Free Bittersweet Seraphim by Debra Anastasia Page B

in her that her father had to grudgingly respect. He didn’t see that passion in any of his soldiers. “If only you’d be with me, Daughter. You’re so misguided. You see, breeding vampires isn’t easy. You’ve got to be strong enough to eliminate the ones that fail to thrive. You did continue the line, so there’s some usefulness in you. You’ll do this one more thing for me, then I’ll put you out of your misery. No worries.”
    Vittorio didn’t share the news that had stirred his interest. One of his sources had spotted three adults who resembled his grandchildren going house to house like vacuum cleaner salesmen. All this time they’d outrun him, bested him at this global game of hide and seek. But now they were slowing down, making mistakes. Tomorrow he’d pack up his army and his daughter. They’d surround the children and take them easily. It would be the sweetest victory.

Chapter 9
    Kate had the evening mapped out: She was all set to finish the sweater she’d been knitting and cast on another online order for a glove and hat set. Her favorite chick flick was on cable tonight, and even though she had her own DVD copy of the movie, she still watched it whenever it came on. Why the commercials made it special, she didn’t know. Maybe it was because if the movie was on the TV, being sent into thousands of homes, she could tell herself she wasn’t watching it alone.
    Loneliness was quite a battle. Sometimes the weapons were tears, sometimes loud music—Kate had a whole arsenal to choose from. She was an expert at filling empty holes with random things, but night was the worst. It always had been. For a long time now, the night sky that zipped tight around her little cabin had been laden with suspense. The wait for Nero. There’d been no more visits from her father, and when she was snug in her PJs she was the most restless. Unfinished.
    It was like he was drowning in slow drying cement, and she’d no way to save him. And sometimes she doubted her sanity because she did want him free from Hell—if he was even still alive to hope for. He could very well be gone, punished for his crimes, for the very creation of her in the first place.
    Kate put on her soft clothes and lit a candle. The sweater was so close to finished that her heart raced as she sat down with the intricately knotted yarn on her lap. Silly, because knitting was hardly an adrenaline-based sport, but this represented the culmination of a plan, a wait concluding. She bound off the project and sighed. After threading in the loose strings, it was finished.
    The picture on the front was a puppy, similar to the one she’d worn for her first, ruined tea with Nero. Kate folded the garment and set it next to her recliner. She let herself feel the accomplishment for a few moments before grabbing the next set of needles. The movie’s opening song began and the title flashed across the screen. A love story. Miscommunication and love at first sight: all the things a girl thinks she might want before she knows true heartache.
    She began mouthing the words, putting herself in the lead role. Her attempts at love had been thwarted before she could even get attached to the hope for more. Her looks weren’t the problem, but there was just something off-putting about her. Damned if she knew what it was. Kate set her head back. She did know what the problem was. She wanted something unreal: the fantasy love born of only the most unrealistic circumstances. And her baggage started with a capital B. The wash of exhaustion made her wonderings disappear, and she closed her eyes for just a moment, still listening to the movie.
    She’d been dreaming of Nero’s last night again when she sat up straight on the couch. Out of long-ingrained habit, she ran to the back window to check the shed. Nothing, of course. She grabbed her shotgun and closed her eyes, listening. A too-close car door slam and the murmuring of a group of people soon opened them again.
    She glanced