Chapter 2: Hotel California
"You're taking me to Adrian?" I shrieked. "You do know he hates me, right?"
"Roza, calm down. If anyone can deal with you in this state, it's Adrian Ivashkov. And he doesn't hate you. Nor does he love you anymore. I trust you can both handle a conversation over glasses of water. And besides, I'm not leaving you. I'll be right there. It'll be okay."
"Love fades," I murmured.
"What?" he said sharply. I knew he had heard me.
"Nothing."
The car came to a halt outside what I presumed to be Adrian's apartment building. I moaned as a sudden wave of nausea hit me. For the umpteenth time that night, Dimitri took one look at me and sighed. He opened the passenger door and practically peeled me out of the seat. "Walk," he commanded. "One foot in front of the other. It's not that hard."
"I broke my fucking foot!" I yelled. Okay, that wasn't entirely true. But when he lifted my foot to examine the ankle and saw that it was twice its normal size, he scooped me up in his arms. I willed myself not to ruin his leather duster with all the liquor in my stomach. Outside Adrian's door, Dimitri shifted my weight to knock on the door. As he raised his fist, Adrian began to open it.
"Well, well, well, if it isn't-" Adrian's smile dropped when he saw my condition. "-Everyone's favorite little dhampir," he finished.
"I found her at a bar," Dimitri said lamely.
"That would make sense," Adrian mused.
I giggled at their awkwardness.
Adrian moved out of the doorway, allowing us to pass through. I moaned when my injured foot inadvertently hit the doorframe. "Careful!" I chastised Dimitri.
"Oh, you're fine," he said, as if he were speaking to a young child crying over a scraped knee. Considering my history of dealing with serious injuries while running from Strigoi and guardians who had been ordered to kill me- not to mention being shot- I suppose he was. "She sprained an ankle again in training," he explained to Adrian. "Can you get her some ice?"
The moment they got me perfectly positioned on the sofa with my foot propped up on a pillow and a glass of water by side, I realized they had forgotten something: a trash can. Dimitri sat on the couch next to me, laying a hand protectively on my injured ankle. I turned to Adrian, who had the misfortune to be sitting on the floor next to my head. He looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to speak. Unfortunately for him, I did open my mouth.
"Sorry." With that, I threw up all over his shirt.
"Really, Rose?" came Dimitri's voice from the end of the couch. "Was that necessary?"
I simply groaned in response. Adrian was unfazed. "It all comes out in the wash." I suppose if anyone would know, it was Adrian Ivashkov, our resident drunkard. "Are you done?" He seemed to decide from the look on my face that I was not. "Can you carry her to the bathroom?" he asked Dimitri. "I need to take off this shirt, and if I carry her, that might be a bit-"
"I've got her," said Dimitri through clenched teeth. He deposited me on the bathroom floor. Adrian came in a minute later wearing a clean shirt and Dimitri left to make up a bed on the sofa for him and I. It was Adrian's apartment, but I suspected Dimitri wanted nothing to do with me at this point. Adrian had to be a bit more sympathetic, seeing as he spent many of his nights the same way.
"Ah, little dhampir," he murmured, sweeping my hair out of my face and holding it behind my head. "Never a dull moment with you. Do you ever not make a grand entrance?"
In my mind, I was transported back to the time I ripped off the charmed bracelet that disclosed my identity, back in the day when I was falsely charged with high treason, prompting a swarm of guardians to close in on me. After all I had done for the guardians and the Moroi world, they thought I was a murderer. Well, you are. The voice slipped into my mind again. Just not in the way they believed. I leaned over and threw up again.
"Shhh," said Adrian soothingly. I wiped my mouth and leaned back against his chest. "Careful, little dhampir." He gently eased me back into a sitting position so that we weren't touching. "Hey, Belikov?" he called. "Can you come hold her?"
Dimitri rushed into the bathroom and sat on the floor. I curled into him. I didn't care who held me, as long as someone did.
"Hey, um, so…" Adrian began, speaking with none of his usual smoothness. "You can't both fit on the couch comfortably, so I was thinking… maybe you should take my bed for tonight, and I'll sleep on the couch."
Whoa. That would be awkward. But Dimitri graciously accepted the offer. He and Adrian cajoled me into taking a quick shower, then Dimitri dressed me in a t-shirt and shorts of Adrian's and placed me in Adrian's bed. The day truly could not get any weirder. Thankfully, it seemed to be over.
"You're mad," I told Dimitri, laying in the dark next to him, no longer touching.
"Go to sleep, Rose. We'll talk about it in the morning."
But we didn't. I awoke to the smell of pancakes, eggs, and bacon. I ravenously devoured everything in sight. Dimitri hovered over me, continually refilling my plate and periodically rubbing my back. At first, I stiffened at his touch, assuming we could not ignore the previous night's events. But for Dimitri, Adrian, and myself, the morning was full of nothing but good food and laughter. If there is one thing I'm learning from my life lately, it is that anything heavy can become light as long as you never try to lift it.
I hoped that Dimitri would be living in a hotel during his time in Palm Springs. My mind had created visions of us pressed up against each other between the soft sheets of a plush bed. I had a very nice bed of my own, living in a suite in the queen's palace at Court, but I was always alone in mine. In my daydreams, Dimitri and I ordered room service after a long afternoon of doing anything we wanted with each other. Then we would drift happily to sleep, naked in each other's arms.
But it was not meant to be. Before we left Adrian's apartment, I casually asked Dimitri where he was living, and he explained that he had a room at a paranoid, elderly Moroi man's estate. My eyes narrowed and Adrian snickered, fully aware of why this was a problem. I shot him a warning look.
"So we have to sneak around and hook up like a couple of teenagers?" I asked Dimitri indignantly.
"You two have plenty of practice with that," Adrian pointed out.
"Oh, shut up. Seriously, Dimitri?"
"Relax, Rose. Clarence probably won't even notice you're in the house. We can put a chair under the door handle if that makes you feel better."
"Your door doesn't lock?"
"It's an old house." He shrugged. "We'll be fine. Unless you want to park my car somewhere…"
"Yes, because that just screams 'mature adult relationship'," Adrian commented. "Speaking of screaming—"
"Okay, that's enough," I said hotly. "Adrian, thank you for your hospitality, but it's really time for us to go."
"My pleasure, little dhampir." He paused. "Speaking of pleasure…"
"Oh, for god's sake, Adrian!"
I took Dimitri's hand. He looked mildly concerned by mine and Adrian's banter. For me, despite all of my protests, Adrian's commentary was a return to our normal, friendly relationship. Maybe he really has moved on, I thought. As he should. He has his faults, but he deserves better than me. He has never been a monster, not like Dimitri and I have been.
Dimitri and I made it to Clarence's house uneventfully. When he took my hand at the foot of the stairs, he grinned and put a finger to his lips, gesturing for me to stay quiet. It was completely unnecessary, but adorable. We dropped all pretense of cuteness when he shut the door behind us. So much for wedging a chair under the doorknob to prevent anyone from opening it. We had been away from each other for far too long. He pushed me onto his twin size bed, my hair flowing over the edge. I was desperate for him to get right to business, but still relished every moment he spent kissing me and undressing me, sliding his hands up my back and taking my t-shirt with them. He straddled me, holding onto my hipbones and slowly kissing my neck, moving downwards. I heard the front door of the house open and close.
"Ignore it," he whispered. "Clarence won't come upstairs."
He didn't have to tell me twice. Nothing in the world mattered except his body against mine. I rolled to the left, pulling him with me. He took my lead and lay flat on the bed, allowing me to kiss his neck. My hands found the button of his jeans all on their own.
"Hey, Dimitri! We went to the grocery store!" sang a familiar voice, accompanied by a knock on the door that was entirely pointless, seeing as the door was already opening. "Guess what— oh my god! Oh! I am so sorry!" Most people would have turned away at that point, but Jillian Mastrano Dragomir was not most people. She simply backed up against the wall and looked mortified.
Dimitri rolled off of me and I pushed myself up on my elbows. I really do have terrible luck.
"Hey, Jailbait," I said glumly. The playful nickname seemed awkward in that moment. At least I was still wearing a bra, and only our shirts had been thrown to the floor. "Nice to see you."
"Y—you too, Rose!" she stammered. "And I am so sorry. Wow. This is awkward. Um, we got popsicles. All different flavors. If you guys want them, they're in the freezer!" Jill pivoted and ran out the door and down the stairs.
"She really could have at least closed the door behind her," I said, my voice full of defeat.
"That would have been helpful," Dimitri agreed. After a long pause, I started laughing, and he followed suit. Wordlessly, he jumped up, slammed the door with far more force than was necessary, wedged his desk chair under it, and leapt on top of me. This time, we were not quite so patient.
After a day filled with a delicious breakfast, quality time with Dimitri, and a cherry popsicle (which was, admittedly, quite good) after dinner, I should have known that my luck was running out. I awoke the next day after only a few hours of restless sleep, not because Dimitri and I were busy all night but just because his bed was too damn small. When Adrian sent me a text saying that we needed to talk, I was not really in the mood.
I settled down at a table outside Spencer's, the coffee shop in town, with an iced chai tea and an admittedly handsome ex-boyfriend. Our meeting, according to Adrian, was actually Dimitri's idea. That's how I knew I was in trouble.
"Look, Rose," he began after very little small talk. "You've hurt a lot of people in your life. We've been through this. But what's hardest to watch is the way you treat yourself these days."
I opened my mouth to protest, but he stopped me.
"I'm not talking about the other night. Had that been an isolated incident, it would be perfectly fine. In fact, I thought you were quite charming, aside from the yelling and the part where you puked on my shirt."
I cringed.
"Rose, it's really not a big deal. But this isn't a one-time thing for you. Do you think Belikov doesn't know what goes on at Court? He knows you don't call him when you're sober. And that you're nearly always alone when you're off-duty. Rose, I don't know what kind of a hole you've dug for yourself and crawled into, but you need to claw your way back out. You're better than this."
"You're one to talk," I snapped.
"Exactly," he agreed. "I am. I've been down this road, and let me tell you now, it doesn't fix a single fucking thing. Whatever demons you're fighting, whatever burdens you're carrying, you can't drown them. And for heaven's sake, stop making Belikov sad, because I'm tired of hearing about it from him."
I ignored the last part entirely and stared him down. "Are you done yet? I didn't peg you for the 'Zen life lessons' type."
"Yes. I'm done. I'm not here to lecture you. Dimitri could have done that himself. He wanted me to talk to you because I can't lecture, not without being a total hypocrite. I'm just telling you that the way I live is hardly living at all."
We looked into each other's eyes with the same intensity we used to show during those spirit dreams that I took for granted at the time. It struck me suddenly that I missed Adrian. The connection between us had never been one of love, and now it wasn't even about sex. For how badly I hurt Adrian, he moved on surprisingly quickly. I wondered if there was anyone new in his life.
"Fine," I said, and his face visibly relaxed. "Can you at least tell me where Sydney is? I haven't been able to get in touch with her. I know she's still here. She and Jill and Eddie are still Amberwood students for the next few weeks, right? When they supposedly "transfer schools" and go back to Court or St. Vladimir's?"
"Right," he said.
"So how is she?" I prompted. "I have dinner plans with Eddie, and Jill has certainly seen enough of me, but Sydney isn't answering her phone. Is she mad at me for something? What's going on?"
A shadow cast over Adrian's eyes. "No. She's not mad. She's—it's complicated, Rose. But she's not mad, and you'll see her soon enough. Not on this trip, but soon enough." I thought back to the conversation with my mother, the one I had pushed to the back of my mind. Sydney won't see me. I'm working at St. Vladimir's. Everyone seems to know something about my life that I don't, and if there's one thing I have always hated, it's being kept in the dark.