Yesterday I posted the first chapter to The Vampiric Housewife. Today we have the second book in The Vampiric Housewife series:
The House of the Vampire Queen
Chapter One
What Dreams May Come
Valerie’s fiery, violet eyes opened. The bedroom was dim in the evening’s light, the alarm clock’s digital red numbers read seven forty-five. Lying on her stomach, warm and cocooned within the dark cerulean comforter, she rolled onto her side, hugged a pillow from the empty side of the bed, and stared out the window at the settling night. The beach was spotlighted by security lights that gave the white sand a yellowish hue, the waves chased up the beach then retreated, only to rush up again in a soothing rhythm. She could see a few white stars in the purple sky; the sun had set not long ago and the residue of its brilliance hadn’t completely faded. Valerie wished she could feel the serenity and contentment of waking to such a calming, gorgeous evening, and take pleasure in the fact she could enjoy it without being rushed out of bed by daily obligations. But it was with a dull sadness and apathy that she remained in bed. She had the dream again.
For the last year and a half—ever since the incident at St. Vladimir—it had been the same dream, the same nightmare. She was back in Sangre Valley, but it was a post-apocalyptic Sangre Valley. The sky’s horizon was a deep mix of red and orange as if the whole world was on fire. St. Vladimir Hospital was a tower of raging flames, staring down from the edge of town. Houses all around her were nothing more than piles of rubble. Not a single building remained standing. Cars burned in blazing fires on broken streets, and cracked water mains spouted fountains of water into the air. Her jeans and blouse were ripped and stained with soot, sweat, and blood. In the real life version of events, she had been in the burning hospital as the town outside collapsed in a series of explosions. But in her dreams she was in the middle of the chaos, frantically calling out for her children. Her heart pounded in her chest and her stomach was sickened with worry and dread. In her head, she chanted the mantra They’re alive! They’re alive! just to keep the surrounding desolation and death from overwhelming her. She came upon her house on Lestat Road. The walls had fallen inward, the roof collapsed, her home reduced to mangled pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, everything inside destroyed; it was the detritus of her life. Panicked, she began searching through the rubble. John! Amelia! Harry! Can you hear me! Charlie! She threw a shingled portion of the roof to the side and saw an arm poking up. Her heart stopped in dread and anticipation as she pulled the arm up. A body came with it. It was her childhood friend Betsy—dead. Her body bruised and bloodied, limp and heavy. That didn’t stop Valerie, though. She continued to dig—crumbled plaster, splintered wood, broken furniture, and fractured keepsakes. She had to find her family, she had to save them. She found Marie in the rubble, dead, her belly swollen to full term. The baby inside of her still and motionless. Then she found Charlie’s body, his face scarred by the vampire venom Venjamin had used to torture him, blood dried in his hair and clothes, a piece of wood piercing through his heart. Charlie! she cried out holding him in her arms, trying to wake him. Suddenly his body disintegrated into ashes and crumbled away in her arms. No!
She had to keep looking, her children were somewhere in that debris. She found John’s body, lifeless and dead inside his Sangre Valley letterman jacket, then Amelia, pale and bruised, blood dripping down her neck. She was in the pink dress she had worn on her first date. It was torn and blood-stained. Harry, she still had to find Harry. He had to be in there too. He would be alive. Her whole family couldn’t be dead. She heard a child’s giggle behind her and whirled around, her son’s name on her lips with a rush of joy and relief. It was Harry, still eleven years old, with his moppish hair in his violet eyes, a grin on his face. But Valerie didn’t run to him. Instead, a coldness spread through her entire being, body and soul. He was grinning hungrily at the carnage, at the destruction. And that was always when Valerie would wake up. She had the dream so many times that the fear no longer lingered afterwards. But the emptiness and hopelessness of her desolated hometown always stayed with her.
Every evening she lay in bed and had to remind herself that John was alive and seventeen now. Amelia had made it to sweet sixteen. Harry had just turned thirteen. They were alive and healthy. But Charlie was dead. Her husband would never see his children grow into the amazing people that they surely would become. He would never hear Valerie say that she had forgiven him for everything—the lies, the invasions, the danger. And the sad thing was, Valerie didn’t know if she would have been able to forgive him if he hadn’t died. Somehow in death all the bad things a person does in life fall away and you only hold onto the good. Valerie wanted to hold onto the good in Charlie, the way he loved his children and would go to any length to protect his family, how he died saving her life. She just wished she could tell him thank you.
Her husband was dead, a pile of ash, and Valerie was here in St. Thomas, far away from Sangre Valley. She half-wished she had chores that would usher her out of bed, housework and cooking that would keep her mind and body busy. But she no longer had to worry about that type of work. Still living in Alessandro and Jonathan’s house, there was a housekeeper to clean, and all her children were teenagers now, stubbornly independent and self-sufficient. For the first time Valerie’s life was her own.
Also for the first time she had a job outside the house, be it a part-time job. She had to do something to earn her keep if she wasn’t needed to keep house. So she had approached Alessandro and Jonathan for a job in their resort. Three nights a week she answered phones, organized files, opened mail, and completed whatever chores they needed done. It was menial work, but it was work; she was contributing. That she liked. And it was nice to have her own money and not depend solely on them, even if they did support her family. Alessandro had also coaxed her into coming down to the community theater with him. She hadn’t acted in twenty years, she wasn’t sure if she still could, but the desire to be on stage was there, even after all these years. She began as a voice in the chorus or a servant on stage without lines. It was an amateur group (which existed only because of Alessandro’s funding and operated out of the high school auditorium), but she could still feel the pull of the stage, the magic, the escape out of oneself and into another. It was strange; she felt more herself, more sure of who she was after she had stepped into the skin of someone else for a few hours. She played Lady Capulet in Romeo and Juliet then Mary Magdalene in Jesus Christ Superstar. And in two nights she would perform her first lead in Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll House as Nora. There was a nervousness turning her stomach, but it was the exciting nervousness of anticipation. Opening night couldn’t come soon enough. She was ready to show the world what she could do, or at the very least the island of St. Thomas.
Eventually Valerie rolled out of bed and took a long, leisurely shower. She let the hot water wash away the remnants of sleep and dissolve the dream into a distant memory. Stepping out of the shower, she towel dried her hair and wiped the steam off the mirror. Her reddish brown hair had grown out and flowed in waves down past her slender shoulders. On a diet of mostly donated blood, she had not aged one minute. Her skin was still pale and smooth, no wrinkles or lines in her forehead or around her large amethyst-colored eyes. There was no sagging of her breasts or butt, no filling out of her middle or thighs. Her body was lean and strong. She was thirty-six years old, but only in theory. As long as she continued to drink human blood, she would never age past twenty-four. Not missing the layers of constricting underwear she had to endure as a 1950s housewife, Valerie dressed in a free flowing white skirt and a white tank top. White was just about the only color she wore anymore. It made her feel light and pneumatic. It was the color she wanted her soul to be if she could ever cleanse herself of the blood and shame of James Peterson, the human she knowingly murdered, or the failure to keep her vow and save her husband’s life. She carried those two sins with her daily and prayed to God for forgiveness, but perhaps it would only be in death, as it was with Charlie, that she could gain that forgiveness. If that was the case, it would be a very long penance.
She made her bed knowing that the maid would only remake it with tighter corners and a smoother surface, but the act of making her bed gave her a sense of accomplishment as small as it was.
On her way downstairs, she passed John’s bedroom, music blaring as it did nearly twenty-four seven. Originally opposed to modern music, he had embraced heavy metal with a certain love of Marilyn Manson, Korn, and other dark artists who Valerie despised. Of course, her loathing was part of the appeal for John, who had become quite rebellious.
She knocked on the door and heard no answer so she opened it. The room was a disaster. The floor could not even be seen beneath the layer of clothes. Every table and orifice was cluttered with dirty glasses, dried blood caked on the bottom and flies buzzing about. His computer, TV, Xbox, and all his other electronic toys were a tangled mess of cords and wires. The once green walls of his room were plastered with music posters of his favorite bands and pictures of skulls and crossbones, corpses and blood, anything grotesque he could find. In a fit of rage after his father’s death, he had reduced his bed to kindling and now just a mattress and box spring lay on the floor. On that mattress lay John asleep. Valerie sighed.
If life had carried on in Sangre Valley, he would have just graduated from high school and probably would be engaged to his girlfriend Lisa, the wedding set for the summer. Dr. Venjamin would have found him a job in the hospital or somewhere else in town. Within a year the couple would have a small house all of their own and a tiny baby in their arms. At one time Valerie dreaded such a conventional life for her son. There was nothing wrong with being a family man, but she knew her son was capable of more. College, travel, adventure, love. But now she’d give anything for such a life for John. He used to shine oh so bright. People were drawn in by his good nature and affable personality. That was why he had been so popular in Sangre Valley. But he no longer shone; now he glowered in anger and isolation like a fire’s dying embers. He had already failed the GED once, despite the coaching of his tutors and had no plans to take it again or any ambition to attend college. Granted, college was not the typical path for a vampire, but there were night classes he could attend. He was a smart kid. He could do it. It would give him more options in what was going to be a very long life. No matter how hard she tried to make him see that, he refused. Her once handsome son had grown his black hair out so it hit just below his chin in stringy, greasy strands. He had sprouted up another couple of inches, which would have made him two inches taller than his deceased father. Every day he looked more and more like Charlie with his long, gaunt face, narrow nose, and thin lips. It was almost like looking right at Charlie. Of course, Charlie never would have dressed in John’s ratty cargo shorts or in his array of disturbing t-shirts that were inundated with skulls and death. He also always wore a hoodie, the hood over his greasy head. John had acquired a hunch now, his hands crammed into the pockets of his sweatshirt, the ear buds of his iPod blasting heavy guitar riffs and screaming lyrics loud enough for anyone near him to hear. Sometimes Valerie could barely see her son in the angry, lost person before her.
He never left his bedroom. Back in Sangre Valley he had been interested in sports and hanging out with his friends. But here he had yet to touch the basketball hoop that was installed especially for him. He was offered surfing lessons, swimming lessons, snorkeling, diving . . . the list went on and on. He refused them all. Valerie didn’t know what was going to become of him, and it worried her to no end.
She shut the door and let him sleep. She didn’t know what else to do.
Downstairs the house was quiet except for the sounds of the sea. She poured herself a glass of blood for breakfast and sat at the table. She remembered the days of waking before everyone else and preparing a hearty breakfast for her family, all of them gathered around the table together, wishing them a goodnight as they headed off to school or work. As much as she loved having a job and an outlet for her creativity, she missed the family meals together, hearing the stories of her children’s days, knowing what was going on in their lives and in their heads. These days it seemed like they were rarely all in the same room at the same moment. In truth, they didn’t feel much like a family anymore. She didn’t know if the loss of Charlie had created the black hole in their family or if it was Valerie’s lack of presence in the home—not just in the home but in their lives. John was always locked away in his room. Amelia spent most of her nights out on the beach drawing or painting and making friends with the tourists. Harry often followed any one of the three men of the house around—looking over Jonathan’s shoulder on a computer, asking about Alessandro’s analysis of Venjamin’s work, or tailing a brooding Ethan like a puppy. Every time she went to the resort or rehearsal, her excitement and joy was dampened by a gnawing, underlying guilt that she should be at home with her children, that while she was out fulfilling her dreams she was losing her family.
“Evening Mom,” a voice said behind her, startling her out of her thoughts.
She smiled. “Goodnight sweetheart.” She watched as Harry poured himself a glass of blood and sat next to her at the kitchen table. Harry was a naturally happy kid. Valerie felt such a sweeping joy every time she was around him because she could feel his happiness emanating from him. Sometimes it felt like he was the only child of hers that was happy these days.
Her youngest son had finally caught up with his age. At thirteen he stood as tall as her now, far above the average height for a boy his age. His body was long and lanky, stretched by his frequent growth spurts, but his shoulders and chest were broad. He wasn’t going to be lean like his brother and father—well, like his brother, Valerie thought with a chill. He would grow into his frame, fill it out given time. Harry’s hair was still a sandy color, still longish, but no longer a mop. He took interest in his appearance and styled it with product. His complexion was white and flawless, still boyish and hairless, but she knew he was going to be a very handsome man when the time came. His violet eyes were still wide with the curiosity and excitement of a child, but they seemed to have deepened in color, if not maturity. His plump red lips were almost always in a boyish grin. His voice had already cracked and changed into that of a man. She didn’t think she would ever get used to that voice coming out of her little boy.
“What are your plans for the night?” she asked him, sipping her blood.
He gulped down his blood and set his glass down on the table with a thud. “I was just going to tool around on the computer until my self-defense lesson with Ethan. He says I’ve got a natural flair for street fighting. I told him I learned it from my video games. That made him knock me on my butt with a round kick,” Harry said with a laugh. He liked Ethan. But then again Harry liked everyone. “He told me that I should practice more and play less video games.”
“I agree with that,” she said with a smile.
He rolled his eyes. “Please. I could already have my high school diploma by now if you’d just let me take the GED. Unlike John.”
“Hey, be nice,” she scolded. Her boys had never been close—both had always gotten along better with their sister—but now they were practically estranged.
Harry just shrugged. He didn’t know what John’s problem was. For a short time his older brother was actually cool. They could play around on the computer together, figure things out, play video games. It was the first time they really had anything in common; it was also the first time John really let Harry hang out with him. But as soon as John discovered that Harry had a better understanding of computers, he lost interest in them and took out his frustration on Harry. Just because he could beat his older brother at most video games, John refused to play with him, calling the games he liked childish. Harry knew he played those same games alone. Whenever Harry started talking about a new program or an enhancement he wanted to make on his computer, John would call him a geek or nerd, tell him that he’d never have a girlfriend. It was sad. Harry could have really tricked out his brother’s computer and gaming systems. But his brother would forever be a butthead.
Harry got up to get himself some more blood. His bloodlust had not diminished as he had gotten older. It was a wonder that Alessandro was able to keep them supplied with donated blood. His blood drives at the resort were held twice as frequently. But Harry no longer begged to feast on humans or asked to be taught how to hunt. Though she had caught him eyeing the beautiful Gabriella and his teachers as if they were delicious morsels of food more than once, he had finally learned to control his impulses and hunger. Secretly, he longed for a symbiotic relationship like Jonathan and Gabriella possessed, she knew that. And maybe that would be a good balance for him—one day. Right now, he was much too young.
“Where is everyone?” she asked, sipping her blood. Its sticky metallic taste ran down her throat, and she could feel it spread through her body with a slight ecstasy. The energizing effects were almost instantaneous. Her body felt strong, her senses sharper, keener.
“Alessandro’s in the security room obsessing over Dr. Venjamin’s data.”
A human Saxon turned vampire doctor, Alessandro’s intrigue with the files—now dubbed the infamous V-files—stolen from the hospital before it burned down bordered on the fanatical. The security room was a windowless, metal room located in the center of the house that monitored all the cameras and alarm systems in the home and housed all their sensitive, stolen information. It was only assessable with Alessandro or Jonathan’s retinal scan and hand print. Though Alessandro’s exuberant and eccentric personality had not been diminished by his obsession with the work, he rarely slept during the day, preferring to analyze the hundreds of thousands of computer files on Dr. Venjamin’s vampiric research. Somewhere buried in all that data laid Valerie’s secret, Venjamin’s deathbed confession. She hadn’t told a soul what the doctor declared to her before she ripped out his throat. Eventually Alessandro would find it though. Until then, she did not want to know one detail of those depraved files.
“Jonathan’s at the resort and Gabriella’s out shopping,” Harry said.
Jonathan, a former tribal leader and slave turned computer genius vampire, spent more and more time managing the resort and its adjacent casino and nightclub. Though his interest in the V-files was just as consuming as his companion’s, Jonathan’s home life was less than ideal. He and his human girlfriend were having troubles. She longed to become a vampire like Jonathan so they could spend eternity together, and he wouldn’t hear of such a thing. The once sickening tender moments between them were gone, and the tension that replaced them was palpable. So Jonathan spent much of his time away from the house while Gabriella spent his fortune like there was no tomorrow.
“What about your sister?”
“On the beach with Ethan.”
Valerie took her glass of blood outside to the beach. With unrestrained force and grunts, Amelia attacked Ethan with a series of kicks.
After Drew Sanders attacked her in the back seat of her father’s car, Amelia knew she never wanted to be that vulnerable, helpless girl again. Witnessing her own display of strength against Drew, she knew with the proper training, she wouldn’t have to be. That was why when her mother told her she would be taking self-defense classes, she couldn’t wait to start.
Ethan successfully blocked each and every kick. On her last kick, he caught her bare foot in his cold, strong hands. She didn’t hesitate for a moment, launched herself into the air, and delivered a blow to his head with her other foot. In the beginning she had worried about hurting Ethan with moves like that—she wanted to be able to take care of herself, she didn’t actually want to injure anyone—but after Ethan had delivered some stinging blows, her concern vanished and she gave him all she had. He fell back, releasing her. She dropped to the sand, but with a cat’s instincts and speed, she was back on her feet in a defensive stance, arms up to block. Ethan came at her with speed and what Amelia had dubbed his “warrior face.” A fierce expression of bared teeth and narrowed eyes that made him look larger than he already was and just about as aggressive as he truly was. It was menacing. But she was so used to it that it was hard not to laugh. There really wasn’t anything scary about Ethan, not once you got to know him.
His fists went for the face, the ribs, the chest—she blocked them all. Amelia didn’t like to be on the defensive so she went on the offensive. She struck Ethan’s side, once, twice, his muscles hard like steel, bruising her bare hands, but she did not stop. She planted a kick square in the middle of his chest, knocking him on his back. She went in for the kill—maybe this would finally be her first win against Ethan—but he flipped back up on his feet and delivered a blow across her face that Amelia had never even seen coming, sending her flying into the sand. It stung like hell, but Ethan had the skill and control to hit without leaving a mark or doing any real damage. Before she knew it, he was straddling her, arms pinned to the ground. If he had a stake in his hand, she would have been dead.
Besides being pissed that he had once again beat her, she kind of liked the position beneath him, his weight heavy on top of her, cool and strong, her arms pinned above her head, looking up at his scarred face through strands of her own hair. She was helpless in that position, but it didn’t make her feel like a victim. Quite the opposite actually. It felt empowering in a primal, sexual way that Amelia was just discovering. She liked the way it felt.
She still had a little crush on Ethan. She knew it was one sided and nothing would ever come of it—she wasn’t even sure if she wanted anything to come of it—but she couldn’t help herself. She spent more time with him than anyone else in the house. He taught her kick boxing (her favorite), boxing (her least favorite), Jiujutsu, Kung Fu, wrestling, and everything else he had picked up in his ninety-odd years as a vampire (though the boxing he had learned as a human, it was a good Irish sport that his father had approved of). He was a patient but brutal teacher. He was also her mentor when it came to art. She had a professional tutor who taught her a lot about technique, composition, and texture, but she learned something more from Ethan: how to see. How to see a picture in animated life, freeze it in time, but continue to give it emotion and movement. He granted her access to his art books and all of his own drawings and paintings. From then on, she went to his room in the early evening every night, and they shared their art. He was gruff as always, nearly silent most of the time, but very open with his work, no matter how personal the subject matter, nor how good or bad it may have been. Sometimes they would sketch together, not speaking, other times she would goad him into critiquing her work. He’d always give her the honest, blunt truth. One thing you never had to worry about with Ethan was him sugarcoating anything. Of course, that was part of the attraction. There were no games with Ethan; you always knew where you stood. As silent and brooding as he could be, his drawings—the poverty and misery of the dying people he fed on, the face of the woman he drew over and over again—showed the pain and loneliness, the self-loathing and anger he harbored inside, but also a softness, a tenderness that she had rarely seen him demonstrate. How could a girl not be attracted to such a man? But secretly, she wished it was another boy straddling her in the sand.
Valerie did not flinch at the sight of her daughter being knocked to the ground. For a vampire to live for centuries, he or she must know how to take care of oneself and that meant knowing how to defend oneself in a physical altercation. Violence was built into being a vampire. Valerie had learned that the hard way. To deny her children such an education would be to their great detriment. Plus, she trusted Ethan, knew he’d never hurt a single one of her children. Not even John at his most obnoxious. Yet the sight of him on top of her daughter did cause her distress. It was a sharp stab of jealousy.
“Not bad,” he grunted, pulling Amelia to her feet. Or rather Amy to her feet. Like the rest of her children, Amelia had gone through a metamorphosis after the death of her father. She cut off her long hair so it hung above her shoulders, gave herself long swooping bangs that hid her eyes, and dyed it jet black with neon blue highlights. She now wore black eyeliner that made her doe eyes seem even larger, nearly caricature-like. Bright red lipstick on her pouting lips added a shock value to her very pallid face.
Just as Valerie favored the color white, Amelia favored the color black, usually dressing in black skirts or capris, with layered black tank tops. Sometimes she might sport a rare blood red t-shirt. The only real color she would wear was in the scarf around her neck that hid her bite scars. Pink, blue, purple, green, striped, polka-dotted. Sometimes they were short fifties scarves, sometimes they were long and winding. They had become her signature. She had also gone ahead and pierced her nose with a tiny diamond stud without permission. Hair dye was one thing, putting a hole in her body was another. Valerie did not handle that transformation in her appearance particularly well, but in the end she allowed her to keep it. Her daughter did nothing lightly or without thought. The piercing had to have been something she felt strongly about. Valerie wasn’t going to hold her back.
Her daughter also had asked to be called Amy or Aims instead of Amelia. This had slightly broken Valerie’s heart. She had always loved the name Amelia; that was why she gave it to her only daughter. Though she tried to adhere to her daughter’s wish, she just could not seem to call her daughter anything other than Amelia.
Like her younger brother, she continued to excel at school. Unlike her older brother, at sixteen she had passed her GED. Her tutors came less frequently and urged her to enroll in the university on the island. But Amelia wasn’t ready for that. Right now her art was the most important thing in her life. Valerie supported this whole heartedly. She knew what it was like to have a passion, though Amelia’s seemed more like a calling or vocation. Her style was mostly manga. To Valerie her work looked like a comic book, but her daughter informed her that it was a graphic novel. Valerie didn’t really understand the difference, and may never since Amelia wouldn’t share more than a snippet of her work with anyone other than Ethan. This made Valerie jealous of both of them.
“Thanks,” Amelia said, wiping the sand from her butt.
“You know, you could be a lot stronger,” he said.
She smiled. She had been through this with Ethan many times. Amelia had refused to drink the donated blood from the beginning, but lately she had been limiting her intake of raw meat while slowly introducing human food into her diet. She knew the consequences—the loss of speed and strength, aging, and eventually death. Yet there was nothing that could rationalize the drinking of human blood in her mind. “I know. But I’m not changing my mind.”
“Okay,” he said in his gruff manner. Thankfully, Ethan wasn’t one to lecture. His azure eyes suddenly looked up to see Valerie.
Valerie envied her daughter’s bond with Ethan. In order to spare the kids any more change, Valerie had kept her distance from Ethan after Charlie’s death and he returned the favor—all too well. She feared that they had missed their moment. She could not stop her eyes from lingering on him, while he never let his eyes rest on her for even a moment. He never sought her out to talk or demand a change in their relationship. In fact, about the only time they were alone together or had any physical contact was when he taught her how to defend herself. She missed him. She missed that intense connection between them that surpassed all convention. She missed his hunger for her, and her own hunger for him. But so much time had passed between them, she didn’t know how to initiate a relationship or even if he was still interested in pursuing one.
He looked at her then looked behind her where Harry had joined her outside.
“You ready?” Ethan asked her son.
“I’m always ready,” Harry said, kicking off his flip flops and jumping into a fighter’s stance.
“Come on Harry,” Amelia said. “Give the old man some time to regain his strength,” she teased.
Ethan just glared at her. If you weren’t familiar with Ethan, you’d never know that was a teasing glare.
“Then I guess I’m fighting you,” Harry said, throwing out a teasing punch at his sister. They continued to laugh and play fight on the beach, kicking up sand. Ethan joined her on the patio, both of them watching over the kids as they played. She was ever so aware of his massive presence next to her. Her mind flashed to the single kiss they shared under the heat of the sun, his strong, cold arms embracing her, the voracity of their mouths and bodies and souls as they clung to each other. He had risked death by sunlight just to kiss her. It seemed so long ago.
“Did you sleep well?” he asked. Casual chit chat. That was all that passed between them these days.
“Fine,” she lied. Valerie kept her nightmares to herself. “How are the kids doing?”
“Exceptional. Aims needs to drink to be stronger. She’d be down right invincible if she did. Harry is a natural. Too aggressive, but that’s because he’s young. He’s still learning self-discipline. John,” he said and paused. “He is clouded by his anger. Rash and a danger to himself. He has no control.”
John still held an intense hatred against Ethan. Even though Ethan had gone on the mission to save his father, he would always be the one responsible for letting Charlie be captured by Venjamin’s men in the first place. He would also be the one who failed to save his father. He had gotten over his fear of a budding romance between Ethan and his mom, but now it was the closeness Ethan had developed with his siblings that angered him. It should have been Charlie teaching them how to defend themselves, how to be a vampire in this world, and helping them with their homework (not that Ethan did this). He loathed letting Ethan do anything in place of his dad. But he had consented to the lessons because even he realized that self-defense was something he needed to know—and was much more important than some stupid high school equivalency test. Plus, it was the only outlet for his rage. He wanted to hurt the man who took away his father, who threw him into this hellish life. But Venjamin was already dead so that left Ethan, the next best thing. He would take him down. Bring him to his knees. It had yet to happen, but one day it would.
Valerie felt like she was at a parent-teacher conference, as if Ethan only had a relationship with her kids and not her. She wanted to scream at him Look at me! See me!
“And me?” she asked, trying to add a flirtatious note to her voice. He ignored it.
“Come on Harry, let’s get started,” he said, stepping off the deck.
Valerie sighed and was about to go back into the house when three vampires in the distance caught her eye.