The Lost: Book Two of The Whitechapel Chronicles

Chapter 19

"Is this your new compound?" I winced inwardly as I said it, not wishing to remind him about Gainsborough and what we had done there; what I had done there.

If it bothered him, he didn't show it. "Sort of," he shrugged. "You could call it a safe house, maybe."

I stared at him, aghast. "You call this place safe?"

He smiled, cruelly. "I said it was safe. I never said it was safe for you."

I flinched, bracing my back up against the headboard. "So it's safe for you. From my kind?"

Brandon glared at me, his mouth curling into an ugly sneer. "You really grant the vampires too much credence. As if we need to find a safe place from them!"

"We found the compound before."

"No, you found the compound and they got lucky. And now you're here and they're..." He smiled again, his eyes glinting under dark lashes. "Well, they're not here and there's no chance of any of them coming to find you."

A cold touch crept over my skin, raising goose bumps that prickled intensely. "What do you mean there's no chance of them coming to find me?"

Ignoring my question, Brandon slid off the bed and began walking idly around the room, studying the decor and furnishings. He stopped by a large dresser upon which stood a huge vase of roses and he touched the petals, pulling one free from the flower and rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger. "It's a beautiful room, isn't it?" he mused and I frowned, thrown off guard by his sudden change in demeanour.

"Y-yes," I mumbled. Why did I feel like everything he said was a trap?

He looked over at me and smiled again, a typical Brandon smile, the one that lit up his face and showed me the young Brandon he was when we had first met. "I knew you would love it. I just knew you would. As soon as I saw this place, I knew it would be perfect."

"Perfect for what?" I said. There was no direct threat in what he said, but somehow I felt the tension crank up and the fear coil around me, squeezing the air out of my lungs and making it hard to breathe.

"When I came here with the estate agent, I felt everything click into place," he said. "Finally, I knew that everything was coming together. It was like a sign. You know when your whole world just turns to shit and everyday you wake up and you hope, you hope that something will happen that will show you the way again? This place was it. I could feel it as soon as we stepped through the front door. The way it looked, the way it smelt. I felt as if you were standing right beside me and I knew that if I looked at you, you would nod your head and say yes Bran, this is the place."

"This is your place?" I said, confusion making my head spin like a frantic fairground ride. "So this isn't the clan's new compound?"

He stared at me for a moment, before letting the petal fall from his fingers and float steadily to the floor.

"You have no idea what it was like to see you when you walked back into that rat hole you'd been living in. When we got there, it was like torture. Your scent was all over the place, it was so strong that it felt like you were there. I didn't actually think you would be, I'd hoped of course, but didn't go there expecting to find you. So you can imagine how I felt when in you walked, straight to where I was too. It was as if you were just drawn to me, as if fate had taken your hand and led you right to where I was waiting. And I knew immediately that it was another sign. I mean, first this place, then you? How could I possibly ignore that, Megs?"

He began pacing the floor, his breath quickening and I noticed a small tremor to his hands as he bit anxiously on his nails. I couldn't take my eyes off him. I felt as if someone or something were sucking the air out of the room, the rococo-patterned walls were closing in and my head was pounding with the pressure.