Vampire's Kiss (3 page)

Until the Challenge, when I’d seen what the Isle of Night was really about, which was kill or be killed. I’d triumphed, and sure, partly it was because I was smart, but I wasn’t as strong as some of the other girls, and I suspected it was only Alcántara’s help that’d pushed me over the top. I’d triumphed over Lilac, and she’d disappeared, and now I’d begun to worry that maybe I should cut my losses and find a way out of here before the vampires changed their minds and decided
I
should be dead, too.

I tried to think proactively about it all, but my mind kept wondering what might’ve happened to Lilac’s body after I beat her, and how mine might suffer the same fate if any escape attempt were to fail.

There was movement around us, and we followed everyone’s eyes up the beach. Tracer Otto was approaching, carrying burlap bags.

My shoulders sagged. “
Crap
. Adolph brought the sandbags.” Sandbags were a pleasant little pastime wherein we scooped handfuls of sand into bags, and proceeded to run around in circles, carrying them over our heads. “Arduous
and
pointless.”

A half smile quirked Emma’s lips—the equivalent of a belly laugh from my redheaded friend. But then Otto turned our way, and she bristled. “Shh. Here he comes.”

I tucked my head toward hers, quietly singing, “‘The hills are aliiiiive…’”

She shot me a panicked glare. “You, hush!”

I smiled placidly as the other Acari joined us to sit in a row on the sand. I leaned over again, pitching my voice to the barest whisper. “‘Viss ze sound of muuuuziiic…’”

Tracer Otto stormed up the beach and proceeded to pace up and down the line, dropping the empty bags at our feet and instructing us in his best drill sergeant impression. “You will fill the bags,” he said, in a decidedly German accent—all he was missing was a little whistle around his neck. “Without delay.”

He reached the end of the line, and as he turned, I couldn’t resist murmuring, “Vizout delayyy.”

“Acari Drew.” A mellow voice spoke from behind me.

Oh God.
Too late, I noticed the shadow that had fallen on me. My skin rippled with goose bumps, as if a chill breeze were at my back instead of a vampire.

I looked over my shoulder and had to force myself not to startle when I saw how close Alcántara had managed to come behind me.
Stupid.
Things like that could get a girl killed in my world.

He stood there, tall but not towering, with bottomless dark eyes and smooth black hair that brushed the collar of his black leather jacket. He looked like a beautiful indie rocker…carved out of marble.

I hopped to my feet as reverently as one could when
wearing damp, sand-encrusted gym shorts. It struck me that all the other Acari had grown quiet around me, and even Tracer Otto was standing in respectful silence. They knew as well as I did how the sudden appearance of a vampire could mean somebody’s imminent evisceration. I only hoped it wouldn’t be mine.

I cleared my throat, speaking slowly enough to ensure avoiding any tongue twisting. “Master Alcántara.”

One side of his mouth crooked up in a wicked half smile, and I didn’t understand how it was possible to feel cold on my skin but so hot in my belly, all at the same time. “Acari Drew,” he repeated, stretching my name out on his tongue. “You have no taste for sandbags?”

Crap crap crap.
I racked my brain. What, exactly, might the correct answer be?
No, sir,
and I’d be a troublemaker;
Yes, sir,
and I’d be an intellectual dullard.

“So silent all of a sudden?” Though Alcántara addressed his next words to Otto, he held my gaze, speaking slowly as though imparting his message with significance. “Tracer Otto, it appears young Miss Drew doesn’t relish the gritty futility of your selected workout.” His smile grew broader. “I think perhaps Acari Drew craves more of an intellectual challenge.”

Alarms shrilled in my head. Had he read my thoughts? Or was it just a weird coincidence that he’d spoken my mind?

“I…Yes,” I stammered, second-guessing myself.
What’s the right answer?
It came to me, and I buried my nerves with a bravado delivery. “And no. The challenges I crave are of both the mental
and
physical variety.”

Alcántara barked out a satisfied laugh, and I felt a hot blush
creep from my chest to my hairline. How was it his laughter made my words echo in such a naughtily suggestive way?

Eager to change the subject, I glanced to the limp sandbag at my feet. “Is it time for the…for
these
?” At that moment, I’d have traded running up and down the beach with a sandbag over my head for Alcántara’s uncomfortable stare any day.

“Yes—”

“No,” Alcántara said, speaking over a visibly shaken Tracer Otto. “I am finding this exercise too…
vulgar
for Acari Drew.” The vampire’s voice was smooth as brandy, with a faint, sultry Spanish accent, his murmured
vulgar
managing to make sandbags sound like the crassest endeavor ever conceived by man.

I snuck Alcántara a tentative look, uncertain whether to feel thankful or terrified at just what other activity might be in store for me. The glint in those black eyes decided it, telling me the appropriate emotion was definitely
terror
.

“There is a different assignment for Acari Drew. Today Acari Drew begins an…
independent
study.”

B
reathe in, breathe out, foot up, foot down.
We wound along the trail leading from the beach back to campus, and it was taking all my concentration not to make an ass out of myself.

Why vampires didn’t choose to drive was beyond me—instead they just seemed to
appear
, and usually at inopportune times. Or, as I was currently discovering with Alcántara, they simply glided from one place to another, as though navigating a dinner salon instead of a rocky, rugged,
uneven
isle.

Stumbling a little, I amped up the mantra looping in my head.
You are not an ass. You are sophisticated, graceful, and bright. Watch the rock—

While my eyes were on one rock, I tripped on another, stubbing the toe of my sneaker hard and toppling to the ground, looking pretty much as
un
sophisticated and
un
graceful as a girl could get.

“Shi—” I swallowed my curse, quickly correcting myself. Vampires were old-school in every sense of the word, and Ronan was constantly warning me about my swearing. “Sh-
shoes
. My feet are sandy in my
shoes
. That’s why I tripped.”

“Cuidado, querida.”

I dusted off my hands, as embarrassed by my lame excuse as I was by my epic fall. Picking the sharp pebbles from my knees, I mumbled, “So much for graceful.”

I heard a low, rumbling chuckle overhead. The shadows shifted, and Alcántara came into view, squatting before me. “If you but relax, the legs will be as supple as the mind.”

I felt his deft hands on my knee and elbow, and before I knew it, he’d arranged me so I was sitting before him. I was horrified, sprawled there in my damp cotton shorts and oversized sweatshirt—my legs seemed extra pale, the flesh extra mottled with bruises. But it got worse, because he took one of my sneakers in his hand, unlaced it, and slipped it free, and then the other, until both my feet were pale and naked before him.

I felt as if he’d bared more than just my pruny toes.

I’d lied—I didn’t trip because I had sand in my shoe; I tripped because my nerves made me clumsy. But if he sensed my excuse, he didn’t show it. Instead, Alcántara took turns cupping each heel, gently sweeping away every last bit of sand. The sensation of his hands rubbing rough sand over the delicate arch of my foot sent electric shocks zinging up my body.

I couldn’t have budged if I wanted to, I was so paralyzed watching his every move. He worked in silence, eventually lacing me back up, and as I came back to myself, he was sliding his hand over mine, his grip cool and firm on my buzzing skin.

He stood, pulling me with him, and I became aware of his nascent power. Hugo de Rosas Alcántara might have been lean, but he was
strong
.

Those dark eyes met mine. “Better?”

“I’m feeling much more…uh…supple now, yes, thank you.” I felt the blood dump into my cheeks.

Great.
First Alcántara witnessed me stripped of dignity, and now my violently blushing cheeks would make him so thirsty, he wouldn’t be able to fight the urge to bite me and drink me dry.
Well, maybe he’ll make it quick.…

But instead he smiled. “You must have a care,” he told me with that devil’s grin. He bent over the rock that’d tripped me and easily pried it from the dirt. He held it before him in his outstretched palm. “We cannot have the best fighter on this island downed by a simple stone.”

And then he crushed it to powder.

He dumped the dust from his palm, his fingers sprinkling it into the breeze. “You are working with me now, and we must let nothing stand in your way.”

It was a kind thought, and yet menace had infused the words. I got the sense that Alcántara would allow nothing to distract me—not obstacles, not fear. And especially not people.

“Thank you,” I managed. If I’d known winning the Directorate Challenge would mean
this
, I might’ve rethought things a bit.

He gave me a courtly nod in reply, strolling on, and I did my best to keep up, despite my trembling legs.

We walked, and time passed, and despite our little foot interlude, his features remained as still as marble. I imagined
that, to an immortal, fifteen minutes of quiet was like the blink of an eye, but to me, the silence was excruciating.

I distracted myself by carefully scanning the path as we went, all the while trying to discern whether Master Alcántara breathed and wondering if his heart beat. Would I ever feel comfortable enough to ask?

Not daring to look straight at him, I snuck a peek at his legs and feet. Black denim. Thighs that were not too skinny, not too muscle-y. Simple ankle-high boots in a leather that wasn’t too shiny, nor too weathered. This vampire might’ve looked the part of an indie rocker, but his attention to detail struck me as studied. He’d have been just as pitch-perfect in the seventeenth century, or the nineteenth, or forty years ago for that matter.

I stifled the nervous laugh that threatened to bubble free, picturing Alcántara in a seventies leisure suit and paisley shirt.

Surely he sensed my shifting gaze—nothing escaped the vampires—but still he remained silent, until it began to scare me, certain as I was that I’d start giggling at any moment. Unable to bear it any longer, I asked the question that’d dogged me since I won the Directorate Award. “So, what’s my, uh, independent study, anyway?”

I knew our assignment would take us off-island, and my mind raced with all sorts of James Bond possibilities. Would I learn to fly a plane? Ski while balancing a rifle over my shoulder? Hack into state-of-the-art computer systems?

His black eyes went flat. “You really must work on your diction, Acari Drew. You are lovely, your wit amuses, and your mind has great potential, but your language betrays a certain lack of sophistication.”

“Umm…” I began, earning a sharp look from the vampire. I swallowed hard, trying again. “I mean to say, what will be my independent study this term?”

We reached our destination, and I’d been so preoccupied, I hadn’t noticed we were standing in front of my most detested spot on campus—the Arts Pavilion. It was a ridiculous name, and I was sure
he’d
named it, the head of the arts department and my least favorite person, dead or undead: Master Alrik Dagursson.

“Wait. What are we doing
here
?”

“I am delivering you to your independent study.”

“I thought my independent study would be with you.”

Embers smoldered to life in those coal black eyes. “I am deeply flattered,
querida
.” He stroked a finger down my cheek, and I held my breath, vowing to guard my words more carefully from now on. “We shall have many hours together, you and I. But first you must begin with Master Dagursson.”