Wombstone (The Vampireland Series) (19 page)

“Big night?” Sam guessed.

I nodded. “Something like that. I swear, I had two glasses of red wine, and I was
stoned
.”

“Your metabolism is much different now,” Sam said. “Don’t forget that.”

“How can I?” I replied. “I basically throw everything up that’s solid. I’m like a baby.”

“That’s exactly what you’re like,” Sam said, smiling.
 

“Yeah,” I said, suddenly feeling small and immature. “Okay, well, I better get back before Ryan kills someone.”
 

Walking back to meet Ryan, I felt a small surge of hope blossom within my chest. I could call Jared. Maybe even Evie and my mother. I could go to school.I could still get back on track and have a life, my life, and most of the things I had dreamed of since I was a little girl.
 

Almost everything.

My hand slipped down to rest over my stomach, and below that, my barren womb. I suddenly felt a heaviness sweep through me at the knowledge that while I could still act like the old Mia Blake, I was kidding myself if I thought I could just forget everything that had happened and go back to my old life. I felt a longing for the past, and a hollow pain inside my stomach throbbed in time with my aching head.

Ryan and I want you to go home as soon as possible.
 

Yeah, right. After last night, the crazy bloodlust and the sex, I doubted I’d ever be able to look Jared in the eye again.

I waited a respectable distance until Ryan had finished his conversation with his next potential victim. “Hey, Blake,” he greeted me. “Did you find the professor?”

I nodded, following Ryan’s gaze to land firmly on the blonde girl’s ass. “Oh, really? I was only gone five minutes!”

Ryan smiled. “I’m that good.” I felt him glance sidelong at me, while I was still checking Clair out. An image of us entwined on the kitchen table flashed through the bond and I whipped my head around to glare at him.

“Don’t,” I said through gritted teeth. He must’ve known I was serious, because he looked at the ground and didn’t say – or think – anything more about it. Which was very unusual for him. He normally loved to torment and tease me.

“What’s up with all the bruises?” I said, gesturing to Clair as she walked away from us. Her otherwise attractive legs were littered with dark purple and blue circles. It looked like someone had taken a tire iron to her shins.

“I don’t know,” Ryan said slowly. “Looks like she’s had a run in with someone… or some
thing
.”

“Let’s go,” I said, suddenly exhausted. I was still feeling the remnants of that bottle of wine and my head felt heavy and vague.
 

“Already?” Ryan asked. “Don’t you want me to give you the grand tour? We’ve barely scratched the surface.”

A thread of anxiety entered my thoughts. “And why would you be giving the grand tour? I don’t see ‘Vampire Academy’ written on any of the signs.”

He shrugged. “I may have attended this university a few times over the years. I’ve got degrees in Law, computer science, architecture.”

I shook my head. “So that’s why you chose UCLA as my day pass from prison.”

Ryan turned serious. “No,” he said, clearly annoyed. “I chose this school because you got a full scholarship. Your little trust fund isn’t going to last forever, my dear. You, on the other hand,
will
be around forever, if you play your cards right.”

If you play your cards right
. Somehow I thought that sleeping with my vampire maker wasn’t the right play. I blinked, trying to forget the night before, when I saw Ryan’s gaze cloud over as he daydreamed with a frown. Somehow, I knew he was thinking about the very thing I was trying to forget. I glared at him pointedly. He finally noticed and smirked.
   

That will never happen again
, I said sharply through the bond.

Ryan stiffened. “Don’t throw anything at my face, please.”

I shook my head and attempted to change the subject. “Well, did you get her number?”

“Why? You jealous?” That smirk again, as he unlocked the car.

I started to laugh. I laughed so hard that tears ran down my cheeks. “Yes,” I gasped, holding my stomach. “You got me, lover. I’m jea–lous.”

Ryan opened his door and slid into the driver’s seat, ignoring my sarcasm. “I’m taking her to dinner tonight. I’ll probably have to kill her.”

I stopped laughing. I quietly opened the passenger door and sat in the car. “
Why
?!”

As soon as I shut my door, Ryan threw the car into reverse. “I think she’s working for Caleb.”

Fear shot through my entire body. I started to panic as my lungs malfunctioned. “What do you mean?” I asked thickly. “Is he here? Is he coming for us?”

Ryan grabbed my hand and placed it on the gear stick, with his hand over mine. I started to feel that familiar falling sensation, and looked at him incredulously.
 

You’re going to show me something while you drive?

He just smiled wickedly as we drove faster, through suburban streets until we reached the coast. Ryan exited onto a narrow mountainside road that hugged the ocean below. Soon we were going so fast I felt sick. It didn’t matter, though. Images and sounds started tumbling through the bond like a motion picture until I could barely see the road past the scenes Ryan was showing me.

The pretty blonde thing at the assembly was on Ryan’s mind. He could have sworn he knew her from somewhere, or had at least crossed paths with her before. She smelled familiar to him, not like he had drank her blood or anything, but almost like he had met someone very close to her.
 

She sat in the bleachers, fussing with her handbag. On closer inspection, Ryan could see her fishing a pen and notebook out.
 

He walked straight up to her and did his thing. “Do I know you?”

She smiled. “Wow. I haven’t heard that one before.”

Ryan smiled. “No, seriously. Have we met before?” He put compulsion behind his words this time, always fearful that Caleb could be closing in. Or other people. Ryan Sinclair had made a lot of enemies in seven hundred years.

“No, I don’t think so,” she replied.
 

“What’s your name?” Ryan compelled, on high alert. This girl could be a distraction, and Mia could be in danger right now. But all he sensed from her through the bond right now was confusion as she tried to find Sam’s office.

“Yours first,” she smiled, resisting his compulsion with such ease it made him nervous. Then he noticed the small green and white flower tucked into her hair, a flower that stopped vampires like him from compelling humans.
 

He smiled broadly and stuck out his right hand. “I’m Ryan. And you look awfully familiar.”

The pretty blonde girl with dark blue eyes the color of a stormy ocean smiled back at him, taking his hand and shaking it. “I’m Clair,” she replied. “And I’ve never seen anyone like you before.”

They chatted some more. Clair revealed she was on the track team on a full scholarship, just like Mia. Ryan felt himself relax marginally as the two chatted about UCLA, running, the weather, and finally, about dinner.

“A poor college student like you must need a good meal,” Ryan said cheekily. “Let me buy you dinner on Thursday.”

She laughed. “I’m hardly a poor college student. But I do enjoy a good steak.”

“It’s a date,” Ryan said, for the second time that morning. “I’ll pick you up at, say, eight?”

“Perfect,” Clair said. She wrote her address on a slip of paper and pressed it into his palm.

“Hey, I like that flower,” Ryan said, pointing at the asphodel flower in her hair. “Where’d you get it?”

Clair smiled, touching her hair. “My dad loves growing all these weird plants I’ve never heard of. Did you know California is one of the only places in the world these flowers will grow?”

Ryan smiled to hide his worry. “I didn’t, no.”

“Well, you learn something every day. I’ll see you on Thursday, Ryan Sinclair.”

Ryan smiled broadly, ignoring the danger flag at the mention of his last name. He didn’t think he had told her his last name, only his first. He thoughts it was a shame that he’d probably have to kill her.

I wrenched my hand away, dizzy from the vision I’d just seen through our bond. He might have wanted to show me more, but I’d had enough. The car was going a respectable sixty miles an hour now, through suburban streets that were familiar to me now. We were almost home.

I stared straight ahead and didn’t say anything else. When Ryan glanced down to change gears as we pulled into the driveway, I tried to hide my shaking hands as I tore little strips of paper off my UCLA class schedule and shredded them with my fingers.

“You’re getting my car dirty,” Ryan said, but there was no force behind his words. He looked at me, and I was practically drowning in the worried vibes he was giving off.

“Sorry,” I said, and folded my arms, staring out of the window.

As I got out of the car, I realized why the car ride had been so abnormally quiet. I had held my terrified breath the whole way home.
 

A few days later, on a Thursday night, Ryan pulled up to a nondescript apartment building in nearby Sacramento. I knew because I was sitting in the car with him. After he refused to let me accompany him to Clair’s house, I had shared with him my newfound ability to see things in other rooms of the house, even if I wasn’t there. He didn’t believe me at first, but after I showed him what I had been able to see with Ivy and Sam fighting about me, he changed his mind. Suddenly, despite the risk that we may have been walking into a trap, Ryan was happy for me to keep watch in the car while he confronted Clair.

It was pretty nice digs for a college student. The girl obviously had money, or a rich vampire–daddy renting her a sweet pad. The navy cashmere sweater Ryan wore was just loose enough to conceal the G23 Glock, his favorite pistol, in the waistband of his pants. If
Clair
turned out to be a problem, well, the bullets in that gun were enough to blow her head clean off. Not that I really wanted to think about that, but he had gleefully gone into graphic detail on the drive over.
Thanks for that.

Ryan adjusted his sweater to fall just right over the Glock that sat sandwiched between his belt and the small of his back. The street was pretty quiet. After a final glance my way, he got out of the car and stood dead still next to it. I knew that he could hear the slightest branch break underfoot half a mile away. I watched as his keen eyes scanned the bank of windows at the front of the apartment block, taking in minute details in each apartment, like seams on curtains and shopping lists stuck to refrigerator doors. The curtains in Clair’s apartment were drawn shut, and neither of us could see anything other than the soft glow of mood lighting behind the heavy drapes. He sniffed the air, taking in freshly mown grass on the nature strip, engine oil dripping from the car in front of his, the damp smell of a nearby dog.
 

Nothing appeared suspicious. It felt fine – which worried Ryan and made me uneasy. It was much better to walk into an ambush when you knew it was there, I supposed. This picture of normality was evidently something he was not accustomed to.

Clair’s apartment was on the third floor. Ryan crossed the street and entered the foyer casually. Onlookers wouldn’t have been able to catch it, but I had watched as he broke the lock on the door to gain access rather than buzz Clair’s apartment. I guessed that the element of surprise was something a vampire held in high regard, especially when a potential trap was involved.
 

 
After he disappeared from my sight, I closed my eyes and breathed steadily, letting my other senses take over. Pretty soon a picture started to unfold in my mind’s eye. I found it interesting that, as well as seeing what Ryan was doing, I could
feel
what he was feeling and sense what he was thinking. It was almost exactly like the visions he had shared with me – only now we were operating in real time. It was a vision in technicolor, streaming live.

It must be the bond.

The foyer was empty, and Ryan immediately turned towards the stairwell. Elevators were just asking for trouble when one was being cautious – they could trap a vampire easily and permanently. It didn’t help that they were normally made of steel and were essentially moveable prison cells that could seal you in and make you undetectable even to a powerful witch like Ivy. It was safer just to take the stairs, and when you lived forever, you could spare the extra few minutes.

Ryan took the stairs two at a time, his arms loose by his sides and ready to react to danger. He sprang forward on the balls of his feet, making it easier to move quickly if required. He had ceased all breathing upon leaving the car, using the extra quiet to open up his supernatural senses and really listen to his surroundings.

Humans were noisy. Ryan was lucky though; he had lived for so long, he was able to filter noise in a way most younger vampires would find impossible. He heard, processed and discarded noises such as people talking, doors opening and closing, a dishwasher humming, someone talking on the phone. I felt him concentrate as he let his supernatural senses reach Clair’s apartment, and he listened for what he might find.
 

Upon reaching the third floor landing, he hesitated briefly. He could hear Clair’s breathing, and her slightly elevated heart rate. She was nervous; about a first date or something more sinister, he couldn’t tell. She was fussing in the kitchen by the sounds of things, putting groceries or dishes away perhaps. There didn’t seem to be anyone else in the apartment.
 

Seemingly satisfied with his initial scan of the building, he exited the stairwell and made his way down the hallway. Clair’s apartment was right next to the stairs, a detail that did not escape his attention. Was it just a coincidence, or had she chosen to stay there because the stairwell offered a quick escape in case of a crisis?