Scent of a White Rose by Tish Thawer

acknowledge that I have one! Plus, I don't need you to
buy me a car, I can buy it myself!" Now I was the one who was
pissed. "I'm so sick of being the sweet little girl who does just
what Daddy says."
    Dad opened his mouth as if he was about to yell
back at me, then shook his head, took a deep breath, and slowly
walked in my direction. "Rose, I'm sorry," he started as he placed
both hands on my shoulders, "I just don't think I'll ever get past
seeing you as my little girl. And you're right; you've been dealing
with the brunt of the fear that I've been fighting since your
mother's death, and it's not fair to you. How about on Monday I
pick you up from school and we go car shopping? Then we can talk
about this apartment idea of yours."
    Wow. That was quite a turnaround. Not that I
wasn't grateful for the change in his perspective, but I had a
feeling things weren't going to go as smoothly as he was making
them sound. "Okay. That sounds great actually." I tried to keep my
voice steady and strong, when really, I was so excited about the
idea of getting a new car that I wanted to squeak and squeal.
    Dad hugged me and moved off to put away his left
over Chinese food. I started to do the same when I heard a knock at
the front door. Dad's head snapped up from the table. "Are you
expecting someone?"
    "No, are you?"
    "No, I'm not. Get upstairs right now and don't
come out of your room, no matter what you hear." Dad's voice was
clipped, serious, and panicked. So much for making progress on his
over protectiveness. For all we knew, it could just be a couple of
Jehovah's witnesses, but he was acting like Satan was knocking at
our front door.

* * * * *
    CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
    Complications
    (Christian)
     
    It seemed like everyone had risen at the same
time today. We had all gotten up and moved through our usual
routines fairly quickly and arrived outside Evie's door at
practically the same time. I thought it was pretty obvious that we
were all still concerned over what had happened and wanted to see
if Evie had indeed risen tonight without any further
complications.
    As we greeted each other with head nods, or
slight shoulder bumps, we heard Evie and Dax talking from within.
Thank God she was awake.
    "Hey! Quit messing around in there. You've got a
crowd of concerned people waiting out here." Tori announced.
    "Okay. Give us just a minute and then we'll meet
you guys upstairs," Evie called out.
    Bobby wagged his eyebrows. "I bet it takes them
more than a minute if you know what I mean."
    Everyone started laughing as we headed down the
hall. Finding Evie awake and okay had definitely lifted our
spirits. As we filed past Terrance's cell, we found him sitting on
the floor, back resting against the wall. He gave us all a weak
smile, then said, "I take it Evie woke up?"
    Everyone stopped and looked at me. I guess since
I was the first vampire Evie had sired after Dax, it kind of put me
"higher up" in our ranks, even though we didn't really have
ranks.
    I gestured for everyone to head on up while I
took a moment to answer Terrance and maybe ask a few questions of
my own. "Yes, she woke up. We're heading upstairs to have a meeting
about what happened."
    "Would it be too much to ask for you to let me
know how the meeting goes?" Terrance sounded calm and collected. I
supposed I would too if I was trying to get information out of
someone.
    "Yeah, I don't know about that. Plus, you know
that's something only Evie can decide."
    It only took him a second to launch himself at
me, rattling the chains until they pulled tight. His eyes were
glued to mine and he squinted slightly. I thought he was trying to
attack me, so I landed a kick to his chest that sent him flying
back into the cinderblock wall. "What the fuck do you think you're
doing?" Every time I got near this guy he did something else to
piss me off.
    He took a moment to right himself and stood with
his back against the wall. "Huh. I guess I was wrong."
    I started to stomp into the cell. "What are