Two.
No light. Nothing. Even the sound of the falls had been yanked away.
Something wasn’t right.
Chapter Three
Trapped. Claustrophobic. Hungry. She sat on the cold ground.
Emotions whooshed through Della like a fire chasing kerosene. Then she heard it. Breathing.
In.
Out.
Air being pulled into another set of lungs.
She remembered she wasn’t alone.
“Chase?” she whispered his name, but even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t him.
It was Liam.
But who the hell was Liam? She didn’t know any Liam, so how did she know his name? Her heart thumped a little faster and she tasted blood on her tongue.
Mo fo! What the hell was happening?
“You okay?” a voice asked, Liam’s voice.
“No,” Della said. I’m pretty sure I’m losing my mind.
“Here. Drink some more.”
She smelled another vamp. Liam was a vamp. But she’d already known that. How could she know and not know something at the same time? An arm, a strong limb of flesh and blood, came against her mouth.
“Go ahead, drink a little more.”
Knees pulled up to her chest, her empty stomach clenched as she realized what he was offering. Vampires didn’t drink another vamp’s blood. At least not the ones she knew.
“No.” Della pushed the arm away, but as she moved the limb, her fingertips touched tiny wounds … wounds that felt like teeth marks.
When she rested her arm on her bare knee, she felt the same tiny wounds on her wrist.
“Do it, Natasha. Come on, I’m fine.” His arm came against her mouth again, and she gently moved it away, holding on to him a second longer than necessary, needing the contact.
She started to tell him she wasn’t Natasha, but it would have been a lie. She was Natasha. Somehow, someway, she was inside Natasha. Then she remembered this happening before, with Lorraine. But Lorraine was dead. Were these two … She blinked and tried to make out her surroundings. Only darkness filled her vision.
She was locked in a dark, dank place that smelled like wet dirt with a boy named Liam. The tangy taste of blood lingered on her lips. Then the realization hit. They weren’t dead. Didn’t feel dead. They were actually trying to survive. And to do it, Liam and Natasha were feeding off each other.
“Seriously, I’m fine,” Liam repeated.
“I’m not hungry,” she lied. She barely noted the skip of her heart, listening to the sound of her voice. Not Della’s voice. Natasha’s voice.
Who was Natasha?
Panic started to swell inside her chest. She buried her nails in the wet earth she sat on, and almost cried out from the pain. Obviously, she’d already tried to claw her way out.
And it hadn’t worked.