Page 30

Danny

W hen Danny’s dad had died, driving home from the airport after a red-eye flight, eight-year-old Danny had been woken in the middle of the night by his mom.

“Your dad’s been hurt,” she’d whispered, shaking him gently.

“We need to go to the hospital.” There’d been no warning of how bad his crash had been, and nothing had prepared Danny for the fact that, by the time they’d gotten to the hospital, his father’s heart had stopped.

Driving to see his brother— Gabriel was hurt —Roman hadn’t pushed Danny for a reaction.

He’d let him stay silent, and Danny was grateful for that.

He hadn’t realized how deeply entrenched the trauma of that night was until he’d felt it being repeated.

Hadn’t known how to process the fear Roman’s whispered words had evoked.

Walking into Gabe’s hospital room now, Danny only realized how truly numb he’d been since hearing the news of the attack when a painful mix of guilt and relief washed over him at the sight of his brother.

Gabe was hurt. Gabe was alive. Gabe would be okay.

His brother had already been moved out of the ER and was lying in a hospital bed with his splinted right arm resting on a stack of pillows.

He was free from any obvious cuts or bruises—Soren’s work, Roman had told him—and the only clear injury was the broken arm.

His eyes looked vacant though, and his body was trembling slightly, almost imperceptibly.

Even when he finally noted Danny’s presence, almost a full minute after Danny had stepped into the room, the vacant look didn’t leave his eyes. As if Danny wasn’t really there.

“Gabe?” Danny kept his voice soft. Gabe’s eyes, a more golden color than Danny’s own, slowly focused from their empty stare and finally settled on Danny properly.

“Danny.” Gabe’s voice was hoarse.

“How-How are you feeling?”

His brother gave a slow shrug with the shoulder of his uninjured arm. “They’ve given me a good amount of pain meds, so…” It didn’t really answer the question, but it seemed all he was willing to say on the matter.

“That’s good,” Danny said inadequately. “I’m glad—I’m glad you’re not hurting. Are they going to keep you here overnight?”

Gabe stared at him dully. “It was an open fracture. They need to do surgery. I had eaten before—before all this happened, so they’re waiting a few more hours.”

An open fracture, meaning the skin had been broken, the bone having torn through it. Luc must have snapped Gabe’s arm violently. Danny’s stomach churned at the thought.

The silence became strained, but Danny didn’t know where to begin. In the end, Gabe was the one who broke it. “Where’s your shadow?” His voice was bitter.

“My shadow?”

“That guy who’s always around you lately. Roman .” Gabe said the name like a curse. That didn’t bode well.

Danny cleared his throat. “I thought maybe you and I could use a moment alone.”

Gabe nodded at that, but his mouth twisted. “That guy…except he’s not a guy, is he? None of them are. Not him or that little blond one or the one—the one who did this to me.” He raised his splinted arm in demonstration.

“What did he say to you? The one who did that.”

“Not much. He was busy with…other stuff. Right before he snapped my arm, he told me to be a good brother and give his regards to Roman and his ‘little human toy.’ I’m assuming that’s you?”

Jesus. “Not what I prefer to go by, but yeah, I guess so.”

Gabe’s stare went vacant again, the man lost in recollection.

“He was so strong, Danny, so fast. I couldn’t do a thing to defend myself.

And his eyes…his teeth… He— He bit me. And it fucking hurt .

Then suddenly he was gone, and Sor—that blond one was there, licking all my cuts and the bite, and then they were just—just gone?

” Gabe’s trembling had increased visibly, and the volume of his voice had risen until he was basically shouting.

It was a miracle no one had come in to check on them.

“Who the fuck are these people, Danny? What the fuck are they?”

Danny felt helpless and small in the face of Gabe’s distress. It was one thing for his own world to be turned upside down in the span of a few days; it was a whole other thing for his brother’s to be. For him to be hurt and scared and confused.

“Maybe now’s not the best time—”

Gabe shook his head violently. “Tell me what’s going on, Danny.”

“You’re in shock, Gabe.”

“No shit.” Gabe laughed humorously. “Tell. Me.”

Danny went to sit on the edge of Gabe’s bed, trying not to be hurt when his brother flinched at his closeness. “If I tell you, you have to promise to stay calm. No more yelling. Unless you want them to put you in a psych hold after your surgery.”

Gabe nodded at him in agreement and said in much calmer, quieter voice, “Just tell me what’s going on.”

“Roman and Soren and Luc, the one who hurt you—you’re right, they’re the same.

Well, not the same , exactly. Luc’s gone kinda feral and grr-y, where the other two are generally pretty chill.

Relatively. Mostly. Right. Well. Um. Well, they’re all…

vampires?” Was this how Roman had felt telling Danny the truth?

Because Danny was feeling straight-up bananas saying it out loud to someone else.

“Vampires,” Gabe deadpanned.

Danny bit his lip. “Yep. Uh-huh. They used to be human, and then they were turned—that’s what they call it when they become a vampire—and now they don’t age, and they drink blood, and they’ve got some other cool stuff going on like moving really fast or healing stuff with their saliva or like… mind control, I guess you’d call it?”

Gabe was staring at him, seemingly at a loss for words, so Danny figured he should just power through. In it to win it. Better for his brother to know it all if he was going to know any of it, right?

“So they all used to be friends, and then something tragic happened, and it loosened a few screws in Luc’s brain, and he’s had it out for Roman ever since.

They’ve been playing this epic game of hide-and-seek for a few decades, but then Roman came here, and he saw me, and he thinks that maybe I’m his…

destined vampire soulmate, I guess? Like, each vampire maybe has a person whose soul helps keep their inner demon thingy tame and not psychotic, and he thinks I’m that person for him?

” Danny hated that all his statements were coming out as questions, but he’d never said any of that last part out loud to a non-Roman person, and he was aware that he sounded really, super, batshit crazy.

He tried to catch Gabe’s eye to gauge his reaction, but his brother had taken to staring at the wall.

“Vampires,” Gabe muttered a second time.

Danny giggled, to his own horror. “Kind of wild, right?”

“And that douchebag—”

“Hey!”

“—following you around… He’s fixated on you as, like, his vampire bride or something?”

Danny couldn’t help but roll his eyes at that. “Jeez, Gabe, offensive much? Vampire husband , if you please.”

Wait, what?

Gabe was just nodding, eyes growing wild. “Okay. Okay, so…first step, we need to get you out of town. I can’t go with you yet, surgery and all, but maybe one of my buddies…”

“Gabe.”

“I’ve got a little saved up. Not nearly enough, but we can make it work. Do we need to change our names? How do you even go about changing your name, like, under the radar? Why didn’t they teach us that in school?”

“Gabe!”

Gabe finally stopped his frantic muttering and looked at Danny.

“I’m not going anywhere.” Danny enunciated each word clearly.

“If you’re worried about leaving me here—”

“I don’t want to leave, Gabe. Yes, Roman’s fixated on me, but the fixation is…mutual. I like him. Maybe more than like. He’s kind and thoughtful, and he wants me. No one’s ever wanted me like this before. And I want him right back. I don’t want to leave him.”

Gabe nodded, but Danny’s relief was short-lived.

“Mind control,” Gabe said.

“Excuse me?”

“You said one of their powers was mind control.”

Fuck. “Did I?” Danny definitely had.

Gabe was looking at him with something suspiciously like pity in his eyes. “Danny, if he’s got his creepy vampire fingers in your brain, you can’t be trusted to make your own decisions.”

“He’s not mind-controlling me, Gabe.”

“How do you know?”

“I just—I just do! Besides, they only use it for simple, temporary stuff. They can’t just make a person think they’re in love with someone else long-term.” At least, Danny didn’t think so. He was sort of talking out of his ass at this point.

“In love.” Gabe’s voice was flat. “You’re in love with this monster.”

Had Danny really just accidentally confessed his love for Roman to his brother? Did he really mean it? Not the time, Danny. “He is not a monster, Gabe. Listen, you’ve been hurt, and you’re angry, and I get it. But you’re being very speciesist right now.”

“ Speciesist ?” Gabe was now looking at him like he’d grown another head. This was going very well .

“Yes. Exactly. Assuming that simply because they’re not human, they’re evil monsters.”

“It’s the drinking blood and breaking my arm that has me convinced they’re evil monsters, Danny.”

“Humans do the same shit every day, Gabe! Well, maybe not the blood drinking,” Danny conceded.

“But how many injuries do we see on our patients that have been inflicted by other people? If vampires are evil because one hurt you, then the whole human race needs to be written off too. One bad banana doesn’t mean you throw away the whole bunch. ”

“I think the phrase is ‘bad apple.’”

“Whatever.” Danny huffed. “Vampires are complicated creatures, just like any other species with any sort of intelligence. Learn a little more about them before you judge.”

Gabe was looking at him now with an expression Danny couldn’t quite place.

“ Well ?”

“Sometimes I forget how special you are, Danny.” Gabe’s voice had noticeably softened. “Ever since we were kids. You see the good in everyone. You want to help everyone. You’re a good person.”