Kidnapped By The Vampire Prince

“Very true,” he replied, stretching out his arm so he could reach the top of the gate. Smoothly, he cleared the fence.

Vincent watched me with apprehensive eyes as I moved toward the cool metal, putting my hand to the top of it. When I noticed him staring at me, I nodded for him to go over. “It’s easy.”

He rolled his eyes. “I can do it. I’m more interested in seeing you do it.”

“I do it all the time,” I told him confidently. Albeit Kai or Alli always helped me over, but it couldn’t be too much harder without them. “Watch and learn.”

Placing both my hands at the top of the fence, I used my upper body strength to lift myself off the ground.

Or let me correct that.

Try to lift myself off the ground.

Groaning in strain, I managed to get myself a foot up before my arms gave out and I dropped back down. Joel covered his mouth to hide his laughter. I glared at him, then at the black fence. Kai and Alli barely helped me over! Kai lifted me up while Alli helped pull me over… A grimace crossed my face when I realized how much they did actually help me.

Suddenly a pair of cool hands was placed on my hips. I jerked in surprise, twisting my head to see Vincent behind me. His expression was flat, but his eyes were smug. “Need help?”

“I… No,” I said defiantly, standing a little straighter.

He moved his head closer to mine. “Liar,” he whispered in my ear.

Before I could protest, he hoisted me into the air. Automatically, I reached for the fence, gripping the top bar of it. He kept raising me until I was able to get one leg over it. At that point I could do the rest myself, so he let me go. Not so elegantly, I jumped down, stumbling a little bit as I landed. Seconds later Vincent landed next to me with a dull thud.

“Now what?” Joel asked, turning toward the lake. “Do we just take the paddleboats?” He gestured toward the small pleasure boats at the side of the lake.

I followed his gaze, nodding. There were ten of them, about as long and wide as a small car. They came in four different colors: blue, red, green, and yellow. A small dust of rust covered the bottom of a few of them, showing their age. We moved toward the plastic vehicles, debating which ones would be the best to use.

“Should we just use two?” Fiona asked. “We could have two on one and three on the other.”

“I’m going with Emily alone,” Sebastian stated quickly and firmly.

I stared at him in surprise. “Huh?”

“Is that okay?” he said hesitantly.

“Um, yeah, but…”

He smiled gently at me. “I just want to talk.”

“Then Fiona, Vincent, and I-”

“I’m going alone,” Vincent declared flatly, interrupting Joel. “You and Fiona share one.”

Joel shrugged. “Sure.”

I glanced at Vincent as he moved toward the closest paddleboat. He didn’t seem to share the same idea of getting along as I did. Shrugging, I turned to Sebastian. “I’ll show you what to do; come on.”

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Moving toward the boat behind Vincent’s, I demonstrated how to step onto it without falling into the water. Of course seeing as how Sebastian was a vampire, he didn’t really have to worry about balance. He got on more smoothly than I did. By the time I was seated on the boat, Vincent was already paddling out. It was kind of a funny sight. Usually I didn’t see him doing anything active.

“So what do I do?” Sebastian asked, looking down at the pedals at his feet.

“You paddle,” I instructed him, putting my feet on the pedals at my feet. “Just like on a bike.”

He raised an eyebrow. “That’s pedaling.”

“No, paddling,” I corrected him, pressing down on one of the pedals so we could start going. “Use it like a bike. And use the wheel in the middle for steering.”

“Sure,” he responded slowly, moving his feet in a circular motion to keep up with me. “Let’s go the opposite way than Vincent. I know he’ll be listening.”

My eyes wandered to the other man’s back, which tensed at Sebastian’s words. Growing even more curious about what he wanted to talk about, I nodded, steering the wheel to the left so we could go to the other side of the lake. For a while Sebastian stayed quiet, focusing on the nature around us.

“It’s nice here,” he commented casually.

“Mhm…”

“Quiet.”

“Yep.”

“Do you come here a lot?”

I turned to look at him now. “Yeah, but that’s a different topic. What do you want to talk about?”

He sighed lightly. “Well there are actually two things. One is pretty casual, and the other is more serious. Which one would you like to hear first?”

“Serious,” I responded, feeling my gut shift uncomfortably.

“I figured you might. You don’t have to look so nervous though. It’s not that bad…” He hesitated, pursing his lips. “Well, actually, I’m not sure if it is or not.”

“Well what is it?” I inquired.

A scream cut the silence around us and both Sebastian and I snapped our heads around to see what the problem was. My heartbeat increased tenfold as my eyes searched the immediately area. They finally landed on Fiona, who was laughing hysterically at something while trying to grab onto the back of Vincent’s boat. I figured the scream must have come from her.

“What is that girl doing?” Sebastian muttered, his gaze never leaving her form. His eyes showed half amusement, half concern.

“Umm Sebastian?” I said after a moment, putting a pause to my paddling so I could get his attention.

He snapped out of his trance. “Sorry,” he apologized quietly.

I laughed. “It’s okay. But I’m starting to feel sick. What do you want to talk about?”

“Oh, you know, just the whole Blue Blood situation. It seems like there will be problems in the near future…”

.

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“Why’s that?”

“Yesterday we received a letter… Or rather I received a letter,” he clarified, furrowing his eyebrows together. “My father was expecting this.”

“Expecting what?”NôvelD(ram)a.ôrg owns this content.

“Well the letter said if I didn’t step down from the thrown there would be a death…”

My eyes widened. “You’re being threatened?”

“If I was being threatened, why would I be talking to you about it like this? It wouldn’t be any of your concern. I wouldn’t want to make you worry unnecessarily, Emily.”

“Um, well…” At that moment, I realized why he was telling me this. “It’s me, isn’t it?” My heart sunk as I said these words.

He nodded, a frown developing on his face. “It’s Ashton and his goons. They think they have the upper advantage since they know you’re a Blue Blood.”

“I should have guessed.”

Sebastian chuckled. “It wouldn’t have been too hard. Blue Bloods are rare, so of course they would think that.”

“Does it run in families or what? Are my parents Blue Bloods?” I asked him, cupping my elbow with my hand.”

He shook his head. “It’s completely random. Luck of the draw.”

“Figure,” I muttered. “Have you figured out how Ashton knows?”

Sebastian shook his head. “I’m afraid not, I’m sorry. My father and mother believe it was someone from the kitchen help. I wouldn’t be surprised about that. But that’s not what we should be talking about.”

“What exactly did the letter say?”

“It was long,” he explained. “I wouldn’t worry about it too much at the moment, I just wanted to give you a heads up. I won’t be stepping down from the throne, but I won’t let any harm come to you either. Neither will Vincent, or my mother, or my father, nor anyone else who knows about you. Ashton isn’t nearly as powerful as he thinks he is.”

I bit my lip. “Are you sure? I don’t want anything to happen to any of you because of me.”

He brought his hand to my face. “Thank you for your concern, Emily, but you really shouldn’t say that. Vincent was the one to drag you into this mess in the first place.”

“It’s not his fault!” I protested.

“I didn’t say it was,” Sebastian replied, dropping his hand and cocking an eyebrow. “He is just the one who brought you into the vampire world. You didn’t come in willingly.”

I brushed my hair away from my face, starting to paddle again. “Sebastian? What does Ashton look like?”

“Why?”

“I saw someone strange at the bowling ally the other night…”

“I highly doubt Ashton would be at a bowling ally,” Sebastian responded slowly, “but he has the same form as Vincent, height, weight, and body structure. He might have grown taller though. It’s been at least half a year since I’ve seen him last. He also has black hair, the natural kind.”

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Relief flooded through me. The guy from the ally had white hair, and it looked pretty natural to me. “What about eye color?”

“Grey. That’s probably where he got his name from.”

So they had the same eye color. But that happened with a lot of people, didn’t it? It could be some random guy from school that knows me- a person from a younger grade. Or maybe it was Samuel and I didn’t recognize him. How long had it been since I last saw him? A few weeks? Would Ashton come to the human world to find me? The guy at the ally had a lot of friends with him, and his friends were definitely human. He was the only one who looked like a vampire… at least to me. Now that I was thinking about it though, it was hard to tell the difference.

“I really don’t think it was him you saw,” Sebastian spoke up. “If you’re worried about that person though, stay away if you see him. It’s better not to throw caution to the wind. Also, I wouldn’t mention him to Vincent.”

“Why not?”

“He would go hunting for that person, I assure you.”

I narrowed my eyes in confusion. “Why do you say that?”

“Well, that brings us to topic two. Do you remember when I asked you if you’d ever date a vampires?”

“Yes…?”

“You kind of hesitated then. If I asked you right now, would you hesitate again?”

I paused, pursing my lips to the side. Would I hesitate? Sure, I had a crush on Vincent and I liked him a lot, despite his outer jerk persona, but would I date him? My gut was telling me yes, but my mind was saying no. He was still a vampire. I didn’t want to end up like Sebastian and Fiona… unable to be with the one I love and a vampire. Repressing a shudder, I looked at Sebastian. “I’d still hesitate.”

His famous kind smile graced his face.