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  I had no freaking idea where they would have taken them, and Thomas and Benjamin wouldn’t be up for a few hours. I didn’t know what else to do, so I started yelling. “Hey! Immortal guy? Hello! Can you hear me?”

  I opened the back door and screamed into the backyard. I didn’t care if the neighbors heard. Whatever kind of powers the immortal being possessed, I hoped that he had the power to magically hear me from wherever he was.

  “I need your help! Hello?”

  “You don’t need to yell,” he said, standing in my living room.

  “Holy hell! You scared me half to death!”

  “You’re already there.”

  “Har-har. They took her!”

  “Domino?”

  “Yes, Domino. Wait, how do you know her name is Domino?”

  “I get around,” he said.

  “Well, why weren’t you here to stop them from taking her?”

  “As I said. I am in a lot of places. I cannot keep watch everywhere at once.”

  “Can you find her, then?” I asked, getting exasperated with the immortal being. “Do you have a name, by the way?”

  “You may call me Adam and yes, I can find her. But I cannot get directly involved.”

  “Fine, don’t lift a finger. Just take me, or tell me where she is.”

  “Why do you care?”

  “I don’t know. I want to help her and I think she’s the answer to stopping this demon problem.”

  “Now that your friend is dead, you don’t want to help others. Remember?”

  “Hey! Jerk! Get out of my head.”

  “It cannot be helped.”

  “Well, same here. I care, okay? It can’t be helped. It’s who I am and the longer we talk, the more danger Domino is in.”

  “They will not kill her until she returns to demon form.”

  “Yeah, I know that, but no one has a clear idea as to when that day is. For all I know, she could have turned back into demon form an hour ago.”

  “You are one of the good ones,” Adam said. His golden hair looked even better in the daytime.

  “This is what I’ve been saying!”

  “The only reason I never killed the one called Benjamin is because he did not want to make any new vampires.”

  “Why would you want to kill him?” I asked.

  “I hunted and killed all of the original vampires that Domino created.”

  “Except for Benjamin.”

  Adam nodded.

  “Are you going to kill him now since he made me?”

  “What do you care? You wanted him out of your life.”

  “That’s really annoying! Stop invading my mind. And you can’t kill him.”

  Adam shrugged his shoulders and circled around me. “Ready to go?”

  “Yes.”

  Adam closed in on me in an embrace, pulling me into his body. “Close your eyes,” he whispered.

  I did.

  I felt numb everywhere, like my entire body fell asleep for just under three seconds. When I opened my eyes, Adam and I were standing outside of a warehouse. I was standing in complete sunlight, and still had yet to burst into flames.

  “I cannot interfere here,” he said.

  “That’s fine, but can you tell me one thing?”

  “You are able to go out into the sun because Benjamin’s blood gives you that ability.”

  “It’s as simple as that?”

  “There have been others. Most of the vampires do not continuously drink the blood of another vampire, hence, they do not usually realize their ability. If you stay out here too long in the sun, you will start to burn.”

  “Why don’t vampires drink each other’s blood?” I asked.

  “You haven’t met many vampires. Eventually, you will notice that they do not often pair up either. Not with each other, demons, or humans.”

  “But what about Benjamin, then?”

  Adam shrugged his shoulders. “There are exceptions to every rule,” he said, disappearing.

  I felt my back pocket quickly and thanked myself for remembering to keep my phone on my person at all times. I was already starting to feel flush as the sun began to set. I sent Benjamin a text message, telling him the address. I was at a warehouse near the airport. Luckily, the street numbers were visible on the side of the building.

  The door to the warehouse opened into a preliminary office. The receptionist area was small at the left side of the room. The door behind the receptionist’s desk led to the actual warehouse. Judging by the garbage strewn about and the dust collecting, my guess was the warehouse had been abandoned for five months or so.

  I caught the scent of Jeremiah’s blood—again, repulsed by my ability. I followed the scent, walking slowly through the warehouse, keeping near the sides of the buildings and camouflaging myself amongst the crates and boxes. Security appeared to be relaxed, considering it was daylight and they didn’t expect any vampires to be out and about.

  Jeremiah and Domino were tied up to a couple of steel pipes, bolted into the cement flooring. As far as I could tell, there was only one demon watching the prisoners. I came in as fast as a blur that the guard never saw coming, and hit him in the head, hard. I used a metal pole that I’d found lying on the ground. Jeremiah was covered with a lot of his own blood and it looked like his arm had been re-injured.

  Domino, I was happy to see, appeared unharmed. She looked frightened, but at least, she was still alive. I undid her chains first and then started my work on Jeremiah’s restraints, which were more extensive. He’d taken a good beating. I mean, really, where was he going to go?

  “I thought vampires couldn’t go out into the sun?” Domino whispered.

  “We can’t. I’m just having one of those days, you know?”

  Jeremiah had to be carried out of there, but I could move a lot faster if I could carry both of them. However, I couldn’t figure out the logistics of carrying both of them on my small frame. Jeremiah was about six feet tall and Domino was taller than I by about three inches.

  I threw Jeremiah across both of my shoulders and told Domino to follow close behind me. “You haven’t been turned back into a demon yet, right?” I asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Just checking,” I said. We sped out through the loading dock, and I saw that the sun was going down, except that it was bright and orange as it descended, causing me great discomfort.

  Shit! My skin was getting so hot, I had to fight the urge to throw all of my clothes off. The view from the loading dock told me that we were in the middle of a fairly populated business section. Good job, dumb-ass demons! They knew nothing about subtlety.

  I was losing my strength just as a few of the workers from neighboring businesses caught sight of the bloody Jeremiah and little ol’ me, under him, lugging him along.

  “Ma’am! Let me help you! I’m calling an ambulance,” one man said, dialing his phone as he ran over to me. Five other men rushed over from another building as my knees collapsed under me. No freaking way! This was so not happening.

  All the yelling drew the demons out of the warehouse. The humans were just too irresistible to them. They came down from the second floor of the warehouse, completely unaware that their prisoners were escaping. Instead, they were entirely focused on the small number of humans gathering on the loading dock.

  “We can handle this,” I said, meaning Domino and I. “Stand back,” I told the humans. “Don’t come any closer!”

  Though the sun was practically down, my skin was bubbling all over and the pain was excruciating. I was breaking out in blisters the size of my fist. Ewww! I was glad not to be anywhere near a mirror. Finally, I fell forward onto the hard concrete with Jeremiah on top of me.

  “Domino. Run!” I said with my last bit of energy. I could still hear and see my surroundings for the time being, but I’d lost every last ounce of strength. Within twenty minutes, I would be dead… really dead, and burnt to a crisp.

  “I’m not going to leave you guys,” I
heard her say, crouching down and trying to hide behind our bodies. She reached into my back pocket, but I didn’t know whom she planned to call.

  The eight remaining demons circled the group of about twelve to fifteen humans that were gathered near the loading dock. “The ambulance and police are on their way,” I heard one of the men say, before he realized they were in a world of trouble.

  One of the demons struck first and grabbed a human. It was savage and animalistic, the way he picked him up and sucked the soul from the man’s body. The worst part was that the human had to be alive while his soul got sucked out. The sound was deafening and horrific. The scene threw the other humans into sheer panic, but they were completely trapped. I heard the ambulance coming, and I thought, for a brief moment, that perhaps Domino could get away.

  More humans, police and paramedics arrived on the scene and shots were fired. Bullets, unfortunately, could not stop the demons. It sent them into a soul-feeding frenzy. Though the sun was finally down, my skin felt burnt and flaky. I would start disintegrating in just a matter of minutes.

  “Olivia!” I heard Benjamin yell.

  But before he could get a good look at me, he encountered the human carnage and slaughter. I watched as he jumped in the middle of everything, throwing the demons off in every direction. Benjamin wielded a large metal pole with him and I almost laughed to see that he was in his black pajama pants and gray t-shirt. I didn’t think he ever left the house dressed in anything but a suit.

  One demon grabbed onto his back, while another hit him head on. His long fangs were showing and he pulled the demon off his back, tearing into the demon’s neck with great relish. The remaining demons were distracted as there was a large group of humans around. The addiction to human souls was too strong for the demons to resist.

  Thomas arrived and dispensed of the remaining two demons on his own. Through my not so blurry vision, I saw that some of the humans were still alive and I knew their souls could be reattached. Benjamin stood in between the fallen, limp bodies and closed his eyes. He extended his hands over the group, and after just a few beats, the souls slowly retreated back into their respective human bodies. Some of the humans would not survive their wounds in the end, but others would—with their souls intact.

  “Benjamin!” Domino called, jumping up and down.

  Most of my body was obscured under Jeremiah. There was no way that Benjamin could have seen the extent of my injuries. I was leaving this world fast. Would I be a ghost? If so, I would definitely come back and haunt Domino, and maybe Benjamin, too.

  “Help me,” Domino said, rolling Jeremiah’s body off me.

  Benjamin bent down and cradled my head in his hands. I felt a few flakes of my charred skin fall off at his touch. Another ambulance arrived and I heard Thomas yell something about getting the bodies on the ambulance and hypnotizing the driver.

  “Is she going to be okay?” Domino asked.

  Benjamin let out a pained growl and that was answer enough for me. I would not survive this. “Thomas,” he yelled. “Get these two to safety!” He meant Domino and Jeremiah.

  He picked me up in his arms and the movement was like being scraped with knives all over my body at once. I whimpered in his embrace as he attempted to move as fluidly as possible, trying his best not to jostle me.

  He set me down in the passenger seat of the car and sped through the congested Miami streets as swiftly as the traffic would allow. I wanted to tell him he should not even rush. There was no way my body could ever recover from this.

  Benjamin brought me inside the house and lay me across the bed. My blackened skin fell all around me. It was worse than any horror movie. What a terrible way to go! I would have rather died in Benjamin’s arms that first night, when I met him. Not flaking away like some overdone chicken thigh, left on the grill too long. He straddled my body carefully and pulled a small knife out of who knows where? He made a large cut on his wrist, and squeezed with his other hand, forcing the blood to come out of his arm faster.

  The blood dripped into my mouth at a fairly steady stream, but I didn’t have the energy to swallow. It pooled at the back of my throat until I started choking and coughing. Surprisingly, that did the trick, because the blood made it all the way down. With that little bit ingested, I regained the ability to swallow his blood again. I kept drinking little by little, and eventually, I could speak again. My body was still a red mess of icky grossness. If I were Benjamin, I wouldn’t even be able to tend to me. After so much blood loss, he was growing weak. I needed more to finish recuperating, but I convinced him that he needed a break. He’d do me no good if he passed out from xsanguinations.

  Hours passed and he left the room for a little while, and I assumed he wanted to speak with Thomas. When he returned, I was well enough to sit up. This time, I drank directly from his neck. I drew away, feeling sated for the first time. I looked down at my bare body and watched as my angry, pink skin knitted itself back together, eventually becoming flawless again.

  There was only about fifteen minutes left before dawn broke. I lay, completely naked in Benjamin’s bed. He still had not spoken. He simply traced my unscorched skin with his long fingers in a circuitous motion. Up one arm, across my chest, around my abdomen, back up the rib cage, and then down the other arm and back again.

  “I’m never going out when it’s light outside ever again,” I said. My throat was still mildly sore from the burning, but the pain was tolerable, and I had something I needed to tell Benjamin.

  “Ben,” I began, catching his hand in mine. “Laura’s death was not your fault,” I said, looking at him directly in his ocean blue eyes.

  “Yes, it is,” he said, closing his eyes.

  “No, really. Look at me,” I said, running my fingers through his disheveled hair. “You warned me several times that I shouldn’t get Laura involved, and I didn’t listen. My recklessness is what got her killed.”

  “No,” he said. “A power-hungry, sadistic vampire killed her.”

  I closed my eyes, remembering the image of Natasha slicing Laura’s head clean off her neck. I shuddered; Benjamin drew me close to his body. His arms felt so lean and strong under my delicate, new skin.

  “I’ll leave before dawn,” he said, pulling away from my body.

  “The hell you will!” I said.

  “You don’t owe me anything, Olivia. I barely got to you in time. You almost died out there on the loading dock.”

  “But, you saved all of those humans. You put their lives ahead of everything else,” I said, smiling. “You do have some humanity left in you.” Benjamin seemed so strong in the fight and powerful. Something told me that even before he turned into a vampire, he must have been a strong man, always capable of greatness.

  “Only because you brought it back,” he said. “I am able to love again because you reawakened those emotions. It’s been a thousand years, darling Olivia. I love you.”

  “I love you too,” I said. “No matter what.”

  Nineteen

  I was so drained the night I stayed out in the sun, that I kept waking up late every night for a week straight. I spoke to Laura’s family. Her body was sent to Washington D.C. to be buried. I explained to them that since my parents had died quite recently, I just didn’t think I could bear to attend Laura’s funeral. I don’t know what they thought about that, but Laura’s death was something I would have to deal with for the rest of eternity.

  There was a little bit of bad in me now, but I kept telling myself that all the good I did would balance things out. Domino was safe and living nearby in Coral Gables with Jeremiah and Thomas. It’s difficult, however, keeping her safe. We have to make sure that the demons never follow any of us there, so we can’t meet at our homes anymore. If we can protect her long enough for her to turn back to demon, I think everything will be okay.

  I think.

  Jeremiah hovers around Domino affectionately, however, rarely engages her in conversation. I don’t know when he plans to inform her ab
out her past, or what she did. The more I speak to her, the more I can’t believe she would ever snap and go on a murderous rampage.

  In a tiny way, which I would never admit to anyone, I’m glad she did though. Love… passionate, raw, insane love can drive us to do almost anything. It’s mad and wonderful, and her actions brought Benjamin and me together. Otherwise, we would have missed each other across a millennium.

  I didn’t see Adam in the days following Domino’s kidnapping.

  “He said he couldn’t interfere,” I was telling Benjamin. “What does that even mean? The guy is strange. I’m mean, really strange. And why does he keep talking to me? Why doesn’t he visit you or Thomas? Or even Domino herself? How come I’m the one that keeps getting all the cryptic messages?”

  Benjamin shrugs, stepping out of the shower. I already showered while he was out checking on the others. Now, I am watching him from the counter. He dries his body and dresses in his favorite dark gray suit. He looks like he just walked out of another photo shoot, not like he’s about to hunt demons.

  I hop from the counter, my heels making clicking sounds as they hit the ceramic tiles. I circle around him, stopping directly in front of his body. I straighten his tie, though it doesn’t need straightening.

  He cradles my face in his hands. “Are you sure you’re ready to go out tonight? It’s okay if you need a few more days to recover.”

  “I’m a freaking vampire, Ben! How much recovery time do I need?”

  “Maybe I’m the one that needs time,” he says. “I don’t think I can ever bear to see you that hurt again.”

  “Won’t happen again. From now on, it’s play dead until I’m sure the sun is down.”

  Besides, we can’t stay out of the fight now. The demons are getting restless and overtaking the city. I will fight in Laura’s name. Everywhere we turn, the demons show up on their never-ending search for Domino, the heir to the underworld throne. And they still manage to procure vampires’ blood.