Page 84 of Bitten By Desire
Yes.Several times. And Theo hadn’t just stared. He’d given me the biggest hickey ever. I nodded my head.
“And he had his hands on you in the maze. Didn’t his skin feel cold?”
“Yeah.” Every time he touched me I shivered. And there was a chill in the air even when I was just near him.
“And you know he’s lying about who he is.” He gestured to the sweatshirt I’d stolen from Theo’s house.
Definitely.
“He also looks exactly the same as he did ten years ago, right?”
“Mhm,” Zoey said. “And as much as I believe in a good workout, it doesn’t prevent wrinkles. The only real conclusion is that he’s immortal.”
Really? Theonlyconclusion? I was really irritated with her. I’d brought up all these valid points before. But if I was being honest, I hadn’t wanted to believe it either. I wanted to be wrong. About all of it.
“And whose doors don’t have security alarms, but the garage windows do? I think we both know what was in those big freezers in his garage.”
“Dead bodies?” Zoey whispered.
“No.” Bennett shook his head. “Blood. Lots of blood.”
Okay…but where did he get so much blood? I was pretty sure huge freezers filled with blood meant lots of dead bodies too. But I couldn’t ask because the waiter walked up to our table balancing a tray in his hand.
He dropped off our burgers. “Anything else I can get you?”
I shook my head. I could barely even look at my burger. The ketchup dribbling down the side suddenly didn’t seem appetizing at all. I felt like I was going to be sick.
The waiter wandered off as Zoey took a huge bite. Apparently her appetite was fine.
She cleared her throat. “So Theo killed those people in the hay maze?”
“Obviously,” I said.
“That’s so messed up. I can’t believe you made me break into his house, Emma. We could have been killed.”
Bennett shook his head. “No. Theo didn’t do that.”
Wait, what?
“Vampires suck your blood. They don’t rip people’s hands off. Fangs didn’t do that. Theo probablywandered into the maze because he smelled blood though. And that’s when he ran into Emma.”
I swallowed hard.
“You’re lucky I found you when I did,” Bennett said. “Vampires get a little unhinged whenever they smell blood. Without a doubt, he would have killed you if I hadn’t shown up.”
I believed him. Theo had looked like he wanted to hurt me. I remembered the way his eyes had fallen to my neck.“I tried to warn you.”His words echoed in my head.
Zoey finished chewing her bite. “So there’s a vampireanda murderer loose in this town? God, what is happening to the world?”
“Not necessarily,” Bennett said. “If vampires exist…maybe something else exists that we all thought was made up.” His eyes searched mine.
“Even more monsters?” I shuddered. “I hope not. It’s probably just a serial killer.” I didn’t want to even think about the possibility of more monsters living among us.
Bennett pushed his burger aside. Apparently I wasn’t the only one who had lost my appetite. “Yeah,” he said. “Probably.”
The serial killer didn’t seem like a problem right now. I was much more concerned about Theo and that voicemail we’d left him. And the fact that Zoey had let him walk into her house. “So…what are we going to do? He’s expecting me to show up to work tomorrow. I don’t want to get my blood sucked.” But that was partially a lie. Because God, I loved Theo’s lips on my skin. I shook away the thought. I was pretty sure I needed to go to therapy.
“You’re going to quit,” Bennett said.
