Darius smiles as he walks towards the bed. ‘A customer you’ll never forget.’
Chapter 17
Sadie | Highlands, present day
Drops of rain splatter the tarmac as Damian opens the car door and shoves me into the back seat.
He starts the engine, and we take off with a squeal of rubber. Floss throws him a querying look from the passenger seat. ‘What’s the hurry, babe?’
She and Hester were facing away from the men’s loo, so they didn’t see Damian yanking me away from it—and the unfortunate trucker. The taste of his blood is on my tongue, so it’ll be easy enough to wipe his memory before we get too far out of range. He’ll be back in his Graham’s milk truck shortly, none the wiser about what happened when he went off to take an innocent piss. But he may wonder why his neck hurts.
‘Apart from Elliott being in mortal danger, I checked the weather, and it’s not looking great. I don’t want to hang around,’ Damian replies calmly without even a wobble in his voice to betray any of what just happened. I’mimpressed. I feel a bit better now that the bloodlust has subsided, and I apologise (albeit grudgingly).
Me:Thanks for pulling me away from that guy and for not telling the others what I did. They don’t need to know about it. It’ll be our little secret. Quick thinking about the weather too.
Damian:I did actually check the weather, and I don’t want to keep secrets from Floss. I’ll probably tell her later on.
Me:Oh, right. But you’ll still let me feed from you? You did promise.
Damian:Fine. You get five minutes. That’s all.
His jaw clenches, and his knuckles turn white on the steering wheel. I back out of his mind space hastily, sensing his annoyance about having agreed to that. Well, too bad! If he’s going to be one of us, he’ll need to learn that you can’t break promises once you make them. It’s a coven rule.
Now that he’s agreed to it, I can’t help staring at Damian’s neck and its visibly pulsing vein. His adrenaline is heightened, and he’s going through a moral dilemma about letting me feed from him and how to tell Floss about it. I don’t care about any of that. My mouth is watering. Floss is always in raptures over how good Damian’s blood tastes, so I’m looking forward to sampling it for myself.
A thin drizzle begins as we leave Perth, and Damian heads north towards the Highlands without giving anyreason for doing so. But no one disputes his decision. There’s only one main road, so it makes sense that Alexander came this way.
After twenty minutes, the light is fading fast, though it’s barely noon. Damian switches on his car lights and the windscreen wipers; one of them goes swish-squeak swish-squeak, and it sets my teeth on edge. Leaning forward, I peer through the windscreen to see ominous dark clouds ahead. The sky looks like it’s about to explode—I can relate.
‘We’re driving into a storm,’ I say pointlessly.
‘No shit,’ says Damian through gritted teeth. His neck muscles are now strained as he peers at the slick road; his speed has dropped right down again.
‘What do you think, babe?’ asks Floss, placing a hand on his leg.
Damian sighs. ‘It might be better to wait it out and decide what to do next.’
His eyes flick to mine in the rear-view mirror briefly, then back to the road. ‘My Uncle Tim’s place is in Pitlochry, which isn’t far from here. We can hole up there for the night so I can do a hypnosis session and see if Sadie can pick up anything more from Elliott.’
‘No,’ I say instantly. ‘Not Tim. I don’t want to go there.’
‘It makes sense, Sadie,’ says Hester. ‘Do you want to find Elliott ornot?’
‘You know I do. It’s just ... well ...’ I feel sick at the thought of seeing Tim again after all these years. ‘He kind of hates me,’ I mutter. ‘And how am I going to explain why I look exactly the same as when he last saw me in 1983?’
There’s silence as everyone digests this. Hah! Not so keen on going there now, are we?
‘Let’s take a vote on it,’ says Floss. ‘Uncle Tim or a hotel. I vote for Uncle Tim.’
Damian nods. ‘Me too. Uncle Tim.’
‘My vote is for a hotel,’ I state firmly. ‘Preferably four-star or up. There are plenty of choices around here.’ I’m quietly confident that will sway Hester as she’s a sucker for a nice hotel with excellent amenities. I know this because we took a few trips to the Highlands before we bought our flat in Ramsay Garden to see if it was viable for us to stay up here and feed from animals. It was. But Floss refused point-blank to leave Edinburgh, so that plan fell through. We had several lovely stays in five-star hotels, though.
‘My vote is for Uncle Tim,’ says Hester, studiously avoiding my eyes.
Motherfucker!
Chapter 18
