Hyde (The Devil's Roses 3)

It was no wonder she looked weak and thin. The bartender who had her the first time would have tasted her weakness in her blood but the Dark One at the club wouldn’t have cared what he tasted.

The bartender had tasted the illness and told her never to come back, he'd been trying to save her.

He looked back to see her sitting on the driftwood, huddled into herself.

His fists clenched thinking about what he would do to Tony. He smiled thinking he would bring Lucas and Ben with him. Nothing was more classic than vampires and werewolves fighting.

He looked out at the sea watching the waves roll in, thinking about how he would tell Aimee about her sister.

Chapter Fourteen: You're making me Batty, not that kind of Batty

Hanna

She watched him working quietly.

"So do you eat animals or people?"

He smirked not taking his eyes off the work in front of him, "Never eat animals. You are what you eat my love."

"Have you killed people?"

"What do you think?"

"I want you to say no."

"I killed your father."

"I watched that girl do it. I know you never."

He glanced at her, "I made the elixir he was taking for nearly a decade. It was killing him, suppressing the beast."

She shrugged, "Its not what I mean. I mean have you drank until they were dead?"

He watched her face as he spoke plainly, "Yes."

She shivered, "When was the last time?"

He sighed rubbing his eyes, "Few years ago, no wait. Uhm well it was at a movie release. Scarlet O'Hara, Gone with the Wind. So it was, uhm. I don’t know. What year is it now?"

She laughed, "2012. The last time was in the thirties? You last drained a human in the thirties and you thought that was a few years ago?"

He blushed, "I'm old Hanna. Like old, old. Time passes when a hundred years have gone by. I don’t recall what was going on. I just remember that when I tasted her blood it was good. I couldn’t stop." He laughed, "No that’s not true. I could have stopped, but I didn’t want to."

She cringed, "What is wrong with you?"

"I have no soul. No beating heart. You've seen the movies I would imagine. They're not so far off."

"How did the information about you and my dad get published into novels?"

He laughed, "Disinformation of sorts. People have discovered us. Witch hunts, burnings, the Spanish inquisition, all our fault. Fortunately none of our kind was ever harmed, just regular people. Women mostly. So rumors were spread, myths and lore. It made it seem as if it were entertainment instead of fact."

"Garlic and holy water?"

He looked annoyed, "Totally false but the day light thing is true for every vampire beyond myself. It's partly why I've never had a relationship with a vampire. I can't imagine being with someone who couldn’t go out in the sunlight."

She hadn’t ever imagined he would have a relationship with another person. He seemed so closed off and cold.

"Your skin isn’t cold."

He chuckled looking back down at the map he was drawing with weird letters and numbers, "No it isn’t. It also isn’t hard as a diamond. It cuts, its soft."

"Can you be killed?"

He shook his head, "I am what Aleksander is, I am cursed. I heal instantly. No man made weapon or even Aimee can kill me. I believe if Lorri ever got the chance she might be able to, but I ensure I'm never around her."

She thought about everything that had been explained to her about Lorri being the devil. Roland and Lydia had rambled many things at her.

"Who are the good guys and bad guys in it all?"

He pointed at her, "Last question. I don’t believe there are necessarily good or bad. I believe the good have committed the same crimes as the bad so who are they to judge. The Roses, Lorri's goon squad thinks they're the good guys, protecting the humans from us freaks. Daniel and his monsters, who used to be Roses, think of humans as sheep. They believe humans are the lesser species and must bow before the rest of us as gods. They believe what they are doing is for the good of the rest of us."

"Where do you fit in?"

He dropped his pencil and walked to her. He stood between her thighs looking down on her, "With you. I said last question and I bloody mean it. You're driving me batty."

She opened her mouth but he growled, "NO I don’t turn into a bat and don’t you dare even think about asking it."

She snapped her mouth shut and smiled. He bent kissing her lips softly.

The questions were rolling around in her mind.

Chapter Fifteen: Boston be Damned

Aleksander

The doctor shook his head as he spoke, the words got lost but in the sentences somewhere he heard, "No chance…hopeless…such a shame…"

Aleksander looked at Giselle taking it all in. Her face never changed, she accepted the fate with grace and calm. He found her behavior alarming.

He looked at her sitting on the bed in her hospital gown, "I will be right back. I need to make a call."

She looked at him breaking his heart with her devastating beauty, "Okay."

He walked from the room feeling desperate.

He dialed quickly.

His heart clenched as she answered her phone, "Hello."

"Aimes I need you to come to the hospital. I'm in Portland at the Science University. I'm at emergency."

"I don’t understand. Are you okay?"

He chuckled bitterly, "Yes of course, I'm here with Giselle."

"What? Be there now."

The phone went dead.

Suddenly he could hear the telltale click of her boots on the linoleum floor.

He looked back at the entrance to the emergency ward.

Her face was drawn and panicked.

He pointed to the room, "Wait for the doctor to leave. She'll be a mess when she sees you. She doesn’t understand why you’ve left her alone in the world."

He hated saying it to her. He hated hurting her that way.

Her face pinched, "I never thought, my dad said she was fine. I just didn’t know how to fix it." Her head hung.

He put his arms around her trying desperately to control himself and not smell her hair or kiss the top of her head.

"How did you find her?"

He pulled her back and looked into her blue grey eyes, "It was a tip from a friend at the blood bar Master Mikes."

She looked confused, "She's hanging with Vamps?"

He nodded, "She has been blood drugged repeatedly for the last two or three weeks. Her liver has started to shut down again. The transplant with her was always fragile I guess."

"Well wouldn’t their blood heal her?"

"If they gave her a day or two in between feedings and gave her blood that wasn’t loaded with drugs yeah. The blood is probably the only reason she isn’t dead right now."

Aimee's tears rolled down her face, killing him inside.

"I need to message Shane, he needs to be here for this."

Aleks nodded, "I'll wait with her."

He turned and walked away wishing he could find some closure. He wished for even the smallest ability to not think about kissing her or the memories of her.

Giselle sat alone in the room, "They're like admitting me. I'm being taken to the room in like the next five minutes."

He nodded, "Aimee is here. I called her."

She looked around, "Where are we?"

"Portland."

"How? We were on the beach and then like everything went black."

"You fainted. I have the ability to move to a place quickly, like flying sort of."

She snickered, "I've seen it all I guess. Like this one time I was at that blood bar and this one girl had these green eyes. They looked like cats eyes and Tony said they were tiger's eyes. She was a tiger. I was like no way but he said those shifters are every where."

"You need to get some rest. Try not to get too excited when Aimee comes in okay. You could hurt yourself."

She shook her head, "I feel pretty good."

"It’s the drugs."

Her face went pale, "What drugs? I don’t do drugs. The doctors know I can't have any drugs right?"

He shook his head, "The vampires at the bar take mass amount of drugs and it's in their blood stream and when humans eat their blood they get high. It makes the humans more free and willing, well to try new things." His voice cracked.

She gasped, "What? No."

He nodded.

Her dark doe eyes filled with tears making her face considerably more attractive. He felt his knees getting weak watching her.

He would have calmed her down and made her more relaxed if his charm worked on her but it didn’t. He wondered about it.

"Giselle?"

He looked back seeing Aimee enter the room slowly.

"AIMES! Oh my god! Aimes you look hot. No wait I'm pissed at you."

Aimee looked full of remorse, "Giselle I had to stay away. I was sick."

Giselle raised an eyebrow, "Your sister and Blake said that you were an evil killer now."

"You've seen them?" She asked without answering.

Giselle nodded, "Yeah. Alise has been by a couple times when Blake had work here. Well in Seattle not here."

Aimee looked confused, "His work. I thought he was at MIT?"

Giselle smiled, "Yeah duh, he works at the school now."

Aimee didn’t look convinced, "He works at the school. After a year and a half he's working there?"

Aleks felt the answer hitting him square in the face suddenly, "Who took you to the blood bar for the first time, the one down town Seattle?"

She shrugged, "Blake took me and Alise. They had been there before."

Aimee looked like she would throw up, "What?"

Giselle nodded, "Yeah he wanted to see the vampires. He liked to watch them bite me and Alise." Her cheeks reddened.