Revelations (6 page)

In this dirty, smelly suite. Didn’t they have housekeeping? Why was this allowed?

Newspapers stacked waist-high, empty cans littered about, ashtrays overflowing with cigarette butts.

“Sorry for the mess.”

She took a seat on the corner of a plaid sofa that was covered with the remains of the Sunday
Times.
She suddenly felt so tired. She’d been waiting for him to come back, dreaming about it for so long—and now he was here, but it was nothing at all like she’d imagined.

Everything was wrong, wrong, wrong. He had tried to hurt Schuyler; he had tried to hurt
her.

As if he knew what she was thinking, Dylan spoke. “Bliss, I don’t know what came over me back there. You know I would never…never …”

Bliss nodded curtly. She wanted to believe him, but the strength of his force of will on her mind still throbbed. He had done this to her, cut her with a knife—a mental one, but that did not diminish the sharpness of its blade.

Dylan sat next to her on the couch and pulled her to him. What was he doing?
Now
he wanted to kiss her?
Now
he wanted them to be together? When he’d done nothing but make her believe he didn’t want that?

She had to agree with Schuyler and Oliver. Dylan was dangerous. He had changed.

Was he corrupted? Was he turning into a Silver Blood? He’d taken Aggie, hadn’t he? After their meeting at the Odeon they had placed Dylan in the back of a taxi, and Bliss had had a quick, whispered conference with Sky and Ollie.

“He can’t be alone.”

“I’ll stay with him,” she’d promised them.

“Be careful. He’s not the same.”

“He’s not
sane.”

“I know,” Bliss admitted.

“What are we going to do?”

“We’ll figure it out. We always do.” That was Oliver. Always optimistic.

And now here she was, in this dirty, smelly room, with the boy she’d once loved so much her heart had ached for months after his disappearance.

Dylan peeled off his jacket. It was a nylon one, a light beige windbreaker, the kind they sold at warehouse stores where you could buy tires in the same aisle as your underwear.

She dimly remembered stuffing a bloody leather jacket in the trash. Whatever happened to that? Incinerated.

She stiffened as his hand grazed her arm lightly.

“What are you doing?” she asked, wanting to be angry but feeling a rushing, queasy excitement instead. He was so different from the Red Blood boys she’d had. Mimi was right—there was something about being with your own kind that got the blood flowing in a different way.

He nuzzled her cheek. “Bliss…” The way he said her name, so softly, so intimately, his breath warm in her ear.

“Stay with me,” he said. Before she could even halfheartedly protest, he had deftly maneuvered it so they were lying on the couch, her knees underneath his, his thighs pressing against hers, his hands entwined in her hair, and she was running her hands all over his chest—he’d gotten scrawny, but there was a hardness to his muscles that hadn’t been there before—then his tongue was in her mouth…and it was so sweet…She could feel the tears behind her eyes slipping down her cheek, and he was kissing those away too…God, she had missed him…He had hurt her, but maybe you only hurt the ones you love?

He fumbled for the hem of her shirt, and she helped him lift it up; he buried his face in the hollow beneath her neck, and then suddenly he jumped away, as if burned.

“You still have that thing,” he said, leaning as far back as he could, pressed up against the other end of the couch, away from her.
“Palma Diabolos
…” He was speaking in a language she could not understand.

“What?” she asked, still dizzy from his kisses. Still feeling drunk with his scent. She looked at where he was pointing.

The necklace. Lucifer’s Bane. The emerald hung in a chain over her heart. Somehow she had never returned it to her father’s safe. Somehow she had gotten into the habit of wearing it everywhere.

It comforted her to know it was there. When she touched it, she felt…better. Safe.

More like herself.

Dylan looked stricken. “I can’t kiss you with that thing around your neck.”

“What?” Bliss pulled her shirt back over her head.

He continued to look as if he’d been poisoned. “You’ve been wearing that all along.

So that’s why I couldn’t … I knew there was a reason.” Then he was babbling again. In a different language. This time it sounded Chinese.

Bliss put her shirt back on. He was
incredible.
She’d been a total idiot. Okay, so maybe she’d promised Schuyler and Oliver she’d keep an eye on him, but it wasn’t like he was a danger anymore. He knew Schuyler wasn’t a Silver Blood. Plus, he was old enough to take care of himself.

She certainly wasn’t going to stay here one second longer. She was humiliated. She had no idea how he really felt about her. He ran hot and cold. One minute he was ripping her clothes off, and the next minute he was cringing away from her as if her body were the most disgusting thing he’d ever seen. She was tired of this game.

“You’re leaving?” Dylan asked as she gathered her things and headed toward the door.

“For now.”

He gazed at her sadly. “I miss you when you’re gone.”

Bliss nodded as if he’d just told her something innocuous about the weather. Dylan could take his hangdog eyes and his sexy voice somewhere else. She just wanted to be alone.

Eleven

“Last call, guys,” the waitress informed them “Another Campari?” she asked Oliver.

He rattled the ice cubes and emptied his cocktail glass in one gulp. “Sure.”

“Anything for you?”

Schuyler considered another glass of Johnnie Walker Black. She used to hate the taste of whiskey but lately had developed a liking for it. It was fiery and sweet and succulent—the closest thing you could get to the taste of blood. Oliver had once asked her to describe what it tasted like, since he didn’t see the appeal. To him, blood tasted metallic and faintly sweet.

Schuyler explained that vampires tasted blood with a different sense—it was like drinking fire.

Hence, her newfound love of whiskey.

“Sure, why not,” she told the waitress. It wasn’t like it was going to get her drunk.

Although Oliver looked like he was well on his way. He’d come into the habit of fortifying himself with alcohol whenever they got together. Sure, he wasn’t drunk when they were together at school—but those abrupt reunions were so brief it didn’t matter. But she noticed whenever they spent a substantial amount of time together, he was always a little buzzed.

The waitress returned with two cocktail glasses filled to the brim. It was way past midnight, and the only people left in the place were groggy-eyed clubkids getting breakfast after a late night spent at velvet-rope champagnalias, or groggy-eyed clubkids getting breakfast before an early-morning stint at after-hours lounges where no alcohol was served and the clientele preferred their highs to be chemical ones.

Oliver sipped his cocktail through a red straw. She found it endearing how he liked sweet things. Oliver hated beer and all the usual trappings of what he called “el jocko-Americano.” Somehow the girly drinks made him more manly, in Schuyler’s eyes. He wasn’t afraid to be himself.

It was so nice to finally hang out with Oliver in public. She couldn’t very well sink her fangs into him with other people around. Lately, whenever they were alone, it hovered in the air, an expectation on his part, and Schuyler had missed their easy friendship. She relaxed in his company.

“Why do you drink so much around me?” she asked, trying to keep her voice light.

“I’m offended. You think I’m a lush?”

“A little.”

“I don’t know.” He looked up at the ceiling instead of looking at her directly. “Dude, you scare me sometimes.”

Schuyler wanted to laugh. “I scare you?”

“Yeah, you’re all—vampire superwoman. You could have really done some damage to him, you know.” Oliver grinned, although Schuyler knew he was more troubled than he let on.

“He’s fine,” she snapped. She didn’t really want to dwell on what could have happened back there. She had had Dylan in her grasp. She had felt his mind bowing to hers. Had felt all his memories screaming to be let free. And she had wanted nothing more than to crush all of them—silence all their voices. She’d had it in her power to do so. It was a sobering thought, so she took another sip of her drink.

“He’s not fine,” Oliver said. “You know we have to tell Lawrence about him, don’t you? They’ll have to do something about it. He’s showing classic signs of corruption.

Delusions, hysteria, mania.”

A busboy cleared their table and gave them the eye. Schuyler knew they should leave, the staff was ready to go home. But she wanted to linger with Oliver just a while longer.

“How do you know all this?”

“I did my reading. You know, the stuff Lawrence told us to look up?”

Right. Schuyler felt guilty. She had been remiss on her vampire lessons. Lawrence had been using Oliver to keep her abreast on her studies. She should be concentrating on refining her strengths, on sharpening her skills, but instead she’d been distracted. The Perry Street apartment…

“Do you think Dylan was lying to us?” she asked.

“No, I think he thought he was telling us the truth, as much as he knew. But he’s obviously been manipulated.” Oliver cracked ice cubes in his mouth. “I don’t know if I believe he ever really got away from them. I think they let him go.”

Schuyler became silent. They had let him go so that he could finish the job he’d failed at before. Dylan had attacked her—twice—before he’d suddenly disappeared. They’d chosen him because he was close to her, was one of her best friends. She couldn’t deny it: someone wanted her killed. She wanted to share this realization with Oliver, but kept it to herself. He worried about her enough.

Oliver glanced at the bill and put down his credit card. “So, how are things over at the Death Star?”

“The same.” Schuyler smiled, although she felt sick enough to throw up. It was hard to see Oliver and not hate herself because of what she was doing to him.

“So…” Oliver sighed. Schuyler knew where this was going and wished once again that she hadn’t made him her familiar.

“So?”

The waitress returned with the credit-card slip and hinted that if they stayed any longer they’d have to leave through the back entrance.

Oliver pocketed his card and tried to take another gulp of his already empty drink. “I was on my way to meet you at the Mercer when Bliss called. She said you were down here, on Perry Street. I thought that was kind of odd, since we’d agreed we’d meet at the Mercer, as usual, but she said she was positive you’d be there. What were you doing in that building anyway?”

Schuyler wouldn’t look him in the eye. “Modeling thing. Linda Farnsworth has a place for the models to crash there. Bliss and I go there sometimes to hang out with a couple other girls. I didn’t realize the time. I’m sorry I kept you waiting.”

“Well, um, since we didn’t get to meet like we’d planned, do you want to…”

It was easier to rebuff him this time, since she’d already made her decision earlier.

Schuyler shook her head. “No, I’ve got to be back for the curfew. I’m late enough as it is, and if Charles finds out—”

“Fuck Charles.” Oliver flicked a toothpick across the table so it landed on the floor. “I mean, God, sometimes I’m so tired of all this shit.”

“Ollie—”

“I just want us to be together,” he said, looking at the ceiling again. “I mean, I know it’s not possible. But why not? Why should we follow the old laws? Why should anyone care anyway?” he railed. “Don’t you want us to be together?” he challenged, an edge to his voice.

Schuyler was moved to take his hand in hers. “I do, Ollie, you know I do.” He was her ally, her partner-in-crime, her conscience and her comfort.

Oliver’s face transformed into a look of utmost happiness and satisfaction. He smiled at her then, and Schuyler hoped with all her heart that he would never find out the truth.

Twelve

It was late when Mimi and Jack finally wobbled out of Per Se. The bill for their meal was in the four-figure range, not that Mimi was surprised. She was so used to paying exorbitant prices for everything in her life, she sometimes complained when she discovered something was cheaper than she’d expected. “What do they think, that I’m poor?” she sniffed.

“That I can’t afford FIJI Water?”

Jack chided her for her extravagance. “It’s the mistake of the nouveau riche, you know, believing that having a lot of money is the same as having an infinite amount of money.”

Mimi stared at him incredulously. “Did you just call me nouveau riche?”

Jack barked a laugh as they got on the elevator. “I guess so.”

“Bastard!” Mimi pretended to be terribly offended. “Our money is so old it’s drawing social security. Bankruptcy’s out of the question. We’re flush.”

“I hope so. Didn’t you say Lawrence reported a huge dip in earnings? And I’ve listened in on the latest investor appraisals. FNN is down several points. It’s not good news.”

She faked a big yawn. “Don’t bore me with details. I’m not worried.”

They walked out into the night. Across the street, horses hitched to hansom cabs awaited clueless tourists. It was cold—the last dredge of winter. Vestiges of the most recent snowstorm remained in the form of yellowy, cracked ice on top of garbage bins and the sidewalks.

Jack raised his hand, and a sleek black Bentley as large as a hearse pulled up to the curb.

“Home?” Mimi asked as she slid into the seat.

Jack leaned over, his arm resting on the edge of the door. “I’ll see you there in a bit. I told Bryce and Jamie I’d meet them at the club.”

“Oh.”

He bussed her cheek. “Don’t wait up, okay?” Then he shut the door and rapped smartly on the window. “Take her home, Sully.”

Mimi waved at him through the tinted glass, her good mood evaporating as she watched him walk across the street to catch a cab headed downtown.

“Home, Miss Force?” Sully turned around.

She was about to nod. She was tired. Home sounded like a good idea. Though she was a little piqued that she had to go home alone. She toyed with the idea of following him, but Jack had been so devoted of late…There was nothing to suspect … He always met Bryce Cutting and Jamie Kip at the club…silly boys. And besides, she’d been watching him like a hawk in the past few weeks, ever since Venice, and had felt guilty because she had found nothing. What was she so worried about anyway?