Vampire's Kiss (34 page)

Josh snorted. “
Fantastic
idea. Really. You’d be sensational.”

With a roll of my eyes and a shake of my head, I walked away, not looking back as I raised my hand to wave.

Yas called at my back, “Sharpen those stiletto heels, Blondie.”

I was nestling my empty glass in the dish cart when I felt a person standing behind me.
What now?

I turned to find Ronan and instantly forgot I was supposed to be mad at him. I’d thought we’d said good-bye forever, but seeing him next to me, in the flesh, relief swamped me, enough
to bend my mind with a momentarily woozy feeling. I fought the urge to fling myself at him for a giant bear hug.

But then I noticed how very deathly pale he was. “Are you okay?”

“I must speak with you,” he said somberly.

As I followed him outside, I had to break the tension and joked, “I bet you didn’t think you’d see
me
again.”

But he didn’t take the bait. Instead, he told me in all earnestness, “On the contrary, Annelise. I am glad to see you’ve returned safely.”

Wow…okay.
“Thanks,” I said, and my response was followed by an awkward silence.

He led us down the path back toward the Acari dorm, his face ashen. Finally he stopped, then turned. “Amanda’s dead.”

It was a total disconnect. “Amanda—what?”

“Your Proctor, Amanda. She was killed. Dismembered. Her body was found this morning.”

The grisly specificity was what slammed the truth home.
Dismembered.
Just the word was hideous, unthinkable. The ground dropped away from my feet, and I was falling, falling, although I stood right there, my flesh gone prickly and cold.

I stared at him, waiting for some fluke to correct itself. Waiting for the jarring words to take on meaning and sense. “How did it happen?”

“She tried to escape. And failed.”

I tried to armor myself, to muster indifference. After all, I was experienced; I’d seen girls die before. Alcántara had warned me not to have friends—Amanda was merely the first
of many I’d lose. And really, she’d been more a kindly Proctor to me than a true bosom buddy.

But the armor didn’t work. Years could pass, I might one day get promoted to full-blown Watcher, and I was sure even then I’d still reel from this news.

A million thoughts dumped piecemeal into my head: how she’d taken me under her wing; the way she stirred her tea and ate only plain yogurt in the morning; how she called me
dolly
.

Most staggering of all, she’d seemed such a part of life here, but had she secretly been as unhappy as I was?

She’d been so preoccupied when I’d seen her last. We’d been so disconnected. And now I felt guilty, though I knew that was ridiculous. Still, I had the absurd notion that the fate she’d suffered had been meant for me. That I was the one who was supposed to have attempted escape. I was the one who would’ve failed. I was the one meant to have died.

I stared at Ronan, looking for answers, but his face remained a mask, frozen and unreadable. My mind raced, wondering what her plan had been, where it’d gone wrong. “How did she—?” But then it struck me: She would’ve needed help. “That
key
. This has something to do with that key you gave her, doesn’t it?
You
were going to help her.”

They’d wanted to escape
together
. Jealousy spiked my veins, burning away the guilt with acid. I felt more of an outsider than ever. Ronan never offered to help
me
escape. Hell, he was the whole reason I found myself in this situation in the first place.

“It unlocked a boat dock on the other side of the island,”
he said. “Except Amanda didn’t make it. Her body was found at the base of one of the southwestern cliffs. She was tortured, then thrown from the side.”

The blood drained from my head. I knew a vampire with quite the taste for torture.

I scraped a hand through my hair. I couldn’t let myself jump to conclusions—we were on an island crawling with vamps. “They tortured her because she tried to escape?”

“They tortured her for information.”

I blanched, hoping desperately this had nothing to do with my Lilac sighting. We’d gotten back yesterday—plenty of time for Alcántara to find and interrogate her. “What sort of information?”

“Perhaps they discovered she’d taken a lover who wasn’t Vampire.”

Ronan.
I swallowed hard. Amanda had once insisted I could succeed on this island without kissing any vampires. Looked like she was wrong.

Ronan was watching my every reaction, the muscles of his shoulders, his jaw, all clenched tight. I imagined it was about as upset as I’d ever see him.

Despite all that’d passed between us, my heart broke for him. I’d miss Amanda, but it was nothing compared to what he must’ve felt. He’d once lost his sister, and now he’d lost his girlfriend, too. “I’m so sorry.”

“As am I.”

“No, I mean, I know you two were a…you know…a thing.”

The look on his face was pure astonishment. “Amanda and
me? Never. She was with Judge. She…It was always Amanda and
Judge
.”

I swayed on my feet, putting out my hand as though I might brace myself on thin air. Ronan and Amanda
hadn’t
been together?
“Judge?”

“Aye,
Judge
. Though her death just proves how impossible such things are when you’re trapped on this island.”

Amanda and Judge; not Amanda and Ronan. Everything clicked into place. Secret keys, secret looks…Ronan had only been the go-between. Did it mean
he
was the one in danger now?

“She was going to escape with Judge?” I couldn’t help the stupid question, my tone robotic, me on autopilot.

“Nobody knows about them, and you’d do well to forget it, too.”

I glared into space, frustrated, angry, confused, even though it was a waste of energy. Ronan was as helpless as me on this island. My life—both our lives—were beyond our control. Our world was one of secrets and violence.

And then came the biggest secret of all. Carden appeared as though bidden, looming beside us and casting us in shadow. He addressed me but stared at Ronan. “Well, Acari Drew, I see I have some competition for your affections.” He’d meant it as a joke, but his smile didn’t reach his eyes.

Ronan stiffened. “McCloud. Might I be of service?”

“I sensed some trouble,” Carden said. “You wouldn’t be bothering our wee Acari here, would you? You see, I owe the little spitfire a debt. Silly, I know. But we vampires tend to stick to the old ways.”

Ronan’s jaw tightened, something sparking in his eyes. Was it realization? Would
he
be the one to guess our bond, not because he had some magic at his disposal, but simply because he knew me so well?

I found my voice, eager to head off any potential male conflict. “He’s not bothering me. I was just going back to the dorm.”

Carden casually folded his hands at the small of his back and began to stroll ahead. “I’ll walk you.”

Once again, I had no choice but to follow. I glanced back at Ronan, and he looked drawn and pale. “Bye,” I told him, and I tried to infuse the word with comfort and connection and warmth—my own attempt at a bond.

I followed in McCloud’s wake, wondering who this vampire really was and what he now meant to my life, because our bond sure seemed more than skin deep. I’d felt intense emotion, and Carden had appeared, and it terrified me more than any Draug ever had.

Fleeing the island was apparently impossible. Escaping one’s bonded vampire felt inconceivable.

T
HE DAY OF THE DANCE
arrived and, as expected, my moment came to dance the Paso Doble. Alcántara held me on the dance floor, leading me, shooting me wicked grins, and calling me
querida
as if nothing had happened, though, of course, something had.

Like, things
really
had.

I felt Carden’s eyes on me. I sensed him from all the way across the room where he was leaning against the wall with a sort of amused disdain, as though he knew a secret nobody else
did. He was easy with his smiles, and Guidons swarmed him like a bunch of cats eyeing an open can of tuna.

I told myself the jangly feeling in my belly wasn’t jealousy.

I’d helped save him—I should be happy. Mission accomplished. I was a company girl now—an agent in the fight of good against evil…or at least evil and a worse evil.

So why wasn’t I happier?

I should’ve felt triumph. Word had gone around that my mission had been a success, and the Guidons were giving me a wide berth. Another girl in my circle had died—this time a friend—and once more it hadn’t been me.

Yet the only thing I felt was alone. I was rudderless, at sea. And I couldn’t help the nagging suspicion that the vampires who’d trained me weren’t entirely what they appeared.

H
is lips.

Not quite full, not quite thin. Just the right shape for an easy smile. They hitched up at the corners when he got that
look
—that look that said he was thinking of doing something reckless.

I’d move closer, and he’d part them. His eyes would drift to my—

“Acari Drew.”

The stern voice brought me back to myself.
Crap.
I was doing it again. Thinking about
him
. The vampire.
My
vampire. Carden McCloud.

“Are you paying attention?” my teacher asked. Thankfully it was just Tracer Judge and not one of the vamps. Daydreaming in class when a vampire was your teacher was high up on the list of Stupid and Possibly Deadly Things To Do.

Just after bonding with a vampire.

As I’d bonded with Carden McCloud.

His lips.
A glimpse of fang, shimmering. I’d felt that fang, an accidental slip, a hot kiss.…

“Acari Drew?”

“Yes, Tracer Judge,” I said automatically. I gave a quick shake of my head to clear it.

Focus.
I was in class. Combat medicine. It was actually kind of cool. I wanted to focus.

I wouldn’t call myself a teacher’s pet, but I was the smartest thing they had going around here. My brains were what made me stand out. But it’d been my abusive, deadbeat dad who had hardened me, who had landed me on the Isle of Night.

Generally, every girl here had been an outcast in her former life. There were girls who’d called juvie home. Druggies and gang girls. Bad seeds. We were the sorts of girls who’d never be missed.

Only the most elite eventually became Watchers, so vampires recruited only the strongest, the most ruthless. The best among society’s bad girls. But training was lethal, and survival demanded
more
. Something extra. Something special.

In the normal world, my genius IQ had made me a loser. A social reject. But here? Here it made me an object of fascination. Someone with possibilities. In a place that valued secrecy and cunning, smarts meant potential.

We all had talent, but all too often these were things like a proclivity for knife play or an inability to feel pain. (My pyromaniac, maybe-dead/maybe-not former roomie-slash-nemesis, Lilac, came to mind.)

Roommate.
Now, there was a topic to consider.

As in, where was mine? Fall classes began last week and there was still no sign of Lilac’s replacement.

Rather than seeing the empty bed in my room as a good sign, it freaked me out. There was no way the vampires were letting me have a double room all to myself, and it did
not
bode well that something was holding up this new roomie.

Had she already been selected? What would
her
gifts be? And would she view me as a freak, as Lilac had?

But, most important, would I be able to hide my relationship with Carden from her? Because this blood bond was proving to be…immersive.