What Lies Inside (A Blood Bound Novel, Book 1) (7 page)

Deflecting my thoughts I asked, “So, you and what’s-her-name? You didn’t waste any time.”

“Cindy,” Dorian said while slicking his dark hair back with his hands. “Pretty, huh? And why wait. I’ve been girl-less for six months. That’s like a lifetime in teen years.” A playful smile crept across his face. “So, what’s going on between you and Ty?”

The dead blood I had just downed spiked my throat, and I fought not to cough. “W-what do you mean?”

Dorian’s eyes gleamed with perception, an expression that made me want to slap it from his face. “You two couldn’t keep your eyes off each other.”

Without wanting to, I thought back. Ty’s calculating gaze had plagued me with nerves. On top of that, the sight and smell of him had invoked involuntary reactions in my body. I shook my head, grimacing. “It’s his scent. It’s just so—overwhelming.”

“Yeah, I picked up on that too,” Dorian said. “They’ve probably got a rare blood type, or something.”

“I guess.” Tears at feeling so out of control, of finding adaption so difficult when Dorian was breezing through, pricked at my eyes. “How is it so easy for you?”

“It’s not,” Dorian said absolutely, resting a cold, supportive hand on mine. “It’s a struggle. But I know I can keep it together, just as I know you can, too. You give yourself far too little credit.” His gentle expression transformed with a mischievous grin. “Now, back to you and Ty, what’s really going on?”

I jerked my hand from his. Inside I could feel my heartbeat elevating. “I told you.” My tone was icy and sharp. “It’s his blood. I literally want to kill him!”

Dorian gazed thoughtfully through the windscreen, barely slowing as he turned a sharp bend on the rain-slicked road. The Audi screeched in protest, sliding. Then its four wheels reclaimed the road. “If that were true,” he said raising an eyebrow, “you’d look at Troy the same way. But you don’t.” His mouth gaped as though he were rearranging the pieces of a puzzle. “Ah, I see,” he said, looking back at me with gleaming eyes. “You’re into Ty. You’re attracted to him.”

Fire seared up my neck and across my cheeks. The notion of wanting to kill someone while being attracted to them was utterly ridiculous. He was wrong. The urge to lash out seized me and I clenched my fists, narrowing my eyes at Dorian. “I am only going to say this once. Troy is a steroid-pumped jerk. Ty isn’t. That’s the
only
reason I look at them differently.”

Dorian raised a doubtful brow as we drove through the stone-barrier fronting our house. “Whatever you reckon, sis.” But the look on his face said,
I’ll get to Mom before you do.

Knowing he’d lock me out of Mom’s office if he had the chance, I raced into the house, failing to slam the door before he leaped inside.

Mom smiled. “You just missed your uncle on the phone. He was calling to see how you’re both settling in. Unfortunately, he’s swamped with work at the Armaya. However he said he might be able to visit in a couple of weeks.” Mom was already dressed in a blazer and A-line skirt for her first meeting at the Portsmouth Vampire Council. “Now tell me, how was your first day at school?”

I threw my backpack down at the side of her desk. “Mom, please, you have to say no.”

“What is going on?” she demanded, nodding at the two chairs across from her for us to sit. “Did something happen?”

“What?” I suddenly realized the worry on her face came from fear that we’d failed to control ourselves today. Before I had a chance to voice my
how could you send us to school if you thought we’d kill someone
rant, Dorian spoke.

“No,” he said, “nothing like that. Amelia is just over-reacting, as usual.”

“Now, Dorian,” Mom spoke sternly. “You know being a vampire heightens your emotions. So far you have found most of the transition quite routine. Amelia on the other hand, has always been more emotionally charged. So her ability to control her influx of feelings will take more time and patience.”

“Whatever.” Dorian rolled his eyes and thrust the two forms into her hands. “I want to join the swim team, and to qualify I have to race their captain.”

“A race?” Mom pursed her lips in thought. “Well I don’t see the harm.”

“You don’t see the harm!” I shot up and kicked my bag. Everything spilled out: textbooks, pencil case, iPhone, and the damn excursion slips. It had an extended deadline of tomorrow morning, seeing as it was already well into the new school year. Every other student’s had been returned last week.

Mom snatched the permission slips up from the ground, scanning it over with narrowed eyes. “And I suppose you don’t want to go on this geography excursion either?”

“Mom, you don’t understand.” I threw clasped hands across her tidy desk, pleading. “Today was hard, really hard. I don’t think I…”

“Amelia,” she said, cutting me off. Her eyes were gentle but set with determination. “I don’t want to force you to do anything. But I will not let you hide away, believing you’re some despicable creature. You are not. You are a good person.” With a steady breath she pulled a pen from her blazer pocket and signed all three forms. “Learning to co-exist with humans is a process. And you and Dorian are doing so well. I am so extremely proud of you both.”

I cringed. The race was bad enough. Now I had to stress about the cons of being trapped on a human-packed bus ride to the White Mountains. Not enough clean air, too many bodies, and no escape…unless I dive out one of the windows. I knelt to stuff the spilled items into my backpack. Then knowing nothing I could say would change her mind, I snatched my two forms from Mom’s desk and stomped from her office.

Upstairs in my room I dumped my bag on the carpet before flopping onto my bed. Today sucked! And I still had algebra homework and a paper on Freud’s Theory of the Unconscious to get started on.

With another sigh I pulled my iPod from my bag, playing the Three Days Grace song
‘Let you down’
. I peered past the mauve tapestry draped around the corner post of my bed. Through the high-arched window the cloudy sky was darkening. Ty flitted to mind and I wondered again how I could know him. Something about him kept me speculating and totally uneasy. I wondered how long it’d take before I let everyone down and tried, maybe even succeeded, in killing him. There was only one solution. Stay away. Better never to know him than to kill him.

I rolled off the bed and glanced around the room, my room. It was so big, with walls and a high ceiling all in varying shades of purple. There was a hint of paint fumes, and I wondered if Caius or Mom had organized it to be painted before we arrived. A white antique dresser sat across the room with an oval mirror spanning its length. Two side tables flanked the disarray of my oversized, purple bed. Above a lavish chandelier with glittering, crystal teardrops filled the room with twinkling light. Their design mirrored the others that marked almost every room in this expansive house. Even with my Lifehouse, Three Days Grace, and Skillet posters splashed across the walls, the room still felt bare. Nothing else in this room was really mine. It was all new, compliments of our wealthy vampire uncle. I hadn’t kept anything else from my old life in Anchorage, bar a few comfortable clothes. At the time I had wanted to be punished for the
thing
I was becoming. Now, seeing this big empty space, I wish I had kept something more that reminded me of a time when I thought of myself as almost normal, just a human.

I turned back to the window and yanked the dark-purple drapes closed. Then, with the weight of the day bringing me down, I dropped back onto the bed and flicked off the black-velvet lamp. The song
‘Animal I have become’
came on and my iPhone beeped. Instantly my mood lifted, expecting the text to be from Kendrick. Then it sank. It wasn’t him.

‘Wanna grab a bite after I kick your brother’s butt?’

It was Ty. How had he gotten my number? Then I remembered art class when Vanessa had requested my number. She gave it to Ty?

My pulse quickened and I sighed, throwing my head back against the pillows. So much for keeping my distance… Pursing my lips, I read the text again and frowned. Grab a bite? That phrasing made my paranoia kick in.

Hold up. My eyes bugged. Was he actually asking me out? Or was this just some kind of ploy to figure out why I was such a freak? Or was it even worse, a cruel prank on the strange ‘new girl’? In truth, I couldn’t imagine Ty actually wanting to go anywhere with me. Not after how moronically I had behaved at lunch. I shrugged. No matter what his motivations were, I knew my answer and keyed in a response.
‘Can’t. Busy.’

Anxious he’d reply I stared at the screen. My free hand rifled through my bedside table’s drawer for my hidden after dinner mints. Chocolate always helped calm my nerves. After a few minutes without reply and four chocolates later, I breathed a sigh of relief, turning the music back on.

When the phone unexpectedly beeped again, I almost jumped out of my skin. But the text wasn’t from Ty.
‘What’s new? How’s school?’

Warmth coated my heart like warm honey. It was Kendrick, my best friend, the one whose help and guidance had been the only thing to get me through the long months at the cabin. I keyed a response,
‘School sucks! WYWH.’
Wish you were here. I clutched the phone to my heart.

Salty tears blurred my vision, and I blinked them back. Before this moment I hadn’t allowed myself to dwell on it. But without Kendrick’s support, I truly felt alone, like I was drowning in my own blood. I knew I had Mom and Dorian, and that they would do anything for me. But it just wasn’t the same.

A final text came through.
‘Maybe I can visit. But I GTG. Miss U 2.’

At the first opportunity, I vaulted off the bus and darted behind it. My hands braced against my knees while I sucked crisp, untainted air into my lungs.

It was Thursday; only three days since Mom had signed the bloody permission slips, which any and all arguing hadn’t gotten me out of. The bus ride to the White Mountains in a stuffy, packed-to-the-brim coach had been long, way too long. I had been seated up front, blockaded by Dorian against a window. Still the urge to turn on everyone trapped within the slow-moving vessel was overwhelming. Not even my supposed reprieve, the menthol nasal tube that I hid in a clenched fist fearing anyone might catch sight of it, could deter my wicked thoughts. The collective scent of blood, heightened by not only Ty but Troy’s too, was far too pungent.

Now at our destination, the beautiful and dense green forests of the White Mountains, everyone poured off the bus. Groups of twelve were being arranged as Dorian sidled up behind the bus, finding me still curled in on myself. He patted a supportive hand across my back while the geography teacher announced his name into group one with Mrs. Ruby. When I finally got placed into group three with Mr. McKenna from psychology, I groaned.

Dorian hauled me upright. “It’s outside, fresh air. Just tail behind your group,” he said with a squeeze on my arms. “You can do this.”

I felt tempted to chuck a pink fit. But I knew Dorian wasn’t about to demand the teacher move me, not when his eyes were already wandering to a group of pretty girls. Besides, there was no way in hell I could argue the point myself, surrounded by blood-scented teens, without the possibility of letting my fangs loose. “I hate this.”

Dorian sighed, then half-smiled, lowering his voice so that only I could hear him. “Think of it this way. If you lose it, you only have to kill everyone in your group. That’s only twelve people. And I’m sure there are plenty of good places to stash bodies out here.” He brushed his hands together. “No witnesses, no crime.”

“That’s not funny!” I swung my fist to connect with Dorian’s stomach, but he jerked back just in time.

“Call me if you need,” he said, lifting his mobile from his pocket as he backed up to his group. “I’ll
always
back you up.”

Left with no escape, I sighed. My assigned group had already taken off up the winding gravel path. Now Mr. McKenna was calling for me to hurry up. Trailing far behind, I sucked in a deep breath of fresh air. Then instantly wished I hadn’t. A much too familiar scent intruded as the crunch of gravel reached my ears. The sound was approaching from behind. No, please no.

My heart jumped into my throat and I whirled. Ty and Troy were bounding straight for me. Troy passed by, face stormy as he caught up with the front of the group. Ty however slowed, falling in step beside me. The smell of his blood mingled with a touch of chlorine in the air. Picking up my pace, I groaned internally. There must have been swim practice before school. I forced my view from him and onto the dense surrounding scrub, which breathed life with a spectrum of colored, wild flora. If only the raw beauty were enough to distract me from him.

“So,” Ty said with clear hesitation. “What about coffee, as friends?”

His proximity made my mouth water, and I knew he had spoken. But above the irregular beating of his heart, I hadn’t been able to concentrate enough to hear the words. Instead, I dug into my jeans pocket with shaky hands and retrieved the nasal tube. Before I could think twice, I lifted it to my nose. Then I cringed. Now Ty had seen me use a nasal decongestant. Great!

“Sorry, what?” Hiding the tube back in my pocket, I glanced at Ty. I fully expected to find his expression guarded with a look that said
you’re a nerd!
Only Ty wasn’t staring at me like I was a nerd. He was smiling, a curious and confident smile that brought warmth to my cheeks.

“Coffee, as friends…”

I hated coffee with a passion. Give me hot chocolate any day. Wait, was Ty asking me out? Not that it mattered. What did matter was that I not give in to my primal instincts. And I could only do that if I eliminated my biggest temptation.

“Look Ty,” I said, keeping my eyes ahead. My fingers itched to raise the decongestant to my nose again. “You need to stay away from me.”

“And why is that?” Ty’s voice sounded amused and light, devoid of the confusion I had expected given my words.

Because I’m a monster, and every moment I’m near you I contemplate ripping your throat out to drain every last drop of your sweet-smelling blood.
I glanced back at him, studying him head-to-toe. His black hair shimmered in the broken sunlight that filtered through the thick canopy above. The black shirt that clung to his body emphasized his defined arms and abs. His casual, black jeans were torn across one knee. In so many ways he appeared like a regular teenage boy. Yet in others he was distinctly different. Ty’s eyes were watching me, the green of his irises sparkling.