Undead Memories Part 2

Happy New Year! I'm starting the year off with the second part of my short vampire story, Undead Memories. Want to read the first part? Then see the previous entry or click here!



The sun would not be back for a while still. Edie did not want to return to the others until she had to. She rather liked being alone and sought seclusion whenever she could. It was hard. There were always eyes trailing after her, following her for different motives. She had tried to stop noticing.

It was late for humans to be out, but she was suddenly aware that she was not isolated. Up ahead she spotted someone walking. His hands were jammed into his pockets and the collar of his black jacket was pulled up to protect his neck. After leaving Victoria so fresh with death, humans were the last thing she wanted to see. She could not ignore him, though. She began to trail behind, studying his movements and guessing his path. Edie prided herself as a good huntress.

But this was not a normal prey. He seemed to have better instincts than most. Like any good predator, she knew by his body language that he was aware of her presence.

He stopped walking. “I know you’re following me.”

Landon’s boldness continued to surprise her. As he turned to search for her, she made her move. Before he could finish turning, she was already standing before him. He gasped and jumped back at her sudden appearance.

“Holy shit!”

She grinned, but only for a second.

“Don’t do that.”

She watched the vein in his neck bulge and his jaw tighten. “I like to.”

He looked away from her. “Of course you do,” he mumbled.

“Are you still scared of me, Landon?”

“I don’t know what I am. You’re one fierce chick, you know that? I swear sometimes you’re going to rip out my throat, and then sometimes I feel . . . I don’t know.”

She couldn’t blame him for being on the fence. When they first met nearly two weeks before, upon first impressions she gave every indication that she despised him. She couldn’t help it. Never in a thousand years would she have expected to suddenly come face to face with the spitting image of the boy who had nearly succeeded in forcing himself on her. Her first teenage date would have ended very differently if Warrick hadn’t interrupted and tore him off of her. She had tried to forget that night and tried to forget that Warrick had done her some kind of service. He had not been acting out of the kindness of his nonexistent heart.

She had come to town for one human, and now she was staying for another. It seemed too perfect to be coincidence.

“What are you doing . . . were you looking for me?”

Edie grinned. “No. Just walking. I have a lot to think about.”

He looked down at the pavement. “Me too.”

Edie watched him for a moment. What was he doing out this late? “I’m still trying to figure some things out. Like what I’m doing with you.” She watched as he struggled to keep his eyes on the pavement. “I guess I’m curious – that’s a way to put it. Don’t ask me why, but I am. Just like you are about me.”

“I don’t know whether I should stay the hell away from you, or . . .”

His feelings unsettled her because she knew he was lying. He wasn’t second-guessing anything. If they both had some unwise fascination with each other, things would only become further complicated. She didn’t know why she was drawn to him – a mere boy – but she knew it was unnatural and purely selfish. The undead just weren’t drawn to humans. The natural repulsion felt for the living made it easy to be what they were and to kill without question – like, she imagined, how it was so easy for people to murder cows and chickens for food. The fact that she wanted to know more about him was dangerous – for the both of them.

“You know you should stay the hell away from me.”

He didn’t say anything.

“Is that why you’re out by yourself? Were you hoping I’d find you?”

He met her eyes. “Maybe.”

This was wrong. What right did she have to pull him toward her? If anyone else found out about her interest in him and his knowledge of her, things would only turn out two ways for Landon – with him dead or turned.

Why didn’t he just keep away from her, especially after that first day when she showed him just how fast and strong she was? She nearly broke his spine when she flattened him on his back. She nearly crushed his esophagus when her grip on his throat tightened.

Probably, she thought, because I kissed him. What a foolish idea that had been. Eighteen-year-old boys were just bursting with hormones. It hadn’t even occurred to him at the time that she had gotten carried away and bit his lip. That or he didn’t care. She didn’t even know why she did it. But she had never kissed a human, and she had temporarily lost her common sense. They may have looked the same age, but Edie was over forty years his senior. When looking at it from that angle, her little fascination with him was sick. Compared to Landon, she was an old woman, but compared to her clan and Warrick, she was simply a young child. It was a twisted balance.

“I’ve never met anyone like you,” he had told her after. “I know there’s more to you underneath that hard front you wear.”

He had figured her out too fast for comfort. But that didn’t turn her off.

Lust wasn’t everything, no matter how much she wanted to believe that was the sole reason he had stuck around. If he wasn’t scared after she almost crushed his spine, then he should have kept running after he caught her sucking the life out of that runaway, but he didn’t. What the hell was wrong with him? It had only taken a few hours for him to return and demand an explanation. Any other normal human would have doubled over sick with horror, stayed away for good, or gone to the authorities – anything other than come back. She had been so surprised by his bold approach that she told him the truth. He did not take it well, but she had expected no less. And here he was, seeking her out in the middle of the night against better judgment.

“I have nothing to lose,” he finally said. “Getting involved with you, and your deep shit. I don’t care.”

“You should care, Landon! Just because you have a shitty human life now doesn’t mean it’ll always be shitty! Being around me will only get you killed.”

“I don’t care. I don’t care! I was going to end it myself anyway before you interfered.”

She turned away from him. There should be no conflict, no question. She knew what was right – leave him alone or suck the life out of him. But she couldn’t do either. When she first saw him and realized who he looked like, she had wanted to kill him. When she followed him to the edge of that roof, she just couldn’t let him jump. That hint of compassion had startled her, too. It wasn’t something she felt very often. Perhaps she had been a little forceful when she pulled him back – she had wanted to scare the life into him. Something else happened, though. She had piqued his interest. And after that, she kept seeing him around town. At that high school kid’s party Nikolai, Joel, and Ruthie had taken her to as a sick form of amusement, Landon had actually demanded to know why she was following him. As if the thought had ever crossed her mind. But that was the night she had decided to kiss him, and two days later was when he found out who she really was.

He would be dead already if it wasn’t for her. In that sense he was right. He really did have nothing to lose.

“I want to help you.”

She turned back to him. First Victoria, and now this. The time for vulnerability was over. Yet, there was something in him that she recognized in herself. They both had that same flaw of always seeking misery. It was like it was unavoidable. He had been so successful, in fact, it nearly drove him over a ledge. She couldn’t let go either – it was why she couldn’t let Warrick win and why she had forced herself to Victoria’s deathbed.

That’s when she knew what it was. They were so similar, but yet completely different species. How did that work?

“You don’t even know me.”

“But that’s just it. I do.” He reached out and touched her hand. His skin felt so warm against her icy flesh. It did not feel nice.

She had been wrong to think Landon looked like his perverted grandfather. Perhaps they shared the same strong, square jaw and high cheekbones, but Landon’s blue eyes were all his own. They had an intensity Edie found herself wanting to be lost in. There was something about his sad, pathetic life and the history of his family’s murder that made her want him. It was wrong, in more ways than she could count. If he didn’t care, why should she?

“I can’t promise you anything.” She hoped he would pick up on her warning.

“I don’t care.”

She studied him for a moment to make sure he wasn’t lying or having second thoughts. “You’re an idiot.”

He grinned, showing his straight, white teeth. He really was a fine specimen. Even she could see that. It was just that she could never truly appreciate him as long as he was human – there would always be a part of him that naturally disgusted her.

Landon followed her into the wall of trees. Without so much as a warning, she turned and leapt on top of him.

“Don’t you dare scream,” she growled.

Before he could do anything, she sank her perfectly dangerous teeth into his chest.