The Vampire's little Mate (Sequel)

CHAPTER: 9

"You are going to think I am crazy, and you are probably going to want to run away." James stared at Tanya, watching her expression. "But don't. I promise you, there is nothing to run from."

"Get on with it, James." She could not take any more of these vague answers, between him and Alex. She was getting sick of it.

"The Walker family is different from ordinary people." James was choosing his words carefully. Tanya barely caught that he gave the name 'Walker' and not 'Peter.' "We are...Vampire Hunters."

Tanya burst into laughter, but there was little humor behind what he said and his expression was deadly serious. "Vampire hunters?" Tanya shook her head and was about to get up and leave. "I knew it, it's all a joke. You and Alex are both going to get it for this crap. I..."

"Alex?" His eyes went from gentle to fierce, almost fearful. "Please tell me it isn't Alex Jackson?"

Tanya opened her mouth to confirm his assumption but stopped herself. "You are the one who set him up to do it, aren't you? You are obviously both in it. Okay...you got me!" Tanya threw her hands up in frustration.

"Tanya, this is serious," James growled. "Alex Jackson isn't safe."

"He seems perfectly safe, and friendly to me," Tanya objected.

"Tanya, this is not a damned joke. I am being serious!" Tanya somehow knew by the tone in his voice and the look in his eyes that everything she had been told was indeed true. "Alex...he is one of them!"

"One of... them?" She gulped, eyebrows creasing with uncertainty. "Them? Do you mean a Vampire?"

James nodded slowly. "He is one of those, who live around these parts that I haven't been able to kill as yet."

"You kill people?" Tanya gasped in horror.

"They are not people, Tanya. They are monsters!"

"But, I don't believe in monsters," she said.

"Please, you have to listen to me," James pleaded, reaching across the table to touch her hand. But, she pulled it away.

"If all of this is true, and you are who and what you say you are, why did Adriana and Mark pretend for so long, how and why are they involved, in all this?" Tanya asked James.

"They don't know a complete truth," he said uncomfortably. "I put you in foster care after your mother passed away, hoping someone would find you and give you a better life than I could ever give you on my own. But I insisted they let me be a part of your life, Tanya. Thus, I played the role of your uncle. It worked out well for me because I had already known Mr. and Mrs. Peter. I had gone to school with Mark. You cannot imagine how hard it was, pretending all of this time to be your uncle," he explained with grief. "I told Adriana that by the time you were old enough, I wanted you to know the truth about where you came from. I guess eighteen is old enough to understand, in her book. All she knew, though, is that I was your dad and that your real mom passed away."

"Why did it have to wait until now?" Tanya asked him.

"I had to protect you from them if they knew I had a young daughter..." James shook his head. "There is no guessing what they might have done to you. It was for the best. But now you are older, stronger, and more able to understand all this. In fact, I have an intuition that you will turn out to be an even better hunter, Tanya."

"I refuse to believe this, James. It is not funny anymore." She didn't know what to think, her head was spinning with everything James and Alex had said.

She got up from her chair, ignoring his pleading calls, and left the room. Tears began to stream down her cheek, from frustration and confusion. Then she looked out of the window to see Alex in her car, staring back at her. She walked slowly out of the auto shop and grasped the handle of the door. She was scared to open it, afraid that James had not been joking...but the welcoming smile on Alex's face made her change her mind. She collapsed onto her seat and glanced at Alex cautiously, wiping away the tears from her eyes. 

Tanya thought over everything that she had read in vampire novels, noting the fact that he was out here, in the sunlight, and not burning due to it. However he was very handsome and had a pale white complexion, but he seemed harmless-aside from the bizarre episode about his special abilities that he went on about. Crazy, perhaps...but harmless.

Alex opened his mouth to speak, but she put her hand up to stop him as she remembered what James had said. "There is more about you than you told me last night, isn't there?" 

He lowered his eyes. "You are correct, Tanya Walker."

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked him.

"I was afraid of how you would react, Tanya."

"But if you are what James says you are, and you tried avoiding this place, why would you want to bring me here?" Tanya asked him.

Alex sighed. "I promised Adriana I would," he replied.

"How is my mom...Adriana...involved in all of this?"

"She knows my secret," Alex spoke quietly. "All thanks to Daniel."

"Daniel? Her boyfriend?" she asked him.

Alex nodded. "He is one of us as well."

"What? Oh my God! Is she in danger?" Tanya asked him, as she was alarmed. Tanya still loved her, regardless of she being her biological mom or not.

"Of course, she isn't." He smiled reassuringly at her.

"This is all some sort of trick, right, Alex?" Her voice was filled with panic as she stared at him with pleading eyes. "Tell me this is not real. Tell me my mom is at home waiting for me, and that she is secretly planning a surprise party and is just using you guys to distract me."

"I wish I could," Alex replied.

"I don't know what to think. This is all impossible," she said, shaking her head. "Okay, I will play along, Mr. Vampire, but I have a question for you."

"Anything, for you," Alex said.

"Why, if James is your enemy, are you willing to be around me at all? Are you not afraid, as hunting is in my blood or something? Or that, you know...he might kill you?"

"I told you before. I find you intriguing in more ways than I can even explain right now. And, you have not been taught in the ways of hunting, therefore I have nothing to fear from you. As far as James goes, I have nothing to worry about."

"Nothing to worry about? Well, I have another question for you, Alex, then. If you are a Vampire, how are you out here in the sun? Shouldn't you have shriveled up by now, and be dead? Or burst into flames?"

Alex grimaced. "This is reality, Tanya, not a story. Everything that you have read about Vampire; most of which is inaccurate or downright false. We don't turn into bats, we don't shrivel up in sunlight, and we are definitely not afraid of something as fickle as garlic."  

"That is not entirely true," Tanya whispered bashfully, turning to look out of the window, hoping he somehow had not heard. "Are you going to kill me?" she asked him. Tanya then really wished she didn't always blurt out what she was thinking.

He put his finger on her chin and turned her face towards him. Tanya flinched at his touch, trembling slightly. "I would never hurt you. In fact, I have no interest in hurting anyone else for that matter."

"James said you are a monster, and that I shouldn't trust you," Tanya said.

Through gritted teeth, Alex said, "James is the monster. A lot of vampires have not done anything wrong, not for a very long time. Some of us haven't at all. The hunters...particularly the ones that kill without feeling or discrimination...they are the monsters!"    

"A long time? So you are saying that you used to be a monster?" Tanya asked him.

"Some of us, yes. Some still are, but I am not amongst those. These hunters such as James do not understand that many of us are different. They only judge us by what we are, not who we are," Alex said.

Tanya stared into his pale blue eyes, wondering if he was telling the truth. If he really was a Vampire, there was no telling over how many years he could have perfected the art of lying. "If your kind is nothing to be afraid of, for we humans, why do hunters even exist?" 

"I said a lot of us, not all of us, Tanya. There are some vampires that are still a definite threat to humanity, and that is why the 'Walker' lineage exists. Your ancestors are natural-born hunters of our kind. It would actually overwhelm you to know just how many Vampires exist in the world, in fact how many exist in just this little town? That is the reason why hunters exist." 

Tanya gulped at his words, trying to avoid wondering just how many vampires were roaming around in what she thought to be a peaceful little town. Sure, Vancouver Island wasn't perfect, it had criminals just as any town did, but thinking that there were undead monsters roaming through the city sounded far more sinister than the everyday crook. "Are your special abilities a part of being...what you are?" she asked Alex.

"No," he said quietly. "I have always assumed it was something to do with my mother's heritage," Alex replied.