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“You turned away from being a vampire a long time ago, I know,” Lucas said. He clasped one of my hands in his. “But this looks like your only choice. If that’s what it takes to save you, it’s not so bad, is it? You could go back to your parents. Be young and beautiful forever.”
It wasn’t as simple as that, and we both knew it. But if Lucas was really ready to take this step with me, I could consider it. “You would become a vampire, too,” I said. “We’d make the change together. Can you do that?”
Lucas shook his head. “No.”
“What?”
“Bianca, you have to promise me—you have to swear on everything that means anything to you—when I’m dead, before I come to, you have to destroy me. Don’t let me rise again as a vampire. I’m willing to die.”
So he could accept my transformation, but not his own. The fragile hope I’d felt for a few seconds shattered.
Lucas tugged at the neck of his shirt, exposing his neck. Quietly, he repeated, “Drink from me.”
“You want me to kill you,” I whispered. “You’d give up your life to save me.”
He gave me this look like that was so obvious, so necessary, and tears welled in my eyes.
“I know what I’m doing,” he said. The shadows in the room framed his face; it seemed as if the light in the room was drawn only to him. “I’m ready. The last thing I’ll ever know is that you’re going to be okay. That’s all I need.”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Yes,” he insisted. But I still had enough strength to push back.
“How could I go on, knowing you’d died to save me? The guilt—I can’t live like that, Lucas. I can’t. Don’t ask me to.”
“You don’t have to feel guilty! I want you to do it!”
“Could you?” I asked him. “Could you kill me, even to save your own life?”
Lucas stared at me, trying and failing to contemplate the horror of doing that.
I said, “You have to promise me to lead a good life. Not to sit around mourning me.”
“Oh, Christ.” Lucas grimaced, and I knew he wasn’t far from tears. He buried his face in the blankets on my bed, and I rested my hand on his hair. “Bianca, please. Please do this. Save yourself.” I could see in his eyes that he was wavering in his conviction—that if I pushed harder, he would let me turn him into a vampire. But I knew that to him it would be a sacrifice even greater than dying. I realized then that I couldn’t ask him to do it, not to save myself, not for anything.
“No,” I said, and this time I knew he would understand my answer was final. “Promise me, Lucas.”
“What kind of a life am I supposed to have without you? You were the one good thing, the only good thing I ever found.”
I started crying then, and he gripped my hand tightly. Soon he laid his head on my shoulder, and that was comforting, knowing that at least he was near.
After a while, I couldn’t hold onto his hand as tightly. The shadows in the room seemed to darken. Lucas became very worried, but I couldn’t quite pay attention to what he was saying. Certainly I couldn’t find the strength to respond.
He got me water, but I wasn’t able to drink much. I fell asleep—maybe it was sleep—and came to after what seemed like a very long time.
Lucas stood against the wall, his hands braced against it like he needed that to keep from falling down. His eyes were wild.
When he saw that I was awake, he said, “I nearly called an ambulance. It wouldn’t do any good, but standing here—I can’t do a damn thing.”
“Just stay close,” I whispered. My chest felt so heavy. Speaking was such hard work.
A tremor passed through me, wringing me out. My whole body had become too leaden and feverish to bear. I wanted to push myself away from it. I wanted to be free.
Something in my face must have told Lucas how I was feeling, because his eyes went wide. He came to my side and put his hand to my cheek. For a second, he struggled for words, but then he gasped out, “I love you.”
“Love.” I couldn’t say anything else. Lucas’s face dimmed as the light in the room went away. It would be so easy to let go.
I gave in to the tide pulling me downward.
