My body felt frozen as I looked up at Erik. His Mark was still a surprise. It was unique and incredible and made him look even more handsome.
"Why, Zoey?" He repeated when I just stood there staring at him like a speechless moron.
"I'm so sorry Erik!" I managed to blurt. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I didn't want you to find out like that."
"Yeah," he said coldly. "Finding out my girlfriend, who has been playing oh-so-innocent with me, is really a slut would have been no problem if you'd, I don't know, advertised it in the school paper. Yeah, that would have been way better."
I flinched at his hateful tone. "I'm not a slut."
"Looked like you were doing a good imitation of one. And I knew it!" he yelled. "I knew there was something going on between you two! But I was so damn stupid I believed you when you said it wasn't true." His laugh was completely humorless. "God, I'm an idiot."
"Erik, we didn't mean for this to happen, but Loren and I are in love. We tried to stay away from each other, but we just couldn't."
"You have got to be kidding! You actually believe that asshole loves you?"
"He does love me."
Erik shook his head and laughed humorlessly again. "If you believe that, then you're stupider than I am. He's using you, Zoey. There's only one thing a guy like him wants from a girl like you, and he got it. When he's had enough of it, he'll dump you and move on."
"That's not true," I said.
He kept talking as if I hadn't spoken. "Damn, I'm glad I'm out of here tomorrow, even though I would like to be here to say told-you-so when Blake dumps you."
"You don't know what you're talking about, Erik."
"You know, you might be right," he said in a cold, hard voice that made him sound like a stranger. "I sure as hell didn't know what I was talking about the whole time I was saying you and I were going out, and the whole time I was telling everyone how great you are and how happy I was that you were with me. I actually thought I was falling in love with you."
My stomach twisted. I felt like his words were stabbing me in the heart. "I thought I was falling in love with you, too," I said softly, blinking my eyes hard to keep from crying.
"Bullshit!" he yelled. He sounded mean even though I could see tears filling his eyes. "Stop playing games with me. And you think Aphrodite is a hateful bitch? You make her look like a fucking angel!" He started to back away from me. "Erik, wait. I don't want it to end like this between us," I said, feeling tears spill over and fall down my cheeks.
"Stop crying! This is what you wanted. This is what you and Blake planned."
"No! I didn't plan this!"
Erik shook his head back and forth, blinking hard. "Leave me alone. It's over. I never want to see you again." Then he practically ran away from me.
My chest felt tight and hot and I couldn't seem to stop crying. My feet started moving, carrying me to the only place I could go-to the only person I wanted to see. Somehow on the way to the poet's loft I got myself together. Okay, not really together, but at least I looked normal enough to keep anyone who walked by me (like two vamp warriors and a couple of fledglings) from stopping me and asking what was wrong. I'd managed to quit crying. I'd run my fingers through my hair and pulled it forward over my shoulders so that it partially covered my blotchy face.
I didn't hesitate when I came to the building that held the on-campus faculty quarters. I just took a big, deep breath and prayed silently that no one would see me.
As soon as I was inside I realized that I shouldn't have worried so much about being seen. It wasn't set up like a dorm. There was no big meeting room as you walked in where vamps hung out and watched TV like fledglings. It was just a big, stone-floored hallway that had closed doors leading off of it. The stairs were on my right and I hurried up them. I knew Loren might not be back at his room yet. He might still be looking for Erik. But that was okay. I'd curl up in his bed and wait for him. At least that way I would kinda be close to him again. My body felt stiff and unfamiliar as I walked out of the stairwell on the top floor and headed to the one large wooden door not far away from me.
As I approached it I could see that the door was cracked and I heard Loren's voice trickle out from inside. He was laughing. The sound brushed against my skin, washing through the pain and sadness the scene with Erik had caused. I'd been right to come to him. I could already almost feel his arms around me. Loren would hold me and call me "love" and "baby" and tell me that everything would be all right. His touch would wipe away Erik's hurt and the terrible things he'd said and make me stop feeling so broken. I put my hand flat against the door so that I could push it all the way open and go in to him.
Then she laughed, low and musical and seductive, and my world stopped. It was Neferet. She was in there with Loren. There was no mistaking that sound-that beautiful, alluring laughter. Neferet's voice was as distinctive as Loren's. When the laughter stopped, her words came to me, sliding through the crack between door and frame like a poisonous mist.
"You've done well, my darling. Now I know what she knows, and everything is coming together perfectly. It will be a simple thing to continue to isolate her. I just hope the part you have to play isn't too unpleasant for you." Neferet's voice was teasing, but there was an edge of hardness to it.
"She's easy to lead around. A shiny present here, a pretty compliment there, and you have true love and a popped cherry sacrificed to the god of deception and hormones." Loren laughed again. "Young girls are so ridiculous-so predictably easy."
I felt like his words were piercing my skin in one hundred different places, but I made myself move silently forward so that I could peek in through the cracked door. I got a glimpse of a big room filled with rich leather furniture and lit by lots of pillar candles. My eyes were drawn instantly to the centerpiece of the loft-the huge iron bed in the middle of the room. Loren was lying back on it, propped up by zillions of fat pillows. He was completely naked.
Neferet was wearing a long red dress that hugged her perfect body and dipped low to show the top of her boobs. She paced back and forth as she spoke, letting her long, manicured fingers trail over the iron railing of Loren's bed.
"Keep her busy. I'll make sure that little gang of friends deserts her. She's powerful, but she'll never be able to tap into her gifts if she doesn't have her friends to help keep her head on straight while she's chasing around after you." Neferet paused and tapped a slender finger against her chin. "You know, I was surprised by the Imprint, though." I saw Loren's body jerk. Neferet smiled. "You didn't think I'd be able to smell it on you?
You reek of her blood, and her blood reeks of you."
"I don't know how it happened," Loren said quickly, the obvious irritation in his voice driving daggers into my heart so that I could feel it shattering into tiny pieces. "I guess I underestimated my acting abilities. I'm just relieved that there's nothing real between us-saves me from the messy emotions and bond that would go with a true Imprinting." He laughed. "Like the one she had with that human boy. He must have experienced some nasty pain when that was broken. Weird that she was able to Imprint so fully with him before she's Changed."
"More proof of her power!" Neferet snapped. "Even though she has been ridiculously easy to lead astray for a Chosen One. And don't pretend to complain that she Imprinted with you. You and I both know it just made the sex more pleasurable for you."
"Well, I can tell you that it was damned inconvenient that you sent the gallant Erik to find his little girlfriend so soon. Couldn't you have given me a few more minutes to finish up?"
"I can give you all the time you want. Actually, I can leave right now and you can go find your little teenage lap dog and finish up."
Loren sat up. Leaning forward he grabbed Neferet's wrist. "Come on, baby. You know I don't really want her. Don't be angry with me, love."
Neferet easily pulled away from him, but the gesture was more teasing than mad. "I'm not angry. I'm pleased. Your Imprint breaking the bond with the human boy has left Zoey even more alone. And it's not like your Imprint with the chit is permanent. It'll dissolve when she Changes, or dies," she finished with a mean little laugh. "But would you rather it didn't dissolve? Perhaps you've decided you prefer youth and na?��vet?? to me?"
"Never, love! I'll never want anyone like I want you," Loren said. "Let me show you, baby. Let me show you." He moved quickly to the end of the bed and took her into his arms. I watched his hands roam down her body, a lot like he'd touched me not long before.
I pressed my hand against my mouth so I wouldn't sob out loud.
Neferet turned in Loren's arms and arched her back against him as his hands continued to moved all over her body. She was facing the doorway. Her eyes were closed and her lips were parted. She moaned in pleasure and her eyes opened slowly, almost sleepily. And then Neferet was looking directly at me. I whirled around, ran down the stairs, and burst out of the building. I wanted to keep running away. Anywhere that was far, far away, but my body betrayed me. I was only able to stagger a couple steps from the door. I did manage to get to the shadows behind one of the well-trimmed holly hedges before I bent at the waist and puked my guts up.
When I stopped gagging and dry heaving I started walking. My mind wasn't working right. I was disoriented with terrible, whirling thoughts. I was feeling more than thinking, and all I could feel was pain. The pain told me Erik had been right, except he'd underestimated Loren. He'd thought Loren was just using me for sex. The truth was that Loren hadn't even wanted me. He'd only used me because the woman he did want had put him up to it. I wasn't even a sex object to him. I was an inconvenience. He'd only touched me and told me all those things... all those beautiful things because he'd been playing a part given to him by Neferet. To him I meant less than nothing.
Stifling a sob, I reached up, yanked the diamond posts from my earlobes, and with a cry hurled them away from me.
"Damn, Zoey. If you were tired of those diamonds, you could have said something. I have some drop pearls that would go great with that dorky snowman necklace Erik gave you for your birthday, and I would have traded them for the rocks."
I turned around slowly, like my body might shatter if I moved too fast. Aphrodite was just coming out of the sidewalk that led to the dining hall. She was carrying a weird fruit in one hand and a bottle of Corona in the other.
"What? I like mangos," she said. "The dorm never has them, but the vamps' kitchen fruit fridge always does. Like they'll miss a mango here and there?" When I didn't say anything, she continued, "Okay, okay, I know beer's common and kinda tacky, but I like it, too. Hey, do me a favor and don't ever tell my mom. She'd totally freak." Then I saw her eyes widen as she got a good look at me. "Holy shit, Zoey! You look awful. What's wrong with you?"
"Nothing. Leave me alone," I said, barely recognizing my own voice.
"Okay, whatever. Go on about your business and I'll mind mine," she said, and then almost bolted away from me.
I was alone. Just like Neferet had said, they were all leaving me. And I deserved it. I'd caused Heath terrible pain. I'd hurt Erik. I'd given away my virginity for lies. How had Loren put it? I'd sacrificed true love and a popped cherry to the god of deception and hormones. No wonder he was Poet Laureate. He definitely had a way with words.
And suddenly I had to run. I didn't know where I was going. I only knew that I had to move and move fast or my mind was going to explode. I didn't stop until I couldn't breathe anymore, and then I leaned against the bark of an old oak and gasped.
"Zoey? Is that you?"
I looked up, blinking through the fog of my misery to see Darius, the young, hot, warrior mountain. He was actually standing on top of the wide wall that surrounded our school, and he was studying me curiously.
"Is all well with you?" he asked in the weird, kinda archaic way the warriors all seemed to talk.
"Yes," I managed between breaths. "I just wanted to take a walk."
"You were not walking," he said logically.
"It's just a figure of speech." I met his eyes and decided I was sick and tired of lying. "I felt like my head was going to explode, so I ran as hard and as long as I could. This is where I ended up." Darius nodded slowly. "It is a place of power. I am not surprised you were drawn here."
"Here?" I blinked and looked around. And then-ohmygod-realized exactly where I was. "This is the east wall near the trapdoor."
"Yes, Priestess, it is. Even the barbaric humans sensed its power enough so that they left Professor Nolan's body here." He motioned over his shoulder just outside the wall to the place Aphrodite and I had found Professor Nolan. It was also where I'd found Nala (or rather, where she'd found me), where I'd cast my first circle, had my first glimpse of what would turn out to be the undead dead kids, and where I'd called on the elements and Nyx to break through the memory block Neferet had placed on my mind. It really was a place of power. I couldn't believe I hadn't realized it before now. Of course I'd been awfully busy with Heath and Erik and especially Loren. Neferet had been right, I thought with disgust. I was ridiculously easy to lead astray.
"Darius, do you think you could leave me alone here for a while? I'd-I'd like to pray, and I'm hoping Nyx will give me an answer if I listen hard enough."
"And that would be easier to do were you alone," he said.
I nodded, not sure if I could continue to make my voice mind.
"I will allow you privacy, Priestess. But do not stray far from here. Remember that Neferet has bespelled the perimeter, so if you use the trapdoor and cross the line of her spell, in moments you would be surrounded by Sons of Erebus." His smile was grim, but kind. "And that would not help you concentrate on your prayers, my lady."
"I'll remember." I tried not to flinch when he called me Priestess and my lady. No dang way I deserved either title.
With one fluid, unhurried movement, he vaulted from the top of the twenty-foot wall, landing neatly on his feet. Then he saluted me with his fist over his heart, bowed slightly, and disappeared soundlessly into the night.
It was then that my legs decided they wouldn't support me anymore. I sat heavily in the grass at the base of the familiar old oak, pulled my knees up to my chest, wrapped my arms around them, and began to cry, silently and steadily.
I was unbelievably sorry. How could I have been so stupid? How could I have fallen for Loren's lies? I really had believed him. And now I'd not only given the jerk my virginity, but I'd Imprinted with him, which made me a double idiot.
I wanted my grandma. With a little choking sob, I reached into the pocket of my dress for my cell phone. I was going to tell Grandma everything. It'd be awful and embarrassing, but I knew she wouldn't leave me or judge me. Grandma wouldn't stop loving me.
But my dang cell phone wasn't there. Then I remembered it had fallen out of my pocket when I'd gotten naked with Loren. I must have forgotten to pick it up. Didn't that just figure? I closed my eyes and let my head fall back against the rough bark of the tree.
"Mee-uf-ow!"
Nala's warm wet nose poked against my cheek. Without opening my eyes I spread my arms so that she could hop up into my lap. She put her little front paws on my shoulder and pressed her face into the crook of my neck, purring furiously, as if the sound could force me to feel better.
"Oh, Nala, I've messed up so bad." I held my cat and let the sobs shake my shoulders.