Unspoken (Shadow Falls: After Dark #3)(26)

Her voice shook. “He knows I’m a monster.”

The second the words were out, Della would give anything to pull them back in. To wad them up in her fist and hide them deep in her pocket—so deep she might be able to forget. Because damn it, in those few words she’d voiced the pain and shame that she’d felt since she’d discovered she’d been turned—since she’d learned that to sustain life, she needed blood.

“You are not a monster.” Holiday moved around the desk toward Della. Probably to touch her, to try to take away the pain she felt. It wouldn’t work. Not this time.

“Della?” Holiday touched her arm. “Hannah’s vampire. Look at her. Do you think—”

“It’s not what I think that matters,” she lied. “It’s what my dad thinks … and what my mom and sister will think.” It’s what the whole damn world would think if they knew vampires existed.

“I think you’re reading more into this than there is,” Burnett said. “How could he know?”

“Because he saw his twin brother in vamp mode kill his sister.”

Burnett looked confused. “But I thought … He saw his brother? He witnessed the murder?”

“He had to. My mom told me that Dad said he couldn’t remember anything that happened that night. That he was unconscious. But my aunt’s ghost says he wasn’t unconscious after all.”

“But your aunt could be wrong,” Holiday spoke up. “We’ve talked about this. When someone is dying they…”

“But it makes sense,” Della insisted. “Don’t you see? Mom said he still has nightmares about it. How can you have nightmares about something you can’t remember? She said that he was hospitalized after the murder, not because he was hurt, but because he was so distraught. He knows. And now he’s afraid I’m going to do to them what Feng did to Bao Yu.”

“I think you might be jumping to conclusions here.” Holiday gave Della’s shoulder another soft squeeze. She felt the calm sink into her skin, but it never got to her heart.

“Jumping? No, I’m embarrassed I didn’t figure it out earlier.”

“Look, I think…” Burnett stopped. He tilted his head to the side ever so slightly, telling Della he’d heard something.

She did the same and heard the footsteps in the front of the cabin. She raised her nose and got two scents. One was canine. The second … Chase. A jolt of unwanted anticipation swept through her. She pushed it back.

Back.

Back.

Back.

She turned and faced the front of the office. “Get ready, I’m coming,” she said, just loud enough for him to hear, and took a step toward the door.

*

Chase prepared himself to see her, but distracting him from getting too excited was the echo of her words. Not her warning—that, he expected—but the earlier confession: He knows I’m a monster. His chest tightened, and a deep somber feeling hit him right in his solar plexus. Then the emotion turned to anger. Anger at her father again.

“Don’t do it, Della!” Burnett’s voice came next.

Chase didn’t move, fighting his growing dislike for Della’s father, and the disappointment that she wasn’t this second standing in front of him. Only when he was convinced Della wasn’t coming, did he continue. He got only a few steps when he realized Baxter wasn’t following.

“Come here, boy,” he called to Baxter, who must have gotten Della’s scent because he was trotting toward the office. “No, Baxter.”

The dog stopped and glanced back as if to say, “But Della’s in there.”

“You’ll see her later,” Chase promised when the dog begrudgingly came. “Believe me, I’m as eager to see her as you are.” Anticipation tightened his shoulders, but his mind ricocheted back to another emotion.

Did Della really believe she was a monster?

Of course she did. He recalled with clarity feeling almost the same thing when he’d first been turned. But he’d had Eddie to counter all of the emotional crap. She’d had no one. Well, she’d had Chan, but considering she’d still been living with her nonvampire parents, she hadn’t gotten the same amount of guidance. And if he figured it right, it had been months before she’d gotten to Shadow Falls.

Did she know how rare it was for a fresh turn to survive those first few months without a vampire mentor? Or at least to survive with any morality. Most of them went rogue, or killed themselves. He made a mental note to make sure she understood how special she was to have survived all she had.

He made it around the first bend when the hairs on the back of his neck rose. Feeling as if he were being watched, he stopped and looked around. He saw and sensed nothing but nature.

Neither did Baxter, who looked up at him confused.

That didn’t mean they were alone. A shape-shifter could still be lurking. And one in particular came to Chase’s mind. “I don’t want any trouble,” he said. “But Della and I belong together. You need to respect that.”

Right then he felt something land on the back of his neck. He saw the bird flying away and he didn’t have to reach back to know it was bird crap.

Every instinct in his body said to take flight to teach the twerp a lesson, but he heard Burnett’s warning: First hint of trouble and you’ll be house hunting.