The Night House (28 page)

And what is this awful chill I feel in my bones?

We’re moving now. How did we get back to the van so soon?

Stop. Think. Find Ally.

I close my eyes tightly. The vamps don’t know I can bring myself out of this. Unless that was all a hallucination. No. It was definitely real. I know because I felt Bianca’s heart break inside my own chest.

I felt Micah die. I felt his energy fading, like a candle flame flickering in a snowstorm. I felt his heart stop beating and his blood stop moving. I felt his brain shut down. I felt his dying breath, and then I was forced out of his mind and body, like being tackled to the ground.

Micah…you were so strong.

I can’t let him down by letting her go.

Where the hell is Ally?

Now I feel an ache in my neck. Not my own pain. Ally’s been leaning her head on Shiloh’s shoulder, and she’s getting a cramp. She’s scared. She won’t let Shiloh leave her alone. She’s hates to feel so dependent, but not as much as she hates the thought of losing me.

Shiloh is still holding her. He knows Ally won’t be the same, and worse, he doesn’t know what’s happening to me. He wishes he were confident enough to tell Ally everything’s going to be okay, but he can’t bring himself to lie to her.

Ally is too tired and scared to help me now. Shiloh will have to do.

Focus.

Shiloh sits with his back against the wall. One arm is around Ally’s shoulders, the other is gripping his guitar: two of the most important things to him. It gives him strength. Maybe enough to tell her it’s okay. Maybe enough to believe it. He knows I’m smart. Vampires might be strong, but I have something they don’t.

He smiles now. He’s remembering something. He tells Ally, and together they laugh in that way everyone does when they really need to be cheered up and they really want it to work, but they know it won’t.

I smile, too, even though I have no idea what they’re saying.

But I’m with them.

I open my eyes. I can see again. There are three vampires in total. Finn and two others.

This is a stranger sensation than being high. I see where I am. I see myself, the vamps, the van, but I don’t feel any of it. I see the others bumping along with the road, but I am still. One of them opens a window and their hair blows in the breeze, but I am the same temperature.

I am Shiloh’s senses. I am his emotions and his pain and his nerves.

There is heat on my left arm from Ally’s body. My legs are stiff from sitting there for so long. I can even feel the strands of Ally’s hair on my shoulder. I know when he opens his mouth, when he blinks, when he breathes. I’m calm, because Shiloh’s found a way to comfort the girl he’s always loved. I’m desperate, too, because Shiloh thinks I’m somehow the dumbest and the most intelligent person he knows and I have to pull through because he’s going to kill me for this.

In the van I move my head, but I barely feel it. Only enough to understand that it’s happening. I wave my hand in front of my face. It’s there, I see it perfectly, but it just feels like a memory of movement.

It’s like I’m in two bodies at once, half in mine, half in Shiloh’s.

The van slows to a stop.

“Get him out,” Finn says and throws his door open.

Stalker opens the side door and slings me over his shoulders. Finn stands on the curb. He can’t keep still. He keeps moving his hands from his pockets to his hips and back. He’s turning in every direction, scanning every corner and shadow.

“Put him down,” he orders.

I am deposited onto the street.

“Get back to the Night House, both of you.” Finn says. “I don’t need you screwing this up any more.”

“You sure?” the vamp asks.

“Yes, I’m sure,” Finn barks.

“Alright,” the vamp says and backs away. He retreats into the van and the tires squeal.

Finn stands between the city and me. When I’m sure we’re alone and his lackeys won’t come back, I bolt toward the water. I make it down the stone steps before Finn catches my arm and sends me sprawling across the pavement.

With some concentration, I manage to stand up on my own. I stumble back a few steps, trying to get as close to the water as possible. Then I meet Finn’s gaze directly.

“So this is it?”

Finn backhands me, ruining my balance. “You never had a chance.”

I turn back to him, but he sweeps my legs out from under me and I’m on the cement again. As I stumble back to my feet, I manage a laugh. “Micah had more strength than you without his fangs.”

He knots the front of my shirt into his fists. “You should be on your knees. You’re a disgrace, not even a
real
vampire. You can only dream of having power like mine, you disgusting
half breed
.”

Half breed.

Half vampire.

One of my parents wasn’t human.

I am half vampire.

“Did you know my parents?” I ask, much quieter than I intended.

He snarls laughter. “If I did, I assure you, I would have rid the world of the traitorous vampire who decided to create a spawn.” With a precise motion, he snaps open a knife, holding it like an extension of his arm. “Since I couldn’t prevent you from ever being created, the least I can do is make you wish you’d never been born.”

Bianca

There is a pool of blood where Micah used to be and an empty promise of where James is.

The tunnel is silent.

I am completely numb.

Jeremiah faces the crowd. “I’d like to thank you all for coming. Unfortunately, I cannot stay for the after party, but I hope you all enjoy yourselves. This has been an incredible evening. And it was all thanks to you and your support. It means a lot to me. I will serve you well.”

Still gripping me tightly, he turns toward the stairs. I stumble after him. Priscilla catches up to us quickly.

“Darling, simply wonderful ceremony. I do hope whatever you have planned for this evening is for pleasure. It’s too soon to start working yourself into the ground.”

When Jeremiah turns around to face her, his smile is disturbing. “As you wish.”

Priscilla winks at me and leaves us for the crowd, where she belongs.

Once Jeremiah and I are up the stairs, we pass by all the gated shops. Our footsteps echo around the hall like gunshots. There is a faint odor of fried food and cat piss. Then we’re up another flight of stairs and now we’re street level. All the motion forces some of the numbness away. Jeremiah’s touch sickens me. The anger feels right. It fills the hole in my chest.

The limousine waits for us by the curb. This time, no one opens the door for us. Jeremiah shoves me inside and climbs in after me. The car jumps to life and we’re off.

I say, “Where are we—”

“Shut up.” He crushes me against him. “No talking.” He stares down at me with that almost-happiness. Then he jerks my head back. His tongue is on my neck, and I feel like crying.

“Where to begin,” he breathes.

He must have bared his fangs, because I feel nauth hitting my skin. That’s when I remember the garlic.

The desire to fight courses through my blood. I have to be careful now. I can’t let him bite me yet; I’ll lose control too quickly. He must have already gotten some of the garlic off my neck. I just have to outlast him.

I take a chance and reach up to his face, placing my wrist next to his mouth. He takes the bait, running his tongue over my skin. I want to gag, but I push down all of my emotion. I am an actress. This is just another appointment at the Night House.

Jeremiah slides one hand down to my hip. “Do you know how hard it is not to drain you completely every time we are together?” He releases my neck, only to touch my face. His breathing changes, becoming more ragged and I pray that it’s because of the garlic, and not how close we are. His hand trails down my cheek. “You don’t even know what you do to me. The blood of a true heir is so addictive.” Quickly, he presses his face into my neck, and I brace myself for the bite of fangs.

Instead, he kisses my pulse. This is a different kind of feeding. I grit my teeth and comfort myself with the thought that he is only getting more garlic. But I want to throw up.

He begins to laugh. Terror ices my heart as I think he must have tasted or smelled the garlic. He puts his hands around my face. His eyes are glassy.

“I was alive when St. Germain performed the experiment that changed him.”

He licks his lips then and takes my arm in his hand. He presses my other wrist to his mouth, inhaling deeply. This is so much worse than anything he has done to me at the Night House. I am not just blood to him. I am a body as well.

He nicks my wrist with his fang, watches a thin trail of blood paint my arm, then lets some nauth land in the wound. It sizzles as it repairs the skin. He lets out a small sigh.

“Who would have thought,” Jeremiah speaks dreamily. “Changing iron into silver…”

My breath catches. I put on my infatuated voice. “Please tell me more.”

He smiles for me, and I think he feels the garlic because his pupils are dilated. Then he tucks some of my hair behind my ears. “Alchemy, Bianca. The ability to change one element into another. He tried to create synthetic blood, the fool. He wound up changing the properties of his own blood. He spent the rest of his days in hiding, as every vampire in the world began to hunt him and his unique blood.”

My heart pounds like a hammer against my ribs. I can hear Finn telling me I don’t have a blood type.

I choke out, “I don’t understand.”

“There is no iron in you.” Jeremiah takes my chin in his hand. “It is silver. So much more potent than regular human blood. I have spent centuries in search of you, St. Germain.”

It’s so crazy. But if that’s true, then maybe it explains how I’ve managed to stay alive for so long. It may even explain how I managed to keep Micah alive. But it’s so crazy.

“And to think that bottom-feeder Finn is the one who brought us together.” Jeremiah laughs. “I’d thought you were just another random human with an important surname. When Finn told me he had a St. Germain in his Night House, I expected you to be like all the others— coincidences I’d found over the centuries. But instead, you were a true heir, real and waiting for me. Meant for me.”

Finn had sold me out from the start.

I try to take my anger and make myself stronger. I couldn’t save Micah, but I bargained for James. And there may still be a way to save myself.

James

He comes at me with everything he’s got.

The muscles in my hands tighten and I feel tension in my shoulder. By the time I realize Finn is going to punch me, it’s too late. My body flies back and hits the ground. I can’t really tell how hard the hit was. Maybe I would have passed out if I wasn’t so deeply in tune with Shiloh right now. He’s stroking Ally’s hair. I can feel her curls parting at my fingertips.

I get back up again.

Finn grasps the knife tighter. Nowhere inside his twisted head does he actually find the desire to kill me, only the fear of what will happen if he refuses.

“You don’t have to do this, Finn.” Even as I say it, I know it won’t make a difference.

“I’d rather betray her than disobey him.”

Then he flies at me. I brace myself, but at the moment of impact, Shiloh happens to stand up. The contradictory motions send my mind reeling. I hit the ground and actually feel it, but I’m also walking across Shiloh’s room. Finn slashes at my stomach and it’s like someone lit my skin on fire where the blade crossed. I desperately try to claw my way back into Shiloh’s head, but he’s too far away. Instead, I go for the closest thing and find myself in Finn’s body.

Adrenaline courses through me, but at an unusually fast rate—it feels like my heart might stop at any moment. He can’t believe what he just did, but now that he’s started, he has to finish. The smell of blood is invigorating.

My arm tenses and my hand squeezes so tightly, it hurts.

He’s going for the kill.

As Finn raises his knife arm up, I lash out and palm his hand at the top of his reach. If he’d been human, it would have stopped his momentum. Instead, I am able to redirect him just enough so that the knife slices across my cheek instead of my throat. Finn winds up punching the pavement. The reverb makes my arm go numb.

I don’t know if it’s because of all my blood or the shock of his hand hitting the street so hard, but Finn’s grip loosens.

With both my hands, I claw at the knife, wrenching it from his clammy fingers.

My hand is around the knife.

With every ounce of strength I have, I throw the knife toward the water.

We hear a distant
plunk
.

Finn blinks.

I heave all my weight at him. Now he’s on his back and I’m straddling his chest, lunging for the pin on his jacket. When he tries to pull my wrist away, the pin tears free from his clothing. It’s in my hand now, its point touching his neck. His veins pulse against its edge.

He stops dead, gaze glued to mine.

I am here for Bianca. But it’s not
just
for Bianca. She’s not the only girl at the Night House. Alex, her friend, is still there, and all those other girls. If I walk away from Finn, he’ll return to the Night House and keep running them into the ground, just to keep himself safe.

But I’m also here for my sister, and my best friend, and my parents. If I don’t do this, Finn will keep after me. I’d put them in danger.

There is so much hate inside of me. I could kill him right now. Just another inch of pressure, and the iron would pierce his skin. The girls would go free, and the world would be rid of one more vampire.

Easy.

Considering everything he’s done, he deserves this.

But then I think of Bianca. She cares about him. There must be something inside of him worth saving. So I search his being, tear through his emotions, desperately seeking something worth saving. I want so badly to find that single scrap of decency. I want him to be good, so that Bianca can be right.

And then I feel it. Or rather, I see it—a single star shining in the pitch-black night: Bianca. She’s there with him. And it kills him.

But guilt isn’t enough. I push even further, to see if I can tell exactly how he feels. I see the locked door of his mind, and with every ounce of strength I have left, I pry it open.