Page 84 of Envious Of Fire
This is all too much for Elias suddenly. Between Kyle not being home and the nightmares, he isn’t sure he has room for yet another supernatural conundrum. “He won’t know what to do any more than I would.”
Cade doesn’t seem satisfied with that. “Kyle always knows what to do. These past several months since he’s lived here in this town, I may not have known the ‘real’ him all that well, but he was always a great listener. He’s patient. He’s persistent.”
“And he’s gone.” Elias turns away, grips his head. “Fuck, I really need some coffee right now.” He heads for the kitchen.
Layna issues a sigh. “Mom, it’s nothing, like I said. We just need to go to the doctor and—”
“More like a witch doctor,” mumbles Cade, to which her daughter says something else, and then the two are bickering back and forth in a way Elias might otherwise find entertaining, had he even an ounce more patience left in his weary bones.
He stops at the kitchen counter, considers putting on a pot of coffee and offering them a drink to see if he can calm them down, change the mood, anything at all.
That’s when his eyes fall on the scribbled note resting by his favorite mug.
A note in Kyle’s handwriting.
He snatches it up at once, devours the words. There aren’t many. He lowers the note to the counter, stares off, silent. His heart rages in his chest, thumping blood with a terrible cocktail of fear and anger.
He barely notices when Cade’s calm voice comes from the kitchen archway. “Everything okay?”
Elias slowly turns, leans back against the counter, continues staring off at nothing, the words swimming laps in his head. He can even hear Kyle’s voice reading them, as if he’s speaking in his ear right now, saying his message over and over.
Cade comes up. “He left a note?” she asks. Elias just nods, out of it. Cade takes the note from his loose fingers and looks it over herself. “Elias. I need to be able to protect my loved ones,” she reads. “I have to learn more about my kind.My kind,” she repeats to herself, sounding sympathetic, then resumes. “I hope you understand. I love you. Just one night of my life they asked for. That’s all I’ll give them. I’ll be back soon. Love, Kyle.”
“Fucking lied to me,” breathes Elias, in shock.
Cade looks up. “Who? Kyle?”
“Said he wouldn’t do this. Said he wouldn’t just—just—”
“What’s he talking about here? ‘One night of my life they asked for.’ Who’s ‘they’?”
“Vampires. Fucking godforsaken real-ass vampires.”
Cade steps back. “Real vampires? What’s Kyle, then?”
“Not anything like them.”
“I’m confused.”
“Can’t blame you.” Elias stares at his mug, the one with “R.I.P. SLEEP” written across it, realizing at once that he has neither appetite nor thirst anymore. He swears, if Lazarus had encountered him while he wasn’t strapped down to the bed, thisvampire whose face he doesn’t even know, he would pound him six feet into the ground with his bare fists. He wonders if he has ever felt rage like this before.
Of course he has. He grew up with nothing. Then his mom and dad became rich overnight. Las Vegas became his home, including a handful of successful establishments, each bigger than the last, feeding his parents’ ambitions. Then came the Scarlet Sands just a few years ago, and his life changed. His dad vanished from the picture. His mom grew greedier, more controlling. Elias grew reckless. Too many nights, he fell asleep with rage in his heart. It’s amazing, what alcohol can do for such rages, converting Elias into a giddy drunk who couldn’t be bothered by any evil in the world. Come to think of it, he’s drank so little since coming to this dusty town. Instead, he himself has become the drink—Kyle’s drink. He’s known so little rage since being here.
And the moment Kyle’s gone, he feels it again.
Bubbling forth like a poison.
Elias can’t keep sitting on the sidelines of Kyle’s journey to find himself. Why does all the responsibility of protecting this town fall on Kyle’s shoulders? Elias can do something about it, too. He lives here, too. He’s not powerless. He’s not helpless.
The problem is, all his power and connections reside in the very part of his life he just worked so hard to free himself from.
A part he may have to return to.
“I swear I could kill you, Kyle Bentley Amos,” he growls to himself, “if I didn’t love you so fucking much.”
“Kyle probably feels a little guilty,” suggests Cade. “Juan’s been putting a lot of pressure on him—you know Chief Rojas. He still blames Kyle for everything. Then there’s that Patrick guy still sitting in our jail, totally off the books, forcing Juan to break laws I doubt he’s ever broken in his life. None of it is Kyle’s fault.”
“Yeah, that Chief Rojas can be a real prick when he wants to be,” says Elias, “but he’s just doing his job as best as he can, I know. Kyle knows, too. He’s the least of my worries.”
