Page 46 of Secret of the Vampire
His voice was cold. Hard. I felt as though I were outside my body, watching as my hand slowly reached out and took them from him. My eyes never left his face as I opened them up and put them on.
Alex studied me, a look in his golden eyes I couldn’t read. Behind him, the djinn was watching us with interest. “As you can see,” he said. “The vampire is alive and well.”
I frowned as Alex, with one last sweeping look at me, turned away. “She wouldn’t have been if we hadn’t gotten here when we had. I thought she was so important to you.”
The djinn looked over at me. “I left her on the couch. She was perfectly safe.”
I was so confused. Why was he talking about me like I was some sort of animal without a mind of my own, and why was Alex acting the same way?
“When do we leave?” he asked the djinn.
“Tomorrow night. I have something I must do before we go.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked him. “Go where?”
The djinn—what was his name? Marcus?—leveled a stare at me. Then he sighed. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to fill you in. The sooner you know, the sooner I can have what I want.”
I glanced over at Alex, but he wouldn’t look at me. I had to admit, it hurt worse than I thought it would, his betrayal. Even though I kinda knew it was coming. My instincts had told me all along that he couldn’t be trusted. And as usual, they were right. He’d been in on this all along.
But if that were the case, then what I didn’t understand was why hadn’t he just taken me to the djinn himself? It would’ve been so easy. Last night, he could’ve handed me over to him with little fuss. I never would’ve suspected a thing because I, in my infatuation with him, had trusted him completely when he’d told me it was safe. When he’d told me that he was as taken with me as I was with him.
I’d been stupid. And naive. And…stupid.
“Vampire? Are you even listening?”
I blinked rapidly, clearing my head and turning my attention back to the djinn. “What?”
He exhaled loudly through his nose. “If you’re not going to pay attention, I’m not going to waste my time standing here talking to you.”
“I’m sorry,” I murmured. Then could’ve kicked myself. What the hell was I apologizing for? This thing had kidnapped me!
But he seemed to take some measure of pity on me, for his expression softened a bit. “You won’t be harmed,” he told me. “As long as you do what I need you to do.”
“And what is it you think you need from me?” I asked him. I was still standing in the corner of the kitchen, afraid to move. The djinn were nothing I ever wanted to mess with. And even if I could somehow sneak up on him and tear his head off, at this point in time I had no idea how Alex would react.
“I need you to bring someone back from the dead.”
I glanced at Alex, but he was staring at the floor and no help at all. “Like, make someone a vampire?” Did he want to create vampires? Why?
“No, not a vampire. A witch. She died about forty years ago.”
Confused, I looked between him and Alex. “You kidnapped me because you think I’m some sort of necromancer?”
“Not think. I know.”
I shook my head, holding my hands in front of me in supplication. “Look. I don’t know what you think you know, but you’ve got it all wrong. I’m nothing but a nerdy girl who was made into a less than extraordinary vampire that my maker decided to keep around anyway. Maybe to keep him and the rest of the guys from becoming complete Neanderthals, I don’t know, but anyway, he did. I don’t know anything about magic, or raising the dead, or…or…anything like that.”
He tilted his head. “How little you know of yourself.”
I dropped my arms back down to my sides. “What is that supposed to mean?”
With a smirk, he glanced at Alex. I was glad to see he didn’t return it. Although it didn’t change anything about what was going on here. When the djinn looked back at me, the smirk was still there. “It means there is more to you than your family ever told you. Your human family,” he specified.
“I never knew my human family,” I admitted. “I was given up for adoption right after I was born.”
“And your adopted parents wouldn’t know where you’d come from, I gather.” Though he said the words aloud, I got the impression he was speaking more to himself than to me.
I answered anyway. “I was never adopted. I just got bounced around foster homes until I was old enough to live on my own.”
