Chapter 3
My fingers lazily slide along the frayed carpet in search of my beer. The glass bottle is more to the left than I remember it being. I frown as I bring it to my lips, silently chiding it for trying to make an escape. There's not much left, so I'm forced to lap up the bitter froth caked around the rim.
Kelly strums his guitar in the background. Every once in a while he stops abruptly and pulls the pencil from his ear, scribbling notes across a sheet of paper with the ferocity that borders on madness. I used to get envious of the way he could write music. Now I just see it as a secret treasure that I'll be privy to enjoy before anyone else.
Truthfully, I used to be envious of a lot more than Kelly's musical abilities. We were four years apart in high school, but even back then, the differences between us were notable. Where he was popular and adored, I was gangly and blended in with the background. Where he was intelligent and athletically inclined, I was middle of the road and shamefully uncoordinated. Where he was good-looking and charming, I was plain and boring.
It wasn't until I graduated high school that I just stopped caring. Even though I knew he surpassed me in – well, just about everything – I got the prize of being able to call someone like him my best friend. That seemed to make all the rest irrelevant.
"Did that last hook sound like the one in 'Horseshoes and Hairpins?'"
I pull the beer bottle away from my lips and squint. "Play it again?"
Kelly strums a few chords, and his converse shoes tap along to the unique beat. I try to compare it to the hook in question and shake my head when he's done.
"No," I confirm. "They're completely different. They're both in 3:4, but that's about the only similarity I can tell."
Kelly smirks and jabs the end of his pencil in my direction. "You're learning."
"Yea," I scoff. "Only took me about seven years to pick up a thing or two about music."
He shrugs, the very embodiment of patience when it comes to my mediocrity. "Everyone learns at their own pace."
I roll my eyes and force myself into a sitting position. "Speaking of pace, I need to pick mine up if I plan on being buzzed by the time Fiona and her gaggle of crows come over. I'm way too sober to deal with that shit right now."
Kelly snorts but doesn't look up from his music notes. Once a month Fiona takes over their apartment and invites a handful of her friends over for a night of girl bonding. I'm not exactly sure what it entails, but it usually ends in high-pitched squeals and sickening gossip that tastes worse than the warm beer staining my lips.
"You want me to grab you one too?" I ask, standing and stretching my torso.
He doesn't answer right away. He's lost in the musical realm, and based on the early hour of the evening, he won't be joining me again for a while. I round the corner of the living room and pad my way across the kitchen floor. The refrigerator seems to beckon to me as I pry it open and reach for two more beers. When I bring them back out to the living room though, Kelly is standing and frowning at his phone.
"What is it?" I ask.
"I got an alert from my vamp," he mutters.
"You need to go feed sometime soon?"
"Not soon," he answers. "She needs me now."
If I didn't know any better, I'd say that he almost sounds worried. It's hard to tell, though. Kelly isn't the type of guy to let fear edge its way into his mind. He's known for always dealing with situations using a clear mind and a sense of ease.
"What's wrong?"
"She wants me to go to the Village."
My eyes widen. Whenever vampires and their consorts meet for a live-feeding, it's usually in a setting closer to other humans. Or at the very least, it's in a chosen setting that's neutral to both parties. That way if something goes wrong, the human is always close enough to get help.
But the Village isn't a part of our world. It's a part of theirs.
"Why does she want you to go there?"
Kelly stands, scratching at the back of his neck. "I dunno. She marked it as a code red, though. She needs a feeding."
As much as it pains me to see the torment in Kelly's features, that old, familiar feeling of envy resurfaces. I know how much it annoys him to be a vampire's consort, but at least he has a vampire. The one assigned to me fled the scene, sent me a nast-o-gram rejection email the next day, and hasn't responded to my sarcastic reply in almost a week.
I know, I know. Why am I complaining? Most humans would pay for this type of outcome. It'd be like winning the lottery. There's something seriously wrong with me for thinking otherwise. Yet for reasons unknown to me, I just can't shake the desire to fulfill my role as consort.
"Let me take you," I offer.
Kelly snaps his head up. "What?"
"Seriously," I continue. "I'll drive you into the Village, wait until you're done, and then I'll drive us back."
My best friend vehemently shakes his head back and forth. He wraps his hands around the neck of his guitar so tightly I wonder if it'll leave an indent.
"You can't do that, Finn. What if something happens? I can't. I – "
"Well you're sure as hell not going alone," I argue. "And if you even tried, I'd tell Fiona. How do you think she'd react knowing you traveled to a place like that by yourself?"
Kelly's eyebrows arch with surprise. "You wouldn't dare."
I grab my keys off the coffee table and dangle them in the air. "Try me."
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Kelly points to the last exit on the right. He checks the GPS on his phone a final time before nodding.
"That's the one."
I ease the car onto the exit. Nerves get the better of me, and a cold sweat breaks across my skin as we get further and further away from the land of the living. There's not a single car in sight when we merge onto the new highway. Even the road seems unsure of what to do with us as we cruise over it.
"I shouldn't have let you drive me," Kelly whispers.
"I wouldn't have let you go alone."
And I wouldn't have. Besides, even if I did, Fiona would have my balls for breakfast. That's really not the way I want my manhood removed.
Lights break through the dark and dingy night. The colors radiating from the immortal city vary from a florescent white to a neon green. Kelly nervously taps his foot – up, down, up, down, up, down. The woman on his GPS instructs for him to take the next left. Both of us glance ahead.
We pass under a final tunnel, and the shift in view causes my breath to hitch. The buildings along both sides of the street are made of all glass. They're so pristine they seem to sparkle. The few vampires walking along the sidewalk stare at my car as we drive by, their reddened eyes pierced with curiosity.
My courage scuttles into the shadows. Even though vampires might look like us, their moral compass doesn't beat with the pulse of a conscious. They live by a different set of rules entirely. And unfortunately for us, since we're in their territory now, we need to abide by theirs.
I turn right and the glass buildings transform into metal homes. Most of them are shaped in the same fashion of a wide dome. A handful are square, but none of them look anything like the houses I'm used to.
"Please proceed another twenty feet. You will then reach your destination."
Kelly puffs out his cheeks and stares at the house ahead. I ease the car to the curb. He clicks his phone to silent and stuffs it in his pocket. He nudges me and plasters an overly bright smile onto his face.
"Want to go in for me?"
I force a smile in return. "If I could, I would."
He shakes his head at my words. Probably because he knows they're true. The longer I don't hear from Bogdan, the more envious I become of everyone else who has a vampire. Kelly reminds me more than a handful of times this is something that should make me grateful. But I can't help feeling useless knowing my vampire cast me aside.
"I'll be right here waiting," I assure him.
Kelly puffs out his cheeks and then reaches for the door handle. He swings it open and kicks his leg out.
"May your veins be thick and your blood run freely!" I shout after him just as he closes the door.
I think I see him smile at my morbid joke, but he turns away so fast it's hard to tell. He jogs up the long stretch of white, speckled pavement leading up to the house. The door opens before he has a chance to knock. I crane my neck to try and get a look at his vampire, but he's ushered into the house too fast for me to see.
The moment the door closes behind him, the uneasiness in me doubles. There aren't many vampires walking the streets, but the ones who are have taken notice of my presence. A woman just a few houses down stares without shame. Her red eyes look way too bright, even from here. She remains stoically frozen, but her nostrils flare and she licks her lips.
Shit.
My chest tightens when she takes a step towards my car. And then another one. A cunning smile slips across her beautiful face. I want to look away from her, but she seems to have me in a trance. The blood pulsing in my veins drives her forward, and the fear bubbling up inside me is strong enough to make me choke.
Her pace quickens and soon she's just a few feet away. I swallow hard and lock the car doors. If I wasn't in this situation, the action would probably make me laugh. Locking the doors will do me as much good as trying to open a can of soup with a paper towel. That woman, that thing, could destroy me in seconds flat if she wanted to. Her pupils dilate into a menacing victory when she gets an arm's length from my window.
Another figure joins her, and in a blur of fast movements and red eyes, she's gone. I blink in confusion. My mouth goes dry, and I whip my head all around trying to find her. Where in the hell did she go? I'm about to start searching the car just to make sure she didn't break inside, but then a new figure stands outside my passenger window.
He leans down ever so slowly, his eyes blazing with fury. He brings a hand up to my window, and tap, tap, taps it with the pad of his index finger.
It's Bogdan.