Eternal [HS]

Chapter Nineteen

THE HOUSE IS WARM.

Niall and Mitch left only fifteen minutes ago with instructions to "Get the car and get rid of it. I don't care how, just get rid of it." They left before she could interact with them more than she had in the yard when they demanded answers for why they ditched the plan all of the sudden.

Harry is upstairs, half sulking because of what almost happened to them and half excited because of the precious information they obtained while they were there, and she's been waiting in the living room since he came inside for him to come down.

Amidst remembering everything that happened at Adeline's house, she cannot stop thinking about him. It feels stupid to be focusing on him after what happened, but honestly? She isn't as fazed by the incident as she should be, or, at least, as she would have been if it happened to her last month. This nonchalant attitude she's adopted about such dangerous situations only speaks to how chaotic her life has become. Vampires and organized murderers—what a drastic change compared to what surrounded her the day she was brought here.

She remembers it so well.

The boredom was setting into full effect at the Nurse's Station that night, and she wasn't someone that liked to be caught sitting down on the job with nothing to do but couldn't help that there was a lull in the middle of the shift.

The pen in her hand that she nabbed from the Unit Clerk's desk was nearly out of ink, struggling to write the smiley face she spent three minutes trying to draw on the inside of her wrist before a fall alarm went off and sent her sprinting down the hallway. Nothing was wrong, the patient simply set off the too-sensitive alarm by rolling over close to the edge of the bed, so she reset it and walked back to the Nurse's Station with a tired sigh.

That was one of her last memories of life before everything changed, and while she misses her family more than anything, she doesn't feel the same desolation she did at the beginning when it was fresh and overwhelming. Right now, rather than obsessing over the near failure they faced tonight or the fact that her old life is long gone, she's thinking about the man whose footsteps she hears pattering across the floor above her head.

She tried so hard to resist the pull she instantly felt to him and the chemistry that erupted from the second they went head to head in Niall's townhouse. For a while, she pretended not to notice how her eyes would linger on him a little too long, or how she'd feel a burst of happiness when his car pulled into the driveway after a long day of wandering the house alone. Now, she couldn't resist it if she tried. After what happened on the couch the other day, the idea of her and him in that context has refused to leave her alone.

Her eyes flutter shut as the memory takes hold again. The soft touch of his palm at first, as if he was unsure of himself, the sound of his voice wavering when he spoke again, the jittery feeling that fluttered her heart—she would do anything to experience that again. There's something so intoxicating about him, and she doesn't know if it has something to do with the fact that he's different than anyone she's ever met in her world, that he's a vampire instead of a human, but, either way, she has been mesmerized by him for weeks.

The sound of him coming down the stairs makes her jump for a second before relaxing back onto the couch again, fighting the soft smile that wants to form on her lips at him entering the room.

He sits beside her, opting to share the same cushion as her rather than sit on one of the other spots on the couch, in fresh clothes. Before going inside, he told her to leave her clothes from the mission on her bed so he could get rid of those just like the car. Her best guess is that they're going to get rid of anything that could physically pin them at the scene, even though Adeline's word, whether it's true or not, would be enough to end her cronies after them.