“I’d given up the only thing still holding my family together—the last piece of silver that hadn’t been taken in the raids. It was our failsafe, should times get too hard on us. It was my grandfather’s, and with the loss of it, so came the loss of his guiding spirit,” Vance answers just as quietly.

“And silver, according to lore, kills some of the things that go bump in the night,” I deduce.

They both glance at me—Vance turns and Emit looks in the mirror.

“My silver kills all the things, except for skin walkers,” Vance tells me.

“What’s the difference in shape shifters and skin walkers?”

Vance opens his mouth to explain, but Emit beats him to it. “Shape shifters can take the form of animals. Skin walkers can take the form of other people. Idun created shape shifters, but her family remained the only skin walkers. Just as with us, the infected are always much weaker.”

“Are there still some of those around? No one has mentioned them,” I state, eyes spotting a small town ahead.

My bladder wants to weep with joy, but since a weeping bladder is just peeing on one’s self, I tighten my legs and start rifling through my bag, finding that one pair of jeans.

“They’re around,” Vance states vaguely.

“Who do you think runs the mortal cult that kills off Portocale gypsies?” Emit asks me seriously.

My stomach twists in dreaded knots. I hate it when they simply toss out things like that as if they’re of no importance.

Idun is the Forsaken?

“Shape shifters or skin walkers?” I ask as I sit up, bladder forgotten.

“They want us to raise Idun. They’ve protested it since the beginning, and they know it weakens us when a Portocale dies. It often makes life hell when we’re put down by that curse, because we’re useless and things can get out of hand quickly,” Vance tells me.

“And though you can find everyone, you can’t find the cult?” I ask the Van Helsing in the vehicle.

Vance cuts his eyes toward me. “Idun trained her betas. Even her omegas are far more vicious by nature. She knows every weakness we have. She knows every strength we have. She’s the reason for this curse. For now, that cult is my Achilles heel, but eventually, I find everything,” he says, repeating that last part from earlier. “And I kill it,” he adds with a tight smile. “It’s what I do.”

The mortal cult was never human?

“So the perfect woman she created for each of you, was it anything like her?” I decide to ask.

“No,” they both state in unison.

“I meant looks wise,” I elaborate.

“No,” they both say again.

One word answers mean the talking is mostly over.

“You never explained the part about when you can all die at once,” I say as I shed my robe and start pushing my pajama shorts down my legs.

Emit’s eyes flick to the mirror, and suddenly the vehicle jolts when he runs off the road.

Vance curses, and I make an embarrassing shrieking noise.

A strong hand catches me before my head can smash the window closest to me. It takes me a second to realize that Vance is suddenly in the backseat with me, holding me against him, as Emit manages to right the car on the road.

“Forget how to fucking drive?” Vance gripes at him as he continues holding me against him, cradling my head to his chest like he’s protecting it.

My breaths stagger when my body becomes acutely aware of how closer I am to him. I can hear his heart beating quickly with my ear pressed so close, and smell the subtle, refined scent of the cologne he wears.

Why does him touching me always mess with my head? I liked it better when I thought he was gay.

“I wasn’t expecting her to be stripping in the backseat,” Emit mutters, bristling.

Focusing on Emit’s words and not Vance’s touch, I cut my gaze toward the front.

“You run around naked all the time, so I didn’t think modesty was an issue. Vance has seen me naked before. I didn’t think it’d be a big deal, since I at least have on underwear,” I defend. “I can’t go inside a store wearing my Hungry Hippo pajamas.”

Emit scrubs a hand over his face and then tilts the mirror up toward the roof.

Vance’s hand on my head slowly moves down my back, as we drive on steadily. I immediately try to put some distance between us, since like I said, touching him always fucks with my head.

His gaze dips between us to my homemade panties that are not symmetrical or pretty. I immediately start tugging on my jeans, since my embarrassing underwear is causing a spectacle.

My gaze pauses when I spot my male ghost stalker glaring at me from the side of the road, just up ahead, arms crossed over his chest. I’ve decided he’s a little too crazy, and his grief-stricken girlfriend…has no idea who he ever was. So…yeah…he died crazy and I’ve got enough crazy in my life at current.

That ghost now gets salted when he comes around.

He vanishes seconds before we pass him, like he knows what I’m thinking, because he’s smart enough to keep his distance.

“Was that an incorporeal friend of yours?” Vance muses.

“Not all ghosts are like Anna,” is my only response.

Fortunately, we’re pulling up at the gas station, and I keep my pajama shirt on. After stealing Emit’s jacket from the backseat, I pull on my boots and hop out.

“I still never heard what time puts you all down,” I say as I shuffle my arms into the jacket.

I dig around in my bag for some money, but it looks like I only have about three dollars with me.

However, there are an outrageous amount of Gypsy Magic business cards in one side-pocket of my backpack. Awesome packing skills on those omegas.

Shoving the money in my pocket, I finger comb my hair the best I can, and find them both watching me when I look away from my reflection in the glass.

“Well?” I prompt, pulling out my baggie with my toothbrush and toothpaste from the other side-pocket.

I prefer regular toothpaste instead of the fancy stuff I worked hard on creating so I could sell it, but whatever. At least they packed some.

“Noon. At least, on this side of the world and within this time,” Vance answers in a flat tone. “It’s when the battle stopped, and the sacrifice was concluded. We’d slaughtered most of the Portocales within the first hour, with the knowledge they’d killed the woman we loved, along with her entire family. The altar had been set. If we got her vengeance, it would be the second sacrifice, and she’d rise. It lasted from midnight until well after dawn.”

For whatever reason, my mind niggles, like there’s something important I’m forgetting.

Chapter 7

VIOLET

It isn’t until I’m finishing up and washing my hands that a sickening thought forms in my head. I really need to talk to Emit…after I brush my teeth.

A gas station bathroom is the last place a girl wants to brush her teeth, so I shudder through it without overthinking it. After putting everything back in the baggie, I rush through the door.

I spot Vance toward the back, and notice two women pretending to be interested in the canned foods with dust on top of them. They discreetly eye the man in a suit, who remains oblivious.

He studies the cooler section like there are just too many options.

I start to leave, when I hear, “Violet, come pick your snacks.”

I don’t want to announce that I only have three dollars with me, so I move toward him, feeling the burn of two female stares on me.

Vance sniffs the air, and his eyes move to my lips immediately. Sort of weird, but that’s the theme of my life.

“The omegas forgot to pack my—”

He snakes an arm around my waist and abruptly pulls me to him, his other hand coming up and cupping my cheek, as his eyes flick over mine.

I go rigid, since he’s being even weirder than usual when he runs his nose along mine. Way too abruptly close for my mind to properly function.

“What the fucking hell did you brush your teeth with?” he asks on a groan.

Toothpaste isn’t usually sexy, so I’m not entirely sure what’s going on right now.

I do, however, lift my baggie, while slightly resisting his attention, simply because we’re very much in a gas station and I know at least two people are staring. Also…because my stupid mind is malfunctioning, unable to process how we ended up in such a compromising position to begin with.

He darts a glance to the baggie I’m holding up beside us, lips twitching like he’s entirely too amused, and then he runs his thumb over my lips.

“I really need to talk to Emit,” I say after swallowing harder than necessary.

“I’ll just grab you some things I think you’ll like,” he murmurs in response.

He releases me as abruptly as he grabbed me, other than the hand still cupping my cheek. His gaze lingers on my lips for a fraction of a second too long.

I startle when he leans down, but his lips move to my ear, instead of my lips, and he whispers, “I only pulled back because I thought it was wrong to have you before you knew the truth.”

Totally inappropriate place for this sort of conversation…

“It’s an old, complicated truth you should have just told me,” is the response I’m proud I make.

The other option is…what would Anna do?

My body is voting for the more debauched response that would lead to me throwing myself at him.

I’ve decided that motto isn’t working out so well for me, so I turn and start to walk away.

“It’s going to be a semi-long trip,” he calls to my back. “Never know what could happen.”

I turn back around, narrowing my eyes. “If you’re trying to say what I think you are, please don’t. Once burned and all that,” I point out, forgetting there are two women still soaking in all our interactions.

Vance’s lips tug into a crooked grin, and he glances back at the coolers, while I hurry out the doors to Emit. They find the strangest things to smile about, and they seem to have no qualms about anything that comes out of their mouths.

I know I look ridiculous in my hippo shirt paired with Emit’s much-too-large jacket. My hair also needs a brush.

None of that is important right now. I won’t be sidetracked from my mission again.

Emit is putting away the thingy that pumps gas just as I near him, and he sniffs the air. He can smell me over gasoline?

Good grief. I wish they’d just packed my regular toothpaste instead of the one made with Portocale orange essence.

I’m almost to him, when he smirks and grabs me at the waist without any real warning. He’s never really touchy with me.

It’s so shocking that I freeze, too caught unaware to even react. Well, I blink a few times, but that’s about it on the reaction scale.

He slides his nose along my cheek, as one of his very large hands slides down my hip. I’m not sure how things keep escalating right now. Also, I idly wonder if they could smell my morning breath this whole time…