Untamed (Vampire Awakenings, Book 3) (24 page)

"They can't come in here, can they?" she
asked.

"No, but..."

"Then we're safe if we stay inside."

He looked as if he was going to protest
further but he closed his mouth. The sun was rising into the sky
when he pulled open the broken door and stepped into the dawning
day. Emma couldn't stop the tears from flowing freely as she
watched him walk away.

Ethan looked around for the vampires but they
had fled before the rays of the sun had touched on the earth. This
was not their time to roam free, she would be safe in the house
right now, but it still took everything he had to put one foot in
front of the other and walk away from her.

***

"What happened?" Isabelle demanded when he
walked through the front door. He pushed her hands aside when she
tried to wipe the dried blood away from his eye. "Are you ok?"

"Isabelle don't," he muttered.

"Ethan, what
happened
to you?"

She was worse than a gnat as she followed him
down the stairs. "Back off!" he snapped at her when she pulled at
his arm.

Stefan rose to his feet and took a step
toward them when Ethan jerked his arm away from Isabelle's grasp.
"Ethan..."

"Isabelle, come here," Stefan said in a low
tone that froze Isabelle in place.

Ethan moved past his sister and to the
fridge, he needed something to take the edge off of the rage
festering within his chest. The urge to tear something apart with
his bare hands and sink his fangs into it was growing rapidly
inside of him. He craved blood and death, but all he had right now
was the bags of blood in the fridge. He should have stayed to watch
over Emma but if he didn't feed soon he didn't think he would be
able to keep himself restrained for much longer.

Pulling a bag from the fridge, he didn't
bother to tear off the top as he sank his fangs into the bottom of
it. The blood filled his mouth but it did nothing to ease the
frustration boiling up inside of him. He tossed the empty bag aside
and stood for a few minutes with his hands fisted and his shoulders
heaving as he tried to keep his volatile emotions restrained. He'd
messed up, he'd messed up real bad and he had no idea how to fix
it.

There was always mind control. He could make
her forget and he could make her care for him again but he would
hate himself for eternity if he did, and one day he would have to
tell her about himself anyway. There was no way to escape the
truth. He'd also be putting her at risk if he took her memories
away. She had to know what Tristan was, had to know what Tristan's
limitations were, and how she could keep herself safe from him. He
should have told her more before he left, he would have to tell her
more in order to keep her safe, but he couldn't do it when she had
been looking at him as if he had just choked her kitten.

"Fuck!" he bellowed and drove his fist into
the fridge with enough force to dent the stainless steel door.
Isabelle jumped and Stefan stepped in front of her, Ethan would
never harm his sister, but with the way he was feeling right now he
thought he could tear this house down with his bare hands.

"Ethan, what happened?" Isabelle asked
again.

His shoulders heaved as he tried to steady
himself but it was impossible. "She knows."

Isabelle inhaled sharply. "I'm assuming she
didn't take it well."

Ethan shook his head and tugged at his hair
as he ran his fingers through it. Taking a steadying breath, he
told them everything that had transpired over the night. He drank
two more bags of blood while he spoke but he barely tasted them and
they did nothing to ease the growing pressure inside of him. The
only thing that would make him feel better was Emma and she wanted
nothing to do with him right now.

"Are you ok?" she asked when he was done.

"No." He'd meant to tell her yes, but she
knew as well as he did that he wasn't ok, that he may never be ok
again. She had gone through something like this with Stefan, maybe
not quite this bad but they had been separated and it had nearly
destroyed Isabelle. If the clawing sensation in his chest was any
indication, it may very well destroy him too.

"Does she know what she is to you? Does she
know she's your mate?"

"No," he told her flatly. He couldn't tear
his gaze away from the massive dent he'd left in the fridge as he
strained to retain his composure.

"You have to tell her."

"Isabelle..."

"No!" Isabelle grabbed hold of his arm and
pulled him toward her. "No, you
have
to tell her. She can't be allowed to shut you
out Ethan and if she knows the truth you can work through this
together. She
won't
shut you out if
you tell her the truth."

"What will we be working out? Her ex tried to
kill her last night, she's seen the most evil side of us, of
me
, and I'm going to what, condemn
her to this life? Destroy her?"

"You won't be destroying her, but if you
don't tell her she could destroy
you
! Ethan she has to know, please tell her."

"Isabelle," Stefan said. He took hold of her
arm and tried to pull her away from Ethan but she refused to
release him. "Isabelle, step away."

She finally released his arm but Stefan only
succeeded in moving her a few feet back. "Tell her, Ethan, please,"
she pleaded.

Ethan turned away from the tears brimming in
his sister's eyes. "I haven't had any of her blood and we've only
known each other for a couple of weeks. I'll take care of her ex,
I'll make sure that she's kept safe, but I can walk away from this
and I
will
walk away from her
after. She deserves that much."

"But you won't be able to," Isabelle
whispered. "No matter how strong you are, and no matter what you
think, you won't be able to walk away. We couldn't."

"You were both vampires..."

"Dad couldn't and neither could mom!" she
cried and took a step toward him. "She cares for you Ethan, I've
seen that. If you talk to her I think she'll understand, but you
have to give her a chance to make a choice."

"This is
my
choice," he growled.

"What about her friends?" Stefan inquired.
"What are we going to do about them?"

Ethan shook his head and stepped away from
the fridge, his teeth clenched as his eyes turned toward the
growing day. "I don't know."

Stefan nudged Isabelle behind him as he
stepped forward. "We can't leave them with this knowledge and not
know what they are going to do with it. We can strip their
memories, change them."

"I don't know if Emma will allow that," Ethan
said.

"She may not have a choice on this one. If
you insist upon taking this path of leaving her behind then you
have to realize that she cannot be left behind with the knowledge
that she has."

He knew that Stefan was right, but he
couldn't bring himself to do something that might upset her even
more. "They won't say anything, who would they even tell?"

"There are people out there that would
believe whatever they say and would prefer to see us dead. You may
not have come across any hunters, but they are out there and they
are lethal. This is as dangerous for all of them as it is for us,"
Stefan said.

"You're not going to touch her," Ethan
warned.

"I won't touch her but you have to think
about this reasonably Ethan, this is something that has to be taken
care of, for all of our goods. From what you've told us about this
group of vampires, we may require more help to take care of
them."

"Ian and Aiden will be here tomorrow,"
Isabelle reminded him.

"We may need even more help than them.
Neither of them has reached maturity yet. They're strong, but if
this group is feeding on humans then they're also strong, and there
may be even more of them than what Ethan saw tonight. We're going
to have to figure out how to take them down. The humans can't be
left alone though."

"Those vampires also have human help," Ethan
said.

Isabelle did a double take. "What makes you
think that?"

"Judging by the smell of those vamps, they're
not moving around in the daytime and yet things have been left
behind for Emma during the day. There's a human helping them, most
likely under their control, or they have a vampire with them that
hasn't killed as many people as the others have," Ethan explained.
"If it's a human then they can go in that house. I'm going to go
back, she probably still won't let me in but I can keep an eye on
the place and make sure she stays safe."

"You should go with him," Isabelle said to
Stefan.

"I'm not leaving you alone," Stefan told
her.

"I can take care of a human or another
vampire," she retorted. "You should go with him."

"I'll be just fine on my own," Ethan informed
her.

Isabelle's expression was resolute as she
folded her arms across her chest. "No, you're not going to be out
there all alone."

"They can't move about in the daytime
Isabelle."

"Then we're all going." He knew there was no
arguing with her when she spun on her heel and disappeared down the
hall.

"This could get ugly," Stefan muttered.

Ethan tore his attention away from where his
sister had vanished to meet Stefan's gaze. "It already has."

"I still don't know how to wrap my head
around any of this," Jill muttered as Emma put a cup of coffee
before her. "I mean, what the
hell
just happened?"

"I don't know," Emma said. "Nothing
good."

"I feel like we just walked into a bad sci-fi
movie or a hidden camera show. I keep waiting for someone to jump
out and shout, 'Gotcha!' at us," Mandy said as she sipped at her
coffee. "And Tristan, wow
Tristan
.
I bet this is why he just disappeared all of a sudden."

"I suppose dying would put a damper on his
stalking habits," Emma muttered.

"Do you think they're dead? Do you think
Tristan actually
died
?" Jill
asked.

"Isn't that how it's supposed to happen? Or
at least that's the way it's always worked in the books and movies,
right?"

"Yeah well who knew books and movies were
right about this. There was no way we ever could have expected this
to be true,
ever
. What are you
going to do Emma?"

"I don't know," she admitted as she sat on a
stool across from them. Her eyes drifted to the broken door that
was propped closed. "What
do
I
do?"

"I can't even begin to answer that question,
this is complete insanity," Mandy said. "I would say you should run
and catch the first flight off of this island, that we
all
should, but Ethan saved our
lives last night and the way he looks at you with so much caring,
you can't fake that look."

Emma sipped at her coffee as she continued to
study the ruined door. "You saw what happened between Tristan and I
in the end. Ethan lied to me; he started all of this knowing that
it was built on a lie. What kind of a relationship could we even
have? What would become of me, of him? His freaking eyes were
red
, Mandy."

"Yeah that's an image I won't be forgetting,
ever."

"You're going to need Ethan's help to get
through this Emma; we don't know how to handle Tristan, not like he
does. Believe me I understand you feel betrayed, more than a little
frightened by this whole thing, but he may be the only one that can
protect you right now. Protect all of us," Jill said.

"That's just it though," Emma said as she
placed her cup of coffee down. "I don't want anyone to protect me.
I was finally free of Tristan, I thought I was finally
free
, and yet I'm once again
trapped by circumstances completely beyond my control. I don't want
to rely on anyone, I want to have control over my life and not be
trapped again."

Mandy took hold of her hand and squeezed it
tenderly. "It's not fair, but you're not trapped. You have choices
here just let us know what you want to do and we'll stand beside
you. Would you like to leave?"

"And if Tristan follows?" she murmured.

"I don't know," Mandy said with a sigh. "I
don't know anything anymore. We'll have to get more answers from
Ethan, when you're ready, but for now we'll stay inside and we'll
try and get this straightened out the best that we can."

Emma lifted her cup again and blew on the
steaming coffee before taking another sip. "Yeah, I guess."

A shadow fell over the window, alerting her
to the presence of someone outside before a knock sounded on the
door. "Hopefully that's the guy that's going to fix the door," Jill
said as she rose to her feet.

Mandy and Emma moved with her, but when Emma
spotted Ethan and Stefan on the other side of the door, she took a
step back. Jill cast her an apologetic look before lifting the door
a little and pushing it out of the way. Ethan's eyes found her
instantly, her traitorous heart did a strange little flip-flop that
almost made her melt but she straightened her shoulders and met his
gaze head-on.

"How are you doing?" he asked.

"Fine," she lied.

He glanced at Stefan and then behind him to
Isabelle. "I wanted to let you know that we'll be outside if you
need us for anything."

She opened her mouth to tell him to come
inside, to hold her, and make the horrible events of the night
better but her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. "You could
come to our place, stay with us. It would be safer there,
especially with our younger brothers coming," Isabelle offered
eagerly.

Emma's gaze traveled over them. "You're all
like them, like him?" she asked though she already knew the
answer.