Cryptic Cravings (3 page)

“I know he’s mad at me . . .” Sebastian said, “but I stil have his back.”

“He’l see the club once it’s open,” Jagger said, rising. He put his arm around Sebastian. “It won’t be too long.

We’l decorate at night. I have ways of getting these things settled very quickly.”

Sebastian bit his black nails.

“Just think it over,” Jagger said, slapping Sebastian on the back like a coach does to a footbal player. “You have a place to stay, a new best friend, and . . .”

“A girlfriend,” a sweet, ethereal voice said.

Just then pink hair bounced in from behind the shadows.

Luna was dressed in a wickedly cool frock—a pink mini-dress with black spiderwebbed tights. Her perfectly straight baby pink hair appeared as soft as something out of a shampoo commercial.

Sebastian shot up.

She took his hand and pul ed him into her. They shared a kiss that probably would have gone on forever if Jagger hadn’t cleared his throat.

“It’s Luna,” I whispered to Alexander. “Now we should go in—”

Alexander helped me back to the ground and I told him what I’d heard. He shook his head. “We need to wait,” he said.

“Real y?” I was surprised by Alexander’s sudden change in course.

“Yes,” he said. “But not for too long. I’m always getting Sebastian out of predicaments. Maybe this time he needs to figure things out himself.”

“But what about this new club?” I asked. “It wil be here, in Dul svil e.”

“That we wil have to fix. But I don’t have to at this moment.”

We heard the sound of a car driving over the gravel. Alexander pul ed me back into an alcove.

A white Beetle painted to look like a skul drove past us and parked. Scarlet and Onyx hopped out of their car.

“I think it wil be fun to hang with them here for a little while longer,” Onyx said.

“That’s because you want to be next to Jagger at al times.”

“I do not!” she declared.

“It’s okay,” Scarlet reassured her. “I’d like to try to see that Trevor guy again.

He’s such a prep—but I have to admit, I real y think that’s hot!”

Onyx giggled.

“Too bad I can’t bring him here,” Scarlet said. “Maybe I’l just show up at his school in his locker room.”

The two girls giggled as Onyx opened the trunk.

“But he can’t know about us,” Onyx said. “That’s why it’s best to date vampires. We don’t have to hide. Maybe you should like Sebastian?”

“He’s al into Luna. That girl gets on my nerves. I sense something fake about her.”

“Like she’s not a real vampire?” Onyx asked as they retrieved several bags of groceries.

“No—like she’s up to something. She’s either real y saccharine-sweet or total y aloof.”

“Do you think she real y likes Sebastian?” Onyx asked as they headed for the door with groceries in hand and passed by us.

“I think she likes—” Scarlet said, but we couldn’t hear her answer. They had disappeared into the factory.

Alexander took my hand and led me away from the abandoned mil .

“I have other things on my mind tonight,” he said, his eyes stil dreamy from the blood exchange, and he drove me back to the Mansion.

As I lay in my bed, I cuddled Nightmare in my arms. Alexander had final y taken my blood as his own. The moment felt as intense for me as it was for him. To be one of the few living humans in the world to have blood taken by a vampire thril ed me beyond belief. And that it had been done in a harmless and loving way made the whole event exhilarating and blissful. The most important part to me was that Alexander showed me that he needed me, craved me, wanted me. The feeling of connection I now felt to him was stronger than blood.

And that moment was much different than when Sebastian had taken Becky’s blood. One, she hadn’t known it had happened; two, she wasn’t aware that Sebastian was a vampire; and three—and most important—she wasn’t in love with him.

With Alexander, this was something we shared together as a couple. He needed me—inside and out, just as I did him. Heart, soul, and blood. And if he’d done this, something I never thought he would do, did that mean that he was one step—a big step—closer toward turning me? I threw my head back on the pil ow in laughter. At this moment, I didn’t care about being a mere mortal. A vampire had taken my blood! I’d experienced much more beyond belief since meeting Alexander Sterling. I’d always dreamed that vampires existed, and now I knew. I’d fal en in love with one—and this very night, he’d acted as a true vampire and shown me how much he needed me.

But what should have been a uniquely blissful moment was complicated once again by the nefarious vampire twins, Jagger and Luna. If only I could spend time just thinking about Alexander. Final y our lives could be about just us. I wondered if that would ever happen.

I was torn about the Crypt. When I thought about what Jagger was proposing, a fabulous new dance club where none before existed, I was ecstatic. Practical y speaking, though, there was nothing worse than having vampires (ones other than Alexander and his family, of course) inhabiting our town and mixing with mortals. If this place became a second Coffin Club, we could only guess what new vampires would do. Would they put the lives of unsuspecting students or townspeople in danger? But the other part—the dance club itself—was exactly what I’d real y wanted al my life. A club, a haunted happening, only a few miles from my own house, that I’d be able to attend. A place, unlike school and al of Dul svil e itself, where I would final y fit in.

My mind raced. Maybe I could help Jagger and the others with the plans, marketing, and decorating the Crypt. I could be the very thing they needed to bring life to the club.

Could this real y be the gift I’d always dreamed of, and just in time for my birthday? But this one thing that would bring excitement into my life might bring disaster to Alexander’s. The increase in vampires in Dul svil e could bring attention to them and ultimately reveal the secret identity of the one vampire I cared about the most.

Or maybe, just maybe, this could be a place like the Mansion, where Alexander could final y be himself. No hiding or pretending to be anything but himself. Just drinking real Bloody Marys and dancing until dawn.

It was a gamble, knowing Alexander’s former nemesis. Jagger was a vampire who craved attention and seemed to receive a lot because he owned a vampire club. Ultimately I was skeptical about his underlying intentions for this new club.

I was restless. For the first time in my life, the one thing I knew I needed to stop from happening was the one thing I wanted to make sure happened. Jagger, Sebastian, and the others were holed up inside the factory making plans for the Crypt while I was reduced to studying, homework, and insomnia.

What happened to your lip?” Becky asked when I hopped into her truck the fol owing morning before school. “Did Alexander get carried away with you?”

“Is it that noticeable?” I pul ed down the visor and checked my reflection in the mirror—an act I wouldn’t be able to do if I were a vampire someday. I struggled with the idea that I would no longer be able to see myself and what that simple task would mean for me. To never be able to adjust things such as makeup, hair, and my clothes.

Alexander was gorgeous natural y. I wasn’t sure that I was ready for the world to see me without being able to present myself the way I wanted to be seen.

As I touched up my cut with corpse white cover-up, I felt a renewed sense of confidence. It wasn’t the kind of confidence one feels when securing oneself with makeup but rather an internal assurance and peace. I felt as if I couldn’t contain my glow.

“What’s up with you?” Becky said. “You can’t seem to stop smiling.”

“I’m just in love. . . .” I said dreamily.

“Me too. We are both so lucky we found good guys. I still can’t believe that we both have boyfriends, can you?”

“No,” I said honestly.

We drove past the covered bridge that met the winding road leading up to the factory on the outskirts of town. I could see the smokestacks high above the trees, as if they were deliberately taunting me—reminding me of Jagger’s presence.

“But I have so much on my mind,” I said, slightly hinting to Becky.

“What’s up?”

“If there was something you wanted to happen but it might be a threat to others, what would you do?”

“I wouldn’t want it to happen.”

“It’s that simple?” I asked.

“Why would I want something that was not good for everyone?”

Becky was an altruist. That’s why she was such a good friend to me. But in this case I would have preferred she be a bit more cynical.

“Why would it be bad?” she asked, worried. “Is this about you and Alexander?”

“It might not be bad,” I confessed, and it was true, since I didn’t ultimately know Jagger’s plans. I was just going by his previous history.

“I think it would be easier if you just told me what you are talking about instead of being so cryptic.”

“It’s not real y a threat, not now anyway,” I said.

“I guess you’d have to take the threatening part away. That’s the only way it would work.”

I thought about what Becky said. If somehow I made sure that no vampires were invited to the Crypt, other than the ones already inhabiting the vacant mil , then maybe there wouldn’t be a threat. I knew Onyx and Scarlet, and so far they didn’t seem to take advantage of unsuspecting mortals. If Sebastian liked Luna, Onyx had her fangs set on Jagger, and we kept a close eye on Scarlet’s fondness for Trevor, al the vampires would be accounted for.

Perhaps it could be a fun place for Dul svil e’s high school students to hang out. They could, at last, final y understand what I’ve been craving al my life. Maybe the darkness could make them, too, feel more alive than ever.

And it could be a huge, morbid playpen for me.

“You are a genius,” I declared.

“Now are you going to tel me what you are talking about?”

Just then my cel beeped. It was a text from Alexander.

I can’t sleep. Thinking of you.

I melted inside, knowing that my boyfriend was lying in his coffin and dreaming of me. And though I loved Alexander’s mystery and old-fashioned style, I was grateful to be a not-so-normal girl with a not-so-normal boyfriend now that we were able to communicate like a normal couple.

I quickly texted back.

Miss you like crazy.

I held the phone out to Becky proudly. “Alexander,” I said.

“I have something to tel you . . .” my best friend said as we pul ed in to the entrance to school. “There are rumors about Alexander’s party. Some people are saying Sebastian bit Luna. Like for real—like a vampire!”

“Why would they say that?” I asked skeptical y.

“Someone swore they saw blood and the rumor snowbal ed. Now some kids are freaked out. They’ve been talking about it al week. I was kind of afraid to tel you. I didn’t want you to be upset. But it isn’t going away.”

“So? That’s al these people do is talk.”

“But I think it doesn’t real y matter, since Sebastian and those guys aren’t even here anymore.”

They are stil here, I wanted to say. I weighed my thoughts. I wasn’t sure if it was time to tel her Sebastian and Jagger were sequestered in the factory, making a second Coffin Club.

“I kind of wish Sebastian hadn’t left,” she said in a tone that was mostly saved for a confessional. “Not because I like him—in that way—but there was something different about him. Like Alexander and that Jagger guy. I real y can’t put my finger on it. They’re different from the guys here.”

Because they are vampires, I wanted to say.

“It must be that European charisma,” she final y said.

“Yes, that must be it.” I smiled.

Becky pul ed into the student parking lot and turned off the truck. “Your birthday is coming soon,” she said excitedly as we got out and headed toward the main entrance. “What do you want to do? We could al go to Hatsy’s or Hooligans.”

“That wasn’t what I real y had in mind.”

“The cemetery?” she asked nervously.

I smiled again. I hadn’t thought much about celebrating my birthday. Ever since I was little, al my parties were duds and the only ones I ever enjoyed were when Becky and I just stayed up al night pigging out on brownies, chips, and super-sugared and hyper-caffeinated sodas and endlessly watching vampire movies.

“Alexander turns eighteen just before my birthday. I think we should just have one party together.”

“That sounds awesome! Maybe we can have it at the Mansion,” she suggested.

“Did I hear it’s going to be someone’s birthday?” a familiar male’s voice said from behind me.

I didn’t even bother turning around and continued walking, but that didn’t stop my nemesis from disturbing me. He jumped in front of me, blocking my way.

“It’s been a whole year, has it?” he asked in a syrupy tone. “Maybe this birthday I’l final y give you what you’ve always wanted.”

Becky was shocked and blushed. But I wasn’t moved.

Trevor was as menacing as he was gorgeous. If he were a vampire, he’d be the dark kind, the kind that sneaks up on innocent girls and bites without a thought. Trevor possessed many of the qualities of a vampire without actual y being one. He constantly preyed upon me, was deeply charismatic, and tried to suck the life out of me.

Trevor could have any girl he wanted—except for me. But for some reason, I’d always been a thorn in his side, maybe one that he never real y wanted to get rid of.

“I’l just have to Lysol myself and make sure to get a rabies shot,” he said. “I won’t turn on the lights. For my protection—not yours.” He leaned in so close to me I thought for a moment he was going to kiss me.

“Don’t forget to bring your ‘Dating for Dummies’ handbook,” I said. “I’m sure you’l need it.”

Instead of scowling, his face lit up with a glistening white, devilish smile. It was as if I’d made his day and our quick and battling banter were like an aphrodisiac to him. He winked at me before he arrogantly turned away and disappeared into the crowd of students.

Becky appeared weary as we headed to our lockers, but I remained unperturbed.