Page 72 of Stalked

It was toxic.

I placed my hands on his chest and pushed him away slightly, giving us some distance, and backed away from him. I pulled my phone from my pocket and heard Caleb mumble something under his breath.

Shannon’s phone rang once before she picked it up. “Jesus, Mercy. You scared the fuck out of me!” she said. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, and no,” I said, trying to hold back my laugh from her immediate response to my calling. “Look, Shannon, I don’t have a lot of time to explain, but—”

“Riley found me after he left Lily’s,” she said. “He told me she had gone missing and how Caleb took you and—. I swear to God, if Caleb laid a finger on you …”

“No, I’m okay. Caleb didn’t hurt me,” I said.

I heard an audible sigh of relief come from her.

“Listen, Shannon. I need to explain something to you that you might want to sit down for.” I suddenly felt nervous about telling her.

I heard a heavy breath on the other end of the line. “Is this about you being a witch and vampires are after you?”

“Wait, how?” I gasped.

“Riley told me,” Shannon said. “The call was brief, but he let me know so I could hide out for a bit, since your friends were being targeted.”

“Wow,” I said. “Shannon, it took me, who has felt the powers running through my blood, at least a few days to grasp that it was all real.”

“Oh, come on Mercy,” she said. “We’ve known each other since we were five years old.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means that sometimes things happen to us that scare us so badly, that we have to deny it, so we don’t have to face the gravity of the truth. That’s why we have best friends to help us come to accept that you can be a little weirdo, and that’s okay.” Shannon and I both laughed. “I knew you were different. We all kind of did.”

“And about the vampires?” I asked.

“Yeah, that might take me a while. It’s no secret our world isn’t as it seems. But vampires. I need to process that one.”

I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me. “I need to get you here, and quickly. Okay? We’re being hunted at the moment. I can’t let what happened to Cami happen to you.”

I heard a gasp. “Cami was hurt by a … vampire”

It was clear she struggled to even say the word.

“Yes,” I said. “Possession, but I killed the son of the bitch. Unfortunately, there are others coming.”

Shannon sighed heavily. “This is unreal, Mercy. I knew you didn’t mean what you said. I’m sorry I didn’t understand at the time,” she sounded like she was on the verge of tears.

“Stop, Shannon, all of this is my fault. I can’t fix what happened to her, but I can save you and Riley. I don’t want to risk your life trying to travel up here, so my uncle is going to teleport you to a safe house.”

I waited for another gasp to come,but it was much louder than I expected.

“Holy shit!” she cursed.

I had to pull the phone away from my ear until she calmed down. After she stopped screaming on the other end of the line, I instructed her to pack a bag for a few days and stay on her couch until we brought her here. She agreed, but a part of me felt she doubted the entire story of witches and vampires, despite what she suspected as kids. I knew this kind of news wasn’t the easiest to believe. Even though I couldn’t physically show her my powers at that moment, I knew being pulled through the walls of her home and into a vortex would be proof enough to no longer doubt.

I tried Riley’s phone again.

Please, Riley, pick up my call.

His phone rang a fourth time before I got his voicemail.

Dammit. Where was he?

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