Haven (22 page)

Several bites into my frozen pineapple fruit bar, my mood still hadn’t improved.

Because my problem involved more than a little hypoglycemia.

I huffed and bit off more cold sugar on a stick. My life had taken a turn into crazy town, my life with monsters in the family and monsters out to get me. Hard to ignore the fact I was different.
Mostly human.
“Shut up, brain,” I muttered, polishing off my food.

A burst of laughter caught my attention. A few feet away, two women cuddled on a blanket, limbs tangled, hands stroking, lips meshed.

I want to snuggle like that with Alexander.

Meeting him was the one good thing about my reintroduction to the wacky world of vampires. But we’d never hang out and smooch, never share a crème brûlé or a pineapple fruit bar while the sun shone hot and bright in a daytime sky. We’d never be normal.

Who cares? He’s mine.

I wanted to believe it, but sitting here with the heat of the late afternoon sun baking my skin, doubt assailed me. Sure, Alexander was hot, but there was more to a relationship than physical attraction. Lust didn’t usually
make my brain take a complete vacation from logic like it tended to do every time he was near.

Unless...Oh, crap. Was I under some kind of spell? Were my feelings just a magical lie? My gut churned. “
Porco dio
.” Panic
.

I slipped my phone and its earpiece from the inner pocket of my jogging pants and called the one person on the planet I trusted to give me honest feedback on the subject.

“Hey babe, what’s up?” Adrian’s voice was slurred with sleep.

My mouth opened. Nothing came out. I closed it, biting my lip.

“Rina? You there? You okay?” Worry threaded his voice.

“I’m here.”

“What’s wrong?” Another male voice sounded in the background. Likely Jonas. “What’s happening? Are you in danger?”

That wasn’t an Adrian question. “Tell Jonas he can—” I broke off before I said something scathing. I hadn’t called to fight. “No. No danger lurking here. All is well.”

“Where is
here
, precisely?”

“Dolores Park.”

“Are you alone?”

“Yeah. Lorenzo sent Paolo and Greg to guard me, but I ditched them. Those two bug me.”

“Foolish girl.” That from Jonas.

“Tell Jonas I’m totally trackable via my cell so I’m sure Paolo and Greg have caught up with me. Besides, the only danger I’m in right now is from being offered a beer, a crème brûlé, or a pot brownie. Seriously, I’m surrounded by sweaty, happy park people. Just your garden-variety San Francisco humans here. Totally normal.”

C’mon Jonas,
I added in my head, unsure he’d hear me since I didn’t understand how mind chatting worked.
Let me talk to my friend. I’m fine.

Foolish and reckless,
Jonas replied.

“So, you called because?” Adrian prompted.

I hesitated. Did I want to talk about it after all?

I shifted my attention from the mass of people in the main park to the gaggle of kids cavorting on the playground.

“What am I doing, Adrian?” I hugged my knees to my chest.

“What do you mean?”

I stumbled over the words. “You know I don’t do guys I don’t know.”

“Ah. That.”

“Yeah, it’s the whole sober-light-of-day thing, I guess. But this isn’t me, Adrian. What’s wrong with me?”

A golden Labrador Retriever bounded by my picnic table, dragging its leash. It dashed into the playground and barked at the kids, tail wagging. A few protective parents approached as the owner, a tribal-tattooed young guy in cut-off blue jeans, ran to claim the pooch.

“Nothing is wrong with you, babe.
Nada
.”

“No, seriously. I think this is some kind of magic spell. My brain short circuits around him.”

“It’s not magic.” His firm tone failed to convince me.

I raked my nails on the table’s smooth surface. “But it has to be. I can’t think at all and my body goes crazy. It has to be some kind of vampire mind trick. Why else would I feel like I’m a sex addict who can’t survive even one second without touching him?”

“It’s no trick.”

“How do you know, Adrian? How can I know? Because that’s the thing—I don’t know this guy at all. I mean, he’s hot, but that’s not usually enough for me, as you know. How long was it before we moved from platonic friends to sex friends?”

“One year.”

I flicked my hand. “Exactly. And along comes this unbelievably sexy guy, a vampire no less, and suddenly I don’t care about his story? What kind of person he is? Suddenly, I’m ready to do it with a complete stranger I’ve known for, what, several hours at most? He’s got to be messing with me, right? Because the real me would be asking a whole lot of questions or checking him out on the Internet. Or, making our tech dudes run a background check. I don’t know where he’s from, if he has a family, a job, a life beyond drinking blood. Who is this guy?” My voice crackled, tinged with panic.

“Whoa, breathe, babe,” he soothed. “I was wondering when you’d flip out. You were so caught up in the moment, letting it happen, and I was proud of you for that, my little control freak. You were doing so well.”

My eyes watered and I sniffed.

“Are you crying?” Adrian sounded astonished. Contrary to my recent weeping willow behavior, crying was far from a regular habit. In fact, I doubt he’d ever witnessed a tear leave my body the entire time we’d known each other. Five years and counting.

“I’m coming over.”

“No, you don’t have to.” I blinked back the tears. “I didn’t know who else to call. You’re the only one who—”

“I get it. It’s okay.”

“You know Faith’s my girl, but I can’t talk to her about this. She practically has me married off already. She calls him
The Key
and is convinced he’s
The One
—”

“Well, isn’t he?”

“No.”
Liar
, my inner voice taunted.
Mine
.

Adrian chuckled.

I stretched out on the long tabletop. Tattooed boy jogged by, pulled along by his enthusiastic dog. I stared at the tree branches above my head, picturing Alexander.
Mine
, the voice repeated. “Okay, maybe, but—”

“But what, babe? Listen, there’s no magic in play here, no vampire tricks. There’s just you getting in your own way. You’re a control freak, Rina. The ultimate type A, the top string puller, diva of decision making, runner of every show in your life. Except this one. You can’t run this one and that’s what this little freak out is all about. You, feeling out of control.”

He was right. It both relieved and annoyed me.

“You can’t put him in one of your boxes, Rina.”

I rolled my eyes. “Oh, you’re the expert vampire lover now?”

“It’s not about that and you know it.”

“Isn’t it?”

He blew out a noisy breath tinged with impatience. “No. This is the real deal and you have to let it play.”

“The real deal?” I echoed.

“Do I need to spell it out for you?”

“I guess you do.”

“Stop.” His voice hardened. “Now you’re just arguing for the hell of it. You’re not under any magic spell and you know it. So get out of your own way and let this happen.”

My anger spiked at his harsh tone. “Shut up!” Several parents eyed me, assessed the danger threat, deemed me harmless and focused on their kids.

“Hey, you called
me
remember? You wanted to hear this, so listen up. Faith is right. He’s it, he’s
The Guy
. Your one and only. So don’t fuck it up by thinking it to death.”

We sat in silence for an awkward stretch while I processed our conversation. This was happening. All of it was
happening.

“I’m afraid,” I admitted.

“Of course you are,” he agreed, tone gentler now. “You’re out of your comfort zone.”

“Way out,” I added.

“I—oh hey, Jonas wants to talk to you.”

I sat up. “Why isn’t he talking in my head?”

Jonas’s voice came through the phone. “Get in the car.”

“What?”

“Now,” he ordered.

“You do realize I’m in the park, right? I ran here.”

“Go.” He hung up.

With a long-suffering sigh I wished he could hear, I hopped off the table and scanned my surroundings. It didn’t take me long to spot my chauffeur.

Stella waited under a tall, shady tree near Twentieth Street. I hustled through the playground and up the slope to join her, my lips curling upward in amusement at her anti-sunlight attire. Bowler hat, sunglasses, long leather coat, gloves, black turtleneck and skinny pants tucked into knee-high riding boots.

“You’re up early.”

She shrugged and sauntered toward the street.

I fell into step with her. “Seriously, shouldn’t you be fast asleep until sunset?”

“I am strong. I have no need of the moon to wake me.”

“Oh. This is another one of those older, stronger, can-do-more-things, right? What else do you have in your bag of tricks? Like the sun thing—nice, protective outfit, by the way—how much sunlight can you guys withstand before you turn into a pile of ash? Because I know you do, if you get burned enough, I’ve seen it, I—wait a minute.” I stopped. “I’ve seen that?”

A vampire reduced to a pile of ash. Just a mound of dust on the ground.

Yuck
.
It was an old memory and my brain didn’t want to linger there. But I had to know. “I see a pile of ash in my head. I can’t pull up the rest of the memory, like I was too young to get it or something is blocking it. Do you know anything about it?”

She shrugged.

Stop talking and get in the car,
Jonas growled in my head.

I jerked. “What the hell, go away.”

Stella stalked into the street, timing her movement so any passersby would assume I yelled at her. I caught up with her at the double-parked car, Lorenzo’s favorite Ferrari. My eyes widened in disbelief. “Lorenzo let you take
this
?”

She ghosted inside. I followed suit and buckled up. “But this is his baby, Stella. No one touches this car. No one.”

“I am persuasive.” She shoved the car in gear and roared us up the street.

“Ohmigod, you didn’t,” I laughed. “Mind control? He’s going to kill you when he figures out you compelled him.”

“I am already dead.”

My brows shot up. “Did you just make a joke?”

“I do not make the jokes.”

“You did. Anyway, what happened to the ‘do not touch the Tranquilli
bloodline’ rule?”

We turned onto Eighteenth, toward the heart of the Castro.

“No mind control. Your brother said, ‘Take the Mercedes
.
’ So, I took the Ferrari.”

I grinned. “I get it. I don’t like being told what to do, either.”

“No
man
commands me,” she grumbled.

“Ditto.” I thought of the three worst bossy offenders in my life. Lorenzo. Thomas. Jonas.

We drove onto Hartford. This was not the way to my house. “I thought you were taking me home,” I complained.

We pulled into Adrian’s driveway, parking in back. Our arrival here meant Brigid and Faith had indeed blown the whistle on me. Jonas knew about my creepy dream and had clearly ordered Stella to bring me here to discuss it. But I was sweaty and starving. I wanted to go home, shower, stop by the clinic to check on Mark and Ren, and meet my brothers for dinner. Discussing Team Evil’s recent hijacking attempt could wait.

“I thought you were my bodyguard now? I’m sure feeding me to the cranky lion isn’t part of the job description.”

She turned off the car. “You are not food, Tranquilli Child.”

“Speaking metaphorically here. I have plans. Take me home.”

Jonas growled in my head.
Get in the house.

“Get in the car, get in the house,” I mimicked him. “Stop barking orders at me. I’m not your slave.”

Now.
A trickle of power accompanied the order.

He power-smacked me. Damn him. I crossed my arms, unwilling to budge. Stella settled in, too, removing her hat and gloves and tossing them in back. We opened our doors for a cross breeze.

I broke our silence. “Stella, something has been bugging me about that night in the park. You know, when you and your guys, um, tried to eat us for dinner.”

Stella took off her sunglasses, dark eyes narrowing.

“You’re Tessa’s right hand woman, right? Yet when we met in the park, you didn’t know who I was.”

Stella frowned.

“Tessa practically
raised me, so, why didn’t you know about me? Are you new to her...?” What did vampires call their groups?

“
Cosca
,” she supplied.

My eyes widened at the word
clan
in Italian. A very gangster, very mafia term. “I was right. You guys are like a gang.”

Her eyes flashed, lips curling, baring fangs. “No child, we are not human, nor are we criminals,” she admonished me in Italian. “We do not traffic in drugs or slaves. We do not extort money from innocent business owners by maiming and torturing their wives while they watch, nor do we kidnap children and sell them into prostitution when their fathers cannot afford to pay us tribute.”

She gazed through me, eyes distant. Instinct told me she spoke from personal experience.

“We do not brand a young girl with our family crest as if she were cattle and make her our clan’s personal sex toy. We do not addict her to opium to render her incapable of escape. Do not whip her for amusement, let the wounds heal, and then whip her all over again. We do not make her fuck men and women while we watch and take her ourselves when she is barely conscious. We do not reawaken her with cocaine and begin it all again.”