~Rose
My eyes sprang open. I was met with a white substance draped everywhere, fluffy and soft-looking. I frowned. Well, winter snow certainly came late this year. I wondered if Fallon had something to do with the delay.
It was still dark outside, eternally night time. Stuck at midnight actually. Maybe these two were linked.
I puffed out a white cloud of fog. I was sitting outside, half buried under a sheet of white snow.
Mumbling to myself, I stood up and dusted myself off. A burgundy mailbox caught my eye. I tilted my head. Since when did Fallon and Joe have a mail-box?
I glanced around in confusion. This was...My house. Not the Draganov residence, this was the house I used to live in before all this. The one three of my family members died in.
What the hell was I doing here? I made my way to the door and pried it open with some difficulty because of the snow that had almost sealed it shut. I entered. A wave of warm air welcomed me and I gladly bathed in it. It was a good change.
I heard a growl. My head snapped towards the window at the other side of the room. It was suddenly bright outside. Like summer with absolutely no trace of snow.
What was going on?
I peered closer out the window. There was something at the edge of the window. A...Boot?
It was connected to a leg all right. I could see the black jeans clearly. But that's all I could see.
I huffed and opened the window. Yes, I was going to hop out the window instead of using the door like a civilized person.
I swung my legs down and halted. There was nothing there.
I heard another growl, this time to my left. I headed to the side of the house, taking slow, cautious steps. With passing second, the uneasy feeling in gut that appeared the moment I heard the sound worsened. What would I find? I suddenly didn't want to know, but I was too late.
I turned the corner of the house and rested my hand on the wall.
Two figures were on the ground. Male and female. The latter was on her back, arms spread out. The boy was hovering above her, holding himself up with his hands planted firmly on the ground on either side of her. A dark head was bowed to her neck.
I stepped closer, squinting my eyes. There was more to it. The boy was shirtless, wearing black jeans and boots. I realized it was his leg that I had seen. Upon closer inspection, I noticed something red at the side of the girl's neck, exactly where the boy's mouth was positioned.
The boy raised his head. I froze in my steps, searching frantically for any signs that this wasn't him. That it wasn't Fallon.
But the straight hair, the dragon tattoo on his forearm, those dreaded demonic eyes confirmed it. His fangs were still elongated with the girl's blood dripping from them and down his chin. His inhuman eyes narrowed at me, held some sort of deadly excitement sparkling in them.
It hit me like a slap. It was predatory. Identical to the look on his face the second time I had seen him, at school among a crowd of students. This is what he had wanted to do with me.
I peered closer at the girl and recognized the bronze skin, the curly chocolate hair, the rosy lips. It was me. A bite from a demon kills a vampire. I was lucky the first time because I was half vampire before. I was positive what a second bite would do. He was killing me.
The wound on my neck looked mangled, abnormal. Fallon wasn't only drinking my blood. He was eating my flesh.
Suddenly the dead girl's eyes opened and she took in a big mouthful of air. My brows sunk in confusion. She couldn't sit up, all she could do was bump chests with Fallon before falling back down.
I noticed I couldn't feel my heartbeat. Anyone witnessing this would be able to hear it pounding in their ears right about now. I felt frantically for my pulse on my neck and detected nothing. What the hell was going on?
I stared at her dazed expression, then at the boy who killed her. His gaze hadn't shifted from me once. Now he opened his mouth.
And hissed at me.
My eyes snapped open. The hell?
I sat up slowly—and cried out. I collapsed back onto the pillows as the pain crawled up my neck. Was it really just a dream? It felt so real...
I raised a hand to my skin and felt around. Nothing was there, except for two small parallel dots that showed the only reminder of Ken's bite. So what was the searing pain about?
I closed my eyes and sighed, composing myself before swinging out of the bed. My throat was dry, scratchy. As if I were screaming for a long time.
I needed water. I tiptoed down the stairs.
Thud.
I halted in mid step, my eyes trained on the kitchen. It came from there.
Thud. Thud.
SLAM.
I winced at the loud noise and crept towards the room again, grabbing the closest thing to me for a weapon. A baseball bat.
I looked at it in perplexity before shrugging it off. Shifting my hold on it, I continued closer. The sound was getting louder yet more sustained.
The second I stepped inside the kitchen, I screamed.
Another shocked scream mirrored mine. Someone's hand was held out in front of them upon seeing the defensive posture I had taken up, bat ready.
"Rose, calm the hell down!" A voice cried. "It's me."
I calmed down and looked on in confusion. My eyes adjusted to the lack of light. I could make out the silhouette of a female, long brown waves of hair draped around her face. I lowered the bat. "Callie?"
She was holding a milk carton, standing in front of the fridge. She stared at me in curiosity.
I blew out a breath I was holding. "You scared the life out of me," I told her. "What the hell are you doing?"
"What does it look like?" She gestured towards the milk carton. "I'm drinking milk."
"From the carton?"
"Again: what the hell does it look like?"
"Can't you use a cup?" I asked incredulously, walking towards a cabinet to get a glass. "It's bad manners to drink straight from the carton. Didn't anyone ever tell you that?"
She shrugged and purposely raised the carton to her mouth again.
"Ah tad tad tad!" I snatched it from her before she could drink again, resulting in a slight spill down her chin. She glared at me. I held the glass up emphatically. "Use a cup!"
I poured some milk out into the glass and held it out to her. She accepted it, giving me a look. "Thanks," she said bluntly.
"Jeez." I put the carton back into the fridge. "What are you doing here so late?"
"Apparently my brothers don't keep milk in their house," she replied, sipping at the glass.
"So you broke into here?"
"It was closer than the supermarket."
I gave her a disbelieving look. She replied with a what? expression. "You are so damn lucky Joe didn't wake up and kill you first."
She snorted. "I'd like to see him try."
I sighed and remembered the initial reason I had come downstairs. I got a second glass and filled it with water.
"So where's the other brother I only got to glance at?" she inquired, sitting down on a chair.
"No idea." I pulled one out too. "He's been avoiding me. They claim he's taking care of Ken."
"He saved you from that other demon. Right?"
"Yup." I downed the glass and almost slammed it down onto the table. "And then he left again. Ken's in a serious condition right now. I believe Adrianna's the one doing it so I don't see why he's still trying to find another way to save him."
She smirked. "Adrianna? You mean Witch B**ch."
I couldn't help but smile back. "Yeah. Her." It only lasted a second as thoughts of my deceased friend flooded my mind. It's been four days. Damien said he was arranging a funeral for her, so he had her body. I didn't really mind so long as I got to attend.
Callie understood the sudden mood swing. She glanced up at the counter. I followed her gaze and spotted a bottle of alcohol sitting there.
I gave her a look. "Are you serious?"
She was already popping it open. "You could use one." She filled my glass up and tilted the bottle at me. "To being reckless."
I gave her a sad smile before dragging the glass to my mouth.
"What the bloody hell...?"
We both turned at the new voice, our servings of bourbon still angled at our lips. We stared at her as if we were caught red-handed. A third brunette stood in the doorway, staring at us in confusion. Abby's eyes were squinted, like she just woke up. Her brown gaze shifted to the bottle Callie had in her hands.
The green-eyed vampire held it in her direction. "Want some?"
*****
I stared up at the ceiling, hands behind my head, my legs crossed over one another. Joe was flipping through the pages of a spell book in front of a sleeping Abby in search of a solution to Ken's state.
I turned my head towards him, just watching. His dark lashes fluttered against his cheek as he blinked. His brown hair was wild, tousled—causing his mane to look like Fallon's black one. He looked like he lacked sleep.
Callie was outside with Nate, talking about his control problem. Matt was there too, just in case his brother tried to run. Nate looked like he was about to bolt for it any second and his eyes kept darting uneasily towards Callie's still elongated fangs.
"Have you seen Fallon?" Joe suddenly asked. I frowned.
"No..." I answered slowly. "I thought he was with Ken."
"He was but he disappeared some time last night." He glanced up at the window, where it seemed eternally night time. "Well, a few hours after I arrived. Let's put it that way."
"I'm worried about him." His black eyes landed on mine and they softened. He opened his mouth to say something—
"We could always call your wolf friends," Stoyan suggested. "They have a very keen sense of smell."
"They're mourning right now, Stoyan," I informed him, sitting up on the couch I was reclined on.
"If I remember correctly, she was your friend. It been four days, yet you're not still mourning."
I glared at him. "She was the Alpha's mate. I'm surprised he didn't go crazy yet. Besides, we've got bigger things to worry about, Stoyan. One of us could be next, so stop being so damn insensitive."
He fell silent and he cast his eyes to the floor. "I liked her," he said after a long moment of silence. "She was feisty."
I don't know why that made me smile at him. "Yeah. She was a great friend."
He sat down next to me on the couch. "Remember the time when I held her hostage? She bit me on the shoulder before I could get a hold of her."
I laughed and elbowed him. "I'm sure you damn well deserved it."
"And when she was with that Damien guy...I saw them together. She would have made a perfect partner for him and a leader for his pack." My smile faded into a look of remembrance. She was always the leader type of person.
I glanced away from him and instead tilted my head to rest it on his shoulder. He put his arm around me, causing my back to lean on his chest until I was basically reclining on his lap. He rested his head on mine. "I'll always remember her," he said softly.
Joe chewed on the inside of his cheek as he looked back at the spell book.
I felt Stoyan's fingers slowly snake around my own. I looked up at him. He smiled down at me and placed a small kiss on my nose. I couldn't help but giggle and not pull away when he started leaning closer again. My gaze landed on his lips inching nearer.
BOOM!
My head snapped back towards Joe. He had dropped the book onto the ground, now closed. It created a loud noise when it made contact with the floor. It even woke up Abby, who mirrored my surprised expression but added a hint of crankiness to it. I guessed she didn't like being disturbed from her sleep.
"Whoops," Joe announced half-heartedly as he slowly bent to pick it up. He intentionally raised his voice a few decibels until it was almost as loud as the book falling. "I'm sorry, I just get so clumsy these days."
Underneath his head of dark hair now angled to hide a majority of his face, I thought I detected a smirk tilted his lips upwards.
"No problem, Joey," Stoyan remarked with a smirk of equal self-satisfaction. "As long as it wasn't intentional."
"My dear Stoyan." Joe now slowed down even more as he lifted the book back onto the table. He laid it down with exaggerated effort. "How could you ever suggest something as cunningly tempting as that?"
Abby was now glaring at him, staring down the length of her body. "I'm going to squeeze your head until your eyes pop out, Joe."
"Still charming as ever, Abigail." Joe licked his finger and turned the page, still giving her a smug look. She looked like she was about to snap something back before her face lost all expression. Her eyes started moving—almost twitching rapidly as she stared up at the ceiling.
"Wait, something's wrong." I pushed off Stoyan's lap, getting to my feet. All eyes were turned towards the witch, who was now convulsing on the sofa.
"Abby?" Joe called, placing a hand on her shoulder. She cried out and clutched her stomach. Alarmed, Joe attempted prying her hands away so he could see. "Abby!"
"What the hell?" Stoyan asked rhetorically.
I stared as Joe wrestled her to the ground and lifted her shirt up a few inches. There was a bullet embedded in her skin.
Joe repeated Stoyan's question, one hand firmly around Abby's wrist. "Joe," she groaned. His eyes landed on hers. "Something's wrong. I can feel it."
"What are you talking about?" I inquired. She yelped and yet another bullet wound appeared. I frantically spun around, vainly searching for the source.
"Fallon." That got my attention. I listened intently as she elaborated, "Something's going to happen to Fallon."
"Abby maybe you just—" Joe started.
"Don't you dare try to toss this aside!" she shouted at him. "This is real, damn it! Do you not have eyes?" He stared at the bullet wounds.
"Joe, she's losing a lot of blood," I told him uneasily. His jaw clenched as he made a decision.
"Find Fallon," he ordered us. "I'll take care of Abby."
I burst through the door to outside, grabbing my phone from my pocket in the process. The three siblings whirled at my arrival.
"What's wrong?" Matt asked upon seeing my expression. Nate really did try to bolt for it then. Callie was faster and tackled him to the ground. She held his collar firmly and hissed at him angrily. He froze and slumped in her hold, submitting.
"Fallon's in danger," Stoyan answered instead. "We have to find him."
"I'm calling his cell," I told them. "You guys do a power release."
Stoyan looked blank. "A what?"
"Just do what they do. Go!" He obliged as I held the phone to my ear. It went straight to voicemail. I growled and had to strain from breaking my phone on the wall a second time. Didn't want to have to buy a new one again.
"Rose." I turned to look at Matt. "It's not working—something's interfering with the signal."
I swore and stared up at the sky in exasperation. The moon was full, just like all the other times I looked up at the dark night sky for the past week. Grey clouds were swirling in, half hiding our source of light.
"Look for him," I ordered. I stared at them all individually. "Search the woods, Abby's house, everywhere. Find him!"
They didn't need to be told twice. They disappeared, Callie half dragging Nate along with her, leaving me running my hands through my hair nervously. Where could he have gone? What was going to happen to him?
For some reason, the dream I had earlier arrived in my mind. I shook it away. He'd never do that. Never.
I put my hand in my jacket pocket—and pulled a crumpled piece of paper out. Frowning, I straightened it out before glancing at the words inscribed on it. It was a number.
My eyes widened. The Alpha's number.
I held my phone in my hand, contemplating. Should I? It is an emergency...
Would our deal still hold now that Diana has been murdered? I hesitated before dialing the number. Deal or no deal, Damien was my friend. Friends help each other out.
I waited a few seconds, weighing the phone in my hand, before reluctantly raising it to my ear.
~~~~~~
I feel so cruel right now. Seems like this is going to be one long book.
Just a heads up though, I may not be on wattpad so much. Final exams are in roughly two months—and I wanna finish with a BANG! Yeah...I'm using a lot of onomatopoeia in this chapter.
Well, now you know. If you enjoyed the chapter, please give it a vote right there and turn my exam-stressed frown upside down! Spread some love and comment on what the cuss you thought of it. Seriously guys, don't be a ghost reader. No one likes 'em.
Bye bye now! xoxo Until next time!
P.S. Any predictions on what will happen next? *evil smile*
Also, have any of you watched Big hero 6? <3