"Emma, I'm sorry,” he said. “It wasn't supposed to be like this. This isn't how you were supposed to find out."
"And how was I supposed to find out?" she croaked.
"I don't know how I was going to tell you," he admitted. "I'm not sure how anyone can be told this sort of thing reasonably."
"But you were going to tell me?"
He clasped her cheeks and tilted her head, so she had to look up at him. "Yes."
"Why?"
"Because I care for you."
Some of her disbelief started to wear off. She jerked her face from his hands as a hot poker of anger pierced her. "Lies are not the way to show someone you care for them."
He recoiled before reaching for her again, but she slid off the stool and took a step away from him. She simply couldn't deal with him right now; she just couldn't, not on top of everything else. Her ex had just tried to kill her and her friends, her ex who was also a vampire.
She shook her head, was she some freak magnet? First Tristan and now Ethan. Or perhaps she was a magnet for the undead if they were even undead.
Ethan's shoulders slumped; his eyes followed her as she walked over to join her friends. Jill and Mandy stared at him as if he were a shark who had climbed out of the water and walked onto the shore. They huddled closer to Emma as she stood with them. He hated the look of betrayal and apprehension shadowing Emma's eyes. Earlier she had looked at him with such trust and love; now she stared at him as if he were a monster.
And if he were honest with himself, he would admit that's exactly what he was. He survived on blood, thoughts of murder consumed him, and he had caused her to look at him like that.
"What are you going to do with us?" Emma asked.
The question was like a knife through the heart, but he kept his face impassive as he watched her. "Do with you?" he inquired.
"I assume this was something we weren't supposed to know. It's not as if it's public knowledge vampires exist," Emma said with more strength than she felt.
Jill grabbed her arm, and Mandy bent to pick up a small vase on the coffee table. Emma didn't know what they were going to do if he came after them, she didn't know how they were going to defend themselves against him. She'd seen some of his brutality outside, and she had a feeling she'd only caught a glimpse of what he could do.
"I would never hurt you, Emma. Never." Though his words were meant to be comforting, she found they weren't. He hadn't mentioned Mandy and Jill either, something not lost on Jill.
"What about us?" Jill demanded.
Emma stepped forward as Ethan's gaze ran over Jill and Mandy. She would fight him to the death before she ever let him harm her friends.
"I have to call my sister," he said.
"That's not an answer," Emma grated through her clenched teeth.
"No one is going to be hurt, not by my family or me. I will keep you all safe." Though he said the words, she didn't trust him, and she sensed something more beneath his calm exterior. Of course, there was something more beneath his exterior; there was a whole world of secrets and lies she'd never dreamed of discovering.
"I think you should leave," she said around the lump in her throat. She didn't know if she felt like crying or screaming more, but she did know she needed some time away from him to comprehend everything that had happened.
"You can't be alone, Emma, they're out there—"
"And you're in here," she whispered. "I can't...not right now. I just can't."
"Emma," he stepped toward her, but she held up her hand and shook her head.
"Please Ethan, I can't right now. You have to go."
The look on his face was nearly her undoing. He had lied to her and kept secrets, but she had just ripped out his heart. It wasn't something she wanted to do, she took no pleasure in it, but she had to get away from him right now. Tears slipped down her cheeks as he bowed his head and glanced at the broken door.
"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 as she watched him walk away.
Ethan looked around for the vampires, but they had fled before the rays of the sun 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 okay?"
"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 on his arm.
Stefan rose and stepped 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 the rage festering within his chest. The urge to tear something apart with his bare hands and sink his fangs into it grew rapidly inside him. He craved
