I wonder where Jareth is. I haven’t seen him since Wednesday night. He told me he’d call me when the results of the donor’s blood came back from the lab, but it’s already Tuesday and I haven’t heard from him. Maybe he decided he’d be better off working alone. That he didn’t need me.
The thought brings on the tears again. Jeez. I feel like I’ve cried more in the last three days than I have the rest of my life combined.
I’m such an idiot. To think Jareth might actually like me. That he might have been jealous when he saw me dancing with that other vamp. That he might have made up that excuse to kiss me in the broom closet just so he could do it. That there might be some kind of future with him.
Dumb, Rayne. Truly dumb.
Of course he doesn’t want a future with me. What do I have to offer? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. My own father isn’t interested in a future with me. Why should Jareth be?
Bleh.
I force myself to zone out to Snow Patrol, concentrating on the deep, melodious sounds and trying to block out the overwhelming sadness that’s threatening to take me. A few minutes later I’m so into the music that I almost don’t hear the knock on my door.
“Rayne?”
Mom. Great. I wonder if she’s here to yell or to attempt comfort. I wonder which would be more annoying.
“Go away!” I cry, my voice sounding a bit wobbly. I hope she can’t tell I’ve been crying. I don’t want to give her the satisfaction.
“That’s really nice, Rayne, thanks,” she retorts. “And I’ll be happy to. I just thought you might like to know there’s a boy here to see you.”
I raise my head and look over at the closed bedroom door. A boy? What boy would visit me? “Who is it?” I ask, against my better judgment.
“I’ve never seen him before,” Mom says. “He says his name is Jareth. Tall, skinny. A bit on the pasty side? Dressed all in black, just how you like ’em,” she adds, and I can hear a small smile in her voice. “Just hope he’s not an evil vampire.”
I wince a bit at the dig, but know she’s doing her best to try to lighten things up between us. “Nah, he’s not,” I say with all the false bravado I can muster. “He’s one of the good guys.”
Mom laughs. “So I should send him up then?” she asks and I can hear the relief in her voice after what she thinks is my attempt at humor.
But no time for analyzing. Jareth is here. Here in my house. Soon to be here in my bedroom. Gah! I’m so unprepared. I glance around the room, realizing I have clothes strewn everywhere and that I’m wearing plaid flannel pants and a T-shirt.
“Rayne?”
“Uh, yeah, sure,” I say, frantically grabbing discarded laundry and tossing it in the hamper. I’d normally ask if she could stall him for a moment or two, but I don’t want her asking a thousand-year-old vampire about where he goes to high school.
I shed my clothes faster than Superman in a phone booth, tossing on a black-and-white plaid skirt and a Smiths concert T-shirt, then run over to the mirror.
Ugh. Even with the change of clothes I’m not looking so hot. My eyes are completely bloodshot from crying and my makeup’s all smeared. I run my index finger under my eyes to try to get rid of the excess black. Then I apply more of my bloodred lipstick. Maybe that’ll detract from the eyes.
A knock on the door causes my heart to jump in my throat. Why am I so nervous? It’s just Jareth. We’ve been working together for nearly a week now. It’s all business. And that one kiss? Well, it didn’t mean anything. So there’s absolutely no reason to freak.
Another knock. This one louder.
“Come in,” I say, rushing back to my computer, as if I’ve been sitting there the whole time. No need for him to know he was worth reapplying lip gloss for.
He opens the door and steps over the threshold into my room. I’ve had guys in here before. Mom’s cool with it as long as we keep the door open. But this seems different somehow. More dangerous. And since Jareth doesn’t know the door rule, he shuts it behind him before walking over and sitting down on the bed. My bed. Gah! Jareth the hottest vampire ever is sitting on MY bed. I wish I had a web cam so I could have recorded the momentous event.
“So the blood test has come back from the lab,” he says, launching right into business. “And it’s positive.”
Gulp. Good thing he shut the door. If Mom heard the words “blood test” and “positive” in the same sentence she’d be carting me away to the clinic before I could explain we were talking vampires, not HIV.
I turn around in my chair to face him. “Positive for . . . ?”
“Wait a moment.” Jareth studies me with his intense blue eyes. “Have you been crying?”
I scowl. Great. I should have kept my back turned. “No. Of course not. I’m not your typical crying type of girl. Now, tell me about the donor’s blood.”
Jareth frowns. “Your eyes look red.”
“Allergies.”
“And your makeup’s smudged.”
“I dig the Mary-Kate Olsen look, what can I say?”
Jareth shakes his head. He’s so not buying any of this. “What’s wrong, Rayne? What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re lying.” He gets up from the bed and walks over to me, kneeling down in front of my chair, his earnest eyes searching my face. I turn my head to look back at the computer, mostly because his concerned expression has me this close to bursting into tears again.
“I’m not.”
“Tell me what happened. Did someone hurt you?” He takes my hand in his and squeezes it lightly, his thumb caressing my palm. “You can tell me. It’s okay.”
And that, my friends, is the point that the dam breaks and the tears cascade down like Niagara Falls. How embarrassing. How pathetic. I can’t believe I’m so weak. So vulnerable. He’s going to think I’m the biggest loser on the planet. Maybe in the entire universe. If there was any chance he was at all interested in me, it’s so gone now. I’m just another whiny, teary-faced human girl.
Jareth reaches up and swipes a tear away with his thumb. His touch is cool against my burning cheeks. “Tell me,” he says in the most gentle voice you could imagine.
“Okay,” I agree, realizing at this point I’ve got nothing to lose. I close my eyes resignedly and try to find my voice. I open my mouth to tell him the story of Mike Stevens, but something completely different comes out. Something I hadn’t meant to share with anyone, let alone him.
“You know how I told you about my dad? How he left us four years ago to go ‘find himself?’ ”
“Yes. Of course.”
“Well, he’s evidently still lost. I thought he was coming home for my birthday. Sunny and I turned seventeen three days ago and he sent us an e-mail saying he was going to come home to celebrate with us.” I swallow hard. “It’s so dumb, but . . .”
“But what?”
“I was so excited. My dad’s awesome. Or he used to be anyway. And I haven’t seen him in so long. I guess I thought maybe if he came . . . if he saw us again. Maybe he’d want to . . . I don’t know . . .” I laugh bitterly. “Stick around or something. Or at least plan more regular visits. Sounds so stupid now that I think about it.”
Jareth shakes his head. “Not stupid at all,” he says. “It makes perfect sense to me.”
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter. He never showed. He was supposed to bring the cake, too.” I laugh bitterly. “We ended up having a birthday party with no cake. Pretty lame, huh?”
“Did he call to tell you why? Did something happen to prevent him from making it?”
“No. I waited up ’til like one A.M., hoping he’d walk through the door. So idiotic.” My voice breaks again and I’m sobbing like crazy now. Can we say LOSER? “Sunny e-mailed him the next day. Turns out some other thing came up and he says he forgot to tell us.”
“Other thing?”
“Evidently he’s got a new wife. And she has kids. One of them had some school play or something . . .” I shrug. “Why go hang
with the old family, I guess, when you’ve got a whole new one?”
Without warning, Jareth grabs me and pulls me into a hug. At first I’m not sure about this, but his arms feel so right, wrapped around me. His hands so good, stroking my back. I give in, burying my head in his shoulder and sobbing my eyes out. Trying to take the strength he is offering me. I’m scared to death at the perfect comfort I receive, but too relieved to pull away.
“I’m so sorry, Raynie,” he whispers, smoothing my hair with his hands. “That’s a lousy thing to do. He doesn’t deserve you as a daughter.”
“I wish I could just hate him,” I cry, hoping my nose isn’t all running on Jareth’s black shirt. “But I can’t. I still love him. I still miss him. No matter what he does, he’s still my dad.”
“It’s hard when people you love let you down.”
“Sometimes I think that’s why I don’t have any close friends,” I say, now in full-on babble mode. I can’t believe I’m telling him all this. But his arms feel warm and his touch is comforting. I haven’t felt so safe in eons. “I mean, everyone thinks it’s ’cause I’m some tough punk-rock chick who doesn’t need anyone. But, in reality, I think it’s ’cause I’m scared to death. That if I get close to someone, they’ll just leave.”
“I know the feeling,” Jareth says, almost thoughtfully. “More than you can know.”
“Oh?” Excitement builds inside me, competing with my sadness. He’s on the verge of spilling the Deep Dark Secret, I can tell.
He pulls his head away. “Some other time,” he says, pressing his lips against my forehead and giving me a soft kiss.
I stick out my lower lip in a mock pout. “Oh, fine.”
He laughs. “I promise.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
“Don’t worry,” he says, reaching over to my nightstand and grabbing me a tissue. He hands it to me and I wipe my eyes and nose. “Unlike some people, I keep my promises. Always and forever.”
He reaches up and brushes a strand of hair out of my eyes and studies my face. “You’re really beautiful,” he says. “You know that?”
I screw up my face. “Yeah, yeah.” But secretly I’m pleased.
“No. I’m serious.” His fingers trail down the side of my face, his nails lightly scraping at my cheekbone. Feels so good. I close my eyes.
And then he kisses me. Yes, the beautiful vampire, the dark general, the one who never gets close to anyone, leans in and presses his lips against mine.
This kiss is different than the one in the closet. This kiss is soft. Gentle. Light. Like a butterfly’s wing whisking my lips. I know it sounds weird, but it’s almost like a worshipful caress. I sigh a bit as tingly sensations burst from my fingers, my toes—all over my body. I kiss him back, hesitantly at first and then with more assurance. Jareth is a master kisser, nothing like the awkward fumbling boys I’ve dated in the past. The ones more interested in the technical workings of my bra. The ones who see the mouth only as an obligatory precursor to getting me to take off my clothes. But Jareth seems content just to kiss me. To explore my mouth with his own. His tongue telling a thousand stories, mine delighting in a thousand tastes.
I wonder what he’s thinking as he kisses me. Does he have feelings for me? Is this something he’s been hoping will happen? Or is this just a gesture meant to cheer me up, to distract me from my pain? Sadly, I have no real clue what this immortal creature of the night actually feels for me and that scares me to death.
Stop thinking so much, Rayne, I tell myself. You’ve got a hot guy making out with you in your bedroom. Just go with it.
But I can’t. Not this time. Because I’m starting to develop a deep tenderness for this vampire. And that’s pretty damn terrifying. After all, he’s told me a dozen times that he doesn’t get close to anyone. He doesn’t even have donors, for goodness sake. He never wants a blood mate. He likes being alone. If I fall for him, I’m going to fall alone. And when I hit rock bottom, it’s going to hurt like crazy. In fact, I’m not sure I’d even be able to survive. To claw my way up from such heartbreak.
And so, as much as it sucks, I force myself to pull away. He stares at me dully for a moment, as if in a daze, then frowns. “What’s wrong?” he asks in a wounded voice that breaks my heart.
“Nothing,” I say briskly, scrambling to my feet. I cross my arms over my chest. “So let’s get back to business.”
“But—” The hurt on his face is unmistakable and I feel like a monster. Still, even though he’s a vampire, he’s also a guy. And guys can get like that after they’ve been denied sex. In fact, I’d be willing to bet he doesn’t care one lick about me as a person. He just wants to jump me. Just like everyone else. And I’m so not interested.
“You said you got the blood test results back. What did you learn?”
He sighs deeply and then rises to his feet, running a hand through his dirty blond hair. He stares into the mirror. Unlike in the movies and TV shows, vamps DO have reflections and his, I notice, is not one of a happy vampire. But that can’t be helped, I guess.
I feel bad, but I tell myself that in the long run, it’s better this way. After all, this can’t go anywhere. It can’t become anything. So just rip off the Band-Aid and move on to the next scene.
“Well, that’s the strange thing,” he says at last, evidently resigning himself to the fact that he’s not getting any more nookie from this chick. “It’s definitely contaminated with some kind of blood-borne virus, but we’re not exactly sure what. Whatever it is, our scientists believe it’s the same virus that’s affected Kristoff. Obviously vampires don’t die like humans, but somehow the virus has been able to weaken him and take away his powers.”
“How is Kristoff, anyway?”
“About the same. Not sick. Not exactly. Just weak. And powerless. It’s the strangest thing.”
“Poor guy.”
“Indeed. And he’s not the only one. Several of the coven’s top leaders have come down with a very similar illness. And all their donors are dead.”
“Wow. That’s terrible. So do you think it’s being spread through the donors? Remember, we saw Kristoff ’s donors at the Blood Bar. Could it be possible that Maverick is behind this?”
“I do. In fact, I’d say it’s quite probable,” Jareth says, nodding. “It’s my theory that this is the way Maverick hopes to overthrow Magnus’s rule. By crippling Magnus’s strong supporters, he can weaken his command, and then stage a coup.”
“Actually, that’s exactly what the Slayer Inc. guy, Teifert, says,” I tell him. “He suggested we go back to the Blood Bar and see if we can find a sample of the original virus itself. Maybe they have a room where they store it all. Maybe they even have some kind of antidote there.” I jump up from my seat, eager to be out of these closed quarters, lest I do something stupid like jump his vampire bones again. “We should go now. Time is a-wasting.”
Jareth shakes his head. “I should go now. Not we. You will stay home.”
“What? No way! I’m so not staying home.”
“This could be dangerous.”
“But I’m Raynie the Vampire Slayer,” I say, grabbing the stake off my computer table and raising it in the air.
Jareth chuckles. “Oh, yes. I forgot. Very scary.”
“Come on,” I whine. “Please? It’s, like, my destiny and stuff, remember? Just let me come. I need an adventure. I can’t keep sitting around moping in my room.”
“Okay, fine. But you have to listen to me. Do as I say. No heroics here,” he insists. “You may have a stake, but I’d bet my fangs you don’t know how to use it.”
“Not true. I got some Slayer Training this weekend. I’m now the stake mastah!”
“Ah. Impressive.” Jareth smiles. “Can’t wait to see you in action.”
“So should we head over now?”
“Hm.” Jareth looks at his watch. “Actually it’s only eight. The Blood Bar will be open ’til two A.M. and we want to hit them closer to closing time.”
&
nbsp; “Oh, okay.” A bit disappointed, I set the stake back down on the desk. So much for immediate distraction. “Uh, I guess just come pick me up when you’re ready to leave?” Hopefully by then Mom will be in bed. I doubt she’d be cool with me leaving the house at one thirty on a school night.
“Actually, I was wondering if you’d like to . . . do something with me first,” Jareth says, sounding a bit shy all of a sudden.
I look up, surprised. “Uh, what?”
“Go dancing.”
“Dancing? Now?” Wow. That is so not what I expected him to say. Though I don’t know what I did expect. A shiver of delight makes its way up my backbone. Dancing. With Jareth. Mmm.
Jareth shrugs. “Yes. Why not?”
Bleh. I know I should say no. Keep ripping off the Band-Aid.
Not put myself in a position where the two of us could easily hook up. Dancing is powerful and dangerous and if I want to stay at arm’s length it’s the last thing I should agree to.
“I don’t know. No reason, I guess. It’s just—” Just that I’m not strong enough not to melt when you take me into your arms.
“Remember what we talked about at Club Fang the other night? About losing oneself in the music? Seeking peace inside the dance?” He smiles at me. “I think someone’s in need of a little of that right about now.”
Oh. So that’s what he means. An unwarranted disappointment floats through me. Bleh. I should have known. He has no secret agenda to hook up with me. This is just a simple cheer-up technique to get my mind back on the job. Well, that’s better, I suppose. Safer, at least. And something I can justify doing.
He’s still looking at me expectantly and I realize that I haven’t given him a verbal answer. “I’d love to,” I reply.
He takes my hand and pulls me to my feet, then ushers me to my bedroom door, hand brushing against the small of my back. Gah. His touch really should be illegal. Almost makes me want to skip the dance club and go straight for the bed. Not that that would be a good idea. And besides, I kind of like this almost old-fashioned chivalrous thing he’s got going on. So unlike guys my age, who are just interested in getting it on with the Goth freak.