Protector (24 page)

There’s a slight breeze blowing through the once operational rice fields
, which causes a tingly chill to run down her spine.  She turns around toward the water and sees her own angel sitting on the bench watching her.

“Alessandro!”
she yells and runs to him and pulls him up into a big hug.  She pulls back to look at him. “I thought you were dead.  What happened? Where were you?”

He doesn’t answer
.  Instead he strokes her cheek with the back of his huge hand and pulls her in closer for a kiss. 

She smiles with anticipation of his soft moist lips that she has longed to touch again. 

They kiss slow and passionate, but as the seconds go by it becomes a desperate hunger.  Anna-Marie didn’t realize how much she craved his kiss until this moment.

They both pull back at the same time and pant to catch their breath, and then they begin to laugh.

“Oh my goodness, I’m so glad you’re okay,” she says to him, still laughing. “I’ve wanted to tell you something, something that came to me in the darkness.  I think I do, too,” Anna-Marie says, beaming up at him.  “Alessandro, did you hear me?  I said I think I love you, too.”

But he is no longer looking at her and his smile has disappeared.  He is looking at something behind her with a serious glare.  She is afraid to turn around to look, but her curious mind won’t let her not look.

Slowly she takes a deep breath and turns her head to see what it is, all the while she doesn’t take her eyes off of Alessandro’s face until she has no other choice but to see what is behind her.

Her eyes open wide in shock at the figure leaning against the female’s tomb.  Her heart stops in her chest and the blood runs from her face, leaving her feeling cold and numb.  Her breath catches in her throat, making it hard to speak or even breathe.

   “Dylan?”

***

   “Dylan!” she yells, as much as she can anyway, through the dry ache in her throat.

   Instantly, her eyes shoot open, but instead of seeing her beloved Dylan or Alessandro, she sees an outline of a figure standing above her, a figure belonging to someone unfamiliar.

Her first thought is,
am I still dreaming?
  But as reality sets in, her eyes grow wider and she begins to hoarsely scream as she struggles against her restraints, to no avail. 

Once her energy is spent, she relaxes back down on the bed and awaits whatever torture he may have in mind for her.  She no longer cares what happens to her.  She’s already dead anyway.  She just wants this nightmare to be over. 

The figure kneels down beside her and puts a spoon to her lips.

“Eat!”
is all he says in a deep rough voice.

Anna
-Marie has gone through this procedure a few times before since being held captive here, so she obediently opens her trembling hungry mouth to welcome the much needed nourishment.  Every so often, who knows exactly how often, someone brings her some soup, if that’s what you want to call it.  She is still tied down, so the man gently lifts her head with his rough hands and spoon feeds her the bland soup.  She is shocked by this act of kindness each time, but she still quivers at his touch.  The Rogue is supposed to be ruthless killers with no soul, so why is this one always so gentle, assuming it’s the same one each time?

Anna
-Marie begins to cry with the second spoon full of slop that she is forced to eat.  She is so tired and she feels utterly helpless.  She isn’t being fed hardly enough to sustain her strength.

With the third spoonful
, her lips are quivering so badly the slop misses her mouth completely and runs down her chin.

The man pulls his hand back as if shocked.

This stuns Anna-Marie. 

“
Why is he so stunned?  I’m the one being treated like an animal,
” she thinks to herself.

This angers
Anna-Marie, “Oh, I’m sorry if I got some of that foul crap on you.  Why don’t you try eating it?”

The man reaches down and wipes the goo from her chin with his hand and licks his fingers.

With a loud growl, he throws the bowl down and storms out of the room without another sound.

“Hey!   Where are you going?” 
Anna-Marie yells at the slamming door.  “What was that all about?” she asks herself.

Anna
-Marie lies back on the bed waiting for him to come back.  Within minutes her stomach starts to cramp and rumble.  The soup tastes like flavored water, but it is better than nothing. 

“That’ll teach you to keep your mouth shut
,” she scolds herself.

Instantly, she hears a loud crash as her door is thrown open and two figures begin pushing their way into the room. 

This is it,
Anna-Marie thinks to herself.  She closes her eyes and tenses as she waits for them to finally end this torture. 

But nothing happens.

“What is this shit?” she hears one growl in a low angry voice.

Anna
-Marie opens her eyes and sees the form of one of the creatures pinning the other against the wall by his throat and shoves the spilled bowl of soup into his face.

“It’s all we have
dammit!” the other one growls back.

“Well then
, go get better stuff.  How the hell do you expect her to live off this shit?” he says in a loud thunderous voice as he shoves the bowl into his face again.

“I’ll send a group out tonight to get food.”

The dominate Rogue lets go of his neck and the lesser one quickly runs out of the room, glaring at her lying on the bed. 

Anna
-Marie is so scared and confused she just lays there in utter shock unable to process what is happening.

The remaining Rogue, obviously the dominate one, lifts his slumped head up and turns toward her. 
Anna-Marie studies the dark figure as much as she can, thanks to the tiny bit of light coming in through the open door.  Her eyes are adjusting more to the dark, but there’s nothing she can really tell about him.  He is tall and built, that much is easy to see, with messy dark dirty hair that falls in his face, almost covering his eyes completely.  The rest of the details are out of focus.  She is thoroughly confused.  This is the only Rogue she has really had any contact with, other than the one in the cemetery and the other one in the alley, so it’s hard to decide what’s real.  Everything she has researched and has been told refers to these creatures as monsters that thrive on killing people ruthlessly.  But this one seems almost humane.  Dear God, he even just helped her.

The Rogue bends his head back down and turns around to leave the room.

“Hey!” Anna-Marie yells, hoping he’ll actually stop this time.

And he does. 

His body grows stiff with rigid tension as he lifts his bent head.

“Thank you
,” is all she could think to say.

This makes him turn around again, with what looks like a smile on his face, as he stares down at her.

“You’re welcome,” he says in a rough voice, then he turns back towards the door.

“Hey!  What is your name?”
Anna-Marie yells desperately.

Surprising her, he stops
once again.  “They call me Dee,” then shuts the door behind him before she has the chance to say anything else.

“That was strange
,” Anna-Marie says to herself.

Anna
-Marie has been lying on this tattered old mattress for God only knows how long and every inch of her body aches from it. 

She doesn’t know how long she has been held here or why she is even still alive.  There are no windows in the room, or any type of light at all for that matter, other than the light filtering around the bedroom door from the hallway.  Once she tried to count the seconds and minutes, but the minutes became endless.  There was no hope.  There is nothing she can do but wait out the never
-ending night and pray for a quick death.

Boredom has become a supreme means of torture.  It’s enough to make a person lose their mind completely.  There is absolutely nothing to do but lay here in this dark
, smelly room and sleep or ponder one’s pitiful life, neither of which is very appealing to Anna-Marie at this moment.

There are far too many things that haunt
Anna-Marie’s overactive mind these days between Dylan, and now Alessandro.  Both men created wonderful memories for her.  Memories a person could cherish for the rest of their life.  Of course she had so much more time with Dylan than Alessandro.  Even though she had known Dylan all of her life, she has no doubt that Alessandro could have given her many more interesting and fulfilling days.  But neither scenario has ended the way it should have.  Anna-Marie can’t help but to blame herself for the two men who were cursed for loving her and who ultimately lost their lives because of her. 

Dylan lost his life because he loved her so much he had no other choice but to follow her to Wilmington and Alessandro for being her mysterious protector, who came to save her.  The torment of both men haunt her every waking and sleeping thoughts. 

Letting her depression consume her, she falls back to sleep.  She doesn’t dream this time, which is good.  Seeing Dylan or Alessandro, and knowing they are both dead, is too much for her to bear.  That thought feeds her hatred for the Rogues, even her newfound friend.

Suddenly she opens her eyes wide, as a stinging burning sensation explodes through her arm.  Her eyes search wildly for the source of the pain.  She is still unable to move, except to lift her head.  She sees the form of a man suddenly jump up and back away
from her until he is against the wall.

“You’re not human
,” he hisses at her. “Your blood is tainted!”

Anna
-Marie is too shocked to speak.  What do you say to a vampire that just tried to suck your blood? 

With a loud crash the door is thrown open and two figures come bursting into the room. 

“Ahh . . . you stupid fool! I told you to stay away from her,” one of the Rogues says to the one that has Anna-Marie’s blood on his breath.

He cowers further against the wall
, as if at any moment it will open up and allow him to escape. 

“Her blood was singing to me.  I couldn’t stop myself.”

Her usual visitor, Dee, bends down beside her and looks at her arm where she was bitten.  In the blink of an eye, he is no longer beside her but in front of the other Rogue with his hands around his throat. 

“You were not supposed to touch her!” Dee growls and slams the creature’s head into the wall behind him. 

“I told him not to, Dee.  I told you he wasn’t to be trusted,” says the Rogue who had followed Dee into the room.

“I’m sorry.  Her scent possessed me to do it,” The Rogue whimpers.
“She’s not even human.  She has been tainted,” he yells back in defense.

Dee turns around to look at
Anna-Marie.  With one motion, he lets go of the Rogue and walks back to her side, as the other one pants for breath and scampers out of the room. 

Dee studies her with concerned eyes for a few seconds, looking her up and down.  He bends his head down and sniffs her arm where she is still bleeding. 

“Are you a vampire, Anna-Marie?”

Anna
-Marie is shocked by this question.

“What are you talking about?”
she yells back, full of hysterics.

Dee bends his head down even further, but this time he grabs her arm more aggressively than before.  Shocking her even more, he licks her wound, and then pulls back immediately.

“No!  Not a vampire but-” He stops to licks his lips again.  “How can this be?”

He backs away slowly towards the door, barely able to look at her now.

“Please, Dee, tell me what is going on?  Oh, my God!  Did he turn me into a vampire?”  She starts crying even harder.   

Anna
-Marie is hysterical and panicked at this point.  Breathing is becoming harder and harder as the overflow of oxygen floods her lungs.  She was hoping for a quick death.  She had even prepared herself for it as a way to end this torture, but this is far worse than any death she could ever imagine.

“No
, Anna-Marie, you are a mix.” 

Dee walks out of the room with the other Rogue trailing behind him
, his head bent, looking utterly defeated.  They leave Anna-Marie crying on the bed, confused and panicked, all alone.

“But, I don’t understand!  What do you mean I’m a mix?  A mix of what?”