Keystone (Crossbreed #1)(78)
My daddy was a mechanic and former Marine. But I knew him best for being a biker with a grey mustache, long goatee, tattoos, scars, weathered hands, blue eyes, and long hair pulled back in a ponytail. He drove a couple of Harleys, loved to watch TV, and drank a lot of orange soda. He was just the sort of guy you’d expect to see spending his nights at the bar, but Crush was a recovering alcoholic and stayed away from that scene. He got his nickname because of all the sodas he drank after he kicked the habit and joined Alcoholics Anonymous.
He wasn’t an angry drunk, but he almost lost custody of me when I was nine after the police arrested him for driving under the influence. I was thrust upon him at an early age after my mother died, and he wasn’t prepared to be a full-time father. My parents didn’t live together; Crush had a special relationship with my mom, but his drinking might have kept them from something more permanent. Regardless, my mother had never denied me knowing my father, and for that I was thankful.
After he got clean and sober, we built so many great memories together. He didn’t become a different man, just a better one.
If only time machines existed. Just thinking about those nights when I’d stormed out the door and told him I hated him for making me live in a trailer park made me sick with regret. It was one of those asinine things that most kids say to their parents, but I never got the chance to make it right. Crush was a hardworking man who kept me out of the foster care system after my mom died. I learned street smarts from him. He taught me to be a strong woman who could think for myself, but I never realized the sacrifices he’d made.
That epiphany only came after I’d become immortal, and by then it was too late since I’d had to cut ties with my human life.
I knew all his hangouts, so I never worried about running into him. Aside from that, Crush was the kind of guy who worked long days and came home to watch any comedy show on TV he could find.
I missed his laugh.
Maybe that was why I still crept over to the trailer on occasion, climbed the tree in the back, and then lay on the roof with my ear pressed against it. My love for heights began with that trailer. I’d spent many nights as a little girl sitting on top of it, pretending it was my castle.
At night I could hear him in there, popping the lid off his orange soda and belting out a laugh at something on TV. Sometimes when it grew quiet, I wondered if it was because he’d fallen asleep or because he was lost in his thoughts.
Did he ever think of me?
The worst part about it all was that I had no idea if someone had given him my cremated remains. Did a grave exist with my name on it? Had my Mage Creator hired someone to scrub his memory of me? There were so many questions I’d never have the answer to, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted them.
“I miss you, Daddy.”
Mist coated my face, and I stared bleary-eyed at the low clouds drifting overhead. My Vampire eyes could pick up the subtle shifting of light behind the darkness that hinted dawn was fast approaching.
“I think of you all the time,” I said quietly, tears gathering at the corners of my eyes. “I’m so sorry for everything. You were a great father, and I don’t think I ever told you that.”
Crush wasn’t a sensitive man, but he bought me a bunny on my eleventh birthday, even though he was allergic. Any guy who buys his little girl a bunny is a good man in my book.
I wiped my face with the heels of my hands and sat up, my back stiff from lying on a hard roof for the past nine hours.
This place felt so familiar, as if I could walk in the door and pretend nothing had ever happened. But knowing about our world would endanger his life. Aside from that, what would he think about his daughter becoming a monster? Part Mage, part Vampire, and complete killer. I wanted him to remember me as the little girl in crooked pigtails, because Crush didn’t know how to do hair.
After saying good-bye, I hurried down the road toward the gas station off the main road. I closed my eyes, imagining the sky turning an indigo blue before the pale-orange light bled into the horizon. Instead, morning greeted me with rolling fog on the tree line to my right and thunder rumbling in the distance.
It only took the cab driver ten minutes to arrive—impressive considering we were on the outskirts of the city. I tossed my duffel bag on the floor and got in, my clothes damp, my throat parched.
After giving the driver directions, I hugged my midsection, shivering from the cold air. My eyes closed as thoughts of my father stayed on my mind. When I was first offered immortality by my Vampire maker, I thought I’d hit the jackpot. But after a few years of living the life, immortality frightened me. Someday I’d be thousands of years old, and my father would be nothing but a distant memory. Would I still remember the sound of his laugh?
The car slowed, and the back doors suddenly opened. Someone slid next to me on the right, and when I turned, I saw another man getting in on the opposite side.
Confused, I knocked on the plastic divider between the front and backseat to alert the driver. Maybe he hadn’t switched the light off.
“Darius wants to speak with you,” one of the men said.
My heart thumped against my chest, and I turned to look at him. He calmly sat in his seat, eyes forward, making no aggressive moves to restrain me.
“Maybe I don’t want to speak with him.”
They both had on sunglasses, and the one on the right looked more the part of an FBI agent. “That’s your choice. You can either go willingly, or we can do this the hard way, but you are going.”