CHAPTER ELEVEN

I turned and went to my room.

My emotions were running in directions I never would have thought were possible.

Dimitri tried to say something but I closed my door.

Oh sure, I loved him, more than I could ever say but I had too much going on in my life. And like he said, love fades, mine has. The only way I was going to be able to do what I needed to get Lissa on the council and maybe queen was to do as Tatiana wanted.

So with that I threw myself at my giant king size bed.

Somewhere in the distance of the hotel apartment I heard Dimitri shut his door.

It took awhile for me to sleep and when I did it was fitful.

Finally I woke at 4:30pm. So much for a 3pm flight.

I thought I should check on Lissa.

She was in her room with Abe, Christian and my mother.

"Before you even ask me, I have no idea where Rose went or even how she got out." Lissa told the adults in an exasperated tone.

"We know you don't." My mother told her.

Lissa was totally thrown by that comment.

"What do you mean, you know she doesn't know." Christian asked before Lissa could say anything.

"Exactly that." Abe said with a smug smile on his face. He looked kind of pleased with himself.

"We know where Rose is and who she is with." Mother said with a chiding look at Abe.

Lissa and Christian locked eyes on my mother.

Lissa thoughts almost made me laugh because they were basically the same as what mine had been when Janine had picked the door lock to my cell.

"What the hell . . . . " Lissa and Christian said at the same time.

Quickly Lissa's thoughts change pattern to anger.

"She knew she was getting out and she didn't tell me!" Lissa said her voice getting louder with every word.

"How could she do this to me, we agreed that if there was going to be anymore crazy stuff I was coming too."

Everybody looked questioningly at Lissa. But she was so angry that she didn't take any notice of what she was saying.

"After she came back from Siberia, she promised me she would never leave me behind again." Tears of rage spilled down Lissa face as she continued to rant.

"I mean for goodness sake, we broke Victor out of prison together, saved Dimitri together. What the hell was she thinking?"

My mother, ever quick, heard what Lissa had said about Victor, but it was Abe that spoke first.

"Yes, I have to admit that when news of his escape broke, I did have my suspicions about if it was her or not." Abe said with a small, proud grin on his face. Obviously his daughter breaking the law made him proud, ha.

"What?' Janine snipped.

"Well, it was a 3 person team that got the Prince out, and before Adrian join them in Las Vegas, Lissa and Rose only had one other person with them, Eddie wasn't it?" Abe asked Lissa.

Lissa looked at the ground as she nodded slightly.

She knew she'd opened her mouth to much in her anger, but even though she was hanging her head she was glad that she had told Abe and Janine. Kind of like, she was poking her tongue out at me by telling my parents.

I watched my parents exchange looks. My mother obviously shocked and Abe still looking proud.

"So, why didn't she take me with her? Or even tell me?" Lissa asked Abe.

"Well, with the political climate as it is, she thought that the best thing would be to keep you in a position of plausible deniability." Abe answered in his matter of act tone.

Lissa just looked at him, her mind going over the last statement. Logically, she knew I was right; it was safer for her (in more ways than one), not to know what I was up to. But she was still pissed as hell.

"So where is she then?" Christian asked while Lissa was in thought.

"I'm afraid it's safer for you not to know that."

Lissa was about to kick off again but she was silenced by the sound of a cell phone ring.

It was my mothers.

"Hello?" she said in her all-business tone. "I see, and what would you like me to do?" If I had said that to anyone they would have thought I was using attitude but the way Janine said it, it was nothing more than a question.

"Alright, I'll be over in about 10 minutes." She closed the phone.

All eyes in the room were on her again.

"They have had a tip off, someone saw them driving toward New York." My mother told the room.

I pulled out of Lissa's head as Janine said her goodbyes and headed to the guardians building, I presumed.

I sat up in my bed. I had to get out of here before i was found.

I listened for sounds of Dimitri but all I heard was silence.

I got up and went through my suitcase.

I threw on a pair of hipster jeans and a fitted tee and hoody. I looked at the selection of shoes that had been put in the bag, and although there was a fine selection of Prada and Jimmy Choo's, I grab a pair of trainers.

After I pulled a brush threw my hair and tied it up I went through the rest of my suitcase and found a small purse with a credit card and $500 cash and a fake id in it, god bless Abe, he had given me my escape route without even knowing it.

After I had heard Janine say that someone had seen us I had decided to leave Dimitri behind. He wanted to take me to Siberia and keep me safe but I had things to do. Not to mention the confusion him being with me was causing.

I slid out my bedroom door, praying that Dimitri was still sleeping and wouldn't hear me.

But when I got to the door there was a note taped to it

Rose, I didn't want to wake you i changed our flight times, we don't need to be at the airport til 9pm. I've just gone out to get us some breakfast. Be back soon. D.

I let out a breath that I hadn't realised I was holding. Trying to disappear with him in the same hotel room would have been hard.

I moved out into the hallway and started heading toward the stairwell.

Just as I was about to open the security door I head the elevator ding. Shit.

Moving quickly I got through the door and closed before anyone got off the elevator. Damn that was close.

I made my way down the stairwell quickly, heading for the back for the hotel and hopefully an emergency exit that came out at the back of the hotel.

I figured that as soon as Dimitri realised I wasn't in the room he would run and try to find me.

Once outside I followed the service exit out on to the side street and found a cab.

It took about an hour and a half to get to the airport because of the traffic.

I had to get to New Orleans, once I got to the air port it didn't take long for me to book a flight. The fake ID that Abe had given me worked like a charm.

Thinking it was the luckiest day of my life, I headed for the bathrooms to freshen up before I was due to board my flight an hour later.

It was a bit of a hike to the bathroom but I took the time to breath.

I thought about Dimitri, leaving him behind had been hard, but in my 18 years I had done harder things, and funnily enough, most of those things had been for him.

I noticed that the sun was down, after my experiences in Siberia, night time always brought my senses fully on line, and I always noticed what time the sun went down.

I was straightening myself up in front of the mirror when that familiar nausea came across me and I cursed in my head.

Just when I thought I would make it to New Orleans unimpeded.

One of the other things I had found in my suitcase before I left the hotel had been a silver stake, which I now took out of my hoodies pocket.

I looked around the bathroom to double check that I was the only one in there.

Chances are that a strigoi was out to get breakfast and figured a tired passenger would be easy pickings in an airport bathroom.

I backed away from the door and into one the empty stalls. Strigoi have excellent hearing so no doubt it would figure I was in the bathroom on my own, unfortunately for the strigoi I wasn't just some tired passenger, I was a fully trained and field tested guardian, complete with molnija marks.