivery truck to the front gate of Daciana’s mansion. The same servant came out of the booth to greet him.

Alvin shot the servant with a tranquilizer dart. He collapsed to the ground.

Through the front gate, around the house, then all the way to the back, where a line of cars, vans, and trucks was waiting for him. Alvin went to the keypad and punched in a six-digit code.

A code the Network got thanks to a set of cameras that were in Nicky’s earrings one night.

The whole convoy entered the estate—everyone the Network could scrounge together for a last-second operation like this. Alvin led them across the back side of
the grounds, stopping in front of the loading dock where, earlier in the day, he had dropped off a wooden crate.

The bay doors were wide open. Phillip Fischer was standing there to meet him.

“We’re all clear inside,” he said. “I count forty-two sleeping beauties in the house. The gas is mostly dissipated, but let’s have everyone wear masks just in case.”

Alvin went around to the back of the truck and opened the doors. He pulled out three cardboard boxes full of gas masks.

“Alright everyone,” he said. “You know what to do.”

*****

There was a boy waiting on the porch with a gun in his arms and a vacant stare in his eyes.

Sergio commanded him to stand aside.

The boy stepped out of the way, and Sergio opened the door. He found her in the parlor, sitting in one of the chairs.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” she said.

Her back was to him, but he saw her face reflected in the glass in front of the fireplace.

“I’m supposed to be gone already,” she said.

“Gone where?”

She stood up and turned to face him. Never before had he seen her look so beautiful.

Had he seen anything look so beautiful.

“My friends are leaving tonight,” Nicky said. “I’m supposed to go with them.”

Sergio went into the parlor, stopping when he was right in front of her.

“But you didn’t,” he said.

“I knew you would come.”

He reached out and grabbed onto the ruby pendant hanging from her neck.

“I had to wear an item to honor the clan,” Nicky said. “But really, I wore it to honor you. I never thanked you for giving it to me.”

“It looks good when you wear it,” Sergio said. “You make it beautiful.”

He let the ruby slip through his fingers, and his hand slide onto her waist. Gently, she raised her hand and put it on his shoulder.

“I recognize that bracelet,” he said.

“I wore it the first time we met,” said Nicky. “When we danced at the Masquerade.”

Outside, music from the prom radiated away from the gym, gently vibrating the walls and the floor of the Purgatory House. It was a slow song, with a deep, hypnotic beat. Lightly, Nicky shuffled her feet back and forth, and then they were dancing. In small, swaying movements, they danced, just like they did the first time they met.

“You didn’t win the contest,” he said. “Our bonding ritual isn’t complete.”

“Then why are you here, Sergio?”

He danced with her for a moment before answering, their bodies inching closer as they moved.

“I felt drawn to you,” he said. “I’ve always felt drawn to you.”

“What about Mary? Aren’t you supposed to be at her house right now?”

“I can’t do it, Nicky. I’m different than I was. You’ve changed me. For centuries, I’ve been able to draw forth my venom at will. It’s what made me unique. But I can’t do it anymore. I’m the same as all the others. I can only make a new immortal when I bond, as I have with you.”

“You said we have to complete the ritual. You said the ritual makes the bond.”

“It does,” Sergio said. “And tonight I feel more strongly bonded with you than ever.”

“What are you saying?”

“That you weren’t meant to win Coronation after all. Our ritual was different than I thought it was. You were meant to disappoint me, Nicky. Only then could I realize how deep my love is for you. You failed to complete the ritual I laid out for you, and still I’m here. Still I’m ready to make you immortal, to join with you as one.”

He pulled her closer. Their chests made contact. He felt her heart beating. He closed his eyes and they danced. Just as they did at the Masquerade, they became one with the music, their bodies intertwined, losing themselves to the rhythm.

And then she kissed him, and his body sang in ecstasy. The touch of her lips on his, it was everything he had ever wanted in the world. For five hundred years he had waited for this moment. It was better than he imagined it could be. It was joy, beauty, harmony, life itself—Sergio felt like he hadn’t truly lived until now! The feel of her lips, of her hand on the back of his head, of her body pressed against his.

His fangs came out. The venom coursed through his veins. He would burst if he didn’t release it soon. An explosion of ecstasy. Every nerve in his body screaming in anticipation. He was going to bond! Finally, after so, so long, he had found the one, and he was going to bond with her!

He pulled away from the kiss, ready to make for her neck, to insert his fangs deep into her
flesh. He opened his eyes for only half a second. To look at her. To stare into her eyes and share this moment with her before it finally happened. And when he saw her, she looked even more beautiful. Her hair was down. She was an angel with flowing brown hair that had fallen to her shoulders and…

She moved too quickly for him to respond. At first there was nothing, then there was pain.

Terrible pain.

“Nicky?”

Her right hand was extended. She had thrust it into his chest.

Into his heart.

He looked down, expecting to see her entire hand in his chest cavity, wrapped around his still-beating heart. It wasn’t her hand he saw. A weapon. A slim piece of steel. She had stabbed him and his blood was gushing forth from his chest, spilling all over her hand, which was wrapped tight around the weapon. She leaned in, twisting the steel farther into his heart.

“Nicky?”

“You never asked about the third item I wore to honor the clan tonight,” she said. “The crossbars from the paper lantern you made for me. I tempered the steel and sharpened the edges.”

Sergio fell to his knees. Nicky bent down with him, holding her arm around his back. His heart had stopped beating. The world was fading away from him.

“I meant what I said to you that night in the safe house. I felt the connection, Sergio. I’ve always felt it. From the very first time we danced together, I felt it.”

“Nicky.”

The word came out in barely a whisper. There was no air in his lungs to say it.

“But I didn’t come to Thorndike to fall in love with you, Sergio. I came here to kill you.”

Her arm still around his back, Nicky laid Sergio’s head on the floor, gently.

“Goodbye, Sergio.”

His world fading to black, Sergio looked up at Nicky Bloom. Her white dress was covered in blood, just like the girls in the portraits behind her.

She was so beautiful.

After five hundred years of life, Sergio died on the floor of the Purgatory House, in the arms of the only woman he had ever loved.

Ryan was hiding in a bathroom stall when he read the text from Jill.

Got what I needed and am on
my way to the next job. See you at the rendezvous.

Jill’s “next job” was hacking the computer at Daciana’s mansion, and “the rendezvous” was a farmhouse in Richmond, Virginia, where everyone was supposed to gather after their jobs were completed tonight.

Ryan’s job, his only job, was to walk into prom with Jill and cover for her while she stole Daciana’s phone.

His work was done. It was time for him to go.

He lingered in the stall for a moment. It surprised him how scared he was to leave. He wasn’t just leaving the prom. He was leaving behind his entire life.

He sent a return text to Jill.

Good luck with your next job. See you after you’re done. On my way out now.

He slipped his phone into his jacket pocket and left the stall. Jake Castillo stopped him right outside the door.

“Dude. I’ve been looking for you,” Jake said. “Where’s your girlfriend?”

“I don’t know,” Ryan said. “I was in the bathroom.”

“I can’t find her anywhere. Daciana’s looking for her.”

“Oh. Daciana? Do you know why?”

“Not a clue. She’s just got me looking for Jill. Hey, if you see her, will you send her Daciana’s way?”

“Sure thing.”

Jake slapped Ryan on the back, saying, “Good man,” and then walked away. Ryan stood in place for a second, pondering what this meant.