Lost in the Chaos: Book 1, Chaos Trilogy

The young man slept on his stomach, bare chest rising and falling beneath my hand.

For a moment, I simply listened to his heartbeat.

Steady. Warm. Alive.

A small smile lingered across his lips. Dreaming, perhaps.

How strange.

I leaned closer and drove my hand through his chest.

Muscle tore easily beneath my fingers. Bone cracked. His eyes snapped open just as my hand closed around the frantic pulse of his heart.

A strangled gasp escaped him.

I sank my fangs into his throat.

The whimper he made vibrated against my mouth as I drank him dry.

When I finally pulled away, blood clung to my lips in shining crimson beads. His breathing slowed. Stuttered.

Stopped.

His heart gave one final twitch in my hand before falling still.

That moment always fascinated me.

The exact instant a person became a thing.

I withdrew my arm from the corpse and lifted the heart over my mouth, squeezing blood between parted lips.

Warm.

Sweet.

Daria's voice drifted from the other room.

"Asher, hurry up."

I sighed and placed the heart back onto the man's chest, positioning his hands around it carefully.

Poetic.

There was a time such a sight would've horrified me.

Now I found it beautiful.

I brushed my thumb against the corpse's cheek.

Handsome.

What a waste.

I rounded the corner into the living room and found Daria sprawled across the stranger's sofa, one leg crossed over the other. Her silver eyes lifted toward me with open irritation.

"I thought you'd never finish."

She pushed dark hair behind one shoulder and stood.

"It's simple. Feed. Leave." Her gaze narrowed slightly. "Don't tell me you're getting sentimental again."

I raised an eyebrow. "Why would I pity them?"

"Because you're soft."

I ignored her and headed for the kitchen sink.

Blood spiraled down the drain in diluted crimson ribbons, leaving stains against the steel basin. I didn't bother cleaning them.

We never cleaned up after ourselves.

The bodies were supposed to send a message.

Ten minutes later, we were speeding through Ravenswood in Daria's black corvette.

The town looked half-dead already.

Storefronts were dark. Houses glowed softly behind drawn curtains. The sidewalks sat empty beneath the streetlights.

Daria smirked at me from the driver's seat.

"It's the curfew," she said. "Nobody's allowed out after ten now. They're terrified the Heartbreak Killer is gonna get them."

She laughed.

Sharp. Grating.

I stared out the window without responding.

Eventually, she stopped trying to pull a reaction from me and turned the radio louder instead, humming along to a song I didn't recognize.

The silence outside felt unnatural.

Fear had hollowed the town out for us.

Once upon a time, I never would've imagined becoming this. Eighteen-year-old me couldn't even throw a punch without panicking. Now I tore beating hearts from sleeping men and left them posed like grotesque valentines.

Vampirism hollowed people out eventually.

Maybe that was the real transformation.

Not the fangs. Not the hunger.

The erosion.

As we passed the sheriff's station, the grocery store, the rows of sleepy houses, a familiar emptiness settled over me.

Hunt.

Feed.

Hide.

Repeat.

Endless hunger. Endless killing.

None of it ever satisfied.

And somehow, all of this traced back to Daria.

Most vampires severed themselves from emotion eventually.

It was the only way to survive eternity without losing your mind.

The problem was that emotions had a habit of resurfacing when least convenient.

Those moments were dangerous.

Rain soaked through my clothes as I walked toward Central Square beneath a sky thick with gray clouds. Daylight still lingered behind them somewhere, but the storm muted its effects enough for me to move around without collapsing.

Sunlight didn't kill us.

That would've been kinder.

It weakened us instead. Stripped away our strength. Left us sluggish and exposed beneath something as ordinary as the afternoon sun.

The rain intensified, dripping from my hair and sleeves.

It felt warm against my skin.

Almost everything did now.

July in Vermont carried a heavy sort of heat, thick and damp beneath the storm clouds. Daria hated weather like this. She preferred darkness, apartments, isolation.

I missed sunlight.

I missed crowded sidewalks and summer noise and the feeling of being part of the world instead of lurking beside it.

That ache still caught me off guard sometimes.

I turned the corner and stopped.

Further down the sidewalk, a teenage boy struggled to help an older woman off the pavement. Rain drenched both of them. One of her legs bent wrong beneath her.

Blood scented the air immediately.

My fangs slid down.

The boy looked up.

Brown hair plastered against his forehead. Green eyes bright with panic and determination.

"Help!" he shouted.

For one dangerous second, I wasn't sure whether I wanted to help him or feed from him.

Then my body moved before I could think better of it.

A moment later, I stood beside him.

He had one arm wrapped around the woman's waist, trying desperately to keep pressure off her injured leg. She hung half-conscious against him.

The smell of blood thickened.

I forced my fangs back.

"Well?" the boy demanded when I hesitated. "Are you going to help?"

Despite everything, I smiled.

There was fire underneath the kindness.

"Here," I said, sliding one arm beneath the woman's legs and another behind her back. She weighed almost nothing in my arms. "I've got her."

Surprise flickered across his face before determination returned.

"Let's get her out of the rain." He nodded toward a café across the street. "Then we can call an ambulance."

I considered simply carrying her to the hospital myself.

At vampire speed, we'd be there in minutes.

Unfortunately, humans tended to ask questions when someone vanished down the street like a missile.

So instead, I nodded and followed him across the road.

The café smelled like coffee, toasted bread, and wet coats.

Human heartbeats pulsed softly beneath the chatter and clinking dishes.

The scent should've been comforting.

Instead, it only sharpened my hunger.

A hostess hurried toward us, alarm flashing across her face.

She looked to be in her fifties, hair tied into a neat ponytail, apron strings fluttering behind her as she guided us toward an empty booth near the back.

We settled the injured woman carefully into the seat. The boy wrapped an arm around her shoulders to keep her upright.

"Oh my god," the hostess breathed. "What happened?"

"I saw her fall crossing the street," the boy explained, brushing soaked hair from his eyes. "She was awake earlier, but I think the pain knocked her out. Can you call an ambulance?"

The hostess nodded frantically and rushed toward the back room.

I remained standing awkwardly beside the booth.

"Sit down," the boy said. He tapped the seat across from him with a small smile. "You carried her all the way here. You've earned it."

Gratitude.

That was unfamiliar.

Usually humans looked at me with fear. Or desire. Occasionally both.

Not kindness.

I sat across from him slowly.

"You know," I said, "most people don't talk to me like that."

"Like what?"

"Like I'm not dangerous."

One corner of his mouth lifted.

"Should I be worried?"

Probably.

"I didn't catch your name," he added. "I'm Kai."

"Asher."

The injured woman snored softly beside him.

Kai glanced at her, then held up a bloodied hand with a grimace.

"I think she might still be hurt."

The scent hit me instantly.

My body locked tight.

Hunger clawed through me hard enough to ache.

I turned my face away sharply.

"Asher?"

"My apologies." My voice sounded strained even to me. "Blood makes me uncomfortable."

A ridiculous lie.

Still, Kai immediately grabbed napkins and wiped his hands clean as best he could before pushing the stained pile farther down the table.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "I didn't know."

That caught me off guard more than the blood had.

Kai started picking nervously at his fingernails.

Without thinking, I reached across the table and rested my hand over his.

His eyes widened.

He pulled back quickly.

"My apologies," I said. "You seemed anxious."

A faint blush touched his cheeks.

"It's a nervous habit."

His gaze flicked toward my hand briefly.

"Your hands are freezing."

"I get that a lot."

"You should let me buy you a coffee."

Despite myself, I smiled.

"I'd like that."

Sirens wailed faintly in the distance.

Not close enough for the humans to notice yet. Close enough for me.

Kai glanced toward the windows. "I think they're coming."

Then, after a brief hesitation, he pulled out his phone and slid it across the table toward me.

"It's unlocked." He looked almost embarrassed suddenly. "Put your number in?"

I picked up the phone.

"You know," I said while typing, "once they take her, you don't actually have to leave."

Kai looked everywhere except directly at me.

"I should probably ride with her."

Soft sadness lingered beneath his words. Something quiet and bruised.

"And I need to clean myself up."

I handed the phone back.

The ambulance lights arrived moments later, flashing red and white across the café windows.

Two paramedics rushed inside with a stretcher while conversation throughout the café dimmed into curious silence.

One of the paramedics checked the woman's pulse.

"She's alive," he said. "That's good."

Kai stepped aside while they carefully lifted her onto the stretcher.

The hostess hovered nearby, wringing her hands anxiously.

Before leaving, Kai glanced back at me.

"I'll call you," he mouthed.

Then he disappeared through the café doors behind the paramedics.

I looked down afterward and noticed droplets of blood scattered across the table.

Tiny crimson beads.

For a moment, I simply stared at them.

Then I dragged a fingertip through the blood and brought it to my mouth.

Metallic.

Warm.

Familiar.

Outside, the ambulance doors slammed shut.

Kai climbed into the back beside the old woman.

Why did he unsettle me so much?

I'd met beautiful humans before. Kind ones, too. They all blurred together eventually. Faces. Voices. Bodies emptied and discarded across decades.

But Kai lingered.

The hostess approached cautiously.

"Honey," she said, voice still shaky, "can I get you anything? Coffee maybe?"

I looked up and smiled.

Predatory instinct slid comfortably back into place.

"Sit with me," I said softly. "We'll have a meal."