Leah Winters has lived in the prison for her entire life. Not as an inmate, but as an adopted daughter of the prison's creator and warden, Brett Winters. As a Abeo Half-Demon, Leah struggles with the inability to reach her full potential when it comes to her ability to teleport, and with overcoming the gap between herself and the love of her adopted father. When a new prisoner arrives, claiming that he doesn't belong and that he hasn't done anything wrong, she doesn't believe him at first. But as he continues to tell her his story, she can't help the doubt she feels. Has her father imprisoned someone who doesn't belong here? Someone who hasn't committed a crime?
Finally, Leah finds no other choice than to investigate.
Chapter one
I could feel the nervousness creep up on me as I pushed the cart along the narrow corridor. I always felt like this when I was doing this task, but still, every single time, I was nervous, scared, sometimes even petrified.
There was always that possibility that they would attack me, thinking that holding me hostage would be their ticket to freedom. That if they threatened to snap my neck or pierce one of the plastic cutleries into one of my arteries and let me slowly bleed to death if they didn't let them out, they would get to leave their cells and be on their way to continue their evil deeds out in the open.
But they were all wrong.
It had happened once. Someone had grabbed me and called out for one of the guards, who'd appeared instantly. My capturer had said that if she wasn't freed immediately, she'd bite my head right off.
Neither I nor the guard who'd come had doubted her words. She'd been a vampire, so we both knew she was able to hurt me if she wanted to.
I'd been so scared as I sat there, held tightly in her grasp, whimpering and my eyes tearing up. I'd been a little bit surprised when she seemed to noticed how her fingers dug into the skin of my arms, and she'd loosened her grip a little. But I hadn't thought much of it at the time. I was too scared.
I'd always lived with a doubt inside of me when it came to my father, but when his face appeared at the small window in the door, peering in and setting his eyes on me, all doubt disappeared from my heart and mind. I could see in his eyes that he was not going to do anything about it. There was just no way he was going to let the vampire go just because she threatened my life. The life of his own daughter.
When the vampire had noticed him standing there, her hold on me tightened again, and I let out a whimper of pain.
"Let me go or I will slit her throat out!" she'd hissed towards the locked door, one of her hands moving to grasp around my throat.
My father had just stayed on the other side, looking through the thick glass with unbothered eyes.
"If you do that, Karen," he'd said, his voice indifferent and calm, "It will only speed up the process of your execution. It's up to you. Die later, or die now."
And with that, he'd left. He'd left me there, locked inside a room with a vampire. A vampire! One who could kill me right that second. It was then that I knew. That I understood for sure.
He didn't love me. He didn't even care if I lived or died. He'd never did.
I'd squeezed my eyes shut and prepared for what was coming. Tears slid down my cheeks and I didn't even stop myself from letting out the pathetic sobs. Like it mattered if I gave up. Like it mattered if I were strong, like he'd taught me to be. He could think of me as a wimp, as a loser. I didn't care anymore.
But my death never came. The vampire simply let go of me and pushed me away from here. I stared back at her, my eyes wide. I tried to speak, to ask her why she hadn't done it, but all I managed to press out was an odd mixture of a sob and shrill octave.
"He is your father," she'd said, her eyes landing on me. "Isn't he?"
I only managed a nod.
"Then why?" she asked, taking a step back and sitting down on her bed.
I managed to stand up from the cold floor, moving slowly toward the door. I still wasn't sure that she wasn't going to kill me.
I reached the spot where I needed to be to transport myself to the other side of the door, and was just about to do just that, when I hesitated. My eyes were on the vampire, her eyes were on me. She seemed so … Weirded out. Like she couldn't believe that my own father had just left me for dead. I don't know why I did it, but I answered her truthfully.
"He doesn't love me," I said, quietly, looking down to the floor. "He doesn't care."
"Didn't he take you in? Hasn't he raised you as his own?" she asked.
I didn't look up at her.
"In some way," I said. "I thought he did at first," I glanced up at her, "but then … I think he's … I think he's disappointed that I can't … That I can't …" I looked back down, letting my words trails off, unable to finish the sentence.
"Abeo?" she asked.
I looked back at her.
"What?"
"You father was an Abeo demon, right?" she asked.
I just nodded.
"And you can't teleport as far as you should? Look at you now; you're inching closer to the door when you should've been able to just pop out when I was holding you. You should've been able to escape. But you didn't. You couldn't, could you?"
"No."
The word came so quietly, I don't think she would've been able to hear me if she wasn't a vampire.
She was silent for a moment, then she said: "So he doesn't love you because you haven't reached your full potential yet? What kind of a father is that?"
Her tone was venomous, hateful, disgusted. I met her eyes again.
"He's not proud of me because I'm not what he wants me to be," I said quietly. "He doesn't care about me because I've turned out to be a disappointment." I looked back down. "He doesn't love me because I'm not his."
I could feel the tears threatening to return as I heard the truth in my own words, and before I would completely crack down and start crying, I focused my attention on what I wanted to do, and found myself standing on the other side of the door. In a flash, her face was by the window, her eyes meeting mine.
"He is a monster," she said through the glass. "He might have told you that that's what the kinds of me are, but you should know." Her face turned serious and cold. "He is the monster."
Then she was gone from my sight, and when I peered through the window I saw her sitting on her bed, staring into the cement wall.
That had been two months ago, and now, as I once again pushed the cart through the corridor, I couldn't help but to glance over at her cell door. It was empty now. No one was in there. The vampire was gone, dead, and even though I knew she was evil, I still felt a pang inside my chest whenever I thought about what had been done to her. Killing wasn't right. No matter what my father said I just couldn't believe that killing another person had any kind of justice in it. If she'd been so bad, then why just not let her stay in her cell for her entire life, her entire existence. Why murder someone when the reason everyone thought so badly of her, was that she'd done just that. Murder. If it was so wrong, then why do it themselves?
As I passed the cell door I tried to push the thought away. I didn't want to think about what could happen inside those cells when I was about to enter one right now. And this wasn't just any cell. It was one with a new supernatural in it. I had no idea what this person could find himself able to do to me.
I stopped when I reached the cell door. I looked at the number written on it. 12. I glanced down on the cart and started filing through the many brown paper bags placed on it. I found one marked twelve and picked it up. It had a little symbol written on it too, a circle with a dot inside it, meaning special diet. I made face, wondering just what exactly his special diet was.
I walked over to the door and tried to discretely peek through the window. I didn't want him to see me trying to spy on him.
He didn't notice me thought. He lay on his bed, his back resting against the headboard, his legs crossed and stretched out and his eyes closed. His arm rested behind his head, which bobbed slightly, as if moving it along the beat of music. There wasn't any music playing though.
His hair was short and blonde, which I found a bit odd considering he looked to be of Asian descent. He must've colored it. It looked good on him though. It fit him.
He wasn't much older than me. Maybe around eighteen or something. Most of the prisoners here was adult, which was another thing that often bothered me when I considered the fact that my father had assigned me – his fourteen year old daughter – to be the one entering their cells every day. But I guessed I was only natural, considering how he felt about me. I wasn't special to him, just another one of his employees. Even if I didn't get paid. But what would I need the money for anyway? It wasn't like I was allowed to strut outside and go shopping. I was stuck in this sterile and boring prison every single day, having to kill my boredom with videogames and TV, dreaming of the day I'd get to live out my own The Hills. Hell, I'd even prefer to be one of those Teen moms if it meant I'd get to live in the normal world. I'd take drama and pregnancy any day over rules and imprisonment.
I took a deep breath, looked away from the window and gave the door two hard knocks. I then focused on the spot on the other side of that door, and before a second had passed, I was inside the cell. I was just about to speak to him, when I noticed he was off bed the bed, making his way towards me. He saw me, and yelped.
"Whoa!" he exclaimed, stopping abruptly and placing a hand over his heart. "Where did you come from?"
I held out the paper bag to him.
"Your food," I said, and then I stood there, waiting for him to take it.
He didn't. He just stood there, staring at me. I sighed and took a hesitant step toward him.
"Take it," I said. "You must be hungry."
When he didn't move, I added: "Don't worry. It's uh …regulated to you, uh … special diet."
He must've noticed the question in my face, because he raised his eyebrows and gave me a funny look.
"Yeah," he said. "Bugs and the blood of the innocent."
I could feel the way my mouth opened in horror and disgust, and I tried not to imagine the image of him consuming whatever was inside the paper bag. I felt the sudden urge to just drop it. Get it away from me. But before I could, he'd walked over to me and snatched the bag from my outstretched hand.
"I'm diabetic," he said, walking back and plopping down on his bed again. "Real special, I know."
I didn't say anything, just moved around and took a step towards the door. I was just about to transport again, when he spoke.
"Is it drugged?"
I turned around, staring at him.
"What?" I asked, chocked.
He looked up at me.
"Is the food drugged?"
"Why would it be drugged?"
He let out a small laugh.
"Uh, because you're afraid I'd run away and escape before you could do your little experiments on me," he said. "For all I know there could be poison in these insulin shots." He held something up that he'd taken out of his bag. It was some sort of syringe, I thought. Just not any syringe I'd ever seen before.
"You can't escape," I said, stupidly, as if I was implying he was dumb or something. I hadn't meant it that way.
He seemed thoughtful for a second. Then, he placed the thing back into the paper bag and set it aside. He positioned himself back the way he'd been before, resting on the bed, his back against the headboard.
"Maybe not by myself," he said. "My magic doesn't seem to work here." He frowned for a moment, before relaxing his face and closing his eyes. "But they'll come for me. And then I'm gone."
I don't understand what I was thinking, why I did what I did, but his calm tone annoyed me. He was in a prison. He'd done something wrong. Horribly wrong. He belonged in here and he was going to be punished for whatever evil deeds he'd done. And yet he lay there, relaxed and uncaring, believing he'd be out of this place without consequences. I gritted my teeth.
I took two steps toward the bed and crossed my arms over my chest.
"So you're a sorcerer?" I asked. He'd mentioned he couldn't do magic. "What did you do? Use your magic to steal? Betray? Kill?"
My voice was hard, venomous. I couldn't help it. Just imagining what this guy could've done to deserve this place made my insides turn.
He opened his eyes and looked at me.
"What?" he asked, sitting up straight. "Kill? What are you talking about? Why do you think I've killed someone? I would never do that."
"Then what did you do?" I pushed.
I didn't believe him, of course. The prisoners always lied. Thinking they could talk their way out of this place. Plead innocent to the young girl who brought them their food. I knew better. I knew they were all horrible people.
The guy stood up, his body tense with anger.
"Ididn't do anything!" he snapped. "You're the one who kidnapped me with the intention of doing god knows what to me!"
"I didn't do anything!" I snapped back, angry myself. "I just came with your food. You're special food. You should be glad my father is kind enough to help with that. For all I care you could eat maggots. It's what you deserve anyway. I wouldn't care if they let you starve to death in this prison."
It wasn't true though. I didn't think my father was kind enough. I knew he only let the prisoners have special diets if they really needed it to stay alive. Until their execution. And I didn't want him to eat maggots. That'd just be torture on our part. And we didn't torture. We were just, we followed the laws. We made sure justice took part, even if I wished justice didn't involve the taking off a life. But I didn't know if this guy was going to get executed. Maybe he was just here as a normal prisoner, here to do his time.
But still … he was locked up in the E block. Only the worst criminals sat here.
His face change to confusion.
"Prison?" he asked. "You're saying this is a prison? As in a place for criminals?"
"Duh," I said, hating the way I sounded like a total brat, but ignoring the feeling. "What did you think it was? A resort?"
He sat back down on the bed.
"Why am I in prison?" he asked.
The anger was gone from his face and voice now. He seemed honestly confused.
"Because you're a rouge supernatural," I said. "This is where you go when you don't follow the laws."
He looked up at me.
"What laws? Is it illegal to run for your life now? Is it illegal to protect yourself and your family? You're honestly telling me I'm in prison for not letting myself become a lab rat or being killed?"
I stared at him. What the hell was he talking about? Then I remembered. Prisoners lie. They all do. That was what he was doing now; playing me.
I backed toward the door.
"Eat your food," I said.
And then I travelled to the other side of the door, grasping the cart's handle and began pushing it down the corridor again, continuing my assignment for the day, trying to forget the look on his face. Trying to remove the feeling inside me that said he had been as confused as he seemed. Trying to stop myself from believing him
