Page 12 of Kept 4
I don’t respond, just hang up the phone. He knows how I feel. There is no point saying it, making it any worse than it is.
But no sooner than I have ended the call, than I receive an email with an attachment.
Gritting my teeth as I see what it is, I make my way out of the alley and, avoiding the shocked stares of locals and tourists alike, limp back to my hostel, pulling scraps of discarded paper, something that smells like baby shit, and a prawn shell from my hair as I go.
Leaving the shower wrapped in my towel, I sit by the window in my hostel room and stare down at the passers-by on the streets below.
Getting back to my room had been a nightmare, but last night, I shudder, that was beyond a nightmare. Such violence, such anger, such retribution – I’d only ever seen it in movies and briefly, really briefly, when Elsbeth had attacked me. But now, now I could truly say I knew what it was like to be punched in the face, have my arms broken, have my head pushed underwater until my lungs felt like they were on fire and have my neck snapped. And yes, I knew what it was like to die – and no, my life had not flashed before me. I’d seen no guiding white light, no deceased parents stretching their loving arms out to welcome me into the afterlife – there was nothing, nothing but pain and cold and fear.
I think back over the night, the hunters and their questions, my foolishness in not being more careful. I should have realised the couple who kept staring at me in the restaurant was up to no good. I should not have ventured into the streets alone at night, especially knowing the kinds of things that roam after dark. I should not have come to Rennes, and I definitely should not have forgotten that the hunters were out there too and that they might be pissed.
I’d never asked Nicholas what he did with James’ remains, if he had even cleaned them up. I guess in all the palaver of my own almost-death and reincarnation as a Kept, I’d simply forgotten all about him. Until now.
Now I feel terrible because, in my own way, I’d helped get both Lucy and James murdered, not that either of them had been the most trustworthy or reliable allies, but they had offered to help me, and that was not something I took lightly. I hadn’t lied when I’d told my captors I didn’t know where James’ body was, I really didn’t. But I had certainly lied about his weapon, which I had hidden safely at Ereston prior to leaving, in a location no one would ever, ever think to look.
‘If I could just get away now, I would go somewhere far, far away, like Asia, or maybe the middle-east, then maybe, just maybe I could live a normal life and forget all this ever happened.’
But even as I think this, I know I haven’t got a hope in hell. What was it they had said? Oh yes, that they would not stop until the weapon was recovered. And there is only one person who knows where that is now; me. I don’t think it will take them too long to figure that out, once they piece together the information I gave them, under torture, together with what they already knew.
I’m certain the hunters will never give up looking for it, and never give up looking for me if they figure out my bond with Nicholas. But providing I am not seen by them again, providing they continue to think I’m dead, have no idea I am Kept – I should be able to evade them.
I think back over any information I might have given them that I shouldn’t have.
“He was murdered by Elsbeth,” I told them, gasping for breath as they held my face up from the river momentarily, “dismembered.”
“Did he give you something before he died?” the woman with the intense eyes hissed, “something of great power?”
“No, he was already dead when I got there.”
“How did you escape?”
“I told you, the vampire, Lord Montague; he saved me.”
“Yes,” the older man with the posh accent grunted as he pushed my face back down into the water, “a vampire would save his whore – right after he killed the hunter who trusted her and thought he was going to rescue her, but walked into a trap, you bitch.”
I would have answered, but, after all, I was drowning.
Still, they weren’t finished with me yet. They brought me up a fourth time.
“Where is the weapon?” the woman snarled, “James would not have ventured to the grounds of a monster without it. Where is it?”
“I don’t know of any weapon,” I lied, “I was reading the vampire’s journals for James, he said he wanted to know of an ancient vampire, I found nothing. He promised to take me with him if I didn’t discover any hints within a fortnight – I rendezvoused with him so that he could spirit me away. I promise it was no trap.”
They looked at one another, the woman shrugged, and the man snapped my neck and pushed my head back down, and I drowned. But not before an image flashed before my eyes of Nicholas, and I sent out a final thought of my love for him, my longing.
Then, of course, I woke up in the skip bin realising I now have more than a bloodthirsty, obsessed Elsbeth to fear – I have a whole team of hunters, now enemies, to also evade.
Unless Nicholas can destroy Elsbeth, then I’ll only have one set of murderous bastards to keep ahead of.
I shake my head and pick up my phone. I don’t want to read the scanned documents he has sent, I do, but I don’t. I know I will never be able to get this man, this vampire out of my system if I keep in contact with him, and yet… I resolve this will be the last journal entry of his I ever read, take a deep breath, and open the email.
New entry
I cannot bear to stay here, at Ereston, now that she is no longer here.
I thought I might be more content here, in this manor, now that for the first time in its long history, it had known love within its walls.
But I was wrong.
