Disclaimer: I disclaim.
"I swear to GOD Anne, if you sing that 'Nugget in a Biscuit' song one more time, there will be bloodshed!" I swore as Anne multi-tasked between navigating the long, winding gravel road to my home and annoying the ever-living crap out of me. She'd been either humming, whistling,singing, or kazooing (Really. Who the hell keeps a kazoo in their car?) that ultra-repetitive song since I put mashed potatoes in my chicken biscuit.
It's brilliant. I don't deny it, and at first the song was appropriate, sure.
But not all the way home!
Of course both other passengers found my threats terribly amusing, so Rickie joined the singing. Anne imitating a deep voice and Rickie in falsetto. The little shits.
I tried to ignore them and glared out the window at the woods on either side of the road, encroaching slowly into the ditches. I thought I saw a dark blur pass by us to the left, and then I had the sneaking suspicion that the vampires were going to beat us home.
Or perhaps they had heard the noise even outside the car and were hoping for a bridge to jump off of further down the road.
Either way, we would all know in a few minutes.
"My lovely Hershey Bar!" I called out to my beloved, sweet, annoying, chocolate, musclebound baby brother, "If you don't shut your pie-hole, it will see nothing of pies or cakes ever again."
And there again came the laughter at my expense. I'd obviously been too soft on this pair. I unbuckled my safety belt with the only functioning hand and stretched out my sore limbs. I could still vaguely smell the fried food from the scattered and crumpled paper bags in the car, but my stomach was blessedly full. I grabbed my soda from one of the many cup holders in the van and slurped until that annoying end-of-the-line sucking sound filled the car.
"Ew!" exclaimed Rickie, disgusted (as I knew he would be), "You know how much I hate that noise! Fingernails on a chalkboard, man."
Of course I knew, but it made the singing stop as Anne burst into peals of giggles. Which subsequently caused the vehicle to veer towards the ditch.
"Watch the road Anne!" I snarked, and when she jerked back to the middle of the lane, I slammed into the seat a little harder than was comfortable. I hissed in pain and she glanced back at my from the rear view window.
"How long has it been on those meds?" she asked, "Can you take another?"
"I don't know... Ask Rickie."
He had been quiet through all of this, and glanced down at the clock on the car radio. Wordlessly he started digging around at his feet, where I assumed he had thrown the prescription bottles when we started the trip home. I watched patiently as he read labels and measured out the correct amount of pills in his large hand, then passed back both the pills and his unfinished cola. I made sure to suck down to nothing, just because I'm a bitch.
"Damn it! That's so gross Lucy!" he shrieked back at me, his voice cracking, and the ladies in the van enjoyed a good laugh at his expense rather than mine again. But we were all three of us distracted by the view as we made it around the last curve to the front of my home.
The circle driveway was graveled out right up to steps onto a beautifully stained wooden front porch with antique rocking chairs and outdoor fans to discourage insects and move the humid Georgia air sluggishly. The facade of the manor house was two stories of stained wooden siding, with large bay windows and slate shingles on the roof. The front door was massive, wide and surrounded by windows as well. The entire area of my front lawn was shaded by very old, very large oak trees just the perfect distance from the house. Peeking around from the sides of the porch stairs were large azalea bushes, blooming prettily in vivid pinks, purples, and reds. From behind the attached four car garage, I could see the beautiful, decorative lines of metal, framing filtered glass that marked my greenhouse.
But the most exciting thing about the view at that moment was not the grandeur of my home. It was the two monsters casually standing in the shade of my porch, watching us as we watched them.
"How did they..?" Anne started, but I had already worked out my lies.
"They must've parked their rental car in the garage," I said smoothly, "You know, it's no shock that they beat us with how slowly you drive, dumbass."
I glanced covertly at her face to see her reaction, and though still rightfully wary, her suspicions seemed to have abated for the moment. She pulled to a stop at the feet of the stairs and put the car into park, engaging the emergency break. She went to unbuckle her seatbelt, but I stopped her quickly.
"Hey, don't get out," I said, pulling my billfold from my bra where I always kept it, "We have a lot of situating to do for our guests this evening, and I don't want to keep you out. Your boyfriend hates us enough as it is."
Before she could protest, I stuffed a generous wad of bills into one of her many cup holders and opened my car door to get out.
"For the gas," I said, once again interrupting her before she could refuse the money, "Rickie?"
Rickie stepped out quickly, shoving my meds in his pockets and reaching out to pick me up. I used my one good hand to slam the side door shut, wincing at the pain it cause me. Anne rolled down the passenger window to call out one last thing before driving away.
"You be careful honey. I don't trust those freaky Italian nutjobs one iota! Call if you need anything!"
And then she was kicking up tiny bits of gravel as the car went back down the long driveway, leaving Rickie and I alone with two vampires in the light of the setting sun. How romantic.
But if that fairy looking Demetri went after my Rickie, I'd rip his balls right off of his body. Should've done Heidi the same when I first laid eyes on her. With her ovaries though. I'm relatively certain she didn't have testicles.
I was distracted from my morbid line of thought by Rickie shifting me in his arms. I looked up at him to see if he was getting uncomfortable, but he wasn't looking at me. He was looking at Marcus. I decided to not look at Marcus, because I wanted to have a few rational thoughts, and my monster was a mouthwatering distraction on legs. Legs that were very long and lithe. I was very curious as to the muscle tone on said legs. Mmmmmn...
"Rickie," I started to distract myself from my own distraction, "Will you be a dear and make up the beds in the guest rooms for these two boys? I'll be fine if you set me down in that there rocking chair. Oh, but bring me something to drink first please?"
I batted my eyelashes up at him to be cute, and he reluctantly carried me up the porch stairs and set me down very gently in the rocking chair closest to Marcus. Good idea too, because the way Demetri was looking at me was predatory in the wrong sort of way.
Now that I wasn't speaking, and as Rickie cautiously crept past the silent monsters into the house, the air was a little stifling, and I'm not talking about the good Ole Georgian humidity.
We spent a few quiet minutes in the silence though, vampires so still I thought I could paint them over with a coat of crackling paint and put them on the front lawn as decorations (Or make a giant fountain out of them like Robert DeNiro gave Billy Crystal in Analyze This. If you haven't seen that movie, I hereby disown you until you watch it.), but then I thought, I'm not quite that hoity-toity, am I? (About the fountain, not the movie.)
I felt a shy breeze play with my hair and the ragged edge of my formerly favorite sun dress and sighed. I looked up at the treetops and watched them dance, listening to the rustling of leaves as they brushed against one another, moving the small spots of sunlight around on the lawn and gravel. My God it was so beautiful to me, and I almost missed the chance to say goodbye to it in a stone-walled prison cell in another country.
I felt Marcus draw nearer to me, until he was behind my chair. I smelled his sweet scent and the gentle weight of his aura, for lack of a better word, as well as the coolness of his body so close. I still didn't look at him. He still said nothing.
The wind picked up a bit, and I noticed that the sky was getting darker, as the sunset was clouded over with thunderheads. I smiled. My joints and old injuries were aching with barometric pressure, but storms left the surrounding trees and plant life the most beautiful, vivid green, and the dirt a dark, richer color as well.
It was the moment that Rickie came back, and smart kid that he was, he had a lap tray with a shot glass full of my favorite bourbon, and a tall, crystal glass of my favorite chaser... a mixed drink of bourbon, honey, and lemonade, complete with a slice of lemon and sugar in the raw glittering on the rim. My personal chef and bartender. I'd have to find a way to send him to cooking school.
I graciously accepted as he carefully maneuvered the tray between the armrests of my chair. He smiled at me, and it almost reached his eyes. I knew he was nervous about our monster guests. So was I. And it didn't help that going and being home had left us both with that thin, false web of security.
"It's gonna rain?" He asked, quietly.
"Not quite yet."
Rickie leaned over to press his cheek to mine and pushed my hair behind my ears. I used the opportunity to place a loud, messy, wet kiss obnoxiously on his face.
"EW!" he said, jumping away and almost spilling my drinks.
"Now go make the beds for the Italians Cocoa-butter," I grinned at his obvious embarrassment, happy to distract him from his fear, "I would myself, but I'm not fully functioning this evening."
He hopped up from me and skittered back inside. Well, maybe skittered isn't the right word for a teenager of his size. Damn giants.
As soon as he made his exit, I gratefully knocked that shot back without any more preamble. Mmmn. Lovely. The burn of the bourbon making its way down my throat to my gut was familiar (very familiar) and comforting. If you disapprove of me mixing my drugs and alcohol, I'd like to let you know where you can shove your opinion. Up there with that stick that's jammed in your ass. It's my body and my booze, if I wanted to for example, throw either of them in a bonfire, it's my prerogative. But seriously, I would never waste a good bourbon that way. Or a bad bourbon either, for that matter. How wasteful. That was a horrible example. Why do you let me get away with these things?
As a chaser of sorts (for the shot, if you forgot by now), I took a sip of my lemonade cocktail, first licking a bit of the sugar off of the rim. Good. Heavy on the bourbon, just how I liked it. I blew a gust of my newly acquired liquor breath out and closed my eyes in bliss.
Marcus was still behind me; a silent guardian, which I found comforting with the opposing presence of the likewise silent, but definitely less benevolent Demetri. I glanced over at the latter, a bit nervously. I mean, Marcus was one thing. He wore his sincerity like a piece of toilet paper that he didn't realize was trailing from the bottom of his shoe.
But Demetri was a bit harder to pin down He glared out over my front yard, nostrils quivering minutely. I wondered what he was scenting a moment before deciding I probably didn't want to know. Just the thought of the thinks he could have been thinking was enough to make me very nervous. And the nice(it's a relative term) vampire made me nervous enough as it was.
I started to rock my chair a bit and swirl my drink around just to breach the silence without having to actually face Marcus yet. It seemed I still wasn't ready to look back at my monster. I knew very well why that was.
If you're wondering, it's because I didn't want him to become a part of my sanctuary. I didn't want to associate him with the feelings I had in and for the house. If I saw him, and spoke to him there, in my territory...? I might have started thinking of him as a part of it. As mine.
I didn't want that at all. Mostly because there was a part of me, that was growing at an alarming rate that really did want it. Desperately.
That was more frightening to me than anything that had happened to me since I boarded that God awful plane.
I shuddered lightly, glad that I couldn't see him. Gladder yet that he was respecting my decision to ignore him. Rudely, might I add.
I looked back out towards the front lawn. The only sounds I could hear were the wind in the trees, the squeak of my rocker, and the light clinking of ice in my glass. I could almost imagine it was any other evening, free of monsters, nightmares, deals with the devil, and the gloom of my imminent death. And it was coming. This I knew without any doubt.
Marcus watched the approach of the van that carried Luce as it pulled up in front of the stairs. He and Demetri had run ahead of the humans when he had begun smelling Luce's residual scent in the area, and traced it back to the large house with wood siding and slate roofing. The area was well shaded, and the house obviously saw very little traffic. The only human scents for miles were those of the boy, the chatty woman, and his Luce.
Demetri had wanted to scout the area as soon as the two of them had arrived, but Marcus had forbidden it.
"If we are to be here for any length of time, we must hunt outside this area." he had told his subordinate, who had chafed a little at the order, "We will do so after we have made sure that Luce and the boy have settled in."
It was a little worrisome to Marcus when he thought about it, as the boy picked up Luce and the chatty woman shouted something he didn't bother to listen to and drove away. He looked down at Luce, who would not meet his eyes, and then spared a glance at Demetri. The younger vampire looked rather sullen, and impatient...
Marcus was beginning to think that he would need to request a change of guard for the safety of his charges.
"Rickie," called Luce, distracting Marcus from the heavy turn his thoughts were taking, "Will you be a dear and make up the beds in the guest rooms for these two boys? I'll be fine if you set me down in that there rocking chair. Oh, but bring me something to drink first please?"
Marcus smiled a little as she batted her eyes at the boy in a way that would have been coquettish and sweet, had any other been making the expression. As it was, she looked like she had an eyelash caught in her eye and was attempting to dislodge it. The boy did as she bade him, however, with only a slight sigh and a roll of his dark eyes. He was very careful about seating her, helping to arrange her injured limbs and then sneaking past the two Volturi in a frightened manner.
Luce said nothing, but refused still to make eye contact. Marcus frowned slightly. There bond was still growing, but the strands that originated from her end were obviously confused, hesitant. The scent was a little muddy, the mixture of Marcus and Luce not quite balanced. However, Marcus reasoned with himself, the progress made already was astounding. He had a full year with her to win her affections, and he didn't think he was very far from that goal.
There were clinking and thunking noises coming from inside the house as the boy presumably prepared Luce's drink. Added to that the extra sounds of slicing and crunching, and Marcus had no idea what the boy would return with. Marcus's idea of drinking was a much different affair.
On that note, he glanced again at Demetri, and what he saw was not reassuring.
He stepped up behind Luce laying a hand so gently on the high back of the rocking chair that Luce didn't notice. Either that, or she could notice nothing outside of whatever reverie she was caught in. She looked so peaceful and content that despite his desire for her attention he could not bear to interrupt her happiness. Marcus caught a tiny strand of her hair that was floating in the warm breeze and twined it around his finger. She smiled a bit, and he thought maybe for a moment she would turn to him, but her attention was on the approaching thunderheads. He dropped the piece of her hair that he held, and, as if on cue, the boy returned precariously balancing a tray.
Ah, alcohol. He was not surprised in the least. Had he been human, Marcus thought he would have enjoyed drinking such things with Luce... Though perhaps none that looked so feminine...
"Is it gonna rain?" the boy asked in a soft voice, thick with his American accent.
"Not quite yet," replied the small woman gently, and Marcus could see that they were not speaking of the weather. He looked once more at his current guard, and clenched his jaw at the malice in Demetri's eyes. Marcus was not sure how to control that. He had always left such things to Aro and Caius, who were always quite pleased with the responsibility of ordering others around. Marcus had never had any interest in taking part in such things, even before Didyme had died. It was disconcerting. What if Demetri did not feel that Marcus's orders held the same weight as those of his brothers..?
He would have continued on that line of thought for longer if it had not been completely derailed by the loud smooching noise Luce made against the boy's face. The dark skinned youth protested the treatment, but she ignored his embarrassment.
"Now go make the beds for the Italians Cocoa-butter," She said, grinning and wrinkling her nose at the dark skinned boy, "I would myself," she continued, her smile inverting into a frustrated frown, "but I'm not fully functioning this evening." The boy made his way quickly back inside, making more noises along the way. Squeaking stairs and opening and closing doors loudly.
"Alice! Jazz!" Alice looked down from her coniferous perch where she'd been zoning out, patiently awaiting her quasi-siblings. She was experiencing another vision of the same, redheaded woman that had caused this whole debacle in the first place.
The human had been sitting on a covered porch in a wooden rocking chair, flanked by two very not human men, Demetri and Marcus. The oddest part of the whole vision, not counting the fact that this woman was still breathing, or the odd, affectionate look on Marcus's face, or the hatred on Demetri's... was the lack of other vampires in the picture... Worse yet, she'd been having visions of them a lot lately; it seemed that they were already across the Atlantic.
Rose and Em appeared from the underbrush just as the vision faded. Rosalie in a quiet manner, polished, graceful, poised, without a single, beautiful blond hair out of place..
Emmett crashing through behind her like a bulldozer.
"Is Nessie okay?" asked Rosalie, the concern an fear palpable in her voice. Jasper was at Alice's side that instant, close, but not touching in that silent intimate way he had.
"Nessie's fine," offered Jasper calmly, subtly influencing Rosalie to the same state, "We wanted to meet up with you two, just in case something went wrong in these visions Alice has been having. So far they've been benign, but Aro may still be angry. Carlisle and the others are getting in contact with some of our friends and comrades from the last time we dealt with the Volturi... just in case." he repeated.
Since the near disaster outside Forks, Washington several years back in which the whole force of the Volturi swept down on them for breaking a law they hadn't actually broken, the Cullen clan had convinced friends and allies to carry cellphones with them... just in case.
It looked like just in case was about to become an urgent sort of phrase.
Everyone looked to Alice as she spoke again, "I saw Demetri and Marcus just now. They weren't doing anything, but I've been seeing them on and off, and they're in Georgia."
Tense again with the discomfort of knowing that they could be in danger, but not why, all four vampires turn northwest as a unit and began to run.
So, I looked up my story on the fanfiction search, only to realize that there's now another Twilight/Marcus fic under the same exact name...
I might be a little offended. Would it be wrong of me? I chose that title very specifically, after much consideration, referencing things that won't be revealed until almost the end, and now it feels almost cheap. Probably because the other author has over twice the chapters in much less time... (My own fault, really.)
Well, I am rather petty.
On the other hand, I was thrilled with all the reviews I got! I put up that chapter the night before leaving town for the weekend to move my brother into his new house. When I returned, BAM! Reviews! How lovely! So I got all inspired to work in the next chapter. I have a little more written, but I decided to post at a good stopping point to get something up. Still took me forever, but I can't promise speed, only that another one will eventually be posted.
Please review!
