Soulless (The Heartless Series Book 2) by Kelly Martin Page A

pre-pubescent thirteen-year-old boy.
    “Something like that.” And by “something” I mean Willow. I can’t make myself tell him, though. The urge not to is incredibly strong.
    “Hmmm,” he says.
    He’s so dang close I can smell the scent of wet grass and mud. It reminds me of April, not September. For the briefest of moments, he looks down at me like he’s daring me to say something, anything. His eyes are filled with what I can only describe as lust, but that can’t be right because he’s him--and I’m me. He doesn’t come any closer. Just stands there. Looking down at me. I don’t know if he’s trying to intimidate me or make me squirm in a good way. Right now, it’s a toss-up.
    “Hart?”
    Like hearing his name broke him from a trance, he backs away and wipes his eyes with his fingers. “There’s blood in the refrigerator. You won’t need as much as you did before you were fully healed. You just need to drink once, maybe twice, daily to keep going.”
    “You said I can’t die, remember?”
    “I also said there are worse things than death.”
    Like I need reminding.
    “Why would dying be such a bad thing?” I mean it as funny since we’d already had the death discussion. I don’t think suicide is funny. Not at all. And I feel bad for anybody who attempts it. I want them to think very, very carefully before doing something permanent they can never take back.
    Hart doesn’t take it as funny. His jaw clenches, and I do believe smoke is about to pour from his ears. It might for all I know. I have no idea how demons get in or out of people. Might be through their ears.
    “You aren’t dying, Gracen Sullivan. Do you understand me?” He flinches, I suppose at the forcefulness of his own words. He clears his throat, closes his eyes, and takes a big deep breath. I only watch him to see what he has to say next. I assume it will be articulate and poignant.
    “You will make the world a much worse place if you do.”
    “How do you know that?” It’s a good question. How does he know this much about me? Think about the things he’s known about so far: the demon-killing blade, how I need demon blood to live, how I’m able to heal myself. Hart has been one step ahead on all things abomination from the get go, and I want to know why.
    Hart scoffs and crosses his arms over his mud-covered shirt. “Fine. Then don’t drink it. Don’t trust me. But don’t come crying to me when your insides turn white hot, your skin shrivels up, and you—you know, never mind. Just never mind. You won’t listen to me anyway.” With a growl, he walks past me. His eyes don’t meet mine. He doesn’t stop until I hear his door slam upstairs.

CHAPTER ELEVEN
     
    I WAIT A GOOD TWENTY MINUTES until the allure of the demon blood draws me into the kitchen. I’ve smelled it this entire time, but I’ve been good. I’ve not given in to it. I’ve been good.
    I don’t want to drink the blood. Not willingly. Not knowingly. If I walk into that kitchen and open that refrigerator… if I open a bottle and allow that blood to pass my lips, taste it on my tongue, enjoy it as it slides down my throat…
    I have to stop.
    If I do that, it’ll make me a monster.
    There is a difference in having something done to you and willingly doing it.
    I can’t help what my father or Hart did to me. But I can help this.
    So I sit there, and I try my darndest not to smell the blood. Not to want it. Not to feel the headache pounding in my head, threatening to explode my eyeballs if I don’t get what it wants.
    There is no way Hart is right, right? How would he even know how it would affect me if I don’t have blood? It’s not like there’s a book on this, well, except the book Seth had, the one he read the ritual from. I’m guessing he didn’t just leave it there when he went kaput.
    Still…
    Okay, I have to think about this. Hart says I can’t die no matter what now. I don’t know if it’s the gospel or if he’s telling me that so I