“Don’t hurt me,” I gasped. “Please.”
A cold hand touched my forehead, and then withdrew. My ears caught the sound of slicing flesh. I feared for a moment that it was my flesh, and I was just so numb that I couldn’t feel it. But when the man’s wrist pressed against my mouth and cool blood trickled into my mouth, I realized that he’d just cut himself. I coughed and spluttered. His blood tasted even more disgusting than mine.
“You’re a wreck,” he said. “Stop spitting out my blood. Drink it. It will speed up your healing.”
I still didn’t know whether to trust him, but the thought of relief from the pain was enough to make me begin swallowing his blood. I held my nose to make the taste more bearable, though the strange texture of it remained off-putting as ever.
Within a minute of drinking the man’s blood, a miracle happened. The pain all over my body and face subsided. My vision returned to me. I found myself staring up into the face of a handsome dark-haired man with vibrant green eyes. It was the same man who’d stormed out of the sauna earlier, after Jeramiah had asked him to half-turn me.
“Joseph?” I said, sitting up slowly and backing away toward the headboard.
He nodded, then stood up from the bed.
I stared at him, studying his face and trying to figure out whether he was any danger to me now. I wondered what his agenda was in saving me from those half-bloods. His face was quite expressionless as he looked me over. It was hard to come to any kind of conclusion.
“So you’re… a vampire?” I asked.
He nodded.
“Why did you help me?”
“Because I saw them beating you into a pulp for apparently no reason.”
I narrowed my eyes on him. “Why would that bother you?”
He paused, frowning as if he were unsure of the answer himself. Then he shrugged. “It’s what any man would have done who wasn’t a total monster.”
So you’re not a total monster?
“What are you going to do with me now?” I asked.
“I’m not going to do anything with you. In fact, it’s best you leave. Are you coupled with a vampire?”
The thought of leaving made me panic. I still didn’t trust this vampire, but so far he hadn’t given me any reason to fear him.
“A vampire called Michael stole me and brought me down here.” I bit my lower lip. “Please… don’t make me leave. He’s going to put me through torture when he finds me again.”
A flicker of discomfort played across Joseph’s face. “So Michael hasn’t been treating you well?” he asked.
I gathered my knees to my chest. “He’s a sick bastard.” That was all I wanted to say of Michael. I was trying to forget the trauma he’d put me through. I didn’t want to relive it over again.
“Where did Michael steal you from?”
“The desert. They also stole my sister and a friend. I was out looking for them. I walked right up to that weird barrier, and Michael pulled me through it… Who are you exactly?”
He paused before responding. “Joseph Brunson.”
It irritated me that his name was all the information he offered. “And? You seem to be different than the other vampires I’ve met here so far. Why did you storm out of the sauna the moment you saw me? I thought you were going to attack me.”
He averted his gaze away from me. “Long story,” he said darkly.
Although I was curious, now certainly wasn’t the time for long stories. This vampire, for whatever reason, was behaving sympathetically toward me and didn’t seem to be as crazy as all the others I’d met here so far. I had to take advantage of the situation while I could.
“You must know where the humans are kept in this place, right?” I asked. “Do you have any idea where my sister might be?”
He took a seat on the edge of the bed, still keeping his distance from me, and breathed out slowly. “Humans are kept in the basement beneath the atrium. But simply knowing this isn’t going to be of much use to you.”
My heart lifted a little, even as my anxiety increased. “The basement? Can you take me there?”
He furrowed his brows. “What’s your name?”
“River. River Giovanni.”
“River,” he said, a deep frown still on his handsome face. “Even if I knew exactly which cell she was being kept in, and you managed to get her out of the prison without alerting anyone, and then up through the many levels of the atrium which is swarming with vampires who can detect human blood miles off, you still couldn’t escape. The boundary surrounding The Oasis won’t let you out.”
“C-couldn’t you help us through the boundary? You’re the only sane person I’ve come across so far in this place. Could you not find it in yourself to help us?”