Death (The Devil's Roses #5)

Something about the kiss is satiating me. He's filling me up. The need and the craving are gone. I grab his hair and pull his face away from mine. I breathe right in his face. "Oh my god. I'm so sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I haven’t been feeling so well."

He grins the crooked smile at me and presses his face into mine again. I moan into him and then push him away from me. I shake my head and climb out of his lap. Something isn’t right. Something is wrong with me.

I'm almost running away. He stands and laughs, "Come back."

I frown and shake my head. A piece of sand flies in my eye. I blink and try to get it out. I close my right eye and flutter my left eye. I need to find Shane. I wish I as home and then I am. I'm standing in my room. I gag from the horrid feeling in my belly. I grab my waste bin and heave the contents of my stomach into it. I drop to my knees gagging and coughing. I feel like death.

Taking deep breaths, I try to piece it all together. I look around the room at the sand and rocks on my carpet. How did I get home? Was any of it real?

A knock at my bedroom door startles me.

Gripping the bin, I prepare to explain to my mother that I don’t have the flu. Regardless of what she sees in the bin.

Instead Giselle walks into my room. She looks awful, haunted.

"Hey."

She bites her lip, "I did it again." A single tear drizzles slowly down her cheek.

"What?" I know what. I just want it to be something else.

"I sucked someone else. He died."

My stomach drops, "Who?"

She shakes her head in a twitchy way, "I don’t know. He's not from here." She drops to her knees and looks at my carpet blankly. "You believe me?"

"I did it to." I whisper.

She looks at me, startled, "What?"

I nod, feeling sick again, "I did it to Shane and some guy on the beach. The sucking thing. It filled me up. I wanted to do it." I whisper the words.

Her hand comes to her mouth, "What happened? Is Shane…?"

I shake my head, "No. I don’t think so. He kissed me and my hands started to suck. I thought it was the kiss, like you, but it was my hands. They were on fire. Just dragging something from him. I wanted to touch and suck and then he was gone. There were others. A girl with black hair and eyes and a dark haired guy." I stop. My memory must be mixed. I frown and argue with myself.

"What?"

"He had fangs. And then a blond guy touched me and we were at the secret beach."

"Like, what kind of fangs?" She looks lost. I know I am.

My brain will not make a picture beyond the one it seems to remember. I close my eyes and shake my head, "I don’t know. Like Dracula."

"You saw him and then walked to the beach? That's weird."

I glance up, "No. No I never walked. I don’t know. We just were there. Like how I'm here. I'm just here." I realize my right eye is aching from the sand in it. I look at the sand behind me, "See."

She sits back on her knees and shakes her head, "Aimes, we got a problem."

I feel like crying, "I know. We gotta get out of here. Before we hurt someone else."

She sobs silently. I reach a hand for her. It feels natural even though we are not friends. I know we are not and yet I love her like a sister.

"Can we just go now?"

I squeeze and stand, leaving the puke bin and sand and walk out. "We can go now. But I want to make sure Shane is okay. I think I hurt him. Bad."

"What about the blond?"

I shake my head, "He was fine."

She licks her lips, "We should find him. I'm starving and not for a burger and fries."

We leave my house. I don’t say goodbye to my mom or my dad. I just walk out the front door again. Giselle and I hold hands, as if to protect ourselves from everything.

"Do you think we're vampires too?" She asks after a while.

"No. Maybe like a succubus. I've read about them. But how would we just become a mythical creature? What were we exposed to?"

She shakes her head.

"Let's go find Blake. He'll know."

I drag her down the road. When it forks I turn, walking carefully as we approach his driveway. We round the corner of the house and open the door to the garage with the lock code. We slip through the garage into the hallway. We don't make any noise until, we reach the stairs to the basement. Even then we creep down them very slowly.

I can see the faint glow of the computer screen flashing from the far corner, where I know he sits playing World Of Warcraft. We sneak along, not wanting to scare him or wake his parents, if they are even home. Blake’s parents were lucky he was a calm kid. With the amount of free time he had, he could have been doing the unsavory without any hindrances.

I expect to find him hunched over his computer but it's at the main screen and he isn’t there.

I hear a giggle and turn to look at Giselle. She scowls, "Alise?" She whispers.

I nod, "Gross."

"I know right. Why would she be with him? Like ewww."

I snort, "I was thinking the exact opposite." A small flash of ownership over him trickles through me. He is my best friend and my rock. I hate that she has touched him with her grubby hands. Now I'll have to Lysol him just to have Halo night. Then it dawns on me. Halo night might not happen. Not if I eat people with my sucky thingy.

I grab the computer chair and sit down. My fingers fly over the keyboard.

"Yeah, see. We both have succubus like traits. This is weird. It says here, bear in mind it's all mythology, they feed on souls and essence. Of course it also says they collect semen and impregnate girls."

"Uhm, what? Dude. I don’t collect it. I avoid it. Shit doesn’t come out of clothes."

I put a hand up, "Wow, okay, no. Please. Stop. This isn’t the Monica Lewinski trial. Jesus. Look, this all just sounds like a great way to blame someone else for being pregnant. You know like back in the day when being pregnant and unmarried was something bad."

"Unless you live in the south. I think they still, like, don’t approve."

I nod, "Right. Anyway. This has to be some kind of chemical reaction. Let me see if I can find reactions that cause you to suck the life out of someone."

"Oh like how my mom does that to my dad."

I roll my eyes and let my fingers loose on the keyboard, "Exactly."

"Aimes?"

I turn and smirk at Blake standing in the hallway with a shirt over his naked parts, "Lovely."

He walks backwards back into the room, "Why are you in my house?"

I look back at the computer, "Why are you having sex with my sister?"

"Aimee, you are such a nerd loser. Why are you even here? I know you're jealous."

I sigh and continue to scroll and read. "Frig."

Blake comes out, pulling a space camp shirt on. "Dude, why are you here?"

"We have a problem. I need your help."

"So you brought Giselle with you?"

"She's part of the problem." I slump back in the chair, "Let's say I had an issue with sucking the life out of other people, what would you say?"

He grins, "That would be sweet. Just like Rogue on X-Men. Is it live role play day?" He looks panicked for a moment and glances at his calendar.

I shake my head, "No. Giselle and me are having some issues. Her with the mouth and me with the hands. She killed Mr. Mac after he tried to attack her. She sucked his soul out of him. I almost killed Shane. I think." The words don't feel as crazy as they sound. Like I know they're true. Somehow.

Blake stops rifling the calendar and frowns, "What?"

Alise storms out of the bedroom at the back of the hall, "Oh my god Aimes. You will stop at nothing to ruin our happiness. I get that he's more your type but he said he's liked me for years." She crosses her arms and glares at Giselle. "Why are you here?"

Giselle leaps at her and grabs her face. Alise screams but her scream fades as Giselle's sucking thing starts.

The air changes as Giselle sucks from her. I jump in and grab her. I drag her off and hold her to me. Alise coughs and chokes. Blake grabs her, scowling at us.

"What the hell?"

I sigh. Giselle turns back and growls. I sooth her, "Shhhhhh. Don't do this. You'll regret it."

She shivers, "She tastes nasty. Alise you taste sick."

I laugh.

Alise coughs again and shakes her head, "What the hell was that for bitch?"

I narrow my eyes, "Stop now. Neither of us has a hold on this." I look at Blake, "You know me. You know I wouldn’t make this up."

He nods and crosses his arms over himself, hugging. "Aimes, you need to tell me everything."

Alise gets up and staggers, "She tried to kill me and that’s all you have to say. You're pathetic. You two are freaking crazy." She storms down the hall.

Blake tries to go after her but I shake my head, "She gets past things quickly. This is important."

He clears his throat, "Okay. Start at the beginning."

I sigh and start where I think it started, with chocolate soymilk.

By the time I finish the story his face is cold, he looks confused and scared.

"Do it one more time."

I blink my eyes a few times and then shut the right eye. I wink my left and think about the other side of the room and then I'm there.

He takes a deep breath and nods once, "I believe you, but I'm having a hard time with it all. The science doesn’t make sense. You two, why her? I can see you becoming like this but her? What does she do for society that she deserves a super power?"

I laugh and look back at Giselle, who has fallen asleep on the couch.

"She will look killer in the leather suit." My laugh is bitter. My heart is breaking. I don’t know what to do and I know Shane is out there, with those others.

He nods, "Duly noted. Skintight shiny leather is definitely going to be killer on her. So no oddly glowing space rocks or weird visits in the night by strange men and you haven’t been to any test facilities?"