Page 19 of Fanged Embrace
I decided to get to the topic at hand, before I asked too many personal questions. “So, you made a pretty dramatic exit the other night at the diner?—”
“Yeah, well, you guys were acting suspicious.” Laurie’s arms crossed over her chest and she shot me a wry grimace. “You said you might be able to help me.” It wasn’t a question.
“I hope so,” I murmured, watching passersby in the park. “You mentioned an organization that’s been tormenting humans. I suspect they’re tied to some trouble we’ve been dealing with ourselves. Rogue vampires are turning people without regard for consequences—attacks are escalating and it’s getting harder to cover it up and keep our world a secret.”
Laurie lowered her head and choppy, dark hair fell over her eyes. “They’re not just turning people. They’re—” She trailedoff, her lips twisting into a grimace. “Experimenting. Torturing. It’s not random.”
Experimenting. That word alone conjured horrors I could barely guess at. My nails dug into the wood of the bench but I kept my expression muted.
“I’m sorry,” I said it again and winced, “—that you had to see that.” When Laurie stiffened, even that small sympathy causing her shoulders to go rigid, I leaned a little closer. “You did see it, didn’t you? First hand?”
Her voice was taut and she kept her eyes forward, coiling her arms tighter around herself. “I don’t need your pity.”
“Not pity.” I shrugged. “Just… I want to understand.”
She snorted, one eye roll away from dismissing me entirely. “Sure you do.” But at least she didn’t get up to leave.
“Okay, how about this.” I shuffled closer to her, pausing right before she shot me a warning glare. “You don’t trust me, I get it. So to clear the air, I’ll tell you everything I know about the recent attacks, everything we’ve found so far. If you think my story holds, then you tell me what you know.” I mustered the most serene smile I could find in me. “Hopefully by the end, you’ll see that we’re on the same side.”
Laurie watched me like a cat with its hackles raised, thinking it over. Eventually, her shoulders sagged and she shrugged. “Fine. Just… fine. I’m listening.”
So I filled her in. I got as close to the topic of my coven as possible without stating it outright. I explained that we stuck to a code—we didn’t harm humans in the city, or anywhere for that matter. I told her about the attacks and our investigations, and the messes we’d worked to cover up in order to keep our kind a secret.
Laurie listened with a blank stare, kicking her heel against the bench leg.
Finally, when I was finished, she sat back and blew out a breath. I wasn’t sure what to make of her expression, but thestorm cloud surrounding her had receded slightly, so I took that to mean she at least believed that what I told her was the truth.
She stared at her shoes for a long, long while, and I could see her thinking it over—what to say, how much to say, how to put it. “Okay,” she murmured eventually. “Maybe we are after the same people.”
“And maybe we can work together…?” I ventured, cracking a smile that I hoped looked reassuring, careful to keep my fangs out of sight.
“Maybe we can.” Her gaze slid over to me, still suspicious, but slightly more at ease. She sat up straighter, rolled her shoulders, and braced her hands on her knees. “I’ll tell you what I can but… I just… It might take a while.”
I wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but I nodded. “All right.”
“I was… taken by the organization, when I was very young.” Laurie began, tone turning robotic like she was reciting verses. “They didn’t turn me but they… did other things. They were working toward something big. They wanted to build an army of powerful vampires—I don’t know why.”
Her words triggered warning bells in my head, alarms screaming loud and clear that this was what my visions had been warning me about. But I bit back my burning questions, letting her continue without interruption.
“I was trapped in one facility for most of my life, but I know now that there are more. I escaped two years ago…” I saw her nails dig into her knees, knuckles whitening. She sucked in a sharp breath, eyes going wide. “I?—”
I recognized that look of pure panic a second too late.
Her breathing turned shallow, face growing pale, a sheen of sweat suddenly breaking across her brow.
“Laurie,” I murmured, voice hushed, trying not to spook her. My hand twitched, wanting to reach out—but I held back.She clearly had no interest in being touched unless necessary. “Hey, it’s all right. You’re safe.”
Her breath came in ragged pants. She squeezed her eyes shut, pressing her lips together like she was fighting back a scream. I could see the white hot panic tearing her apart from the inside. She was spiraling, sinking into some terrible memory like I’d witnessed her do once before.
“Laurie?” I tried again.
“Just—stop,” she croaked, hugging her elbows, hunching over her knees. She was trembling so hard the bench shook.
“It’s okay. Just… breathe,” I coaxed, my tone as gentle as I could make it. “You don’t have to talk about it now. We can stop anytime you want—It’s okay.”
Laurie jerked backward, rattling the bench, and her eyes flew open. She was a million miles away. That coiled tension hovering around her suddenly ballooned in size, swallowing her whole. I felt it enveloping me, too, a trembling pain of enormous magnitude.
Her breaths came in ragged hitches, each one a small battle. Her eyes were wide, her pupils dilated.She’s drowning.The desperation rippled off her in thick waves, and it hurt to feel it. But I refused to look away.
