Old Habits

Tish: least like a horror movie

Tish

I could barely breathe, I was so angry. Conor was preoccupied; the vampire woman who was gripping him tightly looked like she had been through hell and back. I assumed this was Stefa, though she was nothing like I had imagined. We traversed the shadows as best as we could and made it back to the SUV in short order, climbing in as if nothing in the world had happened. Conor sat in the middle; me on one side of him and Stefa curled up on the other. I wasn't jealous, which was odd, I thought. This would be the perfect time to be jealous.

"Now what?" Conor said. "Jackson, we need a proper night sleep and everyone needs a shower and clean clothes. I'd rather stop at a hotel down the road, get out of St. Louis."

"That's the plan," Jackson replied. "We'll stop at a mall or something. I could just murder Helen. Doing that to your own kind...Stefa had made them angry, but that was absurd. That was about petty revenge. Stefa? Do you need anything?"

"No," she whispered and nestled further against Conor.

She hadn't spoken since I had seen her. Conor took my hand in his and kissed my fingers.

"I'm sorry," he said again.

I didn't know what to say in reply. He had warned me about coming along. He had known that this would happen. I didn't know how to process that. The Conor who had turned me, he was the Conor was I dealing with now, not the one I had fallen for at the farm. This Conor was a little scary, and more than a little heartless. I wondered if it was Stefa, though she didn't seem like she was capable of influencing anyone in her current condition.

We stopped in a drive through and ordered double the amount of food we had last time. Jackson glanced back at us and frowned.

"What now?" I demanded.

"We all look a little rough," he said. "I was debating who looked the least like a horror movie to go shopping, but I think that's me. I hope there's a parking garage or something."

Jackson handed me the large bags of burgers and fries and drinks and then pulled into a parking spot.

"Do not leave the car," he ordered. "I'll be back shortly."

I wasn't sure what had happened to Mike. He had been mostly calm and a little cavalier before, but now he was staring listlessly out the window. I assumed the person he had been sitting next to had been important. I wasn't sure if there was anything I could say.

Agatha popped into my mind and I had to tamp down those thoughts. We had killed two of her sons. With the way that grate was located, there was a chance she would simply never see them again. And even if they did find them, odds that they would realize it was our fault was low. There were dozens of bodies in that room.

Conor released my hand to clumsily unwrap a burger; his other hand was still wrapped around Stefa. I helped him and unwrapped my own.

"I would have thought you could resist Jackson," Conor remarked to Mike.

"Normally, probably," Mike replied, not turning to face us. "Now I don't care."

We ate several burgers in silence. Neither Stefa nor Mike moved.

"So this is Stefa?" I said quietly.

"Yes," Conor said. "They tortured her."

"And all the others were..."

"Yes, hers." Conor said.

But like when it had come up in the basement, Stefa began to shudder again. Conor set his drink down to hug her tightly.

"You're safe now," he told her.

"No one else is," she murmured.

I really hoped that wasn't true. Conor resumed eating; he was very pale and I could see the blood and bite marks on his arm. Of course, saying anything about it now wouldn't help.

I didn't dare call Mel. I didn't want to talk to her and have to lie. Jackson had made me shoot Matthew, a man who had been a decent friend just a year past. They had drained Phillip so quickly I hadn't been able to do anything but stare like a moron.

"Hey," Conor said, wrapping his free arm around my shoulders. "I'm sorry about the hunters, but I'm not sorry we didn't get shot and killed. I'm not sorry that you're unharmed."

He had a point. I still didn't like inhabiting this morally ambiguous area; I missed the farm where Mel and Ralph outlined what was right and wrong, and I just had to stay inside that. Maybe that was lazy, I thought. Maybe I had gotten too used to having alphas define parameters.

"Say something?" he requested.

"Conor, I'm still processing," I said. "I'm not sure what we walked into, and yes, I wish that the hunters hadn't followed me in. And you're right; without them, I'm not sure how I would have gotten to you. But I wish we hadn't killed them."

"They're just hunters," Mike said gruffly. "Hunters who would have killed us and added our bodies to..."

"Please stop," Stefa whispered, lifting her head far enough to not be muffled by Conor's shirt.

Mike turned around to look at her coldly. "What the hell happened, Stefa? Why did we find the bodies of my friends, my partner, in mangled pieces but you survive?"

"They caught...H...Hannah and some of the little ones first," Stefa said. Her voice was barely audible. "When I went b...back to Chicago; I came b...back and...tried..." She stopped talking, her breath caught and she took a shuddering breath. "I gave myself up for their release. B...but Helen was never going to release...she wanted to wipe our clan from the face of the earth."

"Well, she's done that," Mike scoffed. "Doesn't explain why you're alive."

"Helen's only been gone a couple days," Stefa replied. "She wanted me to die last."

"That I do believe," he replied. "Goddamn it."

Someone slammed their car door in the parking garage, and Stefa startled. Conor pulled her back into his chest where she began to cry again. I had some idea how far vampires would go to get their way, but I hadn't dealt with any of the revenge rage that Stefa seemed to be implying. Whatever happened, it was quite a lot worse that she was able to tell us. I spread my fingers over my stomach, hoping that we would avoid a similar fate.

Jackson reappeared with shopping bags and threw them into the back of the SUV before hopping back into his seat.

"I've had a better idea," he said. "Stefa, I need the address of that cabin of yours. We need space and quiet and we're not going to get that around humans."

"No, we're..." she stammered.

"It will be safe," he told her kindly, handing his waiting phone to Conor. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you. But I need the address, sweetheart."

"Don't call me that," she told him.

Conor managed a chuckle. I didn't know what was going to happen to us. Up until today; I had imagined we'd reunite Jackson and Stefa and we'd immediately drive back to Montana and never see them again. Stefa had yet to let go of Conor. Jackson looked like he was ready to go on a murder spree with us in tow.

Conor handed Jackson's phone back to him once Stefa had clumsily typed with her one arm. He readjusted in his seat to grab another bag of burgers as we pulled out of the parking garage.

"Hungry?" I teased.

"I'm a little low on blood," he admitted. "I'll probably fall asleep soon, sorry."

"Oh, because that's so different than normal," I laughed.