Bloodlines (Bloodlines, #1)(32)

The question was directed to me, and Lee jumped off the counter. “I’ll take the cue. Is Jill still in the den?” Adrian nodded, and Lee glanced at me questioningly. “Do you want me to . . . ?”

I nodded. “That’d be great. Thank you.”

Lee left, and Adrian glanced back at me curiously. “What was that about?”

“Oh, we thought Lee might be able to help Jill with her problems,” I explained. “Since he can relate.”

“Problems?”

“Yeah, you know. Adjusting to living with humans.”

“Oh,” said Adrian. He produced a pack of cigarettes and, to my complete astonishment, lit up right in front of me. “That. Yeah, I guess that’s good. But that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about. I need you to get me out of this place.”

I was startled. This wasn’t about Jill?

“Out of Palm Springs?” I asked.

“No! Out of this place.” He gestured around him. “It’s like living in a retirement home! Clarence is taking a nap right now, and he eats at five. It’s so boring.”

“You’ve only been here for two days.”

“And that’s more than enough. The only thing keeping me alive is that he keeps a hefty supply of liquor on hand. But at the rate I’m going, that’ll be gone by the weekend. Jesus Christ, I’m climbing the walls.” His eyes fell on the cross at my neck. “Oh. Sorry. No offense to Jesus.”

I was still too baffled by the unexpected topic to feel much offense. “What about Lee? He’s here, right?”

“Yes,” agreed Adrian. “Sometimes. But he’s busy with . . . hell, I don’t know. School stuff. He’s going back to Los Angeles tomorrow, and that’ll be another boring night for me. Besides . . .” He looked around conspiratorially. “Lee’s nice enough, but he’s not . . . well, he’s not really into having fun. Not the way I am.”

“That might be a good thing,” I pointed out.

“No morality lectures, Sage. And hey, like I said, I like him okay, but he’s not here enough. When he is, he keeps to himself. He’s always checking himself out in the mirror, even more than I do. I heard him worrying about gray hair the other day.”

I didn’t care about Lee’s eccentricities. “Where would you even want to go? You don’t want . . .” A very unpleasant thought came to me. “You don’t want to enroll at Amberwood, do you?”

“What, and play 21 Jump Street with the rest of you? No, thank you.”

“Twenty-one what?”

“Never mind. Look.” He put out the cigarette—on the counter—which I thought was kind of ridiculous since he’d hardly smoked any of it. Why bother with such a filthy habit if you weren’t going to use it all? “I need my own place, okay? You guys make things happen. Can’t you get me some swank bachelor’s pad like Keith has downtown so I can party with all the rich vacationers? Drinking alone is sad and pathetic. I need people. Even human people.”

“No,” I said. “I’m not authorized to do that. You aren’t . . . well, you aren’t really my responsibility. We’re just taking care of Jill—and Eddie, since he’s her bodyguard.”

Adrian scowled. “What about a car? Can you do that?”

I shook my head.

“What about your car? What if I drop you guys back off at the school and then borrow it for a while?”

“No,” I said swiftly. That was probably the craziest suggestion he could’ve made. Latte was my baby. I certainly wasn’t about to lend it out to a heavy drinker—especially to one who also happened to be a vampire. If there was ever a vampire who seemed particularly irresponsible, it was Adrian Ivashkov.

“You’re killing me here, Sage!”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“Exactly my point.”

“Look,” I said, growing irritated. “I told you. You’re not my responsibility. Talk to Abe if you want things changed. Isn’t he the reason you’re here?”

Adrian’s annoyance and self-pity shifted to wariness. “What do you know about that?”

Right. He didn’t know I’d overheard their conversation.

“I mean, he’s the one who brought you guys here and made the arrangements with Clarence, right?” I hoped that would be convincing enough—and maybe yield me a little information on what Abe’s master plan was.

“Yes,” Adrian said, after several seconds of intense scrutiny. “But Abe wants me to stay in this tomb. If I got my own place, we’d have to keep it secret from him.”

I scoffed. “Then I’m definitely not helping, even if I could. You couldn’t pay me to cross Abe.”

I could see Adrian bracing for another argument and decided to make my exit. Turning my back on him and any further protests, I headed out of the kitchen and back to the living room. There, I found Jill and Lee talking, and she wore the first genuine smile I’d seen in a while. She laughed at some comment he made and then looked up at my entrance.

“Hey, Sydney,” she said.

“Hey,” I said. “Are you about ready to go?”

“Is it time?” she asked. Both she and Lee looked disappointed, but then she answered her own question. “I guess it is. You probably have homework, and Eddie’s probably worried already.”