The Hunted (14 page)

We were terrible.

*          *          *

We spent the next half an hour in idle conversation about the party, work, and any boys that Kayla was semi-interested in, as well as bobbing along excitedly to the various new tunes pumping through the radio. It would have been nice to contribute to this area of the conversation myself, but I wasn’t interested in anyone at the moment. In fact, no one had caught my eye since I had dated Stephen, and that had been a little while ago now.

Stephen had been a cute guy with a deceptive bad boy appearance that I had met at another party similar to the one we were going to tonight. Unfortunately, my expectations for what role a boyfriend should play in my life were obviously distinctly different to Stephen’s. While I enjoyed the physical stuff, I didn’t like talking about my feelings and holding hands while taking long walks on the beach. Kayla said that I was mentally defective when it came to boys. I was starting to think that she was right.

We arrived at the rave in less than half an hour. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Kayla had run a few red lights and blitzed the speed limit on more than one occasion. She was a dangerous driver normally, but when in the pursuit of a good time she put race car drivers to shame.

We’d brought a little mud map of the location to the rave, that was on a fluorescent yellow flyer that had been passed around at the last party we went to.

I grabbed it off the dashboard and had given Kayla directions as best as I could. I wasn’t actually certain if I was leading us in the right direction or on a wild goose chase, but given that most of these parties were in the area I figured I couldn’t go too wrong.

The turn-off down the winding dirt road was a little difficult to find in the dark, but Kayla managed to locate it after circling the area for the second time. After a short drive down the unsealed road, we could see that there were cars parked everywhere among the trees. It was apparent that no sense of order was necessary. Loud bass beats were cutting through the dense foliage that led down to the beach. I could feel my heart rate start to climb as excitement spread through my limbs—the beat of the music began to run through me like a steady pulse.

I absolutely loved a good party. The chance of meeting new people, the dancing, the music—it was all great—and particularly when there was supposed to be well over five hundred people crowding the sand tonight.

We found a spot as best we could behind a Ute. Its occupants looked like they’d be settling in for the night from the camping paraphernalia we could see in the tray back. So we pulled up behind them and switched off the engine. We stepped out into the night air, letting the soft sand at our feet slip between our toes and the music from the beachfront swirl around us like a ferocious wind.

‘This is going to be great!’ Kayla squealed with delight. As she locked the vehicle and shoved her keys in a small pocket on the front of her sundress, her dress drooped even further at the front, showing off even more of her bountiful cleavage that was already on display.

She ran around the car and grabbed my hand, dragging me down the path to the beachfront where the party looked to be in full swing. There were dancing bodies everywhere and the swirl of neon glow sticks lit up the night. There was a little bit of light coming from the DJ booth, but apart from that and the sticks, the only other form of illumination on the sand was the faint glow of moonlight shining from above.

As a precautionary measure, I tilted my head up into the air and breathed deep, the biting cold breeze stinging my nostrils slightly. I could smell the ocean, alcohol, vomit, and the decidedly unpleasant smell of sweaty flesh—not to mention the overpowering stench of cheap perfume and little boys trying to smell like men by dousing themselves in supermarket brand deodorants. None of these scents were uncommon, and none of them had me worried. But it was hard to throw all caution to the wind and break habits that I’d spent the last four years building. I was trained to be wary of my surrounds regardless of where I was, and given that vân
â
tors had arrived in Queensland only days ago, anything was possible.

Peter, one of my trainers at the IMI, always said that danger did not cease simply because we desired it so. I believed, in theory, that that was probably true. Just because I closed my eyes in a speeding car didn’t make the possibility of crashing any less real.

Peter had always sought to make me more aware of my surroundings and to be prepared for the unexpected, and his lessons had an impact. I was always cautious now.

We passed a small group of three, relatively attractive boys that were huddled together under a mass of coconut palms, passing around a bottle of an unidentified liquid that I assumed contained alcohol.

I glanced up at the bunched and ripened coconuts hanging just above their heads and grimaced. Apparently relative good looks didn’t stretch to intelligence in these boys. I thought everyone knew that at least one hundred and fifty people each year died from falling coconuts.

Obviously not.

They looked up from their bottle as they saw us passing them by and motioned for us to join them, much to Kayla’s delight. I couldn’t have been less interested if I tried. I just wanted to go and dance and maybe rub up against some Sam Worthington look-alike.

All three of them eyed us appreciatively. The one with the short blonde hair held the half empty bottle out towards us and Kayla answered by commandeering the bottle, flashing a cheeky grin and taking a generous swig. They all clapped and cheered loudly and she bowed graciously at their drunken adoration, and, of course, revealing a little too much flesh.

I moved myself some distance away from Kayla and the circle of boys and kept looking up repeatedly at the coconuts hanging precariously from the fronds above.

Kayla handed the bottle over to me, at which point I promptly forgot all about coconuts. I shook my head. The alcohol was not going to have the slightest effect on me. Also, I had no idea where their mouths had been and I wasn’t real keen on sharing their germs.

Kayla and I had both experimented about twelve months ago with the notion of getting drunk. It was one of Kayla’s less than brilliant ideas that, of course, only ended in us getting into trouble yet again. We may have both been relatively independent in a lot of ways, but we were both still under age and drunkenness was still considered unacceptable behaviour from our parents. Notwithstanding the revving that I got from Susan and George that day, I learnt that it was impossible for me to surrender to the effects of alcohol (or any drugs). My Vampiric genes were stronger than I had thought possible, effectively burning the alcohol straight out of my system. Fixing my cuts and broken bones was handy, but self-healing robbed me of the ability to get smashed with the rest of my peers, if I’d wanted to.

‘Come on, Kayla, let’s go and dance,’ I said and started dragging her towards the dance pit and away from the alcohol. She loved her alcohol. Did I mention the wedding dress,

the golf cart, and the bottle of tequila? You can guess which one of us was driving at the time.

‘Come on, girls, stay here and have some fun with us.’

Fun doing what? Watching you lot throw up in the bushes later? No, thanks.

‘Maybe we’ll come back later if there’s any of that left,’ Kayla said, pointing a finger towards the half empty bottle. She grinned like an idiot and flashed a little more breast.

I was going to have to find her a hobby—and a sports bra.

A girl in a green midriff top and denim shorts walked past us, laughing with a group of her inebriated friends and shoving a neon glow stick into each of our hands as she passed. Most of the crowd had them wrapped around their necks, heads or wrists. We wrapped ours around our wrists a couple of times and then made our way into the centre of the dance pit, to dance near everyone else who wasn’t on the fringes of either throwing up, drinking, or making out with random strangers.

A new remix track from Incubus pulsed through the speakers, and seemed to vibrate through the sand and up the length of my legs as I began to move.

We both laughed and wrapped ourselves into the fold of pulsing, sweaty bodies and joined the hundreds of others who were just as intent on having a good time. We let our bodies ride the beat of the music as we laughed and danced and ground against the continual mass of people that surged around us. It was heated, exciting, and oddly sensual.

I danced like that for what felt like hours—and then felt something change. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was exactly, only that something was different. It was almost like I was being watched (hopefully by a total hottie). There was a hum of energy all around me, and a distinct smell of spices and sandalwood that I had not scented in the air before.

I tilted my face upwards as I felt a new man press himself into my back and place his hands on my hips. I could smell soap and the sweat coming from him mixed with the sweet scent of Kayla’s perfume somewhere in front of me.

Looking over my shoulder, I decided this new guy was definitely not my type. I ignored his advances and shimmied away. I was more interested in this enticing scent, one that I could not pinpoint to any particular source.

‘Kayla, can you smell that?’ I shouted.

She laughed, twisting around and pulling me close. ‘All I can smell is how badly I need to get laid tonight.’

I laughed loudly and cupped a hand over my mouth at the shock of what she’d just said.

No more alcohol for her.

I sniffed again. Drifting across the cold wind I caught all the familiar scents from earlier this evening and this new one again. It was stronger this time and very, very alluring. It could be coming from any direction. It seemed to swirl all around me in a thick, transparent cloud and completely overwhelmed every part of my being.

Where is it coming from?

I glanced around at the people near me and, although a fair majority of the men were angling towards me, I knew that the scent did not belong to any of them. I felt certain that this particular smell was coming from somewhere outside of the dancing mass of people.

I started to dance my way towards the outer limits of the crowd, twisting and cavorting through the clinging press of people. This proved more difficult than I first thought. Hands, arms and legs were everywhere, and they crowded around me, drawing me back within the confines of the dance pit. And at the same time, I still had the distinct feeling that I was being watched again. I didn’t know for certain, but I had the impression that a particular set of eyes were upon me … I shivered.

Am I in any danger?

I reached for my knife, wrapping my fingers around it, feeling immediately comforted by the protection of having it near.

I reluctantly let the knife go, tucking it back where it belonged. I didn’t want to stab anyone by accident, my wariness was still unfounded.

I noticed Kayla trying to make her way through the crowd towards me. ‘What are you doing?’ she yelled over the music.

I shook my head. ‘Nothing, I just thought I saw someone that I knew.’

‘Christian Bale?’

‘I wish.’

‘You want to keep dancing?’

‘Yes,’ I lied. What I really wanted to do was track down that scent, but Kayla could never know that.

I ignored my instincts and instead, plastered a smile on my face and began a slow gyration that was sympathetic to the rhythm of Nickelback’s
Far Away
. I could let it go for now but the smell had apparently no intention of letting up anytime soon.

I looked up the moment the crowd in front of me parted.

Bodies rolled away from me creating a tunnel of empty space that led in a direct path from the outer edge of the dance pit to me in the centre. It was as if Moses himself had commanded it—and it was weird.

My hands continued to weave through the air around my head in time with the music, my hips gyrating suggestively. I rolled my hips around and turned to face the gap in the throng, my eyes lifting from the sand as if commanded and resting upon a man in the distance.