Authors: Jessica Sorensen
your promises are worthless. At least the ones you
make to me. You promised me you wouldn’t let
anything happened to me and look where it got me.”
He raised his eyebrows, a slight mocking
expression teasing at his lips as he spread his arms
out to the side of him. “It got you here, safe and
sound.”
“Safe and sound,” I repeated, glancing around the
room where no potential danger was evident. I looked
down at my hands, my arms, and, except for the
bandage around my leg, everything appeared to be
fine. I could stil
feel
as wel , my emotions resting
somewhere between confusion, anger, and longing.
But I blame the last feeling on the sparks.
“Gemma,” Alex said, and I looked up at him. “You’re
okay, right?”
I eyed him over warily. I wasn’t sure what to do here.
I didn’t trust him at al , despite the fact that I did seem
to be alright. “I don’t know…Am I?”
He cocked an eyebrow at me. “I’m asking you?”
“Why? You’re the one who knows what happened to
me.” I crossed my arms. “I mean, what’s going on
here? Am I supposed to feel? And where’s Stephan?
Outside the door waiting for you to come check on me
and see if the memoria extracta—or whatever that
stupid memory erasing rock is cal ed—has wiped out
my mind.” My anger simmered hotter as the painful
memories of what had happened to me resurfaced.
“
Memoria
extraho
,” Alex said.
I gaped at him. “What?”
“The memory erasing rock is cal ed a
memoria
extraho
,” he said.
I glared at him. “That’s not important right now. Al I
need to know is what the heck is going on.”
He hesitated, running his fingers through his dark
brown hair, probably trying to conjure up some lie to
tel me. I couldn’t take this. I couldn’t take anymore
lies. I needed to get out of here and away from him,
even though the electricity was tel ing me to do
otherwise.
I darted to the side, starting to swing around him.
“Gemma,” Alex warned, matching my move with
cat-like reflexes. He blocked my escape. “Just listen
to me for a second. If you’l settle down, I’l explain
what’s going on.”
I let out this unnatural y high pitched laugh. “Wil
you?” I asked. “Because you never have before. Not
ful y, anyway.”
“Gemma,” he started, but I was already hopping up
onto the bed, overlooking the pain igniting in my leg
as I dodged around him, and headed for the door.
He stuck his arm out, attempting to catch me in
mid-air as I leapt off of the bed, but he missed me by
a sliver of an inch, and I was able to escape out of the
room.
I wasn’t exactly sure where I was planning on going,
or what would be waiting for me down at the bottom of
the stairs, but I knew I had to get away. Run. Find
Laylen or someone else who would tel me what was
going on.
My bare feet hammered against the stairs as I
charged down them. There was a door just at the
bottom, and the sunlight spil ed through a smal
window at the top of it. If I could just make it outside,
then I could run away to…Wel , I real y hadn’t gotten
that far in my escape plan. Al I knew was that I was
going to run away from this madness. I was sick of the
lies and the secrets. I was sick of monsters and
people trying to harm me.
I reached the bottom of the stairs, my hand
extended out to the doorknob. Just a few steps and I’d
be overtaken with the warm Vegas air and sunshine.
“Gemma,” a voice said from beside of me.
I jumped, my heart racing. For a split second I
thought I was dead. That the person who’d said my
name would be Stephan.
But, thankful y, it wasn’t.
“What the heck?” Laylen said breathlessly, his hand
pressed over his heart. “You scared the heck out of
me.”
“You scared the heck out of me,” I told him, equal y
as breathless.
His bright blue eyes stared at me in astonishment,
almost as if he couldn’t quite believe I was standing
here.
Trust me, I felt the very same way.
For a moment, I just stood there, taking in the sight
of him. His blonde hair, the tips dyed a bright blue.
The dark red shade of his lips with a silver ring looped
through the bottom. The mark of immortality tattooing
across the pale skin of his forearm. It was such a
relief to see him. I had so much I wanted to tel him
and so many questions I wanted to ask.
“Are you alright?” He eyed me over as if he were
checking to see if I was broken. “What were you
running from?”
“I was—”
“From me,” Alex’s voice drifted up from behind me.
I spun around and scooted closer to Laylen.
Alex, in typical Alex style, strol ed lazily down the
stairs, as if he had thought I’d never actual y run away.
“I don’t understand why you have to be so difficult,” he
said, his eyes locked on me like a target, the sparks
reacting with such eagerness that my legs felt a little
weak. “I told you I’d tel you what was going on.
There’s no reason to try and run away.”
“There’s no reason to try and run away,” I said
exasperatedly. “Are you kidding me?”
He frowned as he reached the bottom of the stairs.
As he walked closer to me, I inched myself closer to
Laylen. So close in fact that my shoulder bumped into
his.
Alex’s eyebrows dipped down as he stopped just
short of me. “What do you think I’m going to do to you,
Gemma? Hurt you?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I never know anything
when it comes to you.”
He glowered at me, and I glowered right back, the
electricity heating hotter and hotter the longer our
eyes stayed on one another.
“Gemma,” Laylen said, and for the second time in
just a few short minutes I nearly jumped out of my skin.
“Everything’s okay. No one here’s going to hurt you.”
I looked up at him. And I mean it, I real y had to look
up because Laylen is like six foot four. “Everything’s
okay?” I asked with skepticism. “Real y?”
He nodded. “Yeah, let’s go sit down, and Alex and I
wil explain everything that’s happened.”
I casted a quick glance at Alex, and then looked
back at Laylen. “I want
you
to explain it to me.”
“Gemma, I already said I’d tel you the truth.” Alex
sounded irritated.
I opened my mouth to tel him that I real y didn’t care
what he said he’d do. And that he was a liar. But
Laylen spoke before I got the chance.
“Alex, you real y can’t blame her for not trusting
you.” He paused, deliberating something very charily.
“After what you did.”
That, of course, pissed Alex off. “I didn’t do
anything. And you have some nerve for saying that I
did.”
Laylen got this look on his face that I could tel
meant he was about to say something that might start
a fight. And Alex looked completely ready to fight
back. That’s what these two did sometimes; they got
into arguments that became more heated the more
they opened their mouths.
But I didn’t have time for this right now. I needed to
know what went on back at the cabin, after I’d…
blacked out?
“Can’t you just tel me what happened?” I begged
Laylen. “
Please
. I trust you more than I trust him.”
In
fact, I don’t trust him at all.
Laylen glanced at Alex, who shot him a dirty look,
and returned his bright blue eyes on me. “Yeah, okay.
I’l tel you what I know.”
“Thank you,” I said, feeling slightly less anxious. But
stil anxious enough that my legs were wobbly.
Laylen motioned for me to fol ow him as he swept
through a beaded-curtain doorway, which led us into a
living room with dark blue wal s that were decorated
with shelves holding odd looking knickknacks. Black
and white tile checkerboarded the floor, and a set of
purple velvet couches centered the room, along with
an apothecary table topped with black candles.
Hmm…I was getting a weird sense of
déjà vu
with
this room. Then it dawned on me. “Is this Adessa’s
house?” I asked.
“Yeah.” Laylen took a seat on one of the purple
velvet sofas. “Which is actual y attached to her store.”
I sat down next to him, and Alex, looking annoyed,
dropped down in the chair across from us.
“So where do you want me to begin?” Laylen asked
me. And I liked that he asked, instead of trying to
evade my questions, like a certain someone with
bright green eyes would’ve done.
Having options, though, was kind of confusing me.
“So…um…what happened?” I shook my head at the
ridiculousness of my own question. “I mean, what
happened back in Colorado? And how did we end up
in Vegas?”
Laylen stayed quiet for a second, and I started to
wonder if he even knew the answers to my questions.
Alex had made it clear that, because Laylen was a
vampire, he was no longer part of the Keepers’ world
anymore, making Laylen a little out of the loop on
things.
Laylen brushed his blue-tipped bangs away from
his forehead. “Wel , I guess I’l answer the easy
question first. You’re here at Adessa’s because Aislin
transported us here.”
“What?!” I exclaimed, making Laylen flinch. I
lowered my voice. “Sorry. But how? I mean the last
thing I can remember is being surrounded by a ton of
Death Walkers, and Stephan trying to use some
creepy smoking rock to try and take my mind away.”
“The rock’s cal ed the
memoria
extraho
,” Alex
interrupted.
“Wel , you’d know since you were going to let him
use it on me,” I snapped.
A condescending look rose on his face. “If you’d
just listen to me explain, then you’d realize you’re
wrong.”
“I said I want Laylen to tel me,” I told him firmly.
He shrugged and leaned back in the chair, resting
his hands behind his head al casual and everything.
“Fine. Whatever you want.”
I stared at him, entirely taken off-guard. Huh? Did
he just say whatever you want? To me?
“What,” Alex said, with a blasé attitude. “I was
planning on tel ing you the truth, but if you’re more
likely to believe it from Laylen’s mouth, then it’s better
that he tel s you. That way you won’t have any doubts.”
I shook my head, wondering why he was acting so
cooperative, but figured I would worry about it later, so
I returned my attention back to Laylen. “So how did
you and Aislin end up in Colorado?”
“Wel …I guess to make a long story short, after
Aislin came back to get me in Nevada, those Death
Walkers you and I saw marching through the desert
had reached the house. They ambushed us, but after
a big struggle, Aislin and I managed to escape in the
car. But the Death Walkers cold ruined Aislin’s crystal
again so we had to come here to Adessa’s to get
another one. Then we transported to Colorado.”
“So how did you guys not get attacked by the Death
Walkers when you showed up in Colorado?” I asked.
“And by Stephan? Because the last thing I can
remember was that there were a ton of Death
Walkers around, watching Stephan try to erase my
mind.”
Laylen glanced over at Alex, and they both
exchanged a look I couldn’t quite figure out. My
muscles tensed up as the idea that maybe Laylen
was keeping secrets from me flashed through my
mind. Would he? I mean I barely knew him. But from
the moment I’d met him, my instincts told me I could
trust him. Although I sometimes wondered how much I
could trust my own instincts.
“When Aislin and I showed up there,” Laylen’s
bright blue eyes focused back on me, “Stephan and
the Death Walkers were gone.”
“What,” I said, baffled. “Why would they just leave?”
Laylen looked at Alex again, and I grew even more
uneasy. Something was up. I could feel it through the
sudden heaviness in the air.
“I think maybe you should explain that part to her,”
Laylen told Alex. “It’s more your story to tel , anyway.”
“No,” I protested, shaking my head. “I want you to
tel me.”
Laylen shifted uncomfortably in the sofa. “Look
Gemma, I understand why you want me to tel you. But