Aiden followed Grace through the hatch and down into the ground below the ball sculpture, careful not to step on her fingers as he descended the ladder behind her.
He had a few questions he'd like answered, but first, they needed to close that door. His old friends from the night before were approaching fast. He couldn't quite put his finger on exactly how he knew that. He just...felt it, in every single cell of his body. It was a rather strange thing actually, but he didn't have time to chew over the reasoning behind it at the moment.
Right now, he just needed to get Grace out of harm's reach.
He peeked underneath his arm to find her already off of the ladder and standing motionless with her back to him, whispering so quietly even he had a hard time hearing her.
The door above him began to close, and he jumped down the last few feet as she came to life again and reached into a nearby cubbyhole in the wall.
Striking a match, she lit the candle in her hand and set it on the counter. Walking over to a metal box on the wall, she began flicking switches, and lights came on around the room.
Aiden set the black bag in one of the other cubbies and looked around. The entire shelter was no bigger than a large bedroom in the average American household.
A row of vertical cubbies was cut into the wall right next to the ladder. The top one contained matches and candles, a kerosene lamp, and boxes of extra ammo. The others contained towels, peroxide, alcohol, jugs of water, and a large first aid kit. The third had a food and water bowl, and some cat food.
Nowhere did he see a way to open or close the hatch door.
Interesting.
Hanging on the wall were the weapons for the ammo, including another 9mm and a shotgun, and right next to them, some wicked looking knives.
"Don't touch the knives." Grace's voice came from across the room. "The blades are silver."
He raised an eyebrow. "Silver?"
She made an affirmative noise. "Silver is bad for you, right?"
"It's not my metal of choice to be stabbed with, no." He wandered past some cabinets with doors, a steel counter with a propane camping-style cook stove on it, and over to the desk where Grace was now sitting at a state of the art computer.
Monitors came to life on the wall in front of her above the desk as he set her rucksack down next to her chair. Within a few seconds, they had views of the grounds in every direction around the sculpture above them.
Aiden leaned in closer. "Bloody hell," he growled.
The soccer ball sculpture above them was surrounded by demon hybrids, including the group that used to be his old friends.
Grace stopped breathing completely for a few seconds, and then she inhaled a shaky breath. "Jesus. They're everywhere."
"Can they get in?" he asked.
"No," she asserted confidently.
All right, then.
He kept a careful eye on the multiple screens, but it appeared as though she was correct. Their trail dead-ended at the sculpture, and they couldn't find their way in. Crawling the grounds above them like ants, they sometimes wandered off towards the streets, but would always come back to the soccer ball. Like hunting dogs on a scent.
How the hell did they know he and Grace were still there? There was no way they could smell them this far underground.
A sour feeling curled his insides. As much as he wanted to deny it, Aiden had a feeling he knew.
It was him. He was the one pulling them here. They sensed him somehow, just as he could sense them when they were anywhere near him.
As he watched them swarming above them, that strange sensation hit him again, like something, or someone, was stirring inside of him.
A forgotten memory of Leeha's red eyes suddenly flashed in front of him in bits and pieces. Tears streaming down her lovely, evil face as she told him goodbye. Her hands reaching out and catching him before his head had hit the ground and he'd passed out. Standing in the room full of her demon zombies - all vampires that Luukas had created yet had followed her to create their own colony. She'd possessed them all with the demons from the altar.
And he had been next, because the dark warlock had refused to use Shea.
His head started to spin, and he backed away from the monitors.
No! It couldn't be. Those things out there, they had no recollection of the vampires they used to be when they were under Luukas' rule. He, Aiden, was still himself. His body, his mind, his memories.
Yet, they had called him "Waano", and they could sense whenever he was near them. Like he was one of them.
He suddenly felt nauseous. Could it be possible?
But if Leeha had injected him full of one of those demon-ghost things, why was he still here? Why was he still him?
An unlikely scenario occurred to him: Unless, for whatever reason, it didn't want to be inside of him. Unless, unlike the others, who were eager to be corporeal again, his own demon didn't want to come out.
Poppycock.
However, he remembered how strange he'd felt when he'd first seen his old friends in that empty building. He remembered the violence that had risen inside of him when he'd seen the human male shot in Grace's kitchen.
It wasn't like him to get so overwrought with emotion. As a matter of fact, he couldn't remember ever reacting so intensely to anything since he'd gone home to find his entire family murdered.
Was that what this strange feeling was inside of him? That feeling like he was experiencing someone else's emotions? Could it be that that was exactly what he was doing?
No. NO. It couldn't be. He was going daft. More likely, Leeha had chickened out and found that she couldn't make him into one of her minions. She'd always had a soft spot for him, after all. She'd probably knocked him out and stuck him in that shipping container somehow to get him out of harms way.
"Aiden? Are you all right? What's wrong?" Grace's concerned voice came at him as if from outside a bubble. "Aiden, why are they still here? Why aren't they leaving?"
The slight tremble in her voice belied her calm appearance.
He stared into her exotic green eyes, and reached blindly for her good hand, too shaken up by his own thoughts to reassure her properly with words.
She gave it to him, squeezing his fingers and not letting go. Even that slightest of touches from her managed to ground him. And a few seconds later, he felt that presence inside of him begin to subside.
Her freckles stood out against her pale face as she waited for answers, but he couldn't tell her what he suspected. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
"I don't know," he told her instead. Without releasing her hand, he took stock of the room around them, trying to get his mind on to something else - like their survival. "How long can you stay here before you run out of supplies?"
"Um, about two weeks if we had to, maybe even longer since I'm the only one who'll be eating the food."
He waited for what she'd just said to sink into her human brain. And sure enough, after only a few seconds, her eyes flew to his. He knew exactly what she'd just thought of, and he gave her a tight smile. "I'm not a young vampire. I'll be good for a while, as far as feeding is concerned. Long enough for us to figure a way out of here, in any case."
She nodded, but her expression was grave.
If only she knew how gentle I can be, and how much she's going to enjoy it.
He may need to educate her on that sooner rather than later. But then he frowned a bit. What was he thinking? He would do no such thing. The only thing he'd be doing would be to get her out of this coffin and somewhere safe, and then he'd be on a plane back home.
He noticed her still staring at him, her face all screwed up with worry, and then suddenly she smiled.
He looked at her suspiciously. Did she read minds now? A bit affronted, he wondered if she was happy that he had no plans to seduce her.
Something tickled his ear, and he reached up to rub it, only to quickly pull his hand away.
"Bloody hell!" He rubbed his palm on his thigh. "How the hell did your boot brush get on my shoulder?" He reached up again to dislodge the bristling little guy.
Grace giggled as Mojo huffed and jerked away from Aiden's hand, raised his quills, and then promptly returned to Aiden's hood.
"He must've crawled out of the pack when you were holding it," she giggled.
"And into my hood? What if I'd needed to wear it? I'd have his bloody quills sticking out all over my skull. I'd look like Pinhead!"
"He likes you."
"Likes me? He won't even let me touch him."
"You just startled him is all."
He gave her such a look of exasperation that she laughed out loud. "Here. Sit down in the chair so I can get him."
Slowly, so as not to upset the grouchy beast in his hood, he took a seat and turned his back to her.
"Hey, baby," she murmured softly, her breath tickling the back of Aiden's neck. "It's ok. It's just me. We're all done running for now."
If he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine her soft lips moving against his skin as she whispered to him like that, but then he felt Mojo's slight weight get lifted from his clothes as Grace scooped him out and put him on the floor to run around. Once the little prickler was out of his clothing, he gave himself an internal shake, and swiveled around in the chair to check out her computer.
At least the little rat had distracted her from their previous conversation.
"What sort of system do you have on here?" He began surfing around the desktop, clicking on this and that, getting a feel for it.
"Nothing fancy," she told him. "Just the security cameras. No internet. No cell service in here either." She tossed her now useless phone onto the desk.
He clicked the mouse around a few more times. "No internet? How is that even possible these days?"
"I think it was something my Mom meant to get around to doing, but never got the chance."
She walked over to the adjacent wall, grabbed a handle that was sticking out of it, and partially pulled out a hidden bed to act as a couch. Plopping down on the mattress, she placed her elbow on her knee and rested her chin in her unwrapped hand. "So, what now?"
Aiden scratched his head and gave her a sheepish look. "To be completely honest, I'm not really sure. But give me just a bit, I'll think of something."
She yawned behind her hand. "Bet you're wishing you'd taken your friend up on that plane ride about now, huh?"
"And miss out on being all alone in this tin can with you?" he teased, giving her a wink. "Not for anything in the world, poppet."
She didn't need to know that he'd been thinking that exact same thing for a while now. He didn't want to hurt her feelings.
He turned back to the creatures on the monitors. They were examining the ball sculpture now, having honed in on him directly beneath it, and were searching for any telltale signs of where they could've gone.
"Grace?" he asked softly. "Are you quite certain there isn't any way those things would be able to find their way in here?"
She was silent for so long, he turned to look at her, but she was shaking her head. "No. I don't think so, not unless..."
She didn't finish her thought.
"Unless what?" he encouraged her.
"Nothing," she insisted.
He narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously. "Come to think of it, how did we get in here? How did you get it to open?"
She answered his question with a cool, level stare.
"Why is it exactly that your family has this shelter?" he continued. "And for that matter, where is your family, if I may ask?"
Apparently he couldn't, for again, all he received was that cool look that told him he wasn't going to be told anything she didn't want him to know.
"Ah. It's like that, is it?" He swiveled the chair around to give her his full attention, and gave her his most trusty look. "C'mon, love. There's no need for all of this secrecy between friends. You can tell me."
But she wouldn't break, just looked down at her hands as they twisted in her lap.
More secrets. Seems this female was stocked full of them. Having to watch what you say and do so much couldn't be healthy. It would really behoove her to share her burdens.
He joined her on the makeshift couch and sat right next to her. They weren't touching, but he was close enough to make her bristle.
Kind of like Mojo.
"Grace, love, if we're going to be risking our lives together, you're going to have to indulge me and let me in on some of your little secrets. I may be nothing but a lowly vampire, but you can trust me. I promise. I only want to get us all out of here alive."
She gave him a sideways look.
He scooted a bit closer, and heat ran down his thigh where it was touching hers. "Where is your family? At least tell me that. Are they nearby? Are they in danger? Do I need to go get them?"
Her teeth chewed her bottom lip as she shook her head, finally telling him, "No. My family is gone."
"Gone?"
"Yeah, it's just me."
She looked so lost for a moment that he almost hated to ask. "What happened to your family?"
"My parents are both dead."
"Do you have any siblings? Grandparents?"
She shook her head again. "No. No one else."
"May I ask how they died?"
"My father died in an...accident before we moved here. And my mom was in an accident a few years ago. A car accident."
"I'm very sorry," he told her sincerely.
She nodded, accepting his condolences as she watched Mojo explore the room.
A young woman alone, full of secrets, whose parents were killed in "accidents". This story was sounding vaguely familiar to him, and the more he thought about it, the more a nagging suspicion rose up in him. "Grace?"
"Hmm?"
"What's your last name?"
A steel rod slammed into her back at his question, and she looked him square in the eye as she told him, "Poland."
"Poland," he repeated in disbelief. "Grace Poland?"
"Yup."
This female was many things: Smart, compassionate, sexy, and an exceptional liar. But she couldn't fool him. However, he decided to play her game. For now.
"All right, Grace Poland, why do you think it is that our guests outside want that bag so badly?"
"I honestly have no idea."
The innocence in those green eyes pulled at his heartstrings, almost as strongly as the heat and scent of her pulled at certain other strings of his. Whenever she looked directly at him like that, he found himself hard pressed to look away. It was like she was staring directly into his soul, and he was suddenly more than willing to let her in there and allow her to rearrange until she felt at home.
"Why is it," he continued, "That just a few hours ago, you could barely walk and had broken bones in your hand, and yet now they are magically healed with nothing more than an Ace bandage? And why were you about to collapse when I got back to your apartment after hiding the body?" Her eyes darkened as he delved further into her secrets without restraint, and he noticed the strain around them for the first time. "Why did you have a gun, with a silencer, may I add, in your apartment? Why do you have this shelter?" When she broke eye contact and turned away against his barrage of questions, he took her chin gently in his hand and turned her face back to him. "I think I deserve to know. I'm risking my very life by helping you, after all."
She searched his face for a moment, and then closed her eyes and sighed heavily. "You're right. You deserve to know what you're getting into."