Davy Harwood (The Immortal Prophecy) (18 page)

“What?” Emily gasped and whirled in a tight circle with her blindfold still on.

I rolled my eyes and reached to remove it. She shrieked until she saw that I held the blindfold in my hand.

“Oh.” She sounded a little disappointed.

“You need to drop that guy, Em.” It wasn’t a suggestion. She flushed and hung her head. “I know, but I’m weak and I think I’m on a little something.”

Think? She was.

Adam groaned from the corner and I turned to see that he had sat on a chair. He gripped his blindfold tight in his hand and didn’t look at us. No one said anything for a moment. It was almost as if there was too much to say that we didn’t know where to start.

Then Emily exclaimed, “We’ve been kidnapped! I can’t believe it. Why? Are they doing it for ransom? What’s going on? Why are you so calm, Davy?”

I ignored Emily for the moment and stood in front of Adam. He saw the tips of my ballet slippers and gulped. His jaw clenched before he lifted his eyes to mine. There it was. I saw it in his eyes. I knew a cheater when I saw one.

“You’re with Shelly?” I asked it quietly, but so damning.

Guilt was all over him, but he rasped out, “I didn’t… I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. Shelly was lonely and crying the other night when we went out with that guy. You kissed him and I… I got so jealous. I kissed Shelly. Your friend, Kates, saw us. She was going into the Shoilster and caught us.”

I frowned. That explained… some of it.

They’d said the Immortal and the Immortal’s boyfriend. Adam had looked guilty… none of this made sense. “Adam, they took us because of you. You know that, right? They grabbed you first.”

“Because Kates is psychotic!” Emily laughed hysterically. She rounded to perch precariously on a dark purple velvet couch beside Adam’s throne. She shook her head and her hand lifted to pull at the ends of her hair. “She was probably so angry that he was two-timing you that she seduced Bennett. She persuaded him to kidnap us all. It’s all because of her.”

My roommate was crazy, stupid,
and
under the influence of vampire lust.

Adam frowned, but didn’t address Emily’s weird ramblings. Instead, he sounded sincere. “I am so sorry, Davy. The thing with Shelly happened so quick and then I asked you out yesterday. I never thought you’d actually say yes. You were with that guy, even though you said that the kiss was just because of his girlfriend. And then you said you liked me and I liked you too—I
like
you. I still like you, but this happened… and… I was going to break up with Shelly tonight. I just didn’t call her yet.”

Well, if my math added correctly, I highly doubted he would’ve gotten in touch with her. Kates and the Lucan Family thought Adam was the Immortal’s boyfriend. I knew that Roane had the Immortal. Everything should’ve added up so that meant—Shelly was the girl that Talia had brushed arms with the night before she jumped. They thought Shelly was the Immortal.

“But why kidnap you?” I asked the question out loud to myself, but I jumped when Emily answered.

“Kates is behind all of this. I already told you that. She’s doing this to get even with Adam because she thinks he cheated on you. She’s crazy. Your friend is crazy.”

The crazy one was the one talking. I sighed and closed my eyes. My insides were a whirlwind. Everything was happening too fast and not fast enough. “None of this makes sense.”

“What guy?” Emily must’ve finally heard Adam.

“Huh?” Adam looked at her.

“You said that Davy kissed a guy. Who? She only likes you.” Could my roommate be more blunt?

“Emily,” I hissed. “Shut up.”

Adam frowned, ever so helpful. “I never got his name. We were never introduced, but he was tall.”

“These people…,” Emily murmured, tearful. “What kind of people could do this?”

Kidnappers. Heartless soulless people. Vampires.

I watched as my roommate tried to make sense of what she couldn’t understand. She really thought Bennett was a person, someone with a soul. She didn’t understand the power he had over her. She clung to what she wanted to believe. And Adam—he just saw his own guilt. I felt a tear at the corner of my eye, but I swallowed painfully and brushed it away. Adam was the guy that I had thought all along. He was so human that he was… human. He got jealous. He made a mistake. Then he got caught up in the situation. Neither of them had a clue what was really going on. I was envious of their naiveté. It was my fault Emily was crying. It was my fault that Adam looked so shameful. Both of them were innocent in this entire thing.

I was the Immortal.

Then the door was pushed open. Emily jumped, but she didn’t squeal this time. Thankfully.

Adam looked up.

“Davy,” Kates called me. A strand of her dirty blonde hair had slipped down to frame the corner of her cheek. Her sea blue eyes were bright and clear. She fully knew what she was doing. There was no vampire lust that filtered her decisions.

I took a small breath. I needed to accept the inevitable. Kates had betrayed me, but the sad part was that she didn’t know she betrayed me. I did know one thing, though. Kates wasn’t there to kill vampires. She was there for an entirely different reason.

“Come on,” she beckoned and I went.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

We didn’t go far. We went down one set of steps and past four doors before Kates opened the fifth. After she shut the door and I glanced around, I realized that this was her room. There was a giant bed that had a canopy, just like the one in the other room. There was a sensual feeling to the room until I caught sight of the opened closet door. I saw the hooker boots, leather halter tops, and frayed jeans.

That was all Kates.

“This is where you stay?” I asked, hurt.

Sorrow flashed in her eyes, but she nodded before she perched on another velour throne chair. She only had two. It looked like they kept the good stuff for the hostages.

“So… let’s start this by you telling me why you
really
came to Benshire.” I deadlocked my eyes with hers. This was the showdown. Truth time.

Kates swallowed once. “I came here because I fell in love with someone.”

“Someone or something?” I couldn’t keep the disdain away.

Anger flashed briefly in her eyes, but she pushed past it. “I fell in love with a vampire. Your contempt’s not new so could you stop with the attitude? It’s not helping.”

“It’s helping me.”

“You want some answers and I’m trying to tell you them. I won’t be so inclined if you piss me off.”

“Listen to you. ‘So inclined’—who’ve you been talking to? You don’t talk like that on a good day, Kates. Drop the act. I want my friend here, not whoever you are when you’re with this
thing
you love.”

“Thing?”

Had we just not gone over this? Contempt. Me. For vampires. Not a surprise. I raised my chin and glared.

“What is your problem? You’re acting like I’ve lied to you!” Kates shouted.

“You have!” I shouted right back. “You just kidnapped me.”

“You weren’t supposed to be there!”

“Well, I was. And my roommate is in that room. And Adam—it had to be Adam?”

Kates snorted again, but laughed hollowly. “Don’t come crying to me because you have crap taste in guys.”

My eyes went red. “Excuse me?”

“You didn’t like Craig, but he sure liked you. Maybe it’s something about you that attracts these losers?”

“Losers? Me? Are we really not considering your vampire? He’s a creature of the night, Kates. I don’t think Adam is worse than that.”

“Creature of the night? So am I, Davy!”

“You’re a human.” Unlike myself.

“So are you.”

“This isn’t about me.”

“This
is
about you! I’m sorry that you’re mad that Adam cheated on you. You could do better. He looks like a pussy.”

She’d been the one to interrupt Adam and Shelly while I’d been pressing Roane against the wall around the corner… was it hot in here or was it me? I fingered my shirt’s collar and pulled it away to fan myself, but to no avail—I was burning up. I hoped my Immortal stuff wasn’t acting up.

“You’re going to be fine anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look,” Kates continued. “I came to Benshire because of the Immortal.”

“The fairytale Santa Claus for vampires?” Her words exactly.

Kates grimaced and I caught a flash of embarrassment. “That girl that killed herself, she was the Immortal.”

Tell me about it.

“I was sent here to find the new Immortal.”

At her look of expectation, my eyes widened and I sat up straight. I was supposed to be confused. I was supposed to be shocked. I was supposed to be… I didn’t care. “Like I’m going to believe anything you say right now anyway.”

“Oh my god, Davy!”

“You kidnapped me!”

“I did not!” Kates surged to her feet.

“Evidence. I’m in a vampire castle! Against my will!”

“By chance! By chance. It was an accident. You’re not supposed to be here. You’re not supposed to be a part of this at all.”

I wasn’t supposed to be a part of this? She had no idea. “I’m still here, aren’t I?”

“Could you be more dramatic? I’m here. I’m going to protect you. Obviously.”

“Right,” I scoffed and crossed my arms. “Because you’re a slayer?”

“Because I’m your best friend,” Kates pointed out. “Idiot.”

“How’d you even know where we were?”

She grimaced. “Bennett knew. He followed Adam to your dorm and overheard him talking to Emily.”

Oh holy hell.

She added, “For what it’s worth, I think Bennett actually has a thing for her.”

“What else should I know about, Kates? You were supposed to be at Blue’s this whole time. Did you even go? What happened with that?”

Her eyes widened and I held my breath. This was not good.

“I went,” Kates murmured quietly, reluctantly. “But you told me that she’d gone inside and did her empathic thing. I couldn’t have that, Davy.”

“
I
did it,” I wrung out, hoarse.

“You’re my best friend. That’s different… and I know you, Davy. You don’t really—you’re not really detail-oriented, you know. You only go so far. I haven’t been worried about you, but Blue—she—she knew things that she shouldn’t have.”

“What did you do to her?” My hands started to tremble. I felt my voice quiver and I felt something become unglued inside of me… it was starting to rise, starting to choke…. I stopped breathing. “Is she alive?”

“Barely.” She whispered the word and refused to meet my eyes.

Blue was family. “What did you do?”

Roane said not to get upset—too late for that. I was upset. I was more than upset. Kates said nothing and I jerked forward a step. “What did you do, Kates?!”

I felt her guilt before I heard it. I closed my eyes and whirled away as I saw what she’d done. She’d hit her. I flinched as I heard the punch. I felt the fist crunch against Blue’s jaw. My sponsor hadn’t stood a chance. “She respected your privacy. She wouldn’t tell me what she’d felt. She was worried about you and she wanted you to get help. She wanted to be the person to help you. I trusted you to go to her! What did you do, Kates?!”

“You know!” Kates screamed back.

I felt the slap of her words. I doubled over and gasped for breath. Tears came to my eyes and I rapidly blinked them away. “You don’t know what you’ve done.”

Kates looked like she’d just been slapped by my words.

“Where is she?”

“She’s in the hospital. Coma.”

“You’re a first class bitch.”

‘
I am.’

I heard Kates’ thought.

‘
I deserve so much worse. I should be the one in the coma. I should be—no, Lucan needs me. He said that I’d have to do things I wouldn’t want to. He always knows. He said this would happen and Davy would react like this. He knows.’

“Who the hell is Lucan?”

Kates jerked her head up and her eyes widened. “You can—no, you can’t!”

I stalked forward, one step at a time.

She backed away. “You can’t, there’s no way. You never could before…”

“I’m gifted, remember?”

“This isn’t… you’re not
that
gifted, Davy.”

I pierced her eyes. I wanted her to feel me deep inside, so deep that she’d never feel privacy again. “Maybe I’ve never been this furious before. Maybe I never had a reason to do what I can do now. She was like a mother, Kates. She was like my mother!”

She wanted to deny what I said. She wanted to not believe me, but it didn’t matter. “Are you going to tell me who Lucan is? Or am I going to go inside of you and figure it out myself?”

She blanched at my meaning. A cruel smile curved at the corners of my mouth. I wanted to see her squirm some more.