“Did you… ever use your ability on me? I mean, maybe you did, and you didn’t mean to or something.”

  Iro turned to her in surprise and said, “No.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “You saw what happened to Cassia today. Normally, they don’t fall to the floor how she did, so I’m not sure why that happened, but their eyes go white. They fade, Arwen. I have looked into your eyes every possible second when I’m talking to you, and they are always hazel. I have memorized those golden flecks. I can promise you that I’ve never used my ability on you. If I had, even accidentally, I would have given you up. I never wanted anything not to be your choice when it came to me.”

  “How do you explain it, then?”

  “Explain what?”

  “Why it felt like that when I met you.”

  “Arwen, it felt like that before I even said words to you. It wasn’t me trying to convince you to fall in love with me. It was you. Those were your feelings.”

  “If Cassia is so horrible, why didn’t you kill her?”

  “It would’ve been a battle. She’s stronger than me, and she drinks from humans, and I’d already gotten cut. I would have had I needed to, but she also had people upstairs who would’ve come down to fight alongside her, and there was a chance I wouldn’t make it out alive if I didn’t try to use my ability. I only wanted to test it, but you were there, too, and I couldn’t risk the others seeing you and trying to fight me with you there, Arwen. So, I did what I did and got you out of there. We’re probably safe here for tonight, but I’m not sure. Maybe we should sleep in the hidden room just in case. It’s a twin bed, but I’ll sleep on the floor, if you want. If it works and she doesn’t remember me or you, her people will just follow wherever she goes, so we’ll be fine, but I’ve never told someone to forget a whole person before, and I was a part of her life for so long. That’s a lot of memories her brain is trying to rewrite. I don’t know how that will go.”

  “Iro, I can’t,” she replied.

  “Can’t what?”

  “Stay here.”

  “Why not?”

  “I… I feel like I need to be away from you right now.”

  “Away from me for how long?”

  “I’m not sure yet. I also need to find Zara and talk to her. I need to make sure she’s okay. I have an apartment I need to get back to and a job that I’m supposed to go to on Monday. I don’t know how to do any of this.”

  “I know. That’s why you should stay. I’ll help you, Arwen. We can talk about it.”

  “Not yet,” she said. “I need some time alone.”

  “Time alone, or time alone with Zara?”

  “She’s my friend. And she’s a vampire, too, apparently. I need to talk to her.”

  Iro nodded, stood, and walked back over to the fridge. She pulled out two more containers and walked back over, setting them on the table.

  “Take those with you. Zara might need one as well. And I’ll have more sent to the office. I have a butcher I trust. You and Zara stay together at least for tonight.”

  “You’re not going to argue with me? Try to lock me in that room again?”

  “The one thing I will never take away from you is your choice, Arwen. I want you to stay here so that I can protect you if I have to, but if this is what you want, I won’t stop you. I would only request that you don’t tell anyone about us, that you don’t hurt anyone, that you do whatever you can to keep yourself safe, and that you only drink what I’ll send you to drink. Once you start on human blood, it is incredibly difficult to stop. Ask Zara.”

  “Zara has–”

  “She can tell you everything.” Iro motioned for Arwen to stand. “I need to sleep now so that this heals.”

  “Oh, okay,” Arwen replied and picked up the two containers.

  “My car is parked right out front. Take it. I have the car service if I need it. Keys are by the door.”

  “Iro, are you okay? You’re cut, and–”

  “No, I am not okay. The woman I love is walking out the door, and I’m scared she may never return.”

  CHAPTER 32

  Zara

  “She’s on her way to you,” Iro said.

  “She is? Why?” she asked as she put the phone to her other ear.

  “Zara, I was too late.”

  “Oh,” Zara said.

  “She’s… I was just too late.”

  “I’m sorry, Iro,” she said.

  “Me too. You can leave the office after she gets there. I would play it safe tonight, at least, and I can tell you more later, but I need to sleep.”

  “Iro, what happened?”

  “Arwen can tell you. I wouldn’t go home tonight. Stay there, if you want, but please stay with Arwen wherever you go. You will be safer together. I need you to keep her safe,” Iro said, not sounding like herself.

  “Why isn’t she staying with you?” Zara pressed.

  “She should be there soon. Stay safe, Zara. Please keep her safe. I’m begging you. She’s the only thing in the world I care about.”

  “I… I will,” she said.

  Seconds later, the phone went dead, and Zara looked around the room Iro had let her hide in, deciding that if Iro said that she was safe, she could finally leave. She pressed the button and headed out into Iro’s office, but she didn’t know what to do next. Arwen was on her way to the building, but would she come upstairs or expect Zara to meet her downstairs and outside? It was getting late now, and Zara didn’t want to have to sleep in a hidden room in Iro’s office, but she didn’t want to go home, either.

  She sat on the sofa in the corner and pulled out the phone Iro had given her. She had been able to grab her purse at the café, but it was in her car, which meant it was either stolen by now or far out of reach, at least. Luckily for her, she had one of her credit card numbers memorized, the one she used most often, so she found a hotel about three blocks from the office and got them a room for the night. It was under her name, yes, but if Cassia was determined to find her, she’d have to search through every hotel in the city or track down Zara’s credit card records or something, and Cassia didn’t seem the type. She had told Zara once that she still handwrote letters and sent them to whomever, and she would talk on the phone when she had to, but she preferred the old ways, as she had called them.

  “Hi.”

  Zara looked up just after receiving the booking confirmation and said, “Hi.”

  “Iro said you might need this.”

  Arwen held out a container of blood.

  “I’m okay,” she lied.

  “Zara, just take it. She said she would send more. It’s probably already on its way, honestly. That would be just like her.”

  Zara took it from Arwen and felt embarrassed at the idea of drinking it in front of her, but she was hungry.

  “How are you doing?” she asked.

  “I’ve been better. I’ve been a lot better, actually.”

  “I got us a hotel room. We can go whenever you want.”

  “Hotel?”

  “To be safe. Iro called me and told me we should stay together tonight, but not go home, so I thought a hotel for the night, at least, and we can maybe call her tomorrow to see what she thinks we should do then.”

  “Fine. Let’s go,” Arwen said with no emotion.

  “What about the–”

  “If it’s not downstairs already, I’d be surprised,” Arwen interrupted as she walked through the open door. “You can tell her the hotel name if it’s not down there, and she’ll send it there instead.”

  “Yeah. Okay,” Zara replied and stood before she followed Arwen out, trying to hold what was essentially a bucket of blood at her side so as not to have it be noticed by the two security guards in the lobby.

  “Thank you,” Arwen said to the man who held out a plastic bag to her when they got outside.

  “Of course, Ma’am. When you need more, just dial this number. It’ll go on Miss Black’s tab.”

  “Thanks,” Arwen replied and took the card from him. “Let’s go, Zara.”

  It wasn’t Arwen’s but likely Iro’s car, because Arwen’s would still be somewhere on the street outside the café, probably collecting parking tickets. Zara got in, and Arwen handed her the bag, inside which there were four more containers like the one she had at her feet now. It would get them through the night and tomorrow for sure; maybe even the next day, depending on Arwen’s hunger. Zara told her the name of the hotel and the address, and Arwen joined the traffic wordlessly. Minutes later, they arrived at the hotel’s parking garage and took a ticket from the machine like it was just a regular old night, and neither of them was a vampire.

  “Checking in,” she said to the man at the desk, handing him her ID.

  “Credit card?”

  “I booked with one.”

  “Yes. I need to see it in person.”

  “I don’t have it on me. It’s in my purse, which is in the car that ran out of gas earlier today, so I can’t get to it. I can read you the number, though.”

  “Here,” Arwen said and put a credit card on the desk. “I had my wallet and phone on me when I went to the bathroom. They didn’t take it when…” She faded out.

  “Thanks,” Zara replied.

  “We can pick up your car and purse tomorrow, if you want.”

  Zara nodded, and they checked in and headed to the third floor, where they walked down the hall in silence, carrying the plastic bag and nothing else, probably looking like two women who’d just met and wanted to find a hotel for sex for the night and not two lost vampires. She’d booked a room with two beds, at least, and when they walked in, Arwen took a container out of the bag, walked to the window, and pulled back the curtain. She then took a long drink, and it made Zara so incredibly sad.

  “They have no idea.”

  “Who?” Zara asked as she took her own container and sat on the end of the bed closest to the door.

  “The people out there, walking to wherever it is they’re going with no idea that there are vampires out there.”

  “Sounds like us not all that long ago.”

  She took a drink but then tipped it back further because she needed more. It was gross compared to what she’d been drinking recently, but she was hungry, and she didn’t want to hurt people anymore, so animal blood had to be enough.

  “I’m sorry, Zara.”

  “What? What are you sorry for?”

  “For bringing Iro into our lives.”

  Zara turned, took another long drink, and set the container down on the desk meant for the business travelers that this hotel attracted.

  “It’s not your fault, Arwen. You fell in love.”

  “With a vampire,” Arwen replied.

  “You had no idea. And you can’t exactly help who you fall in love with.”

  “But Iro led Cassia to you. Now, you’re like this, and it’s my fault.”

  “What did Iro tell you about what happened?”

  “Not much. She got me out of there, and when I woke up, we talked about what I am now and some things I needed to know. She said you’d been turned by Cassia and that she told you to spy on us. The rest, she said I needed to talk to you about.”

  “I see.” She nodded and finished the blood before she put the container on the floor at her feet. “There’s more to it than that. Sounds like Iro was being nice to me if you thought you needed to apologize to me.”

  Arwen sat at the side of the other bed facing Zara, who didn’t move to face her because she knew she couldn’t handle that yet.

  “Do you remember when you got dumped and cried on my shoulder a few years ago?”

  “Yes.”

  “That was when I realized it.”

  “Realized what?”

  “That I was in love with you, Arwen.”

  Arwen didn’t say anything, so Zara finally worked up the courage to look at her.

  “I think I knew for a long time, but it didn’t really click until then.”

  “You didn’t say anything.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Why does anyone not tell their best friend that they’re in love with them? I was scared.”

  “I didn’t know, Zara.”

  “I know. I hid it pretty well. But the night you met Iro, I was going to tell you. Finally, I was about to tell you, and I wanted to know if you’d give us a shot, but then, we walked into that bar, and you saw her. It felt like there was no point then.”

  “I’m sorry,” Arwen replied.

  Zara shook her head and said, “It’s not your fault. Today, I lied to you because Cassia told me to. She said I needed a reason I’d been acting like a jerk that didn’t revolve around me being a vampire because she didn’t want you to know that yet.”

  “Sounds like Cassia got you to do a lot more than lie to me today.”

  “I had cancer, Arwen,” she revealed, and Arwen gasped at that. “My biopsy came back positive, and it was rare and aggressive. The doctor told me I didn’t have much time, and what I was going to do was very selfish; ask you to give me a chance for the maybe six months I had left; make you watch me slowly fade away, and then say goodbye to me. That night, I would’ve done that had you not met Iro, and it would have been unfair to you. Losing your best friend would have been hard enough already.”

  “You were sick, and I didn’t know?”

  “You did know. You kept asking me about it. I just lied to you because I wasn’t ready to tell you yet.”

  “Zara…”

  “That’s not the point now, though. The cancer’s gone anyway.”

  “Thank God,” Arwen replied.

  Zara smiled at her and said, “Cassia saw me the night of your first date with Iro. I went for a walk, trying to clear my head and figure out what I wanted to do, and I saw you two outside the restaurant that I wanted to take you to for the first time. Cassia told me she wanted to have some no-strings fun, which I’d never done, but I was dying, so I just thought what the hell.”

  “And she turned you?”

  “She asked me if I wanted it, Arwen.”

  “She does that, from what I’ve heard,” Arwen remarked and looked away.

  “I said yes.”

  “She’s very convincing,” Arwen retorted.

  “No, Arwen. I wanted it. I wanted to live. I wanted time with you. I wanted to tell you how I felt. When Cassia told me she could give me that if I spied on you and Iro… that she and Iro would leave together, and I could–”

  “What? Have me?” Arwen guessed.

  “Yes.”

  “Zara, I don’t love you like that. I’m sorry, but I don’t feel that way about you.”

  “I know.” Zara rubbed her face with her hands. “And everything I did after that was wrong. I can blame Cassia because, yes, there’s a definite pull there, and it’s very intense, but it was still me. I wanted to be with you, and I hated Iro because you seemed to fall for her after thirty seconds, and I’ve been here for ten years, and you couldn’t even see me.”

  “I always saw you, Zara. Not as someone I could fall in love with, but as my best friend I would have gone through anything with.”

  “I know. I know you might not ever forgive me – and not ever is a very long time for us now – but I wanted you to understand why I helped her.”

  “What happened today? Did you set me up to be turned into a vampire, Zara?”

  “No,” she insisted. “She just told me to make sure you didn’t know that I was a vampire and that she was going to get Iro back. I was thinking you and I would be friends for a while, and maybe one day, I could tell you how I felt and see how that goes. That was it, Arwen. When you went to the bathroom, Cassia sat down at the table. As soon as she told me what was happening, I ran. I got in my car and went to Iro as quickly as I could. I told her what I did and that Cassia had you. Then, I had to hide because Cassia sent Gigi after me.”

  “Gigi…”

  “Yeah. Iro killed her, and–”

  “Iro did what?”

  “She didn’t tell you?”

  “No,” Arwen replied.

  “She killed her. I think Gigi would’ve killed you, Arwen. She wanted Iro dead as well. I could tell she was in love with Cassia, and Iro stood between her and what she wanted. She could’ve killed you to make Iro miserable and then killed Iro or something. I don’t know, but Iro did what she had to do. Then, she sent me to the office and went to get you. I’d been sitting in that room ever since, thinking I’d gotten you killed and trying to figure out what to do. Iro called me and told me you weren’t dead but that you were like me now right before you got to the office.”

  “Zara, did you kill anyone?”

  “Yes,” she admitted and looked down. “Well, turned. They’re not dead. One was an accident. I honestly don’t know how it happened. I did what Cassia told me to do, so I could just take enough, and–”

  “What?” Arwen asked.

  “It wasn’t me,” Zara said and realized at the same time. “Son of a bitch. She set me up.”

  “Who?”

  “Cassia. She wanted me to think I had made her, when I didn’t. I listened to Cassia when she told me to stop. I know I did. She was fine, and then–” Zara stopped again.

  “And then what?”

  “Well, being a vampire means you want two things over everything else.”

  “Sex and blood?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh,” Arwen said, realizing it now.

  “Yeah…”

  “You slept with Cassia?”

  “Yes. Other women, too. But I don’t think I was the one who turned that woman. I didn’t drain enough. I think Cassia did it to make me think that I screwed up so that I would need her help.”

  “I know very little about her, but that’s unsurprising.”

  “There was one more, but she wanted it.”

  “To be turned?”

  “Yes. I asked her more than once to make sure. She’d been there as someone who willingly let us feed from her. She wanted it, Arwen, I swear.”

  “So did you, I imagine.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It sounds like you’ve really enjoyed being a vampire since you turned, Zara.”

  “I’ve made a lot of mistakes, yes, but Arwen, the moment I realized you were really in trouble, I ran. I’m sorry I was too late. I never should’ve agreed to help her in the first place. I should’ve died with dignity instead of what I did.”