Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side (31 page)

"Have you forgotten me completely, silly?" Faith Crosse was standing next to us, hands on hips, shaking her head. "If I didn't know better, I'd swear you were getting a little too close to your housemate here." Her tone was light, but she jabbed a finger at me, and there was anger and disbelief in her eyes. Her expression said, very clearly, "There is no way that you abandoned me for
that."

"Lucius and I were just dancing," I said, voice even, immediately regaining control of myself. I would not panic. I would not be flustered. And I would not act like she was
superior
to me, or deserved Lucius more. I turned away from Faith. "I have to find Jake," I told Lucius.

"Wait," Lucius insisted, reaching for me. But Faith intervened, grabbing his hand.

"I'm sure Jenn wants to get back to her date. And I'm positive you do, too."

“Jess—“

A scene was brewing. Other couples were starting to stare.

"Thank you for the dance." I smiled, backing away. "He's all yours, Faith."

"Oh, I know that," she said, her own smile as glitteringly frosty as her dress. She swung into Lucius's arms. But he was looking at me. I think there was pity in his eyes. Or apology. Maybe he really just couldn't help himself. Maybe he really was like every teenage boy. Any throat would do in a pinch. Once again, I'd nearly been used—a mistake—just like that day in his apartment. Why was I so powerless to see through him? What hold did he have over me that I fell for him again and again and again?

God, he almost bit my throat. . . .

I met his eyes for a good long time across the dance floor, then I slowly turned my back on Lucius Vladescu and walked, head high and shoulders back, directly through the crowd. People stepped aside, making way for me. I refused to look back. But I hoped he was watching me. Watching me and realizing that he had made a terrible mistake, abandoning me for Faith Crosse.

Pity me? I don't think so. I pity
you,
Lucius.

Jake, of course, was nowhere to be found. I wasn't surprised. I'd completely humiliated us both. Anyone who had paid any attention must have thought Lucius and I were way too close. We were probably just lucky no one had seen his fangs.

I ended up calling my mom for a ride and sat in silence the whole way home, hating vampires. Meddling, heartbreaking, hormone-raging, throat-biting vampires.

Chapter
40

VASILE
--
—

Is this how you planned it all along?

But of course it is.

I was such a fool not to see the scheme in its entirety. Or
— I must
be honest with myself
—perhaps I
did know the truth. I just wanted the power so badly, too. . . .

This evening, however, as I placed my fangs against An-tanasia's throat, the whole future became so clear to me. The scent of her blood was like a truth serum injected into my veins, a cracked mirror into my own hellish self.

You knew all alongthat an American girl not raised as a vampire would be easily destroyed should she take the throne. The letter I wrote warning you that Jessica was not ready, that she would be vulnerable to attack from power-hungry females . . . those were not revelations to you. You have always prized her weakness. You
counted upon
it. Oh, god, Vasile, did
we
count upon it?

I would have married her, thus completing the pact, brought her into our world in Romania, where she would have been almost utterly defenseless, and then abandoned her to her dark destiny. When? How long would it have taken? A year? Less? But by
then, the clans would have been legitimately united, and all the power in our hands. In
your
hands.

Would you have forced fate, Vasile? Would you have taken her down yourself? Secretly, of course, by the gloved hand of one of your minions . . . or would you have tried to force
my
hand?

With
Antanasia hidden high in our castle, who better to at' tend to her "unfortunate" destruction than the man who shared her bed?

Was that the crudest thrust, Vasile? To make me feel as
I
do
—
and then rip her away? Was that to be your greatest attempt at hardening me? Even for you, that seems too vicious
.
Too vile. Or perhaps, even after all these years, I underestimate you
—
which is always a dangerous mistake.

And if I had not done as you directed me
—
if I had not destroyed her
—
would you have dispatched me, too, on the grounds of insubordination? Eliminated the inconvenient heir? Who among the Vladescu Elders
—
and I assume they all know of and applaud your intentions regarding Jessica
—
who would have blamed you?

Damn. The power you would have wielded then: absolute control over the two greatest vampire clans, with no successor nipping at your heels.

Did you know all along that I would grow to feel so deeply for her?

Is it not appropriately cruel, Vasile, that now to have her, I must not have her?

Set us both free, Vasile. Release Antanasia from me, and release me, as well, if only for a short time. Just a few months. That is all I ask. Just let me be. I want not to think about pacts and power and all that I, like you, am capable of. . . .

Because the most sickeningly thrilling part is,
I
grudgingly admire your strategy. It gives me a twisted pleasure to see the plan in its entirety. To know that in your place I no doubt would have done the same thing: sacrificed an inconsequential
American
teenager without second thought, in the interest of lording over so many damn vampire legions. I can almost feel the power in my hands.

But of course, I am who I am: the product of
 
your
hand.

Thus I remain, as ever,

Yours,

Always, irrevocably, and irredeemably,

Lucius

P.S. Antanasia may have surprised all of us, Vasile. She really may have. She may have gone down with a hell of a fight. But I will not be the instrument of her inevitable destruction.

P.P.S. In case you have not inferred my meaning from all that I've written above, let me be perfectly clear: I choose to defy the pact.

Choice, Vasile ...is
it
not
a wondrous thing? No wonder the Americans prize it so.

Chapter
41

"JESSICA?"

My eyes popped open. I was in my room, lying in bed in the dark, but someone was there. I jolted straight up, rumbling for the light.

Someone else switched it on. I started to scream, but a firm hand over my mouth stopped me, pushing me back down on my pillow.

"Don't scream, please," Lucius whispered as I wriggled beneath him. I lay still, and he removed his hand. "My apologies for frightening you, and the rough treatment. But I needed to speak with you."

For a moment I was almost thrilled to find him in my room.
He is here for me. . . .
Then all the events of the evening came rushing back.

Propping myself up again, I clutched my sheets around my chest. "What do you want?" I spat at him, glancing at the clock. "It's three a.m.!"

"I was unable to sleep after what happened this evening." He sat down on the edge of the bed, uninvited. He was still wearing his tux, but the tie and jacket were gone and the shirt was untucked and rumpled. "I can't rest until we talk."

Lifting the sheet, I glanced down at myself, not sure what I'd worn to sleep in.
Am I even decent?

"Everything is covered," Lucius reassured me, the smallest smile on his lips. "Your sleep attire reveals nothing but your insistent love of Arabians."

"You are on such thin ice right now that I can't believe you even tried a joke," I said. "You are so out of line!"

Lucius's face fell. "Indeed. I made the jest only in hopes of pretending that our relationship had not changed as of this evening."

"You nearly bit me, Lucius. And then you ran off with Faith. I would definitely say things have changed."

"What I did tonight—what I almost did tonight—it was unforgivable," he agreed, clearly miserable. "Reprehensible. Not only to come so close to biting you, but in public, too. And with Faith—the woman I was accompanying, for god's sake—looking on, no less. I don't know what came over me. I don't even know how to begin to ask for your forgiveness."

Everything about that apology stung. Being close to me was "reprehensible"? It was "unforgivable"? He couldn't imagine "what came over him," finding himself attracted to a disgusting creature like me. Especially since it might have upset his precious priority, Faith Crosse.

Lucius sighed, correctly interpreting my silence. "You despise me even more than usual, don't you?"

"Yes."

"You left. I suppose Jake was upset."

"We'll all live."

My cold tone seemed to take him aback. "Yes. I suppose we will." He waited. "I thought you would have more to say."

"What do you want me to say, Lucius?" I intended to stonewall him, but suddenly it all came spilling out. "You show up on my doorstep, you hound me for months, and when you finally convince me that I'm special—when I finally felt something for you—you turn everything around on me and fall for the same cookie-cutter blond girl every guy likes. You're such a typical guy—"

"You really did, didn't you? Begin to feel something for me?" His voice was bittersweet. More bitter than sweet.

"Felt, Lucius. Felt. It was just for a moment," I said. My anger drained away, settling into a sullen sadness. "It seems like a bad dream now. A 'mistake,' to use your word. A terrible mistake."

Lucius rubbed tired eyes. "Oh, Jessica . . . Do not think you know the whole truth about anything I do or say," he said cryptically. "Sometimes . . . sometimes I do not even know myself. If I seem inconsistent, it is only me struggling with myself."

He leaned forward, wringing his hands. "Damn, I've made a mess of everything."

"Yeah. I guess so."

He looked at me with misery in his eyes. "You will never understand how it is to be seduced by the normal."

I nearly snorted. "You? Normal?"

"Yes, me. Normal."

"The last thing
you've
ever cared about is being
normal."