What Lies Inside (A Blood Bound Novel, Book 1) (18 page)

Unsurprisingly, Marika was dressed in a skin-tight, lime-colored boob tube sporting what looked like traces dog hair from the animal shelter. The shortest denim skirt I had ever seen covered her round butt. Knee-high, black-leather lace-up boots topped it all off. Any trace of chlorine lingering on Dorian from his morning swim practice was overwhelmed by the dousing of vanilla perfume coating Marika’s entire body. Any jealousy I’d had because of her confident dressing had dissolved since her recognition of Ty at Troy’s party. Now all I felt was unrelenting irritation at her and Dorian’s flaunted physical interactions.

As I took my seat between Kendrick and Vanessa, I tucked my iPod into my jeans. I’d just been listening to a new band Kendrick had suggested,
Kutless
. Dorian turned to whisper something into Marika’s ear.

“You are so bad,” Marika giggled. “But
I
have an even naughtier idea.” She stroked his chest suggestively. Then at a level that all enhanced beings such as Kendrick and I could detect, she whispered the vomit-inducing details into his ear. They began making out in plain sight, hands groping and the sound of wet lips smacking.

With a groan, I pushed my lunch tray away, and forced back the sensation to gag. “
Great
, they’ve kicked it up a notch,” I moaned. Kendrick chuckled beside me, unaffected by the scene before us. My elbow shot out, collecting his ribs. “It’s not funny.”

“It’s disgusting,” Vanessa spat from my other side. She crossed her arms over her chest. For once it seemed we were in agreement on something. Though I knew it wouldn’t last.

Dorian and Marika finally ceased kissing, needing to come up for air. Thank God.

“I can’t wait for the charity auction,” Marika announced, shifting her warm-brown eyes onto me.

Dorian invited her!
I glared at Marika as irritation scratched under my skin. “Oh, I didn’t know
you
were coming.” Dorian had grown accustomed to my not-so-latent dislike of Marika. He’d even stopped telling me off when I was being insolent.

Marika raised her lip in a half-snarl. “Your
brother
invited me, and I just couldn’t say no.”

“Hey since we’re all
friends
,” Dorian piped up, forcing my angry glare from Marika. “I reckon we could talk Mom into letting everyone sleep over after the auction.”

“Are you insane?” I spat. Spend more time watching his sexcapades? I twitched in my seat suddenly feeling as though I were sitting on a sharp bed of spikes. “I don’t think…”

“Oooo, sleep over,” Marika cut in. “I’m in. My ’rents let me do
whatever
I want.”

I jumped up, kicking back my chair harder than I had meant to. It skidded across the blue-checkered tiles, thudding against the glass wall behind me. The abrupt movement caused Vanessa to jump in her seat. Now a sea of widened eyes from surrounding students was bearing down on me. Too irritated to care, I ignored them. “Dorian, a word…”

Feeling my gums tingle, I stormed from our table and through the glass doors outside. The courtyard was a quaint clearing of paved squares and aluminum picnic benches. It was surrounded on three sides by a splash of green from bordering fernery. I stomped up onto the bench seat, dropping with an intentional
thud
onto the table top.

“Don’t do this,” I hissed through extended fangs. In this moment I was so pissed that I couldn’t control my predatory reactions. “Don’t force me to endure this shit. I
won’t
be responsible for my actions when she pushes me past breaking.”

Dorian scooted beside me with a sigh. “Why do you hate her so much?”

His lack of defensiveness to my insults and hostility caught me off guard. Trying to remember how irate I was, I tensed my fingers, nails scraping indents along the aluminum with a hair-raising screech. “I just have a terrible feeling about her. She’s not
good
for you.”

Dorian reclined on his arms, cocking his head to face me. “And if I warned you against Ty, would
you
listen?”

My jaw dropped, fangs retracting. For a split second I thought of Ty. The only thing that had joined us all week since the party was that one short phone call. I’d tried to call him since, but he hadn’t answered. Just as fast, my thoughts shifted to the party. Dorian had barely reacted to finding out what Ty and Troy were. “But you accepted him. You never said…”

“Of course I didn’t.” Dorian straightened to rest a palm across my knee. “You are your own person, Amelia. I may not agree with your choices, but they are yours to make.” When I remained frozen and silent, guilt tugging at my heart, he continued. “Look, I don’t expect you to like her. Just give me the same respect I show you. Allow me to make my own choices in life,
without ridicule
.”

I’m a hypocrite. I drew in a long breath then blew it back out through tightened lips. I couldn’t expect Dorian to fold to my opinions. And I couldn’t protect his heart from being broken any more than I could my own. “Fine, but could you at least tone it down on the PDAs?”

“For you?” Dorian’s smile was full of mischief. “I’ll try.”

I pulled up from the bench and we walked back inside.

“All good,” Dorian stated, resuming his spot beside Marika. “We’ll clear it with the ’rents tonight.”

Kendrick’s questioning gaze narrowed at me. With a shrug of defeat, I retrieved my toppled chair and slumped into it. I may have lost this round, but I’d argue like hell when we got home.

~

“You found it!” Mom was exclaiming into the phone as Dorian and I passed through the frosted-glass door to her office.

She sat behind a flurry of what would have been mess on anyone else’s desk, but not hers. The glass-top was neatly stacked with catalogs and post-it tabbed order forms. There were so many piles of swatches we could have been in a showroom. Her golden hair hung wavy around her shoulders, released from its usual French knot. There was a maroon blazer draped over the back of her white-leather chair. Being daylight outside, thick blackout drapes—an inoffensive shade of cream—covered the tall, arched window. The only light in the room was the yellow glow from a bright desk lamp.

“Wonderful. I will come by personally to pick it up.” Mom held up a hand, motioning for us to wait. “Yes, one hour. I will see you then.”

“That sounded important,” I mused as she hung up the phone.

Mom waved off my curiosity with a dismissive hand. “Oh, just another item for the auction,” she said, before eying us with speculation. “So what can I do for you both?”

Dorian dropped into the seat across from Mom and clasped his hands in front of him. “We’d like to have our friends stay over after the auction. In return we’ll offer free labor on Sunday to help tidy up.”

“Ahem,” I cleared my throat intentionally.

“Okay. Okay,” Dorian said, eyes flashing over his shoulder to me. “
I’ll
offer free labor.”

Mom reached across the desk to pick up a gold-framed photo. “You’ve both grown up so quickly,” she said gazing distantly at our family portrait.

It was an old photograph, faded by time. Mom was lounging back on her armchair and cradling two infants. She was smiling, her face a proud motherly beam. Her blond locks were short, a halo around her head that mirrored mine. Dorian’s almost-black mop was a stark contrast.

Mom’s focus returned and she looked up pointedly. “Okay, but this is how it’s going to work. You will all sleep in the rec room, door open. And don’t think I won’t be listening. No funny business.”

My jaw dropped for the second time today. “You can’t be serious. Sleeping in the same room as…
humans?”
I faltered over the word, knowing that if Ty stayed here there wouldn’t be
just
humans.

Mom replaced the photo frame beside the lamp. Then she crossed her arms over her chest, wrinkling her white, silk blouse. I groaned. I knew that move all too well. Her mind was already made up. “Having friends over is part of having a normal life. I know you want that, Amelia. Besides, if anything goes astray, I’ll be here to…” She froze, lips snapping shut.

“Be here to what?” I questioned. Then realized what she had been about to say. Utter surprise contorted my expression and painted my words black. “Clean up our mess?”

Mom averted her eyes and began flicking through swatches. “No. Of course not. I shouldn’t have said that. I have complete faith in both of you.” Her eyes rose to look from me to Dorian. “I wouldn’t allow this otherwise. And I know I don’t need to worry about you,” she said glancing behind us.

My head twisted. Kendrick was loitering in the doorway, casually leaning against the frame. With his sneaky vampire stealth, I hadn’t even heard him.

“Of course, Ms. Lamont.” He tipped his head formally, seeming so much older and wiser than seventeen. “I’ll keep an eye on everything, too.”

My eyes formed an incredulous glare.
Traitor!
But Kendrick ignored the piercing gaze.

“That would be much appreciated, Kendrick.” Mom smiled and clapped her hands together. “Now, I have much to finalize for the auction before heading to the Council tonight.”

“Hint taken.” Dorian shot to his feet and bounded around the desk to hug Mom. “Thanks, Mom.” He looked at me with an expression that said, “Let’s go before she changes her mind.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me from the office with Kendrick tailing behind.

~

When we arrived at school the next morning, the parking lot was a haze of frosty air. Graying clouds littered everything in sight with a mist of fine rain. Dorian skipped across the car park, having caught sight of Marika emerging from her red Jeep. He took her into his arms, planting a wet kiss against her pouty lips.

I groaned. “
Great,
another day of this…”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Kendrick voiced beside me. In the rain his golden-brown hair was darkening to a rich caramel. “Let’s skip.”

Skipping school wasn’t something I usually did. But the alternative was another lunch watching Dorian and Marika practically doing it. “What’d you have in mind?”

“I’m sick of dead blood.” Around the parking lot students were scurrying to get out of the rain. Kendrick watched them as though they were herding cattle. “But your mom was quite clear on the conditions pertaining to my visit. No human victims.”

My stomach dropped, churning with predatory instinct and seething disgust all at the same time. “You feed on humans? You kill them?”

At the cabin
he
had been the one to introduce us to packaged ‘dead blood’, as he had called it. Back then I’d never questioned it. As far as I knew, Kendrick only drank packaged blood and the fresh blood of wild animals.

Kendrick draped an arm around my stiffened shoulders. “No, not kill them, just…
feed
. We erase their memories with compulsion. They have no recollection.”

A flash of memory scorched across my brain, of Kendrick raking tense fingers down Joel’s chest in the alley.

“You were attacked by a rabid dog,”
Kendrick had said. “
We saved your life.”

Kendrick had altered Joel’s memory in that moment by compelling him, which I sucked at. No amount of practice had help at the cabin. Apparently both being a turned vamp and Caius’s ancient remedy to prolong our vampire traits had affected more than my need for blood and vampire agility. So far there hadn’t been a single success, bar my unplanned compulsion on the bouncer outside
Pulse
.

I wanted to question him for probably the hundredth time on my lack of ability. But my mind was elsewhere. The memory of what I’d done to Joel, and my uncontrollable lust for Ty’s blood stole my thoughts. “But, how can you stop? How can you make yourself pull back
before
it’s too late?”

“With practice,” Kendrick said simply, as though that explained everything. When I frowned, his arm dropped from my shoulder. He pointed past the school’s square, brick buildings and cropped fields. “Come on. I’ll show you,” he said, tilting his head to flash his fangs, “on something less appetizing than humans.”

We walked from the parking lot with purpose. “Got your music?” Kendrick asked.

I pulled my iPod from my jeans and smiled. “Never leave home without it. What are you in the mood for?”

“Red’s great for snowboarding, running too.”

Now out of sight, I put my iPod on speaker to play
End of Silence.
We took off, sprinting. At blurred vampire speed we were faster than the moving cars around us. Even faster than a red Ducati, I thought, which didn’t make me want one any less. I tried to spark conversation over the music as we ran. “How’s your mom? What’s my uncle been so busy with?” After that I moved on to questions about the Armaya and its workings. Kendrick didn’t seem open to discussing any of it, tersely answering my questions with vague indifference.

Within thirty minutes, and after barely raising a sweat, the cars and houses of the residential community thinned. Winding roads that rose through a thicket of autumn-browning trees replaced them.

“Well, who do you hang out with, then?” I asked as the song
‘Wasting time’
ironically came on.

The asphalt under our pounding feet gave way to loose gravel, then to a hardened dirt path.

“My friend Marcus,” Kendrick replied to my surprise. “He’s pretty cool, easy going, and all. You’d probably like him.”

When the path disappeared we pulled to a stop. I shut off my iPod. All that surrounded us was a tall barricade of trees. Their auburn, gold, and brown leaves littered the damp forest floor.

The lack of heaving in my chest surprised me. “Where are we?”

“Mount Major,” Kendrick answered. “The reserve’s packed with game.”

“So what…”

“Shh…” Kendrick silenced me, raising a finger to my lips. “Listen.”

I tuned into the sounds of the forest. Leaves rustled in the faint breeze and small creatures scurried unseen within the dense scrub. There was a distant sound of a gushing stream, and something else. The soft beat of cloven hooves against marshy ground.

Kendrick laced his fingers through mine, pulling me forward to dart through the trees. My Vans skidded on decomposing leaves. Still, even with Kendrick running full-pelt, I somehow managed to keep up. How could I be as fast as him?