Page 23 of Missing Piece (Neon Scars #2)

W ith as long as he had been alive, Vincent had never been one of those vampires who hated the passage of time and the speed of technology.

He embraced it with open arms, because he promised himself he wouldn’t end up like one of the old ones who hid from the world and longed for a time when screens didn’t exist and people mysteriously dying of sudden exsanguination didn’t draw too much attention.

Vincent prided himself on being modern.

But his cracked phone seemed to be taunting him and testing his patience.

Since the moment Petrov’s ancient truck had rumbled away with his niece and his Adam— no, wait, just Adam —he had been waiting for a message.

A call. Anything. Ophelia was perpetually on her phone doing God knows what and yet for some reason she didn’t have the time to send a text saying they got there okay? What if something happened?

What if Adam said something to provoke her? That thought made his stomach clench. Adam was foolishly impulsive and delightfully mouthy. What if he pushed her too far?

I should have considered this before letting her just borrow him.

He could just cover himself head-to-toe like Tariq did when he needed to go out during the day, but if he showed up at his neighbor’s house before sunset, he knew it would bother Ophelia.

She was volatile and had a mean streak about her, but she kept to her word when it came to serious matters.

She promised to look after Adam and not to kill him. Vincent had to trust her.

Frustrated, he glanced at his watch, then at the darkening sky. The sun hung low but hadn’t quite disappeared. Shit.

“Thirteen fucking minutes,” he mumbled as he paced in front of the door.

Luka knocked on the wall as he descended the stairs. ?What’s wrong??

Vincent looked back at his watch. Only a minute had passed. He ground his teeth together as he plopped down onto the piano bench. “I let the kid borrow Adam,” he said.

?Why??

?Because that girl has every one of us wrapped around her finger, and because I am an idiot,? he signed.

?I’ve noticed your IQ dropping ever since we got our house guest.? Luka gave him a weak smile. It made Vincent want to vomit and punch him at the same time.

“Fuck off,” Vincent snapped.

?Seriously, you’ve been acting even weirder lately.

You are always calm. Nothing bothers you.

But I’ve barely seen you down here and when I do you are like this.

What is it about the boy that makes you like this?

? Luka asked. He pushed Vincent to the side and sat down next to him on the bench, his eyes wide but relaxed.

This usually meant he was being sincere. ?I won’t make fun, I promise.?

Vincent wrung his hands. “I don’t know. It’s driving me fucking crazy. Every time I try to do things the way I was taught, my beast gets antsy. It makes no sense. I’ve never had this happen. It’s like…vampire erectile dysfunction.”

Luka laughed. ?From what Ophelia said she overheard, ED does not seem to be an issue.?

Vincent glared at him. “You said you wouldn’t make fun.”

?You can’t use a word like ‘erectile dysfunction’ and expect me not to laugh.

I am old, not mature.? Luka stiffened his shoulders.

?You know fighting with yourself leads to destruction.

You thought you wanted a new trial, and it’s not working out that way.

Don’t make it complicated. Stop looking for the why. Just let it be what it is.?

“I don’t even know what it is,” Vincent confessed.

And if it’s not a trial, then there is no reason to keep him chained up.

Here. With me. Where I want him to be. He couldn’t say that aloud.

Or sign it. That was too much of an admission.

And Luka was a wildcard when it came to his stance on human matters.

For all Vincent knew, his advice on the matter would range from “kill Adam” to “set him free with a check for ten grand.”

Luka chopped his hand down into his palm.

The sign for STOP. He scratched at his beard for a moment before beginning to sign, his hand movements slower and more deliberate than his usual rapid-fire gestures.

?It doesn’t matter what it is. It doesn’t need a name or a reason why, because any word you come up with won’t be right.

Let it be. Until the day a hunter catches us off guard or we leave the house after forgetting to set the clocks back, we are immortal.

You have a hundred years to agonize over what this might be. For now, just live in it.?

Vincent stared for a moment as Luka lowered his hands to his lap and lifted his chin a little, waiting for a response. Everything in him lurched with the urge to vomit and punch Luka in the face again. But in a more affectionate manner.

Luka was right. It didn’t matter that he spent decades being the ruthless monster his maker taught him to be.

It didn’t matter that he spent years after that trialing humans to the brink of insanity for his own entertainment and a steady blood supply.

It didn’t matter that he had once tried loving humans only to have his heart ripped out and burned to ash because the hunters wanted to punish him.

He could just…go with it. Stop fighting the tide that was up to his knees, and trying to pull him out to sea with its current. It whispered at him to stop fighting. Just go with it. Experience this new feeling.

But that was what scared him. New feelings always brought pain.

There was no way to prevent it. If humans thought they had it bad, the constant churning emotion in a vampire body was chaos at best, each emotion fighting over who got to pilot the body from minute to minute.

In that way, he almost envied the old ones he had met.

The five-hundred-year-olds who just picked one way of being and never deviated,even to their own detriment.

?I will consider it,? Vincent said. ?Has Petrov managed to gather the others so we can meet over the supply issue??

Luka frowned. He probably wanted to keep discussing Adam. ?We meet in three days at Euphoria. Ten confirmations, so not everyone, but most.?

Vincent nodded. That would be enough of them to spread the word to the other four who wouldn’t be present. God, that was another issue to deal with. Hunters. Granted, not all of them were as bad as those he had dealt with in the past, but as a whole, he did not want them around.

Marcus could deal with whatever shit was coming down that particular pipe.

He was old, he had the experience, and honestly, with Ophelia (who, despite spending the night under the false pretense of ‘catching up’ with him, had spent most of the night at target practice with Petrov behind the house), they would probably force the hunters to back off before they ever reached the farmhouse.

Luka flapped his hand to get Vincent’s attention before forming a V with his index and middle finger, tapping his middle finger to his own chest. It caught Vincent off guard, because Luka and Matteo only used his sign name when they were dead serious.

?Vin, I’m here if you need to talk. About Adam or…

? Luka closed his eyes and waved his hand, cutting himself off.

?Anything. Anything you need to talk out. ?

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Vincent said, his throat tight.

?Should we go retrieve the humans??

He noted the time. 7:44. The sun was down.

Or, at least it should be. I should give them another few minutes before starting my worrying spiral again.

He needed to believe that Ophelia was handling things fine.

And that Adam was okay. Ophelia might take offense to him rushing there right at sundown to check on them and decide to send a box of ten thousand lady bugs to his house like she did to her high school principal.

Though, to be fair, Vincent had helped her set that up because it seemed like the least destructive option.

She had originally wanted to plant brown recluse spiders in the man’s pillowcases.

The phone lit up as he considered his options, buzzing and ringing with her sullen yearbook photo taking up the screen. Now that was odd. She preferred to text. He hit the button to answer and switched it to speaker. “Are you dead and disemboweled?” he asked.

“Not quite.” She sounded like she was out of breath with a banging sound in the background.

Vincent jumped up. “What’s going on? What is that?” He pulled his keys from his pocket, clicking the button to remotely start his car.

“Just come here. Now.”

“Ophelia, I can’t hold this much longer!” he heard Adam shout over the banging in the background.

“Adam? ‘Phelia?!” Vincent stared down in horror as the phone call ended. The beast clawed at the inside of his chest, gnawing on his ribs as panic crashed over him. Adam’s in danger.

He looked up at Luka, his eyes wide.

“Go,” Luka rasped, rubbing his throat as he used his damaged vocal cords for the first time in years.

Vincent flung open the front door, not even bothering to check that the sun had fully set or shut the door behind him. He nearly ripped the car door from its hinges.

Retrieve him.

Protect him.

Bring him back.