Creature of Habit (Book 3) (8 page)

"Adam? David?” I called quietly while trying to calm my shaking hands. I quickly walked back to the living room to grab my phone and call Grant once again. My stomach was twisted with unease.

Just before I reached the couch a haunting, "Amelia…" echoed through the empty house.

My feet froze mid-step.

"Amelia…" I heard again, this time louder and closer. I looked around discretely and saw nothing, so I lunged toward the couch for my phone. In a blink, someone was there, swiping the slim metal object out from under my hand. I began backing away before I even looked up and when I did, I forced back the bile that was rising in my throat. I was staring down the devil himself.

Caleb stood before me, dirty and raw. His dirt-streaked hair was messily tied at his neck, his clothes the same tattered and worn ones from the video. I realized now that he only had one arm. The jacket he was wearing was knotted at the top where it should have been. He was akin to my Grant, I could see it in his pale, smooth skin, and the lean, taut and strong muscles, but the similarities ended there. His eyes were onyx black—like Sasha’s and Joe’s—and the smirk on this face was pure evil.

"Leave me alone," I sputtered lamely, his intent clear on his face. He was here for me.

He only sneered in response and in that moment, I remembered Grant's final instructions to me about the hiding spot in the basement. I glanced in that direction, the hallway seeming miles away and the door at the end even further, but I had to try.

I swallowed heavily, taking a step backwards, and began to speak. "What use am I to you? You have Olivia. She's the one you’ve been searching for."

He cocked his head slightly and smiled. "You underestimate yourself, dear Amelia. You're precious to me and a very integral part of my game. I admit I began all those years ago looking for Sarah Olivia, and there were times when it seemed so futile. Then I stumbled upon the myth of Grant Palmer. So noble, so brave. Helping the common man, sacrificing his own needs for that of humans." He stopped and sighed mockingly, resting his remaining hand on his chest. "It was so heartwarming. I found him and then he found you, and it was like all the pieces of the most perfect game showed up on the board, waiting to be manipulated." He smiled wickedly, confident he would be the winner.

I only listened partially to the ramblings of this maniac as I took another half step backwards. "How am I part of your game?" I stalled.

He shrugged, as though I was questioning the obvious. "You're important to him, as is she. I want him to choose. Which one survives and which one doesn't? The human or the girl who has loved and supported him for decades? Or does he attempt something even more glorious, like play the martyr and sacrifice himself? It can be any of the three, or frankly none. I don't really care. I'm just curious who he will choose." He leaned toward me and inhaled deeply, flaring his disgusting nostrils. "Although from the smell of you, I now have a better knowledge of his possible choice. He has made his loyalties abundantly clear."

I suppressed the urge to smell my skin, looking for the odor Adam and Caleb continuously spoke about. Caleb shook his head in disgust before he turned and walked over to the window, disregarding the glass under his bare feet. I peeked over my shoulder at the hallway and took another step back when he turned his face towards me and frowned. "I wouldn't do that Amelia—" but the words halted in his throat as he was thrown across the room by the oversized fox that flew through the busted door. My heart lunged to my throat as David pounced on Caleb before he had the opportunity to regain his footing. The animal looked in my direction, with soulful, begging blue eyes and I knew he was giving me the opportunity to run.

I spun on my feet running around the arched wall separating the living room from the hallway, while listening to the sound of Caleb's rage and the fox’s cries. Another animal joined the fray, dashing past me sleek and gray, and I knew Adam had joined in, giving me a better chance. A crash echoed behind me as my feet slapped on the wood, but I never stopped. I never looked back. I skidded on a rug as I came to a stop in front of the basement door. I heard a loud hiss and Caleb’s unmistakable rage from the living room as I turned the knob, revealing the short stairway that led under the house. I spared a glance behind me, shocked to see the fox flying through the air, across the span of the hallway and crashing into unseen objects in the adjoining room. Caleb rounded the corner and I bolted, taking one step after the other in the dark stairwell, frantically feeling along the wall for the camping gear Grant had described.

With fumbling fingers, I felt the straps of a back pack and pulled it off the wall, my nails digging into the wood, searching for any kind of latch. I almost cried in relief when my finger connected with a cold metal knob but instead it slipped, forced from the latch. An iron fist smashed into my head, slamming it hard into the wall.  My vision dimmed, and I fell to the floor.

“I told you not to run,” he said. I struggled to get up but my body felt like it was being held down by weights. I blinked, head woozy from pain, and the last thing I saw before drifting off was the cold black of Caleb’s demented eyes.

~*~

My mind started working before my eyes opened. I heard the rushing sound of noise, voices, music, and movements speeding through my ears. My body felt the cool, unfamiliar, hard floor beneath me. I clearly remembered the moments before I blacked out.

Caleb.

The Shifters.

My head smashing into the wall.

I didn’t escape. I never contacted Grant. I was alone with a serial killer.

Clamping my eyes tight, I inwardly begged for the comfort of unconsciousness to overtake me again. I sat this way for a while, listening to the absolute silence of the room, feeling the throbbing pain in my temple, until a cool hand covered my own.

I wasn’t alone.

"Hey," a kind voice whispered and I cracked an eye in recognition.

"Olivia?" I rasped in a dry, cracked voice. Olivia kneeled next to me. Her red hair was tied back, giving her face sharp, hard angles. I searched her eyes for hope, but they were worried and tense.

Despite that, she sighed with relief. “Thank goodness you're okay. I was so worried when they brought you in here. I knew you were alive but…” She touched the soft spot on my head and I winced. “That looks bad and I feared for internal bleeding or something. Did he hit you?"

"No… well, I don't really know. I was trying to get to the basement safe room and he got to me first. I just remember slamming into the wall before passing out."

Olivia brushed back my hair and put an arm around my shoulder, the two of us leaning against the hard wall. "I knew he was going for you, I saw that much before he left the building, but once he got to you things were unclear. I haven't been able to see much of anything for the last couple of days.”

"What about Grant?" I asked, frantic for any news.

Olivia nodded and my heart soared. Quickly she told me what she knew. "There was a fight. A pack of fledglings and a stronger vampire, named Penelope—not as mean as Sasha but just as crazy.”

“Great.”

“He’s coming for us. Right now, in fact. He was able to get our location from Penelope before he handed her over to Elijah. But Amelia… this is where things get complicated."

"What do you mean 'complicated'?" I asked, with a mixture of happiness over Grant coming here and confusion over Olivia's hesitation.

Olivia sighed and looked at me warily. "I mean, Grant is coming here and Caleb is going to make him—"

"Choose between the two of us," I said knowingly. "He told me."

"Amelia, one of the three of us will not make it out of here,” she said with absolute certainty. "Right now, it's unclear which one of us it will be, only because Grant hasn’t been given the choice yet."

“Are you sure we can’t change those odds?”

She shook her head.

I sat, stunned by the information. Nothing had ever made me see more clearly than being told I had anywhere from minutes to hours to live. The one thing that came to my mind was how much I loved Grant and never wanted to lose him.

"Okay then,” I said.

“Okay what?”

“It has to be me.”

She shook her head slowly. "I know it’s one option, but Grant won't let this happen. There is no way he will let you sacrifice yourself for him. And frankly, neither will I. Amelia, we've lived our lives and then some. It not going to happen."

I looked in her deep, green eyes, rimmed now with a dark black from hunger. "Make me like you," I whispered, pleading for her to understand. "For him. I want to be with him forever."

She stared at me in return before she blinked and her eyes glazed a bit, taking her to a different place. Her eyes snapped back quickly, wide and renewed as though she had seen something. But before I could ask what it was, the heavy metal door flung open, banging loudly into the wall behind it. I tensed on impact but Olivia was calm and collected, never removing her arm from around me.

Caleb strode in the room, flanked by two black-eyed vampires. "Isn't this cute? You're protective of the human, too." He rolled his eyes, locking in on Olivia. "What's going on? What have you seen?"

She hissed in return, tightening her grip on my arm to the point it was almost painful. Caleb stood over us glaring, now at Olivia and finally she said, "I already told you. You end up dead every time. I don't know why you keep pushing this."

I listened to her lie, obviously trying to convince Caleb to let us go for his own benefit. It was a good idea, but I could tell by the look on his face that he didn't believe it.

"I know what you keep telling me," he scoffed, turning his back to us and running the fingers of his one remaining hand across the long wall of safety deposit boxes, his dirty nail catching on the line separating the two and making a series of clicking sound. With lightning speed he spun, slapping her across the face with a loud smack. Olivia took the beating, never moving an inch, defiantly holding her shoulders back.

Caleb gave her a small smile. "But you're lying, so I will keep asking until you tell me the truth. And now that I have Amelia here, I may have to use her as motivation."

Caleb turned his grin to me, wide and menacing. He shifted his eyes towards Olivia, but asked me in a saccharine, sweet voice, "Tell me Amelia, which would you prefer I remove first? Fingers or toes? Your nails, I mean.”

I looked between the two of them, their eyes locked, engaged in a battle of sorts. Olivia's faltered first but only because her eyes rolled upwards, eyelids fluttering lightly. After a moment she shook it off and spoke stonily, "You want an update? Sure. Penelope’s dead. My husband ripped her to shreds while the rest of my family burned her body. You seem to think you have picked this fight with the three of us but you've forgotten the others. Elijah will hunt you down until the end of days in my honor."

Caleb didn’t appear fazed by the information, and he only glared at Olivia a moment longer before leaving the room, waving a hand at his vampire goons that stood behind him. They followed him out the door, sealing it with a heavy click.

Once he left the room I let a huge gush of air leave my lungs. I looked at her and asked, "What do we do?"

"We wait," she replied with a small shrug. "We aren't getting out of this alone. He's too strong and too desperate. I couldn't get away by myself and I definitely couldn't do it while protecting you."

"Don't protect me," I begged. "Let me go, save yourself." I knew it was stupid and sounded dumb, but I felt responsible for this situation. I felt lucky to have had the time with Grant that I did. I wasn't sure if I could bear the thought of life without him if Caleb won. "Use me as a distraction."

She gave me an unhappy smile and shook her head. "I'm sorry Amelia, but I can't. Grant would never forgive me and I would never forgive myself. My job now is to keep you safe… and the safest thing to do is wait until someone comes to help. Trust me, I could change you right now but you’d be nothing more than a liability."

We sat quietly for a while and my lightheadedness took over, the side of my head pounding from the blow. Olivia had pulled my head in her lap and pressed her cool hands against my temples. Each time I dozed off she would shake me lightly, reminding me not to fall asleep.

“Just so you know,” I told her. “Adam and I had already figured out where you were. I was waiting on Grant to call me so I could tell him.”

“His phone was destroyed in the fight,” she said.

“I feel like there are some things you should know—before this is all over.”

She frowned. “What kind of things?”

“I know Caleb told you about your past, about the hospital and that Grant took you before he could get you. He told me why he did it—why he wiped away your memories.”

“He was protecting me,” she said. There was no trace of anger in her voice.

“You knew?”

“I guessed. The first real memory I have is of Grant. The first feeling is one of love and caring. He’s always protected me. I trust him completely, even when he doesn’t trust himself.”

“Wow. That’s very profound.”

She laughed and my head bobbed painfully in her lap. “When you live as long as we do, hindsight is truly clear.”