Destructive Embrace (11 page)

Naturally, in my rush, I happened to
run directly into someone.

Glancing down at the body sprawled out
in front of me, I ignored the skipping of my heart in my
chest.

Elyssa…

For a bunch of vampires, we weren’t
very coordinated.

I sighed as I picked
myself up off the floor for the millionth time since my arrival at
Castle Lanistter. I glanced up at whoever I’d run into and held
back a grunt of displeasure. Of
course
it would be him.

He seemed just as surprised to see me
as well. “Elyssa,” he murmured, eyes wide. It was almost like he’d
forgotten I was even at the castle.

“Hello, Zeke,” I said quietly, looking
away from him. “How are you today?”

He started, appearing as though he was
about to dodge off down a hallway in order to avoid talking to me,
but ended up holding his ground.

“I’m alright. Just
relaxing and spending some time with Roxann…” He looked away
awkwardly as he said that, and I mimicked the action.
Ah, her
.

“Fun, fun,” I muttered. We
still hadn’t spent much time together since the incident, and all
the time we
had
spent together was full of awkward silences, much like that
one.

As I opened my mouth to excuse myself
from that awful, awkward existence, Zeke cleared his
throat.

“So, I was actually looking for you,”
he said. I furrowed my eyebrows at him and waited, but he wouldn’t
meet my gaze.

“You found me,” I said slowly. “What do
you need?”

After a heartbeat, Zeke finally looked
at me and spoke. “I need you to leave,” he whispered.

I stared at Zeke, dumbfounded. “You
can’t be serious,” I said incredulously, shaking my head at
him.

He stared back at me seriously. “I’m
quite serious, Elyssa,” he replied, shrugging one shoulder. I
glared at him and shook my head.

“You can’t make me leave. I’m Reid’s
Mate, I have every right to be here, even more of a right than that
stupid human girl you’re trying so hard to impress,” I told him.
Dmitri had told me that I had a right to stay as Reid’s Mate, so I
was going to put my foot down and use that right,
damnit.

Zeke scoffed. “As the head of the line,
I can overrule anything. If I say you’re unwelcome here, then
you’re not fucking welcome, woman,” he told me smugly. I still
shook my head and he shrugged. “If you don’t want to leave, then
it’s really as simple as being nicer to Roxann whenever you
encounter her.”

“I never encounter the bitch!” I said,
scowling. Zeke raised his eyebrows and I shook my head again.
“She’s already afraid of me, so I do my best to avoid her. I think
that’s the best you are going to get out of me, Ezekiel,” I
spat.

He sighed. “I was hoping
that I wouldn’t have to give Reid’s Mate the boot, but here you
are, being stubborn as usual. I once thought
that was something I liked about you. I suppose when it’s in
regards to locking you up in the dungeons, it’s certainly something
I do enjoy: little snarky comments and fighting back," Zeke paused
to sigh wistfully. "But those days are behind me, I think. I have
no interest in beating women anymore. Roxann doesn't approve of it
and that's where I think I draw the line. I want to do well with
this woman, so I'm going to change."

For some reason, an odd
feeling rested in my chest, and I smile softly at Zeke. "You
shouldn't have to change to be with someone, Zeke," I murmured,
shaking my head.

Zeke scoffed. "Reid had to
become a one-woman man to be with you," he bit out.

I widened my eyes and
reached out to slap him across the face. He caught my hand and I
wrenched it away from him.

"How dare you," I hissed.
"Reid did not
have
to do anything to be with me, he was always wonderful. A bit
flirty and far too wild to handle, but that was what made him,
him!" I said emphatically.

He stared down at me with a
bored expression. "He could have had any choice of the women around
here, but he chose me. I'm the lucky one, you son of a bit–" I was
cut off as Zeke slapped me hard.

"You don't call my mother
names like that," he tsked at me. I held my hand up to my stinging
cheek and glared at him.

"If I encounter her I will
be as civil to her as she is to me. Considering the last time I
came across her, she ran from the room shrieking
vampire
at the top of her
lungs, it won't be all too civil."

He sighed and held up his
hands in a 'what can you do?' type of motion, so I thought I won
that one. "Then you'll just have to pack your shit and get the hell
out of my castle," he said, smirking.

Something bubbled up in my
chest and I shoved Zeke, hard. "Why are you trying so hard to
impress her? She's nothing special. I bet as soon as she gets her
story, she'll be out the door faster than you can keep up with her,
gone back to her stupid newspaper to tell the secret of Lanistter
castle!"

Zeke eyed me for a moment,
silent as he absorbed my words and expressions. "Elyssa," he
murmured, setting his hand on my cheek gently. I tried not to lean
into it, but it was difficult; his palm was so warm and inviting,
that I just had to press my cheek up against it further. He smiled
at that. "Are you jealous?" he asked, breaking my
tranquility.

I snatched myself away from
him faster than I'd ever moved in my life. "Jealous! What, of that
little witch? Hell no!" I laughed hysterically, holding my stomach
as the giggles took over.

Zeke chuckled along with
me, and fear took hold of me; he was definitely going to say
something that would ruin my bubbly mood.

"You're protesting far too
much, dear Elyssa," he whispered, stepping closer to me. I backed
up, shaking my head in denial.

"I think you're
delusional," I breathed. He held my gaze with his lovely red eyes
and I swallowed, continuing to back away from him as he tried to
invade my space.

"Why are you running?" he
inquired, tilting his head to the side as he finally backed me
against a wall. I placed my hands on his chest and laughed
once.

"I'm not running," I
insisted weakly. "I was just trying to maintain my personal
space."

He placed his arms on
either side of my head, leaning over me as he propped himself up on
the wall behind me. "You're the one touching me, Elyssa, not the
other way around," he chuckled.

His cool breath fanned out
across my face and I felt my heart stutter.
Stop betraying me, body!
I demanded,
letting my hands drop from his chest.

As soon as the contact was
gone, Zeke moved in even closer, until we were only separated by a
few inches of air.

"Oh," I breathed, certain
that my eyes were wide as a doe's by now. "I was trying to stop you
from doing that," I whispered. Zeke smiled.

"Why are you trying to stop
me from doing anything?" he asked, leaning down to whisper in my
ear. "I thought you liked what I do to you?" he asked, lips grazing
my ear softly.

All rational thought left
my mind then as a shudder ran through my body. "Zeke, stop," I
whispered, setting my hands on his shoulders. I couldn't push; he
had me too weak to do anything.

I really couldn’t bear for him to
continue; if he did, I didn’t know what might happen. Finally,
mercifully, an idea came to me.

“What about r-Roxann?” I stammered. I
was grasping at straws, but as I’d hoped, Zeke’s body stiffened and
he slowly, painfully, withdrew himself from my personal
space.

He stared down at me curiously. Under
his gaze, my knees buckled, and he caught me before I could fall,
slowly bringing me down to the floor. “What about her, indeed,” he
murmured. I couldn’t see his face, but his tone told me he wasn’t
too certain about the topic at hand.

About Roxann.

“Do you love her?” I whispered. A part
of me dreaded the answer, but I was incredibly curious for someone
who truly didn’t want to know the answer.

Zeke finally met my eyes, his
expression unreadable. “I… Am not sure,” he answered.

“You should be happy,” I blurted. My
words were sincere, but they left a bitter taste in my
mouth.

Zeke released me and stood up. Then I
was suddenly yanked to my feet, my arms gripped harshly in his
hands.

He removed his hands from my shoulders
after another moment with them just sitting there harmlessly. "You
need to leave," he whispered, balling his hands into fists and
crossing his arms over his chest. I choked back a sob and nodded
once. "I mean, it isn't like you wanted to stay here anyway," Zeke
went on to say. "From the very get-go you were all about leaving
this place..."

As he trailed off, he looked away from
me. I wondered what he was thinking, but before I could even hope
to ask, he sighed. "Even when so many of the inhabitants here
wanted you to stay, you wanted to go. This is me giving you your
out, Elyssa," he said, finally looking back up to meet my
eyes.

His were red-rimmed and if I didn't
know any better, I would think that he had tears lining his lower
lash line. But it was Zeke, of course he wasn't crying over me
leaving.

"I'll go," I said. "Right away. I don't
think I need anything here except for my identification
–"

"– And Reid's bank account
information," Zeke interjected.

I glanced up at him sharply,
questioning him with my eyes. "What do I need that for? I have my
own money."

"You are his Mate, and since he is no
more, you are the one who shall receive his funds, so that you may
live comfortably wherever you choose to settle." I could hardly
breathe at this information.

It made me sick. I wasn't going to take
Reid's inheritance, especially since I was the one who had
performed the fatal blow that took his life. Especially since I
slept with Zeke mere days after his demise...

"I don't want it. Hold onto it in case
someone else here needs it. Or donate it. I don't care," I mumbled,
turning away from Zeke to leave. I ran to my room to grab my
backpack, shoved one set of spare clothes into it along with my ID
card and birth certificate information, and fled the
castle.

Once outside, I winced at the glaring
light of the setting sun, but paid it no mind as I headed to the
gate. Hesitantly I pulled it open, letting my hand linger there for
a few moments longer than it needed to.

I truly didn't want to leave like this.
Without any goodbyes, without it being on my own
terms...

Although I supposed that on some level,
me not fighting Zeke, agreeing with him instead, was somewhat an
admittance that I thought this was what was right for me, for
everyone in the castle.

For Roxann.

A snort of laughter escaped my mouth at
the thought of Roxann, and I couldn't help but roll my
eyes.

I didn't care about her at all, and I
sort of actually despised her for how she was changing
Zeke.

"If you're going to
change," I whispered, turning halfway to look back up at the
castle. "Then you should be changing for yourself, at your own
pace. Not for her comfort, and at
her
speed. You should stop for
you
," I
breathed.

Tears stung at my eyes and I covered my
face with both hands in an attempt to stop them from falling; to
stop myself from having a breakdown right in front of the
castle.

After a few moments, I was able to
recompose myself, and with one last glance up at the third floor –
Reid's floor – I silently bid my farewell to the Lanistter Castle.
As I turned back to the gates, I thought I saw a small blond figure
watching me from one of the windows on Reid's floor, but when I
looked back to that window, there was no one there.

I pushed it out of my mind and stepped
around and out of the gate, departing from the castle grounds
finally.

To think that this was what
I wanted for the first few weeks of me being here,
I thought as my foot touched the ground just
outside of the gate.

As soon as it made contact, though, I
was thrown backward, back through the open gate and onto the drive
of Lanistter Castle once more.

"What the hell?!" I
growled, looking around myself frantically.
What just happened?
I wondered to
myself as I slowly picked myself back up off the ground. Dusting
myself off, I looked around again in an attempt to see what might
have tossed me back onto the grounds. No one was there. Not even a
breeze was blowing for once – the thought made me long for Reid's
playful winds once more.

I tried to step out once more, only to
have the same thing happen. I felt panic rising in my chest and I
rolled to my feet quickly before darting back inside the
castle.

When I got inside the castle, I nearly
broke down. I was no longer wanted there, and yet I was unable to
leave. What more could possibly happen to me at this god-forsaken
castle?