Vampire Love Story (13 page)

“Yari?” I gasped, certain I was hallucinating.

“Shh. Quiet, Josiah. We’ve got to get you out of here.”

I looked at Yari and she started transitioning the way Atticai and the others did. But Yari didn’t transition into a raven. Yari transitioned into…Daphne, my faithful hawk friend. Yari was Daphne?

It was then that I passed out.

I opened my eyes and I found myself in my bed.

Was everything a dream?
I looked down at my ankle and there were two sets of raw, swollen puncture wounds. The snake and Yari?

Not a dream,
I thought.
Last night was real.

So then how had I gotten home?

I got up and went to the living room. It felt like morning, yet my house was still completely dark. I soon saw why. Someone had duct taped the blinds so that no light could get in.

A voice spoke from the darkness, startling me. “In about three hours I can go outside.” Yari was sitting on the carpet cross-legged in the far corner of the living room. She looked as if she had been doing yoga in complete darkness. If not for her pale complexion, I probably wouldn’t have seen her at all.

“So it’s all true,” I said, rubbing a hand over my face. “Vampires, sunlight, werewolves, full moons—all of it.

“It’s all true, Josiah.”

“I still can’t believe it.”

“Believe, Josiah. You have seen it with your own eyes.”

I stared at her sitting there in the corner of my living room, in complete darkness, a beautiful woman I had slept with just weeks earlier, a woman I had watched turn into a fucking hawk. I sat down and held my head. I wasn’t suffering from overwhelming grief—although my heart ached heavier than ever knowing Tommy would never step foot in here again. I wasn’t running on adrenalin, and I certainly wasn’t high or drunk. This was real, and there was no talking my way out of this. Could I still be dreaming? Sure, maybe, but I doubted it.

This was real.
Real.

I asked the only question that I could think of at the moment. “Since when did vampires start turning into birds? I thought it was supposed to be bats or fog or something.”

“You mortals—and your writers, in particular—were the ones who fabricated that nonsense. Hell, we don’t even refer to ourselves as vampires. We are something else.”

“Mani,” I said.

“Yes.” Yari stood up and walked over to me. “Josiah, I have done a horrible thing.”

“What would that be, exactly?”

She paused, and then sat down on the couch. She was being very quiet. I walked over and sat next to her. “What is it?”I asked.

“Josiah, I saved you. The Triat won’t like that. The Mani won’t like that, either. Especially Atticai.”

“Why is it so bad that I know? Lena knows and nothing seems to happen to her.”

“Lena is different.”

“How so?”

“There is so much about us you don’t understand. There is a history and there are many things that have been prophesied. I can’t go into that right now. When I am at full strength, we need to get you out of here.”

“Where would I go Yari?”

“Anywhere but here. Atticai knows where you live and I know him; he’ll get suspicious if there is no word about a man dying in the wilderness. He will assume you survived.”

“So what am I suppose to do? Run? I’ve never run from anything in my life.”

“Can the macho ego bullshit, Josiah. These guys will kill you without a second thought. The Triat gives them the right to do so. Please, we must leave. Soon.”

“And go where?”

“Far away.”

“Come with me.”

Yari stared at the floor for a moment before looking up at me. “Josiah, I will always be with you.”

“No, don’t be with me as Daphne. I want you to be by my side as you...Yari.”

“Look, do you have an extra set of keys to Tommy’s car? It should still be parked at the ranch from the other night. His keys must had fallen out when he fought Atticai because he didn’t have them when I dropped him....” her voice drifted off.

“When you dropped him off at the hospital,” I said suddenly as the realization hit me that it had been Yari who tried to save my friend’s life. “Why would you do that if you knew he was a Carni?”

She looked away. “Because I knew you cared about him.”

This whole thing was almost too much for me to handle. I sat down and cradled my head in my hands, thinking. “You’re going to have to turn into Daphne and get his Mustang from the ranch. You are going to need to bring it back here. It’ll be dark soon, so I guess you won’t have a problem, you know, transitioning, or whatever you call it.”

Yari smiled and looked at me for a heartbeat or two. She reached out and took my hand, and we sat like that until the sun finally set. And when it did, she stood from the couch and stepped away from me. “Do you have an extra set of keys Josiah?

“Yes, we both kept a set of each other’s keys in our bedrooms just in case of an emergency.”

“I’ll need the keys to the Mustang, Josiah.”

I nodded and fetched the keys, and when I returned a beautiful red hawk was sitting on the arm of the couch. She opened her beak and I carefully hooked the key ring inside. I opened the door and the hawk shot out of my apartment like a cannon shot.

“Be careful!” I yelled after her, wondering what my neighbors were thinking. With any luck, no one saw the hawk.

* * *

About a half hour later, Yari made her way back in Tommy’s Mustang. During that time I packed a few things. We jumped into the muscle car and headed straight for the freeway. I kept looking up in the sky for ravens.

So far, the coast was clear.

We hit the the 91 Freeway and eventually made our way to the 5 Freeway. I wasn’t sure how far north I wanted to drive but Monterey seemed far enough. Monterey was a quaint beach town about five hours north, and it seemed like it would be the last place anyone would think to look for me. If the Triat wanted me dead I think she or it—or whatever it was—would have done it by now.

Then again, what the hell did I know?

* * *

In Monterey, we stopped at a bed and breakfast and I got us a room that only had one small window. Before the trip, I had packed the same duct tape Yari had used to tape my own curtains shut. Yari and I proceeded to tape shut the curtain to this window as well. We even duct taped the blinds themselves so no light whatsoever could peek through come morning.

I was exhausted. In hindsight, I probably should have had the vampire be the one to do the driving through the entire night. Anyway, I got the room for three nights so that we could figure out our next move. Even though it wasn’t morning—in fact, morning was still a few hours away—Yari hit the sheets hard, crashing immediately. Dead to the world, so to speak. And for all I knew, she really was.

I lit a couple of candles I had brought and then I sat on the leather-back chair that was directly in front of the bed. Although Yari and I had been intimate previously at the party in Victorville, I felt I needed an invitation before lying next to her.

So I sat there and watched her sleep. I thought I had read somewhere that vampires didn’t actually sleep, that they sort of died all over again, and then were reborn come sundown. Well, say that to this softly snoring girl. She sure as hell sounded asleep to me.

I was exhausted, but was too wired to sleep. I didn’t want to put on the TV because the noise and light might bother her. So instead I just stared. I sat there and looked at her in the candlelight. Her Auburn hair flowed down her back. Her body was long and athletic. She sort of looked like a female superhero. Like something out of a comic book. And, like a hero, she saved my life. I didn’t know why, but she seemed to always be there for me.

I thought about everything, trying to wrap my brain around this vampire business. Had Tommy really been a werewolf? Actually, the more I thought about it the more it was adding up. Tommy had come out of nowhere. He had no family. He had an erratic temper that he seemed to always be trying to keep in check. True, he had disappeared for a few days, and, no, I had never seen any actual proof that he was in the Reserves. I just took him for his word. Who wouldn’t?

In fact, oddly—or perhaps hysterically—he even hated high-pitched noises.

My eyes were growing heavy and I dozed off. Sometime later, I felt a hand guiding me to the bed. I cracked my eyes open and saw Yari pulling down the covers. She unbuckled my belt and slid my pants off like a mother putting a son to bed. Still wearing my boxers and T-shirt, she guided me into bed and tucked me in. She was sweet and gentle and kind in every movement she made. She slipped under the covers next to me, her body surprisingly warm.

“Aren’t vampires supposed to be cold?” I asked.

“I’m not a vampire,” she said patiently.

I nodded once. “You’re a Mani.”

“There’s a big difference.”

“Of course,” I said, and actually grinned.

I turned and faced her. “I don’t know what to do. Where do I go from here?”

“Don’t think about it, Josiah. Not right now. Tonight, just close your eyes.”

I could feel her breath on my face. I leaned in and kissed her forehead. “Thank you for saving my life.”

I slept a long time. It felt like years. I opened my eyes and saw that Yari had opened the single window because it was now dark outside. The clock on the nightstand showed 8:42 p.m. Wow, I had slept fifteen hours. I sat up. The shower was going in the connecting bathroom. Considering I had been out for the past fifteen hours, I really needed to use the facilities.

Duty calls. I eased open the bathroom door and could see Yari’s silhouette through the steamy glass shower door.

“Josiah, is that you?” Yari called out over the water.

“Of course it is. Who else could it be?”

“Who knows? Maybe the maid. I’m not sure how familiar the staff is at this bed and breakfast.”

I did my business. Luckily, she couldn’t hear it above the drone of the rushing water. When done, I started walking out the door. “Where you going?”

“Outside. To give you some privacy.”

“Aren’t you dirty? Do you need a shower?”

“Yeah, I’ll take one when you’re done.”

“There’s plenty of room in here.”

I paused. “Seriously?”

“If you’re shy, I understand.”

“I’m not that shy.”

“Well, you better hurry up I would hate to use up all the hot water.”

Oh, she was good. I looked at her silhouette one more time. That’s all I needed to see. My boxers and T-shirt were off in seconds. I walked over to the sliding glass shower door. I took a deep breath as if I was entering a swimming pool and pulled open the door. I looked in and Yari was facing me. Her body was perfect. The wispy shower steam did little to hide her curves. I tried not to stare but the truth is I haven’t seen that many women naked before—and the ones I had seen naked were nowhere near Yari’s jaw-dropping perfection.

Oh, my God.

Her skin was milky white. Her body as curvy and hard and soft as anything I had ever seen. Her wet hair hung over her shoulder and she put a long-fingered hand on one hip.

“You getting an eyeful, mister?”

So much for not staring.

“Uh, sorry,” I said. At least, that’s what I think I said. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I had any control of my mouth or my voice at that moment. My hormones were somewhere in orbit at the moment.

“Come over here silly. I’m not lying about the hot water getting used up.”

I stepped into the hot shower and she backed up underneath the shower head. The water flowed over her, accentuating her curves. I went straight to her like a moth to the flame, and into the epicenter of the water flow.

At first the hot water shocked me and then it felt incredible. Yari turned my body around and began lathering my back and shoulders with a bar of soap. As she did so, she gently massaged my skin and muscles.
Oh, dear Lord.
She next guided my head so that the water sprayed directly onto my scalp, and then poured some shampoo into my hair. Now she was massaging my scalp and I think I died and went to heaven. I tried to turn around but she stopped me.

“Hold on,” she said. “I have to wash out the soap.” She rinsed my hair thoroughly. I relished the feeling of her gentle fingers on my scalp. I couldn’t take all this sensuality much longer. My passion was burning and I was going to explode.

I turned around and switched spots with her so that now she was underneath the flow of water. I ran my fingers through her thick, black hair and pulled her toward me. She came willingly. I kissed her passionately, and soon we were pressed up against the side wall, kissing hungrily. I had never kissed any woman in my life with this much intention. I wanted her to know how much I appreciated her and wanted her. I pulled back and looked at her intensely. Then I leaned in and kissed her again and again. It was the first time I had ever felt in complete control in her presence. Everything up to now she had dictated. I sensed that releasing control was somehow turning her on—more so than I had ever seen before in my life.

Stumbling and slipping, I led her out of the shower and into the bedroom. I threw her on the bed and proceeded to kiss every square inch of her body. I was in the midst of kissing her belly button when she reached around me and grabbed my buttocks and pressed me up against her. Then she wrapped her arms around me and just held me close.

I look down at her, gasping. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay, Josiah.”

“Are you sure?”

“Josiah, I....”

“You what?”

“Josiah, I....”

“You what?” I was anticipating her saying that she loved me, which would have floored me. To be honest, I
wanted
her to say it. So I pressed again. “What? Please tell me.”

“Josiah, I...have to kill you.”

“What?” I jumped off of her.

“I know I have to do it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Josiah, the Triat led me to you. I never understood why. I thought it was because it would have something to do with Tommy. But I think the Triat led me to you because you were going to ultimately mess up the prophesy.”