Chapter 7

It turned out we couldn't get into the first club because we didn't possess an ID card each. Christian tried to compel the security guys at the door, but it didn't work. Eventually we gave up trying and tried our luck at the next one; this time we were allowed in.

The club was packed out. When I looked around for a table, I saw that every booth was taken up by at least twelve people. When Christian went to the bar to order us some drinks, I found myself being asked whether I wanted to join some people at the far end of the room and before I had a chance to reply, I was being ushered with this mystery person. Once there, the people occupying the table made some room for me to sit down. I will admit on closer inspection of these strangers, I felt quite nervous. Sitting opposite me were two identical girl twins, who both looked about twenty and were dressed like sluts. I don't think they intended to be, I just think they tried too hard and the end result wasn't desirable. The guy who had brought me over was very good looking and had his arm around a stunning woman, who I realised was a moroi with silky blonde hair that went down in waves to her shoulders, with chocolate brown eyes and flawless skin. I envied her beauty. When the girl saw me looking at her she winked and I blushed. I didn't know what was coming over me.

"And what's your name sweet girl?" She asked in an Australian accent. I always found it funny when I heard moroi and dhampirs speaking in English, Australian or other type accents because I only ever imagined our kind to be American. I don't know why, but there you go.

"I'm Rose. What's-" At that moment, Christian appeared beside me carrying two beers. I wondered how he had managed to get it in here. Well, the fact that we had been allowed in this club was proof enough we wouldn't have been not allowed to have an alcoholic drink.

I wasn't the only one that had noticed his sudden appearance here. I saw the hot girl who had asked me my name staring at him with a mixture of lust and approval. "Is this your boyfriend?" She asked me as both Christian and I replied at the same time "Oh no! Oh no!" I could have kicked myself for saying it. Not only did it make us sound suspicious, but also it meant this girl could try and get her filthy claws into him. I didn't like her anymore, not to mention she was making me as jealous as hell. I also wondered what her boyfriend thought of all of this. I soon found out.

He bent over and whispered in my ear about how him and his girlfriend were into kinky stuff and they wanted to have a foursome with me and Christian. I was horrified. I knew Christian was too because I saw his eyes widen and gestured to the door; I took the hint and disentangled myself from the man's arms in which he had put around me and both Christian and I raced out of the door. Too bad we never had the chance to have those beers and have a good dance and laugh.

When we were out of the club, I felt my ears feel quite numb at being in an environment in which it was so loud. I found myself laughing at the hilarity of the situation. I hadn't said good bye to the moroi and humans at the table, but I could just imagine them looking on in fury at our obvious dismissal of them. I looked over at Christian who had started to laugh as well. Before we knew it, we were nearly collapsing from all the laughing we had done and I felt my stomach hurting a bit from the amount of laughing I had found myself doing.

Eventually, when our laughter had died down, we ended up nearly falling to the floor as we became closer and were near each other, with just a small gap between us to breathe. I looked up at the sky for a moment and saw a shooting star and made a wish. The moment I was in just felt too surreal and too corny, but even though I knew I shouldn't feel so happy because of Adrian, I couldn't help it. I was happier than I had been in a long time. When I looked back into Christian's eyes, he was looking at me oddly, and before I knew what I was doing, I leaned in to kiss him on the lips passionately. I wasn't sure whether he would rebuff me like last time, but when my lips crashed down on his, he didn't even hesitate in kissing me back. Before I knew it, I felt Christian's tongue in my mouth as he pushed me backwards until I was against a nearby wall; his hands were doing crazy things to my body, one minute they were holding my face as he kissed me like there was no tomorrow and then the next he was moving his hands down my body slowing, groping my breasts and then moving further downwards. I dug my sharp nails into his forarms which had impressive muscles and I felt Christian groan in pain and desire and me in return.

I knew we were getting too heated and too overcome with lust in the moment so reluctantly I pulled away from his lips. "Christian, stop." I told him softly, doubting I would be able to keep my mouth from his much longer. I was so overcome with lust it shocked me. I wasn't even sure where it had come from; I had been friends with Christian for what seemed like ages and it was only over the past few months we had become closer. I just never realised how close until these past couple of days. I watched Christian as reality set in and he groaned from the obvious torture of not being able to touch me anymore, as I pushed him backwards so we wouldn't end up giving into our lust in front of possible passersby.

"You're right. We shouldn't be doing this. Lissa-" That's when I realised I had made a big mistake. After everything Lissa had done, he still cared about her opinion? Sure, I knew feelings didn't just vanish because the person you love treated you badly, I mean after everything Dimitri had done, I knew deep down that although I hated him with all my heart, especially because of his involvement in Adrian's demise, I also loved him as well. Life really was a bitch sometimes. However, it hurt seeing that Christian still had obvious feelings for his ex. But was she really his ex? I had never even asked him, I had always just assumed they had broken up since the truth about her and Dimitri came out. I felt tears at the backs of my eyes beginning to come to the surface, and I was determined not to let Christian see them. Therefore, I was going to leave before he hurt me more.

"It doesn't matter Christian. Just leave me alone." I said to him as softly as possible, trying to block out the hurt I felt. I walked away, hearing Christian calling my name out into the night, and I didn't reply or listen at all. I couldn't face him. Not yet. I had gone through too much already.

I found myself entering one of the beaches surrounding Ibiza. I had seen it when Christian and I had been in the taxi on the way to our hotel and we had both admired it from a distance. We had promised each other that in the short days we were in Ibiza for, we would come here even if it was for a couple of hours. We had to make the most of this holiday as much as possible; we might not get another chance.

I took my sandals off and felt the slow burn of the soft sand crushing around my feet. Even though it was very late here in Ibiza, I could still smell the hot air and hear large groups of people walking around the streets laughing and joking, some obviously drunk. The sand was still very hot as well and that's one of the things I loved about being a dhampir; whereas humans would have kept shoes or sandals on in the sand to keep their feet from burning, I didn't feel it as much. It just felt warm to me.

I walked along on the sand, until eventually I found myself at the edge of the sea, and I could feel the water lapsing over my feet and I felt how cool it was. On a moment of impulse, I stripped out of my dress and standing in my fancy underwear which I had bought from a human underwear shop called La Senza, I rushed into the freezy cold sea and began to swim. Even though I should have been shivering from the coldness of the sea, I enjoyed the sensation of the sea around me, and at first I laughed because I hadn't been in the sea for so long. I think the last time I had been in it was when I had been forced to learn to swim by my mother. As I swam along, I couldn't help but think about Adrian. Now that I was alone, my mind kept wandering to the last ever conversation I had with him. I hated myself because I hadn't told him how much he meant to me and how much our friendship meant to me. I hated that he had died for doing something he hadn't done; this was one of those occasions that I cursed the day hanging wasn't classed as illegal anymore. It caused deaths for people/moroi/dhampirs that deserved it, sure, but then there was always someone, like Adrian, that was killed when they hadn't done anything wrong. I felt the tears I had been holding being released then. I cried about Adrian, about Dimitri and Lissa and I cried about Christian as well. Maybe I was feeling sorry for myself, but the problem was it didn't make me feel any better. I wished for a moment that I had been the one that had died instead of Adrian, to stop me from feeling this much pain. I knew it was selfish of me to think it, but I felt it nonetheless.

As I swam further and further, I suddenly felt a small tinge in the side of my left leg. As I bent down to rub it to try and maybe remove the pain somehow, I saw a big jellyfish slowly swimming away from me and realised that I had been stung. I turned round, trying to rub my leg at the same time and I saw that I was really far away from the beach now. I began to panic as well, as I accidently swallowed some sea water and I tasted a horrible taste, like salt and I knew that I was in danger. Waves had suddenly become vicious and before I knew what was happening, a strong wave thrust into my face and then everything went black.

I woke up back at the hotel, with Christian leaning over me with a look of concern that nearly blew me away. I had never seen him look so frantic before. "Rose! Are you okay hunny?" He asked me, and I realised he was lying next to me with me in his arms and he was stroking my hair delicately. "I was so worried..."

"What happened?" I asked him slowly.

"Well after you walked away... I tried to go after you and I found you at the beach in the sea. I watched you for a couple of minutes and then the next thing I knew you were struggling to keep yourself above the water, to stop yourself from drowning. I began to panic like crazy so I ran to the shore and swam to where you were. Moroi are exceptional swimmers so there wasn't much risk of getting myself drowned in the process of saving you." I heard his voice break and when I looked into his eyes, he actually looked like he was going to cry. I hadn't realised until that moment how much he must have cared about me.

"I'm sorry." I mumbled into his chest as I began to cry. I couldn't believe how much of a bitch I had been. The next thing I knew, Christian had grabbed my face into his hands.

"You don't need to be sorry. It's me that needs to be. I shouldn't have, maybe..." He was struggling to form words, I could tell.

"I shouldn't have walked away. I should have let you explain." I said and I hadn't realised that the way I had said it had been like I was leaving a hidden message there; I wanted to know what he was going to tell me before I walked away to the beach. Christian got the message and told me what I wanted, or maybe not wanted, to hear.

"Lissa hurt me so much, I can't deny that. But I also can't deny that I still have feelings for her. They're not just going to go away as much as I wished they would. I mean, how do you still feel about Dimitri?" He asked me. He must have seen something in my face that gave my answer away, because he didn't give me the chance to reply. "Exactly. We don't choose who we love, as much as we wished we could. I remember when I was visiting my Aunt Tasha and she forced me to watch this show called Veronica Mars. The main love interest of Veronica in it said, 'Spanning years and continents. Bloodshed. EPIC.' I think this has such a good meaning. I mean, I'm not saying Lissa and I were an epic couple, but real love, the epic kind anyway, takes a lot of work and there will always be people that are hurt. After I found out that she had cheated on me with Dimitri, I had kept replaying that quote in my head over and over, to try and convince myself that that was the kind of love Lissa and I had. I know that's not the case though now. Before we left to come here, when I was getting my stuff together, Lissa came to my room to try and explain about her and Dimitri. In the process, she let slip that she had slept with Adrian as well. Well, that was when I brought Adrian into the conversation. She flipped when I mentioned it and when she mentioned she had slept with him as well, she had put her hands over her face, like she wished she could have taken the words back and then she had ran out of the room. After that, I knew it was over with her."

I saw the obvious torment in his eyes, and I wanted it to go away. I didn't want Christian to be feeling hurt over Lissa. He deserved better than her and I knew that one day, when we weren't teenagers that Christian would make a great husband for someone. The thought of someone else with Christian actually made me want to puke though.

"Listen Rose. There's something else I need to tell you. I hadn't realised it until you kissed me that first time, but well I think I've developed feelings for you. I mean I don't know for sure, but..." I placed a finger to his lips to make him be quiet for a minute as I smiled at him, and I felt Christian's soft lips kiss my finger. The next thing I knew, Christian took my finger and placed it in his mouthed and sucked on it. The sensations of his tongue mixed in with his fangs was almost enough to make me climax, even though we hadn't even had sex. I felt a sharp pain in my finger in his mouth and knew he had bitten on it and drawn blood. I then felt him sucking the blood away.

Eventually, I pulled my finger out of his mouth and this time placed my mouth on his lips and for what felt like hours we made out. It was the best make out session I think I had ever had. It was then that things started to get a lot more heated. I felt his hand go up my top (well actually it was my pyjama top, which I guessed Christian must have put on me. The thought sent shivers down my back) and in turn, like it was almost subconscious, I was unbuttoning his hideous Hawaiian shirt. The rest you can probably guess.