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I stared at the phone like it was a rabid animal rearing to attack. Colette told me to call Aleksi when I got home. She was certain he’d forgive me, I wasn’t so sure.

Thud. Thud. Thud.
I knew that loud bad-ass knock. I opened the door quickly to reveal Leslie standing on the other side, grinning from ear to ear. The second the door was fully open she wrapped her arms around me and gave me a squeeze.

“I’ve missed you so much! You have no clue!” She shook me a little. “Did you hear about Kendra? Well, of
course, you did. I was shocked as hell when Tristan told me.”

“Yeah…” I trailed off.

“She has a great apartment now, it’s in Aleksi’s building. I was
there last night, I was invited over tonight but Tristan told me you were coming in so I wanted to see you.” I couldn’t help but to laugh a little as she stepped in and I closed the door.
She knew Aleksi wasn’t picking you up.
I hadn’t told her about the absence of Aleksi.
She’s also fucking a vampire.

I pursed my lips and eyed Leslie warily for a moment, her warm green eyes seemed to twinkle in the dull afternoon light. She seemed so happy.

“Did you get the part? I forgot to ask, but you said Tristan wanted you to audition for something?”

“Yep, I’m playing Alice in Alice in Wonderland.” She grinned. “I am also the third human to ever be
an official member of Ballet du Nuit. Which means when they leave, I leave with them.” She offered me a weak smile and sighed softly. “Though honestly, Kendra is insufferable and also now a member of du Nuit. And since you’re with Aleksi, I don’t think a whole lot will change.”

I pursed my lips again and my gaze wandered off to the side. She didn’t know. I sighed again, a heavy, heaving sigh and passed my fingers back through my hair.

“I’m not… I’m not sure I’m… I mean…” I trailed off and sighed shaking my head. “I… Aleksi and I…” I trailed off again breaking off my stammer.

“Tristan mentioned last night that something was up
between you two. And in rehearsal Aleksi has been distracted. Originally we thought he was pissed because Tristan cast him as the Knave of Hearts—he really wanted to be the Queen or the White Rabbit apparently. But Tristan is actually going to dance the part of the White Rabbit, and Colette agreed to be the Queen.” She snickered, it was clearly an inside joke I wasn’t a part of. “After Alice we’re doing Sleeping Beauty, Colette is playing Aurora and I’m going to be the Lilac Fairy. I can’t believe I’m going to be the Lilac Fairy.” She sat down on the couch, “Do you remember the last time we danced it? Almost two years ago and Kendra danced as the Lilac Fairy, and Anna was Aurora… Garrett was Prince Desire.”

“How’s Garret?”

“I don’t know. Though the companies
are supposedly merged, the humans and the vampires have very different schedules. But it’s good, we have three or four different shows rehearsing at once now. Oh! That reminds me! There is going to be a Masquerade Gala to debut the merging of the companies. It’s in a week or two and if Aleksi doesn’t invite you I will. Oh! And it’s in my honor.” She beamed at me and I forced myself to smile. Great things had happened to everyone, except for me.

“That’s great, Leslie. You really deserve this.”

“I know, and I only kind of feel like I’ve fucked myself to the
top
.” She laughed a little. “But even if Tristan wasn’t director, choreographer and a myriad of other things I’d still want to be with him. He’s fascinating, did you know he and Aleksi were lovers briefly?” I blinked at her words.
He fucks anything that doesn’t move fast enough to get away, you should have seen that coming.

“O-oh…” I trailed off and fussed with my skirt. “No…I mean… I guessed. He was also lovers with
Colette and Elizabeta. He’s had a long life, I’m not surprised he h-has… he has a string of lovers.”

“Isn’t Colette his sister?”

“She’s his third cousin. So… so they could technically get married. So I don’t think it’s that weird.”

“I guess. So are you meeting Aleksi tonight?”

“
No.” I clipped out as I turned and walked over to my coffee maker. I turned it on and picked out a K-cup instead of elaborating. The machine clicked to life and began its dark gurgling. I focused on the coffee machine, I stared it down as if it held the key to drowning out the incoming Leslie Inquisition. Everyone expects the Leslie Inquisition.

“I’d ask if he hurt you, but you’ve been in England for three months.” She blurted out.

“He t-told…told me he… loved me.” I wriggled out with a long heavy sigh as I tossed the K-cup in its little hole and closed the lid on the coffee maker.

“Wow, and you told him you didn’t?”

I glanced back at her for a moment. “Nope, I-I t-told…I told him I loved him too.” I grabbed a coffee mug and placed it on the little silver tray below the mouth of the monstrosity and hit the brew button.

“Okay…” She trailed off and out of the corner of my eye I could make out her shifting on the couch. “Was it the Kendra thing?” She asked turning her full attention
to me. I could feel her eyes.

“If he has her,
wh-why does he need me?” I whispered, my voice drowned in the sound of coffee filling up my cup. “Would you like a cup?” I asked taking her favorite brand of coffee out of the carousel. Leslie never turned down coffee.

“Sure, but…Tristan hates the way caffeine makes my blood taste.”

“But you love coffee, even more than I do.”

She shrugged. “It’s a small thing to do for him. I like feeding Tristan.” She took a deep breath. “You’re Aleksi’s servant, Autumn. Kendra is just his flunky.” She smirked at me as I switched out K-cups and coffee mugs. I hit the button again and turned to her cradling my hands around my mug.

“He wrote me, called me, e-mailed
, and texted me every day from the time I hung up on him, until the week I had to leave.” I swallowed and frowned down at my coffee. “I screwed up, Les. I really screwed up. When I was in England I felt so self-righteous, I felt like I was in the right and now…” I let my words fade as I continued to stare at the darkness of the coffee.
Now you’re chickening out.
My frown twisted.
This is for the better, stay away from the vampires, you’ll just end up hurt.

“I…Autumn, I’m not you. I can’t really give you good advice here. Being with a Vampire is very tricky, you have to put all your cards on the table when you begin or you end up… well like you or Kendra. I told Tristan in bed after the first time we had sex that I didn’t want to be turned, and I didn’t want to be his servant. We negotiated from there.” She smirked and passed her fingers through her hair and sighed wistfully. I could almost see the pleasant memory trailing through her mind. “You and Kendra just kind of jumped in. Or rather in your case you were pushed in, against your will.”

“It wasn’t against my will…” My voice came out as a soft whisper. I mixed the cream into the coffee almost in a trance. Was I pushed against my will?
Yes. Or did your selective memory kick in and make you forget that you were marked on your second date?
“I didn’t fight. I did-didn’t say anything.” I walked over to the couch with the coffee and handed Leslie hers.

“Autumn, Tristan told me what happened. That Aleksi went against Elizabeta by seeing you and she punished him for it… by using you. You can deny it, but this whole thing… it’s like someone blindfolded you and shoved you into a pool full of sharks.” She took a sip of her coffee. “But he told you he loves you, Autumn. He doesn’t strike me as the type to throw the word around. So maybe you should talk to him. I’m sure he’d want to hear from you.”

“It’s been two months. Would you want to talk to someone after two months of them ignoring you?” I frowned out before sipping my coffee. She sighed and set hers down.

“I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever said the big three words to anyone before. But I would like to think that if I loved someone enough to say I love you, that I would want to hear from them—even if they shut me out for months. Even if it was just about
closure.”

“Closure.” I repeated curling my fingers tighter around my coffee cup. My index finger traced over the raised gold filigree
.
Yep, because he’s not going to wait around two months for you.
I leaned my head back and stared at the ceiling. The sun had started to set.

“I know you don’t want to hear
it, but…it’s a possibility. I’d like to think that with all he’s gone through to have you that he would wait for you—that he’ll realize that you’re not used to that world. But he hasn’t been human in a really long time, so I don’t know if he’ll be able to empathize like that… but those are just my thoughts.”

“Well…I’m going to go take a shower...” I trailed off and my phone buzzed on the counter, and Leslie’s rang. She took her phone out of her pocket and glanced at it—I just stared at my mine from the couch like it was going to grow legs and teeth and attack me.

“Kendra wants to know if you’ll come over. She says she misses you.” Leslie waved her phone at me. I continued to stare at mine. “Autumn?”

“Yeah… s-sure.” I stood and walked back towards my bathroom with heavy feet. “I’m going to need
like an hour.”

“
Alright, I’ll be back then. Oh! Maybe she has a copy of the Le Diable Amoureux performance. Tristan’s restructuring and integration of modern music made the whole thing… epically erotic. Aleksi’s performance was just… hell, I respect boundaries and even I wanted to bump uglies with him. That man could seduce the panties off nuns.” She laughed a bit and then stopped abruptly. “Sorry, I forgot for a second… well, I’ll see you in an hour okay?”

I nodded at Leslie and stepped into the bathroom closing the door. I turned on the shower and heard the door rattle after Leslie left. After pulling my hair up into a bun and tugging the shower cap on I stood in the spray of the water. I stared at the white tile for a moment remembering the last time I stood in this shower, and the feeling of Aleksi’s chest against my back and the scent of his skin. Would I ever feel that again? I started crying.
You need to stop crying over nothing, do you think he cried over you? Do you think he cried while he fucked Kendra? When he turned her?
Swallowing I leaned against the cool tile, wiping my eyes.
You need to stop being stupid, Autumn. You did this, you’ll get over it. Who knows, in the end this could be for the best.
Even as Miss Manners—my common sense—lectured me, I still felt like I had done something incredibly stupid. I didn’t think about it in England, I threw myself into my dissertation and now with it surpassing the schedule I had free time. Free time meant I could think about what I did.

Leslie and I took the train to Kendra’s new apartment. After the train, we had a ten-minute walk through the city. As we walked up to the ultra-modern building with its black glass and dark steel, I couldn’t help but to pause. Leslie stopped at the door and looked back at me. The warmth of the summer night wasn’t quite oppressive, but it was warm enough that even my white linen sundress felt like it was too heavy.

“If you want to go back I get it. I know Aleksi lives here. The whole company has apartments here.” She said as she fingered the shiny black door handle.

“I’m… I’m fine.” I forced a smile and continued into the building.

The air conditioning hit you like a prize fighter the moment you buzzed in. The doorman smiled at Leslie, and she smiled and waved back. Apparently she had spent a lot of time here. The elevator dinged, we stepped on and Leslie hit the button. The last time I was in this elevator was when I had wine at Aleksi’s.

The doors opened and Tristan was on the other side. When his eyes fell on Leslie his face lit up like a Christmas-tree. Without a word, he gathered her into his arms and kissed her deeply as the doors closed. Her fingers passed through his hair, twirling one of his golden curls. It was like I wasn’t even there. I felt invisible… and I was getting tired of feeling invisible.

“H-hello there, Tristan.” I blurted out with a grin. Leslie snapped her head to me and blinked
wide-eyed. Tristan actually blushed and took a step back from Leslie.

“Oh. Hello, Autumn. Sorry about that.” He chuckled nervously and draped his arm over her shoulder.

“I know this doesn’t seem like much, Tristan… but I don’t think Autumn has ever spoken first. Are you okay, Sweetie?” Leslie asked as the elevator continued its way up.

“I’m… I’m fine, it was rude of me. I shouldn’t have been so forward.” I blushed and shook my head. Tristan nodded in response.

“You’re so old fashioned, Autumn. You have this elegance, and politesse that is simply lost these days. It’s frankly a bit refreshing.” Tristan chuckled as the doors opened and he glided forward taking Leslie with him. She was shooting him a look that could have curdled milk. “Ducky, you are amazing as well, that much goes without saying.” He continued as they walked down the hall. I paused and watched them for a moment. They practically floated. The doors started to close and I shot forward and pressed the black lever and the doors opened again. I still kept my distance from
them, but I followed down the hall and passed a couple of doors. The wallpaper was the same as it had been on Aleksi’s floor, those intricate silver on white art deco arches and the floor was that polished dark wood. They paused at the last door in the hallway, lucky Kendra had a corner apartment… again. Before they could knock the door opened and Tristan walked in, Leslie paused and turned back and waved me towards the door. I laughed and walked into the apartment.

Once in the door behind me closed. Seated on the black leather couch in the living room visible from the doorway was Aleksi. He looked beautiful as always that dark hair was in its loose half disheveled bun. He was dressed more or less as he always had been before, a black tank top and dark, low cut jeans, on his feet were all black Chuck Taylor sneakers—he looked so normal. But those surreal blue eyes were fixed on me. I shivered, and my body felt like it was going to melt under his gaze. I couldn’t shake the feeling that my world was going to implode. Around me, things continued on of course. Leslie hugged Kendra who was now shockingly pale, her hair almost bronze in color—vampirism clearly agreed with her. Tristan was tinkering with Kendra’s PlayStation as he brought up the video of the performance. But all of that was fuzzy and muted to me, the only thing that was clear was Aleksi.