Hollowed (23 page)

"
Does it matter?
"
Another drop of rain, this time splash
ing against my denim-clad knee. I
refuse
to let it bother me that
Noah
knew Ruby well enough to recognize something
belonging
to her.
"
No one
'
s given me any answers about anything. Not you, not her. It
'
s really starting to piss me off.
"

Noah sighs. A moment later he comes to sit on the hood with me, though there
'
s a foot of space between us.
"
Ruby and I dated for awhile. Six, seven months, I guess. I met her at a club where I was looking for a mark.
"

H
aving Noah confirm it makes it all the more sharp and real. I close my eyes.
"
And then what?
"

"
She was turned, and she changed.
"
He shifts restlessly.

"
Changed how?
"

"
Changed. I don
'
t know how to explain it. Did she seem the same to you?
"

"
Same sister I
'
ve always known.
"
I
'
m a lying liar who lies. But a
ny changes I noticed weren
'
t bad ones
, were they?
Ruby used to be so uptight. It was good
to see
how free she seemed.
There was that brief moment where she told me about Maverick's brother, but I've shoved that to the back of my mind for now.
"
So she got infected, and you dumped her. Real nice. And you
'
re trying to kill her like you
'
re trying to kill me?
"

"
She
'
s been taking lives, Briar.
"
He sounds so tired.
"
Carelessly and brutally. I tried to make things work for awhile after be
cause I cared about her, but...
she changed too much. I couldn
'
t do it.
"

He cared enough to give Ruby a chance but not me? Ouch. Thanks. My eyes open.
"
Ruby wouldn
'
t hurt people.
"

"
She does,
"
he snaps.

"
She
wouldn
'
t.
Maybe Maverick made her hurt someone and that
'
s why she ran away from him. You should
'
ve been
there to protect her from that!
"

Pain flashes across his face, raw and real; I
'
ve struck a nerve and he doesn
'
t know what to do about that. Cue instant guilt.
I know it isn't something he could've prevented anymore than I can blame him for what happened to me and Sherry. All I'm doing is shoving the blame onto someone else, trying not to carry it on myself.

Maybe none of us could have prevented any of this.

"
Noah
,
I didn
'
t...
"

He slides off the hood, pacing restlessly. Raindrops dot and darken the shoulders of his jacket.
"
No, you
'
re right. It
is
my fault. Which is why I
'
m going after her instead of making it someone else
'
s problem.
"

I worry at my bottom lip.
"
I didn
'
t mean it like that. It isn
'
t your fault she got turned.
"

"
W
ouldn
'
t be surprised.
"
His shoulders hang heavily.
"
She knew about my work. She
was
obsessed
with it. All the details... Vampires, nymphs, shape-shifters, faeries. Every time we talked she wanted to know
every little detail about my missions
and I told her because...
I thought I could trust her with it.
"

I
'
m torn between sympathy and irritation.
"
Oh, so
she
got to know everything.
"

Noah whips around, eyes as sharp as his words.
"
After how she reacted, I wasn
'
t about to make the same mistake with you. If I could have kept it a secret forever, I would have.
"

I meet his gaze steadily, unwilling to back down.
"
Did you know who I was?
"

"
What?
"

"
The night we met at the bar. Did you know
I was Ruby
'
s sister
? Is that why you talked to me?
"

His eyes widen.
Cornered. That
'
s how he looks. Like I
'
ve put a gun to his head and backed him right up against a wall.
"
I don
'
t see why that matters.
"

"
It
matters,
Noah.
"
I slide to my feet, closing the distance between us.
"
It matters. Give me the truth for once.
"

He leans back but doesn
'
t step away, as stubborn as I am and
just
as unwilling to admit defeat. Just say no, Noah. Just say no. Let me keep what one little shred of dignity I have left.

"
Yeah. I knew.
"

Not the answer I wanted. Maybe I should have known the truth wasn
'
t better than living in ignorance. Back when I thought Noah was
a
government employee carting around a briefcase and a spare tie,
when I thought
Ruby was dead and gone. Back when things were simple and made sense. I close my eyes and turn away.

Noah grabs my arm.
"
Ruby had completely lost her mind, so from time to time I came back just to make sure she wasn
'
t
hurting her family. But I ha
d never laid eyes on you before that night.
"

Would punching him make me feel better? I
'
m
really
tempted.
"
That
'
s all it was, a charity case? Checking up on your ex-girlfriend
'
s baby sister?
"

"
That
'
s what it was,
at first.
I was going to be in and out. Spend a few hours with you, try to find out if you were in contact with Ruby.
"
He takes a breath, lingering long enough on
that pause between words
that I reluctantly look up at him.
"
...And then I came back. Again. And again.
You were funny and weird and no matter what we were doing, I had fun with you.
The idea that Ruby might come
back and hurt you...
it scared
the hell out of
me.
"

Damn him. Damn that soft and sweet tone that always used to make me melt and obviously hasn
'
t lost its effect.
Focus, Briar, Focus.
"
Ruby wouldn
'
t hurt me. The worst she
'
s done is let her family think she died, but at least that was for a good reason.
"
I feel like I
'
m making excuses for her, but it
'
s true, right? None of us would have understood.

"
The Ruby you knew wouldn
'
t have, no. She was a good girl. Full of herself, but good.
"
He releases my arm.
"
But becoming a vampire
warps
people. Trust me when I say that. I
'
ve seen it time and time again, and I
'
ve met the elders. They go crazy with age. Don
'
t believe me? Ask your friends what their elders are like.
"

I already know the answer to that. They told me as much. Just a little crazy, right? Wouldn
'
t the same thing happen to anyone that old?
"
So we
'
re on your hit list. Why haven
'
t you killed me yet? We
'
ve been out here for ten minutes, you
'
ve had every opportunity.
"

His expression tightens, struggling to keep his resolve. This isn
'
t as easy for him as I initially thought it was.
"
I jumped the gun a little
I wanted to put you out of your misery. Didn
'
t want to see you change the way she did
, even if it meant getting me in trouble with my own elders
. But you said you didn
'
t let them infect you on purpose, so I
'
m willing to wait.
"

"
Wait for what?
"

"
For you to mess up. Like it or not, you
will
change, and you
will
hurt someone, and I
'
ll be the one who comes after you when you do.
"

The final, crushing blow on any hope I might have had that we could work things out. I still even
had
hope? How much of an idiot am I
?
"
How can you say it like that?
"

"
Because when it happens, everything I loved about you will be gone,
"
he says quietly, the pain thick in his words.
"
You won
'
t be my
Briar
anymore.
"

No. No, it
'
s not
fair.
Have I changed at all? Aren
'
t I the same? I can
'
t stomach the idea of hurting someone. Even seeing Artie and Joel get mauled by Daniel
, stabbing Artie in the chest
...
the idea of it churns my stomach. Noah has to understand that; I
'
m not going to change. I
'
m still
me
.

The sky splits open and spills the rain it
'
s been threatening all day. The three seconds it takes for me to grab Noah, hands cupping his face, dragging him to me, we
'
re already soaked. And I kiss him. I kiss him like I
'
ve never kissed him before, begging him to understand, to
see
and
feel
that this is still me and I
'
m never changing.

What
'
s more, he kisses me
back
with all that familiarity and heat I
'
ve come to miss so
much
and his hands are on my shoulders, in my hair, torn between pulling me closer and pushing m
e away, as though kissing me—not kissing me—is physically painful.

This is how it should be. Me and him. I
'
m not as much of a freak as I thought I was, because
he
'
s
different, too. I have a chance
to
catch up to him now,
to exist
in his strange world, in his life instead of always being left behind. No more secrets. He doesn
'
t have to keep anything from me anymore. Why can
'
t he see that?

I can feel every ounce
of his struggle until finally,
finally
, he jerks away.