Meg Cabot - Insatiable

Meena opened her mouth to say that it was ridiculous to suggest that Lucien was behind the kidnapping attempt on her. True, she did remember exacting a promise from him, right before falling asleep in his arms at dawn, that he would go away and never come back…otherwise he was going to kill her brother and Alaric.

But kidnap her against her will so that they could be together? Never. Lucien loved her, and she him. He would never have sent anyone to do such a thing to her. He’d have kidnapped her himself.

Wait. No, he wouldn’t.

Would he?

Abraham Holtzman, however, didn’t give her the chance to say a word.

“The best thing we can do right now is batten down the hatches, as they say, and prepare for a long night. You and I can defend ourselves, of course, but this young lady here…” He sent a compassionate glance in Yalena’s direction; she still stood in the doorway, Sister Gertrude’s arm around her. “Well, she’s best off safely tucked in bed, I think.”

Sister Gertrude nodded, not seeming at all ruffled at the suggestion that her church might come under vampire attack now that it was getting dark out.

“I’ll put some garlic on her door, for good measure,” the nun said with a hearty nod.

“Excellent idea,” Abraham Holtzman said. “The oldies are still the goodies.”

“And I’ve got my Beretta semiautomatic,” Sister Gertrude added cheerfully, patting her habit, “right here with the silver bullets. That ought to take out a few of those dirtbags.”

Meena’s eyes widened. No wonder she had such a bad feeling about all this.

These people were completely nuts.

Yalena surprised everyone by opening her mouth and trying to speak. “I-” Her blue-eyed gaze was fixed on Meena. Yalena stood in the doorway, wrapped in the absurdly huge comforter, with the stout little nun’s arm around her.

“I-sorry,” Yalena finally managed to say, a tear escaping from one swollen eyelid and trickling slowly down her bruised cheek. “I not want to call you, Meena. I not want to g-get you in trouble like I in trouble. But he find the card you give me. Right away, he find it. And today, for some reason, they make me call you. They say they do to me what they do to…the other girls if I don’t. I so sorry!”

She flung both her trembling hands over her face and burst into sobs. Sister Gertrude tsk-tsked with her tongue and hugged Yalena’s slight form fiercely to her bosom.

“There, there, dear,” Sister Gertrude said. “They’re nasty, nasty creatures. You mustn’t blame yourself. You didn’t know.”

“I not know,” Yalena sobbed into Sister Gertrude’s habit. “I not know!”

Meena got up from the kitchen table and went to lay a hand on Yalena’s slender back, her heart twisting for the girl.

“It’s all right, Yalena,” she said. “It was good that you called me. I told you to, remember? I said I’d help you, and I did.” Well, technically, Alaric had. But she was the one who’d brought Alaric and his sword arm along. “But,” Meena added, “I need to know…what other girls?”

Yalena lifted her bruised, tear-stained face from Sister Gertrude’s shoulder and said, sniffling, “For the bankers. Gerald, he not a manager for actresses.” Yalena looked infinitely sad. “He only wants girls to feed to the bankers.”

“To feed to the bankers?” Meena shook her head, completely confused…and horrified. “Yalena, what are you talking about?”

“The bankers,” Yalena said. Her eyes were wide with terror. “That they make into the vampires.”

7:30 P.M. EST, Saturday, April 17

Shrine of St. Clare

154 Sullivan Street

New York, New York

Oh, my God,” Meena said after Sister Gertrude had taken Yalena-sobbing too incoherently to get any more sense out of her-off to bed.

“What?” Abraham Holtzman looked down at her distractedly. “Oh, right. Sister Gertrude. Yes, she’s quite an amazing woman. St. Clare, who was a contemporary of St. Francis of Assisi, founded her own order just for women, the Poor Clares. Oh-and this might be of particular interest to you, Miss Harper-St. Clare is also the patron saint of television, due to the fact that she-”

“Please,” Meena said, trying not to sound impolite. “I didn’t mean Sister Gertrude. I meant…”

Before Meena had a chance to go on, heavy footsteps sounded in the corridor outside the kitchen. Then the swinging door burst open to reveal Alaric Wulf, a swathe of his blond hair falling over one eye.

“Is…is he dead?” Meena asked hesitantly. She was torn between hoping they’d killed Stefan, who’d done such terrible things to Yalena, and being horrified at herself for wishing anyone dead, even a vampire.

“Just taking a break,” Alaric said. He stalked straight to the rectory’s industrial-sized fridge. “I’m thirsty.”

Meena stared at him as he reached for the milk, then straightened and began chugging the contents directly from the bottle, without bothering to pour it into a glass first.

Well, she supposed killing vampires was his job, after all. It wasn’t any wonder he treated it somewhat…cavalierly.

And now that his boss had explained about his childhood, Meena thought she understood Alaric Wulf’s lack of interpersonal skills and manners as well.

“What did he say?” Abraham Holtzman asked his fellow guardsman eagerly. “Did he talk, Wulf?”

Alaric’s small mouth twisted with bitter humor. “That’s a good one, Holtzman. You’re filled with jocularity tonight, I see.”

“Listen,” Meena said, glancing back and forth between the two men. “I, uh, really appreciate everything you’ve done for me. Honestly, I do. But if it’s all the same to you, I’m tired after a really exhausting day, and I’d really like to go now. Plus”-her eyes flashed with defiance, even though Alaric was only regarding her mildly over the milk bottle, not challenging her in any way-“and I know what you’re going to say to this, so I don’t even know why I’m bothering, but here goes: I really think if I could just talk to Lucien, on the phone, we could clear a lot of this up. Just let me call him. Some of the stuff Yalena said…I don’t think he knows about it. And…well…” She added the last part in a rush: “Jack Bauer needs to be walked.”

Still holding the milk in one hand, Alaric’s glance shifted toward the windows and the growing darkness beyond them. Meena could think of only one way to describe his expression as she mentioned her dog:

He looked as if someone had kicked him in the gut.

To her surprise, he didn’t mention anything about what she’d said concerning Lucien. He only murmured, as if speaking to himself, his gaze shifting away from the darkening windows, “The dog. I forgot about the dog.”

“What?” Meena looked from Alaric to the windows to Abraham Holtzman, who’d also gone pale. She didn’t need to be psychic to know that the tension in the room had gone up about ten notches.

“What do you mean, you forgot about the dog?” she asked. “Why do you have that look on your face?”

Before either man could respond, the swinging door to the kitchen burst open again, and her brother came in. He, however, didn’t possess anything like Alaric Wulf’s swagger. He was shuffling like an old man, his shoulders slumped, his expression dazed. He seemed to look straight through Meena. In fact, she wasn’t sure he was even aware of her presence until he mumbled, when he came alongside her, “Meen…you should have been there. It…it was unreal.”

That’s when she realized he meant what had been going on in the rectory basement…from which she hadn’t heard any screaming in a while, which was why she’d asked if Stefan was dead.