Soulless (Book #2 of Hunted)

Forget About It

"I had a dream. Or vision, whatever. I saw Zane. He was in South Town and he lured that girl out to Nata's woods and he killed her." Phoebe's expression grew more shocked by the moment.

"You mean like the dreams you had when Zane was feeding off the blood bar skank?" she asked in an attempt to lighten the mood. I refused to let the mood be lightened. I nodded.

"Exactly like those, only a whole less sexy and a whole lot more brutal. He practically chewed her head right off," I said. Phoebe's face was steadily turning red. She jumped up off the floor at the foot of the bed and began pacing.

"How long is this going to go on? He bites you! He bites Peyton! The girl at the skating rink! He's finally killed someone and all of this is reducing my bestie to tears!" she screeched. She sucked in a huge breath and screamed, "I AM GOING TO KILL HIM!!!!!" I stared at Phoebe where she stood radiating fury. I could not see any possible way that Phoebe could kill Zane when he was only feeding on cattle's blood. I didn't even want to imagine what would happen if she tried to stand against Anton or the true Terror of Romania. In my mind's eyes I could see Phoebe standing next to Zane. He was nearly a foot taller than her. I shook the image out of my head.

"It's not his fault. He doesn't want to kill. He doesn't want to feed," I said. She paused in her pacing and glared at me.

"Not his fault? Then whose fault is it?" I couldn't help but be slightly stumped. He left me of his own free will. He killed Nadia of his own free will. Why didn't he just stop? Why didn't he just come back?

"The Hunters. It's their fault. They were the ones who nearly tortured him to death," I insisted.

She took a deep breath and focused on my face. "It's not entirely their fault," she said. My brow creased in bemusement.

"Who else is to blame?" I asked though I had a dreadful feeling that I knew where she was going with this. Her defiant expression wavered.

"It's mostly your fault. You know...technically," she mumbled. I knew she was right but it was just so horrible to think I had caused all this chaos.

"How is this my fault?!?" I asked defensively. She gazed at me incredulously.

"You broke the weird hexy thing, Lor. He loves you and you gave him your blood without a second thought. You pushed him off the deep end and now he can't stop," she informed me accusatory. I felt anger bubble up inside me though I knew she was right.

"He-" my words caught in my throat. I took a deep breath and continued, "he was dying, Phoebe! What choice did I have?! I couldn't let him die. I just couldn't!" I was shouting now and the tears were pouring fast. I'm such a cry baby. Phoebe looked down at the floor.

"I can't believe I'm saying this but, maybe the world would've been better off without him here. Maybe you'd be better off." The tears splashed onto the wood floor.

"How can you say that?" I sobbed. She shook her head sadly.

"You know I hate seeing you hurt but I only tell things how I see them, and this is wrong." I nodded. I didn't know how I nodded because I felt I could no longer be capable of agreeing with anything that said Zane was turning into a monster. I sighed.

"So what do we do?" I asked as I wiped the tears angrily from my cheeks. Phoebe sat down next to me and shrugged.

"You can't ask me something like that, Lori, because I don't want to tell you what I think we should do," she said warily. I glared at her with eyes red from crying and said, "Just tell me, Pheebs. I can handle it." She shook her head.

"I don't think we should do anything. He left you. I don't think you should think of him as your responsibility anymore. If he keeps killing I'm sure the Hunters will eventually take care of him," she said quietly. I shouldn't have told her to tell me what she really thought. I could see Zane going up against the Hunters in my mind's eye. Either he would be so juiced on fresh blood he would kill all of them or he would be so weak with hunger that there wouldn't even be a fight. What if I kept living Zane's kills? I couldn't forget about someone I saw in my sleep every night.

"I don't think I can forget about him," I admitted. Phoebe gave me a look. A look that made me think once more about a psychiatrist.

"Why? Just focus on something else for the time being," she said. I growled at her.

"I could do that and it's all fine and dandy until I go to sleep and witness him tearing someone's throat out over and over again," I said. She looked at the floor.

"Yeah...I suppose that would be bad," she mumbled.

"Thank you for that astonishing insight Miss State-the-Obvious," I said with a staggering amount of sarcasm. I grinned at her to show her I didn't mean it.