Stake You

Chapter Fourteen

After Base showed me the picture he had taken of a dank, bloody room in Sully’s house, we decided to make an attempt to sleep in his car that night, parked in an underground car park. We agreed to take turns sleeping because neither of us felt particularly safe.

“I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again,” I admitted as I took the first shift.

“Me either,” he said, trying to get comfortable in the backseat.

“I’m sorry I keep turning into a blubbering mess the whole time. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“A supernatural creature with superhuman strength wants to kill you. I think I can cut you some slack.”

I laughed in spite of myself. “I can always count on you to—”

“’Bout time you realised. We going to school tomorrow?”

I glanced at him in the mirror, unsure of his mood. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.”

“I’ll have to go home eventually,” he said.

“Well, we’ll have to do something before that.”

“We still going to follow him?” he asked after a moment of fidgeting.

“Yes,” I said, steeling myself. I needed to get back to being me. I needed to be the strong one. “We’re going to follow him until we figure out what to do about him. Nobody’s going to believe us. He’s proved that. If he can hypnotise people then he can make anyone do anything.”

I took a deep breath. “So we’re going to have to be the ones who stop him. I won’t ever feel comfortable again until that happens. And I’m sorry, but I don’t think he’s going to leave you alone now either. I still think the whole Aoife thing has as much to do with you as it does with me. He basically warned me I would have to keep looking over my shoulder, never knowing when he was going to attack. Well, screw that. Let’s get him first.”

“This is so messed up.” He sounded wide awake.

“We should go to my house,” I said, surprising myself. “We’ll go to sleep tonight, and we’ll go to school tomorrow, and we’ll act like everything’s okay. He keeps saying things to me, about feelings and memories. He said something like my pain now will make it better for him later, and whenever he looks at me, I suddenly start remembering stuff I don’t want to think about.”

“So, what, he’s feeding on emotion now?”

“I’ve no idea. I just want to stop feeling like I’m his for the taking. I want to show him that I won’t back down. That he can’t make me feel anything I don’t want to. I want to put on a brave face, and I’d feel better if Mam wasn’t alone.”

“I dunno if that’ll work,” he said. “Maybe if we surround ourselves with crosses and garlic.”

“I’m not ready for that train of thought, Base.”

He sniggered. “You called me Brian earlier.”

“I thought you were going to die. It seemed appropriate.”

But we both ended up laughing until we had tears running out of our eyes. Our solution to the fear of being killed by what was likely a vampire. I couldn’t believe I was even thinking that word.

“At least you aren’t boring,” I said when I stopped choking with laughter.

“Ditto,” he said, climbing into the front seat. “And I don’t think he’s exactly worried about us. If it’s okay with you, I’m gonna drive past his road again, to see if his car is there. We might feel a bit more comfortable if we have some idea where he is.”