After the Fall: A Vampire Chronicle (Book One) (7 page)

             
“What do you mean by that?” he asked, hoping he had managed to hide the insistence in his voice, hoping she meant only that their behavior was inhuman, not that the killers themselves had been inhuman. The reason vampires had managed to become such a well kept secret was that 99.9 percent of their victims always ended up dead, so that virtually the only ones with knowledge of their existence were the vampires themselves and those who fought them. Christian was ready to admit to himself that he was more than concerned that Caroline knew entirely too much about what was going on, but mostly because of what he feared might happen to her if the vampires found out she knew.

             
He liked Caroline. For the first time in many years, he had found in her someone he could relate to, someone he felt comfortable being with. Okay, so she had spent most of their conversation yelling at him and she probably hated his guts. He was willing to bet, though, that most of that anger was coming from a place that couldn’t allow herself to feel sad. He knew what that was like. He had spent years being so angry he had almost gotten himself killed. She was trying so hard to be strong. She was all alone – no family, no friends. He knew what that was like, too. It was Christian’s duty to keep vampires from harming humans in general, but suddenly, he more specifically wanted to protect Caroline. He had already failed her once, which was why she was in this mess to begin with. He wouldn’t fail her again. But first he had to find out exactly what it was she knew.

             
“I don’t know if I believe in God or in the devil, but after that day, I’ll tell you Chris – I definitely believe in evil. They stood in front of me, my parents’ blood dripping from their mouths, and they smiled at me. They actually smiled. It was the most chilling and horribly evil thing in the whole world. As if they thought they were vampires or something.”

             
Christian was trying to come to a decision. Caroline knew. Okay, she didn’t know she knew, but she knew. But worse than that, the vampires knew she knew. He had failed to truly anticipate the very real possibility that she actually knew something substantial, but worse than that, to truly anticipate that the vampires would now be aware of the fact that she was aware of their existence. He couldn’t simply leave her here, on the street, and return to Lorenzo with just the knowledge that she was in way over her head. If he returned to the hotel and left Caroline behind, she would be as good as dead.

             
Yet, if he brought Caroline back to the hotel with him, she would know that vampires really did exist, and that there were people who dedicated their lives to killing them. And that he was one of those people. Lorenzo would not be happy with that. No one outside of the Manus Dei had ever heard of the order or knew of its existence. That’s how secretive the organization was. Not even the pope was aware of its existence.

             
Okay, now he was staring off into space, probably ignoring her. Good. Then he wouldn’t notice her leaving.

             
“Okay, well this has been fun,” Caroline said, lying through her teeth, “but I have somewhere to be.” The truth was, she didn’t even have anywhere to go.

             
Christian came to a split second decision. He grabbed her hand, and held up his other hand as a sign of peace.

             
“Don’t get mad,” he said softly. “I mean, don’t get any madder than you already are. I know that right now, you probably hate me.”

             
She didn’t hate him, although she didn’t correct him. The truth was, as much as she had yelled, she kind of liked him when he wasn’t being all pushy and nosy.

             
“I know we just met,” he continued, “and I know you’re probably not too keen on trusting strangers right now, but I have a favor to ask.”

             
She said nothing, and he rushed to continue, knowing he had to convince her, knowing she had no idea that it was a matter of life and death.

             
“I need you to come back to my hotel with me. I think you need to talk to Father Lorenzo.”

             
She started to protest, but he interrupted.

             
“Not about how you’re feeling and how you should be feeling,” he insisted, “but about what you saw that night.”

             
“Why?” she asked suspiciously.

             
He hesitated. He couldn’t tell her. Not without talking to Lorenzo first.

             
“I need you to trust me, Caroline.”

             
She didn’t know what it was about him. Maybe it was that familiar look she had glimpsed momentarily in his eyes earlier, maybe it was the fact that she felt so comfortable with him that she had been able to blow up at him in public. Whatever it was, she felt something deep inside her that told her he was on the right side. He was on her side. No matter how annoying he had been, he was trying to help her.

             
“Okay. I’ll go with you.”

             
As they began walking towards the subway, Christian knew he had made the right decision, to bring Caroline back with him. Lorenzo would give him hell about it, but he had no choice. He could’ve tried to protect Caroline from afar, and not let her know she was being protected, but unless he was watching her 24-7, the Master Vampire would make sure she was dead. The only way to ensure her safety was to bring her back to the hotel and tell her the truth about everything, Lorenzo and secrecy be damned. He had already failed her once; he wouldn’t fail her again.

Chapter Six

Lorenzo Catalano was more than surprised and not too thrilled to find two people standing in the hallway when he got up to answer the knock on the door to the hotel suite. Though the priests at Saint Joseph’s had offered to put them up in the rectory, he and Christian had chosen to stay in hotel because it afforded more privacy for the work they were doing.

Christian had a guilty but determined look on his face, and the girl standing next to him… well, Caroline looked like a girl who had just buried her family that morning.

              He watched with disappointment as she didn’t seem the least surprised to see him there. If she had known to expect Lorenzo to be staying with Christian, then he must have told her something about what they did, something he shouldn’t have told her.

             
“Father Lorenzo,” she said. “It’s good to see you again.”

             
“And you as well, my child,” Lorenzo answered her, while questioning Christian with his eyes. Christian chose to ignore him, instead putting a hand on Caroline’s shoulder.

             
“Let’s sit down, shall we?”

             
Lorenzo moved out of the doorway, allowing the two to pass and enter the front room. Caroline walked in first, and as Christian followed her, Lorenzo placed a hand on his shoulder.

             
“You shouldn’t have brought her here,” he murmured discreetly, close to Christian’s ear. Christian said nothing, only looking at Lorenzo with an unreadable expression on his face, before following Caroline into the room. Lorenzo turned to face the two younger people.

             
“Well, this certainly is unexpected,” Lorenzo said with barely feigned cheerfulness. “I wasn’t expecting Christian to return with company. We aren’t used to having guests, as you can see by the mess.”

He gestured around the spotless, bare room. He turned to Christian, waiting for an explanation, as Caroline looked on in bewilderment, clearly ill at ease; a palpable tension between the two men filled the air. She could tell that she wasn’t completely welcome in the apartment, but she was in the dark as to why. Chris had specifically said he wanted Lorenzo to talk to her, but Caroline had the distinct impression that Lorenzo was unhappy with the decision Chris had made.

              “Can we speak in private?” Chris asked, suddenly looking uncomfortable.

             
“If you had wanted to speak to me in private,” Lorenzo said through clenched teeth, “you should not have brought her here.”

             
Christian turned to Caroline, an apologetic look on his face.

             
“Would you excuse us for a second?” he asked.

             
“Of course,” she answered. Christian practically dragged Lorenzo into one of the two bedrooms, shutting the door as Caroline began looking through a pile of books on the end table to amuse herself while she waited.

             
“Christian, she cannot be here,” Lorenzo began as soon as the door was shut. “It is much too dangerous. She is a civilian-“

             
“She knows,” Christian said in a voice so soft Lorenzo almost missed it. He froze.

             
“How does she know?” Lorenzo asked, trying to mentally assess the situation.

             
“Because she saw them, because she was there in the apartment with them,” Christian explained, starting to get exasperated.

             
“But that is impossible,” Lorenzo sputtered; Christian could tell the old priest was shaken up by the news. They had known there was a possibility she had seen and discovered things, but the possibility had been so slight that neither of them had seriously entertained it. Lorenzo had sent Christian to Caroline to find out how much she knew, expecting that Christian would return with the news that all was well, the secret was safe, because the girl knew nothing. Things were definitely not going as planned.

             
“That is impossible,” Lorenzo repeated, as if trying to convince himself. “They would never allow a human to survive.”

             
“Well, they did, and she’s sitting in the other room. She
knows
. She doesn’t know, however, that she knows. She thinks what she saw were two people acting like vampires, not two actual vampires.”

             
Christian paused, letting it all sink in. Lorenzo was deep in thought, but the shock of the situation had taken its toll - he looked as if he had aged ten years in the past ten minutes.

             
“The thing is, Lorenzo, and the reason I brought her here,” Christian continued, “is that
they
must know that she knows. She is in danger. I have already failed her in not protecting her family. I won’t fail her a second time by not protecting her.”

             
“But she is a
civilian
,” Lorenzo insisted. “What will you tell her?”

             
“The truth,” Christian said simply, walking past Lorenzo and opening the door to fill Caroline in.

             
He was too late.

              “They were real, weren’t they?”

             
It wasn’t a question, but rather a statement. Christian had entered the room where they had just left Caroline a few minutes ago, planning on telling her everything. He would need to explain to her everything in order to convince her to stay with him and Lorenzo for her protection, even if it meant revealing for the first time ever a secret that had been kept for hundreds of years. He noticed immediately, however, upon entering the room that something had changed.

             
Caroline was no longer sitting on the sofa, but rather, was pacing angrily, though she had stopped when he and Lorenzo came back into the room. She glared at him, a book in her hand. Because they never had visitors, it hadn’t even occurred to either man to hide or cover any of the neatly stacked books on the windowsill and end tables.

She had a look of utter betrayal on her face. Considering the fact that she looked like she wanted to kill someone, particularly him, she spoke very calmly. It was a dangerous calm.

              “Vampires, you mean,” he said, hesitating only a second before continuing, his voice much calmer than he felt. “Yes, they’re real.”

             
“You have all these books,” she said, waving the one in her hand in a furious gesture. “All these books, about signs and prophecies and…vampires!”

             
Christian didn’t know what to say, though he was certain she wouldn’t listen even if he did know. He felt Lorenzo’s presence at his back, but he was sure Lorenzo was as much of at a loss of what to do as he was. Caroline threw the book down on the floor, and the fury in her eyes was replaced again by betrayal as she glared at Christian, but there was something else there too, that took Christian only a moment to identify - extreme hurt.

             
“You never spoke to Father Reed about me, did you?” she asked, her tone accusatory.