“Tell me everything,” he commanded. “Start at the beginning.”
So I did. I told him about the past three years and my quest, which had become an obsession. By the time I was finished, my throat was raw, and I’d cried more times than I cared to admit. It was quiet for a long moment in the dim yellow light of the cheap lamp.
But when Matthew finally spoke, his voice was full of awe. “You did all of that, for me?” He turned and pulled away a little so he could stare into my eyes.
“You’re family. Dunemarks stick together. That’s what Dad always said right?”
Matthew’s eyes filled with tears and he barked out a pained laugh. “He meant, like, in the grocery store, idiot. So you wouldn’t wander off.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I know so.” Matthew shook his head and pulled me into the tightest hug imaginable. “Thank you, Hailstorm. Thank you.”
We hugged until I had to tap his arm and say, “You’re breaking me,” because his hold was too tight.
“Sorry.” He shifted back to lean against the headboard once more. “I’m so sad that I don’t get to say goodbye. They’re both gone and I don’t get to—”
“We can say goodbye together if you want,” I offered.
His nod made the headboard creak slightly. “What should we do?”
I grabbed his hand. “Come on. I think this place has a tiny backyard.” I led him out of the bedroom and up the steps, ignoring everyone who looked our way. This time was for Matthew and me alone.
We navigated through the kitchen and out a sliding glass door to a brick patio.
I looked at Matthew. “Do you remember that picture we took of the four of us? The one where you made the water droplets arch over us in a rainbow?”
He nodded and gave a tiny half smile. Then he lifted his pale arm and water droplets raced out of it, rising and spreading into a beautiful arch that hovered in the air three feet in front of us.
I lifted my palm and shot sunlight at an angle, so that the droplets suddenly gleamed with color.
My brother and I stood watching the rainbow for a solid minute, memories soaring through both our minds. Memories of love and laughter and togetherness. And then, as if our minds were synced, we both lowered our hands at the same time and the rainbow faded away.
The next three days were a combination of bliss and heartache as Matthew adapted to his new life. Learning he’d never see sunlight again without risking massive burns across his newly sensitive skin had caused this reaction: “I can handle a little sunburn.” My arrogant-ass brother had walked outside into the pink-streaked dawn against Callum’s advice.
We’d had to drag him in, his skin charred black and smoking after only seconds.
“You smell delicious,” Evan had taunted him.
“Little burnt, but nothing barbecue sauce couldn’t fix,” Z had quipped.
“I’ll eat you both,” Matthew had moaned in misery while I just shook my head. Vampire he might be, but there was still a shit-ton of bullheaded boy left in there too.
Next to me, Callum sighed. “I tried to tell you, it won’t kill you, but if someone traps you in the sun, you’ll wish it could.” The vampire’s dark tone had told me he was speaking from experience. He’d gone back into the kitchen of our first post-rescue safe house, a little cramped two-bedroom in the suburbs, and grabbed a bag of blood he’d stolen from somewhere. He’d come back and handed it over to Matthew, saying, “Drink it so you’ll get your strength back.”
Big brother had nearly vomited trying to drink the bagged blood. Apparently, though blood was a requirement for a vampire’s survival and he’d drank it for years in his crazed state, Matthew’s rational mind had a hard time overcoming his disgust when he knew exactly what it was he was sipping. I loved to tease him about that. In fact, Zavier and I started searching norm jokes about vampires online and we probably exhausted him with our comedic routine.
Z would randomly run up with a pretend microphone and set me up with questions like: “What do you call a vampire that never leaves?”
Matthew would roll his eyes before I could even spit out our amazing punchlines. “A pain in the neck!”
“Ba-dum-tsssss!” Z would smash the imaginary drum kit before he’d stroll off, like nothing happened while I laughed myself silly.
Eventually, I think we annoyed Matthew enough to retaliate, because I woke up one morning to find a severed head on my pillow. I’d screamed, until I’d mistakenly tried to shove it away and realized it was a watermelon that the fucker had enchanted to look like a head.
When Gray had run into my bedroom and realized what happened, my hot crew member had merely laughed. That night he told Matthew, “Oh, man, you have no idea the war you just started.”
He was right.
An hour later, Matthew found himself spelled with uncontrollable, trumpet-like farts. It didn’t matter that he tried to escape into the next room, they got progressively louder and more frequent for over an hour.
Even his new vampire friends hadn’t lifted a finger to help him, they’d just covered their noses and run away, laughing.
My pillow remained head free after that. Because only Gray was willing to wage that kind of war with me.
Matthew might have been my original sensei but the student had become the master.
While my brother adjusted to vampire life slowly, he seemed to get along with my crew easy as pie. Within less than a week, he and Z were trading barbs like brothers and he and Evan set up a round robin video game tournament at the third house Gray procured for us (because we continued to move every other night). I loved how he fit in with my guys; seeing them together made my heart feel full and satisfied, made every damn sacrifice worth it.
I didn’t love how Matthew looked up to Callum, like he was some kind of mentor.
Though the British vampire had helped me on more than one occasion, my instinct was to distrust him. I debated why I felt that way while my crew sat around me on couches, with pizza boxes split open, their cheese innards ripped apart by huge man-hands. They played while a few of Callum’s crew watched and others played a round of poker nearby. His numbers had swollen to nearly fifteen over the past week as he kept going out at night and coming back with a newly sane vampire to add to his coven, as he’d begun to call them. Sixteen, if I counted Matthew, but I didn’t.
I sat back on the couch and tried to ignore the fact that Callum and one of the other vampires headed out the back door to grab their dinner. We had a strict don’t-ask, don’t-tell policy about that, though Matthew often ended up breaking it when he went out to feed every few nights. He couldn’t help telling.
Though vampires could feed without murdering humans, it took practice. Some, like my brother, were more willing to practice than others.
I tried not to focus on their eating habits, instead staring at the screen as my guys shot the heads off enemy combatants and analyzing why it was that I didn’t trust Callum. Was it my prey instinct? He did set off a little warning bell in the back of my head. But Matthew didn’t do the same, so I couldn’t wipe away my discomfort as some brain stem fight-or-flight response to vampires. Even the other vampires in Callum’s coven didn’t make ice slide down my spine. Something about Callum himself didn’t sit right with me. Maybe it was his undisclosed connection to Claude.