Chapter 6

Crying was the one thing Jo hated almost as much as Vampires, so she didn’t let herself sob for too long before she broke into a mental pep talk and went to the kitchen to grab a leftover napkin from takeout and blew her nose. “This is stupid,” she muttered, wadding the flimsy paper into a ball and tossing it into the overflowing trash can in the kitchen. “I can’t let those shitheads walk into my house and make me feel bad for something none of them can ever understand.”

She drummed her fingernails on the chipped Formica counter and contemplated what to do. She wished a stiff drink would do her some good, but it had been a long time since alcohol or anything else had an effect on her--not that that had kept her from trying. Before she Transformed at seventeen, she’d done more drinking and smoking than most kids her age--all behind her parents’ back, which had been hard because her dad always seemed to know everything. As soon as Jo had Transformed, though, the only drug that ever seemed to do any good was adrenaline, so she sought it out of every crevice she could coax it from. It was hard to live on the edge when there was only one thing that could kill you, but Jo did her best to emulate all of the scenarios she could find that would bring a human version of herself to her knees. That and driving as recklessly as possible, faster than a blazing bat out of Hades, gave her the endorphins she needed to remind herself that she was alive. When she was flying down the highway, when she was eradicating evil, the dark memories that filled her mind every other moment of her life faded away.

It was too late for her to go back out tonight. She checked the time on her phone to make sure, but grumbled when she saw it was past 3:30. By now, some early-riser humans would be out and about, and that always complicated things. Besides, the police had been all over the scene of her last adrenaline rush. There wasn’t much chance they’d traced her back here, especially since she hadn’t even been the one to ride her bike home, but there was no sense going back out into it, just in case.

Despite the fact that it did nothing for her, Jo grabbed a beer from the fridge and plunked herself down on the couch, a hiss emanating from the tired springs, and a sprinkle of dust filling the air. She was used to the dump, so it didn’t bother her, but she hated that her family had seen how low she’d drooped. Thoughts of the apartment she’d grown up in--the one with the signed artwork from famous painters and marble everything--brought back a flood of memories of happier times, ones that needed to be drowned in Budweiser.

Her phone was still in her hand, so she scrolled through it aimlessly, her mind elsewhere. No matter how many times she told herself not to even think about what Elliott had said, his words echoed through her mind. She was the best they had. They needed her. While it had never been a contest to her, part of her knew in her heart he was right. Cadon was a beast, having inherited their father’s speed and their mother’s accuracy. But Jo had gotten both of those traits, plus Dad’s intuition and Mom’s instincts. If Holland had actually gotten out of the Blood Moon Portal, it was as much a mystery as how the Egyptians had built the pyramids, and there was no way of knowing what sort of strengths she’d have now, on her fourth reincarnation. One thing they could all be certain of was the fact that she would be nearly impossible to kill.

If there was even a slight chance that her dad was right and it was Holland he’d seen, Jo wanted in on it. Fighting Vampires was in her blood. But more than that, more than the challenge of killing someone almost as powerful as you, was the thought that taking out Holland was the only way she could ever get vengeance for her mother--because one way or another, whatever had happened to Cadence Findley McReynolds, Jo knew Holland had to be behind it, even if she wasn’t on the planet at the time. But now, Jo thought maybe she was. Maybe the others wanted to capture the bitch and make her talk. Jo just wanted to rip her fucking head off.

Going back would be nearly impossible to do, though. She’d burned those bridges to the ground, not a trace left behind. Regardless of what Uncle Elliott said, none of them loved her--especially not her dad, not after the way she’d spoken to him the last time she’d seen him. If he did, he would’ve called, would’ve showed up. They only wanted her now because of her gun. If she was just in it for the kill, that might be enough. But it wasn’t the kind of decision she wanted to make at the moment, and the moments were ticking by.

Jo’s fingers scrolled to her contacts and she stopped at the bottom, hesitating. In a time like this, she needed guidance, a friend she trusted, and there weren’t a lot of names that popped into her head that met that criteria. But one did. The only problem was, the situation with him was complex in a different sort of way, and since the only sort of adrenaline rush she could possibly get that night would have to come from something other than motorcycles or mayhem, she hesitated to introduce a spark to the already volatile situation.

Blowing out a hot breath, Jo took another swig of beer and stared at her phone. She didn’t need his assistance in making this decision. Her mind was already made up. She wasn’t going. That was the end of it. Let someone else take Holland in and interrogate her. All Vampires were the same after all, all of them deserved to die. They could chase the bitch around while she took out a couple hundred others. She shook her head, tossed the phone away, and watched another sprinkle of dust puff out of the yellow and brown flowers of the rotting couch.

Leaning forward with her elbows on her knees, Jo stared across the room at the one framed picture she still had. She had left it behind once but found herself turning back and tracing her footsteps almost three hundred miles to retrieve it.

Memories of the day in the photo took on a life of their own, becoming moving pictures in her mind. Walking along the beach, hand in hand with her mother while her brother and dad built a sandcastle. They’d rented a private island for a beach get-away, one of the few family vacations they’d ever taken that didn’t get interrupted by work. In the snapshot, a rogue wave had rolled up on them with more velocity than they’d expected, and both Jo and her mom were laughing, droplets of water flying everywhere, their wavy hair blowing in the breeze. Her dad had caught the image and framed it for her when they got back from the trip, and it had sat on her nightstand for nine years. Until the day her mother disappeared.

With tears streaming down her cheeks, Jo reached over, grabbed her phone, and clicked on Zane’s name.