18
Before I could say anything else to Nick, his cellular phone began ringing, and he yanked it out of his pocket.
"Sorry. One second. This could be Noah, wanting to keep me posted about John’s whereabouts." Nick answered the call, had a brief conversation, only saying a few words, one of them being dammit, and then hung up. "That was Noah. John has been spotted lurking around, but he was chased away by my fighters; but now we have another Dormio problem.
“Three of them were seen lurking around the home of one of our council members, right inside city limits, but they were able to escape. Another was found inside a warehouse west of downtown and was captured. I want to interrogate him right away, to see if I can get some information out of him, and this is going to take some work.
“So I need to go right away, but I'll be back to visit you as soon as I'm able." After rising from the couch, Nick took my face in his hands and gave me a hasty kiss. "Try to get some sleep."
He was flying out of my living room before I could say a word.
Getting some sleep proved nearly impossible that night. I just tossed and turned, trying to digest everything he had told me in between fits of anxiety and guilt over the fact that I still hadn’t told him that I was determined to take part in any big fight against John. By morning, all my fretting was manifesting itself in tears, and I took a shower, sniffling all the while. It was only afterward, when I'd dressed in jeans and a cozy, oversize t-shirt, that I began to feel more tired than wired, so I got back into bed and slept until noon.
After what Nick had told me, I expected some calamitous fight to break out in the city at any second, but strangely, the next week or so passed completely uneventfully. Nick came to visit me alone one night, just to talk, he said, and I almost told him what I’d decided about fighting.
However, he was called away by within a minute of arriving at my apartment. Two nights later, pretty much the same thing happened; this time resulted in him being called away after a half-hour by Noah, who said that there was some sort of an emergency with a captured spy getting free.
On this particular night when Nick was called away, I regretted even having wasted my precious seconds with him talking about things that were fairly unimportant because that was time I could have used to tell him the truth about what I’d decided. I’d been trying to screw up my courage.
Later that day, he called me, saying that he didn’t think it would be long before John attempted some sort of an attack. “In fact, I think it could be any day now. Please, just continue to trust in me, Tiffany, and continue to have faith that we’ll soon get our dream. We’ll be able to live happily, and in peace, together.”
Trusting Nick about all this was fairly easy to me now, of course, but continuing to have faith was a little harder. I did believe in him, and no matter how much longer things continued on the way they were, I was determined not to lose hope. The hope that at least one of us would kill John, anyway, even if Nick didn’t know that I wanted that person to be me. However, the hope of our happiness together once I finally revealed this to him was a little harder to muster.
The day after Nick called me with that news, he joined me at my apartment for a bedroom session. It took every ounce of my strength to act "normal" and not show any sign of anxiety about the Dormio situation, but I managed to do it. After all, my only other option was to show Nick that maybe I didn’t yet have faith in our eventual happily-ever-after.
Over the course of that week, Dana asked me multiple times what Nick and I had discussed the night we'd had our long discussion, and I told her everything. Or at least everything except how I’d failed to tell Nick that I was determined to fight, no matter what. Several times, Dana said that she could sense that something was bothering me that I wasn’t telling her about, but I just kept putting her off. Eventually she stopped asking, though at times, she seemed a bit miffed. I figured this was a small price to pay when it came to keeping my plan a secret until I could finally tell Nick.
A few more days passed. Another bedroom visit from Nick. He had become far less jokey and decidedly more serious, and this night was no exception. After he'd brought us both to a mind-blowing climax, he just sat on the floor by the bed, seemingly off in his own little world. I wondered if he was having second thoughts about his decision to not hand me over to John. I wondered if he actually was regretting it. But then again, it seemed more likely that with a battle with John becoming imminent, he was just preoccupied with the details.
On the first day of June, Dana called me unusually early, being that she tended to sleep in. I asked her what was up, and she hesitated before saying just a single word, drawing out the vowel.
"So...."
"'So' what?"
Again, she hesitated. "So... maybe we should meet up in person to talk. How about breakfast at the cafe? I could meet you in the building lobby in five."
For some reason, I suddenly just knew that Dana knew. She knew that I hadn’t given up the idea to fight. It wasn't just what she'd said about wanting to meet up in person, it was something about the tone of her voice, too. I told her I'd meet her down in the lobby in three.
When I arrived, I found her already there, waiting by a large potted fern, and we began making our way out of the building, past small clusters of people waiting at the different elevator bays and other clusters of people milling about the lobby, talking to each other with foam cups of coffee in their hands.
Once we were outside in the balmy air, I spoke to Dana in a low voice, even though there wasn't anyone immediately nearby. "I think there are too many listening ears at the cafe. Let's get in your car and take a drive to the park or something."
We did just that, arriving within minutes, and it was only then, after Dana had parked the car in the little lot adjacent to the new summer flower display, that she finally let loose with her characteristic rapid free-flow of words.
"So…I’ve put a few things together, and I think you've been keeping a big secret. And not that I blame you at all. You still want to fight against John. I just know it. This is what you haven’t wanted to tell me about. And I get that you both have probably just been trying to keep your plans a secret, but honestly, you could have told me, and I wouldn’t have told a soul. Like I'm really just going to blurt out in one of the shops or the cafe, 'Hey, everyone? Did you all know that Tiffany is going to battle John and the Dormios but she hasn’t even told Nick yet?'"
I sighed, unbuckling my seat belt and turning toward her. "Well, I didn't think you'd be that careless about it. But everyone makes mistakes and slips up sometimes. And to be perfectly honest, I was more worried about you telling Noah than anyone, and you know that he would probably immediately tell Nick. And then where would I be?
“I still haven’t been able to screw up my courage enough to tell him yet. I know I need to figure things out soon, though, because he’s told me that John and his fighters are probably going to attack soon."
"Well, if and when they do, Noah and so many of the strongest vampires in the city are going to be right behind Nick, no matter what happens, and no matter who fights. Our vampires may not be as physically strong as the Dormios, but we make up for that in numbers, which will help.
“I even wish I could help myself. So, trust me, Tiff, I know where you’re coming from. But basically, I’m just trying to tell you that you don’t have to fight. You can stay safe. Our fighters are fully capable of handling whatever the Dormios throw their way. I get it, though…what you’re thinking. I really wish I could help in the fight."
"Me, too, and not just because I want to get revenge for what John did to my coven family. I also want to fight because I’d do anything to help Nick. I really love him. I had a dream last night that he was holding me, and I had the strongest sense...this deep-down knowing...that he's the man I'm supposed to be with for the rest of my life."
It was true, and the dream had been even more powerful and vivid than I was able to describe.
"I'll do anything to stop him from getting killed or to help him fight John and the Dormios."
"Well, have you been working on getting your powers back?”
With a rush of embarrassment, I realized that my powers, or the lack of them, had hardly crossed my mind in weeks. When they initially hadn't returned, and I'd started to think that Nick hadn't been behind the murder of my coven, I'd sort of just given up on my magic, though I hadn't made a conscious decision to do it. It had simply been something that had been pushed to the back of my mind.
In response to Dana’s question I admitted that I hadn’t been trying very hard to get my powers back.
She sighed. "Well, have you at least been trying to get them back? I mean...I don't even know exactly how a person would try to get magical powers back, but...have you been? I'm sure there's at least something you can do to try to get them back."
Turning my gaze to the summer flower display in front of us, I sighed. "Not really. Basically, all I can do is just this...." I extended a palm toward the windshield. "And then nothing happens."
Except that this time, something actually did happen. Not a second after I'd said the word happens, a thin stream of fiery light shot from my palm, seemed to go right through the windshield, leaving a tiny hole, and then struck one of the flowers in the display, instantly seeming to vaporize it, making an obvious hole in the center of it.
After gasping along with Dana, I just stared at the flowers for a second. "I guess my powers just came back."
"And apparently, they're strong enough to kill a flower."
We soon left the park when another car pulled into the lot. We didn't want the occupants to notice that the flower display was smoldering a bit and somehow connect that to the little hole in Dana's windshield.
For the rest of the morning, we drove around the city, just talking about everything and trying to find a suitable private place for me to practice my supernatural power. We didn't really find anything, though, and with both of us having missed breakfast, by eleven, we were both starving. We ducked into a tiny, dimly-lit, four-table restaurant on the south side of the city, instantly ceasing our conversation about my magical power when we saw that three of the tables were occupied.
Over chicken-and-avocado sandwiches and chilled bowls of gazpacho, we discussed "safe" things to talk about in public, such as Stephanie and her new front tooth, what Noah and Dana were giving her for her first birthday, and a new outdoor ice skating rink that was going to be opened in the winter, just a few blocks from the cafe. However, Dana seemed distracted, and I could tell she was still trying to think of places where I could practice my magic and shake the rust out without anyone seeing us. I was a bit distracted by this thought myself.
When we left the restaurant, Dana suggested that we just go back to our building. "Not like you'll be able to practice your power inside either of our apartments, just because I imagine a beam of fiery light shooting out the side of a building might be visible to people even on the ground below…but maybe we can try the basement of the building. It's all solid brick and steel, but even if you manage to shoot through that, it's nothing but several feet of dirt on the other side, which should be enough to stop your fire."
The basement, which was completely empty of people and nearly empty of things except for various ducts and pipes, turned out to be the perfect place to get back in the swing of doing my fiery light trick. By early afternoon, I was shooting beams just as easily as I ever had before, and they were just as bright, hot, and fiery as they'd ever been. A few of them actually did go right through the brick-and-steel walls, leaving tiny little holes that looked something like bullet holes.
As we rode the elevator back up to the lobby, Dana said she was sure I could help in a fight with the Dormios. "Not that I'm entirely okay with the idea of you being close to danger or anything, but maybe you could shoot your magic at the Dormios from a fairly safe distance or something."
I agreed with that, but the only problem was that the length of my fire beams seemed to top out at around twenty feet or so. Which would make it difficult for me to help in a fight and still remain a fairly safe distance away.
After Dana and I soon parted ways, I realized that despite all the talking we'd done that day, I hadn't remembered to ask her if and how I should tell Nick about me getting my power back, which I'd been meaning to do, just since we'd already got everything else out in the open.
However, I figured it wasn't that urgent of a detail, and besides, I wasn’t even sure that I needed to consult her anyway because I was strongly leaning toward just telling Nick, even though I was slightly afraid of what he might say. On one hand, I thought that he might be happy for me, and I thought that maybe he’d actually consider giving me his blessing on helping in the fight. However, on the other hand, I was afraid that he might not be moved and might still tell me that he didn’t want me anywhere near the fight, even though I’d gotten my power back.
At any rate, I finally decided that it was simply the right thing to do to tell him. With our relationship becoming more serious every day, the last thing I wanted to do was go behind his back and break his trust by not telling him about something pretty important.
If he said that he still didn’t want me fighting, I supposed I’d just have to deal with it, even though the thought of that killed me. I really didn’t know what I’d do if that were the case. I didn’t want to think just yet about the possibility of me joining in the fight anyway, even if Nick said no.
That evening, I didn't see him, but I did get a brief phone call from him. He said that he only had a second, almost literally, but he just wanted to tell me that he missed me. I said that I missed him, too, which was definitely the truth. The moment I’d answered his call, I was curled up in bed with the part of the blanket that still held his scent.
Shortly after awakening the next morning, I sipped a cup of coffee in the kitchen, realizing that it was already June second. And suddenly, I realized something else, too, something very strange. After slowly setting my coffee mug down, I tiptoed over to a wall calendar hanging from a hook by the fridge, feeling afraid to make a sound for some funny reason. After staring at the calendar for at least five solid seconds, I finally blinked, unable to believe my eyes. I was late for my period. Just a single day, but the calendar didn't lie. I was officially late.
*
Since I'd first gotten my period at age thirteen, I'd never been a single day late for a twenty-eight-day cycle, not even one time. My cycles were what my gynecologist had once humorously referred to as "bizarrely regular."
So when I saw that I was already a day late, a rush of adrenaline flooded my veins. With shaking hands, I grabbed the phone from the counter but then just held it, motionless, not knowing who to call or exactly what to say. After a few seconds, I decided that getting a home pregnancy test should be my first order of business, so I dialed Dana's number. She answered on the first ring, and I immediately asked her if she had any pregnancy test kits in her apartment.
"And if so, could you please bring it up here as soon as possible?"
"Just give me ten minutes...maybe less. The babysitter will be here soon."
After hanging up, I realized that my rush of adrenaline had suddenly made my bladder feel like it was going to explode, even though I'd already used the bathroom not an hour earlier, before my first cup of coffee. Thinking that maybe I'd just try to empty my bladder halfway, to save some urine for the test, I dashed off to the bathroom. And just a second after sitting down on the toilet, a certain horrible sight dashed the bubble of hope that had risen in my heart.
My pale blue cotton underwear was streaked with scarlet. I hadn't even finished using the restroom before I burst into tears, burying my face in my hands. After being on the fence about things for so long, I hadn’t realized that I wanted to be pregnant with Nick so badly. In fact, now that I knew that I wasn’t, I felt as if my heart were breaking. For one thing, I desperately wanted to help him increase his strength by way of me being pregnant with his child.
For another thing, and most importantly, I just wanted to be pregnant with his baby for no other reason than to start a family with him. I didn’t even care that John and the Dormios still hadn’t been dealt with yet. I’d come to share Dana’s thinking that a person shouldn’t wait to “start” their life, even if all the planets weren’t perfectly aligned.
After all, she and Noah had started their family in the midst of chaos and continued fighting with the Dormios, and they both seemed very happy. Not to mention that they’d created a new life.
I was still crying when Dana knocked on my door a few minutes later. The moment she saw me, her jaw dropped, and she came inside and shut the door behind her.
"What is it? Why are you crying? What's wrong?"
With fresh tears streaming down my face, I shook my head. "Sorry. I'm so sorry."
"Oh, don't be sorry for tears. This is a really big deal, finding out of you're pregnant or not."
"No. No, it's not that. I'm sorry for calling you up here for absolutely nothing."
"What do you mean?”
"Well, in the five minutes between us hanging up and you coming up here, I got my period. Sorry."
Dana's expression of concern now blended with one of sympathy and understanding, and she put an arm around my shoulders and began leading me out to the sun-filled, spacious living room. "Oh...hey there. Hey, it's okay, Tiff."
"No, it's not. I'm just...stupid. I'm just a complete idiot. I actually thought there could be a chance...just because I was a single day late. I was just hoping...just thinking that maybe by some miracle...." I sat down on the couch beside her, shaking my head once again. "I'm sorry. I just feel so dumb. Like a complete idiot."
With her arm still around my shoulders, Dana gave me a little squeeze. "Hey. Stop that. You're not stupid, or idiotic, or dumb. You're perfectly normal. Do you know that when Noah and I first got married, I took a pregnancy test the day before my period was even expected, and I did this all the months before I got pregnant with Stephanie? I was always that anxious to find out if I was pregnant or not. I was almost crazy about it. In fact, I didn’t even tell Noah before I took a test each time because I was afraid he would think I was completely neurotic."
Sniffling, I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. "But this is different."
"How? Other than the fact that you were actually a day late. And other than the fact that you actually had the willpower and fortitude to restrain yourself from jumping the gun and taking a bunch of tests ridiculously early like I did."
"You had a reason to take all those tests."
"Well...you had a reason to take the one that you called me up here for. I mean...you're a young woman in a relationship, Tiffany. This is what we do sometimes. We get pregnant. Sometimes really fast."
"But-"
"True, maybe expecting to get pregnant your very first month with Nick was a bit optimistic, but I certainly can't blame you for hoping. I did, too, right away. I know it's hard to help it when you're really looking forward to becoming a mother, and when you've also developed very strong feelings for the man you’re in a relationship with. I know you've probably been hoping to become pregnant with Nick, not only to give him increased strength, but also because you really love him."
"I really do. I love him with all of my heart. I love him more than any man I’ve ever been with in my life."
"Then, don't worry. After all this stuff with John and the Dormios is resolved, you'll have plenty of time to become pregnant with Nick's baby. And this way, it will be even better when you do become pregnant because you’ll have had to wait for it. Just think about it...think about if you really were pregnant right now. Sure, I know both you and Nick would be over the moon and everything, but wouldn't it just be so much better if the baby was something you both had to wait for just a little while?”
I just nodded mutely, then spoke in a shaky sort of voice. “It’s just that this seems like some sort of a sign…like maybe Nick and I aren’t meant to be together or something. Or that maybe we should put all baby-making plans on hold. I don’t know. It just seems like fate is trying to tell me something. All I know is that for those brief few minutes when I thought I was pregnant, I felt happy, and I realized just how much Nick and our future means to me. Now I just feel like…just like my heart has been ripped out of my chest or something.”
With the cheery sunshine streaming in through the windows seeming to make a mockery of my devastation, Dana gave me another squeeze. "Just trust me. I know you're disappointed, but I really think things will be better this way. The next time you think you might be pregnant, you can even take a test with Nick right there with you to share in the joy of it all. It will just be a happier, easier time all-around. You'll probably end up very glad that you got your period today."
I nodded again, suddenly feeling like I needed to tell Nick what had just happened right away. Not only did he deserve to know that I definitely hadn’t gotten pregnant yet, but I also suddenly felt like I could barely take another breath until I knew if he'd still want to be with me once he found out that he wasn’t going to have increased strength anytime soon. And if he still did, I needed to know that he could be completely happy if I didn’t get pregnant the next month, or the next.
After Dana said a few more things to me, trying to be comforting, which I appreciated, I told her that I wanted to call Nick. "I'm going to see if he can even slip away from patrol to come here to the building so that we can talk in person. I just need to see him face-to-face and see his expression while I tell him everything that just happened with this ‘false alarm’ pregnancy.”
"Of course. I totally understand. I'll be just a few floors down if you want to talk some more, or if you need anything else at all. I'm also good for taking you over to the cafe for some chocolate ice cream with extra whipped cream and hot fudge."
I thanked her, and she soon left. After taking a second to splash my hot, tear-stained face with cold water, I grabbed the phone and dialed Nick’s cellular phone, annoyed when the phone just rang and rang for what felt like a hundred rings, when in actuality, it was only four. On the fifth, I expected to get his voice mail service, so my annoyance turned to surprise when it sounded like he'd picked up, but without saying hello.
I waited a second, then said hello myself. "Are you there, Nick? Can you hear me?"
"Well, I'm here, but I'm not Nick. He's a little busy right now, getting his ass kicked so hard I expect to see his eyeballs come flying out of his head any second."
It was John. I was certain. It had been years since I’d seen him, but I knew his voice. The moment he'd started speaking, my blood had seemed to turn to ice water.
"Oh, God, Tiffany...you should really see this. I mean...Anton, my second-in-command, really seems hell-bent on torturing Nick for a bit first before letting me do the honors of stabbing him through the heart and decapitating him. Guess Anton figures that anything less would be too kind of a death for a vampire who's been a thorn in our sides for nearly a hundred years."
I couldn't speak. I could barely even breathe. I could hear muffled sounds in the background that sounded like they might be groans of pain, and I knew they were likely Nick's. Something terribly bitter began rising in the back of my throat.
"What's the matter, Tiffany? Are you disappointed that the job you were supposed to do is being done by someone else? You really shouldn't be, since James and I weren't the ones who killed all your witch friends anyway, and that's the truth. Or are you so quiet because maybe you developed a particular soft spot for your intended target, Nick, who's getting mauled by no fewer than ten of my fighters right now?
“Well, if you did, no matter. Nick will soon be dead, and then you'll just have me. Once you get all your boo-hoos about Nick out of your system, I think we could make something of a good pair, what with you having the were-gene and all. You can think of yourself as 'first lady of the Dormios.' That should cheer you up."
"If you kill him, John, I will kill you."
With adrenaline flooding my body for the second time that morning, suddenly I could speak again, as the ice that had seemed to flow through my veins at the sound of John's voice became something like hot lava.
"And I hope you’re listening to me, John, because I mean it. If you kill Nick, or allow him to be killed, or even allow him to continue to be hurt, I'll kill you. And if I don't do it myself, I'll at least see that it gets done. I'm sure all the many vampires who will fight to the death for Nick are charging to help him right now, as we speak."
"Well, no, that was so three minutes ago. They tried to charge, but they got a little caught up in a line of Dormios. See, a single Dormio is strong enough to take on at least ten Everglen vampires at a time, you know. Which will be helpful to me when I’m ready to kill all the vampires in this damned city.
I suddenly found myself jamming tennis shoes on my feet without even being aware of having decided to do so. "Where is Nick, John? Where do you have him?"
"Oh, well...let's just say that he himself is on the street in front of the building, beneath a pile of Dormios, but the vast majority of his blood is now all over the white awning in front of the cafe. Really, it's a vivid red awning now. But I'll tell you what. I haven't exactly been enjoying the tone you've been taking with me during this conversation, so I think Anton and I are going to bring the show up to you. Just give us a minute to grab our vampire punching bag, and we'll be right up. Have a look out your bedroom window. One of my spies told me exactly which one is yours.”
A strangled cry escaped my mouth, and I wasn’t sure if I could be strong enough to look.