Hollowed (34 page)

"
On that note, I
'
m getting out of here.
"

I tip my head and smile.
"
Keep in touch, I
'
m sure Daniel will appreciate it.
"

Fred gives me
an
unimpressed glare, waves, and heads out of my room without looking back.

After getting dressed, I join the boys in Cole
'
s room. Oliver is still arguing the cons of Cole meeting up with Maverick alone.
"
We don't know if anything he told us is true
,
"
he
'
s saying when I come in.

Cole takes all this in with a lot more patience than I would. Probably comes from years and years of dealing with Oliver.
"
I can take care of myself. You seem to forget that.
"

"
Joel could be with him.
Or t
hat Alex girl. All it takes is one of them to catch you unaware...
"
Oliver twists around, looking imploringly at Daniel and me for help. Help I can
'
t really offer him, so I shrug instead. Daniel settles an arm around my shoulders when I sit next to him on the bed.

"Is there a reason you can't do it over the phone?" I ask.

"How can I prove the man I am speaking with is actually Maverick?" Cole shakes his head. "Besides that, there's a certain...code to doing things like this. I have to see him face to face. He has to be willing to meet with me in order to persuade me I have a reason to give him the benefit of the doubt."

Guess that makes sense. Not like police would be cool clearing a murder suspect with a simple phone call, either.
"
I don
'
t think Fred was lying
, at any rate,
"
I say. Oliver shoots me a dark look. Obviously not the response he was hoping for. I turn my attention to Cole.
"
You talked to Maverick
already
?
"

He gives a vague smile.
"
I did. We
'
ve arranged to meet tomorrow evening at a place of my choosing.
I also spoke to my elders and I
'
ve been given permission to
...
take off the kid gloves, so to speak.
"

I
'
m taking that to mean Cole is officially Involved.
W
hatever lives might be lost in all of this won
'
t come down on his head later.
Oliver crosses his arms, face drawn into a scowl.
"
And what are we supposed to do in the meantime?
"

"
If
we're
able to locate the others, then you
would not
have any reason to worry about Cole,
"
Daniel points out.

"
I suggest you start by
finding
Briar
'
s sister; if Joel is after her, then
that
'
s
where
you'll
find him.
"
Cole sighs.
"
Maverick said Joel might not be working alone. On top of the victims that have been cropping up, several others have gone missing. It
'
s very possible
Joel is
making allies to protect himself.
"

The idea makes me shudder, but I have no doubt
Joel
could find people who would jump all over the chance to become one of us. I think back to the girl on the roof and wonder if he would
'
ve turned her if I hadn
'
t shown up. Would that have been better or worse than death?

Then something dawns on me.

"Cole...wait. There's something Joel said, that night on the roof..."

Everyone's eyes settle on me. What were his exact words? Everything from that night was made fuzzy by the adrenaline and fear.

"He said...something about a family. That he'd made one and it was growing."

"Guess that answers that," Oliver mutters. "Then all the missing people aren't necessarily dead, just..."

"Working for Joel. This could be a problem." Cole sighs.
"
Briar, d
o you know how to get into contact with Ruby?
"

"
Not unless she calls me.
"
Which I
'
ve been waiting
for with no luck
.
"
She didn
'
t tell me where she was staying.
"

Oliver
says,
"
No leads, then. Are we supposed to run around blindly and hope something
turns up
?
"

Well, that seems to have worked so far, but...
"
I
'
ll call Noah. He said he was going to check out my parents
'
house, so maybe he found something out from that.
"
I know Oliver isn
'
t keen on the idea of getting any help from a witch, but tough
luck
. While I don
'
t underestimate Oliver
'
s abilities, I have a hard time picturing him taking on Joel by himself. Especially if he has buddies now.

"
Fred will
search with you. One more pair of eyes won
'
t hurt.
"

Even if Fred is stronger than me, he
'
s still a young vampire. I worry at the thought
of him out there looking alone, so I guess him coming with us is a good thing.

Once Oliver
'
s done grumbling, Cole orders us to get some rest.
"
You two ought to eat before we head out as well,
"
Daniel says in the hall as we head for my room.
"
To ensure you are strong enough in case we have to fight.
"

The idea of eating again makes my stomach turn. Oh, God, how can I possibly
when I killed the last meal I had
?

Oliver sighs.
"
Yes, yes... When is the last time you fed, anyway?
"
he asks me.

I stop outside my door, keeping my eyes on the
ground
.
The wall.
The card-key in my hands. Anywhere but them.
"
Not that long ago. I should be fine.
"

"
It won
'
t kill you to eat again.
"

No, I just might kill someone else. My hand trembles and
I nearly drop
the card. I swipe it down the lock and shove my way inside, feeling the strong urge to get as far away from Oliver as I can. He deserves to know what I did, but I can
'
t bring myself to tell him.
I told Fred, so why can
'
t I spill it to the people who matter?
"
Yeah, sure.
"

Before I can close the door, he braces a hand against it and leans in, frowning.
"
What
'
s your problem?
"

"
She has had a long couple of days, darling. Let us leave her to rest.
"
Daniel looks past Oliver to me, meeting my eyes.
"
Unless there is something she wants to tell us.
"

There
'
s always something about him, something about the kindness and sincerity in his face that makes me want to tell him everything where, with Oliver, I
'
d sooner
throw
myself out the window than admit I made a mistake. A really, really big mistake.

I bite my lower lip to keep it from trembling. What
'
s the right answer? How do I fix what I
'
ve done?

"
I don
'
t really feel like talking about it.
"

Not now, not ever.

Daniel looks away. Have I hurt his feelings? Oliver shakes his
head but he pulls back.
"
Rest well
."

The silence resonates all around me. I feel so claustrophobic. The knowledge
that I
'
ve taken
a life, of having possibly lost my parents, Ruby
'
s lies...
it
'
s
building and building inside of me and leaving no room for anything else.

Earlier I tucked the dead man
'
s wallet away into
my
nightstand. Now I retrieve it, opening it up for the first time. Pulling his driver
'
s license out and studying his picture, committing it to memory. Even if it haunts me for the rest of my life,
even if what happened is an accident,
I should think
it
'
s only fair I remember what he looks like.

Hi name was John. Simple, just like the contents of his wallet. I wonder if people called him John, or Johnny. If he had a lot of friends. A job he enjoyed. He was only in his mid-twenties;
maybe he was attending college
.

There are photos in the wallet. A
pretty
Hispanic
girl with a nice smile
that appears to be his girlfriend
. A dog with a Frisbee dangling from its mouth. No kids.
Thank God,
no kids. I
'
m not sure I could live with myself if I killed someone
'
s father. Boyfriend, husband, owner? That
'
s bad enough.

Looking at his pictures, I
'
m overcome with a sudden loneliness for my parents and Sherry.
Mom and Dad
only met
Sherry
a handful of times, but they adored her. Didn
'
t everyone? She and Dad would get into drawn-out convos about the latest music trends, Sherry skipping from one to the next at light-speed while Dad struggled to keep up and retain the information.

And every time either of them called and heard Sherry in the background, it was always,
"
Tell that girl to keep you out of trouble.
"

Guess I didn
'
t do a very good job of that.

Tears prick the corners of my eyes. Noah liked Sherry, too. I wonder if he was sad to find out
she died
.

I
'
m lonely for him
. The anger inside of me
flares up and quells
again without warning. One second, I can
'
t stand the thought of him, the way he ditched me when I needed him most. How Sherry might be alive if he had at least called me so we weren
'
t waiting around late that night. How if he
'
d warned me about this—
any of this
—
I would have been so much more careful.

In the next instant, all I want is to hear him laugh, see him smile. To have him hold me and curl his fingers in my hair while he
tells
me everything will be okay.

How do you love someone so much and hate them at the same time?

Glancing at the hotel
phone, I wonder what he would say if I called him, just to talk. He might not even answer. He might hang up on me. But I did tell the others I would call and ask him for any info he might have. 

Right now, I really miss the days where I didn
'
t need a stupid excuse to call.

Even with an excuse, I shuffle around the room with John
'
s wallet in hand, occasionally stealing a glance at the phone. Once or twice, I pick it up
to dial out and hang back up
. Until
,
finally, I launch myself at it and punch in his number before I can give myself time to chicken out.