I heard the door open and close, the same upper hinge screaming, then footsteps leading away from my room. Throwing the covers back, I rushed to open the door, catching only the glimpse of a shadow on the wall as the person turned the corner. I ran to the hallway’s end, but the person was gone. There was no one on the steps and nowhere else they could’ve gone.
A louder set of footsteps came from the hall below, leading to the same staircase of which I was currently perched at the top. Leaning over the railing, Asa’s dark eyes met mine.
“What’s the matter?”
“Someone was in my room.”
He cursed and jogged up the steps, brushing past me. I ran after him as he opened my door and inhaled deeply. “Do you recognize the scent? Whoever it was stood behind the door.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Terah.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“I assure you I’m not,” he vowed. “I’ll talk to her.”
“Why are you helping me?” I asked. “What’s in it for you?” Men like Asa never did anything out of the goodness of their hearts, because that part of them, if it ever did, no longer existed.
Even though it was dark, his irises seemed to darken into coals. “Go back to sleep. Titus will return in a few minutes.”
Neither giving me the courtesy of an answer nor a chance to argue, Asa marched back the way he came in search of his sister. I didn’t like that he was being nice, and I especially didn’t like Terah sneaking into my room at night. At the very least, that girl would smother me with a pillow if she could. She hated me. She hated all of us.
I went back to my room and undressed, leaving on just my tech suit. Comfortable, I lay back down and waited for Titus. In less than ten minutes, he returned with a basket full of supplies, which he plopped down on the desk. “You’re awake.”
“I had a visitor.”
“Asa?”
“Terah.”
His brows popped up. “What did she want?”
“To creep into my room while I was sleeping,” I smarted. “I think she realized fairly early that I was awake, so she left rather quickly.”
“We need to figure this tech thing out and get the hell out of here,” he declared, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “And until we can, we stay together. You and me – got it?”
Nodding, I agreed, “Got it.” Except I wanted to see Enoch. I wanted to spend some time with him before we jumped again.
“So, you know that someone tried to kill your clone last week.”
“Asa mentioned it, but didn’t say how.” I sat up.
Titus brought a chair close. “Asa said she was walking in the garden out back after dinner last week, and someone rushed out of the tall hedges and stabbed her in the stomach.”
My eyes flicked to the place on his side where Abram had run him through. “Who was it?”
“No one knows. 1776 thought it was a man, but all she saw was that the person was hooded. She didn’t see who it was. They got away while she was hurt, assuming they’d delivered a death blow.”
“Her suit healed her.”
“Yep. And whomever stabbed her knows she can heal herself,” he warned.
“It could’ve been Terah,” I remarked. Why else would she be skulking around my room? I wished Enoch were here now. Although, he was protective of his sister. Would he defend me against her if it came to it?
Titus scrubbed his hands down his face. “I need to get to work figuring this out, and you need to rest. If the person who stabbed your clone decides to finish the job, you need to be strong enough to fight him – or her – off.”
“I hate it when you’re so damn logical,” I grumped.
Titus puffed out his chest. “Which is all the time. You know, Enoch was right. This thing between me and you never would’ve worked. You’re too stubborn and I’m too smart, and we’re both too pretty to be a real couple.”
“Sad, but true,” I deadpanned, flopping back onto my pillow, a wayward feather flying out of the seam.
Titus groaned. “That reminds me. I have a chicken coop to fix tomorrow.”
“I’ll help,” I volunteered.
“Fine,” he complained with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I guess I’ll let you.”
Titus moved to the desk and arranged what looked like thirty candles in an arch, placing the clone’s hand tech in the center. “I need to steal the lamp from the hall. I’ll be right back.”
I couldn’t relax until he was back inside. He sat the lamp down and locked the door, then scooted a wooden chest in front of it. “There. We’ll definitely hear someone trying to come in now.”
He sat at the desk, working on removing tiny screws with the sharp tip of a too-large knife. “Stop watching me and sleep,” he chastised. “Think of Enoch. He’ll be here soon.”
I closed my eyes and listened. I thought of Enoch and wished he would burst through the door and rush upstairs and into my room. I’d throw my arms around him and inhale the scent that was purely Enoch. What did he look like in this time? Asa still had long hair. Would Enoch? I wanted to run my fingers through it. I wanted to hear all that he’d done in the last almost-century.
I listened and thought for hours until I felt like I was in the ocean again, weightless but falling deeper into the water…
Chapter Seven
Abram
Victor once told me that he was a self-made man. That his diligence, work ethic, valor, and strength was what propelled him to the top. He, a simple member of the military, eventually became its commander. Those who used to give him orders now took orders from him. He described the battle of human versus vampire as an intricate game of strategy, one in which he declared himself the most proficient.
From what I’d learned, I was now in seventeen-seventy-seven, a little more than a year after America had declared its independence from Britain. Even though independence had been claimed, the war still raged heedlessly. Most of the fighting was happening in the north, but lesser battles were being waged throughout our fledgling nation. I’d been following a British regiment as they made their way north in an attempt to close in around the Continental Army. There were so many men milling about that when a few went missing, no one took notice. It made feeding convenient.
But there was another reason I stayed close. The men were scared, and frightened men babble. In the last several hours, I’d overheard a group of them speak of vampires, in particular about a company of them led by a captain named Asa. Asa, according to these men, never lost a battle. Asa was fast becoming a legend, a terrifying myth these men did not want to face.
If Asa and his company were tracking this regiment, I might quickly find their trail. And if we met on a battlefield, it could give me the chance I needed to end him. To these soldiers who have lived in fear of my target for so long, I could give them the victory they craved and prove Asa was not the mythical being they fantasized him to be. Part of me wondered if I would be remiss in helping the Redcoats win any battle against the men fighting for independence; but was my job not to oppose Asa at every turn? My mission was and still is to end him. Unlike my errant counterparts, I had not forgotten the vow I made to end my target.