Page 19 of Vicious and Volatile (Vengeance and Venom #2)

I end up spending the entire day with Elle. I would have stayed with her for days, picking her brain, learning more of her story, but she eventually needed to get home to her family.

She never offered for me to meet them, and I get it. She’s protective of them. She’s shared a massive, important secret with me. But she will still keep them separate.

She’s a good mom and a protective wife.

It’s pushing midnight by the time Billings drops me off at home. I feel like I’m buzzing, electric with everything that I’ve learned in the past day. I feel alive with it all.

And I understand something as soon as I walk back into the penthouse and Ares is there. As soon as I lay eyes on him, I know it.

I don’t want to make an exit out of the vampire world.

Me asking Ares to take that cure for vampirism would make Ares human again. We would have no reason to be involved with the affairs of vampires anymore. It would make the most sense for us to pivot and create a very different life.

I don’t really want to change our life.

I love our life.

I feel like I’m in the right place, like I was meant to be a part of this world. So, asking Ares to change, to no longer be a vampire, doesn’t solve anything.

It would change the basis of who we are as a couple, how we came together.

And I wouldn’t change that for anything.

So, as Ares crosses the space and wraps his arms around my waist, I know it without a doubt: I won’t ask Ares to take that cure.

It’s nice to know the option is there. But I would never want Ares to be anything other than what he is.

“How was Boston?” Ares asks as he looks down into my eyes.

“Amazing,” I say, unable to fight the smile growing on my lips. “And Elle is just incredible.”

“Tell me all about it,” Ares says as he guides us to the living room. He sinks onto the couch and pulls me down into his lap.

I smile as I loop my arms around his neck. I do tell him about it. But I know it in my soul, I won’t tell him about the cure. And it isn’t that I want to hide anything from Ares. I don’t know that I’ve ever hidden anything from him. But why would I ever put the weight of that responsibility that comes with the knowledge of the cure on his shoulders?

I’m never going to ask him to take it.

So, I tell Ares about everything else, but not the cure .

I feel incredible after my visit with Elle. I feel so much more solid in my knowledge of this world. I know what my options are. It almost feels like everything is perfect.

But there’s still a gaping hole in my chest.

So, when it’s been just over a month since we brought her back to New York, I set out to Ophelia’s apartment on a Sunday afternoon when I know she’ll be home. I’ve rehearsed what I want to say about a hundred times, but none of it feels right. I’m just praying it will come to me in the moment.

So, with nervous, shaking hands, I enter the code for the main door. I take the elevator up to the nineteenth floor. I walk down the hall to apartment C, and I knock.

“That was so fast—” Ophelia cuts herself off when she opens the door and sees it’s me. “You’re not the Korean food I ordered.”

“Nope,” I say. “We’re going to talk.”

I push my way into her apartment, past her, and into her living room.

“There’s nothing to talk about, Lana,” Ophelia says as she turns, glowering at my audacity in barging in.

“There is,” I say firmly. “Can you shut that door? This should be private.”

She stands there at the door, studying me. The look in her eyes is hard. Defensive. Not a great start. But finally, she pushes the door closed. When she turns back to me, she folds her arms over her chest.

“Look, I wanted to start over, explain all of this from the beginning,” I say, hoping and praying she will listen.

“I don’t really want to hear your justifications, Lana,” she says coldly.

“I fucking risked my life for you, Ophelia!” I snap out, fixing her with a hard stare. “You will hear me out. Now sit down.”

Her eyes widen at that. She raises one eyebrow at me. But she turns, and she heads for the couch in the living room. The space isn’t huge, but it’s practically new, and she doesn’t have any roommates, which means she practically lives like a queen in this city.

I pull over a chair from her kitchen island. I sit right in the middle of the living room.

I take a deep, steadying breath, trying to clear my mind. I want to do this right. I want to make her understand. I want to fix this.

“After you went to the Red party, I kept trying to call and text you, and you didn’t answer. So, I knew something was wrong. You wouldn’t have ghosted me.” Her expression darkens. She’s been ghosting me for the last month now. “It took me a minute, but I tracked down the date and location for the next Red party. That’s when I realized what the parties were for. Realizing vampires are out there definitely freaked me the hell out. But I still went to the next one the week after that. I was looking for you, Ophelia. I was asking questions, I was showing everyone your picture. I knew it was dangerous being there, but I wasn’t going to stop. You’ve been my family for the last year and a half.”

Something softens in her eyes at that, but just slightly. I’m all she has, too. Her mom died when she was young. Her dad was never there. Her grandmother died. Her brother died. And her sister has been missing for nearly a decade and is probably dead as well. She might still have some extended family left in Chicago, but no one she can count on. But she’s had me.

“It was at the Red party that I met Ares,” I continue, wandering into the dangerous territory that’s torn us apart. “He and his father were estranged, had been for three years. But he knew something shady was going on. He was trying to figure out what was happening at that party, why Augustus was throwing them, but not attending. Ares saw me asking about you. He knew I was in danger, though he didn’t know the purpose of the parties yet. He tried to warn me away. But when he saw I wasn’t going to give up, he offered to help.”

Ophelia pulls a pillow into her lap. She doesn’t say a word, just stares at me with suspicion and doubt.

I let out a hard breath. Ophelia is one of the most stubborn people I know, and it’s awfully annoying in this moment when it’s directed at me.

“Ares knew his dad was doing something bad, but he didn’t know what, and he couldn’t do anything about it without getting back into Augustus’s good graces. Trust me, there’s a big, complicated story behind it, but he needed someone to pose as his fiancée to do that. So, he made me an offer. I pose as his fiancée, and he would help me find you.”

That arches Ophelia’s brow. She’s surprised by this.

“The whole reason Ares and I ever met, ever had interactions, is because of you,” I say as my tone softens. “I was scared at first. Of course I was scared, O. I didn’t know what to expect from him. He is a vampire, and I had no idea what I was getting myself into. We had to sell it. The ring,” I raise my left hand, displaying said ring that is still on my finger, this time with real intent. “The new clothes. The new house. Living together. It was all part of the show, so we could get back into Augustus’s circle, so we could find you .”

I keep waiting for her outburst. For her to interject. She’s never been one to hold back. But she just listens, her entire aura prickly.

But I’ll take it. I’m just glad she’s letting me talk right now.

“It took time,” I say. “We knew Augustus was tied to the Red parties, but we didn’t really know what it meant. But Ares started digging. He didn’t go back on his promise to help me find you. Not once. And O, we spent a lot of time together. It was out of necessity to sell it for real, but we got to know everything about each other. He knows about Mom and Emmie. He knows about Dad. About how I lost the gym. My thing with blood.”

She makes a scoffing sound. Which I’m not surprised by. She knows how I’ve always reacted to blood, the trauma response after seeing my mother and baby sister dead, their blood all over the apartment. I shut down at the sight of blood, and I pretended to be a vampire’s fiancée.

“Ares is good ,” I say, the words coming out soft. “If you give him a chance, you’ll see it. You did see some of it, you were just delirious. I saw it every damn day. And over time, all that pretending became real. I did fall in love with Ares. I am in love with Ares. He treats me like a damn queen. I’ve never felt so cherished and worshipped. I’ve never felt safer in my entire life. And it’s with Ares—a vampire.”

And I know I’ve said it wrong when with the last few words, Ophelia’s expression darkens.

“Does he still drink blood?” she questions, her words cold.

I hesitate. It feels like she’s setting a trap. “He has to. But he hasn’t fed live in years.”

“So, he just takes invaluable donor blood from people who need it in the hospital?” she says sharply .

I close my mouth. What she’s said is correct. But there isn’t going to be any reasoning out of this with her.

“Does he still have fangs?” she presses farther. “Is he still predatorily fast? Stronger than you? Do his nostrils still flare when he has his lips on your neck because, to him, your blood smells so damn good?”

I should say something. I need to stop this runaway train.

But this just hurts.

“Lana, I do not understand this,” she says as her grip on the pillow tightens. “You’ve been bitten. Fed on. You were sold. Your basic human rights to yourself were stripped away. By his father . These are predators. I can’t fight my instinct to breathe or the fact that I need water. How long do you think he’ll fight his instincts because he supposedly loves you?”

“Not all of them are out of control,” I snap. “You’ve met, what, two vampires in your life, and only one of them is like that.”

“That’s like saying ‘not all men,’” she snaps bitterly. “But what have you made your entire career? Teaching women to defend themselves against men. Because we always have to watch our backs. We always have to be alert. We always have to have our guard up. You’ve let your guard down, Lana!”

“He saved you, O!” I shout, my volume rising. “He put his whole life on hold. We spent dangerous weeks, months trying to find you. It wasn’t just me. It was Ares, too. Who was it who tracked down the record so we could come save you? Ares!”

“Two bad vampires, Ophelia,” I snap. “You’ve had experiences with two bad vampires. But what about Ares? What about Sysco? What about Harry? What about Clementine? These are all people I consider my friends. Good friends who would have my back. And every one of them is a vampire! ”

That just deepens the look of disgust on her face. “So, you’re just their bitch now?”

It would have hurt less if she’d slapped me across the face. I straighten. I practically choke on my tongue.

“Vampires kill people, Lana,” she says, her tone low and ice cold. “They torture people. They are predators. One kept me in a mausoleum for months. And you start fucking one, and suddenly they’re your whole circle?” She shakes her head, utterly disgusted.

“I can’t believe you,” I say. It feels like my entire body is filled with boiling acid. “I am trying, O. I am trying to help you be less judgmental. Trying to show you that one bad, one horrific experience does not dictate an entire species. But you…” I shake my head. “I feel like I don’t know who the hell you are anymore. Because the Ophelia I loved would trust me. She would hear me out. She would try to understand.”

“Guess that Ophelia died the first time a vampire latched onto her throat and took away her freedom,” Ophelia says coldly.

“I can’t fucking believe you,” I say as something bites the back of my eyes. I feel brittle right now. Like with one little flick, I’d shatter apart. “I dedicated my whole life for two months to finding you. And you just spit in my face, because I fell in love. There’s no being happy for me. No congratulations that I’m engaged to the love of my damn life. You’re just going to shit on me and say goodbye?”

I see something flash in her eyes, like something is registering. I realize that it’s the fact that I said engaged in present tense.

“Leave him, Lana.” Ophelia suddenly stands. I lean away from her, but she walks right up and takes my hands. She stares into my eyes. There’s something a little wild in her expression, and I’ve never seen her stare at me with this kind of intensity. “You don’t actually love him. Leave him. Reclaim your life. And let’s get back to the way things were.”

Something in my stomach gives a little lurch. It feels like my body is filled with black sludge.

But there isn’t an ounce of me that’s tempted for even a second.

“No,” I say as I pull my hands free of hers. “You’re wrong about Ares. You’re wrong about the rest of them. And you’re wrong about me.”

That hardness creeps back into her eyes. “Not everyone in this city is so enamored with the vampires. I hope that someday you’ll wake up from this. But until then…” she shakes her head and backs away from me a few steps. “Stay the hell out of my life. I don’t want to hear from you again, Lana.”

Cold. It’s as if she’s thrown a bucket of ice water on me.

That’s it. I can feel it.

There’s a cold finality to her words that leaves no room for doubt.

I stand from the barstool. I hold her gaze the whole time because suddenly it feels like I can’t trust the person standing in front of me. Something feels… sinister in the air. I back toward the door. “You’re wrong. About all of it. But at least it revealed one thing. Someone who can throw me away like this, someone who is so damn deaf to what I’m saying, isn’t someone I want in my life.”

We stand there, staring each other down. I swear the temperature of the air has fallen ten degrees.

“Goodbye, Ophelia,” I say with hoarse words.

I pull the door open and step out, nearly tripping over the food in a bag left right in front of the door. I close it behind me. And swiftly, I walk back to the elevator. With every step, I shake harder. With each step, my vision swims more.

The first sob breaks free when the elevator doors close, shutting me in solitude. I stare at my reflection in the polished surface of the doors. Another sob rips through my chest.

It’s over. It’s fucking over.

The one person who I thought would be there through thick and thin, who I thought would always have my back, has rejected me in the harshest, coldest way possible.

And I know it deep in my soul.

Ophelia Bennett will never be my friend again.