The Damned by Nancy Holder, Debbie Viguié Read Free Book Online Page B

monster.”
    “Jenn,” Father Juan said. “You must leave.”
    The priest took Jenn’s arm and firmly pulled her toward the door. As she screamed and wept, Antonio understood her pain, but her words cut deeply. She was right. He was a monster. He had learned to control the urges to subdue her and drink her blood, mostly, but they were still there. Only prayer and God’s mercy had allowed him to push temptation down deep in his psyche.
    Staring at Heather, he stared at himself. He had not seen his reflection in seventy years.
    Until now.
    “Father, it’s not going to work,” Jenn said, as she balled her fists and pressed them against her mouth to dam up the screams that were about to burst out of her. “Antonio won’t be able to change her back.”
    “We don’t know that,” he told her, as he put her hand on the banister of the staircase that led to the main floor of the building. “You’re in distress, I know, but you must have faith.” He made the sign of the cross over her. “I’m going back to her now. To pray and work magicks.”
    She nodded, and he left.
    Nausea ground her stomach. She lurched like a blind woman up the dim stairway, then along the corridors of the university building, sucking in the dusty mix of brick and old wood as she fought for control. She didn’t know what was worse, seeing her father on TV, seeing her sister sneering like a demon, or realizing that Antonio had once been like that.
    That he can be like that again.
    Stumbling to a stop, she lowered her head against her knuckles. None of the vampires she had ever staked had seemed like people to her. They were so evil they were almost targets in some surreal video game. Stake a vamp, get a thousand points. Her mind had never really connected Antonio with those monsters. Or maybe it was her heart that had refused to admit that Antonio was a full-fledged vampire, a Cursed One, and not a “special” kind of human.
    Maybe he wasn’t even a special kind of vampire. He had savagely killed people. When he had first been changed, he hadn’t been able to stop himself. Looking at Heather, how out of control she was, made Jenn doubt everything Antonio had told her about his past. She knew there was a lot he had kept from her, that he was weighed down by burdens he refused to share. She’d interpreted his reserve as a misplaced attempt to protect her. But now he couldn’t. Heather was his mirror, and his secret was out.
    “Oh, God,” Jenn whispered. It wasn’t a prayer. She couldn’t imagine anyone on the receiving end, listening, fixing it.
    Her knees buckled, and she sank to the floor. If she hadn’t gone with her father on the day Aurora attacked; if she had never gone to Spain to become a hunter; if only, if only, if only.
    But then there would have been another day, a different betrayal. Her father had planned his meeting with Aurora. The vampires had won the war.
    “Heather,” she whispered, “come back.”
    She felt as if she were disintegrating, like foam on the waves. Below, the sharks swam deep. She was really losing it, and she didn’t know if she could put herself back together again.
    Then she pictured Gramma Esther at Papa Che’s funeral—sad but composed, stoic, the family matriarch holding her dysfunctional family to account. And then, after Jenn had outrun Aurora, coming for Jenn and keeping her calm, giving her strength and support. It must have been so hard for Gramma to learn what a cowardly bastard her son was, knowing Heather was in mortal danger because of him, then letting Jenn handle it on her own.
    We need her , Jenn thought. I need her. Gramma had texted her once since they had parted at the Oakland Airport. Montana. Gramma had promised to get her mom and take her someplace safe.
    Montana was very big. And very far away.
    Jenn kept hoping she’d text again, or, even better, call. Her grandmother was protecting both of them by maintaining her silence. But Jenn longed to hear from her. Her family was