A Shade of Vampire 8: A Shade of Novak (8 page)

I
woke
up to a searing pain in the back of my head. I reached for it and felt a round bump. I was lying on a hard metal floor. I sat up and rubbed my eyes. Ben lay a few feet away from me. I scanned the room for Kristal and Jake, but they were nowhere to be seen.

I was sitting in a dark, damp room. And it felt like we were in some kind of vehicle or vessel, because we were moving forward. The lower deck of a boat, or perhaps the storage chamber of a submarine.

Memories flooding back, I scrambled over to Ben and shook him. He didn’t budge at first.

Oh, God.

I turned him over onto his back and placed my ear against his chest. I exhaled sharply when I heard his heartbeat.

“Ben!” I whispered, shaking his shoulders. “Ben, wake up!”

I shook him more violently. When he still didn’t open his eyes, I gave him a slap across his face.

That woke him. He groaned and slowly opened his eyes. “Wh-where… what happened?” He sat up, wincing as he rubbed the back of his head.

“I don’t know. I just woke up a few seconds ago.”

“Where are Kristal and Jake?”

“I told you, I don’t know.”

He pulled himself off the damp ground and we both sat on the bench.

“I don’t understand why these vampires want us,” he said. “I thought that vampire left you on the beach, even though he could have easily taken you?”

My brain was throbbing. “Yes,” I said. “He let me go. He even seemed scared to come near me.”

“Then what the hell are we doing here now? Who are these vampires? Where have they come from? They shouldn’t even exist.”

I paused and ran a tongue over my parched lips as a more disturbing question entered my mind.
What will they do—or what have they already done—with Kristal and Jake?

“Some supernatural powers would come in handy now,” Ben muttered.

My throat was so dry, I was dying for water. I scanned the room, but there was nothing down here except a few dirty blankets in the corner. I buried my face in my hands and breathed deeply.

If anything happens to them, it will be all our fault.

We should have just gone to that stupid Scottish island.

“Ben,” I said suddenly. “Check your pockets. Is your phone still there?”

He reached into his back jeans pockets and shook his head.

“They must have searched us and confiscated it.”

I swore.

Ben got up and walked over to the metal door of the chamber and banged his fists against it.

“We’re awake, you assholes!” he yelled, his voice as hoarse as my own. “Some water would be appreciated.”

Ben returned to his seat. Several minutes later, footsteps sounded outside and the door creaked open.

A tall ginger vampire stepped in and placed a tin bowl filled with water down on the floor. I recognized those light blue eyes of his instantly.

“What have you done with them?” I hissed, jumping up and running toward the door.

He slammed it shut before I could reach it.

I shouted in frustration and kicked the door. I looked down at the bowl and brought it over to the bench.

“You have some first,” Ben said.

I took a sip, then passed the bowl to him. We alternated until we’d drunk it all up. It tasted stale and metallic, like it had been stored in some kind of old rusting container for too long, but at least it wasn’t sea water.

Ben placed the bowl on the floor and I rested my head against his shoulder. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me closer against him.

“I miss our parents,” Ben admitted.

“Me too.”

U
nder the questioning
glares of all the vampires on the island, we made them all gather in the large clearing outside the Black Heights and wait in line as we called them into the mountain chambers for interviewing. Claudia, Ashley and Zinnia produced a particularly loud symphony of complaining, so we saw those three early. Eli, Derek and I each interviewed a vampire at a time, but it still took all day even though each interview didn’t last long.

We even interviewed those closest to us: Vivienne, Xavier and my own father, Aiden. Although there was no chance in hell they’d betray us, we had to do it.

Lastly, we asked ourselves the same questions and concluded that each of us had alibis.

As it turned out, every single vampire on the island had alibis for the night the Cancún kidnappings took place… except for Aiden and Abby.

Eli, Derek and I sat alone in one of the mountain chambers we now used for storing sacks of food for the human inhabitants of the island.

“Well, leaving aside my father and Abby for a moment, everyone else seems to be innocent,” I said. “Of course, unless this is a mass operation with multiple vampires going behind our backs and providing each other with alibis.”

“I suppose that it’s possible,” Derek said. “But that would be hard to orchestrate on such short notice. We asked detailed information and it would have been hard to not slip up.”

“So, we’re left with Aiden and Abby,” Eli said, frowning at the long list of names of vampires in front of us.

“Ludicrous,” I said. “Neither of them would do something like this.”

“So, since you’re convinced of that, we can cross everyone at The Shade off of our list of possible suspects,” Eli said, dropping the list on the table and leaning back in his chair, stretching out his legs.

I nodded.

“So we’re back to square one,” Derek muttered.

“I’m going to turn in now,” Eli said, standing up. “I’ll think more about all of this when I’m fresh in the morning.”

Derek and I returned to our own penthouse. We both sat at the dining table and sipped on some blood before heading off to bed. As we were both drifting off, a pounding on our front door sent us shooting up out of bed.

Derek swung the door open to see Eli standing at the door, covered in sweat, eyes alight with panic.

“I just tuned into the news before sleeping,” Eli said, panting. “There have been more kidnappings. Hawaii.”

He came rushing in.

“There were two incidents… some days apart from each other. The second incident,” he said, gasping for breath. “R-Rose and Benjamin Novak, both twenty-one years old. Staying with Kristal and Jake Palmer, eighteen and nineteen. They said on the radio. All four are missing.”

“What? But they’re not anywhere near Hawaii,” I breathed. “They’re in Scotland. And they’re seventeen. It must just be a coincidence.”

“Twins! They’re twins!”

Whatever blood I still had in my pale face drained out of me. I looked up at Derek. His jaw dropped open, eyes widening.

“Come! I’ll show you,” Eli urged. “They showed photos. I saw them. They’re your twins, goddamn it!”

I
must have drifted
off in Ben’s arms, because I woke to the sensation of the submarine shuddering so violently both Ben and I were thrown to the ground. I groaned as my head connected with the wall. Then my stomach lurched—it felt as if we were surfacing.

Several minutes passed in silence, but then there were shouts and banging overhead. It sounded like a violent argument was going on.

“Do you realize who their father is?”

“Obviously. That’s why we took them.”

“Stellan, you’re a bloody fool.”

“For carrying out Annora’s orders?”

“Liar. Even she wouldn’t order something like this.”

“She did. As soon as you told her you’d almost taken the girl.”

“Liar!”

More crashing. Shouts. Screams. Then heavy footsteps descended the steps outside the door. Wood splintered and metal bent as someone kicked the door down in three violent motions.

A tall young man stood over us, a deep gash across his cheek, his face covered with dirt and sweat. His shirt was ripped, revealing his muscled chest beneath.

The vampire I’d danced with on the beach.

Caleb.

His deep brown eyes settled on us.

“Hurry,” he said, his chest heaving. “I need to get you out of here.”

Ben and I shot to our feet. Caleb gripped my arm and pushed me up the stairs in front of him, while Ben followed closely behind.

As I was about to step up onto the upper deck, Caleb jerked me back.

“Wait,” he whispered.

He climbed up on the same step where I was standing, his rock-hard chest pressing against me as he strained his neck to see what was happening on the deck above.

“Now!”

He almost lifted me off my feet as he pulled me up with him. I glanced back anxiously to check that Ben was still following us.

The deck was in chaos. The submarine was split into a large control room at the front, and then an area with more seats at the back. Vampires clawed and ripped at each other.

I didn’t have much time to look around though, because soon Caleb was pushing me up a narrow ladder. We reached yet another level of more vampires fighting. He ran with us across the floor until we reached another ladder. Again he pushed me up and this time, there was an open hatch up ahead. Rain poured onto my face. Caleb gripped my thighs and pushed me up. I held onto the metal edge of the hatch and pulled myself the rest of the way.

It was night and we appeared to be floating in the middle of the ocean. Another black submarine floated parallel to us. I scrambled further along the roof of the submarine. The heavy rain was impairing my vision, and the already smooth surface became even more precarious. My foot slipped. I screamed as I slid down the side of the submarine, trying to find anything to grip onto, but there was nothing. I closed my eyes, bracing myself to fall face forward into the ocean, when a strong hand wrapped around my ankle.

The hand pulled up until I was once again on the flat surface of the roof. When I sat up, I found myself looking into Caleb’s intense eyes.

“Careful!” he scolded.

My hair stood on end as I looked down at the rough, dark waters I’d almost slid into.

I looked around me and breathed out in relief to see Ben climbing out of the hatch. He lowered himself down and crouched down next to me on the roof, pulling me closer to him.

Caleb whistled, and vampires began also retreating out of the hatch, filling up the remaining space of the roof. The last one out slammed the hatch shut behind him and about four vampires pushed down on it as vampires within the vessel tried to break out.

Caleb whistled again, and the submarine floating next to us neared. As soon as it was within jumping distance, the vampires on the roof began to leap onto it. Now all of them had crossed but one who remained applying pressure to the hatch so that the vampires within it couldn’t get out.

Ben pushed me forward toward Caleb.

“Hurry, take my sister,” Ben said, eyeing the hatch.

Caleb nodded and stared down at me.

“Climb onto my back. You
must
grip tight.”

Trembling, I locked my arms around his neck and wrapped my legs around his waist. I closed my eyes as he took the leap. We landed with a thud on the roof of the other submarine and Caleb had to grip a pipe to prevent us from skidding off.

“Now, into the hatch,” he ordered.

“No! Wait!” I gasped, fighting against his attempts to push me into the submarine.

The last vampire who was holding down the hatch on the other sub lost his footing and slipped into the ocean.

That left Ben all by himself.

“Ben!” I screamed. “Jump!”

He leapt, but the ginger vampire who had just climbed out of the hatch jumped with him at the same time and pulled him down into the ocean.

“No! Ben!”

The vampire caught hold of my struggling brother and pulled him back up onto his sub.

“Caleb! Do something!” I screamed as the vampire wrestled Ben back through the hatch. I fought against Caleb’s strong grip, trying to break free.

But then it was too late for even Caleb to leap back over. The hatch slammed shut and the submarine lowered itself into the depths of the dark ocean.

I
stared
at Eli’s TV, barely believing what I was seeing.

Passport photos of my twins flashed before the screen.

“Those are the suspects.” Eli pointed to the screen as CCTV footage showed two tall men dressed in long black cloaks, wearing gloves and black hats, entering the apartment foyer.

Derek stood up and swore as the two men entered the elevator after Rose and presumably her friend Kristal. “But how did any of this happen? How the hell did they get to Hawaii?”

“Oh, God,” I said. “You know how much they were complaining about going to Scotland. They must have figured out a way to get to Hawaii instead.”

Derek slammed his fists down against the table. “And who are they?” He looked like he wanted to climb into the TV and rip the two men to shreds there and then. It was impossible to tell who they were. For all we knew, they could have been regular humans looking to prey on two innocent girls.

“There’s footage of the two of them entering,” Eli said, his hands shaking as he held the remote, “followed by two more a few minutes later—see?—but there’s no footage of them ever exiting. That’s what’s got the police so confused. They have no idea how they could have gotten all four of those teens out of there without being caught on camera. The last footage they have is the four men entering the apartment. After that, nothing.”

“We need to get out of here,” I said, standing up. “We have to find them.”

Derek and I stormed out of Eli’s penthouse and raced through the woods to the Sanctuary. Derek ripped the heavy wooden door from its hinges with his bare hands as we raced through the corridors to their bedroom.

“Ibrahim! Corrine!” we shouted as we burst in.

The married couple sat up in bed, looking at both of us groggily and rubbing their eyes.

“Sofia?” Corrine mumbled. “Derek? What is this?”

“The twins,” I shrieked. “They’ve been kidnapped.”

That woke her up faster than a bucket of ice water.

“We need you to take us to Honolulu, Hawaii this instant.”

She and Ibrahim stumbled out of bed, wrapping robes around their bare forms. Corrine gripped my shoulders, shaking me. “What? What are you saying? Hawaii?”

“There’s no time for explanation now.”

Corrine swore, clasping a hand to her mouth. “This is all my fault.”

“What?” Derek gripped Corrine’s shoulders. “What are you saying?”

“For the twins’ birthday, Rose asked me to change the dates on her and Ben’s passports. She promised that it was just to allow them to—”

“Derek, there’s no time for talk,” I urged. “Take us there. Now! Hurry!”

Ibrahim and Corrine held onto us and a few seconds later, we had vanished from The Shade in a whirl of colors.