Mrs. Tozer was yelling. I looked up in surprise, hoping it wasn’t directed at me or Xandra. We hadn’t been caught; a guy in the front row had drawn her ire.

  Careful to keep my phone out of sight, I sent Xandra a reply.

  I appreciate your concern. But this is going to keep happening until I step out of the shadows. People are going to keep getting hurt.

  I watched as she read the message and then shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

  She sent two words back.

  You’re crazy.

  I gritted my teeth.

  People keep saying that.

  Well, people are right. And the longer you push this, the bigger chance there is of someone, or YOU, getting hurt.

  What would have happened to Laura if I hadn’t gotten involved? She could have been killed. Or worse!

  Xandra’s reply was short, concise, and I read it with all the venom I’m sure she intended: Stay out of the vampire world, Cassie.

  I shot daggers across the room at her. She was making a solid effort not to look at me, but I hoped she felt my gaze boring through her.

  She was my friend. Why couldn’t she understand this? She more than anyone should have been able to see that I needed help and support right now, not opposition.

  I rattled off another reply, fingers dancing quickly across the screen. My Uncle Mike was hurt. Because of me. He has no idea, and probably never will. I am the only one who can stop this. I’m not letting this happen to anyone else. This is bigger than me. Much bigger.

  The lump in my throat was painful.

  Besides, I’m not going alone. I have two vamps coming with me. We’ll sort this all out and be back in no time.

  Xandra’s reply was prompt: Let me guess. Little Miss Sunshine and the handsome Neanderthal?

  I made to text her a nasty reply when another text came in.

  What about your parents? You letting them know you’re going?

  There was a burning in my chest at the thought, and a weight like lead landed in my stomach.

  No.

  Her reply was swift and to the point. I’m not covering for you this time. You’re on your own.

  My jaw clenched. I was going to need dental work before this day was done, I swear.

  Xandra sent one last message—I am not supporting your suicide mission.—and then she stuffed her phone in her pocket, crossed her arms, and scowled at the back of Mrs. Tozer’s frizzy head, refusing to meet my eye. I slid mine away too, quietly seething at her.

  Suicide mission? Did she really have that little faith in me?

  Again, a little voice reminded me: I’d had so much help in getting to this point, been saved at the last minute several times. My margin of victory kept narrowing. Eventually, the luck propelling me forward would run out.

  Maybe Xandra was right. Maybe this was the end of the line for me.

  The idea alone was sobering enough. Was going to New York really the only thing that I could do?

  I couldn’t see another way out of this, aside from approaching Draven directly. And I definitely would not survive that.

  My hands clenched into fists under my desk.

  I was going to die either way, right? Might as well be fighting instead of hiding like a caught rabbit.

  And why was everyone so against me all of the sudden?

  My phone buzzed with a message, and I glanced at Xandra, wondering if she had decided to send along something else nasty.

  But it wasn’t her. It was Mill.

  No night flights to Syracuse.

  Lockwood can drive us. We will travel through the night, arriving sometime late tomorrow afternoon. He’ll pick you up after school and bring you to my place. You will have to, I repeat HAVE TO, shut your phone off as soon as you leave so as to avoid being tracked by your parents and the police when they go nuts and report you missing.

  I felt sick. They had already reported me missing once since moving down here. And they knew that I had somehow been mixed up with kidnappers. This was going to absolutely kill my mother.

  My heart beat painfully against my ribs.

  There was no other option.

  I had made my choice. I had dug my grave.

  Now it was time to lie in it.

  Chapter 10

  Lockwood was waiting for me in the parking lot after school let out, just like Mill said he would be.

  I watched Xandra walk down the sidewalk toward home, just like every other day, her blue hair swirling in the salty air breeze. She hadn’t spoken to me the rest of the day, but I did catch her staring at me from time to time. I knew she wanted me to change my mind, and pretty much ninety percent of me wanted to change it too.

  But I couldn’t. I knew I couldn’t.

  I looked down at my phone, knowing that in fifteen minutes Mom would be calling to ask how my day was and make sure that I got home all right. She would probably ask me if I could pull something out of the freezer for dinner, or ask if I wanted to get take out instead.

  I gripped the phone tighter and my eyes burned with tears.

  I could still back out. I didn’t have to do this.

  No. Not happening.

  Before I shut it down, I needed to let Iona know what was happening. Mill said there weren’t any flights during the night that were right, so Lockwood is driving us. Where should we pick you up after sundown?

  She got back to me quickly, fortunately, specifying a corner. I didn’t know where it was exactly, but this was what GPS was for.

  Thanks, I answered. I’ll have him text you when we are on our way. I have to go silent now. Shutting my phone off. See you then.

  Now was the time to shut out the rest of the world while I did what I had to do.

  My fingers shook as I pushed the power button on my phone, hoping against all hope that Mom wouldn’t text or call me before I shut it off.

  If she did, I knew I’d crack. I’d stay. I’d go on with my life.

  My phone asked if I really wanted to power it off.

  I hesitated only for a second before confirming. It shut off.

  I shoved it in my pocket and walked across the lot, digging my fingernails into my palms until it hurt to keep myself from breaking down crying.

  Focus on the pain, not on the inevitable breakdown.

  I got in the back of the car and slammed the door shut behind me.

  Lockwood didn’t say anything. He just looked at me in the rearview mirror, his bright green eyes curious. Sunlight filtered through, washing out his features.

  I avoided looking at him as I pushed my phone deep into the bottom of my backpack. Maybe it wouldn’t suck so much if I couldn’t actually see it.

  I was grateful that Lockwood was quiet the entire way to Mill’s place, which felt like the longest trip in the entire world when my head was racing like it was. Sundown was still long hours away, and getting later by the day as spring ramped up toward summer.

  Funny to think that, six months ago, I’d have drunk in a day like this one. Blue, clear skies, a blazing hot afternoon to enjoy … I might’ve been like any of the people we passed by, going about their business in an unchanged world. A couple on a rumbling motorcycle, speeding by; kids playing football in the street, running out of the way before the town car passed, then back in behind us as their game resumed; a pair of joggers going at a leisurely pace, chatting amiably …

  Everything was normal for these people. They didn’t have to worry about vampires or being hunted or their entire lives being turned upside down.

  A jealously that I had never known flared inside of me. What I wouldn’t give—what I wouldn’t do … if I could just have a normal life like any of those people.

  “I hope you know that I think you are very brave, Miss Cassandra.” Lockwood’s words broke my reverie.

  I glanced up to see him gazing at me with his usual twinkle in the rearview mirror.

  “Brave?” I asked. “Guess you don’t really know me all that well.”

  “Perhaps I don’t,” he said with an easy grin. He tipped his hat toward me. “But from what I have seen, you’re much braver than you give yourself credit for.”

  I looked away, back out the window.

  He really didn’t know me at all.

  “The way that you handled that vampire, for instance … Roxy, was it? Nasty business. But you held your own.”

  I didn’t reply. He must have not seen the same fight that I did.

  “And Mr. Mill is extremely proud of you,” he went on, checking over his shoulder for oncoming traffic. “He says that you have great potential. He’s glad that you’re taking your training so seriously.”

  “He said that?” I asked.

  Lockwood nodded. “More than once, in fact.”

  I crossed my arms. “I figured he thought I was nothing more than a kid,” I said.

  “‘Kid’?” Lockwood asked as we came to a stop at a stoplight. “I think not. Besides, he isn’t much older than you are.”

  “I don’t know that.”

  Lockwood chuckled, glanced in the rearview mirror. “He claims to be twenty-two in the human world.”

  I pursed my lips. “Well, good. In five years, I can start calling him kid.”

  “Did something happen, Miss Cassandra? I am sensing a great deal of animosity toward Mr. Mill.”

  “It’s nothing,” I lied.

  I really didn’t want to have to explain to Lockwood all of these … feelings that I was dealing with about Mill.

  Especially since I didn’t understand them anyways.

  “Hey, Lockwood?”

  “Yes, my lady?”

  I smiled reluctantly. “Thank you for all of the help you’ve given me. All of this driving me around.”

  “I am pleased to be of service.”

  I knocked on Mill’s door only ten minutes later.

  He answered the door less than a second later.

  “Waiting for me with bated breath?” I asked. I brushed past him, getting a whiff of his cologne. Bergamot.

  I hated that I enjoyed the smell so much.

  “I move fast. Remember?”

  I did a quick scan of the room. Everything was in its place. Immaculate. Minimalist. Tasteful.

  No girlfriend.

  “Where’s Kate?” I asked.

  His eyes narrowed. He ran a hand through his sandy hair. “Burr in your saddle?”

  “Most people don’t use saddles or horses in this day and age,” I snapped, unsure why I was being so nasty to him.

  “She’s not here,” he said. He kept an even tone. “You have some … problem with her?”

  “I heard the way she talked about humans.” I clicked my tongue. “Most of my people would have a problem with Kate, because would have a problem with all of us.”

  He shrugged. “She is who she is. Just not sure why you’re so sore about it. Rather suddenly.”

  I stared at him. “I just don’t know what you see in someone who’s so … hateful.”

  He made a face, and when he spoke, it was low. “Are we really going to have this fight again? Right now? When we should be planning our strategy for New York?”

  “I—” I snapped my mouth shut. My argument dissolved like a balloon being punctured. “Yeah. You’re right.”

  Mill gave me a look, as if uncertain whether or not I had been defused, then motioned toward the couch. “Go sit. I’ll make you something to eat while we talk.”

  “You have food here? Actual, non O-neg type food?”

  He paused on the way to the kitchen. “Since we started training, I thought it would be best if I kept a little food around for you.”

  My heart squirmed in a way that I didn’t like.

  He stopped at big, stainless steel fridge, hand hovering at the pull. “So … what do you like? Pizza? Waffles? Ice cream?”

  Wait, he had all that? “Um … I don’t know,” I said.

  Mill watched me patiently.

  A thought struck me that made me both sad and curious.

  “What’s the one food that you miss the most since being turned?”

  “I …” he started, taken off guard, and then smirked. “You know, I haven’t thought about that in a long time.”

  He glanced at the fridge.

  “Chocolate cake,” he finally decided, forehead loosening now that he’d warred it out in his mind and come up with that. “It just tastes like ash when I eat it now.”

  Quiet. Mill seemed to recede, a gulf forming between us—one that, I noted with sadness, I would never be able to cross.

  “I’ll, uh … I’ll have the ice cream,” I said at last. Probably least wise, but damn if it didn’t sound the best to me.

  Sunset came after a wait that seemed minutes shy of forever. I kept a close eye on the drapes, lest the Florida sunshine slide across the floor and sear Mill, who was waiting patiently on the couch.

  “It’s down,” I said, watching it slip below the horizon.

  Mill stood, checking his watch. “Right on time.” He picked up two bags next to the couch and tossed one to me.

  I caught it. “What’s this?” It was a black gym bag.

  “Clothes,” he said. “For you.”

  I looked at it with suspicion. He didn’t elaborate, so I unzipped it. Toiletries lay across the top—a red toothbrush with the faded blue bristle strip that indicated heavy use, a tube of my brand of toothpaste, carelessly squeezed down to almost halfway, a blue packet of dental floss.

  I frowned. “Figures the vampire would focus on dental hygiene.” I looked closer. “Wait a minute,” I said, rummaging past it for the clothes. There was a black halter top that I’d worn last week, a pair of jeans from two days ago and—my unmentionables at the bottom of the bag—

  I looked up at Mill, mouth hanging open. “These are my clothes.”

  Mill was utterly unruffled. “I assumed you would need them.”

  “How did you get my clothes?”

  He shrugged. “I dressed in a motorcycle suit and visited your house.” He must have seen my eyes get plate-like in their wideness. “You invited me in before, remember?”

  I couldn’t form words. Not any of them. My jaw just moved up and down. Finally, I stuttered out a weak, “When?”

  “Once when we were training,” he said with a light shrug. “We were talking about that Net-flux thing with the internet and you said, 'You should come over and we'll watch Parks and Rec on my dad's bigscreen'.”

  I vaguely recalled that, maybe. An offhand comment about getting together to watch a TV show at my house counted as an invite? Yikes. Then again, Byron had taken my opening a freaking window as an invitation to come in.

  All thoughts of vampires invading my house paled in comparison to the issue of the now. “But—these are my clothes! My—my—my—” And I waved the bag helplessly.

  “Ohhh,” he said, finally getting it. “I didn’t touch anything or, uh … rummage your, uhm … garments. I just … emptied a laundry basket into the bag.”

  If he’d had blood flow to … anywhere … he might have been blushing.

  “Lockwood is waiting for us,” he said, practically rushing for the door at vampire speed.

  I stared at the bag of my clothes, then looked at Mill, who would not meet my eyes. I had a feeling he had not gathered my stuff from a laundry basket … but I decided to leave it alone.

  For now.

  Lockwood was waiting in the parking garage below with the silver Mercedes town car that Mill sometimes called for. He took the corner Iona had given me and we were off, cruising through the dusky streets of Tampa under the purpling skies. Mill didn’t say anything, and neither did I. It was better this way.

  Iona was a bundle of sarcasm when we arrived at the street corner where she asked us to meet her. Apparently she wasn’t keen on the idea of Mill knowing where she lived, because there were no houses around. Unless she lived in the back of a convenience store, we were at least a short distance from her place of residence. I would have guessed quite a ways, based on the icy look she gave Mill when she opened the door.

  “Hello,” she said, slipping into the back seat with me. Mill was shotgun with Lockwood up front and barely turned his head to acknowledge her.

  “How long of a drive is this?” I asked Lockwood as Iona stared out the window.

  “Just under twenty hours,” he said. Rather cheerfully.

  I looked at Iona, already lapsed into silence. Then at Mill, doing his own ‘look out the window brooding’ routine. Two vamps, lots of feels, no buffer.

  Why couldn’t Lockwood have taken the limo for this? Gas mileage, I assumed. Anonymity, for another. A limo would stick out in Onondaga Springs like...well, vampire violence, probably. Still...

  “Great …” I said. Lockwood pulled away from the curb, and we were off.

  It was odd knowing I was going back home. Going back to a past that I thought I had left behind forever. My two worlds, Tampa and New York, had become strangely entangled, even at this distance. Now I was crossing the gap between them, and it felt … weird. Kinda nerve-racking.

  But it had to be done. I was the only one who could do it. Step back from the new one into the old, taking everything I’d learned—and a couple moody vampires—in Tampa and bringing it back to fix a problem I’d caused in New York.

  My life was bleeding over from one place to the next.

  Heh. Vampires. Bleeding.

  I stared out my own window as the streets of Tampa blurred together under the growing darkness. They really were bleeding together. Soon I wasn’t sure I’d be able to separate one world from the other.

  Chapter 11

  For the first hour or so, I was content to just stare out the window at the landscape rushing past. Nothing looked much different as we traveled north. It was still like a jungle, with a lot of stretches of wild forests broken by grassy fields.

  As we got closer to the Florida-Georgia line, though, I was starting to see that an entire day in the car might actually drive me crazy.

  “Hey, Mill?” I asked. I was leaning against the window, my sweaty forehead pressed against the cool glass. “Can you maybe turn that music down? It’s giving me a headache. I mean, I know that most people can handle some big band swing, but three hours of it …?”

 

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