I blink back tears, my arms closing around my middle feeling the warmth leaving my body. “I know you were watching me, but you should know I was watching you, too. In a different way. From the day you moved in, I felt you. I didn’t know what it meant at the time. I thought it was just the changes that were happening inside of me, but now I know. I love you.”
The three words slip out, and the silence inside the car is so loud I’m sure I’ve just ruined everything.
“I love you too, Seleme. I have since the moment I saw you. I didn’t believe in love.” He lets out another laugh, deep and full of irony. “Or vampires. But now I believe in both. I may be mortal, but you make me feel I’m going to live forever.”
Before I can answer, the car is surrounded by white doves. Nearly twenty swirl and fly around as the car and we both watch then look at each other.
Maxim finally speaks. “What the fuck was that?”
I shake my head. “I’m not sure. My world is strange, but I don’t know what the doves are about. We’ve been finding them dead on the front doorstep, now this.”
They fly in a circle around the car then seem to flutter in place for a moment before disappearing into the sky leaving us wide eyed and shaking our heads.
“Those aren’t doves.” Maxim finally speaks. “They’re love birds.”
I shrug. “I’m sorry I don’t know what it means. I’ll ask my friend Anna when I see her, she might know…”
Maxim clears his throat then asks. “Tell me about this other family, what I need to know.”
“This other family, the Messinas, they are strong. Compared to them, my father is nothing. They could crush him without a second thought. They won’t be happy about what we’re going to tell them, and part of me wishes we could just run away together right now and never face them. But if I don’t go in, and midnight comes and goes, I don’t know what they will do to my mother and father.”
“Well, what does ‘not happy’ mean, exactly?”
“I’m not sure. They’re powerful and scary. Imagine every evil vampire stereotype you’ve ever heard, and then add on an extra layer of sinister and you’ll be somewhere close. It’s like…paying the mob to keep your bar or business safe. They are the protectors, but they are also the threat.”
“Okay. I can’t say I know exactly how to approach this, but we’re going to try to be civilized and see what happens. In the end, you’re leaving with me, that’s all I know. Come what may.”
He reaches over and cups my cheek, and it takes every ounce of restraint I have not to jump into his lap and cling to him like a child. He seems so calm in the face of such absurdity, and I want to borrow just a fraction of that confidence.
“Now, let’s go inside. We’ve got business to tend to.”
The chill chases me as we approach the front door and it opens on its own, drawing a humorless chuckle from Maxim.
“Yeah, there are some strange things in my world.”
“I’ll adjust,” he says, his eyes darting around the foyer as he closes the door behind us.
“You’re late.” My father wanders over from his study. “Your clothes are a mess. And you’ve brought a guest.”
He eyes Maxim, then me, with wide eyes, running his tongue across his teeth, his sharp incisors more pronounced than usual. He’s losing some control, which is a sign not only of how much he needs to feed, but of how nervous he’s feeling right now.
“Sir.” Maxim steps forward, placing himself in front of me as he extends his hand, but my father only eyes him icily. “Seleme’s told me what she was going to do here tonight. And, just so everyone is clear straight up, it’s not happening.”
I hold my breath as my father silently regards Maxim, then I catch the sound of others as my mother, Alberto, his father, Michael, and two other Messinas step out from the study. Despite his confidence, I sense Maxim recoil from the sight of them, their long, gaunt faces like paper in the blue candlelight.
“What’s this?” Michael glides forward as my mother tries to step back, but one of the two Messina bodyguards has his hand at the back of her neck, and there is fear in her eyes.
“Nothing,” my father snaps, his eyes not leaving Maxim. “Our guest is leaving.”
Michael glances at the grandfather clock on the opposite wall of the foyer, an exact replica of the one in my dollhouse upstairs. “Are you sure? Because I could swear this seems like a problem.” It is only a few minutes before midnight, and the tension in the room is stifling.