Bitter Blood (The Morganville Vampires #13)

Bitter Blood (The Morganville Vampires #13) Page 5

CLAIRE

True to her word, Monica came to the gym ready to work, which was a bit of a shocker; Claire hardly recognized her. No makeup. Dark hair tied back in a plain, thick ponytail. Okay, the tight workout gear was still name brand, and her athletic shoes had a basketbal star's name on them, but this was definitely Monica unplugged.

And she was shockingly good at punching things. Even Shane was impressed, after about two minutes of watching her hit the heavy bag with a flurry of well -placed jabs, elbows, and kicks.

"She's not bad," Shane admitted as Monica continued to pummel the target. "Good form. Hel of a right."

"Yeah, she got it beating up other kids, didn't she?"

Shane sent her a slightly embarrassed look. "I'm allfor peace and love, babe, but I'm just talking technique, here." He went back to studying Monica with calm assessment, arms folded. "She's been working on it."

She had, no doubt about it. When Monica finished on the heavy bag after the required five minutes, panting and sweating, she sent Shane a triumphant look as she swigged some water. "See?" she said. "Not bad, right?"

"Don't get cocky," he said. "Hey, Aliyah? Got a minute?" He gestured to a tal , rangy girl who was shadow punching in the corner. She turned, and her dark eyes fel on Monica, and widened. "Monica needs a sparring partner."

"Wait," Monica said, and turned to him. "I thought you were-"

"I'm the sensei here, and you fight who I say you'l fight," Shane said, with entirely too much relish.

"But she-"

"Problem, Monica?" His smile was brutal, and Monica pressed her lips into a thin line and shook her head. She walked to the roped-off sparring area as Aliyah took her place inside.

"Let me guess," Claire said. "Monica bul ied Aliyah."

"You couldn't throw a rock in Morganville without hitting somebody who fits that description," Shane said. "But nobody's bul ied Aliyah in, I don't know, at least five years-okay, let's have a clean fight, girls!"

It wasn't.

Aliyah took about ten seconds to lay Monica out. It was a violent bal et of fake, strike, fade-almost surgical, really. Two fast, accurate punches -face and midsection-and a leg sweep, and Monica was on her back, staring dazed at the ceiling while Aliyah danced backward without a mark on her. Aliyah dropped her defense and looked at Shane, who shrugged.

"Thanks," he said. "Tel s me what I needed to know."

He climbed in the ring as Aliyah got out, and he crouched down next to Monica, who was making no effort at alltoward getting up. "Something broken?" he asked. She shook her head. "Then stand up."

"Help?" She held out her hand, but he straightened up and backed off. Monica groaned. "You son of a-"

"C'mon, you whiner. Up."

She climbed clumsily back to her feet and braced herself against the ropes a moment. "That bitch sucker-punched me." She felt her lip. "If I swell up-"

"You'l deserve it," Shane said, "because your defense was crap. Are you complaining, or training?"

Claire leaned against the pole and watched, mostly; Shane was a good teacher, patient but not kind, and he showed Monica with brutal and cheerful efficiency that bullying didn't really equal fighting. It was a relatively short lesson-about an hour-but at the end of it Monica was a disheveled, staggering mess. When Shane finally said, "Okay, enough for today," she flopped backward onto the floor as if she might never get up under her own power again.

"You," she said between heaves for breath, "are a total ass, Col ins. You enjoyed that."

"Absolutely," he said, and grinned, but the grin faded fast. "No bul , Monica: you're not bad, you've got strength, but you've never been pushed. Fighting the vamps isn't like taking Jimmy's lunch money in fourth grade. You need to be fast, fearless, and accurate, and you need to understand that there's no giving up, because if they even smel it on you, you're done."

"I can do it," she said. But she said it flat on the floor. "I'm not quitting."

"Good," he said. "Because the opportunity to hit you is pretty much every Morganville kid's dream job. Oh, and you're paying me."

"I'm what?" She lifted her head from the canvas and stared at him, and Claire had to choke back a laugh at the look on Monica's face.

"Paying," he said. "For training. What, you thought I'd do this for free? Are we friends?"

"Fine," she said, and dropped her head again. "How much?"

"Twenty an hour."

"You're kidding me. You make about seven an hour on your best day!"

"That's when I'm doing honest labor, like cleaning sewers. Working with you means charging a premium."

She wearily lifted a hand and flipped him off, but said, "Okay, fine. Twenty an hour."

"Twenty-five now that you were rude about it."

Monica sent him a filthy glare, rolled over, and limped slowly off to the showers. Shane watched her go with a smile of pure satisfaction. "Gold,"

he said. "Pure gold."

Claire kissed him. "Don't gloat too hard," she said. "She's going to get better."

"I know. But I can enjoy it while she's not."

Claire took off after Monica for the locker room.

She found the other girl stripping off her workout clothes and examining in the ful -length mirror the discolored places that were going to form bruises. Claire immediately felt a surge of awkwardness and didn't know where to look; Monica had an almost perfect body, sculpted and waxed and tanned. Claire flashed back to her awkward early-admission high schoollyears, where showering with the pretty girls had been an exercise in merciless mockery.

But she wasn't even on Monica's radar, except as a second pair of eyes. "Hey," Monica said, without even focusing on her. "Do you think this is going to leave a mark?" She pointed to a red area on her ribs, just under her left breast.

"Probably."

"Dammit. I was going to go to the pool. Now I have to wear a one-piece." She made it sound like a burka. "So, pre-school, did you follow me in here to confess your gay love, or what?"

"What? No. And never you."

"Oh yeah? You got a girl-crush on someone else?"

Claire smiled. "Wel , I lost my heart to Aliyah back there when she put you on the floor...."

"Bite me, Danvers. I need a shower." Monica grabbed her soap, shampoo, razor, and a towel, and headed for the open tiled area. Claire fol owed at a distance and sat out of the range of splashing on the teak bench. "Seriously, are you stalking me? Because you're not doing it right."

"I need to talk to you."

"It's not mutual."

Monica turned the spray on and stepped into the steaming water. Claire waited until she'd foamed up her hair, rinsed it, put in the conditioner, and propped her leg up on the step to run the razor over it before she tried again. "I have a proposition for you."

"Again with the girl love."

"I want you to run for mayor."

Monica jerked, yelped, and blood trickled down her leg. She hissed, rinsed it off, and glared at Claire. "Not funny."

"Not meant to be," Claire said. "I'm really serious. People like familiar names, and there's no name for mayor more familiar than Morrel . Your grandfather was the mayor, your dad, your brother...."

"Look, much as I'd like to be thought of as political royalty, that's not how it works. People have to actually like you to vote for you. I'm not stupid enough to believe they do." But she was listening while she soaped her leg again and shaved. Claire had known she would, because there was nothing Monica craved more than power and popular acceptance-and those things came standard with the plaque on the mayor's door.

"I think I can make it work," Claire said. "We could put up signs asking people to write you in on the bal ot. You've got people who owe you favors, right? And the vamps would like it. They think you're easy to control."

"Hey!"

"I said they think you are. But you wouldn't be here working with Shane if you were allthat easy, would you?" Claire cocked her head. "Missed a spot."

"Would you just get to the point?"

"Morganville needs a new Captain Obvious," she said. "And Morganville needs a new mayor the vamps would approve. You could be both."

"What, like a secret identity?" Monica laughed, but it was a dry, bitter sound. "You're such an idiot."

"Shane is already teaching you how to fight," Claire pointed out. "You already know how to target people you don't like. Why not do it for the sake of the town for a change? Captain Obvious has always been kind of a bully, just a bully on the side of the humans."

Monica had nothing to say to that. She simply frowned as she rinsed the last of the soap from her right leg, did the left, and then cleared the conditioner out of her hair. When she shut off the water, Claire threw her the towel. Monica dried off and wrapped up, and finally shrugged. "It'd never work," she said.

"Maybe not," Claire said, "but you owe me. And you're going to run for office."

Monica studied herself in the mirror, then smiled as she met Claire's eyes. "Wel ," she said, "I would make an awesome mayor. I'm very photogenic."

"Yeah," Claire agreed, straight-faced. "Because that's what really counts."

Shane didn't take it well .

"Monica," he kept saying, allthe way home. "Wait, let's back up. We're going to campaign for Monica. For mayor."

"Yes," Claire said. "I'm sorry, why is this so hard to understand?"

"Did you trip in the shower and hit your head or something? Monica Morrell. I'm pretty sure we still hate her. Let me check my notes-yep, still hate her."

"Wel ," Claire said, "you're taking money to teach her to fight, so you sort of don't hate hate her anymore. And I'm not sure I do, either. She's just sort of annoyingly pathetic now that she doesn't have her position and her posse."

"And you want to turn around and give her back, let's see, a position, with a title and a salary, and the power to make the life of everybody in this town a living hel ? She's not that sad a case."

"Shane, I'm serious about this. We need to get someone on the Elders' Council the vampires can't control, and someone who's human, and someone people might vote for. She's a Morrel . She'd get the sympathy vote because of her brother."

He scrubbed his face with both hands as she unlocked the front door of the Glass House. "Such a bad idea," he said. "In so, so many ways. Tell me we're not actually helping her."

"Wel , I did kind of promise to make signs."

She expected him to kick about that, too, but instead, he got a slow, evil smile on his face and said, "Oh please. allow me."

"Shane-"

"Trust me."

She didn't.

And sure enough, two hours later, she heard Eve's outraged scream coming from downstairs. She rushed into the living room and saw Shane holding...a poster. It was a vivid neon blue thing that read, in block letters, WHY VOTE FOR THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS?VOTE MORRELL!, and it had the saintliest picture of Monica that she'd ever, ever seen beneath it. Honestly, it couldn't have looked more angelic if Shane had Photoshopped a halo on it.

It also had one of those bright yel ow cal out stars in the corner that read ENDORSED BY CAPTAIN OBVIOUS!HUMAN APPROVED!, plus a copy of the write-in bal ot with Monica's name written boldly in marker.

It was simultaneously the funniest thing Claire had ever seen, and the most appal ing.

Eve couldn't seem to think of anything to say. She just stared...first at the poster, then at Shane, then back to the poster, as if she couldn't imagine a world in which this had happened. Finally, she said, "I really, really hope this is a joke. If it isn't, Monica's going to killyou. And then she'l wrap you in that poster and bury you."

"What's wrong with it?" Shane asked, and looked down at the paper. "I know, blue wasn't my first choice, but I figured hot pink would be overkill."

"Okay, I need a recap. Why exactly are you making a poster to elect Monica for mayor? Did I miss a step, or wake up in Opposite World, or...?"

"It's Claire's plan," he said. "I'm just the graphic designer. She's the campaign manager."

Eve col apsed on the couch and put her face in her hands. "You're insane. You've gone insane. Too much stress. I knew one of us would break someday...."

"Monica's perfect," Claire said. "Eve, really, she is. Think about it. And hey, if you want, you could be Captain Obvious."

"Me," Eve repeated, and gave a dry, strangled laugh. "Yeah, sure. Sure."

"Hey," Shane said. He propped the poster in the corner, and-unexpectedly, at least to Claire-dropped to one knee in front of Eve. He took her hands and dragged them down so he could see her face. "Look at me. You're the original rebel around here, Eve. Hel , you were a malcontent before I was. Before Michael. Before Claire. Most of these Captain Obvious wannabes half assed it because in their hearts they were regular guys, pissed off at not having everything they wanted when they wanted it. That isn't rebel ion; it's just selfishness. But you're not like that. If you wanted to be Captain Obvious, you'd be real."

He meant it. No mocking, no digs, no friendly banter; he sincerely meant that, and Eve took in a deep, ragged breath as she stared back. She shook her head, once. "I can't, Shane."

"Yeah," he said. "You could be. But only if you really want to." He said it without drama, without even any special emphasis, just stating a simple fact. "C'mon. Pizza's getting cold."

"Michael's going to killyou both," Eve said, and followed him as he stood up and walked to the table, where Claire remembered what she was doing and set down plates. "Killyou so very, very dead."

But she was wrong, because when Michael showed up-about fifteen minutes later, coming out of the kitchen in that silent vampire-stealthy way he sometimes did, when he forgot his company manners-he took a long look at the poster, cocked his head, and said, "Wrong picture."

Shane cast Eve a look of evil triumph. "Wel , I would've used her senior yearbook pic, but she looked like a Spice Girls reject. Anything else?"

"There is no Captain Obvious."

"That's your objection?" Eve said, dropping her half-eaten pizza back to the plate. "Out of everything on the poster, including-oh, I don't know, Monica?-that's your problem with it?"

"He spel ed her name right. I actually like the 'lesser of two evils' motto; it really captures the spirit." Michael had brought his own pizza, and one of his opaque sports bottles. Pizza and blood, a combo only a vampire could love; trying not to think about it much, Claire added some crushed red pepper to her slice. "And to be fair, I did object to the picture first. That one makes her look way too sweet."

"I think that was intentional," Claire said. "Everybody knows-"

"There's a new Captain Obvious," Shane interrupted.

"Yeah?" Michael took a giant bite of crust and cheese and meat, then mumbled, "Who?"

Shane silently pointed to Eve, who swatted his hand away. So did Claire. And Michael choked, coughed, grabbed his sports bottle and swigged.

Eve said, "I'm so very not. Ever."

"No," Michael said, and coughed again, so violently Claire wondered if vampires could actually choke to death. Probably not. They didn't really need to breathe, after all; they'd just have to stop talking until they could clear their throats. "Hel no. Not you."

And that, Claire thought, was his first mistake, because Eve, instead of being relieved that he was supporting her general objection, looked at him with a sudden frown. "No? Por que, Miguelito?"

"Because, well ..." Michael stumbled over putting it into words. "I mean, Captain Obvious..."

"Is what, always a guy? That's what you're going with?"

"No, not-it's just that you-uh..." Michael leaned back and looked at Shane. "Help me out."

Shane held up both hands in silent surrender. "On your own."

"Look, being Captain Obvious makes you a target, and I don't want you to be-"

Eve interrupted him again, rising her chin in chal enge. "Don't want me to be in charge? Out front? Taking risks? Have you seen the tombstone flyers people keep leaving us?"

"Yes," he said. "And I'm scared, because I love you. And it's going to be dangerous. You know that without my tel ing you."

"She knows," Claire said, "but you shouldn't tel her she can't."

Michael was starting to get really concerned. Eve reached over and took his hand.

"Relax," she said, and held his gaze. "I know I could do it. But I won't. I know it would put you in a bad position, for one thing. Props for not saying that, by the way."

"It wouldn't matter what happened to me," he said, and brushed the hair back from her face with gentle fingers. "You know that."

"Okay, you're making me lose my pizza," Shane said, and pitched a napkin at him, and a paper war began, flying on allsides until Claire waved the last surviving unthrown one in a sign of surrender.

So it was allokay, then. For now.

One thing about pizza was that it made for an easy cleanup, again-paper plates and paper boxes, and some glasses dumped in the dishwasher. Miranda had stayed in her room, watching movies; she was still fascinated with their having so many of them, and it was shocking how many of the classics, such as Star Wars, she'd never seen before. Claire left Michael to cleaning up, since it was his turn, and considered joining Shane on the couch (he and Eve were bickering over which video game to play, because she was heartily sick of shooting zombies and he never was) but the lure of study was just too much.

That made her weird. She was aware of that.

After an hour or so, she became aware of a faint tapping, and for a moment she thought it was at the door of her bedroom (and that it might, miraculously, be Shane choosing her over zombies), but no, the sound was at her window, the one facing the big tree at the back of the house. It was ful dark now, with stars set like diamonds in the dark blue velvety sky; here in the high desert it was so clear, she could even see the faint, cloudy swirls of galaxies. The sky seemed close enough to touch.

So was Myrnin, standing balanced on a tree limb that was far too slender for his weight. If she hadn't known better, she'd have thought he was floating in midair, but not even vampires could accomplish that. No, he was just being incredibly graceful, and ignoring laws of physics that were inevitably going to protest.

"Open," Myrnin said. "Hurry up, girl. Open the window. This branch won't"-he stopped as there was a sharp crack, and the branch sagged under his feet-"hold me for long!" He finished his sentence in a rush as she jerked up the window sash.

He lunged forward through the opening just as the branch broke free and crashed through the leaves to the ground below. Claire got out of his way. Vampires were nimble. He didn't need help, and just now, she wasn't feeling especially like helping him, anyway.

Myrnin hit the floor, rol ed, and came with fluid grace back to a standing position. He struck a pose. "I suppose you are wondering what brings me here like this, in secret."

"Not really. But I see you found your shoes, thank God," Claire said. Glancing down at the bright white patent leather loafers on his feet, he shrugged.

"I think they belonged to a pastor, perhaps. allI could locate," he said. "No idea what's carried the rest of my shoes away. Perhaps Bob has developed a taste for footwear, which would be most interesting. Albeit alarming."

"Bob the Spider."

"Yes."

"That's...not too likely. Please tel me you washed them."

"The shoes?"

"Your feet. Do you know what kind of diseases are allover alleys?"

He gazed at her with perfect still ness for a second, then said, "I saw the campaign poster on the porch outside. I'm not sure whether to applaud you for your initiative or box your ears. Monica Morrell? really?"

"I know it seems weird."

"Weird? It seems insane, and believe me, when I am tel ing you that, it's worth taking seriously, dear girl. I expected you to put forth a real candidate."

"Can you think of anybody who could really do the job? If Hannah Moses couldn't manage it, nobody else has a shot, anyway," Claire said.

"Monica wil get the votes, just because, well , her brother died in office. And her father. And she's a Morrel . People mostly just vote for what's familiar, even if it's wrong."

Myrnin gazed at her, and he just looked...miserable. Defeated, really. "Unfortunately, I cannot refute your logic. Then we're finished," he said.

"The grand experiment is done, and allhope is lost. I suppose I must make preparations to go away, then."

"What?"

"Claire, attend: if this madness proceeds unchecked, there is only one way for this to end, and that is in blood, fire, and fury. Amelie and Oliver have formed what psychologists would cal a folie a deux, and their indulgences wil lead to cruelty, and cruelty wil lead to slaughter, and worst of all, slaughter wil lead to the discovery of vampires in this modern age. I've seen it before, and I won't be caught up in the inevitable aftermath. Best to flee now, before the pitchforks and torches and scientists come cal ing. That is, if the two of them don't have a bitter and blackened fal ing-out first, and destroy the town in their rage."

"Myrnin!"

"I mean it," he said. "There is a reason that I've tried to keep Amelie and Oliver apart. Opposites do not merely attract. A chemist of your skill should know that quite often, they violently explode. Go while you still can, Claire, and take allyour friends. In a matter of weeks, it would not be a fit place for you to cal home anyway." He seemed almost sad now. "I have liked this home. Very much. It grieves me to leave it behind, and I fear I wil never find a place that is as tolerant of my...eccentricities."

He really did mean it, and it shocked her. He'd always been a little cavalier about danger, even his own; he wasn't someone who ran away easily. In fact, he'd persuaded the other vampires to stand their ground against the draug, to protect Morganville.

How could he want to run away now, from so little?

"Wel ," she said, "you can go if you want, I guess, but I can't."

"Won't," he corrected primly. "You can leave whenever you like. Amelie has said so, and as far as I am aware, she never countermanded that."

"She said I could go alone. As in she insists that Michael, Eve, and Shane stay here. I'm not leaving them behind, especially not if you think it's going to get dangerous. What kind of friend-what kind of girlfriend-would I be if I did that?"

"One with a sense of self-preservation," he said, and gave her an off-kilter, fond smile. "And that would be so unlike you. You're always caring about the strays and outcasts among us, myself included. You really are a very odd girl, you know; so little sense of what is good for you. Perhaps that's what I find fascinating about you. Vampires, you know, have such an iron-strong sense of self-preservation; we are the ultimate narcissists, I suppose, in that we see nothing wrong with others dying to save us. But you-you are our strange mirror opposite."

"Coming from you, I don't know how to take that, and on the subject of strange and not at allappropriate, could you please stop dropping into my bedroom in the middle of the night?"

"Oh, did I?" He looked around vaguely. "I suppose I did. Sorry. well . If you won't leave this place, arm yourself heavily for as long as you stay," he said. "Don't go anywhere alone. And make alternate plans to flee when that becomes necessary."

"Myrnin-you're scaring me," Claire said, and reached out. "Please, tel me what's going on!"

He took her hand and raised it to his mouth in an old-fashioned gesture that made her skin tingle, especially when she felt the cool brush of his lips against her skin. His eyes were very dark in the dim light of her study lamp, and she didn't think he'd ever looked more...human. Crazy, maybe, but so very human.

"I hope I am scaring you," he said. "When things seem calmest, that is the time you should fear the most; it's when you have the most to lose. It's not your enemies who are likeliest to hurt you. It is, always, those you trust. And you have trusted Amelie too far."

He hadn't let go of her hand, and she was starting to feel flushed and awkward about it. "I've trusted you, too," she said. And he gave her a sad, slightly manic smile.

"Yes, and that too is a mistake," he said. "As you've known from the first moment you met me, I am not reliable."

"I think you are," Claire said softly. "I really do. Myrnin-please. Please don't go away. You-you matter. To me."

There was just a flicker of warmth, something, and for a moment she thought...But then Myrnin's face shut down, and he let go of her hand.

Where his fingers had touched hers, her skin felt ice-cold.

"Don't," he said. "It's dreadfully unfair to say things like that when this is likely the last time we wil speak, and we both know you don't mean what you say. It's pure selfishness that you want to keep me here." His tone had a harder edge than she was used to hearing from him, and his expression was deathly still .

She felt an unexpected surge of anger. "Didn't you just accuse me of not being selfish enough?"

"Don't play at word games with me. I was a master of it before your country even existed."

"You can't just go! Where willyou-"

"Blacke," he said, cutting her off. "For a start. Morley and I do not get along well , but he and the quite-frightening librarian woman have built a rough approximation of a town where vampires are welcome. It wil do until I gather resources to settle elsewhere more congenial. You'd do better to think of yourself. Without me to help protect you, you are likely to end up dead, Claire. I should regret that. You've been the least useless apprentice I've ever had."

"That's it? That's allyou're going to say? I'm the least useless?"

It burst out of him in a furious, low-voice rush. "Yes, of course that's allI'm going to say, because there's no point in it, no point at allin tel ing you that I'm lonely, that it's been so long since I could discuss books and theories and science and metaphor and alchemy and philosophy, and that is a desperately lonely thing, Claire. Even for someone who has kil ed to stay alive, there's a point where life-where existence-just seems... worthless, without some deeper connection. Do you understand?"

She was afraid to, really, but she gulped down a deep breath, and said, "You're saying that you care for me."

Myrnin froze, staring at her. He really was amazing, she thought; when he had that light in his eyes, it was possible to see past the crazy behavior and clothing chaos and recognize him as just...beautiful. The longing in his face was breathtaking.

But he said, in a low voice, "Not as you would understand it. What I admire in you is...intel ectual. Spiritual."

She actually laughed a little. "You love me for my mind."

He sighed. "Yes. In a sense."

"Then stay."

"And watch you torn apart between Amelie, Oliver, and this town? Helpless to stop it?" He shook his head. "Better I go."

"No," she said, and grabbed at his sleeve. The old fabric of his jacket had an odd texture to it-cloth that had survived a hundred years or more past its makers. He could have avoided her, of course, but he didn't. He simply waited. "You can't go! You fought the draug to save the town!"

"I won't fight Amelie, and for as long as Oliver holds sway over her, she's dangerous to us all. So what do you propose I do? They'l come for me, sooner or later; I've always been a thorn in Oliver's side, and he'l want me dealt with before long. If I'm lucky, he'l do it before he comes after you and your friends, relieving me of the burden of standing by for that."

"Amelie won't let him hurt you."

"Won't she?" Myrnin's face set hard, and he seemed to be remembering something very unpleasant. "Oliver has a talent for corruption. He had the same skil in breathing life. The atrocities men committed in his name were legion and legendary, and those were mere mortals acting on his behalf. Vampires can be infinitely more cruel. Let enough of us lose our better instincts to that, and there wil be a kind of-fever. A madness that sweeps us away, and we won't care about promises of good behavior, or even about our own survival. I've seen it happen to entire towns of vampires. They just...break." He snapped his fingers in front of her face in a sharp, dry motion, and the sound reminded her of bones shattering. "I don't wish to see it again. And I certainly don't wish to be part of it."

"Then make her listen to you. You're one of her oldest friends!"

"Friends count for little when they cross lovers," he said. "You're old enough to know that. And it is why I can't-" He shook his head. "Why I can't stay."

She felt she would choke on tears, suddenly. He stepped forward and took both her hands in his cool ones. For a moment, she thought he intended to kiss her, and for a panicked moment she wasn't sure if she ought to stop him, wanted to stop him...but then he just touched his forehead to hers and held it there.

"Hush, now," he said, and there was so much sweetness in his voice. "I don't want to see you cry. I'm nothing to cry over."

"I don't want you to go."

He pulled back, still close, very close, too close. There was a faint crimson flicker deep in his eyes, like a distant thunderstorm. "Take care," he said. "Promise me."

"I wil ," she said. "Myrnin-"

He kissed her. It was so fast that she couldn't move to prevent it, even if she'd wanted to; it was also quick, and light, and cool, and then...

Then he was gone.

Claire leaned out the window and saw him scrambling in a blur down the tree. He jumped the last ten feet, landed smoothly on his white patent leather shoes, and looked up at her in silence, then held up a pale, long-fingered hand.

She held hers up in response. Tears blurred her view of him, before they broke free of her eyes and rolled hot down her cheeks.

When she blinked, the yard was empty, except for the broken branch he'd been standing on when she'd first spotted him.

Claire gulped in several deep, cold breaths of night air, then slammed the window shut and sat down on her bed. She felt...She didn't know how she felt. Just wrong. She wanted to talk, but she couldn't to Shane, not about this; he wouldn't understand, not about this.

Eve. Maybe she could talk to Eve.... But she could hear the shouting from downstairs, and Eve's voice was gleefully announcing her victory over Shane in the game. Upstairs felt like a whole world away from that.

Claire stretched out on her bed, closed her eyes, almost il with how wrong that had been, how guilty she was about that whole conversation. But she'd needed to have it with him; she knew that.

She flinched and bolted upright at a knock on the door, both arms instinctively crossing over her chest. "Who is it?"

"What do you mean, who is it?" Shane eased the door open and studied her. Oh. Of course, that was Shane's knock; she knew it very well.

"What's up? You all right? You look scared."

She felt a surge of feeling so fierce that it burned in her cheeks and made her stomach churn, and for a second she didn't even know what it was, until her brain kicked back in.

It was shame.

"No," she said, and her voice sounded shaky. "No, I just-I had a dream. A bad one." Liar.

He gave her a grin that made the shame bite deeper, then sank down on the bed next to her. "Shouldn't have come up here and gone to sleep, then. Come on, sleepyhead. It's too early for you to crash out."

He kissed her, and he felt warm and sweet and strong and most of all, alive...and she fel into it eagerly, almost desperately. The kiss went on, and on, damp and slow, like something perfect in a dream, and she pressed close and into his arms, and allthe storm inside her turned into peace, a peace so strong she could feel it glowing in her blood. She sighed onto his lips, into his mouth, and he was smiling, his hair brushing gently over her face like a ghost's caress.

"You make me happy," she whispered. She meant it literally-he'd just led her out of a strange, dark place and into sunlight, and the relief was so great that she felt tears in her eyes. "So happy."

Shane pulled back and looked at her with an expression of absolute focus. His smile was blinding. "I was about to tellyou the same thing," he said, and brushed his fingers over her face. "Cheater."

For an awful second she thought he knew about Myrnin, standing here in her room, but then with a wave of icy relief she realized he was talking about her beating him to the punch. She gave him a shaky smile. "Got to be quick."

"Oh," he said, and kissed her very lightly, moving his lips down her throat, "I really don't think I do."

She laughed, because the joy just became a pinpoint of light inside her, bright and searing, and she rolled him over and sprawled on top of him and kissed him again, and again, and again, until everything was a burst of brightness, everywhere in the world.

And when it faded, when it was dark and quiet again, she listened to the strong, fast beat of his heart with her head on his chest, and thought, I'm sorry. She wasn't even sure what she was apologizing for, or even to whom it was directed. Myrnin? Herself? Shane? Maybe she'd let them all down, somehow.

But not again.

Never again.

Shane fel asleep next to her, out like a light, but Claire found herself humming with energy and too restless to try to close her eyes. She went out into the quiet hal way, closed the door, and sank down against the wal , turning her phone over and over in her hands. Might as well, she thought. It was late, but her parents were used to that, and they were always going on about how she didn't cal enough.

Claire dialed before she could think better of it. Her mom answered on the second ring, her tone anxious. "Claire? Are you all right, honey?"

"Fine," Claire said. She felt a deep surge of guilt, because what did it say about her that her mom assumed she was in deep trouble every time she bothered to cal ? "Sorry I haven't been to see you lately. How's Dad? Is he doing all right?"

"Your dad's fine," her mom said firmly. "Except he worries about you, and so do I. He was hoping you could come home and visit soon. Any chance of that? If you want to bring your boyfriend, I suppose that's okay." She didn't sound so very enthused about that. It wasn't that she and Dad disapproved of Shane, exactly, but they were...cautious. Very cautious.

"I might do that," Claire said. "So, are you still doing that book club thing?"

"Oh yes; I just read the best mystery novel, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Maybe you've heard of it...?"

"Yes, Mom, I've heard of it. And there are movies."

"I didn't think there were any theaters in Morganville."

"There are a couple," Claire said. "But I watched it as a rental. You should do that."

"Oh, I have to do it over the Internet now; it seems so complicated."

"It's not. I could show you-"

"You know me and technology, sweetie. So, how's school?"

"Fine," Claire said. She knew she ought to say something more, something important, but she couldn't seem to come up with anything much. My vampire boss, who would like to maybe be my boyfriend, just dropped in to tell me he was running away because Morganville's too dangerous.

That was a lot to dump on an unsuspecting parent, on so many levels. "Thanks for the lovely birthday gift." It had really been lovely-Claire had been expecting an out-of-fashion dress or a gift card or something, but instead she'd gotten a hand-bound book that had pictures of her from babyhood on, with space to add more. She'd already put in some photos of her and her friends, and her and Shane. Suddenly it reminded her that she'd never taken a picture of Myrnin...and now maybe she never would.

"That's a relief. You know, I think you work too hard at those classes. We'd be so happy to see you, honey. Do you think you might be able to come out this weekend?" Claire's parents lived only a few towns away, in a house that they wouldn't have been able to afford except that Morganville's Founder had bought it for them, in a fit of conscience over their daughter's contributions to vampire survival. Her parents had also once understood about the vampires, but not anymore. Those memories had faded almost to nothing-a deliberate action by the vamps, or by Amelie in particular. And that was okay. Claire preferred it that way-she liked them thinking she was in a safe place, with people who loved her. It was half true, anyway-the second half.

"Maybe I can try," she said. If Myrnin was right, she might not have much choice in getting out of town soon. "Mom-I know you were disappointed at me about not going to MIT when they cal ed me, but..."

"I trust you, sweetie. I was just afraid you'd made that decision because of-wel , because of Shane. If you really made it because you weren't ready to go, then that's all right. I want you to do things the way that's most comfortable for you. Your dad agrees." There was an indistinct mumble in the background that might have been her dad agreeing, but more likely it was just the opposite, and Claire smiled.

"Shane's not in charge of what I do," she said. "But I won't lie. I didn't want to leave him here, either. So maybe there's a little bit of that in there."

"I-honey, I know you don't want to hear this again, but are you sure you're not plunging into something too quickly with him?"

It was a familiar subject, and Claire felt a white-hot stab of annoyance. Never thought of that, Mom. Wow, what insight! She wouldn't say it....

She'd rarely been sarcastic to her parents, but that didn't stop her from thinking it. Older people so often thought they'd been through everything, experienced everything...but it wasn't true. Few of them had ever lived in Morganville, for instance. Or apprenticed to a vampire with poor impulse control.

"I'm not," Claire said. She'd learned that short answers worked best; they made her sound adult and certain. Overexplaining only opened the door for more lectures. "I know you're concerned, Mom, but Shane's a really good guy."

"I know you wouldn't stay with him if he wasn't-you're a very smart girl. But it does concern me, Claire. And your father. You're just eighteen. You're too young to be thinking about spending a lifetime with someone. You've hardly even dated anyone else."

Claire was just about fed up with the You're too young litany. She'd heard it from the time she was old enough to understand the words. The format might change, but the song remained the same: too young to do whatever it was she most wanted to do. And she couldn't resist saying, "If you hadn't said I was too young to go to MIT at sixteen, I would never have come to Morganville."

It was true, but it was a little cruel, and her mother fel silent in a way that told Claire she'd scored. It's not a game, she reminded herself, but she couldn't help a little surge of satisfaction, anyway.

When her mom restarted the conversation, it was about her new hobby, which had something to do with remodeling the house. Claire listened with half an ear as she flipped pages in her textbook that she'd opened on her lap. She still had another twenty pages of material to digest, and cal ing home was having the desired effect: it was making her forget allabout Myrnin, and what he'd said, and focus back on her studies.

The door to her room opened unexpectedly, and Shane was standing there, bed-headed and yawning. He waved at her. She pointed to the phone and mouthed Mom. He nodded, stepped over her, and headed for his own room. Knowing him, he'd be facedown in dreamland in five minutes.

Claire grabbed her stuff and went back into her own room. Mom still hadn't paused for breath, and except for a few noncommittal uh-huhs, Claire was just a conversational spectator.

A second after she settled in on the bed, there was another knock at the door-not Shane this time, because it was much more tentative. Claire covered the phone and cal ed, "Come in!"

It was Miranda, who stepped inside and looked around with interest. Claire mouthed to her, I'm on with my mom. Miranda nodded and went to stare at the large bookcase in the corner of the room. She began pul ing out titles.

"Mom, I've got to go," Claire said. "My friend Miranda's here. I told you about her. She's the new one in the house."

"Oh, okay. Love you, pumpkin. Your dad says he loves you, too. Can't wait for you to take a look at the carpet samples. I'm sure you can help us decide on that. Maybe this weekend?"

"Thanks, Mom. I love you, too. Yeah, maybe this weekend."

She hung up and dropped her cel back in her pocket as Miranda wandered over with a couple of books. "Do you mind if I borrow these?" she asked. "I don't sleep anymore."

"Any time," Claire said. "Did you like Star Wars?"

"Yes," she said. Miranda sat down on the bed next to her. She was a smal -framed girl, and she seemed even more fragile than Claire, who'd at least put on some muscle these past few years, if she hadn't grown much tal er. Miranda had the seeming physical strength of a stick insect. That was deceptive, of course; Miranda wasn't really alive in the same way Claire was, and she could draw on the considerable power of the Glass House when she had to, so she could probably break bricks with her hands if necessary.

It was hard not to feel protective, though. The kid just had that look of vulnerability.

"That's it? Yes? People usually have more to say than that."

"It was good?" Miranda tried tentatively, and then shrugged. "I guess I'm not really in the mood for movies after all. You know, I used to think that if I couldn't see the future, it would be terrible, but really, it feels pretty good, not knowing what's coming. It makes it more fun to watch movies and things when you can't guess the ending." She fel silent for a second, then pushed her hair behind her ear. "But it'd be more fun if I did it with you guys."

She'd been coming out of her shel slowly, but steadily; she hadn't quite joined the Glass House gang in ful , but she was, at least, an adopted kid who was trying to fit into the family. Claire knew how that felt; she'd come into the house when Shane, Michael, and Eve had already been an established unit of old friends. She knew what it felt like to be an outsider.

Claire hugged her impulsively. "We'l do that," she said. "Movie night. Tomorrow. I've got a bunch of things I think you'd like."

"Michael and Eve are going to move out," Miranda said.

Claire almost fel off the bed as she twisted to get a look at Mir's face. The other girl was staring down, and she didn't look like she was making a bad joke; she seemed serious, and a little sad. "What?"

"I know I'm not supposed to eavesdrop, and I try not to, really, but it's hard when you're invisible during the daytime," Miranda said. "I mean, you're drifting around bored and there's nobody to talk to. You can't even watch TV unless someone else turns it on, and then you have to watch whatever they want-"

"Mir, focus. Why would you say they're moving out?"

"Because they're talking about it," she said. "Eve thinks that it's hard to feel married when they're just living the same life, you know? When it's here, with you and Shane. I know she moved into Michael's bedroom, but she doesn't feel like anything really changed. Like, they're married for reals."

Claire had honestly never thought about it. It had just seemed, in her mind, like marriage wouldn't change anything-wouldn't mean any difference at allin the way Michael and Eve felt around her and Shane. They'd already been, ah, together, after all. Why should it matter? "Maybe they just need some time."

"They need space," Miranda said. "That's what Michael said, anyway. Space and privacy and nobody listening to them allthe time."

Wel , Claire could understand the privacy part. She always felt odd about that, too. Even as big as the Glass House was, sometimes it felt very crowded with five people in it. "They shouldn't move out," Claire said. "It's Michael's house!"

"Wel , I can't move, can I?" Miranda said, and kicked her feet. She was wearing cute sneakers, pink with an adorably weird brown bunny face on them. "I don't want them to go, though. Claire-what happens to me if you guys allleave? Do I just...stay here? Forever? Alone?"

"That's not going to happen," Claire said, and sighed. She grabbed a pil ow and flopped backward, holding it tight against her chest. "God, this can't happen now. Like everything wasn't complicated enough!"

Miranda lay flat, too, staring up at the ceiling. "I don't feel right tonight. The house feels...It feels weird. Anxious, maybe." The Glass House had its own kind of rudimentary life force to it-something Claire didn't exactly understand but could feel allaround her. And Miranda was right. The house was on edge. "I think it's worried about us. About what's going to happen to us all."

Claire remembered Myrnin's anxious, determined expression, his insistence that she leave town, and felt a chil .

"We'l be fine," Claire said, and hugged the pil ow tighter. "We'l allbe fine."

It was as if the universe had heard her, and responded, because allof a sudden she heard the crash of glass downstairs. Miranda stood bolt upright and closed her eyes, then opened them to say, "The front window. Something broke it."

Claire raced her downstairs, with Shane stumbling out of his room in a daze to follow. They found Michael and Eve already there. The window in the parlor was broken out, and a brick was lying on the carpet in a spray of broken glass. Wrapped around it was another note. Nobody spoke as Michael unfastened the string that held it on and read it, then passed it to Eve, who passed it to Shane, who passed it to Claire. "Wow," she said. "I didn't think they could spel perverts."

"It's getting worse," Eve said. "They're not going to let this go, are they?"

Michael put his arms around her and hugged her tight. "I'm not going to let anything happen," he said. "Trust me."

She let out a sigh of relief and nodded.

Shane, ever practical, said, "I'l get the plywood and hammer."