Freedom by Ferrari | ✔

Chapter Three

Lillian threw her forearm over her eyes to block out the bright lights above her and cuddled deeper under the covers, her head pounding as a buzzing noise flew by her ear. She reached out and snatched the insect from the air, throwing it to the floor. "Go away!" she mumbled, pulling the sheets over her head. Man, she had the strangest dream.

"No. It wasn't a dream, sweetheart."

She reached out, patting the bed next to her where Manny usually was. It was empty. The voice wasn't his. Oh god. He was real?

"Last I checked." Moving the blankets, she opened her eyes and found his black ones staring back at her, a big grin on his face. "Welcome back to the land of the living. Well, sort of."

"What did you do to me?"

"I gave you a gift."

Lillian looked down at her wrist, which was wrapped in a bandage. "You bit me."

"More of a love nibble really."

"What are you?"

"Same as you now."

"And what's that?" Her head was still a fuzzy mess, and her body felt like it had been ran over by a tank, flattened and all used up.

"Don't worry, that'll pass soon."

"For god's sake, stop reading my mind and tell me what's going on here before I scream."

"You might not want to do that."

"And pray tell, why not?"

He picked up a handheld mirror and gave it to her. She flipped it around and her jaw dropped. Her eyes were as black as coal, like his. Anger welled within her, and she moved with a speed she didn't know she had, wrapping her fingers around his neck. "What am I?"

A grin spread across his handsome but annoying face. "A vampire. Now, let me go and go get your revenge. You know you want to."

Lillian let him go and stood there a moment, feeling the newfound strength coursing through her body; her headache slowly fading away already. "I thought this was the stuff of fables and legends."

"We try to keep it that way; otherwise, people would be constantly hunting us down," he said, as he took a seat on the couch across the room. He crossed his legs, resting his left ankle above his knee.

"How's this even possible."

"Don't question how. Just go. Find your freedom. He'll be like a rag doll in your hands now."

"But I'm not a killer," she whispered.

"You are now."

Lillian stared at her hands. She felt like she could crush steel with her bare hands. Could she do it? Could she kill him? What if the police found out? "By the way, don't bite him. We don't want you turning him into a vampire, nor do we want the people finding out that we exist in their town."

"I can change people now?"

"We all can."

She sat down on the man's recliner, trying to absorb all the new information. "How?"

"When we bite someone, we can release a toxin that triggers the transformation."

"That's what you did?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked. "God. I can't believe I actually let you bite me. I don't even know your name."

"Christian."

"Talk about ironic," she said with a wry grin.

"Yep, this isn't quite what I imagined for the resurrection, but I'll take it."

She was raised in a deeply religious family. And she knew that they would consider her part of the dark forces now, a captive of the enemy—one that could never be redeemed. An ache rose in her chest. She rubbed it, trying to make it go away.

"Don't think of it that way. Biology is what triggered the change, not devils or demons," he said, motioning for her to come over to him. Standing up, she crossed the wooden floor and stood in front of him. He stood up and took her hands in his. "We'd be a lot further ahead medically if people could look at us from a scientific viewpoint rather than something that goes bump in the night."

Lillian's lips pulled to one side, and she stared up at his dark brooding eyes. "But didn't you bump into me in the dark?"

Christian laughed. "Touché. Come on. Let's go pay your husband a visit."

"I'm not sure I'm ready," she said, glancing away from him as her stomach flip-flopped. Just yesterday she was trying to find a way to disappear and today, they were talking about a good-old-fashioned Dracula murder. She didn't want to wind up as a lab experiment, locked away somewhere forever.

"Oh, don't worry about that. You won't be harming him in the traditional way. Well, you will, but you won't."

"Stop being so enigmatic and just tell me."

Christian let her hands go and wandered over to a large pine cabinet in the corner, opening the cupboard. The shelves were full of various knives and daggers gathered over the centuries. He pulled out one that was small enough to hide in the palm of your hand, and then he opened the drawer below and took out a pair of gloves.

"I take it you've done this a million times?"

He shrugged. "Give or take a few thousand," he said, handing her the knife. He grabbed her wrist again and traced the vein. "Slice right here and then suck him till he's almost dead, but only till then."

"Can't I just mind wipe him or something instead of killing him?" Murdering someone in cold blood wasn't her, even if he would kill her without a qualm.

"There is that, but it's not so satisfying. And you don't know how to do that yet"

Lillian took a step back, giving herself some much-needed space. "Then that's what I want to do."

"Chances are you'll find yourself without a choice."

"Why?"

"You're new to our world. You won't be able to control yourself."

"I'm in complete control. I can smell yours," she said, turning up her nose, "and I don't care for it." It wasn't super pungent or anything, but it didn't stir any cravings inside her.

"That's because I'm like you. Our blood smells different because we're not exactly alive as such."

"Makes sense," she murmured.

Lillian pulled her phone out of her pocket and glanced at the time. She'd been gone the whole night. That was something she'd never done before. He was going to be furious. She knew she had to go home and face what was going to happen. Maybe if she scared him just a little, he would let her go without a fight.

"Fat chance," she muttered under her breath.

"What?"

"I'm surprised you didn't just read my mind," Lillian said wryly. She walked over to the window and pulled back the curtain. They were still in the graveyard—shocked to see that they were still in the graveyard. "You're the caretaker?"

"Does that surprise you?"

She laughed. "Given the circumstances, nope."

"Come on, let's go."

Following him out of the building, she watched as he shut the door behind him, locking it. "Are there many more of us?"

"A few, but most like their own stomping ground. We don't really move in herds."

"You just leave that to the zombies, eh?" she said, with a side smirk.

It was his turn to laugh this time. "They aren't the most intelligent bunch."

"Don't tell me they exist, too?"

"Only in the movies, darling!" he said, patting her on the butt as he walked by.
In that moment, her mind flashed back to the last time Manny had hit her. It was almost like a sheet of red flashed before her eyes, and her fist swung out of its own accord.