Bad Taste (Part I) // Colby Brock

139 - Rebecca

Tara noticed my discomfort immediately and she turned for the window, but it was too late: he'd already run away. My heart was pounding in my chest, a thousand terrible memories swimming around in my head. Why was he there? Why was he watching me? Did it have anything to do with Angela and what she'd told me? Was it really him who'd been following her? She hadn't mentioned that for a while, so was he following me now instead?

After the James and Blair fiasco, everyone had figured that James was the one stalking Angela and that it was all resolved now. She hadn't said anything about being followed, so I believed the story. But now that I'd met those eyes and seen that face, I was making a hard u-turn.

Angela was right: he was going down the list and I was next.

"Rebecca!" Tara called loudly—I didn't know for how long she'd been calling my name, only that I wanted to go home. I finally met her eyes and felt the emotion brewing up inside of me. "Girl, what's wrong? Are you okay?"

"No," I replied. She frowned at me. "Take me home. Now. My home, not yours." Tara opened her mouth but I snapped at her, ending the argument there. We walked at a rushed human pace out of the cafe then she grabbed me and ran at vampire speed through the city. When we stopped, we were at my apartment.

I didn't look at her. I didn't talk to her. I didn't explain myself.

I just walked into my apartment and slammed the door in her face before running to my room and dropping to the floor with my back to the wall and my knees up to my chest. I couldn't handle all of the thoughts going around my mind. I couldn't handle all the memories that had my head doing that annoying spinning thing.

Time passed. I didn't know how much or how fast, just that it was passing around me and I couldn't move. How fast was my heart going? Very fucking fast. Was I about to throw up? Maybe. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Did I almost scream when I felt a hand touch my shoulder? Yes, but I kept it down and opted to just jump instead.

My head snapped to the man standing next to me, my whole body responding to his presence. In a good way this time. I felt myself get up without control and grab onto him for my life, my arms squeezing him so tightly I was sure I would be choking a human. But he wasn't human: he was my vampire boyfriend.

"What's wrong, Becks?" He asked softly, his arms bringing warmth and comfort to every part of me. I didn't want to reply. Something about the overwhelming thoughts in my head had my mouth sewn shut. "Becks," Colby said as he pulled his head back to look at me. I reluctantly pulled mine away enough to see him too. "Talk to me."

Flicking my gaze between his eyes, I felt a tear break through my hold. The almost foreign feeling drifting down my cheek woke me up from my panicked stare, and I quickly let go of Colby to wipe it away like it was never there. I cleared my throat and shook my head violently, eager to get rid of these damn thoughts.

I was stronger than this.

"I saw something, that's all," I murmured, turning my head to look at my bed in embarrassment. Colby moved up to me, his hand on my waist and my face. Another tear was trying to escape and the feeling of his cool skin against mine had it falling. He wiped it away, bringing my attention to him.

"You don't cry for 'something you saw'," he said softly, "so what is it?" I gulped, letting the next tear fall. He patiently wiped them off as they came until I gave up and hugged him again. He held me tight in return.

I knew right then that I was going to tell Colby, I just didn't know how to do it. How to tell the man you loved that you just saw your biggest nightmare... without letting him go and avenge you. Colby would kill this man, whom I didn't even have a name for. He would kill him in a heartbeat for me, and as sweet as that was (kinda), I couldn't let that happen. I vowed that I would be the one.

When the tears stopped, leaving me close to feeling numb, I pulled back from Colby and took his hand, leading him over to my bed. He didn't argue with me, even as I pulled off my jeans then crawled in on the opposite side to him. There was a short silence before I felt his weight move toward me. I rolled into him, finding that he was shirtless. It felt like he was wearing sweatpants beneath the covers.

We lay there in silence until I was ready. And when I was, I spoke with so much venom that you might have mistaken me for a vampire. "I saw him. I saw the guy who ripped my family apart." Colby was silent. "We all thought it might have been James following Angela around, but that wasn't it at all. She was right. It was him. And now he's moved onto me."

"Are you sure?" Colby whispered after considering this. I nodded without looking up at him. "How do you know it was him?"

"I saw him so many times, Colby. Every time he brought my mom or my sister home, which was nearly every day, by the way. I used to wait for them hiding in the shadows. I know his face by now—how could I not?"

Colby sighed. "Then we have another problem on our hands."

"Another solvable problem... right?" I asked hopefully as I twisted my head to see him. He smiled comfortingly at me, but I could tell he was hesitant to answer. "I know you can't promise that," I murmured.

"I can't, but I can promise that we'll see what we can do about him. Without knowing his name, it'll be kind of difficult to kill him or even find him."

"Angela might know more," I suggested, though I was hesitant to. I didn't want to see my sister. As far as I knew, she and Aryia spent enough time together for the rest of us. She was seemingly in safe hands and away from all of this, which was all I needed from her.

"Fuck," I breathed, "she's gonna relapse."

"You don't know that," Colby denied but I shook my head.

"She is. She's going to relapse. If we talk to her about him, she'll relapse. I know she will. She was telling me something about how you never forget the first one to bite you, and that there's some sort of weird attachment there."

Colby's jaw clenched. "Yeah."

"What was she talking about?" He didn't respond. "Colbs, I wanna know."

He cringed. "The first one to bite you has a sort of claim on you. If they ask for another bite, it's close to impossible to ignore their request." I stared at him silently. He had this claim on me and I didn't even know it. I could tell the same thoughts were going through his head, too. "The only way you can ignore it is if you have... uh..." he trailed off.

"What?"

"Nothing," he said, making me frown. "I completely forgot about all that stuff anyway. Are you sure he's Angela's first bite?"

Brushing away what he was hiding from me, I nodded. "I'm sure. I can tell by the way she talks about him."

"That's not good."

"No," I agreed.

We lay there in silence for a minute then I tucked into his neck and closed my eyes, needing the rest. "I'll skip the studio and everything tomorrow and we can talk to everyone about it... I'll invite Angela, but only if we decide we can do it."

"I'll talk to Aryia," Colby offered.

"Okay."

"I love you, Becks. I'm sorry you're having to go through this." Halfway asleep already, I started to smile as I kissed his neck, eyes still closed.

The darkness slowly curled around me after that, and it was here to haunt me.