“It’s James,” she admits thickly. “He’s been claiming me every night, and it hurts so bad every single time. Sometimes he forgets to clean up after, and then I have to walk around like a leaky faucet until someone else takes pity on me and closes me up. I can’t…” She shakes her head fiercely. “I cannot live with the idea of being bonded to that. Of wanting it in spite of myself. Of seeking out his rough handling.”
She sniffles, her voice growing angrier and more panicked with every syllable. “And what then? Vampires don’t touch each other’s bonded tributes, it’s against the bro code or something. Once I’m bonded, that’s it. If he leaves me open, he leaves me open, period. No one else will even be able to help me then, and I’ll bleed out unless he decides to save me.”
A hanger snaps in my fist as my jaw clenches so tight my teeth ache.
Motherfucker. I want to kill him. I could go find him right now. It wouldn’t be hard. Even the other vampires keep an eye on where he is in order to avoid him—that’s how big of a fucking dick he is. Would any of them even care if I shoved a chair leg through his shriveled little heart? No, no they wouldn’t. The only thing stopping me is that if I kill one of them, they’ll be forced to take me out for the safety of the nest.
But it’d almost be worth it anyway. He’s the embodiment of the terror I was expecting when they brought me down here, not to mention the pain. Jessica doesn’t deserve that. Nobody does—except maybe Winona—but especially not Jessica. She’s here on an angel’s errand, dammit.
“It’s so fucked up,” I growl at the closet. “This whole setup is fucked. They all need to—”
Fuck.
I bite my tongue in the nick of time. Even Jessica doesn’t know who I really am or why I’m really here, and I need to keep it that way.
“Need to what?” she asks, her voice muffled by her hands.
I grind my teeth. Nothing fits better than “die,” but I can’t utter those words, even to my best friend in this place. I take a deep breath, groping around for something to say.
“Remember,” I finish blandly. “They need to remember what it’s like to be human.”
Some of them do. Connor does. Bastian seems to, which surprised the hell out of me, especially given how old he told me he is. Rome feels human—superhuman, even.
Thinking about the three of them acts like fire retardant on my fury, which is frustrating. I can see my mission so clearly when I think about James, but as soon as one of those three pop into my head, everything seems a lot muddier. I can tell myself it’s lust or magic or hypnotism or whatever, but the truth is that they just don’t feel like thugs or villains. They don’t seem very closely related to the vampires I’ve killed in the street.
“Wouldn’t that be nice.” Jessica snorts. “But somehow I don’t think James was a good person when he was human either. He seems more like the type to spend his mama’s tax return on drugs and steal video games from ten-year-olds while beating up on his pregnant teenage girlfriend.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Specific,” I say mildly.
She shrugs, looking sheepish. “He reminds me of my cousin’s ex-boyfriend. Like, a lot.”
“Gross.”
“Right?” She shakes her head and sighs. “You think if I pretend I’m sick, I won’t have to go to dinner?”
I shake my head. “I think if you pretend you’re sick, they’ll get a doctor in here and make sure you aren’t infecting the rest of the herd.”
She makes a face. “You’re probably right. Ugh.” She shudders and goes quiet for a while, chewing on her lip. Then she glances at me again, her large eyes sad. “Did you ever think you would end up like this? Corralled like a cow, competing to see who’s going to be sticking their fork in your flank for the rest of your life?”
I shake my head. “Never crossed my mind until it happened.”
“You know the worst part?” she asks, her voice very quiet.
“What?”
Tears fill her eyes. She looks—ashamed? That can’t be right. She has nothing to be ashamed of.
Jessica swallows hard and moistens her lips. “It’s already starting,” she murmurs. “The more he feeds on me, the less I hate it. It hurts like a bitch every single time, but at least I know it’s going to be over soon. When he takes a while to get to me, I find myself looking for him. I don’t want that. I never wanted to be that girl.”
Fat tears roll down her cheeks, and my chest constricts. I cross over to the bed, sitting down and wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
“Hey, it’s not you,” I tell her earnestly. “It’s something about the bite. I don’t know why James’s bites don’t come with that endorphin rush—I think it’s because he attacks rather than kisses—but still, there’s some kind of magic that goes into it. They want you to get attached, Jess. It’s not your fault that a magic older than civilization works on you. It’s just evolution.”
I don’t know if any of that is true, honestly. It could just be Stockholm Syndrome for all I know. If it is, I’ve got it too.
“It’s affecting me too,” I say to her. “I can’t get through the salad course without looking for Connor or Rome or Bastian.”
She snorts and pulls away from me, giving me a look. “If you were anybody else, I’d accuse you of humble bragging.”
I grin. “Hell, if you were anybody else, you’d be accusing me of humble bragging. If I was looking for other friends here, I’d be shit outta luck.”
She laughs, but the sound trails into a sympathetic noise, because it’s true. My getting consistent attention from those three has not
