Unspoken (Shadow Falls: After Dark #3)(47)

“Maybe,” Della admitted. “But if you could have seen how he looked at me. He’s afraid I’m going to kill him or my mother and sister.” Tears stung her sinuses and a lump formed in the back of her throat.

“So are you going to confront him?” Miranda asked.

“And say what?” Della snapped. “Hey, so you know I’m a monster?”

“You’re not a monster,” Kylie said.

“Right.” Della swallowed down a lump of pain. “But I am the one who brought this whole court case down on him. What if they convict him? He could get the death penalty.”

“Don’t think the worst,” Kylie said. After a second she asked, “Did Chase turn your uncle in?”

“No, he says he doesn’t know where he is. But he also says my uncle didn’t kill my aunt. That it was another vampire.”

“Do you believe it?” Miranda asked.

“I don’t know what I believe anymore,” Della sighed. “Tomorrow we’re getting my dad’s case file from the DA.”

Kylie turned the soda can in her hand. “Maybe you’ll find out what he told the police and then you’ll know for sure if he saw the murder.”

“Yeah.” Della looked again at her phone, and when she glanced up both Miranda and Kylie were studying her.

“Who are you dying to hear from?” the witch asked.

“I’m not. I … Oh, hell!” She pulled in a pound of oxygen. “Chase is doing something stupid.” She told them about Chase’s visit to the prison.

“And you’re not going to call Burnett?” Kylie asked.

“No, because if the situation were reversed and he told Burnett on me, I’d never tell him anything again. He’s working my father’s case. I need him to trust me.”

“But if something happens to him, you’ll never forgive yourself,” Kylie said.

“Do you see what a position he’s put me in?” Della snapped.

“Well, maybe you told me and then I told Burnett. It wouldn’t be your fault.”

“He’d still be pissed.”

“But at me more than you,” Kylie said.

Della looked at her phone for the hundredth time. “Give him thirty more minutes. If he doesn’t contact me, then you can call Burnett.”

Miranda turned her Coke in her hands. “Have you seen Steve?”

Della frowned. “Yeah. He heard about me going to identify some bodies and he came to see if I needed to talk about it.”

“That’s sweet,” Miranda said.

“Yeah,” Della said. “Steve’s sweet.”

“But?” Kylie asked.

“But she cares more about Chase,” Miranda said, putting words in Della’s mouth.

“No.” Della felt her heart thump to the tune of a lie. “I would be just as worried about Steve if he was in danger.”

“Would you?” Kylie asked.

“Yeah,” she said, but that came with a tremble of her heart as well. “And if I wasn’t, it would be because of the bond. So that wouldn’t count.

“Because … because … It wasn’t my choice to care.” But she heard Chase’s words: You still have a choice.

Did she?

“Everything in my life feels like I don’t have a choice. Everything is changing and I don’t get a say in it. It’s my friggin’ life, and all I am is a spectator.”

“I’d have to disagree with that,” Kylie said. “I’ve never met anyone who fights as much as you do against anything.”

“Yeah, but just because I fight doesn’t change anything. I was turned into a vampire and no amount of fighting changed that.”

“It didn’t change it, but you’re here at Shadow Falls because you had the nerve to call Holiday,” Kylie said. “We can’t always change what happens, but we always have control over how we deal with those things.”

“You’re channeling Holiday again and spouting all that psychoanalytical crap,” Della accused.

“Sorry,” Kylie said, smiling. “Sometimes her wisdom just takes me over.”

“Nobody likes a wiseass,” Della smarted back, only half serious.

“Did you kiss him?” Miranda asked.

“Duh, you saw it,” Della said.

“Not Chase, Steve. Did you kiss Steve?”

“No,” Della said. “We just talked.”

“Did you want to kiss him?” Miranda asked.

Della squeezed the can. “I … I don’t know. I didn’t think about it.”

“But you thought about it with Chase, right?”

“No,” Della snapped. “I didn’t think about it. It just happened.”

“Hmm,” said Miranda.

“Don’t ‘hmm’ me,” Della said. “Things between Steve and me are different now.”

“Different how?” Miranda asked.

Della tried to define it and finally said, “He’s … He feels safer.”

“Safe is good,” Kylie said.

“Is it?” Della wasn’t sure. She hadn’t had a lot of time to think about it since she’d been dealing with the cat/dog disaster right after he’d left.