Storm (Blood Haze: Book Two) A Paranormal Romance (4 page)

didn’t… well, I wish…”

“I know, Kai. You don’t have to say it.”

He leaned over and wrapped his arms around

me, and I put my head on his shoulder. I felt his

jaw clench against my head, and I knew he was

upset. He must have been trying not to cry.

“I love you,” he said quietly, his voice

threatening to break.

“Oh, Kai,” I breathed. “I love you, too. I hope

you know that.”

“I do.”

“Please don’t ever forget.”

He pulled the blankets back and got into bed

beside me. Wrapping his arms around me, he fell

asleep. It felt so good to lie there with him that I

actually went back to sleep, too.

I woke up around noon, and Kai was gone. I

felt a twinge of loneliness again, and I went

downstairs. Kai was in the kitchen, and his back

was facing me. I couldn’t tell what he was doing.

He turned around and smiled when he heard me

shuffling across the floor.

“I was making you something to eat,” he said,

beaming proudly.

“Oh, my gosh, thank you,” I said, suppressing

a yawn. “I’m starving.”

He turned around with a tray in his hands. He

had a bud vase holding a single rose on the tray,

along with a can of Diet Coke, a glass of ice, and

a roast beef sandwich with carrot sticks and

ranch dressing – my favorite lunch.

“I was going to serve you in bed,” he

mentioned, placing the tray in front of me on the

bar.

I hopped up on a stool. “Are you going to join

me?”

“I’m not hungry,” he said. “But I will sit with

you while you eat.”

It was hard to choke down the food. It was my

favorite, but all of the emotions I’d felt the past

few days were still raw. Max was gone, and Kai

was too good for me. I felt like the world’s most

evil person. I’d betrayed Kai yesterday, and I was

sure he knew the extent, yet he was going to

serve me lunch in bed. I was truly, truly evil.

“Let’s do something together,” I suggested.

“Anything you want,” Kai agreed.

“Maybe we could go out to dinner tonight,” I

suggested.

“We could do that.”

“A movie maybe?”

“Sure.”

“Could we go to Tybee tonight?” I asked

quietly, nibbling a carrot.

Kai was quiet. I peeked at him, and he was

staring at me with a slight smile on his face.

“You really want to go to Tybee?”

“I think it would be good for us to be there

together again.”

“I agree,” he said.

“So let’s have dinner and a movie tonight,” I

said. “And after we’ll go to Tybee.”

“Sounds good,” he said, planting a kiss on my

forehead.

I’d been afraid he wouldn’t want to go to

Tybee – like maybe our relationship was so

damaged he wouldn’t want to go there with me

anymore, because it would taint the place. But

instead, my asking to go seemed to give him

hope that things would be okay. I guess he

thought I must really still love him if I wanted to

go there with him.

It was settled.

*****

Chapter Four – Renewal

Kai chose the movie and I chose the dinner

location. We watched an action movie, which I

was happy about. I wasn’t one for watching

sappy chick flicks, anyway. I preferred science

fiction and action movies.

For dinner, I chose Italian food. That would

have been an ironic choice if people had known

we

were

vampires,

given

the

popular

misconception that vampires are somehow afraid

of garlic. The irony had Kai and me snickering

through the whole meal.

We got to Tybee around ten o’clock that

night. It was a chilly February evening, and the

beach was completely deserted. Kai spread out a

blanket, and the two of us relaxed together. It

was an especially breezy night, and I could taste

the briny seawater in the air. I leaned against him

and sighed happily. He put his arm around me

and squeezed. I wasn’t alone, anymore.

I couldn’t believe I’d never been to the beach

before I met Kai. It was such an incredible place

at night. I could never get over the way the

moonlight sparkled like millions of glittering

diamonds across the water. I could have looked

at it forever.

When it was nearly midnight, Kai and I heard

a commotion further down the beach. It sounded

like a woman crying and a man shouting. We

went to investigate, and we discovered a couple

arguing. As we neared them, we could see the

woman had a black eye and was crying while the

man was shaking her violently.

“We should do something,” I commented.

“What can we do without calling attention to

ourselves?” Kai asked.

I looked around. There was no one else

nearby. It was just the arguing couple and us.

“I haven’t fed in several days,” I said slyly.

He grinned at me wickedly. “How can we get

the woman somewhere safe?”

“Leave it to me,” I winked.

With that, I sauntered over to the couple.

“Is there a problem?” I asked sweetly.

“None of your concern, little lady,” the guy

bellowed.

I was blasted with the stench of alcohol and

cigarettes

emanating

from

him.

It

was

nauseating.

I looked directly at the woman. She looked

terrified. “Are you okay?”

“I… I’m fine,” she stammered anxiously.

“You don’t look fine,” I commented,

scrutinizing her injuries.

“I said it’s none of your damned concern!” the

man shouted.

“Please don’t talk to my girlfriend that way,”

Kai said suddenly from behind the man. “It

makes me very angry.”

“What are you going to do about it, punk?”

the guy spat at him.

“Honey, can you take this lovely lady

somewhere safe while I deal with this… man?”

Kai asked me.

I put my arm around the woman and gently

said, “Let’s go.”

She looked at Kai and the man glaring each

other and I could tell she was afraid of what the

guy might do to Kai. I knew there was nothing to

worry about in that department. This human

male, tall and bulky though he was, would never

stand a chance against Kai.

I led the woman away from the beach, and I

asked her where she was staying. “We’re staying

at the Sea Breeze,” she told me.

I took her safely back to her hotel room, and I

gave her my cell phone number and told her to

call me if he tried to hurt her again. She insisted

she would be fine, though I wasn’t so sure.

I met Kai on the beach, and he already had the

guy paralyzed with his venom. “I saved him for

you,” he said with a grin.

“Thanks,” I winked, sinking my fangs into the

flesh of his neck.

I was thinking it was a shame he couldn’t feel

this and wouldn’t remember it the next day. I had

no patience for abusive people, especially after

seeing the way Kai had been treated.

Suddenly, I heard a deep gasp behind us.

“You!” a man’s voice shouted.

I turned to face the voice, and there stood a

very tall, muscular guy who appeared to be in his

twenties. He had intense green eyes that seemed

to reflect the moonlight, and spiky black hair.

For some reason unknown to me at that time, I

shivered.

Kai’s instinct to protect me kicked in. He

moved toward the man, intending to bite him so

his venom would erase all memory of me.

However, as he neared the man, he jumped back

in shock. The man was holding the sharp silver

blade of a hunter. It glinted menacingly in the

moonlight.

“Run!” I hissed, but Kai would not budge. He

stood between the guy and me, holding his arms

out in an attempt to shield me.

“Go!” he hissed.

I realized the hunter had only seen
me
bite the

human, so I sprang into action.

“Get out of here! This is too dangerous for a

human!” I yelled at Kai. “You don’t know what

you’re getting into!”

“You’re human?” the guy quizzed Kai, eyeing

him suspiciously.

“Go!” I shouted again.

Kai hesitated, and I whispered as quietly as I

could, “Please.”

With that, Kai took off running, careful to

keep his speed slow and even like a human.

“I have no beef with you,” I told the hunter.

“But I have a beef with you, blood sucker,” he

snarled. “You killed a whole family right before

Christmas, and now you were going to kill this

guy, too. It’s taken me months to find you, but

now you’re
dead
!”

“I didn’t kill that family,” I explained. “I
never

kill.”

“A vampire that doesn’t kill?” he growled.

“Impossible.”

“It’s true,” I tried to convince him. “Please, I

don’t want to hurt you.”

“
You

hurt
me
?” he laughed. “Don’t be

ridiculous!”

“I’m
not
the one who killed those people!” I

insisted.

“Oh, yeah?” he leered. “Then who did?”

“I… I don’t know who did it,” I lied. “But I

saw the family. I was there that night.”

“Oh, so you admit being in the vicinity the

night of the murders,” he challenged me.

“I do,” I said. “I was there. But I would
never

kill a human, and I would certainly never hurt a

woman or child.”

“Too bad I don’t believe you,” he said, glaring

at me.

He made a lunge toward me with his dagger,

but I stepped to the side. In a split second, I

jumped behind him and wrapped my arms around

his neck. He slashed at me with his dagger as I

held him tightly in a headlock. I screamed in pain

as the silver blade tore through my arm, but I

held fast. He struggled to pull my arms away,

clawing and slashing, but still I held on. In a few

moments, he slumped to the ground.

As he lay there helpless in the sand, I touched

my fingers to his neck. He still had a pulse. I ran

back to Kai’s car, where he was waiting for me.

“Thank God you’re okay!” he whispered,

embracing me tightly.

“We need to find a pay phone,” I said.

Kai nodded, and we hopped into his car. He

drove me down the street to a gas station parking

lot, and from the pay phone, I called 911. I told

the dispatcher I’d seen two men fighting on the

beach near the pier, and that one appeared to have

a knife of some sort. Then I hung up.

“That takes care of that,” I said. “Let’s get

home and warn Will and Mother.”

On the way home, I tried several times to call

Will, but he wouldn’t answer his cell phone or

the house line. Kai raced through the streets,

trying to get us home as quickly as possible. The

police would detain the hunter for a while, but it

would probably buy us twenty-four hours at the

most.

At home, I raced up the stairs and flew into

Will’s room. He was fast asleep, and he shot up

like a bullet when I burst into the room.

“What’s going on?” he gasped.

“Hunter!” I hissed, tossing him the clothes

he’d left hanging over a chair.

I knocked once on my mother’s door, and then

quickly burst in to shout, “Hunter!”

My mother was instantly on her feet throwing

clothing into a suitcase. She needed no further

prompting.

Kai had already started packing a bag for me,

and I told him to go pack a bag for himself while

I finished mine.

“The painting,” I gasped, and Kai nodded. He

knew exactly which painting I wanted to take

with us.

My mind was reeling. We had to get a head

start on this hunter. We had no idea what type he

might be. If he was a Zephyr, he would be able to

run faster than the wind, but he wouldn’t be able

to track us. He’d have the advantage in speed, but

little else.

I didn’t think he was a Psych. They could use

various psychic abilities to move objects, read

minds, and even force their victims to a

standstill. He hadn’t used anything like that on

me, so I assumed he wasn’t.

He might be a Viewer. They were the most

dangerous of all hunters. Viewers could see

through their target’s eyes, watching every detail

of everything they did at any moment. They only

needed to meet their target once, and they could

track them anywhere in the world by looking for

landmarks their targets saw. You could never run

away from them, because they could find you

anywhere.

Will peeked into my room and said, “Jamie’s

on her way.”

“What?” I shouted. “Why would you get her

involved again? Are you crazy?”

“She made me promise I’d call her if we ever

needed her again,” he explained calmly. “We

don’t know anything about this hunter, so we

need her.”

“I don’t like this,” I growled.

Unfortunately, he was right. If the hunter was

a Viewer, there would be nowhere we could run.