Page 5

Meghan

Suddenly, the painful prick of fangs digging into my neck vanished. Something jerked away the heavy weight of the vampire on top of my body. I fell free from his painful grasp around my neck. Staggering back, I gasped for air as stars exploded in my vision.

“Watch your mouth.” Leo shoved the vampire away from me and stood between us, guarding me from Tweedledee and Tweedledum.

Before I could catch my breath and figure out what was going on, there was a wretched scream as Leo twisted and ripped the vampire’s head off in one twisting motion, like he was plucking a grape. All that remained of the monster that tried to kill me was a black puddle of foul smelling ooze on the ground.

Leo looked down at the puddle with disgust before stepping aside and addressing the remaining lackey. “The punishment for treason against the Master is death. Is that clear?”

The vampire cowered and fell to his knees. He touched his forehead to Leo’s shoes. “Yes, sir.”

“And remember that any and all of the humans under our care are his property. Any liberties taken are also an insult against the Master.”

As much as I was thankful that Leo saved me, a part of me couldn’t help but bristle that he only killed the other vampire because I was the property of the Master. According to the laws of vampire society, I was nothing outside of my status as chattel.

“Yes, sir. Thank you, for your kindness and understanding, sir.” The vampire trembled as he groveled at Leo’s feet.

Leo sighed and nudged him away with a slight kick like he was an annoying rat. “Get up and go back to the loading area. Until further notice, you are assigned to the docks. If I see your face in here again, I won’t be so understanding next time.”

The vampire lackey scrambled to his feet and scurried away after some more groveling and sniveling. As much as I hated him and his partner, I couldn’t help but feel pity for him as he ran away.

“Are you okay?” He reached out, as if he wanted to run his hands over my arms to check for damage, but held back with hesitation before he made contact. His words echoed in my mind again. He wasn’t really worried about me, the only thing he was worried about was the status of his master’s property.

I stared at my hands, which were tightly clenched around each other. I squeezed my right hand around the left, though it did nothing to control my shaking. “I’m just peachy.”

Leo frowned. Obviously, he didn’t believe me. If my hoarse voice cracking didn’t give away my fear, my entire body trembling like a leaf probably told him all he needed to know.

“Come on, let’s get you somewhere you can sit down before you collapse.” This time he reached for me, his hands rested on the small of my back as he supported me and ushered me away from the site of my attack. His touch was soothing, as if he had the power to draw away the panic and adrenaline rushing through my body.

For the first time in a long time, I was safe. I could relax. Too tired to analyze why Leo of all the vampires was the one who made me feel this way, I decided to just go with it. In such a cruel world, I had to learn to take whatever good and comfort came my way.

“I thought you would know better by now than to try to run off by yourself.”

I stiffened. My reputation for running away was going to follow me around forever. There was no way I could say anything about the cloaking potion without getting Rose and Lizzy in trouble. I had to think of something quickly.

“I wasn’t running away,” I said defensively. “We ran out of dish soap and there was nobody posted by the kitchen who I could ask for help.” I gave him a look, as he was the one who was usually posted nearby keeping an eye on us. " I wanted to find the supply room to get some, but ran into those two jerks before I could find it."

He looked at me from the corner of his eyes, but did not say anything. I had no doubt that he saw right through my lie, though he didn’t call me out on it.

“Next time, wait until I get back. It’s not worth losing your life over some dirty dishes. Everyone knows the Master has ordered that humans remain off limits, but as you can see, vampires are not very good at following directions. Even under threat of death.”

We arrived back at the kitchens too soon. Stopping just outside the doorway, we could hear the other girls were still inside. Judging by their conversation, my absence was noticed.

“Where do you think she’s gone this time?”

“I think the bloodsuckers have eaten her by now. There’s no way she could have gotten far.”

One of them scoffed. “I doubt even a starving vamp would want her. She’d probably give them heartburn.”

“Who cares. It would be better around here without the stuck-up bitch always glowering at us. Imagine all the extra room we’ll have now that we can take over her corner of the room.”

They giggled and started to talk about how they were going to split up the meager belongings I had hidden under my mattress.

Even though I wasn’t close to any of the girls, their words still stung. I had no idea they hated me so much. I could disappear and they really wouldn’t care.

“Let’s get you out of here.” Leo whispered. He reached for my hand and tugged, urging me to follow him.

“Where are we going?” I asked as I let him lead me away. We were walking toward an area of the building I had never been before.

“A place where no one can find us.”

We took a series of turns down dark twisted corridors and descended two sets of stairs until we finally arrived in a large underground garage. It was filled with expensive looking cars that would not have looked out of place zooming down the streets of Monte Carlo.

I was confused but intrigued.

I followed him as we made our way down the rows of cars until he stopped in front of a teal Lamborghini that hugged the ground. The car looked like some kind of advanced alien’s idea of what a car should look like. Leo touched his key fob, and the doors on both sides of the car lifted like a pair of wings.

Even the cynical voice in my head had to admit that was pretty awesome.

“Get in.”

I climbed into the car as gracefully as possible, which was difficult with how low the seats were. I hoped Leo didn’t notice as I flopped into my seat with the grace of a drunken sea lion.

“Are you going to take me into the woods where nobody will find my body and axe murder me?” I joked as I buckled my seat belt.

Leo started the ignition and scoffed. “If I wanted to off you, I could do it right here, right now, no need for the woods.”

I stuck my tongue out at him. Jerk face.

He gave me a look full of meaning as he pulled the car out of the garage. “You have to promise to keep this a secret. Nobody can know about this place, not even Rose, Amanda, or Lizzy.”

I was as confused as much as I was on the edge of my seat with curiosity about where we were going. A joke was on the tip of my tongue, but the words died in my throat at the vulnerable look on Leo’s face. He was trusting me with something important to him.

“I won’t. Your secret is safe with me.”

He nodded, satisfied with my answer. “You’ll like it, I promise.”

I held onto my seatbelt with a white knuckled grip as we zoomed down the dark, empty streets of Los Angeles. The only things I could see were what was immediately in front of us and lit up by the headlights. With no other traffic on the roads, Leo pushed the racecar to its limits, going multiple times the speed limit posted on the road signs and sending me sliding across my seat with each sharp turn.

From what I remembered of the Los Angeles area, the Diamantis clan headquarters were somewhere near the downtown business and industrial area. We drove away from the urban core and soon we were flying down the freeway away from the city of angels. In the before times, we would have crawled along in gridlocked traffic, but today the entire road was ours.

Soon we took an off-ramp and turned down a couple local streets until we pulled into what looked like a typical suburban neighborhood. The houses were large, but in the before times, would have been cozy and welcoming unlike the soulless McMansions that filled most suburbs. It was the type of place that would not look out of place in a scene from a Hallmark Christmas movie special.

I pictured the type of people who used to live here. Happy families with perfectly well-behaved children and fluffy golden retrievers playing behind white picket fences and neatly trimmed hedges. Those poor people had no idea that their lives were going to end so suddenly. Almost all the homes were empty shells now, looted and vandalized soon after their inhabitants were killed.

It reminded me of my own home in Michigan. My parents most likely suffered the same fate as the people who used to live here. Regret filled me for having left them with so much remaining unsaid between us.

Leo kept driving until we reached what looked like a dead end, but it wasn’t. The paved road turned into a dirt road, obscured by the dead branches of once overgrown shrubbery.

I winced as the branches scraped against the side of the car as he drove through. I guess it didn’t really matter if the paintwork was scratched. Not much mattered these days.

Deeper and deeper we went down the bumpy dirt road until I thought my teeth were going to fall out of my mouth by how much they rattled in my head. Finally, I saw something in front of us lit up by the headlights. It was a house, though rundown shack might have been a more accurate description. It definitely looked out of place compared to the other neat and ornate houses in the neighborhood.

Leo drove the car until we were a good distance behind the house before he turned off the headlights and cut the engine.

“It’s better to park back here. We’re less likely to be spotted this way,” Leo explained.

Right.

I reached for the handle on my door, but before I could open it and get out, Leo was already there and holding the door open for me. Even though I didn’t need any help, I took his outstretched hand and accepted his help in getting out.

“What are we doing here?” I asked.

My eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness without the light from the headlights. I examined the little house, and maybe I had been a bit harsh in my earlier judgment. The windows were boarded up, which gave it a creepy abandoned look. In the before times, I imagined that the garden would have been full of flowering shrubs and trees, with chirping birds and butterflies fluttering about. It was actually kind of cute, like a grandmother’s cottage in a fairy tale or something.

“This is my house,” he replied.

“Really? I don’t really see you as the cottage core type.”

“You’d be surprised. That should teach you to never judge a book by its cover.”

Leo made his way over to the back door and pulled out a flashlight. He turned it on and handed it to me. “Here, hold this for me.”

I followed him with the flashlight. There wasn’t much except for a large white propane tank and some broken flower pots on the ground. He walked over to a giant terra-cotta pot and then started turning over the rocks on the ground surrounding it.

“I stumbled upon this place while on patrol in the before times. The owner was an elderly lady who passed away without family. I waited, but nobody came to claim the house. So, I boarded it up and cleaned it up the best I could. It looks awful, but after the darkness came, the looters didn’t even bother to come here. They all thought this place had been ransacked already, and the other houses looked like they had more expensive stuff to steal.”

“Ha!” Leo held up a bronze metal key triumphantly. I followed him as he practically skipped in excitement to unlock the back door. It took a couple of minutes of jiggling and coaxing, but Leo eventually got the creaky door to open. The noise pierced the otherwise silent night like a gunshot.

He ushered me in and closed the door behind us, locking it even though I doubted that anybody knew we were here.

“You can never be too safe,” Leo replied as if reading my mind. “I’ve kept this place a secret, but someone could have followed us here.”

Leo rummaged through some drawers before he found a box of matches. With the strike of a match, he lit up half a dozen candles placed around the room. The flickering flames lit up the room with a golden, cozy glow.

I turned off the flashlight and examined our surroundings. We were in a simple room with a rustic kitchen and dining area on one side and a living area on the other side. A plush love seat sofa covered in thick fuzzy blankets and plump pillows sat in front of a stone fireplace. The pile of ash and streaks of black soot on the stone indicated that the fireplace was functional and had been well-used instead of just a decorative centerpiece.

Leo caught the direction of my gaze. “I know a warm fire would feel really good, but lighting one would send up a smoke signal and give away our location.”

I sat down on the sofa and shrugged. “This is already cozy enough for me. It’s so much more than I expected.” It was true. After living on survival mode in prison-like conditions for so long, a simple home with soft pillows and some privacy was like a slice of heaven.

Leo rummaged around the kitchen cupboards like he lived here all along. “I used to come here when I needed to get away from the vampire clan. All the cloak and dagger stuff and Machiavellian power plays get to be too much sometimes. Is gin okay?” He held up a half empty glass bottle like it was a trophy.

“Yeah. Whatever you’ve got is fine.”

The pop of the stopper coming out of the bottle sounded like a firecracker in the silent room. “Good, because that’s all there is. I hope you like it neat.” He came over with two glasses and handed me one before he sat down next to me.

“At this point, I’m just glad I’m not drinking boiled swamp water,” I said wryly before I took a swig. The alcohol burned going down my throat, but the warmth spreading throughout my body was worth it. “This is so nice. I wish I could stay here forever. It reminds me of home, before everything went to shit.”

Leo sighed. “When I was younger, I used to dream of what life would be like if I was just a normal man. What it would be like to come home from work to snuggle with someone. We would clean up dirty dishes from the dining table after dinner, or settle down in front of the fire after putting the kids to sleep.”

He threw his head back and chugged the contents of his glass in one gulp. “It sounds so stupid, now. That life only existed on TV and for other people. It was never going to be mine. The darkness and violence will always be in my blood. My life is in service to my master.”

Never in my life did I think I would feel sorry for a vampire, but at this moment, Leo’s words filled me with sadness. He would never escape his life as part of the Diamantis clan. What torture it must be to live for an eternity without knowing a moment of peace.

Neither of us was ever going to know peace as long as the vampires ruled the world.

I don’t know what came over me, but the words spilled out of my mouth before I could doubt myself. “I know it’s not real, but what if for tonight we pretend. You’re just a normal boy and I’m just a girl enjoying a night at home after a long day.”

I held my breath as I waited for his answer. Was I making a fool of myself?