Creature of Habit (Book 3) (13 page)

Chapter 18

Grant

I stared at the back of my closet.

At my shoes.

At the shirts.

Payback sucked when a vindictive vampire knew all your quirks.

Fighting every fiber of my being, I left the closet unchanged and walked to the living room. Amelia sat on the couch staring at the fireplace. I eased onto the cushion next to her and said, “So you’re mad.”

“What makes you think that?” she asked, looking straight ahead.

“Just a feeling I got from the, uh, rearrangement of my closet.”

Her eyes snapped to mine and a small smirk played on her lips. Her very pink, supple lips. “Oh that. Yeah, maybe I was a little annoyed.”

Note to self: That was what Amelia did when she was annoyed. Do not make her angry.

“Can we talk about this?” I asked. “What you’re upset about?”

Her eyes were drawn back to the flame. “You don’t trust me.”

“It’s not you that I don’t trust,” I said. “It’s the hunger inside of you. The animal that neither of us have control over.”

“Who says I don’t have control over it?”

I shook my head. “You don’t.”

I stared at her staring at the fire, her face orange from the glow. Maybe Ryan was right. Maybe I needed to let her blow off some steam. Run wild through the forest. Pillage the nearest village. Shit. Ryan was right.

“Okay then,” I said impulsively. “Get your coat. Let’s go to town.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes, seriously. Get your coat and well, maybe put on some pants that don’t have holes in them.” I looked down at her feet. “And shoes.”

“I know how to get dressed to leave the house, Grant.”

I smiled. “Of course you do. I’ll meet you on the porch in five minutes.”

She hopped off the couch, more excited than I’d seen her since—well, since she’d changed. She darted to her room but stopped, racing back over. Quickly she pressed her lips against the side of my face.

Like that she was gone, but I reached my hands where her skin had touched mine and thought, maybe letting her go was the right thing to do.

If not, it was up to me to handle the fallout.

~*~

The nearest town was thirty miles away. The Palmers owned twenty in all directions, allowing us a wide buffer from the rest of society. ‘No Trespassing’ signs were nailed to trees and at various spots on the fence surrounding the property. At the edge of our border I stopped her and simply said, “Be careful. I’ll stay close, but I won’t interfere unless I need to.”

“Really?”

I nodded. “Go.”

Her first steps were tentative. As though she didn’t know what to do with her newfound freedom, but she sniffed the air and positioned herself in the right direction. With nothing but the breeze from her departure, she left. I followed.

Amelia made a beeline for the highway. I thought she’d take the direct route, as the crow flies, that’s how we tended to navigate, but instead, she stopped along the way. First to inspect a shiny piece of quartz on the side of the road, then again, entranced by car headlights reflecting off the landscape in the distance. She placed her hands over her ears to block the sound of the blaring train whistle five miles away.

She knew I followed her, but paid me no mind. Her hair whipped furiously around her face from the wind. Something interesting must have carried past in the air, as she sniffed once more and darted off.

I found her walking the tracks on the fringes of town. As we moved closer, voices bounced off the buildings—she’d probably heard them before I did. To her credit she didn’t race off at the first sign of a human but she did announce, “They sound so weird.”

“Like ants from a plane,” I agreed. “You get used to it.”

The outskirts turned into the actual village, small—comprising of over a thousand residents. Mostly locals who worked the larger tourist town twenty miles away. I closed my eyes and tried to absorb the town as she would—as a fledgling, where everything sounded too loud, was too bright. The collective sounds of people resonated in my ears, in my chest.

I wasn’t sure what I was doing—why I was letting her come here.

I think I just wanted to know once and for all what she’d become.

A small short strip of shops lined Main Street. A diner. A boutique. The General Store. A dingy bar. A storefront church. Amelia walked casually down the sidewalk, stopping once to peer at her reflection in the window. She studied herself carefully, running her fingers through her hair, sliding her hands over her hips. She blinked and twisted her face to the side.

“You’re beautiful,” I said, approaching her.

“Are you sure? Everything looks… weird.”

I took a chance and wrapped a hand around her waist. “Beautiful.”

Our eyes met in the window and I saw the signs of a smile tug at her lips.

Finally.

She spun and I reached out to grab her, pull her to me but she didn’t stop in my arms. No, she raced past me, disappearing down the street and turning at the corner.

From my spot on the street I heard the sound of surprise—a deep voice—a man. I heard the low rumble of hunger echo off the brick walls, and I chased her down.

When I reached them, Amelia’s teeth were firmly clamped in the flesh of his neck. He looked at me with trembling fear, and I hesitated.

“Oh god,” Amelia said, lifting her head and dropping the man to the ground like a rag doll. He shook and struggled to get on his feet. Amelia turned and spat on the pavement. I lunged for the man and helped him stand.

“I’m sorry,” I said, snapping his neck with one twist.

His eyes glazed and he fell limp to the ground.

Behind me, Amelia retched.

“Amelia?” I asked.

“I feel it,” she said, wiping the bright red blood off her lips.

“What?”

Her bloody hand landed on her chest. “Guilt.”

Chapter 19

December 20

If I thought the feeling of my heart, pounding away in my chest, was annoying, I’d never really considered what it meant to have a
heart
. Humanity.

It grows in me daily.

Digging its tentacles around my brain, in my limbs. I
feel.
Something in direct contrast to my new life.

My body tells me to kill. My brain encourages it. My feelings… my soul? It fights back harder every day.

Grant says it doesn’t matter since we feed on animals anyway. Since the Palmers have dedicated their lives to helping humans. It shouldn’t be a big deal.

But it feels confusing.

They made a choice to live this way. They’re martyrs.

I’m a freak.

Chapter 20

Grant

I buried myself in work. Sebastian’s case. Amelia asked for space. I’d given it to her just like the other times—before—when she needed time to work through her emotions. I understood her better now, even though I was definitely confounded by her struggles.

I stared at the computer screen filled with police crime scene photos. Sebastian—I had little doubt it was him—had littered the East Coast with bodies. Vampires, each and every one. Decapitated. Burned. Sometimes even tortured.

“What the hell are you doing, little cousin,” I muttered to myself as I scanned the video footage taken by a particularly observant teenager in the suburbs of Maryland. Once again he appeared as an enhanced blur.

The floor creaked behind me and I saw Amelia’s reflection in the screen. I spun and caught her standing in the doorway, hair twisted back in an intricate braid.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hey, how are you feeling?”

She shrugged, fingering the tuft of hair at the end of the braid. “Okay.”

“I like your hair.”

“Olivia said it helps with the motor-skills.”

“Ah, Olivia is very wise.”

“Isn’t she?” She walked over and stared at the monitor. “What’s this?”

“This is what Sebastian has been up to since he left Asheville.”

She picked up the mouse, and I heard the crack of plastic. Amelia released her grip. She frowned and readjusted, using a lighter touch to scroll down. “All of these? There are at least five deaths.”

“At least.”

She frowned. “What do they have in common?”

“Other than being vampires?”

“Yes.”

“Well, he seems to be heading north, yet not in a direct manner. He veers back and forth a little—“

“As though he’s hunting something?”

“Yes. Exactly.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know.”

She turned and sat on the edge of the desk. It was all I could do not to take her in my arms. I listened to the faint beat. Looked into her blue eyes. Tried so very hard not to stare at her lips.

“Sounds like you need to go on a field trip,” she said, breaking my train of thought.

“Hmm?”

“Are you not listening to me?”

I cleared my throat. “Just distracted—for a moment.”

She pinned me with a look. She knew. She could sense the changes in me now. My wants and desires. You’d think it would have made the tension less—the lack of secrets, but that wasn’t the case. Everything was heightened.

Everything.

“I said, I think you should go in the field. With Ryan and see what you can find.”

I tapped my fingers on the arm of my chair, looking for the right words. “I’m not sure I’m, uh, comfortable leaving right now.”

“Because I need supervision?”

“Well, yes.”

“Olivia can come.”

“Amelia…”

“And Genevieve. And whoever else you want.”  She stretched her bare foot in my direction and I caught it in my hands. “Do this. Stop him. You know Ryan needs your help out there.”

I tugged on her leg and pulled myself closer, the wheels of the chair gliding over the hardwood floors. Tentatively I placed my hands on her thighs. She took my chin in hers.

“Are you sure?” I asked, meaning so many things.

“Go. And give me the time to sort the rest of this out.” She leaned in and pressed her lips against my forehead, my cheeks. Against my mouth she said, “I’m close.”

I nodded—as though I’d ever deny her anything. She rewarded my patience and obedience with a kiss on the mouth, her tongue touching mine. 

“I love you,” I told her, reaching for the spot on her wrist. 

“I love you, too.”

Chapter 21

January 4

Diary,

I miss having sex.

I'd thought, being a vampire, the sex part would come easily. The two of us, strong and passionate. No longer worried about venom or injury. Not to mention my boyfriend is pretty much the hottest vampire lover a girl vampire could get. You would think it would all just be a piece of cake.

This is not the case.

It's my fault really. Grant definitely wants to have sex with me, too. I can see it in his eyes. Smell it on his skin. I think he spends half his day stifling his perpetual hard-on from me. Trust me, there is no hiding that thing when it's in a state of excitement.

The problem is that I can't focus on anything for more than about three seconds at once. For example, the other day Grant took a shower after hunting. The bear he had been tracking tossed him into the stream, soaking him to the bone. I sat on the bed and when he emerged from the bathroom, hair wild from being rubbed with a towel, clear droplets of water eased down his back.

I noted for the millionth time that Grant had the perfect back. It was smooth and broad. His shoulders perfectly proportional to his waist. There were dips and valleys that outlined the muscles, and for the first time recently, I was struck by the desire to run my hands over the curves and let them wander aimlessly over his body.

This was my plan, or where my mind was at least, when I became distracted by an intense buzzing sound in the room. I tried to push it away and focus on how the angled definition of Grant's hips were like an arrow pointing me toward his… but then that irritating sound came back, echoing through my ears, making it impossible to think.

I looked around the room and spotted it. It was fly trapped in the room. I was consumed with tracking and catching it. I forgot Grant. I forgot his hair and his back and the V that led from his hips. I forgot everything but the blasted insect that taunted me, screaming at me from across the room.

Long story short; I caught the fly in my bare hands and gleefully ran to show it to Grant, planning on shoving it in his face like an excited two year-old. I looked around the room and realized Grant was long gone. He was now dressed and sitting at his desk in the other room, focused on finding Sebastian. Sadly, he was no longer half naked or wet.

I opened the door and let the insect go, realizing I had a serious problem.

I want it noted for the record that, even though I am currently incapable of focusing longer than an excited puppy, I really do want to have sex with my boyfriend.