Аманда Хокинг - Flutter

The last time we had gone to the vampire club, I had been introduced into a pair of vampires, Lucian and Violet, who became intent on stalking and killing me. Peter had taken care of Lucian, but she had gotten away. Violet had seemed less interested in pursuing me, but like her boyfriend, she had been a caricature of vampirism. Her hair had been dyed purple, her eyeliner was thick black, and she capped her teeth to make them pronounced fang.

“What?” Jack asked, watching me frantically scan the dance floor.

“I don’t know.” I shook my head. I had been positive I had heard Violet’s laugh, and it was a very distinct sound that I wouldn’t easily forget, but I couldn’t see her anywhere.

I was just about to give up looking when a girl at the bar caught my attention. Her long blond hair hung down her back, shimmering like silk under the blue lights. She tilted her head back, laughing at something a drunk guy was saying to her, and I shivered. That was Violet’s laugh. Absently, she looked back over her shoulder, her blue eyes landing on mine, and they flickered with frightened recognition. She had traded in the thick black eyeliner for something subtler, or maybe nonexistent, making her even more beautiful than she had been before. Somehow, she looked even younger, more innocent.

Turning into a vampire made her look around nineteen or twenty, but something in her eyes led me to believe she was younger than that, and she had probably hadn’t been turned for very long either.

“Violet?” I said more to myself, but she instantly looked away, shielding her face with her hair.

“You know her?” Jack was at my side, looking at her quizzically. He had only met her very briefly when she looked much different, so he didn’t recognize her, but he was on edge anyway.

“I think that’s Violet.” Without really thinking, I started to walk towards her, but Jack put his hand on my arm.

“Wait, wait. That’s the girl that was stalking you before?” Jack’s eyebrows crinkled with concern and confusion. “Why are you going to talk to her? Are you gonna…” His face darkened. Peter had been the one that had saved my life that night, not him, and it had been a hard thing for him to get over.

“What are you gonna do?”

“I don’t know. I wanna talk to her,” I shook my head, unable to explain myself.

“What’s going on?” Milo asked. He was still standing in the doorway, his arm around his boyfriend, looking impatiently at me. He had to yet to see Violet, and I suspected that was for the best.

He would take running into her much worse than I would.

“I’ll be right back,” I told him, then hurried over to Violet before she hid or escaped. Jack was right behind me, but he didn’t try to stop me.

The drunk guy talking to her was mid-sentence, and she stood up without explanation, preparing to get away. I know I should’ve felt angry. She had almost gotten me, Milo, and Jane killed, but I wasn’t out for revenge. I just… wanted to talk to her. She looked so normal now, and I was a vampire, too.

The playing field was even, and I wanted to know what the hell she had been doing before.

“Hey. Violet.” I blocked her path, and she looked up at me, her eyes wide. All of her former cockiness was long gone, and I suspected that had a lot to do with the death of her boyfriend.

“I don’t know what you want but…” She trailed off, her eyes flicking nervously from me to Jack. The piercing she had in her face was gone, too, and she pushed her hair back from her face. Her short nails were painted purple, the only sign of her former getup. “I don’t want any trouble.”

“Neither do I,” I admitted, and I glanced back at Jack to make sure he wasn’t glaring at her or anything. In truth, Jack had such an open face, it was pretty hard for him to look threatening unless he was really pissed off.

“What do you want then?” Violet demanded, crossing her arms over her chest. She was trying to look strong and angry, but without the confidence behind it, she just looked like a whiny child.

“I don’t know.” I chewed my lip before asking her what I really wanted to know. “Before, when you were chasing after me… what exactly were you planning on doing with me?”

“I didn’t want anything with you!” Violet insisted vehemently, her eyes wide. “I mean, at first, I went after you as a lark because you were so…” She lowered her eyes and shook her head. “I was mostly teasing you. But Lucian, he wouldn’t let it go. I don’t know what he wanted. I think he just liked the idea of stealing you from another vampire.”

“Well, but now he’s gone and she’s a vampire, so that’s settled then,” Jack interjected with a clumsy smile. He was afraid that we might suddenly battle to the death or something, and he was eager to end the conversation.

“How old are you?” I asked pointedly, ignoring Jack.

“I don’t why that matters,” Violet replied, but she looked flustered. I just stared at her until finally she answered. “I was fourteen when I turned, and that was like two years ago.” A strand of blond hair fell into her eyes, and she looked at me, as if daring me to defy her. “Look, it wasn’t my idea. Not going after you, not turning into a vampire. It was all Lucian. He thought this was all some great big fantasy, and he tracked somebody down that would turn him, and then stupidly, I had him turn me.” She shook her head again, trying to keep me from noticing the tears standing in her eyes. “But he’s dead. And I’m over it.

So…” Blinking hard, she looked at me evenly. “Are we through?”

“Yeah. Sure,” I nodded, unable to think of a reason to keep her talking to me.

Violet brushed past me, disappearing into the dance floor. Even after everything she had put me through, I felt this strange sadness for her. I couldn’t imagine going through the whole process of turning without Jack or Ezra or even Milo to guide me. To be so powerful and so young and so confused and alone.

It would be impossibly terrifying. She had just been a dumb kid playing around with Hot Topic makeup, and she had gotten in way over her head.

“You okay?” Jack touched my arm gently.

“Yeah.” Then I remembered that we weren’t here to check up on my enemies and make sure they were happy. Jane was here somewhere, probably losing blood as we spoke. “Sorry. Let’s go.”

Bobby was still clamped onto Milo’s side when we reached them, and I was starting to wonder why he even came here. Despite his fondness for my brother, he seemed rather frightened and upset by everything going on around here. Not that I blamed him, but that didn’t explain why he would keep coming.

“Who was that girl you were talking to?” Milo asked, and Bobby craned his neck around to see what girl he was talking about. Violet was long gone, though, and that was just as well.

“Nobody. Where’s Jane?” I said.

“I haven’t seen her yet, but we’ve just been waiting here,” Milo gave me an irritated look, so I pushed past him into the adjoining room.

The light above glowed dull red, the kind of lighting that was most pleasing to vampires’ eyes. This room was smaller than the last, and dressed more like a bar or a coffee shop than a club.

Several soft looking couches filled the room, and there was a small bar in a very dark corner. That bar served drinks too, but ones that were served best at 98.6 degrees. There were lots of doors and darkened hallways leading out of it, and while I had never been in one of the rooms, I knew exactly what they were for. Some vampires required more privacy when they were with the bloodwhores, while others were camped out on the couch, drinking openly from their human donors.

With one quick scan of the room, I knew Jane wasn’t there. Her heartbeat and her scent were almost as familiar to me as Jack and Milo’s, and they were nowhere in this room. I turned back to look at Milo, and I could tell he had come to the same conclusion as me.