The Last Chance (sequel to A Hundred Lifetimes)

Sixteen

“Okay, this should do,” Mary muttered to herself as she looked out of the cheap motel’s second-floor room window. They were in the relatively quiet and dark part of the island—the one that doesn’t get much tourists, but more of the illegal settlers that don’t have the proper identification cards that could buy them a room for the night.

Mary closed the curtains shut as soon as she saw Dorian’s contacts finally vacate the area, counting the money that she had handsomely given them in return for their silence. “Mr. D’s guys are all sorted out and whatever happened tonight would just be one of those typical misunderstandings among the local vampire herd,” she said in a bored voice, sounding as if she had done this routine a hundred times over. Gabriel sat by the edge of the single bed, still in his prim and proper suit without a single hair out of line, looking even more out of place inside that dingy old room. He just sat there like a mannequin—his back straight, his hands by his lap, and his eyes moved ever so slightly just to minimally survey the room. If Mary didn’t know any better, she would have thought he was asleep with his eyes open.

“I paid for this room in cash, told them your name is Johnny Dickens and you’re a backpacker, so don’t ever go out in your suit,” she warningly told him as she walked over to the plastic bag full of things from the nearby thrift store. “Wear these instead.” She haphazardly threw the bag over to him, not caring if the trajectory was going straight to his face. As she expected, he moved quick enough to intercept it before it could hit him. Gabriel took out the things from the plastic and laid them carefully onto the bed.

“Should be about your size,” Mary muttered as she watched his eyebrows slightly twitch towards the middle in confusion as he was faced with a tacky brown shirt that had a large smiling sun on it, partnered with some khaki shorts, a fisherman’s hat, and sandals.

“When did you last feed?” Mary asked, watching the subtle curl of distaste of Gabriel’s upper lip as he placed the clothes neatly back into the bag.

“You do not have to know,” he simply replied.

“Fine, just don’t go grabbing and biting tourists and we’re good,” Mary warned. She did one last sweep around the room to check if there was anything she missed. “I’ll drop by tomorrow morning and get you a fresh bag from the house, but you cannot come and follow me, got it?”

Gabriel put down the bag and looked up at her, seemingly confused. “How can I observe if I do not follow?”

Mary, who was just about to leave the room, stopped and frowned at him as she digested his words. She slowly walked towards the desk, keeping her eyes on him as she deeply thought. “You keep saying that you just want to keep a low profile,” she recalled, hopping up on the desk and resting her feet on the cushion of the chair below, “you’re not here to do any harm, but you came all this way...” she trailed off, her eyebrows still meeting in the middle as the train of thought came to an end.

Gabriel watched as her eyes lit up and a knowing smile came to her lips. “You really are here for Dorian?” she asked, but not a second later, held up a finger and rebutted herself. “No. You… you’re here for Chiara.”

Gabriel subtly averted his eyes in response, making Mary feel like she finally struck the goldmine and all she had to do was wait. But to her dismay, he simply took out a few bills from his wallet and raised them in the air. “For the troubles,” was all he said, betraying no emotion.

“No, no,” Mary bitterly scoffed. “I don’t need your money. I told you what I wanted in exchange. I want information,” she tapped on the desk for emphasis of the last three words. “What does the Council know about the Order? Why you are you here? And what are you and your little friends planning to do?”

Gabriel folded the bills and neatly placed them back into his wallet, saying with a straight face, “That hardly seems fair.”

“I think that’s for me to say, especially after seeing how compliant you’ve been the entire night just so Dorian wouldn’t know you’re here,” Mary replied, thoughtfully touching her chin as she looked down at him from where she sat. “I really don’t understand it—why you’re suddenly here, alone, following us quietly without the rest of the Council after making such a spectacle the last time you were at the mansion. What’s your angle?” she asked, but it was a question that she was directing more towards herself—knowing that the man would never actually answer it directly.

As she rightfully expected, he simply replied, “You do not need to worry about me.”

Mary’s eyebrow raised as she smugly chuckled. “Oh, I’m not worried.”

“Then why are you still here?” Gabriel asked with a small sigh.

“Because I’m still waiting for you to answer my questions. You owe me at least some simple answers,” Mary argued. “At the very least.”

Gabriel closed his eyes for half a second in exasperation, and when he opened them back up, he looked right at her then slightly nodded his head.

Mary took that as a go signal and began. “What does the Council know about the Order? You all keep saying they’re dangerous, the Vessel is strong, the Order is bad, et cetera, but is that it?” she asked quickly, leaning her elbow onto her knee.

“The Vessel can rid cities of vampires at a time once she reaches her true potential. Strong is an understatement.” Just like that, Gabriel shut his mouth and Mary understood that that was all she was going to get.

“Why are you here, then? Does it have anything in connection to the fact that you think Chiara is connected to the Order?” she continued.

Gabriel straightened his back again and continued to stare right at the air ahead of him. “I am here only to observe,” he merely replied.

Mary leapt down from the desk then leaned her back against the wall, her arms crossed in front of her chest as she frowned down at him. “So, you’re going to spy on Chiara and what, see if she leads you back to the Order? And if she does, what are you and your little friends going to do about it? What was that that one of your Council friends said? ‘Should have killed them all when we had the chance?’ is that it?”

“I am here only to observe. I do not come here as part of the Council,” Gabriel replied with the same expression.

“Are you planning to kill the Vessel, once you find out who she is?” Mary continued to ask.

Gabriel kept still, and for what seemed like the hundredth time in an interrogation, calmly repeated, “I am here only to observe.”

Mary’s eyebrow twitched as her patience grew thin. “You say that now,” she bitterly chuckled, “and then the next thing we know, you’re sinking your teeth into some random local—"

Gabriel’s eyes snapped towards her. “I am here only to observe,” he said again, only this time, providing more emphasis to every syllable. “You have my word.”

“Your word. Right,” Mary scoffed and rolled her eyes.

“Even wars have a set of rules that soldiers abide by.”

“We aren’t in a war, Gabriel, and we sure as hell aren’t soldiers,” Mary spat, staring him straight in the eye.

“Not yet,” was all Gabriel calmly replied.