Love is Darkness (A Valerie Dearborn Novel) (5 page)

She felt a lump in her throat and it made it hard to talk. “What's it to you?” Val dreaded the answer, had no idea what it might be, but was afraid nonetheless.

Lucas ignored her, the quiet of the night registering during the pause.

“Shall I help you?” he said like she was a spooked horse.

She stared hard at the ground. “Compel me, you mean?”

“Yes.”

“Will you...release me again?” Why was she even thinking of trusting him?
Because he hasn’t killed me yet.
She wanted to freeze time so she could think it through, but she only had
this
moment, and if she didn't keep up, he'd make her fate for her.

The vampire was still struggling, but it was as futile as a moth struggling when a child has it by the wings.

Decide.
Run or stay. Her heart pounded ten times louder than the words. But he was a vampire, he'd hear it anyway. “Make me then.”

Val looked back to him almost aggressively, deciding to own her decision. She threw herself into his eyes like jumping off a cliff. His will surrounded her until she was floating in the warm sea of his blue eyes, watching actions that belonged to someone else.

It was someone else who gripped the stake tighter.
Someone else who walked forward, eye level with the monster who had just been about to kill her.
And behind him was Lucas his large presence overshadowing everything else. She smoothed the rumpled
Pogues
t-shirt, wanting to hit his heart on the first try.

She struck hard and fast but the stake didn't go in far enough. Val tried again, using two hands and pressing forward, all of her weight pushing forward. It was like cutting a grisly steak with a plastic knife.

“Harder,” Lucas said.

Val heard a grunt— her own— and pushed, her arms burning with exertion, until the stake slid forward and the vampire paused in mid-struggle.

His skin turned ashen then disintegrated, bones falling around the stake and clunking to the ground before her, dust settling on her tennis shoes. Her momentum carried her forward, the stake still raised, about to pierce Lucas. Deftly, he turned and caught her, his strong hands gripping her arms, keeping her and the stake away from him.

“I think one vampire is sufficient for tonight,” he said dryly.

Val stepped backwards and looked up into his eyes. She thought of a gas fire, the blue that surrounded the flames, the same color and heat of his eyes.

“I release you,” he said softly, looking down at her.

Valerie came back to herself, the blue ocean throwing her out, cold night air biting through her clothing, her shin painful and still bleeding. She looked down at the wound, then back up but Lucas was gone.

She heard Jack calling her. Dropping the stake, she ran; calling for Jack and her father, tripping over tree roots and slipping on damp leaves as she followed Jack's voice back to the car.

Her father looked her over, disappointment, maybe even irritation, etched on his face. “See Jack, I told you she was fine. You think that's a funny game, Valerie? Run off into the woods and scare us witless? If you couldn't help, or I guess
wouldn't
help, then you should have stayed in the car. You were stupid and reckless, Valerie.” Her father strode to the driver's side of the car and got in, leaving Val in the cold night air.

She supposed she should tell him what had happened. But she didn’t want to.

Did she fear Lucas? Hell, yeah! She wasn’t a total idiot. But would he hurt her?

No.

Her mind and body knew it, the answer resonating through her like the vibrations of a bell. Part of her wondered how she could know, wondered at the risk she was willing to take, and then that worry resolved too. Irrationally, she knew. He wouldn’t hurt her.

They drove home in silence and Valerie went to bed thinking about Lucas and her decision to stay quiet. He'd known her name, protected her, and tried to help her get over her fear. Even though she hadn't been in control of her actions, she felt a little better, like she'd kind of done it, and could
maybe
protect herself in the future.

He was like Lucifer, the angel so beautiful that all others paled in comparison. Men didn't look like him, features so bold and striking, so harsh and perfect that he was frightening. When she thought about boys, she thought about Jack. She spent most of her time imagining kissing Jack, she'd even
dreamed
about it.

Lucas was not a boy.

Lucas wasn’t the stuff of girlish fantasies. He was too predatory to fantasize about. It was like a kitten admiring a lion. Val pushed the uncomfortable thoughts away, and was glad she’d decided to say nothing about Lucas. She didn’t want to think about him, have Nate and Jack talk about him. They couldn’t do anything anyway. Lucas had crushed that other vampire with a punch. She knew who Lucas was. All the Hunters did. He was their leader.
King
.
And he could kill her and her family with one careless swipe of his arm.

And if she told them about Lucas they’d have questions. Questions she didn’t have the answers too and that she didn’t want said aloud.
 
She was alive tonight because of him.

Why did he come for me?

Why did he save me?

What does he want?

And worst of all…when will he come back for me?

Chapter 2

San
Loaran
, California

5 years ago

Jack was sitting in the kitchen, his mouth watering in hunger as he listened to his parents bicker about the Italian government.

           
A pot boiled on the stove, steam hissing and rolling outwards. But it wasn’t just ready, it was…jumping, lightly hopping on the stove
—
 
like
it had a message of life and death, if only someone would take off the lid.

           
He didn’t want to dream this again
.

           
He stared at the pot, its shiny silver surface and-
there it was
- a faint blue, twinkling reflection. The twinkle altered, changed shape until it was a blue form, small and distant but becoming larger.

She’s close now
.

The sound of birds, wings flapping, their bodies sighing, filled his ears and echoed off the kitchen walls. He could feel them beating against his eardrums.

That’s not right.

There were no birds, it was the heavy swish of rustling silk, and it grated on his nerves, like biting into chalk.

           
Time to turn around now.

Time to see her coming.

           
His heart thumped and he picked up his butter knife. His father laughed. His mother smiled. They didn’t know that death was hurtling down the corridor like a freight train.

           
And then she was there. His mother fell to the ground, neck broken, happening in between one blink and the next. His father’s face was in his food, body limp, soul already gone, leaving Jack sitting at the kitchen
table,
a butter knife clenched pathetically tight, a useless protection against
her
.

Marion’s sapphire silk skirts blotted out the rest of the world.
 

           
She walked around the little kitchen table where he’d eaten every meal of his life. She whispered to him and teased, sounding like a coquette.

Three, four times, she walked around the table. Like playing duck, duck, goose: the agony of her walking behind him, the tension of knowing she’d passed him, but was coming around again. And when she picked him, he’d be dead.

           
He saw her make the decision, a slight pout marring her dark smile, as she reached out, in infinite slowness, her bony hand outstretched towards him.

Move. Run. Scream. Do something!

Instead, he sat frozen, looking at his mother and then his father, memorizing their features and this moment….

The barest tip of her finger touched him, like an ice cube on burning flesh. He screamed.

           
“Jack! Jack! Wake up.”

           
Both hands were on him now, the sheets her accomplices, as they tried to pull him back under. A gasp exploded from his chest.

It had been a dream. Marion wasn’t here. Jack wasn’t a boy anymore, but nineteen and strong. Italy was
gone,
he was in America now living with the people who had saved him.
 

I’m alright.

           
His hands covered his eyes and he heard Valerie’s voice speaking to him softly. But it held a tremor of sadness and fear, so he tried to get himself together.

           
“I’m fine,” he said huskily.

           
“You called
her
name,” Valerie said quietly.

           
God, he hoped she meant his mother. His breath stopped in his lungs, like a dam had been built before he could exhale. “I was dreaming of my parents.”
      

“No. You said Marion’s name.”

           
The breath oozed out of him.

           
“It’s been almost two months since you last woke me up in the middle of the night. I guess I won’t charge you for this one.” A pause “That’s good, right?”

What was good about it? His parents were still
dead,
he was still living a nightmare, so what if he hadn’t woken up screaming for a month or two? So fucking what?

           
But he smiled at her anyway, at her overly bright smile and the false innocence she tried to project. Because she did know that things were not alright. Valerie’s own mother had been murdered by vampires and it gave them a bond made of and deeper than blood.