Was he joking? I didn’t know him at all, so I couldn’t tell if he was being serious or not. But it almost seemed like he was purposefully trying to cause trouble. Like he was trying to embarrass us. And, let me tell you, if that’s what he was doing, then it was totally working. I’d never been one to get embarrassed easily, but I could feel my cheeks getting warm. I squirmed around uncomfortably and fixed my gaze on the spot on the floor right in front of my feet.
“It was nothing important.” Alex’s tone was flat. “So you don’t need to worry about it.”
A lumped swelled in my throat. It felt like my heart had been ripped out and stomped on. I wished it didn’t feel that way, though. It really shouldn’t have felt that way. After everything that had happened—after everything he’d done. But despite how much I wanted to hate Alex—because, let’s face it, nine times out of ten he was a Class A jerk—I couldn’t. My feelings for him seemed to be out of my control.
“I need a break,” I announced. “I’m going outside.”
“Like hell you are,” Alex said.
“I’m not a little kid.” I stood up straight and raised my chin, hoping I appeared more confident than I actually felt. “If I want to go outside then I will. I need some fresh air”
Alex started toward me. “Gemma—”
Laylen stepped between us, creating a barrier. “How about I go out with her? That way she won’t be alone.” His bright blue eyes locked on me. “That is, if you don’t mind?”
Did I mind? He was a vampire, at least according to Alex. It seemed like I should have felt untrusting toward him. But honestly, at the moment, I couldn’t have cared less what he was or wasn’t. I couldn’t see any blood thirst burning in his eyes or anything. And I really, really wanted a break from Alex.
I shrugged. “Nope. I don’t mind.”
“Fine. Do whatever you want.” Alex waved his hand, dismissing us, and turned back to Aislin. “Let’s keep trying to get a hold of someone. We really need to know what’s going on.”
I heard Aislin muttered something in reply, but didn’t hear exactly what because I was already out the door.
Outside, the deliciously warm desert air dusted my cheeks and swept through my hair. The sky had shifted grey and the stars sparkled across it. The sandy desert land drifted aimlessly in front of me, shadowed by the nightfall. It was a relief not to have goose bumps speckling my skin. It was nice to be able to breathe without seeing it cloud out in front of me. It was so nice to be warm. So, deciding I might as well enjoy the warmth, I shoved the reason I was here as far back into my mind as I could and tried to let myself relax.
I sat down on the cement steps and stretched my legs out in front of me. The warm cement pressed through my jeans. The porch light shined from behind me and casted Laylen’s and mines shadows across the stairs below. Laylen seated himself beside me and leaned back on his elbows.
For awhile, we just sat there, gazing out at the desert, listening to the crickets chirping in the distance. The stars were really dancing tonight, and I could clearly make out the constellation of Cassiopeia. I wondered if that’s where my fascination with stars came from. Perhaps, deep down inside me, I knew what I really was and that some bits and pieces of me belonged up there with them, not down here where I never truly felt like I’d belonged.
“So,” Laylen’s deep voice rang through the silence, “how’s life been with Marco and Sophia?”
“Oh, just great,” I replied, my tone bitterly sarcastic. “It’s been a real blast.”
He laughed. “They never have been the most pleasant people to be around.”
I swatted at a bug that landed on my elbow. Gross. “So you know them then?”
“Yeah, but I haven’t seen them in really long time.” He stared off in the distance, looking like he was lost in a painful memory. “I haven’t seen any of the Keepers since….” He trailed off and looked at me. “Alex told you what I was, didn’t he?”
I nodded. “But it’s kind of hard to believe. All of this is kind of hard to believe.”
“I imagine it would be.” His voice was sympathetic. His blue eyes held such loneliness in them.
I propped my elbow on my knee and rested my chin in my hand. “So….what exactly is it that makes you a vampire?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well…” What was the correct way to ask someone how they were considered a creature of night? The living undead. A blood thirsty monster. “I’ve read a lot of books and everything. Nothing that was actually factual, though. They all say different things about vampires, and I was just wondering which—or if any had some truth to them.”
He rubbed his hand along his jaw line. “You want to know what it is that makes me a monster. Whether I bite, kill, or drink blood. If I can run at an inhuman speed or have super strength?”
It sounded like such a stupid question when he put it that way. I traced a circle in a patch of sand that was on the step I was sitting on. “I guess that’s what I’m trying to ask. Well, minus the whole monster thing because I don’t think that.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “You don’t think that I’m a monster?”
I shook my head. It wasn’t a lie either. I didn’t know him or anything, but he definitely wasn’t sending out the whole I’m-a-demon-and-I’m-going-to-kill-you vibe.
He pressed his deep red lips together. “If that’s true then you’re probably the first to ever think that.” He gave a long pause. “The whole hungry-for-blood thing doesn’t apply to me. I don’t drink blood. I don’t kill.”
“But it applies to other vampires?”
He nodded. “Other vampires are probably a lot like what you’ve read. And I’m not talking about the ones who drink blood, and do it by killing animals. They like to kill.”
A chill crept down my spine. “Why haven’t I ever heard anything about them existing?” I mean, if people were dying because their blood was being drained, you’d think there’d have been something mentioned on the news about it.
“For the same reason you didn’t know what you were. People are excellent at keeping secrets.”
“Yes, they are,” I agreed.
He brushed his blue tipped hair away from his forehead. “I do have some traits that normal vampires have. I’m immortal. I’m stronger than the average person. I have fangs.”
I gaped at him. “You have fangs.”
He nodded. “They’re retractable and I don’t use them. Ever.”
I couldn’t help but stare at his mouth. I know staring is rude and everything, but I just couldn’t seem to look away. The guy just told me he had retractable fangs for crying out loud. How could I not stare?
He laughed, and I got a full view of his flat, white teeth. “Staring at them isn’t going to bring them out.”
I quickly turned my head away, feeling stupid. Could it be true? Could I really be sitting in the desert next to a vampire, all while harboring the energy of a fallen star inside me? There was so much wrong with that statement, and yet, in a bizarre, twisted way, it felt right.
It felt true.
The howl of a coyote cut through the air, and I jumped.
“I can also sense when a person’s afraid,” Laylen remarked.
“I’m not afraid,” I told him.
“I know.” He stood up and dusted off his jeans. “Which makes you kind of weird.”
I sighed. “Weird seems to be my middle name.”
He chuckled. “So it does.”
Everything seemed strange. Here I was, having barely discovered my life was a web of lies, and yet I still found myself able to laugh. A quiet laugh, but nonetheless still a laugh.
I heard the front door creak open. Alex stepped out underneath the porch light with a displeased expression on his face. “You two having fun?”
What? I wasn’t allowed to laugh? Well, I guess technically laughing was an emotion, but whatever.
I looked up at Laylen, who winked at me before extending his hand out to help me up. His hand felt cold against mine as he helped me to my feet. Truth to another myth, I wondered.
I let go of his hand and followed him up the stairs, where Alex was waiting impatiently for us. He shot Laylen a glare as he walked by, but didn’t even so much as give me the benefit of a scowl, staring out into the darkness as I stepped past him.
Chapter 16
When we were back inside, Alex informed us that he hadn’t been able to get a hold of anyone, which I found very odd. I mean how was it that three people wouldn’t be answering their phones at the exact same time? It couldn’t just be coincidental. There was no way. There had to be more to it. And by the way Alex looked—all stressed out and confused—I was guessing he felt about the same as I did.
I sat down at the table and watched Alex pace back and forth across the room. He continued to do so for awhile, not saying anything, and I was starting to grow restless. I wished he’d say something because the silence was driving me nuts.
Finally I couldn’t take it anymore and decided to take matters into my own hands. “So what are we supposed to do now?”
Aislin, who had parked herself in the chair across from mine, was tapping her cell phone anxiously on her knee—apparently, no one could sit still. “We try to find them.”
Alex stopped pacing and shook his head. “That’s easier said than done.”
“I’m just trying to help,” she said. “There’s no need to be rude.”
“Did you two ever consider that maybe they don’t want you to get a hold of them?” Laylen asked.
Alex tossed his phone down on the table. It skidded across it and came to a stop just in front of me. “Laylen, whatever it is you’re trying to say, just say it.”
He crossed his arms and leaned back against one of the bookshelves, the muscles of his arms flexing beneath his shirt. I had to admit the guy was cut. I wonder if it had anything to do with him being a vampire. Vampires were supposed to be cut, weren’t they? Then again, Alex was the same way so maybe it was a Keeper thing—being perfectly built. Because, trust me, that’s what they both were.