Текст книги "The Fallen Star"
Автор книги: Jessica Sorensen
сообщить о нарушении
Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 19 страниц)
I gasped as he pressed the needle into my skin for the third time.
“Oh yeah, the fallen star—all of what has happened has to do with that.”
“How?”
“You remember the story, right? Twenty years ago a star fell from the sky.” 270/695
I nodded. “But that doesn’t mean I believe it.”
He paused, the needle a mere sliver of air away from piercing into my skin. “You promised me you’d keep an open mind, remember. And you need to believe in the fallen star story otherwise the rest of this is going to sound like a lie.”
“But you are a liar, right?” I asked, knowing I was treading on thin water here.
He was the one holding the needle, after all.
But still, it needed to be said.
“Liar’s such a strong word. I prefer to think of it as me omitting some of the details.”
I rolled my eyes. Whatever.
This time when he snaked the needle through my skin, he placed his free hand on my stomach. My bare stomach. All of my focus centered on how his fingers were touching my bare skin. The warmth. The buzzing.
It even numbed out the pain a little.
271/695
“Gemma?” His voice pulled me back to him.
I blinked dazedly. “Huh?” He stared down at me, his forehead creased. “Did you hear what I said?” As much as I hated to do it, I shook my head because I hadn’t heard a single word he’d said. “Umm…No.”
“I asked if you remembered when I mentioned the secret group that hid the star.” I nodded, still somewhat distracted by his warm hand touching my stomach. “Yeah, I remember.”
“Well, the secret group is called Custodis of Vita.”
There was so much electricity. “The awhata?”
“The Custodis of Vita,” he repeated, sounding irritated.
That’s it. It was too hard to focus with his hand touching me like that. I reached down and lifted it off of me.
272/695
He gave me a strange look, glanced at his hand, then back at me.
“What is that like Latin or something?” I asked, hoping to distract him away from what I’d just done.
“Yeah…it means Keepers of Life. But for short we call ourselves The Keepers.”
“Keepers of life.” I raised my eyebrows.
“It sounds like a cult.”
A soft laugh escaped his lips. “It’s not, though. We actually protect the world from dangerous things”
“We?” I studied his expression; so serious and, at least as much as I could tell, so not the expression belonging to someone who was lying. However, Alex was an excellent liar. “So you’re saying that you belong to this Keepersgroup?” He nodded. “And Aislin. And…” His voice got quieter. “Marco and Sophia.” I lay there, motionless, letting his words sink in. “So what you’re trying to tell me is 273/695
that Marco and Sophia, the people who’ve raised me since I was one, belong to some secret group who protect the world from evil?” It sounded way too fictiony. All saving the world from evil and demons and vampires. Yeah, I know, he hadn’t actually mentioned vampires but…God, what if there were actual vampires? “No. There’s no way.
You’re lying. You have to be lying.” He had to be.
“That’s the second time you’ve said that in the last five minutes, which is really frustrating since this is one of the few times I’ve ever told the truth.” He seemed so angry it was hard not to believe him. Besides, something else had just occurred to me. Something that might backup part of what he was saying. That time I’d caught Sophia and Alex having that strange conversation in the foyer. If what he was saying was true, it would explain how they knew each other. My stomach felt all twisty. What if what he was 274/695
saying wastrue? “Is that why you and Sophia were talking the other day? Did it have something to do with all of this?” He gave a slow nod. “That night we were discussing….something.”
I felt a sharp tug as the needle snagged my skin. I let out a whimper and my hand instinctively flew down toward the pain. Luckily, Alex caught my fingers before they touched the stitches.
“Whatever you do, don’t touch it,” he warned.
I drew my hand back and cradled it against my chest. “So, if you’re telling me the truth—which I’m still not one-hundred percent certain you are—then why hasn’t anyone mentioned any of this to me before?” He hesitated, looking stressed. “I don’t even know how to begin to explain the rest of this to you.” He let out a frustrated sigh as the needle slipped through my skin. “Okay, so that star I was telling you about held a lot 275/695
of power. That’s why we—the Keepers went and got it in the first place. If it fell into the wrong hands then…”
Silence grasped the air.
"Then what?” I wish he’d just spit it out.
He shook his head. “Nothing.” He paused, seeming torn about something.
“Okay, let me try this again. There are these people who have the ability to see into the future. Kind of like Psychics, but we call them Foreseers. But anyway, one of these Foreseers made this prediction—or a prophecy I guess you could call it—that this fallen star would prevent the end of the world from happening.” He picked up the scissors and trimmed the end of the string off. “You’re in-to astronomy, right? So I’m sure you’ve heard of December 21, 2012?” I stared at him, dumbfounded. End of the world.WTF.
“Gemma?”
276/695
“Um…yeah…Dec. 21, 2012? Aren’t the planets supposed to align or something?” He nodded. “At the exact same moment the winter solstice takes place.” He tossed the scissors back into the box and pulled out a roll of tape and gauze. “When I say ‘end of the world’, what I mean is there’s this portal that’s supposed to only be able to be open up at the very exact moment the planets align.”
“A portal,” I repeated with skepticism. I mean, I’d heard some theories on what some people believed was going happen on December 21, 2012. And a couple of them had discussed the possibility of the world ending. But a portal? Really?
He cocked an eyebrow. “You still seem like you don’t believe me.” He positioned the gauze over the stitches and secured it with two strips of tape. Then he set the roll of tape back into first aid kit and snapped the lid shut. “I’m all done now, so you can sit up if 277/695
you want. Just be careful, though. And don’t move to fast or you might rip them open.” I tugged the edge of my shirt down and slowly sat up. My side felt all strange and tight, and the skin burned.
Alex set the kit down on a nearby table and dropped down on the couch beside me, his knee brushing against mine and making my muscles tense as electricity coiled up my thigh.
“So what is that?” I asked abruptly.
“That electricity thing that I feel whenever I’m around you?”
He shrugged. “I have no idea.” I eyed him over suspiciously. I could never be sure whether he was lying or not.
“You have no idea what it is?” He shook his head. “Nope. I’ve never felt anything like it until you came along.”
“Yeah, me neither,” I muttered. “Until the first time I was by you.” He looked surprised. “Really?” 278/695
“Yes really. Why do you look so surprised? You just said the same thing?”
“Because it’s different with you.” Before I could yammer out a bunch of questions about that, he shifted the direction of the conversation. “But anyway, back to the portal. See, if it opens up, it will let out a ton of Death Walkers. So I’m sure you can image how the end of the world is supposed to happen.”
I stared down at my hand, remembering the bluish-purple color. “By ice.”
“Exactly.”
“So how come I started freezing to death, and my fingers turned all funky and blue, but you seemed completely unbothered.”
“Eventually mine would have turned out the same way,” he explained. “Your reaction to the Death Walkers chill is just a little worse than mine.”
“Why?” I asked. “I mean, is there something weird about me?” 279/695
“I’m getting to that.” He fiddled with a loose string hanging off of one of the throw pillows. “There’s this guy named Demetrius, who is the leader of all the Death Walkers, and he wants this portal to open up. And basically, this fallen star is the only thing that has enough power to keep the portal from opening, so you can imagine how important it is to keep the star away from him.”
“Do you still have it?” I was confused by how weird it sounded. I mean, this was crazy. It had to be some twisted, freaky dream I’d been sucked into or something. Or maybe I’d had a meltdown and created my own personal fantasy world inside my head.
There was no way this could be real, right?
But if that were true, then why did it feel like there was more truth in his story than anything I’d ever been told?
A funny look flickered across his face.
“Yeah, we still have it.” He kept his eyes on me for an instant longer, before forcing them 280/695
away. “We kept it hidden so Demetrius couldn’t find it and destroy it. For the first few years, we had a Shifter transfer the star’s energy into different objects to keep its location a secret.” He stopped. “Do I need to slow down? You look lost.”
“Kind of lost. Kind of overwhelmed,” I admitted. “But you can go on.”
“Okay, but just so you know the next part is going to be very hard for you to hear.
And you need to make sure to stay as calm as you can.”
I swallowed hard, my stomach churning.
“I’ll try.”
He took a deep breath and surprised me when he reached over and took my hand.
“An accident happened three years after we found the star. Theron, the Shifter I told you about, was attacked by Demetrius while in possession of the object that was holding the star’s energy in it. He ended up panicking and accidently shifted the power into 281/695
something it should have never gone into.” He gave a long pause. “It went into a woman.”
“A woman?” My eyes widened “What happened to her?”
“Well, the energy didn’t end up in her exactly. She was pregnant when it happened, and it ended up going into her unborn child.” I froze. Why did this seem so familiar?
And why did the incident back at the telescope—the one where I’d been sucked away to the field—pop into my mind. “So what happened to the mother and the baby?”
“They both lived and everything, but the stars energy got trapped inside the baby. And it’s still there. For some reason—and no one knows for sure because no one’s ever came across anything like it before—no Shifter could transfer it back out of her.” He pressed his lips together, his hand tightening on mine. “A few years after it all happened, the mother did end up passing away. But her 282/695
death had nothing to do with the star.” He watched me closely. “She was a Keeper and her name was Jocelyn.”
“Jocelyn,” I repeated. “Why does that name sound so familiar? Did I know her?” He nodded. “You did and very well.”
“How?” But before he could answer, I realized why. Because I’d seen the name before. On my Birth Certificate.
Jocelyn was my mother.
283/695
Chapter 14
Neither of us spoke for awhile. The only sound came from a clock ticking back and forth. Alex was still holding my hand, his skin warm and flowing with static. He’d never actually answered my question when I’d ask how I knew the woman. But I think he might have sensed I’d figured it out by my sudden muteness.
“Gemma, are you okay?” he finally asked.
I nodded slowly.
“You do know who she is, right?” I nodded slowly again.
“Then you understand what that means, right?”
I pressed my lips together. Yeah, I understood what it meant. Way, way too 285/695
clearly. He was saying that for the last eighteen years, I’d been harboring a fallen star's energy inside of me. Some piece of a freaking solar systems sun. And as crazy as it sounded, it made sense. I’d never been normal.
I’d been hollow and emotionally numb until an invisible prickle had shown up, and my emotions had come barreling out of me. Add that to the violet color of my eyes, and my ability to either sense or cause electricity to flow just by being around someone….I really was a freak. Literally. I probably wasn’t even considered human.
“So what am I?” My voice sounded so numb.
“What are you?” His eyebrows dipped down. “Huh? What are you talking about?”
“Well, I can’t be human?” I choked on the words. “So what am I?”
“You’re human,” he assured me. “Just a human with a lot of power buzzing inside her.”
286/695
I could feel that power buzzing right now, and it was making me feel like I might throw up. I tried to ease my hand away from his, but he clutched onto it.
“Look,” he began in a very guarded, yet very determined tone. “I know this all sounds crazy. And I understand that you’re probably freaking out right now, but there’s more I have to tell you.”
“There’s more!” I cried. A few hours ago, I’d wanted nothing more than to hear the truth. But now, after what I’d heard, part of me wished there was a rewind button so I could go back in time and chose not to hear it.
He gave a slow nod. “And I think I should probably warn you that it’s just as bad—if not worse than what I’ve already told you.”
My hands shook, and I felt like I was suffocating. How could anything be worse than getting told I was carrying around the power 287/695
of a star that could possibly save the world from a deathly, apocalyptic portal? I ripped my hand away from his and let my head fall into my hands. “This is a lot to take in. I’m not sure if I can take anymore.”
“Well, if you want me to stop then—” My head snapped up. “No.” I sat up straight. I was going to have to tough it out.
“I need to hear the rest otherwise it will drive me crazy.”
He sighed. I think he might have been hoping I’d tell him to stop, but good or bad, I needed to hear it. I’d already learned too much to go back now. Everything had changed. Nothing was simple anymore. But really, had anything ever been simple for me?
He looked reluctant, but continued.
“Well, we lucked out because Demetrius never discovered the location of where the stars power ended up. A few months after you were born, though, a Foreseer told Stephan 288/695
another prophecy about the star. The prophecy said that if your emotions weren’t controlled then the power of the star would weaken and eventually die altogether, which would make it useless to stop the portal from opening.” He placed his hand back on top of mine, which I thought was kind of weird. He sure did seem determined to touch me. “So to keep that from happening, and to keep Demetrius from ever finding out, Stephan made a decision that you’d go and live with Marco and Sophia in the real world.”
“How old was when I went to live with them?” I asked.
“You were one when you went to live with Marco and Sophia,” he replied in a flat tone that puzzled me. His palm felt sweaty on my hand, and I had to admit it was kind of gross. “And they were under strict orders to make sure you stayed unemotional.” I didn’t say anything for awhile. I’d hit some kind of eerie calm or something. Or 289/695
maybe I should say an “unemotional” calm. I knew right then and there that any doubts I’d had about Alex telling the truth were gone. How could I deny it when he knew about my unemotional issue? Now the problem I was facing was that I was made to be that way.
Intentionally.
“Gemma,” he said.
“How?” I asked in a lifeless tone. The same lifeless tone I’d used for most of the last eighteen years of my life. Until I’d felt the prickle.
He cocked his head to the side in confusion. “How what?”
“How did they do it?” I tried to wiggle my hand free from his, but he wouldn’t let go. “Make me unemotional.” He fixed his gaze on the floor and shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess by shutting you off from any kind of emotional contact.
If someone doesn’t ever know happiness, 290/695
sadness, or love, then how can they ever feel it?”
The inability to make eye-contact was the first sign someone was lying, right?
“You’re lying,” I accused.
“No, I’m not,” he said, his eyes still locked on the floor.
“Yes, you are,” I insisted. “You can’t even look at me.”
He shook his head and looked at me with a tolerant expression. “There. Are you happy now?”
My dulled calmness abruptly faded, and a wave of panic and anger thundered through me. I tugged and pulled and yanked my hand, desperately wanting to get the heck out of here. I wasn’t sure where I’d go, but how could I stay here after what he’d just told me? All I wanted to do was get away and hide; curl myself in a tiny little ball and cry until my eyes ran dry. So I did the only thing I could think of to get him to let me go. See, 291/695
what I’d learned about Alex over the last few weeks was that he liked to be the one in control of the situation. So what I needed to do was make him think he was losing the control. There was only one thing I could think that might do that.
Lie.
“But I have been able to feel,” I told him.
“Yeah,” he said, unsurprised. “Marco and Sophia have been noticing a change in you over the last few months. That’s one of the reasons why Ailsin and I enrolled in school. We were trying to figure out what had happened to cause the change. And we were also keeping an eye on you.” That’s why they’d shown up at my school. I shook my head. I was going to have to let go of that one for now, otherwise I’d get sidetrack from my plan to escape. “That’s not what I meant. I’ve been able to feel for more than a few months. Awhile ago, I found a paper in one of Sophia’s trunks that had 292/695
this list of dates on it.” I caught a hint of understanding pass over his face, and I knew he knew what paper I was referring to. “After doing a lot of searching around, I finally figured out what it meant.” Now I was going out on a limb here because I wasn’t sure if the list of dates had anything to do with any of this. It was just a hunch I had, but I was going with it. “After that, the whole being-able-to-feel thing became simple for me.” I searched for a sign that he might be buying my lie. At first, he looked completely lost. Then his expression shifted to anger. A couple moments later, worry washed over his face. I felt his grip loosen on my hand, and I seized the opportunity. I yanked my hand as hard as I could. It worked. His hand fell off of mine, and I was on my feet in a heartbeat, bolting for the door, ignoring the pain tearing up my side.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Alex called out.
293/695
Ignoring him, I threw open the door.
“The Death Walkers will find you,” he said. I could hear him moving toward me, his footsteps scuffing lazily against the hardwood floor like he was so sure I wasn’t going to run away. “Now that they know the stars in you, they’ll always be searching for you.” All I had to do was go. Leave. Find the front door and run my little heart out. But my fear made me hesitate. What if he was telling the truth? What if they did find me and I was all alone? What would happen to me? Was it worth the risk?
I turned to face him, my hand still clasped on the doorknob. “How can you be so sure they know I have the stars energy in me?”
“Oh trust me, they know.” He came to a stop in front of me. “After what happened on the bus, there’s no way they don’t.” I was trapped. Either I could run and risk the chance of getting killed by a bunch of 294/695
hypothermic-inducing monsters, or I could stay here with Alex, a liar who had caused me to suffer through most of my life as a walking emotionless corpse.
I stayed still, even when he set his hand on top of mine.
“Running away would be a very stupid thing to do,” he said in a low voice. “Don’t ever try to do it again.” I frowned as he removed my hand from the doorknob. “You were lying, weren’t you? About being able to feel earlier than we’d thought?” he asked.
I stared at him impassively.
“I know you were,” he said. “If it were true then Marco and Sophia would have known.”
“Would they?” I twisted my hand out of his grip. “Because she didn’t seem to notice when I stole the list of dates from her trunk.” We stared at one another in silence. I wasn’t sure what to believe. And I had a feeling he felt the same way, which was exactly 295/695
what I wanted. I wanted him to feel as lost and confused as I was.
“Well, since this is going nowhere, I might as well go and call Stephan,” he suddenly announced.
I folded my arms across my chest. “Fine.
Do whatever you want.”
“I was planning on it.” He walked by me and waved for me to follow him.
Even though I really, really didn’t want to, I did.
Chapter 15
Alex led me down a hallway lined with doors, finally coming to a stop in front of a closed door at the very end of it. My head was hurting so badly by this point, and my ribs were aching big time. I felt more empty and alone than I’d ever felt in my life. Although Marco and Sophia had never been that great of grandparents, they were still my grandparents. And what they’d done to me felt like the ultimate betrayal.
Alex didn’t open the door right away. He just stood there, staring at it as if he were trying to compel it to open with his mind.
Needless to say, it didn’t open. Then, unexpectedly, he whirled around and faced me.
“There’s is something else I need to tell you before we go in here,” he blurted out.
297/695
I sighed “What now?”
“Relax it’s not about you. It’s about Laylen, the guy who lives in this house” He leaned against the door and crossed his arms. “He’s not exactly human.”
“What does that even mean?” I asked. “If he’s not human then what is he?”
“Well,” he wavered, “a few years ago he was bitten by a...vampire.” I gaped at him. “So you’re saying he’s a vampire?” Was he kidding me?
He moved away from the door and stepped toward me. “I know what you’re thinking. That there’s no way vampires are real, but they’re about as real as the Death Walkers.”
I pressed my lips together and stared down at the opposite end of the hallway, at a door with a small stained glass window on it.
Light spilled through the glass, casting mis-shapen reflections across the floor and walls.
It had to be the front door. And just on the 298/695
other side of it was the desert. The warm and sandy desert. The complete opposite of where I’d been no more than a few hours ago.
“You’re not thinking about running away again?” Alex’s voice tore through my thoughts.
I turned my head back toward him.
“No.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “Are you sure about that?”
“Yeah, I’m sure” I said, but I didn’t sound very convincing.
He opened his mouth and started to say something but, changing his mind, clamped it closed again. He’d done that a lot over the last few hours—started to say something then stopped. Who did that reminded me of?
Hmm…Let me think. How about Marco and Sophia. Coincidence? Who knew?
“Do I have to worry about him biting me?” I asked tensely.
299/695
He laughed. “No, you don’t have to worry about him biting you. Since he was a Keeper before he was changed, things work a little differently with him. He’s more in control of his blood lust.”
“And what about vampires that aren’t Keepers to begin with? What are they like?” He hesitated. “Let’s just hope you don’t ever have to find out.”
And with that, he opened up the door.
On the other side was a room that had the same red walls and ash-black hardwood flooring as the room we’d just came from.
There were also bookshelves everywhere.
The only noticeable difference was a long mahogany table that trailed down the middle of the room. And in one of the eight chairs bordering the table, sat Aislin, staring down at her cell phone.
She immediately jumped to her feet when she saw us. “Oh good. I was just about to come get you.” She hurried over to Alex 300/695
and asked in a barely audible voice, “Did you get everything taken care of?”
“Yeah,” Alex’s bright green eyes flicked in my direction, “I did.” Aislin gave me a wary look before returning her attention back to Alex. “I can’t get a hold of Stephan.” She tapped her cell phone in the palm of her hand. “It goes straight to his voicemail.”
“That’s odd,” Alex mumbled. “Did you try Marco and Sophia?”
The mentioning of Marco and Sophia made my stomach ping. It shouldn’t have hurt. It really shouldn’t have. Yet it did.
Aislin nodded. “They didn’t answer either.”
“Where the heck could they be?” he asked. “They weren’t going anywhere, were they?”
Aislin shook her head. “Not that I know of.”
301/695
“Do you know if Marco and Sophia were going somewhere?” Alex asked me.
I gave him an are-you-kidding-me look.
“Yeah, because they tell me all the time what they’re doing.”
Alex frowned. “Gemma, this isn’t a joke.
It’s important.”
“Oh, I know it’s not,” I assured him. “I was being very, very serious.” He stared at me, clearly irritated. I held his stare until the buzzing became too intense, and I had to turn my head away or else I’d probably explode. “Stare all you want, but I still don’t know where they are.” He heaved a frustrated sigh and looked back at Aislin. “Why would allof them not answer their phones? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I don’t know.” Aislin twirled a strand of her golden blonde hair around her finger.
“You don’t think that something happened to them, do you? Like maybe the Death 302/695
Walkers showed up at the house or something.”
“I highly doubt it. The Death Walkers have no reason to go after them. They want Gemma.”
I rolled my eyes. Lucky me.
“And even if they did go to the house,” Alex said, starting to pace back and forth across the floor. “Stephan can take care of himself.”
“Of course he can.” A voice came up from behind me. It belonged to a guy, that was a given. And he sounded about as re-sentful as I felt. “Because we all know Stephan can do anything.” Aislin’s gaze shot over my head. “Laylen, please don’t start. That’s the last thing we need right now.”
I froze. Laylen, the vampire, standing right behind me. Slowly, I turned around, my stomach rolling with nervousness.
303/695
He was about five or six inches taller than me, which meant he was really tall—six foot four at least. His blond hair swept across his forehead, the tips dyed a bright blue that matched the shade of his eyes. A silver ring hooped the bottom of his dark red lips. He wore a grey t-shirt, black jeans, and biker boots. Black symbols tattooed his forearm.
They looked like a foreign language of some kind. Greek maybe?
His gaze dragged up me and came to a stop at my eyes. “You know the last time I saw you, you were maybe about four years old. You’ve grown up a lot since then.” I scrunched my forehead. “Do I know you?”
He laughed, a very gentle, non-vampire sort of laugh. “Yeah, kind of.” I forced a small smile. Okay?
“So,” he said, directing his attention to Alex, “Aislin said you got yourself into some trouble?”
304/695
“I didn’t get us into any trouble,” Alex corrected him. “So don’t get too excited.”
“That’s not what I was told.” The smug look Laylen was giving Alex made me wonder if there was some kind of bad history between them. “From what Aislin said you—”
“Laylen,” Aislin hissed. “Shut up.” Alex folded his arms, and his glare sliced into Aislin. “Alright, so what have you been saying?”
She bit her lip, looking guilty as charged.
“Well, it’s just that I think…maybe the little thing that happened between you and Gemma on the bus was what helped the Death Walkers discover that the energy is hidden in her.”
Alex shook his head. “There’s no way that could have been the reason.” Ailsin raised her eyebrows. “How can you be so sure?”
305/695
“Because I can,” Alex said easily.
“There’s no reason thatwould have given her away.”
By “ that” did he mean our barely kiss. I had to wonder since he’d said it with such regret.
Well, guess what? I regretted it to. I swear I did. Well okay, whatever. It was kind of a lie. But I wished I was capable of regretting it, and that had to count for something, right?
“Alex, you didn’t see it from my point of view,” Aislin said. “From what I saw, it was far from ordinary. The lights were flashing on and off while you two—”
“Alright, I get it,” Alex snapped.
“Wait a minute.” Laylen held his hands up in front of him. “What exactly was it that you two did?”
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 306/695
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.
307/695
“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 308/695
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.
