Blood Memories

"Your maker once said we are the despised of God's children. We live in darkness and deserve no comfort."

"That's ridiculous. We used to be mortal ourselves. If that's true, where did the first vampires come from?"

"Spirits. Before the world was made, a mass of black clouds existed in its place. When God made the world, spirits rebelled and entered the bodies of dead mortals."

What? Did Julian believe any of this? Maybe Edward had been some sort of heathen or atheist, because he had never talked like this-not that I was buying into it either. But does it make any less sense than other religions? Does it sound any less plausible than four billion years of evolution being condensed into six days?

"So why did you make Maggie? Didn't you want her to stay with you?" I pitched my tone to suggest deference, childlike innocence. Challenging him would have been a mistake.

The question threw him anyway. "A crime… but letting her beauty fade seemed a sin. Not before, not since, has anyone matched my Maggie." He smiled weakly. "Julian would think us mad."

That was it. Possibly not even in life had Philip experienced true loss, mourning. Emotion confused him, and this kind of pain was new.

"Why did you come here, Philip?"

"For you. I came for you."

The ambiguity of his answer brought fear rushing back. I rolled over and up, gauging the distance to Wade's door.

"Worried about your pet?"

"He's not a pet."

"You should silence him, little one. He knows what you are, doesn't he?"

I wanted to smash his face with a brass lamp, but I'd lose, and Wade would die. "No, please. He doesn't know much-just some guy I seduced for help. Don't hurt him."

That was a bad play, and Philip knew it. Vampires don't worry about each other, much less about one insignificant mortal.

"You are a curious thing," he said. "But when Julian comes, your pet will die anyway. Come with me, and he might live."

"Why would you want that?"

"Maggie helped you. Edward helped you. At the beginning, they were on the brink of despair. Oh, don't look so shocked. I know more of Edward than you think. He'd have jumped off a porch a hundred years sooner were it not for you." His handsome face grew intense. "What did you give them?" he demanded.

"Nothing."

"Come, tell me. I am more than Edward was."

Bastard. He was taking me whether I wanted to go or not. Defeat ebbed my power, faded my gift, brought anger to the surface. "You're nothing compared to Edward. Would you take in an orphan and a half-mad undead? Bathe them? Feed them from your arm? Don't compare yourself to him."

I might as well have slapped him. Perhaps no one ever spoke to him like that. He took a step toward me and stopped. "Odd thing. Cold without your gift."

"As you."

Gazing down, his eyes reminded me of Maggie's again. Did he have any of her fire for living? For hunting? Compassion for old cripples like William? Or was he empty?

And then it occurred to me that everyone else was really gone-except Julian, who didn't count. If I wanted companionship from my own kind, Philip was the last boy in town. Sorry thought.

"Come with me," he said. "Your little friend will live."

Wade deserved to live, more than the rest of us. But what would he think upon waking? That I'd deserted him? It didn't matter. Maybe he'd go back home and be safe.

Stopping only to pick up Maggie's wool coat, I got up and followed Philip.

Chapter 19

Do you have a car?" I asked as we stepped outside the hotel.

Instead of answering, he looked up and down the street, then walked to an early-eighties, dirty-blue Camaro and climbed in the driver's side.

He couldn't possibly have rented this. What a piece of junk. Hardly his style.

"You should lock your doors down here anyway," I said. "Somebody too drunk to see might steal it."

His answering laugh made me nervous. The interior looked even worse. Marlboro boxes, Hershey bar wrappers, and Big Gulp cups covered the backseat and floor. As I slammed my door, Philip reached up with both hands and jerked the steering column five inches out of the dash, exposing red, black, and green wires.

"What are you doing?"

"Rewiring the ignition," he answered casually, as if we were talking about fall fashions.

Later I felt ashamed of my own reaction. "You can't do that. It's illegal."

Laughing again as the engine roared, he squealed the tires while pulling into traffic. "You are too tame. Or is this your gift again, eh?"

"Philip, stop the car. If the police catch you, they'll lock you in a cell."

Doing seventy-five as we hit the southbound on-ramp for Seattle, he glanced at me warily. "What are police to us? They are too slow to catch us. Bullets don't hurt us."

"So what do you do when you get pulled over?"

"I don't pull over unless I'm hungry."