Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 122030 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122030 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
A sob escapes my mouth before I can stop it.
But just one. Because I don’t have time for this! I need to get this done! I need to save the world from what we are.
So I look up at the syringe—which is still in my hand, raised above my head—and I count down from three. Two. One… and I just… drop it.
It clatters to the floor and in that same moment, Ryet moans.
I can’t do this.
Maybe—and it’s a big maybe—maybe I could kill myself and live with the consequences. But him?
I don’t know. I don’t think that’s right, I really don’t.
The syringe, the leg, the bed, the drink—it’s all very, very easy in theory.
But I will be killing someone who just yesterday was a friend.
And who the hell am I to make this decision for him?
I’m no savior. I’m not the hero of this story. I’m one of the bad guys. A witch, for fuck’s sake. Made from evil itself.
It’s not my job to save the world.
But what choice do I have? If I don’t die, how do I even get out of here? There must be people downstairs, right? Lots of them. Do I just walk down the stairs and leave?
I walk over to the door, slide the bolt back, and I’m just reaching for the doorknob to crack it open and see if I can hear anything when Ryet moans.
“Hey.” His voice is raspy. I go completely stiff. My grace period is over and I wasted it. Now I have to leave so I grab the doorknob, turn it, and—“I’ll come by your place later.”
I whirl around, stunned. “What?”
He coughs and a bit of blood spills out of his mouth. He licks his lips, his eyes still closed. “I’ll come by your place later. I’m OK. I just need some…”
But he doesn’t finish. I think he just passed out again.
I take my hand off the doorknob and sigh, just like I did last time.
Then I walk over to the bed, sit down next to him—the same way I sat down next to my grandma the night this whole shit show started—and I push some hair out of his eyes.
I could love him. If neither of us were who we are, I could love him.
His ice-cold hand reaches up to cover mine. Then he absently pats me, eyes still closed. “You don’t have to stay. I’m OK.”
He’s not. He’s really, really not. And I want to cry about this so bad. Because I like him. I could love him.
But I don’t have time to think about any of this. “Ryet?” I nudge his shoulder a little.
“Hmm.”
“We have to go, Ryet.” The words spill out, not premeditated, but I find that I really mean them. “We have to go right now. Can you get up?”
His eyes flutter, like he’s trying to open them. And for a moment, I think he’ll do it. That he will just get up, and take over, and fix this. Save me. Like he did my first night in White River when he knocked on my window and I was having a stress breakdown.
But he just doubles up in his fetal position—his face one giant wince—and he moans louder. Because he’s in the middle of something here.
He’s in the process of transforming into a vampire and he’s not capable of saving me.
I deflate a little, scanning the room for some kind of answer. Then I see the little cooler next to the door. The cooler where Lucia was putting all the bags of blood after she bled me out.
I walk over there, open the top, pick up a bag, bite the little plastic tube where the blood should flow out, spit it across the room, walk back over to Ryet, and place the bag up to his lips.
“Here.” I reach under his neck and lift his head up a little. “Drink it, Ryet. We need to go.”
He doesn’t. He’s too busy writhing in pain. So I squeeze a little blood out, wipe it over his lips, and the next time he licks them, he catches on and begins to suck the bag down.
I don’t know how much he’s supposed to get, but I let him take it all because he begins to improve as the minutes tick off.
Finally, his eyes flutter open. They are unfocused at first, like this is just some kind of reflex. But then, slowly, his eyes find mine. We stare at each other for a moment.
And I know what he’s thinking. You did this to me.
And I also know he wants to say it out loud, so I don’t give him the chance. “Paul is gone. I banished him to the other side of the purple. No one has come up here yet, but I don’t know how long we have before they do.”