God, it’s exhausting being me.
When Aphrodite was done bandaging me, Erik asked Jack to bring him a pillow from the bed, and then he put me carefully back down with my head and shoulders resting on its softness.
“You guys had better get ready to leave,” Erik said to the Twins, Damien, and Aphrodite. “I’ll bet Darius will want to get Zoey back to the House of Night right away.”
“That means we have to get our purses from Kramisha’s room,” Shaunee said.
“Like I would forget my new winter season Ed Hardy purse, Twin?” Erin said.
“Of course not, Twin. I’m just sayin’…” Their voices faded as they hurried from the room.
“I want to go with you,” Jack said, looking close to tears.
“I want you to come, too,” Darius said. “But it’s too dangerous. You have to stay here with Erik and Stevie Rae until we know exactly what we’re up against.”
“My mind understands that, but my heart says something else,” Jack said, leaning his head against Damien’s shoulder. “It’s just…just…” Jack took a deep breath and finished on a sob, “It’s just poop that I can’t go!”
“We’re going to step down the tunnel a ways,” Damien said, putting his arm around Jack. “Just have Darius yell when he’s ready.” Then Damien led a stricken Jack out of the room, with Duchess trailing sadly along behind.
“I’m going to go find my cat,” Aphrodite said. “I’ll see if I can find your little orange creature, too.”
“Don’t you think we should leave the cats here?” I asked.
Aphrodite raised a blond brow at me. “Since when could cats be told what to do?”
I sighed. “You’re right. They’d just follow us back and then complain at us for years about leaving them behind.”
“Tell Darius I’ll be right back.” Aphrodite ducked out through the blanket.
That left Erik and me alone.
Without looking at me he started to move toward the doorway saying, “I’m going to—”
“Erik, don’t go. Can’t we talk for just a second?”
He stopped, his back still to me. His head was bowed and his shoulders were slumped. He looked utterly defeated.
“Erik, please…”
He spun around and I saw there were tears pooling in his eyes. “I’m so damn pissed I don’t know what the hell to do! And what’s worse is that this,” he paused, gesturing to the huge Ace bandage hiding the wound that sliced across my chest, “is really my fault.”
“Your fault?”
“If I hadn’t been such a possessive asshole in the basement, you wouldn’t have gone outside with Heath. You were sending him away, but I had to push things and piss you off, so you went out there with him.” He ran his hand through his thick dark hair. “It’s just that Heath makes me so damn jealous! He’s known you since you two were kids. I just—” He hesitated and his jaw clenched and unclenched. “I just didn’t want to lose you again, so I acted like a jerk, and not only did you almost die, but I lost you again!”
I blinked at him. So he hadn’t been acting like stone man because he didn’t care or because he was mad at me. He’d been hiding his emotions because he thought all of this was his fault. Jeesh—I hadn’t had a clue.
I held out my hand to him. “Erik, come here.” Slowly he came over to me and took my hand.
“I acted like a jerk,” he said.
“Yeah, you did. But I should have shown some sense and not gone outside with Heath.”
Erik looked at me for a long time before he spoke. “It was hard to see you with him. To see you drink from him.”
“I wish there could have been some other way,” I said. I did wish it, and not just because it had been uncomfortable for Erik to watch. I loved Heath, but I’d made the decision not to be with him again, not to ever Imprint with him again. I knew the best thing for both of us, especially for Heath, was to be out of each other’s lives, and that’s what I’d planned. Sadly, my life rarely goes according to my plans. I sighed and tried to put some of what I was feeling into words. “I can’t help loving Heath. He’s been part of my life for a long time, and now that we’re Imprinted again, he literally carries part of me with him, even though I didn’t mean for it to happen.”
“I don’t know how much of your human boyfriend I can stand,” Erik said.
I kept meeting Erik’s steady gaze and almost blurted
“Consort,” Erik said bitterly. “It’s called being the High Priestess’s human consort. Many of them have one. Often they have more than one.”
I blinked in surprise. I sure hadn’t gotten to that part in my Vamp Sociology class. I mean, was this consort stuff even covered in the
“Mate,” he said quietly. “If he’s a human who has Imprinted with a High Priestess, he’s called her consort. If he’s a vampyre, he’s given the title of the High Priestess’s mate. And no. It doesn’t mean she can’t have both.”
That seemed like good news to me. Clearly it wasn’t such good news to Erik, but at least I was beginning to believe other priestesses had gone through this kind of boyfriend stress before. Maybe I could read up on it or tactfully question Darius when the end-of-the-world stuff was resolved. For the time being I decided to put a Band-Aid on the issue and clean up the consequences later. If there was a later. “Okay, Erik. I don’t know what I’m going to do about Heath. It’s all a little too much for me to deal with right now on top of everything else. Hell, I don’t know what I’m going to do about you, either.”
“We’re together,” Erik said softly. “And I want us to stay together.”
I opened my mouth to tell him I really wasn’t totally sure that was the best idea, but Erik bent and kissed me gently on the lips, silencing my comment. Then someone cleared his throat and we looked at the entryway to see Heath standing there, looking pale and pissed.
“Heath! What are you doing here?” I hated how shrill and guilty I sounded as I frantically wondered how much he’d overheard.
“Darius sent me to tell you the roads are too bad. There’s no way I can get back to B.A. tonight. He and Stevie Rae went to find a four-wheel drive so that he can get you and the rest of the fledglings back to the House of Night.” He paused. I recognized a tone I’d only heard in his voice a very few times. He was seriously pissed, but he was also hurt. The last time he’d sounded like this had been when he’d told me I’d killed part of his soul when I’d had sex with Loren and broken our Imprint. “Hey, carry on. Pretend I’m not here, just like you were doing before. Didn’t mean to interrupt you two.”
“Heath,” I began, but just then Aphrodite, followed by a bunch of cats, including my Nala and her hateful white Persian, appropriately named Maleficent, came into the room.
“Awkward. Again,” Aphrodite added, looking knowingly from Heath to Erik and me.
I sighed and realized my head was starting to hurt almost as much as the cut across my chest. Then the Twins and Kramisha piled into the room, too.
“Ah, oh,” Shaunee said.
“What’s ex-boyfriend doing here?” Erin said.
“The roads are too bad. Heath can’t get home,” I said.
“So that means he be staying here?” Kramisha asked, giving Heath a long look.
“He’ll have to. He’s safer here than at the House of Night,” I said, keeping an eye on Kramisha and adding silently to myself that I wasn’t convinced he’d be safe here either. “He and I have Imprinted again,” I added for good measure.
Kramisha curled her lip. “I know that. I can smell you in his blood. He ain’t good for nothin’ now ’cept for being your boy toy.”
“He’s not—” I started, but Heath’s sharp voice cut me off.
“No, the girl’s right. That’s all I am to you,” Heath said bluntly.
