Dangerous to be together.

Painful to be apart.

Savannah Colbert knows she broke up with Tristan Coleman for the right reasons. Most of all, to keep from killing him with her new vampire abilities. But try telling her heart. Now, lost in a sea of hostile Clann faces, Sav tries to come to terms with what she’s becoming and what that means for her future. And that someone is doing their best to bully her into making a terrible mistake.

Tristan can’t believe Sav won’t even talk to him. If being apart is her decision, fine. Just don’t expect him to honor it. But even as he prepares to fight for the girl he loves, forces beyond their control take them both in directions neither could have foreseen or prepared for.

A reckoning is coming...and not everyone will survive.

I really was dying this time.

I grabbed the counter, shaking so hard I was afraid I would fall down. What was wrong with me?

“Sav? Sav! What is it?”

I could hear my friends’ voices, distant, muffled. I shook my head, my focus turning inward. What was going on with my body? Was this a sign that the bloodlust was about to take over completely or something? No, it couldn’t be. I’d felt the bloodlust before. It hadn’t felt anything like this.

“What’s wrong with her?” Michelle asked in a high voice.

“I don’t know. Get a teacher,” Carrie ordered.

Anne moved toward the door, but I grabbed her arm to stop her. “No, wait. It’s not...” I closed my eyes and mentally searched for the source of the pain. “It’s not me. I mean, I’m okay.”

“Then what’s the matter?” Anne said, crouching down in front of me.

I shook my head again. “I don’t...”

And then I knew. “Oh, God. It’s Tristan,” I whispered.

* * *

Praise for CRAVE, Book 1 of The Clann.

“An enticing mix of forbidden love, magic, betrayal, and heartache, this romance will leave you craving more.”

—Mundie Moms

“Melissa Darnell has written a beautiful love story centered around the supernatural world. There is nothing sweeter than forbidden love.”

—Realm of Fiction

“A spellbinding, compelling, and completely enjoyable debut, Crave had me flipping pages until there were none left to flip.”

—Electrifying Reviews

Covet

Melissa Darnell

www.miraink.co.uk

To the moms (in order of appearance in my life): Joyce, Janet and Judy, for showing me so many different ways to be a strong woman, mother and wife.

To my dad, Joy and my father-in-law, Mack, for showing me the many sides of being a father and a husband with such honesty, wisdom and humor.

To Dawn: thank you for being the older sister I’ve always wanted!

And to the real-life grandmas who inspired the character of Nanna: Mamaw and (in memory of) Nanna.

I love all of you guys!

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Acknowledgments

Preview

CHAPTER 1

SAVANNAH

The vampire council’s private jet, a giant cocoon of white leather and exotic wood trim, hummed a false lullaby around us, trying to lure me into sleep. But even though I was warm and safe within the arms of the only boy I’d ever loved, I couldn’t give in to the exhaustion dragging at my body. Not yet. There was so little time left to enjoy this doomed illusion of peace and perfect happiness. I needed to fight the urge to sleep as long as I could.

Beside me, Tristan Coleman had already lost that battle. He sat slumped in a corner of the sofa we shared near the rear of the cabin. Though his chin with its dusting of three-day-old whiskers rested awkwardly on his chest, a slight smile deepened the corners of his lips, and his arms, so solidly wrapped around me, never budged. Trying to protect me even while he dreamed.

I should have been protecting him instead.

Despite the soft leather beneath us, Tristan had to be uncomfortable. After all, unlike me, he was human and his body could only take so much abuse. When his eyelids had first begun to droop hours ago, I’d tried to convince him to move to one of the reclining chairs or to at least take the entire sofa for himself so he could stretch his long body out properly. But Tristan had refused, insisting on sleeping upright so we could continue to sit close together.

Knowing what was coming for us, I’d given in. Selfish though it was, I didn’t want to let go of him yet, either.

One stray golden-blond curl, rebellious like its owner, flopped over his forehead. Carefully I reached up and smoothed it back, forcing my eyes to look past the sharp contrast between my pale skin and his rugged tan.

In a few hours, even the right to that small touch would be lost forever.

I tried to memorize every detail of his face, normally so hard with determination or blinding everyone nearby with one of his infamous grins, now softened at the edges by sleep and his mistaken belief that everything was okay. He had no idea what sacrifices I’d made to get the vamp council to release him after they had used him and his powerful, magic-laced Clann blood to test my self-control. Handcuffed to a chair in a cement-lined interrogation room next door, he hadn’t heard the torturous promise I’d made to that circle of cold beings. A race I was slowly but surely turning into.

I could have told Tristan the truth after the council released us from their Paris headquarters. But I hadn’t, partly because I was dreading his reaction, but mostly because I wanted to be with him, as happy as possible, every last second that we had left together.

The muscles in my chest tightened, refusing to let my lungs expand fully, and another tear slipped down the side of my nose. Stupid tears. My eyes hadn’t stopped leaking for more than a few minutes at a time since Tristan and I had safely exited the council’s underground labyrinth of tunnels.

Knowing what I had to do for Tristan’s own safety once we returned to our hometown in Jacksonville, Texas, I feared the tears would never stop.

There were so many perfectly logical and good reasons why I was all wrong for Tristan, why I had to do as promised and stop seeing him. My mind understood. Why couldn’t I make my heart agree?

Dropping his head back against the sofa, Tristan sighed and snuggled me closer. And though I knew I should move away, keep him safe by putting physical distance between us, I gave in one last time to my heart. Closing my eyes, I nestled my forehead where his neck and shoulder met, a curved space of heat and strength that seemed to have been sculpted especially for me. Drawing in a deep breath, I could just make out the lingering crispness of his aftershave left over from Friday morning, the last time he’d had access to a razor. And beneath that, the barest hint of the precious and oh-so-forbidden Clann blood he had been forced to shed for my test. A test I almost hadn’t passed. A test that had nearly cost him his life.

Swallowing hard, I pushed that dangerous memory away.

Soon. I would keep my promise to the council soon. Just…not yet. A few more hours while we were escaping the laws of gravity and the Clann and the vamp council in this plane together, a few more precious memories to make before we were grounded once more so I could be sure I would remember how it felt to be held and loved by him. How it felt to wrap my arms around his waist, feel the press of his hard chest against my cheek, hear his heartbeat pounding beneath my ear. To feel the illusion of safety while cradled within his arms, his strong hands on my hip and back cupping me as if I were a precious treasure instead of the monster that I truly was…

“Savannah,” a familiar voice whispered like an annoying mosquito near my ear.

“Mmm,” I mumbled, wanting that voice to go away. Only one male’s voice was welcome right now, and that one wasn’t it.

“Savannah, wake up,” Dad insisted, his whisper slightly louder but still far too soft for Tristan’s human ears to hear.

Scowling, I cracked one eyelid open.

“We are an hour away from the Cherokee County Airport, and the pilot warned that we will be landing in bad weather. You should call your grandmother and mother and let them know.” Dad held out a black cell phone stamped For In Air Use Only in gold letters.

I took the smartphone, and Dad returned to his recliner at the front of the cabin.

Worried my talking would wake Tristan, I tried to ease out of his arms, intending to move closer to Dad’s end of the plane. But as soon as I moved, he woke up.

“Sorry,” I whispered. “I need to make some calls. Go back to sleep.”

“I’m all right.” He tugged me back onto his lap, brushing his nose against mine in a too-familiar, silent request for a kiss. At the last second, I turned my head so his lips touched my cheek instead. He leaned his head back to search my face, his heavy-lidded gaze hurt and confused.

“We shouldn’t…not until we land and you can draw some energy.” Thanks to the demon Lilith, the creator of my father’s race of hybrid vamps, I could drain energy with a bite or a kiss, a fact I had only recently been reminded of. As long as we were away from the ground, my kiss could kill Tristan, despite his being the son of the most powerful family of witches in the Clann. His ability to pull energy from the earth through direct contact with the ground was the only thing that had saved him a few days ago after too long a kiss with me and a fight with his fellow Clann member Dylan Williams. If I hadn’t been able to drag Tristan over to some nearby grass where he could draw replacement energy, Tristan might have died that night.

He frowned but nodded, letting me slide over to sit at the other end of the short couch. As soon as I was settled again with my legs curled up between us, he rested a hand on my ankles below the cuffs of my slacks. His unusual need to maintain constant physical contact with me over the last few hours made me wonder. Did he somehow know what the council had made me agree to? Or had the council’s test simply left him on edge and worried about me?

I covered his hand with one of mine and tapped numbers on the plane’s phone with the thumb of my free hand.

My home phone rang four times, then the answering machine clicked on. I glanced at my watch, which was still set on Central Standard Time. It was 10:00 a.m. on a Sunday. Nanna, whom my mother and I had lived with most of my life, should be home and getting ready for church. As our church’s pianist, she never missed the Sunday service. Why wasn’t she answering?

I tried again, thinking maybe Nanna was in her room getting dressed. Again, I got the answering machine. Unease crept in as I left a message.

I called my mother’s cell phone next. At least her whereabouts weren’t a mystery. She was probably still on her latest sales trip.

Mom answered on the first ring, making me jump. Unlike Nanna, Mom seldom had a signal while she was delivering safety products and chemicals to forestry clients out in the fields and woods.

“Oh, hey, Mom. Just wanted to let you know I’m okay and—”

“Savannah! Oh thank God. I, we, your grandma…” She was on the verge of shrieking, her normally low voice pitched high enough to hurt my ears and make me wince. “I’m on my way home now. But I’m still hours away from Jacksonville and—”

My hands convulsed around both the phone and Tristan’s hand. “Whoa, Mom, slow down. What’s going on?”

Eyebrows pinched with concern, Tristan flipped his hand under mine and laced our fingers together. Grateful for something strong and solid to hold on to, I squeezed his hand.

“Sav, they took Nanna! They called me, and—”

“Wait a minute. Who took her?” What little warmth my body had drawn from Tristan’s drained away. Had the vamp council gone after my grandmother now?

“The Clann. They called me, asking about that Coleman boy as if I would know where he is. For some reason, they think you two are involved. I tried to tell them it was a mistake, that you’d never break the rules like that. But they didn’t believe me.”

Oh God. The Clann knew. Dylan must have told them he’d caught Tristan and me kissing after dance team practice Friday night.

I eased my hand away from Tristan’s and back into my own lap. Frowning, Tristan sat forward on the edge of the couch, resting his elbows on his knees as he watched me.

“They insisted he was with you,” Mom continued. “I told them he couldn’t be, that you were on a trip with your father, and they went crazy! They said they have your Nanna, and they won’t release her until we bring the Coleman boy back. I tried calling her, but she’s not answering.”

Holy crap. “Mom, hang on. Let me get Dad.”

Dad must have been listening at the front end of the cabin, because he immediately joined us and took the phone. While Mom filled him in, I returned Tristan’s stare and tried to absorb my mother’s words.

“The Clann…they’ve kidnapped my grandmother,” I whispered, hardly able to believe the words coming out of my mouth even as I said them.

“They wouldn’t do that,” Tristan insisted. “There’s been a mistake.”

I told him word for word what my mother had said. By the time I finished, his face had turned pale and his left knee was bouncing out a rhythm only a hummingbird could appreciate.

“I’ll fix this,” he promised. “Let me use the phone and I’ll call my parents.”

“Joan, we are half an hour from the Rusk landing strip now,” Dad told my mother. “I will straighten this out and call you back when I have news.” He ended the call then handed the phone to Tristan.

Tristan tried reaching his father first, then his mother and even his sister, Emily. Scowling, he tried a few other descendants’ home and cell phones. No one was answering.

“I don’t understand. Wouldn’t they be waiting for your call?” I said.

“Yeah, they should be. Unless…” Tristan looked away for a moment, then his gaze snapped back to mine, his jaw clenching. “Unless they’re already meeting at the Circle and using power. If they’ve raised enough power together, sometimes it blocks incoming radio and cell phone signals.”

“Why would they be raising a lot of power?” I asked, hopeful the Clann did this at all their meetings for ceremonial purposes or something.

Tristan stared at me in silent answer, and my stomach twisted.

This wasn’t the norm for the Clann. Which meant they were doing something to Nanna…

Bile burned the back of my throat, and I couldn’t look at him anymore. If anything happened to Nanna, if Tristan’s fellow descendants did something to her to try and find Tristan, the fault would be ours. We’d broken the rules to be together. I’d thought the vampire council was our only real worry, that the Clann couldn’t do anything more to my family since we’d already been cast out due to my Clann mother marrying my vamp father before my birth.

I was wrong. And now Nanna was paying for it.

“Take your seats and put on your seat belts,” Dad muttered, breaking the long silence. “We are landing.”

I avoided making eye contact with both him and Tristan as we moved to the recliners and belted in, then gripped the armrests as my heartbeat hammered in my chest.

Please don’t let it be too late, I prayed.

As soon as the jet touched ground and finished a short taxi, I unbuckled my seat belt and jumped up. Dad was faster, though, reaching the door before I could even blink. He got it open and the stairs unfolded so we could run down them to the rental car he’d called ahead and had delivered. The sky, which should have been a bright spring blue, was an ominous shade of dark gray, the storm clouds blackening out the sunlight so much it appeared to be almost dusk. Wind whipped my curly hair into an untamable red cloud, using the strands to slap first one side of my face then the other.

I got into the rental car’s backseat, Tristan right behind me. Automatically I reached for his hand then froze. We were six miles outside of Jacksonville now. I’d promised the council I would break up with Tristan once we were home.

Not yet. Not till we sorted out this situation with Nanna and the Clann.

At my hesitation, Tristan glanced at me and frowned. “We’re going to fix this, Sav.” He squeezed my hand.

Forcing a nod, I swallowed hard against the knot tightening in my throat and looked out the window as Dad took off north on Highway 69 for Jacksonville, going fast enough to make the pine-tree-covered hills feel like a roller-coaster ride through the woods.

I spent the trip into town silently wrestling with the guilt crawling over my skin and clawing at my insides.

What had I done?

I never should have let Tristan talk me into breaking the rules with him. If I hadn’t, Nanna would be safe right now.

And yet I couldn’t even begin to imagine going through life without having felt Tristan’s love. What we’d shared was a part of me now. It had changed everything…how I looked at the world and the future, how I felt about myself and others. When I was with Tristan, I felt solid and real and grounded and…good. Like being half vamp and half Clann was just circumstance, not who I really was. Like I could become anything I chose, not what others chose for me.

Except that wasn’t true, because I couldn’t change or choose what I was. Believing otherwise was every bit as much a lie as the ones I’d told my family for the last six months in order to be with Tristan. Which meant, no matter how much Tristan and I loved each other, this relationship was wrong. It was a selfish love that had nearly killed Tristan and might be hurting Nanna even now.

How had I gotten here?

I used to think of myself as a good person. But the truth was I was a monster inside and out, and not just because my vamp side was starting to take over. How many people had I hurt? Maybe I could excuse accidentally gaze dazing those boys from my algebra class last year, and even gaze dazing my first boyfriend, Greg Stanwick. I hadn’t understood what I was then. But I had always known dating Tristan was wrong, and still I had made that choice over and over for months. There was no excuse for it, no matter how wonderful it had felt.

I just prayed I had the strength and enough time left to fix what I had done.

Once we reached the center of Jacksonville, Tristan directed Dad to turn right on Canada Street and stay on it all the way out of town past our high school and still farther to the Coleman house, where apparently the Circle was located. Today was the first time I’d even heard of the Clann’s secret meeting place.

I knew when we reached the edge of the Coleman property, because all the houses on the right side of the road ended. Five minutes later, Dad slowed the car and turned onto a gravel driveway barred by a huge wrought-iron gate. Tristan rolled down his window, leaned out and punched in a code on a pad housed on a gunmetal-gray pole near the driver’s side window. The gate slowly rolled open.

I wanted to jump out and shove it open faster.

The driveway was long and curving, lined with some type of hardwood trees I couldn’t recognize in the gloom, their branches lashing in the wind. A few raindrops pattered on the windshield and roof. Dad didn’t bother to turn on the wipers. The trees ended suddenly as the drive circled in front of a three-story brownstone mansion, its every light blazing. I tried not to compare it to Nanna’s single-story, single-bathroom, three-bedroom brick home where I’d grown up.

At least thirty or more vehicles lined the drive in front of the house. We added one more to the collection as Dad parked. We got out of the car, and Tristan led us around the outside of his house. More threatening raindrops fell, surprisingly cool on my skin despite the humidity. Once in the dark backyard, we all broke into a jog. I had time to recognize the yard as the same one in the dreams Tristan and I had shared many times over the last few months. Then we plunged into the even darker forest that ringed the yard. As soon as we did, I could feel it…a too-familiar prickling sensation of pins and needles down my neck and arms. Youch. A sure sign that descendants were using power nearby.

The woods seemed familiar, intensely so, as if I knew the location and size of every pine needle above me and just how the springy green moss below my feet would feel if I weren’t wearing shoes. The moss grew everywhere, carpeting the forest floor and growing up the sides of the pines. When I caught glimpses of the clearing up ahead, I realized where I was.

This couldn’t be the Circle.

We were in Tristan’s and my dream woods, the ones where we met when our minds connected while we were asleep. Even the clearing was almost exactly the same. There was the stream, which ran across the mossy circular clearing where we’d danced and talked for hours. But where was the short waterfall that always spilled past the boulders and fed the stream? Maybe that had been an imaginary addition from Tristan?

Both sides of the stream were filled with descendants, too many of them to count. They gathered like giant crows circled round the harvest, their faces hidden in shadow beneath their blue and black umbrellas. Had my mother come here as a young girl with Nanna for the Clann meetings, maybe carrying her own dark umbrella in case it rained? It would explain why Mom liked to work in the forestry industry…she’d grown up trampling through woods rain or shine for social gatherings.

On the far bank of the stream, where in our dreams Tristan and I usually sat or lay on a picnic blanket talking, sat a stone chair occupied by Tristan’s dad, the Clann’s leader, Sam Coleman. Behind him hovered Tristan’s mother, Nancy, and Tristan’s sister, Emily.

Yep, this was definitely the Circle. And we were so in trouble.

Then I looked up and gasped. Floating several feet above the stream, as if hung by invisible wires, was Nanna.

CHAPTER 2

TRISTAN

Savannah’s grandmother, Mrs. Evans, appeared to be awake but immobilized in the air. The Clann must have caught her before she could get dressed; her long cotton nightgown floated around her legs and bare feet in slow motion as if she were a ghost. Savannah took a step toward her, and the descendants began to mutter. Hearing them, Savannah froze, her eyes narrowing and turning moss-green. A sure sign she was beyond ticked off.

“Mom, Dad, what are you doing?” I shouted to be heard over the wind and across the Circle’s clearing. I had to put a stop to this before somebody got hurt.

“Tristan!” Mom screamed, darting out from behind Dad’s throne. She took two steps toward me then stopped, her joyous smile flashing into shock, then fear, and finally settling into horror as she stared at Savannah. “No, it can’t be true. Tristan, how could you? I told them you would never—”

“Son, do you know what she is? What her father is?” Dad’s voice boomed throughout the clearing. “They’re—”

“I know,” I said. “But obviously I’m fine. There’s no need to do this. Let her grandmother go.”

Savannah looked up at her trapped grandmother again. Mrs. Evans’s papery face twisted horribly, as if she were silently screaming in pain. Eyes shining with unshed tears, Savannah reached for her grandmother’s feet, but even her toes were out of Savannah’s reach.

This was insane. What did the Clann think it was doing, dragging an old lady out of her own home and off to the woods in her nightgown? Mrs. Evans would have every right to hex us all the minute they freed her.

“Let her down,” I yelled, losing control over my temper.

The wind died, but the smell of ozone sharpened the air with the promise of more rain.

In the resulting silence, Dad said, “It’s not that simple.”

What?

Rocking back on my heels, I searched his face for some clue as to what he could possibly be thinking. I could tell from his overly formal tone that he was still in Clann leader mode, probably too aware of the audience of descendants surrounding us. But he wasn’t thinking right. This wasn’t about Clann and vamp politics. No matter what, no matter how powerful the Clann was, we didn’t do this.

“It is simple,” I said. “This woman had nothing to do with my disappearance.”

“We know where you were,” Dad said. “We know the vampires—that…girl’s father—kidnapped you. Now tell us the truth, son. Are you okay? Did they hurt you? What questions did they ask you? Are they trying to figure out our weaknesses?”

Savannah took a step forward. “They’re not trying to start another war, Mr. Coleman. They just brought him in to test me, to see if I’m a danger to anyone. And my dad wasn’t the one who took him. No one in my family had anything to do with Tristan’s involvement.”

“They didn’t kidnap me. I went voluntarily to help Savannah,” I said, desperate enough to lie at this point.

“Tristan, don’t,” Savannah hissed.

I didn’t look at her, my gaze locked on the only person here who had the power to decide. My father.

Dad’s face darkened. “So Dylan was right. You are dating her.”

I didn’t hesitate to answer him. “Yes. I love her.”

The descendants gasped. Savannah froze. I fought the urge to smile as a weight I hadn’t been aware of fell away from my shoulders. This was it, the moment I’d been waiting for, when the Clann would finally be forced to give us our freedom.

Beside our father, Emily slowly shook her head, one corner of her mouth deepening in that look that always said, Oh, little brother, you’ve gone and done it now.

Widening my stance, I crossed my arms and met her stare head-on. Emily might be older than me and think she knew it all, but she had no clue what it felt like to be in love, to need someone like I needed Savannah. In her own way, my sister was even more of a player than I used to be, ready to drop a boy from her dating schedule for the slightest reason. She’d never dated anyone longer than a couple of months, never broken any rules, Clann or otherwise, just to be with someone. And she’d certainly never be willing to leave the Clann if that was what it took to be with the person she loved.

But I was. And it was time the Clann knew it.

“It’s time to let go of the past,” I said, raising my voice so everyone could hear and not just my parents. “We’ve been at peace with the vamps for decades now. How long does that peace have to last before we can get over our old prejudices and fears? I love Savannah, and she loves me. And I’ll do whatever it takes to make you see we’re meant to be together. Including leaving the Clann if necessary.”

“Tristan!” Mom gasped as Dad jerked forward in his seat, his bear-paw-size hands gripping the carved armrests.

Lightning flashed in the distance. A few seconds later, thunder rumbled out a warning of the storm’s approach.

“He believes he loves me,” Savannah said. “But the truth is…this is all my fault.”

What the…?

I turned to her, sure I’d heard her wrong.

“Continue,” Dad commanded.

She swallowed hard, refusing to look at me. “I’m half vampire. All this time, your son believed he was in love with me because my vampire side basically…well, put a spell on him. I gaze dazed him with my eyes. He couldn’t help himself.”

She’d lost her mind. The stress of facing down first the vamp council and now the Clann must have made her go nuts. She knew the gaze daze didn’t work on me!

“I knew it,” one of the Brat Twins crowed. I couldn’t tell if it was Vanessa or Hope. “I knew she had freaky eyes.” Their mother shushed her into silence.

“Savannah, stop it,” I growled, clenching my hands at my sides so I wouldn’t give in to the urge to shake some sense back into her. “You know the gaze daze doesn’t affect me.”

“Apparently it does.” She kept her voice loud so everyone could hear what should have been a private argument between us. “Why else would you suddenly decide to break the Clann’s rule this year and date me, if not for being gaze dazed?”

Half vamp or not, she had the worst poker face I had ever seen. She knew she was outright lying to everyone. But why? It didn’t make sense to throw herself off a cliff now, when the truth was finally out. We were almost home free. All we had to do was stick together and refuse to back down, and the Clann would be forced to see reason.

“You know why,” I murmured, taking a step closer to her. But she quickly stepped back, maintaining the distance between us. “Sav, don’t do this. Just tell them the truth.”

She shook her head, her eyes melting back to a dark slate-gray in sadness. “You’re gaze dazed. You’d say anything right now in order to be with me.”

“See?” Mom hissed to no one in particular as she glared at Savannah. “I told you Tristan would never willingly break the rules. She was making him do it.”

Savannah nodded. “Yes, I was. And I’m very sorry. I didn’t understand what my vamp side could do. But now that I know what I am and what I’m capable of, I can promise you…” Her throat worked as she gulped.

“Sav, don’t,” I said through gritted teeth.

She straightened her back and lifted her chin. “I promise you I will no longer be involved with your son in any way. As long as you agree not to punish Nanna or Tristan. Nanna didn’t even know about us, and Tristan—”

“No,” I shouted, her words clawing at my insides. “I knew what I was doing. Don’t listen to her. She’s lying to try and—”

“How do we know you’ll keep this promise?” Dad asked, ignoring me.

“Because…” Savannah’s voice wobbled. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Because I already made the vampire council the same promise. And they’ll be checking on me to make sure I keep it. Just like I’m sure you will be.”

She was lying. She had to be.

I searched her face. But this time, she was telling the truth. It was all right there for me to see in the trembling of her chin, the tears gathering in her eyes, the sudden slouch of her shoulders.

She’d promised a bunch of strangers that she would break up with me. Hours ago. Long before we ever got on that plane together in Paris. Before she sat curled up against me, letting me hold her, watching me smile and even fall asleep, letting me believe everything was finally working out for us.

All that time, she had been planning this—to break up with me. To dump me. And I hadn’t guessed a thing.

The wind returned, whipping Savannah’s long red curls into a frenzy that hid her face from me. The gusts tried to rock me off balance, but I couldn’t feel them.

“We agree to your request,” Dad said.

With a nod of his head, Sav’s grandmother began to lower to the ground.

Savannah turned to watch her ease ever closer. I should be reaching out to help her catch Mrs. Evans, but I couldn’t move. I was frozen, a statue ready to be pushed over and smashed into pieces.

This wasn’t happening. Sav and I were meant to be together forever. She knew that. She loved me. I knew she loved me. She was just taking the easy way out, caving under the pressure because she couldn’t see how close we were to freedom.

I had to stop this somehow, find the words to undo what she’d done.

I forced one foot forward, then the other, finally closing the distance between us. “Savannah, don’t do this. You know we’re meant for each other.” I reached out and touched her upper arm, silently begging her to face me. “Don’t give up on us.”

She still wouldn’t look at me.

“Savannah,” Mrs. Evans gasped as the last of the elders’ magical hold on her fell away. She collapsed forward, and both Savannah and I managed to catch her dead weight.

Then two pairs of hands grabbed my arms, dragging me backward and forcing Savannah to take her grandmother’s entire weight on her own. They went down to the ground together.

As soon as my captors set me back on my feet, I turned to snarl at them.

Dylan Williams and another descendant two years younger than us. I should have known.

“I warned you, man,” Dylan murmured, sneering from underneath his too-long blond hair.

Cursing, I tried to break free, but the elders must have been lending their power because I couldn’t shake my new jailers’ grip. Their hands were like metal cuffs.

The wind tore through the clearing again, carrying with it a chorus of shrieks from the descendants. Savannah’s father had darted out from the surrounding pine trees to kneel on the soggy ground with his daughter and former mother-in-law.

Hands rose all around us in silent threat. I tried to think of a spell to block them, but Savannah was faster.

She threw out her arms. “No! Wait, he’s my dad, he’s just here to help.”

She and her father crouched together on either side of Mrs. Evans, their matching silver eyes warily scanning the tense line of descendants.

“Let him be,” Dad said, and everyone slowly lowered their hands.

Savannah looked down at her grandmother. “Nanna, are you okay?”

Mrs. Evans reached up with a gnarled, shaky hand, which Savannah took. And that’s when the clouds finally let it rip, dumping sheets of rain on the Circle and everyone within it.

SAVANNAH

Nanna’s pulse skipped all over the place beneath the crepelike skin at her wrist. She’d always been the strongest member of my family despite her age. When had Nanna become so fragile?

I leaned over her, trying to use my upper body to shield her as the clouds rained down their own stinging punishment on our heads. Despite my best efforts, within seconds we were both soaked.

Dad laid his cheek against her chest for a few seconds, then straightened up and leaned toward me.

“Her heart is damaged,” he murmured near my ear. The wind did its best to tear his words away before I could catch them.

“I fought too hard,” Nanna whispered, and even with my vampire hearing, I had to lean close to her mouth to hear her. “I was a foolish old woman. I shouldn’t have tried to fight them.”

“It’s going to be okay now. Dad and I will take you home.” I wiped the water from her cheeks.

But Nanna shook her head. “Too…tired.” Her grip loosened on my hand.

“Someone help her,” I shouted at the shocked faces around us. Were they so cold and uncaring that they would let an innocent old woman die right in front of them? She used to be one of their own!

But as the wind grew stronger and tried to steal their umbrellas, the descendants stumbled back beneath the shelter of the trees.

They weren’t going to help.

Then a single man stepped forward into the sheets of rain. As he strode over to us, I recognized him as Dr. Faulkner, the Brat Twins’ father and a surgeon at the local hospital.

“I’m a doctor. I can help.” Dad moved out of his way, and Dr. Faulkner knelt at Nanna’s shoulder, ignoring the wet moss that quickly soaked and stained his slacks. He pressed two fingers at the side of her neck while checking his watch.

The pulse in her wrist stopped beneath my fingertips.

“Nanna?” I shouted over rumbling thunder as I repeatedly patted the back of her hand. “Nanna!”

Time slowed and the roaring wind blocked out all other sound, making the moment surreal, like a movie I was watching instead of living. I saw Dr. Faulkner use his hands like electric paddles to zap Nanna’s chest, making her lifeless body jerk. Tristan’s dad ran over to us as if in slow motion, abandoning his throne to kneel on the soaked sponge that the moss had become, joining Dr. Faulkner’s attempts. Their combined energy made Nanna’s upper body lift several inches off the ground with each electrical jolt, then land with a small splash in the growing puddles beneath us. I tried to think of something I could do to help, but Clann rules had forbidden my family to teach me anything about magic. I wasn’t yet a full vampire, either, so I couldn’t turn Nanna into an immortal. Despite all the fears of both the vamp council and the Clann regarding what I might be able to do someday, the reality was I was powerless to save even my own grandma. All I could do was cause destruction and the threat of another war between the species.

And make dumb decisions that resulted in my grandma fighting for her life in the woods during a storm.

Mr. Coleman and Dr. Faulkner fell into a rhythm as a two-man team, taking turns zapping her chest, checking her pulse and blowing air into her mouth. I lost all sense of time as they worked for minutes that could have been hours, the rain soaking through their clothes and hair and eventually pouring in tiny streams down their arms.

Nanna never woke up.

Eventually, the men’s hands withdrew from Nanna’s too-still body. Dr. Faulkner was saying something to me. But I couldn’t hear him.

“What?” The dreamlike feeling of shock drained away, leaving me soaked and chilled to the bone. Only then did I realize the wind had died down again and it was only my blood rushing in my head that was causing the roaring sound in my ears. “Is she all right?”

I reached past Mr. Coleman to pat Nanna’s cool cheek, willing her to wake up. “Nanna? Can you hear me? Come on, Nanna, you’ve got to wake up. I’ve got to get you home now and into some dry clothes. Wake up, Nanna. Come on, wake up!”

Her eyes remained closed.

I circled around Mr. Coleman, kneeling so I could lift her head and shoulders and cradle them in my lap. She was still asleep, but she would wake up soon. I just needed to elevate her head, help her breathe easier. All she needed was a little time to come around.

I looked up at the sky, ignoring the flock of crows beneath their umbrellas still lingering at the edges of the clearing. At least the storm seemed to be passing. The thunder and lightning had eased, and the rain was coming down in actual raindrops again instead of a waterfall. That was good. Dad could carry Nanna back to the car now. We’d get her home and into a hot shower to warm her up, then into some dry clothes. She’d tell me how to fix her a cup of hot tea the way she liked it using some of her homegrown mint leaves….

A heavy paw of a hand rested on my shoulder.

I looked up at Mr. Coleman, but he was too blurry to see clearly no matter how much I blinked. All I could make out was his bushy white beard.

“I’m so sorry, Savannah. We tried everything. But…she’s gone.”

“No.” She wasn’t. She was just asleep. Raindrops splattered over Nanna’s cheeks again, gathering in the deep laugh lines at either side of her mouth, and I wiped them dry.

“Savannah, it is too late,” Dad said, standing at my other side. “There is nothing else we can do.”

“No.” I shook my head, staring at Mr. Coleman, willing him to help me. “Use your powers—”

“We did,” Mr. Coleman said.

“Then try something different!” I turned to Dr. Faulkner. Why was I the only one here still fighting for Nanna’s life? He fixed people for a living and he was a descendant. He had to be able to heal her. “You’re a surgeon. Can’t you go in and magically repair her heart?”

He shook his head. “I tried that. But I wasn’t fast enough. There was years’ worth of damage to the tissue. She must have had heart troubles for a long time now. Didn’t she say anything to you?”

I stared down at Nanna’s face, at her chest that refused to rise or fall. She had kept so many secrets. She hadn’t even told me about my family’s past until I was fifteen.

But why keep this secret? If she’d only told us, we could have done something to help her get better, made her lay off the fatty fried foods or helped her work out or something. Didn’t they have surgeries and transplants for this kind of thing?

I tried again, asking both Mr. Coleman and Dr. Faulkner at the same time. “But you can still fix it. You can do a spell or—”

Mr. Faulkner shook his head again. “We can only do so much. We can’t bring the dead back to life. At least, not with a soul—”

“Then bring her back without one!” I said, my hands aching to slap him. He was just refusing to help because we were outcasts, because I was a half-breed. “She’s my grandma! You killed her. Do whatever you have to do, but bring her back!”

“No.” Mr. Coleman’s tone was final. “We don’t do that. It’s against Clann law to create zombies. And that’s all she would be, a zombie, no personality, no true life within her. Just an animated corpse. Is that what you want, what your grandmother would want?”

I almost said yes, but the words choked in my throat. Nanna would be horrified and furious if she could hear us now. She couldn’t stand to watch zombie movies and refused to read books about them. Even if I could convince the Clann to bring her body back to life, it was useless if it wouldn’t really be her again.

“Please, there has to be something….” I whispered, staring down at the tiny wrinkles in Nanna’s thin eyelids. I stroked her soft cheeks, then stopped as I realized she was already turning cold and losing her color.

No. This couldn’t be happening. She couldn’t be gone.

“I’m sorry. But there’s nothing more we can do,” Mr. Coleman murmured. “I swear, if we could bring her back for you, or undo what’s been done here today, I would make that happen. But even descendants have limits.”

So that was it then. Like me, even with all their supposed power, the Clann could only take Nanna’s life, not bring it back. Nanna was really gone. I’d gotten here too late to save her after all.

And now I had to say goodbye.

“Nanna,” I whispered, the ocean of ache in my chest spreading over my body to make my limbs so heavy I could hardly move. The ache bubbled upward, rising to fill my throat and burn my eyes and the inside of my nose, until I felt sure it would push right through my skull. If I had been standing, it would have knocked me over like a tidal wave. But I was already on my knees, and all it could do was bend me in half over my grandmother’s body and leave me gasping for air.

I wrapped my arms around Nanna, lifting her to me in a one-sided hug, remembering all the times she used to hold me in her lap and rock the both of us in her rocking chair when I was little. And how she used to kneel just like this on her knees day after day, despite her joints getting creaky and popping with age, so she could talk to the herbs and fruit plants she so carefully tended in our backyard. It was the last time I would ever hold my grandma, the woman who had helped raise me, who at times had been there for me even more than my own mother.

She was gone. Because of me.

“I’m so sorry, Nanna.” I couldn’t say it enough. A lifetime of apologies wouldn’t make up for what I’d done.

“Savannah,” Mr. Coleman said. “Please accept my deepest apologies for your loss, and also pass on my condolences to Jo—to your mother. None of us intended for this to happen. I just wanted my son back safely, and we thought your grandma knew where… I never dreamed…”

Words apparently failed the big bear of a man. I looked up and discovered tears in his eyes, which were lined copies of Tristan’s, giving me a glimpse of the man Tristan would someday become. A future I would no longer be a part of.

Hands covered my own, easing my fingers loose. Confused, I looked down to see Dr. Faulkner trying to release my hold on Nanna.

On Nanna’s body. Because she wasn’t here anymore.

I let him take her weight and lower her body to the ground. I couldn’t move, couldn’t feel my legs or arms anymore, couldn’t even feel the clothes that were plastered to me along with strings of my hair along my face and neck.

What should I do now? What did normal people do when their loved ones died in their arms in the woods? There must be a procedure, certain steps of some kind that should be taken by someone. But my mind didn’t seem to want to work to figure it out. Wiggling my hands, I discovered my fingers had somehow become buried in the earth. When I lifted them, clods of moss and mud clung to me. The same mud that would be all over Nanna’s back now.

Nanna wouldn’t want this. She wouldn’t want me to sit in the mud sobbing over her body, especially not in front of the descendants who had cast her out and turned their backs on her. She would have demanded that I get up, put on a strong front, hide my pain. Show them just how strong the Evans women could be. Focus on what needed to be done, and break down later in private.

For her sake, I took a deep breath and tried to wipe my hands clean on my pants, only to discover my shirt and slacks were covered in streaks of mud. I would have to wait until I was home to clean my hands of the mess.

Home. Where Mom would be waiting soon for an explanation. Oh God. She didn’t know yet....

“We’ll help you with the arrangements,” Mr. Coleman murmured, and Dr. Faulkner dipped his head in agreement.

What would Nanna have expected of me now?

“I think…she would have wanted to die at home in her sleep,” I said to Dr. Faulkner. “She wouldn’t want everyone to know…” Unable to say the rest of it, I gestured at the mess of it all, the slop of the mud and rain and grass stains all over Nanna’s once-pristine nightgown, which she’d always been so careful to bleach a blinding white.

“I’ll make that the official report,” Dr. Faulkner replied as he, Dad and Mr. Coleman stood up, too.

I looked around the clearing, for the first time seeing again the horrified audience watching my every move. They stared at me, many of them whispering amongst themselves, as if this were a play they were watching but weren’t really a part of. Didn’t they feel any guilt for Nanna’s death? Or was I the only true murderer here today?

Mr. Coleman turned in a slow circle, drawing everyone’s attention and silence. “Today’s events will never be spoken of. Is that clear?”

Slowly the descendants nodded, though my vamp abilities allowed me to pick up the general reluctance rolling off many of them as the crowd broke up and walked away in small groups through the woods.

“Savannah…” Sounding as if he were choking on my name, Tristan tried to cross the distance between us, but Dylan and another boy held him back. Cursing, Tristan fought against their hold.

Needles stabbed at my skin, a sign of his growing power level. Tristan was getting ready to use magic against them.

“Tristan, stop,” I called out. I looked at his father. “Can I…?”

Mr. Coleman’s gaze flicked down at Nanna’s body, then he nodded.

More pain bloomed inside my chest, trying its best to rob me of air. Part of me screamed that I’d already lost enough, that I needed to hold on to what happiness I could. That I wouldn’t survive losing anything else in my life right now.

But I had to. I’d made two promises now. And it was for his own safety.

I forced my numb feet to carry me over to Tristan. Moss squished beneath my shoes with every step I took, the sound loud enough to be heard now that the storm was nearly gone. It took far too few steps to bring me to the end of the only true love I’d known.

I tried again to memorize Tristan’s face…to see every line across his forehead, the full curves of his lips, now flattened and thinned by anger and guilt and panic, the raindrops dripping from those curls, darkened like antique gold, around his face and clinging to the back of his neck. At the edges of my vision, all around us were reminders of the moments we’d experienced in our shared dreams of this place…so many kisses while lying together on a picnic blanket as we’d talked for hours. The pine trees with their heavy boughs swaying in the storm’s retreat, the way they had swayed around us as Tristan and I had danced together barefoot on the mossy ground. Those same trees had been lit with thousands of tiny Christmas lights for my birthday last November as I’d kissed imaginary red velvet cake from Tristan’s lips.

And now here we were. We’d finally come to the real clearing in the real woods to create another memory. A memory I would never be able to erase, no matter how much I would want to.

He stood as if frozen as I closed the final inches between us. “Sav, I’m so sorry. I never meant for this—”

“I know,” I murmured. “I’m sorry, too. But the council and the Clann are right to want us to stay away from each other. It’s better that way. Safer.”

“No, Sav—”

I pressed cold fingertips to his warm lips, the water sliding down his face and around my fingers like tiny streams flowing around rocks. I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to see his face when I said the next words. If I did, I might not be able to say what had to be said.

Standing on tiptoe, I kissed his cheek, tasting the raindrops on his skin, lingering so I could inhale his faint cologne mixed with the ozone scent of the rain and feel his warmth against my skin one last time. Then I stepped back, my eyes still closed, holding on to it all as tightly as I could even as I made myself let him go.

“We have to end this. Please don’t try to see me anymore. This is the right thing to do. Someday you’ll understand.”

Before he could say anything to change my mind, I turned and walked out of our woods for the last time. Somehow I kept myself from looking back.

But I already knew I would be spending the rest of my life looking back on today, on the last few months, on every choice I had made, and wondering. What if I had been stronger? If I had only managed to resist the way I felt about him… If I had only followed the rules…

Nanna would still be alive.

CHAPTER 3

The next few minutes while I waited in Dad’s rental car were a blur as the pain finally had its chance to claw through me. At some point an ambulance arrived. It turned around in the driveway then backed up in the yard behind the Coleman home. Two emergency workers got out and unloaded a metal gurney, carrying it into the woods between them. Eventually they came back, slower this time, the gurney between them supporting a bulky black bag.

I looked away then, burying my face against my forearm on the dashboard.

Eventually Dad came back to the car and got in. He sat there for a few seconds in silence. Then he awkwardly patted my back. The attempted comfort from him was so unfamiliar that it was like a little mental shake, reminding me I couldn’t fall apart, not yet. We had to tell Mom first.

Dad started the car and followed the circle drive back to the road. Then we headed for my home.

Nanna’s home.

“Have you called Mom?” I asked, my croaky voice forcing me to clear my throat.

“No.”

“Then don’t, not yet. I don’t want her to hear while she’s driving.”

He checked his watch. “She should be home in half an hour or so.”

Neither of us spoke again until we reached the house.

Every window of my home was dark when we pulled up onto the short, pine needle-blanketed driveway. The descendants had closed the front door but not locked it behind them after taking Nanna against her will. As we entered the house, I cringed, sure the place would be wrecked by a magical fight. But they must have snuck up on her and knocked her out before she had a chance to react. Everything was just as I’d last seen it.

I turned on the living room lamp, grabbed a handful of towels from the linen closet in the hallway and gave Dad a couple so we could dry off. I would change later, after Mom came home. I was afraid to go to my bedroom before we talked; I might give in to the urge to fall apart again.

I sank down onto the piano bench, the only furniture in the room that wasn’t upholstered and wouldn’t get wet from my clothes. Then I toed off my soggy sneakers and peeled off my soaked socks, trying to find any mental distraction that I could.

The house was so silent. It was hardly ever this quiet around here. Usually Nanna would have the TV on in the dining area so she could listen to it while cooking in the kitchen or crocheting in her rocking chair. Or she would be in the living room on the piano, filling the house with hymns as she practiced for church.

I turned to face the upright piano, laying my hands over the keys, feeling their cold, smooth surfaces, so like my skin right now. I’d never noticed before, but the keys in the center around middle C had rougher spots on them from being played more often than the ones at the far ends. I touched the surfaces where Nanna’s fingertips had worn off the finish. Nanna had tried to teach me to play, but I’d never managed to read music well.

There was a cracked, leather-bound hymnal still open on the sheet music ledge. The last thing Nanna had played was “Amazing Grace.” One line seemed to jump off the page at me….

I was blind, but now I see.

I had to get up, get away.

A truck engine rumbled up to the house and died, quickly followed by the slam of a door. Dad and I shared a look.

Mom was home.

I wasn’t ready for this.

My fingers knotted and unknotted, twisting around each other countless times in the few seconds it took her to reach the front door and open it.

Mom blew in like a tiny tornado. “Savannah! Good grief, you’re soaking wet. Did you shower with your clothes on?” Stepping over the threshold, Mom closed her hot-pink-and-brown polka-dotted umbrella, gave it a quick shake over the cement stoop, then rested it against the fake-wood-paneled wall.

She turned to face me, arms open wide for her usual welcome-home hug. But I couldn’t move. My legs seemed locked into place. Her gaze darted to the right, and her smile faded. A tanned hand drifted up to fluff her frizzy bottle-blond hair. “Oh. Hello, Michael. I thought you would just drop Savannah off.”

He nodded his greeting.

Frowning, Mom shut the heavy oak door behind her. “So where’s Nanna? You didn’t call, so I assumed—”

“Mom, you should come sit down,” I interrupted, dreading her reaction and yet needing to get this over with.

She blinked a few times and then eased into the upholstered rocking chair, making its sagging springs creak in protest. Kneeling at her feet on the worn-out green-gold carpeting we’d tried a million times to convince Nanna to let us replace, I held Mom’s hands and tried to figure out how to tell my mom I’d caused her mother’s death.

“Mom, Nanna’s…”

“Oh no,” Mom whispered, her hazel eyes rounding. “They killed her, didn’t they? Didn’t they?” Her voice rose to a shriek. “I knew it! I knew they would murder her someday. Those hateful, spiteful… Oh sweet God. I should have been here, helped protect her. I shouldn’t have been on the road so much. I was gone all the time, I made it so easy for them….”

“No, Mom. It’s my fault,” I blurted out.

“Wh-what?” she whispered.

I couldn’t look at her. I stared at the carpet, and I confessed it all…dating Tristan and hiding it from everyone, the fight Friday night between Dylan and Tristan after dance team practice, the vamp council’s watchers at my school. And then the council’s test in Paris, and getting Tristan home again only to discover we were too late. I couldn’t make my voice any louder than a whisper as I told her how Nanna had died in my arms despite everything Mr. Coleman and Dr. Faulkner had tried, and how the doctor thought Nanna must have had a heart condition for years. And finally, how I had promised both the council and the Clann never to see Tristan again, and then I’d kept that promise and broken up with him.

There was silence in the room as Mom processed it all. Then she jumped to her feet and went to stand by the dark stained bookcase with her back to Dad and me. For long minutes, the only sound was the ticking of the ornately engraved silver-and-red clock on top of the piano and Mom’s harsh, fast breathing.

“Mom?” I felt like a little kid again, so small and scared. I’d never seen her so furious she couldn’t even look at me. I’d always followed the rules, done everything I could to be a good girl. Until this year. Until Tristan. And now I had broken our family apart.

I got to my feet, my cold clothes sticking to my skin. I took two steps in her direction, not daring to move any closer. “Mom, I am so sorry. I can’t even tell you how sorry I am. I didn’t know…I didn’t believe the Clann would ever do something like this. When they found out about you and Dad, all they did was cast you and Nanna out. And the council…taking Tristan like that…” How could I begin to explain how everything had seemed like no big deal, until it had spiraled completely out of control?

“You are your mother’s daughter, aren’t you?” she murmured, her shoulders sagging, and the disappointment, the utter defeat, in her posture was worse than a slap in the face could ever be.

Then she turned toward me, and I could see the tears pouring down her cheeks. I couldn’t hold back my own tears and sobs any longer.

“Come here,” she said, holding out her arms, and I was a first-grader all over again, running into my mother’s embrace for comfort. Only this was no skinned knee or bruise from falling off my bicycle in the street. This was so much more, and I would never be able to make all my mistakes from this year right again.

I told her I was sorry, over and over, even as I knew no amount of apologies would bring Nanna back to us.

“Shh,” she whispered, running a hand over my hair just as she used to do when I was little, but it only made it so much worse because I didn’t deserve to be comforted or forgiven.

She shook her head, filling my nose with her favorite Wind Song perfume, and sighed. “You didn’t know what the Clann was truly capable of because I didn’t want you to know. I tried to shelter you from all that ugliness, just like your grandma tried to shelter us both from her health problems, apparently.” She leaned back, cupped my face between her calloused hands and gave me a sad smile. “I had really hoped you wouldn’t ever have to experience the same troubles your father and I went through. And yet history just keeps on finding a way to repeat itself, doesn’t it?”

She looked over my shoulder at my father and her eyes grew even sadder, which I hadn’t thought possible.

The air whooshed out of her in the heaviest sigh I’d ever heard from her. “Where’s Nanna’s…?”

“It is all being taken care of, Joan,” Dad said with a softness I hadn’t thought him capable of. “Though of course there are other things to discuss when you are ready.”

She nodded. “Savannah, why don’t you go get some dry clothes on. Rest if you feel like it, and tomorrow we’ll talk some more, okay?”

I nodded, so empty and tired now, it was all I could do to drag myself into my room and change into a giant T-shirt to sleep in. I slid under the blankets, my feet bumping against a stack of freshly folded laundry Nanna must have left at the end of my bed for me to put away.

I fell asleep with my fingertips rubbing the soft twisted nubs of the lavender-colored afghan Nanna had crocheted for my sixth birthday.

TRISTAN

I paced the length of my room from the bathroom door to my desk then back again, my fists curling and uncurling. What an unbelievable mess this morning had turned into, and just when I thought I’d finally figured it all out for Savannah and me.

I tried the knob on my bedroom door. An electric jolt zapped my hand, forcing me to let go with a yelp and a curse.

My parents had put one heck of a spell on my door to keep me here. No doubt the window was covered, too.

Would they let me out for dinner? For school tomorrow?

Growling out a sigh, I sat on the edge of my bed and dropped my head into my hands.

I needed to get out of here, get to Savannah. Be there for her while she dealt with all of this. She talked about Mrs. Evans all the time. Her grandma had been like a second mother to her, especially since her mother was on the road all the time. Losing her would be devastating for Savannah. She would need all the support that she could get right now.

I should be there with her. Instead, I was a prisoner in my own bedroom. And because of the other spells my mother had placed on this room years ago, I couldn’t even dream connect with Savannah as long as I was locked up. The only time we’d been able to connect our minds in our sleep was when I camped out in the backyard.

If I smashed my desk chair through my window, would that break the spell on it, too?

A sharp double rap on my door made me jump to my feet.

“Yeah?” I said.

The door swung open. Emily poked her head in. “Hey. Thought I’d see how you’re doing.”

I frowned at her. “How are you able to open the door without getting zapped?”

“Selective spell. Mom set it to work only on you. Don’t try walking through the doorway just because I opened the door, though. The minute your toe hits the threshold, you’ll get thrown back on your butt. And trust me, you’d remember the experience afterward.” At my raised eyebrows, she added, “What, you think you’re the only one around here who’s ever been grounded?”

Grumbling under my breath, I dropped onto the edge of my bed again with my back to her. Man, this sucked. Why couldn’t I have been born into a normal family?

“What in the world are you listening to? Is that…Phil Collins?”

It was. Not that it was any of her business. Rolling my eyes, I leaned over and turned down the volume on my docking station. Then I flopped back on my bed.

“Raiding Dad’s music collection again?” Grinning, she stepped the rest of the way into my room.

I sighed and stared at the ceiling. “Come to gloat that you’re the angel of the family again?”

“Well, it’s not like you make it a hard achievement for me.” She sat down on the corner of the bed nearest the door. “Seriously, little brother. What in the world were you thinking, pulling that stunt out there? Did you really expect the Clann to just roll over and give you whatever you wanted because you threw out an ultimatum?”

“No.” Well, maybe I’d hoped.

“Then what exactly did you think would happen?”

I shrugged. “Either they’d accept Sav and me, or I’d leave the Clann. Just because I was born into this family doesn’t mean I don’t have a choice about anything.”

She snorted. “Yeah, right. Like Mom would just let you quit and throw away all her plans.”

Honestly, I didn’t care what Mom wanted anymore. This was my life, not hers. “Any idea when they’ll let me out of here?”

“I heard Mom on the phone. Sounded like she was leaving a message with the school office. You’re out with the flu for at least a week.”

A whole week?

As I stared at her in disbelief, she added, “They want you to have some time to calm down and see reason. Well, that and for the gossip to die down.”

Unbelievable. They still didn’t get it.

I slammed the heel of my fist against the mattress. “I need out of here now. Savannah just lost her grandma. And no telling what hell she’ll be catching from her parents, too. She needs me to be there for her.”

“Well, I guess she’ll just have to face Hades on her own for a while, because you’re not getting out of here anytime soon.”

I cursed loudly. Emily didn’t even flinch.

“You know, you could get out sooner.”

That got my attention. “How?”

“Just tell Mom what she wants to hear. Tell her you’re sorry, and you were wrong, and you still want to become the next Clann leader.”

“And that I’ll never see Savannah again?” I didn’t bother to keep the sneer out of my tone.

One blond eyebrow arched in her trademark well, duh look.

I returned to staring at the ceiling. “Not gonna happen. I meant what I said out there. They can’t make me stay in the Clann. And if I’m no longer a member, their rules don’t apply to me anymore.”

“Maybe the Clann rules wouldn’t. But our parents’ rules would.”

I clenched my teeth and focused on not breaking anything.

Emily huffed out a long and noisy sigh. “Lord, you’re hardheaded. I know you like Savannah and all, but honestly, she can’t possibly be worth all of this.”

“She is. And I don’t just like her. I love her. I’ve never felt like this for anyone. Ever. I’m not giving her up just because our parents are a bunch of bigots.”

“So you’re going to stay grounded for the rest of your life?”

“They can’t keep me in here forever. Eventually they’ve got to let me out for school.”

“Not if they sign you up for homeschooling.”

I raised up on one elbow. “They wouldn’t do that.”

She shrugged. “They might if you push them far enough.” When I kept staring at her, she glared at me. “Do you really not know our parents at all? They’re going to do whatever it takes to get it through that thick skull of yours that she’s off-limits! Just let her go, Tristan.”

“Never. Not as long as we love each other. Besides, our parents can only control me till I turn eighteen. Then I’m out of here and they won’t be able to do anything about it.”

“Oh, I see. Planning on falling back on that trust fund.”

“Yep.”

“Except who do you think holds the strings to that, too?”

Mentally I cursed. I hadn’t thought of that, but I should have. This was why Emily was the brains behind most of the trouble we used to get into as kids. “Fine. Then I’ll get a job.”

“Doing what, genius? Folding burritos at a fast-food place? You think you’re going to be able to support the both of you on that? Because I can guarantee you her parents aren’t going to become your biggest fans anytime soon. Her dad looked ready to kill you in the Circle. And now that you two basically went and caused the death of her grandma, I can’t see her mother liking you much, either. The only way she’ll be with you is if she runs away from home.”

“The Clann caused Mrs. Evans’s heart to fail, not Sav and me.”

A long silence. “Savannah didn’t seem to see it that way.”

I’m so sorry, Nanna, Savannah had whispered over and over while holding her grandmother’s body.

As if Savannah blamed herself for Mrs. Evans’s death. “I’ll make her understand it was the Clann’s fault.”

“Good luck with that when you’re grounded to your room till you turn eighteen.”

Mom had taken my cell phone, house phone and computer, too. My left foot started to jiggle. “Let me borrow your phone.”

“No way! Then Mom would take it away, too. And before you ask, you can’t borrow my laptop, either. I’m not losing my social life just because you’ve gone nuts over one of the few girls on the entire planet that you can’t have.” She hopped to her feet. “Face it, little brother. You’ve had your fun, but your fling with Savannah is over. The sooner you move on and find someone else, the better it’ll be. For the both of you.”

She walked out the door then hesitated. “Oh yeah. And Mom sent you this.” She used a foot to push a wicker and wood tray with a can of soda and a sandwich on a plate across the threshold into my room. “PB and strawberry jelly. Your favorite.”

Like I would eat that. Mom had probably laced it with more spells to make me forget about Savannah or something. “I’m not eating till they let me out of here.”

A slow grin spread across her face. “Stupid, but admirable. I’ll sneak you in something to eat.”

Could I trust whatever she brought?

Her grin turned into a laugh. “It’ll be safe. Pinky swear.”

“Thanks, sis.”

Now if she could just find me a spell strong enough to bust out of this joint.

SAVANNAH

As I stumbled out of bed the next morning, I felt like one of my glass ballerinas, cold and brittle and way too breakable. My eyes were scratchy and so puffy I could barely open them at first.

I desperately needed some caffeine.

Dragging myself down the hall, I headed for the dining table, already looking forward to that daily cup of Nanna’s homegrown, old-fashioned steeped tea. Two things stopped me in my tracks.

My father sat at the dining table with my mother. I couldn’t remember them ever sitting at a table together. They’d divorced when I was two and barely managed to speak nicely to each other over the phone since, much less actually sit down to a meal together.

The other thing that made my muscles lock up was the realization that I’d never have Nanna’s homegrown tea again. At least not carefully measured out and steeped by her own hands.

“Hey, hon, how are you feeling?” Mom hopped up from her usual seat at the dining table and went into the kitchen to fix a plate of something I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat.

How did I feel? Like a traitorous, rule-breaking, lying murderer. “Fine,” I muttered, sinking into the chair next to Mom’s. Which left me facing Dad.

I caught myself staring at him. Seeing him at Nanna’s dining table was too weird.

Mom set a plate of nuked waffles in front of me. My stomach rolled over and threatened outright revolt as I stalled for time by cutting up the dripping, sticky plate of guilt into the tiniest pieces possible.

Mom sat down, clasped her hands on the table, then exchanged a look with Dad.

My instincts went on alert.

“Savannah, we need to speak with you,” she began.

My gaze shot to her face, then Dad’s. “Okay.”

“Your father and I have been talking,” Mom continued. “And we both feel that you should live with him for a while. At least until you graduate from high school.”

I stared at her, my brain scrambling to understand words I never thought I’d hear her say.

“Over the next year as your vampire side continues to develop, you are going to need me nearby to teach you how to recognize and control each new ability,” Dad said.

“Why can’t I just call you for advice?”

“This is not just your mother’s and my wishes. The council has also…requested that I stay near you during this crucial time.” Which wasn’t a surprise, considering they’d threatened before to require me to live with my father in order to balance out the “effects” of living with former Clann descendants all my life. “If the bloodlust increases in strength, a phone chat is not going to do much to help control you.”

“Control me? You really think I could become that big a threat to others?”

“It is possible, unless we are proactive in recognizing the signs leading up to such a situation and act quickly.”

I tried to imagine living with him, but it was hard. Until this weekend, I’d seen him only twice a year for an hour-long dinner, during which we’d both pretended to eat and care about each others’ lives. So I didn’t have much personal experience to support my imagination.

“And this is what you want, too?” I asked Mom, desperate for her to say no, that she wanted me to keep living with her. All my life, my family had consisted of Mom and Nanna and myself. Now Nanna was gone and they were talking about taking me away from Mom, too.

“Hon, this is the best choice possible. For everyone,” she said.

“I will of course be purchasing a home for us here in your hometown,” Dad added. “So you need not be concerned about relocating to a new school or leaving your friends and dance team.”

“Why would you do that?” I blurted out in confusion. If he was trying to reassure me, he’d just failed big-time. While descendants were spread out worldwide, Jacksonville was the Clann’s home base and therefore had the highest concentration in any one area. The temptation of being surrounded by hundreds of descendants and their powerful, magic-laced blood would make his existence here unbearable. The only upside to moving in with my father should have been getting away from the Jacksonville Clann.

And avoiding the temptation of getting back together with Tristan.

“The council wishes it,” was all he said.

Maybe the council wanted to continue to test me by making me stay here another two years?

“Well, at least I can still come visit you here on weekends, right?” I asked Mom.

“Hon, please try to understand, Nanna’s social security checks barely helped us make ends meet. Now that she’s gone, there’s no way I can continue to make the payments on this place.”

Dad scowled, and she rolled her eyes. “Yes, Michael, I know you’ve offered to help with that. But it wouldn’t be right now that we’re no longer married. I’m not your responsibility anymore, remember?”

She turned to face me again. “Besides, this place is too big for me to live in alone. I’d have to get fifty million cats just to keep me company.”

A reluctant smile bunched my cheeks and pushed the tears out of my eyes. I sniffed and wiped my cheeks with the back of my hands. “That’d be attractive.”

She smiled. “Exactly.” She took a deep breath, then dropped the biggest bombshell of all. “But the main reason is, now that your grandma is gone, her magic has begun to fade. Within days it will be gone completely, depending on how strong each spell was and how recently she strengthened it. That includes the dampening wards here.” She didn’t quite meet my eyes as she said that last part.

Oh. She was talking about the bloodlust-dampening spells only Nanna had known how to make, because she was the only descendant with magic abilities who had ever wanted to dampen a vampire’s bloodlust—mine, in this case—without actually repelling the vampire completely.

As a teenager Mom had chosen to let her abilities atrophy like an unused muscle. But that decision couldn’t erase her lineage. She was still a descendant with the Clann’s powerful blood running through her veins, the kind of blood that was almost irresistible to vampires.

Without the dampening wards on my home, I might begin to feel the bloodlust for my own mother. And now those wards were beginning to fade.

I shuddered. As much as I hated it, there was only one thing to do. “I guess we’d better start packing.”

CHAPTER 4

I should have tried to enjoy my last week in my childhood home. I also probably should have called my friends and mentioned that I would be moving in with my dad soon. But Mom had already called their parents to let them know about Nanna’s funeral, and the rest they would find out about once I was back at school next week.

Right now, I had zero desire to talk to anyone. Talking to my friends would mean lying about how Nanna really died and why I was moving in with my dad, and I was already crawling around under enough guilt as it was. While my best friend, Anne Albright, knew a little bit about the Clann’s abilities from helping Tristan ward off the algebra classmates I’d accidentally gaze dazed last year, she had no idea I was a dhampir, or even that vampires existed in the first place. My friends wouldn’t see it that way, but I knew without a doubt that the less they knew about the vampires and the Clann, the safer they would be.

As a result, the week passed quietly and much too quickly. Mom and I stayed busy packing up the house and putting it on the market. Mom had decided to sell the house and use the money for my college fund and to buy herself an RV so she could expand her sales territory. We’d thought, due to the lingering effects of the recession, that the house would take at least a few months to sell. But it found a new owner within days, to the surprise of Mom, me and the real estate agent. Apparently two companies had seen it on the internet the day the agent posted it and entered into a bidding war, driving the price up way higher than we’d set it. The winning bidder had also paid cash in full and skipped the usual house inspection so they could close within days instead of a month. Their only stipulation was that we vacate the premises as quickly as possible, apparently because they intended to put it on the rental market immediately.

All too soon, a stranger became the owner of our childhood home.

Later that week, we went to Tyler in Mom’s truck to do some serious RV shopping. Dad had tried to talk me out of going with Mom. But she’d insisted if I could be trusted to go to school with the Clann, then I could be trusted to go shopping with my own mother for the day. Dad had argued that going to school with descendants only put me in large classrooms with them, not tiny truck cabs. But Mom said that was ridiculous and she wasn’t discussing it any further with him.

Still, to be on the safe side, Mom took one of Nanna’s most recent dampening charms with her in her pocket, and for added measure I kept my window rolled down. Just in case.

Halfway to Tyler, I finally gave in to the curiosity that had been bugging me for days.

“Mom, did you ever go to the Circle when you were in the Clann?”

She made a face as if she’d just smelled a skunk. “Unfortunately, I spent half my childhood there. Not only is it the place where all the major Clann gatherings are held, but it’s also a safe place where elders can take descendants to train, especially the kids who are having a tough time learning to control their abilities. They’ve got a bunch of safeguards around it to keep out v—” She glanced at me. “I mean, outsiders, and to prevent descendants from accidentally setting the trees on fire or blowing up anything beyond its border. And believe me, I probably tested those wards more than all the other descendants combined.”

“Then how did Dad and I get past the wards?”

“Your Clann blood will always allow you to enter the Circle. And if you were there and even thought that your dad should be allowed in, then the wards there wouldn’t stop him, either. That’s how the wards were set up, so we could pick and choose which allies to allow in during times of danger.”

“So all I had to do was think ‘let Dad in’ and it did? There’s no magic words that have to be said first?”

“Nope, not usually. Clann magic is mostly based on willpower and focused intention, not fancy words or magical candles and herbs.” She blew out a noisy breath between her lips, making a sound like a horse so I would smile. “When I was your age, I would have given anything if only our abilities required eye of newt and hair of dog to work. Then I wouldn’t have had so much trouble controlling them.”

“Why not just do a spell on yourself to get rid of your abilities?” It seemed obvious to me. There must be some catch.

She burst out laughing. “Oh hon, don’t you think I thought of that already? I tried a million times as a teen! But there are some things that are fundamental to our nature and can’t be stopped with just willpower. Remember how Nanna gave you those special daily teas to hold off your puberty so we could try to prevent your vamp side from developing as long as possible? Remember how well that worked in the end?”

Did I ever. My body had ended up going to war with itself last year and I’d nearly died until Nanna’s spell-laced teas flushed out of my system.

“But what about Nanna’s bloodlust-dampening spell? Doesn’t it affect the fundamental nature of vamps?”

“In a way, yes. See, the vamp wards work on your brainwaves by putting out a kind of targeted energy field that interferes with certain frequencies of thought. But that’s almost like creating a sonar signal set to a frequency our ears can’t pick up. That’s not affecting anything on a cellular level.

“The bloodlust, however, isn’t about your mind or emotions—it’s in a vamp’s genetic coding to crave blood. So the bloodlust-dampening spell has to work on that same DNA level. And that is some deep magic. It’s like nothing the Clann normally teaches descendants nowadays. Which is why Nanna had to turn to the old ways from our Irish ancestors to find a way to make the dampening spell. She said there’s a reason the Clann doesn’t use the old ways anymore, because they’re too dangerous. She even hinted that she had to make some sort of personal sacrifice every time for it to work. That’s why she refused to write down the process or teach it to anyone. She was afraid other descendants would be desperate enough to try the spell regardless of the consequences.”

I stared out at the highway ahead, both my mind and my heart racing. Dr. Faulkner had said Nanna died of heart complications, that her heart had years worth of scar tissue on it. But she’d never told us she was having health problems.

Could her heart disease have been connected to the bloodlust-dampening spells she’d done for my parents for years, and later on our own home so I could continue to live with her and Mom safely?

No. No, I was already at fault enough for the Clann imprisoning Nanna in the Circle. My vamp side couldn’t be even more of a cause for her heart failure. She’d died because she’d fought against the Clann too hard that day, and because of the high cholesterol foods she ate, because she never exercised, because her genes had predisposed her to heart disease.

And yet…it fit, didn’t it? If she were giving up part of her life or her health in some way in order to overcome the vamp’s basic craving for powerful Clann blood, she wouldn’t tell her daughter what Mom’s love for Dad had cost. And she definitely wouldn’t discuss it with her half vamp granddaughter.

Oh God. Nanna, what did you do to yourself?

I stared out my open window, biting my knuckles to keep from crying out loud as tears slid down my cheeks. The guilt, ever present in my gut, rose up to claw at my lungs, making it hard to breathe. I couldn’t break down, not here, not now, when Mom was so excited about picking out the RV she’d always wanted. I’d already taken so much from her. I couldn’t ruin this day, too.

“You okay, hon?” Mom said. “You got awful quiet there all of a sudden.”

I cleared my throat, grateful the wind had dried the tears on my cheeks almost as soon as they fell, and forced a smile into my voice. “Sure! Just looking forward to seeing which RV you pick out.”

“So what’s with all the Clann questions today?”

I shrugged one shoulder. “You know, just…thinking about things.”

“Missing your Nanna?” Her murmur was low and heavy with sympathy, nearly causing more tears to spill from my eyes.

I nodded. Closing my eyes, I tried to make my mind go blank. And yet flashes of that day in the Circle still managed to slip through…all those descendants watching Nanna die, watching me fall apart, listening to us as Mr. Coleman offered his condolences.

There had been something odd in Mr. Coleman’s tone, a strange little catch as he’d almost said Mom’s first name.

Desperate to change the subject, I blurted out the question, “Did you know Sam Coleman very well?”

“He was the future leader when I was growing up. Of course I knew who he was.”

That didn’t really answer my question. Safely dry-eyed now, I risked a glance her way. Her hands were gripping the steering wheel so hard her tanned knuckles had turned white.

“He mentioned you,” I said. “You know, when Dad and I were at the Circle.”

She didn’t look at me.

The seconds ticked by.

“Mom?”

She sighed. “I dated Sam Coleman when we were in high school.”

Whoa, totally not the answer I’d expected. “Was it…serious?”

“Serious enough that he asked me to marry him at the beginning of our senior year.”

“But you didn’t because…you met my dad?”

She shook her head. “I told Sam I couldn’t marry him months before I ever met your father. I didn’t even want to be in the Clann, much less married to its future leader, no matter how much I cared for Sam. So we broke up.”

“And then you met Dad and ran off with him.”

She nodded.

“Did you really love Dad? Or was it just because he was a vampire?”

She looked at me then. “Oh Savannah. Not everything’s so cut and dried. I think, looking back now, that it was probably a little of everything. Michael was so handsome, and dangerous, and yet so polite and protective of me. It was easy to fall for him. The fact that loving him finally gave me the perfect way out of the Clann just added to my feelings for him.”

“I thought anyone who wanted out of the Clann could leave anytime.” She made it sound like some kind of gang or something.

“They can…if they don’t have a mother like mine. Mom was determined to keep me in the Clann as long as she could. She always thought I’d change my feelings about our abilities, that I’d come around eventually and take up my training again.”

“But then the Clann found out about you and Dad and kicked you out.”

“Yes. Unfortunately my plan backfired a little. I never thought they’d blame Mom for my choices and kick her out, too.”

I was starting to get why she’d run away from Jacksonville with Dad for years and come back only because of me. And why she’d chosen a sales rep job that kept her on the road so much of the year.

She wasn’t just running away from Jacksonville or the Clann here, or avoiding causing me to feel the bloodlust around her. She was trying to run away from Sam Coleman and her past, too.

I couldn’t blame her for that. If I thought leaving Jacksonville would really help me forget all my mistakes, I would run away from home so far and so fast and to heck with what the vamp council wanted.

Unfortunately I wasn’t as good at living in denial as Mom was. No matter how far away from this town I ever managed to get, I would never escape the reflection in my mirror or the memories of the choices I had made.

But if running away made Mom happy, then that was what she should do. At the very least, she’d be safer away from the Clann headquarters. And from me and Dad.

It was a relief to arrive at the RV dealership. Normally Mom was a real pain to shop with because she tended to fall in love with everything in sight and become unable to choose. But this time Mom had done her research ahead of time and was surprisingly decisive about what she wanted in her new home on wheels. She test drove only two before she settled on a sleek travel trailer that could be pulled behind her truck so she could leave the trailer at campgrounds while she went into the fields and woods delivering chemicals and safety equipment to forestry clients.

She wore a triumphant smile as she signed the paperwork then towed it home. As she showed off the long-awaited trailer’s updated interior features to Dad, her voice glowing with pride and excitement, I realized I was just the tiniest bit jealous of her.

At least one of us had her freedom.

The funeral on Saturday was even harder to endure than I’d expected. I couldn’t look at Nanna’s body, lying in the open casket at the church where she’d played the piano every Sunday, couldn’t let myself think about her death or its possible causes, couldn’t look at my mother who, despite all her excitement over her new home, was sobbing and clearly brokenhearted at having to say a final goodbye to her mother. When the new pianist played Nanna’s favorite, “In the Garden,” it was all I could do not to join my mother in sobbing.

The preacher’s words were a blur both at the church and at the burial site in the Larissa Cemetery outside town, where all our family were buried. Even though it was only April, it was already hot enough to make everyone sweat under the glaring sun. The heat baked the mounds of carnations covering the casket, pushing their sweet perfume out into the air. I tried not to breathe deeply, but the stench of those flowers of death seeped inside me, clinging to the lining of my throat and lungs.

I knew I would hate the smell of those flowers for the rest of my life, however long that turned out to be.

After the preacher’s final words were delivered, Mom spoke to all of Nanna’s many friends while I gave Anne, Carrie and Michelle each a quick hug of thanks for coming. As soon as I saw my friends, I realized how much I’d both missed them and dreaded seeing them again. But for that day at least, none of them seemed to expect me to explain anything, which was a relief. Then my parents and I returned to Nanna’s home to change and finish the last of the packing.

Dad had already found a house in town. It was a decrepit, crumbling two-story that might have once been a Victorian. The house looked like something the Addams family might live in. Worse than its appearance was its location, though…it was right across the railroad tracks from the Tomato Bowl, where the local high school and junior high football and soccer games were held. The only upside was that I wouldn’t have a long walk after the home football games next year.

Dad said he’d chosen the house because it was the perfect renovation project to showcase his historical restoration company’s abilities. I hoped they worked fast. Really fast. At least money would be no object. According to him, one of the advantages of being an ancient vampire with the ability to read human minds and actually live through several centuries of history was that he’d gotten really good at picking stocks.

On Sunday, Mom and I said a long, silent and teary goodbye to our home and each other. Then Dad and I moved in to our new home in progress, and Mom moved into her travel trailer and hit the road. True to his word, Dad had the movers set up my old bed in the new house. At least I wouldn’t feel weird sleeping in an unfamiliar bed tonight, just a strange and dusty room surrounded by boxes of my things. I’d washed all my clothing before boxing it up, though, so I would have clean clothes until the washer and dryer were delivered and hooked up sometime next week.

Now if I could only get used to all the creaks and groans of my new home.

Nighttime, when I had nothing to distract me while I waited to fall asleep, was the worst. Even as little kids, Tristan and I had used our built-in abilities as descendants to psychically reach out and connect our minds in our dreams. We’d dream connected so often, especially during our recent months of dating, that it felt weird not to dream about him now. Another habit I was struggling to get used to breaking.

It would be so easy to close my eyes and reach out to him with my mind. To meet him like the hundreds of times I had before, always in the moonlight, usually in an imaginary version of the backyard behind his house or the Circle in the Coleman family woods. To see him smile, feel his fingers lace through mine, his lips against mine…

I lay there in my old bed in my new bedroom in the dark, watching the pine trees in the backyard sway in a breeze as if they were dancing. Dancing like Tristan and I used to do with our arms wrapped around each other as if we were two trees that had grown intertwined, never to be pulled apart. I had been so stupid, so naive to think he and I could make it last in spite of all the people and beliefs and fears against us.

Stifling a groan, I curled into a ball and pressed my pillow over my head, wishing I could press the memories out of my mind.

* * *

The alarm went off way too soon the next morning. Between fighting nightmares of Nanna and memories of Tristan, I hadn’t gotten much sleep. Groaning, I slapped the clock’s off button. Ugh, time to get ready for Charmers practice before school.

The thought made me freeze. Would Tristan be there?

I’d called Mrs. Daniels yesterday to let her know I’d be returning to practice today. I should have asked if Tristan would be there, too. Surely he wouldn’t. His parents would keep him as far away from me as possible. Maybe I’d get extra lucky and they had even pulled him out of the history class we shared every other day, too.

I tried to relax as I got ready for school. I’d considered microwaving a bowl of oatmeal in the kitchen in a feeble attempt to recreate Nanna’s cooking, but one look at the grubby mousetrap of a room and I changed my mind. Vampires couldn’t eat regular food, so Dad probably wouldn’t think to renovate in there for a while. There was no way I could choke down anything from that nasty, cobweb-draped dungeon until I cleaned it up. Besides, knowing my luck lately, if I tried to use the microwave I’d probably end up starting a house fire from the old wiring.

I should tell Dad I was leaving. But where was he? I followed the sound of hammering to the living room—then my feet skidded to a stop. My father had his head stuck inside the fireplace, his entire upper body swallowed within its cavernous darkness. Clouds of soot poofed out with each blow of his tools.

He was wearing…jeans? I’d never once seen him in anything but a suit.

“Uh, Dad?”

He ducked out of the fireplace. “Good morning, Savannah. Sleep well?”

Oh yeah, like a baby. “Um, you’re working on the fireplace yourself?”

“Yes. It just needs a little cleaning to remove the nests inside. Then it should work fine.”

I had a sudden vision of him trying to start a fire and blowing up the house. I cringed. “Shouldn’t you hire a professional?”

“I am more than qualified to serve as a chimney sweep, Savannah.”

Maybe he had a point. He was old enough that he’d probably been around when chimneys were invented. “I’ve got to go. Charmers practice.” I checked my watch. “Which I’m going to be late for if I don’t get moving.”

He nodded. “What time will you be home this evening?”

“I don’t know. We’ve got more practice after school.”

His dark eyebrows shot up, hiding themselves under the wavy black hair that had flopped out of its usual precisely combed style onto his forehead. “You do not know what time the after-school practice will end?” His tone sounded either suspicious or accusing, I couldn’t figure out which.

I stared at him. The man had had almost no involvement in my life for years. Now he’d decided to be a control freak just because I’d been forced to move in with him?

“Savannah, I am not your lackadaisical mother or grandmother. I will need to know your daily schedule with precise times at which to expect you home each day.”

Lackadaisical? Did anybody even use that word anymore? And besides, my mother and grandmother had raised me just fine. Just because I made one mistake that caused a huge mess…

Fine. I saw his point. “Usually I do know what time practice will end. But right now the Charmers are getting ready for our annual Spring Show in a week. So we’ll be practicing every morning before school starting at 6:45 a.m., and again after school until at least seven or eight o’clock. I never know when the evening practices will end exactly, because it depends on when each group of girls decides to quit for the day, and I have to stay until the last person leaves so I can lock up the building. So that’s really the best guess I can give you. Would you like me to call when practice ends each day?”

“Yes, please do. I programmed my number into your phone.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out my phone and tossed me the digital dog leash.

I dropped it into my blue leather Charmers duffel bag and turned toward the freedom of the front door.

“And Savannah?”

I stopped and looked back over my shoulder, trying very hard not to huff out a sigh of impatience. If he kept this up, I’d never get to practice on time.

“If you begin to feel strange in any way, do not wait to call me.” His tone was a stern warning.

Or else I might go on a killing spree before he could get to me and stop me? Yeesh. “Yes, Dad,” I muttered then made a hasty escape.

Annoyance continued to knot my stomach during the short drive across town to the school’s front parking lot.

As I walked across the dark campus, I remembered how scared I had been with the watchers there. Now that I was turning into a full vampire, I was the scariest thing imaginable here.

Shaking my head, I headed up the sports and arts building’s cement ramp toward its blue painted rows of doors and then had to stop as a sharp pain spiked through me.

For the first time in months, Tristan wasn’t waiting for me.

My steps became jerky as I forced my legs to move. I swallowed hard and searched for the right key to unlock the doors.

This is all wrong, a voice at the back of my mind moaned. He should be here, leaning against the doors, as perfect-looking as a catalog model. He should be reaching out to hold my thermos of tea, made fresh by Nanna, while I struggled to think straight.

But I didn’t have my usual cup of tea from Nanna. And I was alone.

Inside, I stopped, too aware that I was the only person in the dark, empty building. I scowled. I had been just fine before Tristan came along. I’d been in this building alone countless times and had never felt lonely.

I had to get used to being on my own again.

I trudged across the foyer, flicked all four light switches up in one swipe, then continued up the stairs, my footsteps echoing in the half-lit stairwell, every step seeming to whisper, “Alone. Alone. Alone.”

Gritting my teeth, I pulled open the upstairs hallway door and entered the pitch-black third-floor hall. The door slammed shut behind me, making my shoulders hunch up.

I pushed onward, my eyes adjusting quickly to the dark. I unlocked the dance room doors and turned on the lights. And froze as I was confronted by another crime scene. Right there by the stereo, Tristan and I had sat on the floor, sharing pizza in the semi-darkness for our first date. And then we’d danced together, a silly waltz to make me laugh, then a slow dance until I’d melted into our first kiss since the fourth grade.

Right there in that dance room was where I’d also first unknowingly drained him of energy.

Enough. I shook myself, breaking free of the paralyzing memories and guilt. I had a job to do.

A familiar ache welled up in my chest and stomach, and this time it wasn’t from the memories. Oh no. Only one person caused this sensation.

I was no longer alone.

I whirled around and sucked in a breath. “Tristan!”

He lounged in the hallway’s entrance, leaning one broad shoulder against the wall, arms crossed. He stared at me, his green eyes the color of a deep pine forest today. “Good morning, Savannah.”

I gulped. So wrong for my heart to leap at the sound of my name spoken in that deep, rumbling voice. So wrong of my feet to want to take off running toward him.

“We need to talk,” he said, his tone like a brush of his fingertips across my cheek.

I struggled to make my body move toward the Charmers director’s office door. Routine. Focus on the morning routine.

I fought to keep my voice even. “What are you doing here? Didn’t your parents—”

“In spite of the local rumors, my parents don’t actually rule the world.”

Frowning, I got the office door unlocked. I walked inside, turned on the overhead lights, then headed for the closet door on shaky legs. “The Clann would disagree with that.”

Closet door unlocked, I reached inside for the jambox and Megavox case. And sucked in another sharp breath as Tristan cupped my upper arms, his big hands warm and gentle on my bare skin below the sleeves of my T-shirt. I nearly moaned at the contact.

“Sav, please stop for a minute and listen to me.”

Oh sweet lord. How was I supposed to withstand that soft, deep voice pleading with me? I closed my eyes and prayed for strength as everything inside me begged me to turn around and hug him.

“I’m sorry about your grandmother.”

His words were velvet-covered blows to my stomach. I couldn’t breathe.

“You have to know I never imagined anything like that would happen.”

“But it did,” I croaked, still facing the closet. “Because of us.” Because of me.

He pressed his forehead to the top of my head, his sigh warm in my hair. “We didn’t do that. The Clann did. I know how much you loved her. We tried to save her. You, me, your dad and mine, even Dr. Faulkner. She knew you loved her and were trying to help her.”

Bitter acid rose up as a sour taste at the back of my mouth. “She shouldn’t have even been there. And she wouldn’t have been if we hadn’t broken the rules. We never should have gotten involved with each other.”

“No, the Clann and the vamp council never should have barred us from seeing each other.”

Strength slowly seeped back into my body. “Keeping us away from each other was one of the few things they did right.”

“Savannah, I love you,” he whispered, his voice harsh, as if the words were torn from his lungs. “And I know you love me.”

I wouldn’t lie to him. I nodded.

“Then why can’t you see how this isn’t about whether to follow the rules or not? The rules are wrong. If ever two people were meant for each other, we’re it. We don’t have to let them control our lives. You and I determine our future, not them.”

I turned to face him then, needing to see if he was truly this delusional. Didn’t he get it? This wasn’t about what I wanted, or even what he wanted anymore.

“I’ll leave the Clann,” he said, speaking fast now. “You know I never cared about being in it anyways. Then they can’t stop us. Their rules won’t apply to us anymore.”

“And break your parents’ hearts?” Oh lord, how badly I wanted it to be just him and me, free from the rules, free to be together. But then we’d be just like my parents, always on the run, always hiding. There was nowhere we could go to be together beyond the reach of the Clann or the vamp council. Even if he wasn’t in the Clann anymore, he’d still be a descendant. And I would still be a vampire.

His lips thinned. “They’ll get over it, trust me.”

“And the vampire council?”

“We’ll talk to them, convince them that our being together isn’t a danger to their peace treaty.”

“Tristan, you don’t get it. We’re not Romeo and Juliet. There’s a reason the Clann and the council hate and fear each other. We’re a danger to each other, whether you’re in the Clann or not. You could set me on fire with one snap of your fingers. And I could kill you just as easily. As long as vamps and descendants are each others’ biggest threats, they’re always going to be enemies. You and I will never get permission to be together.”

“Just because they have the power to kill each other doesn’t mean they have to. We can show them that, make them see that they can choose to coexist in peace. Don’t you see? You and me together…we’re the proof they need to make them believe it can be done.”

“Not everything’s a simple choice like that.”

“Sure it is. You could have bitten me a thousand times by now, but you never did. Right?”

“What about all the times I kissed you?”

He hesitated. “So you took a little energy. It was worth it.”

“It put you in danger. I put you in danger. I took a little bit of your life every time we kissed. That’s not a choice I can make, either. It’s automatic. There’s no way to turn that off.”

He scowled. “So we’ll keep working around it. You’re not a danger to me.”

He was an idiot. Or suicidal. How could he not see the truth, how impossible this whole situation was? No matter how much we loved each other, no amount of love or wishing would change the fact that I was a threat to his life every second we were alone together. Even now, right this second, he was in danger. And he refused to see it.

I would save him from himself and make him see.

I stepped closer to him and rose up on tiptoe, finally giving in to the need to press against him. He groaned, wrapped his arms around me, and ducked his head.

I kissed him, parting his lips, purposefully deepening the kiss past sweetness straight into mind-wrecking loss of control. His energy poured into me, a heady rush of power that sang through my veins like liquid lightning.

He moaned into my mouth, and even his breath was food. I didn’t even have to work for it. All I had to do to drain him was kiss him. There was no internal on and off switch, no controlling the flow of energy from him to me. I was an endless, bottomless cup that would take every drop of his life until he was gone. And there was nothing I could do to change that ability.

He staggered backward to the wall, pulling me with him. And still we kissed, his fingers spread wide over my back, mine threaded into the soft, unruly curls at the nape of his neck. His heart pounded against my chest, its rhythm slowly growing fainter.

I was killing him. And part of me didn’t want to stop.

His knees shook against my thighs then gave out. He slid down the wall to the floor.

Only then did I break off the kiss with a gasp and step away from him. He sat on the gray industrial carpeting, struggling for breath, and that struggle brought tears to my eyes.

“How do you feel?” I whispered.

“Wow,” he whispered, his eyes dazed.

My hands ached to reach out to him again, to pull him to his feet. To pull him closer for another kiss. “Can you stand up?”

He laughed, unaware that I was crumbling to pieces inside. “You’ll have to give me a couple of minutes to recover here.”

He’d just proven my point. And my biggest fear.

“How can you refuse to see how dangerous I am to you? How dangerous every vamp is to every descendant? You can’t even stand up after one kiss from me. If another vampire were here right now, would you have enough energy to protect yourself?”

He frowned, his eyes blinking fast as if to clear his vision. He was so stubborn. But I would save him, no matter what it took. I had to. I couldn’t live in a world without him in it, even if I couldn’t be with him.

I leaned closer to him until my lips hovered over the vein pulsing sluggishly at the side of his neck. I could hear his heartbeat, faint and slow like a low chord softly played on an unseen piano over and over. He could never know how precious that music would always be to me.

The memory of how sweet and good his blood had tasted filled me with such an incredible ache that I was momentarily frozen.

I pushed the memory away. Just more proof that I was a danger to him every second we were together.

I pressed a shaky kiss to the side of his cheek instead, breathing in his crisp scent, feeling the rasp of stubble from a few whiskers he’d missed shaving this morning in front of his ear.

“No matter how much I love you, no matter how much I wish I could change what I am, I can’t. And neither can you. Sometimes love doesn’t conquer all. Sometimes we just have to let go. The Clann and the council, they just want to keep us safe from each other. Listen to them. Help me keep my promise to them. Let this go.”

Let me go.

Help me find a way to let you go.

Help me rip out my own heart here, I might as well have said.

CHAPTER 5

TRISTAN

Red strands of her hair tickled my cheeks, their lavender scent filling my nose and adding to the buzz in my head. Did she have any idea how much she wrecked my mind, my control? How much I’d missed even the scent of her perfume all last week? How, even now, without any power to stop her or protect myself, I was still happier than I’d ever been?

When I was around her, my world made sense. I knew who I was. I’d never known what I’d wanted out of life before her, other than to play pro football. I’d drifted through each day, doing exactly what my parents expected of me. I’d dated other girls. A lot of them. Blondes, brunettes, redheads, they’d all made me feel the same…nothing more than casual friendship. They were great to hang out with, but none had ever made me wonder what they were thinking or doing when we were apart. I never wondered how they were getting along with their parents. I never worried that no one else recognized how amazing they truly were. I didn’t miss them when I couldn’t talk to them, and I hadn’t been torn to pieces when I stopped dating them.

I’d never needed any girl like I needed Savannah.

Sluggish as my thoughts had become, I heard the goodbye in her voice, in her words, saw it in her tear-filled eyes. She was letting me go.

I had to stop her.

She turned away, dragging a sleeve across her cheeks as she left the office and headed down the hallway toward the back stairs that led to the stage.

I struggled to my feet. My legs didn’t want to work, but I forced them to move. I caught up with her halfway down the hall. “Turn me.”

She stopped so suddenly I had to grab the wall to keep from running over her. She looked at me over her shoulder, her eyes pale silver now and round with shock. Then she was on the move again. “I can’t.”

“Think about it, Sav. If I was a vamp, we wouldn’t have any problems, would we? You couldn’t drain me, and the vamps and Clann wouldn’t have to worry about protecting their peace treaty.” And my parents wouldn’t have an excuse to keep us apart anymore, either.

“There’s a reason I’m the first known dhampir of our kinds, Tristan. Descendants’ bodies reject vamp blood. Every descendant who has ever attempted to turn died.”

“So they claim. But when’s the last time anyone actually tried it? I’m willing to risk it. There’s got to be a spell to help the process or—”

“No way. I’m not risking your life.” Backstage now in the pitch black of the wings, I heard her set down the portable sound system with a thud. Metal clanged as she opened the fuse box on the wall, probably using her vamp eyesight to see in the dark. The stage lights came on.

“I could find another vampire to help me.”

“No, you can’t. Everyone knows who you are. No vamp would go against the council like that.” She slammed the fuse box door shut, the sound echoing in the empty wings. Then she took the portable sound system out to the front corner of the stage, crouching down in the shadows beyond the reach of the overhead stage lights in order to set up the music in the jambox.

I squatted in the shadows beside her as I always did during sound system setup, our knees touching, her arm brushing mine as she worked. In the beginning last fall, I’d done it to try to get her to recognize her feelings for me. That had been before she’d known even kissing me could be a problem. Back when all I’d needed to do was get her to admit she was falling for me.

Now we knew what we felt for each other, and it still wasn’t enough. Not as long as my parents, the Clann and the vamp council were determined to keep us apart.

“What if I got everyone to change their minds about us?” I had no idea how I could pull that off. But there had to be a way.

She looked at me, her still watery eyes filled with a flash of hope that squeezed my insides like a vise. “How?”

I didn’t have an answer yet. But I would, no matter what it took. “I’ll find a way.”

“Mr. Coleman, what are you doing here?” Mrs. Daniels called out as she entered the theater through the audience area doors. “I don’t believe you’re supposed to be helping us anymore.”

Great, just what I needed. “That’s a misunderstanding—”

“I don’t think so. I spoke with your parents last week. Their intentions were very clear.” Mrs. Daniels took her usual seat in the back row.

Savannah quickly wiped her face dry then went back to working on the sound system. Obviously she would be no help here.

I jumped off the stage and strode up the aisle to Mrs. Daniels’s row. The woman’s gaze was every bit as frosty as Savannah’s when she was trying to shut someone out.

“Ma’am, I still want to help out with the team,” I insisted, trying my most charming smile on her. It always worked on the teachers and the ladies in the front office.

One blond eyebrow arched. “No one stays on the team in any capacity without their parents’ consent, not even volunteers on the stage crew. School rules. You’ll have to take it up with your parents if you want to help us out again. Until then, I’ll have to ask you to go to the front office, where you’ve been reassigned as an office aide for your first periods from now on.” She flipped a page on her clipboard, silently dismissing me.

Great. Now how was I supposed to talk to Savannah, be with her at all, without the Clann seeing? The only class we had together was history every other day with Mr. Smythe, Dylan Williams and the Brat Twins…four descendants who would be extra vigilant in spying on us now.

I glanced back at Savannah. Her shoulders hunched in response, but she refused to look up.

Fine. Savannah had made herself clear. Until I found a way to change the rules, she wouldn’t see me, and there would be no point in arguing with Mrs. Daniels.

But Savannah was wrong if she thought I’d given up on us. I would find a way to change the rules. Somehow.

SAVANNAH

My friends fell silent as I joined them at our usual table in the cafeteria on my first day back at school. I wasn’t hungry, but I’d skipped breakfast, so I’d grabbed a bag of chips and a Coke. And tried to ignore the ache that being within a hundred yards of Tristan always caused. Usually he sat outside at a tree during lunch. Today he was sitting by his sister at the Clann table and staring at me.

In the silence, my chip bag cracked like a gunshot as I tore it open. But I’d pulled too hard. The bag ripped in half, exploding harvest-cheddar-flavored chips all over my lap and the table in front of me.

I sighed. “Good thing I wasn’t hungry.”

“Sav…” Anne began, and I cringed at the hesitant sympathy in her voice. I knew what was coming. Most of the Charmers and Mrs. Daniels had all used that same tone of voice to offer their condolences about my grandmother earlier this morning.

I looked up, found all three of my friends staring at me with drawn, sympathetic faces. I held up a hand. “I know y’all are probably worried about me. And I appreciate it, really I do. But I’m okay. Honest.”

They nodded too quickly and too hard.

Desperate to change the subject, I pasted on a smile and looked at Michelle. “So what’s the latest gossip? Did I miss anything good last week?”

Michelle opened her mouth, then bit her lower lip. “Um, actually, all the hottest gossip has been about Tristan and…you.”

Oh no, we were not going there. “Okay, then I’ve got some news. I moved in with my dad last week.”

“What the heck?” Anne gasped. “But how…I mean, I thought he lived in another state. Will you have to transfer?”

“Nope,” I told her. “He bought that old Victorian place across the railroad tracks. You know, the one you can see from the Tomato Bowl? He’s fixing it up as a local showcase house for his renovation company.”

All three pairs of eyes widened.

“Oh, Sav, that’s terrible,” Michelle whispered, as if I’d just stated that I had some incurable disease. “Everyone knows that house is haunted.”

“And extremely unsafe,” Carrie added. “No one’s lived in it for decades. It must be in terrible condition. Probably filled with lead plumbing and asbestos, too.”

“Well, it does need a lot of work,” I replied, making a mental note to get some bottled water to keep at the house. “But that’s my dad’s specialty. His business’s whole focus is on renovating historical homes and restoring them to their former glory. So he’ll probably have it all fixed up in no time.” I hoped.

“Have you seen any ghosts yet?” Anne asked before taking a long chug of her soda.

“No.” I laughed. “It is a little spooky though. Dad says it gets so noisy at night because all the wood and plumbing expands or contracts or something with the change in temperature from day to night. My room has a great view, though, and it’s about four times the size of my old one. So everyone will finally have plenty of room for our sleepovers.”

I smiled and looked around, expecting them to at least get excited about that. Instead, everyone was suddenly very busy eating or gathering up their trash.

They were freaked out by my new home, and they hadn’t even seen the inside yet.

I thought about the houses they all lived in…Carrie’s brick lakeside home, Anne’s pristine modern brick home in town by Buckner Park. Even Michelle’s house, while not always the tidiest because of all her little brothers and sisters, was fairly new.

And now they thought they’d get lead poisoning if they came over to my house.

I snagged a chip from my lap and chomped on it in silence. Then I felt it…the hairs at the back of my neck stood on end, like someone was staring at me.

Slowly I looked over my shoulder.

Tristan.

My lungs tightened, refusing to expand. Would he come over, insist on arguing with me again about things I had no power to change, make another scene in front of the Clann kids?

But he only sat there staring, his jaw set, his eyes that shade of dark emerald they always turned when he was angry or upset.

Maybe he’d finally started to see the reality of our situation.

My head said I should be relieved.

But all I felt was the aching need to cry.

TRISTAN

I tried to find that old confidence inside me that I was right and somehow I’d find a way to change the minds of the vamp council and my parents. But my parents refused to talk to me about it, my mother even going so far as to threaten to take away my truck keys and ground me if I said Savannah’s name one more time in her presence. And I had no way to directly contact the vamp council.

By Friday night, as I sat in the high school theater while the Charmers performed their Spring Show onstage, I knew there was only one solution to all of this.

I had to become a vampire.

I had no way to convince the Clann or the council to change their rules. But if I became a vamp, then there wouldn’t be any danger in being with Savannah. They’d have to leave us alone.

Savannah would never turn me herself, even if I tried to make her lose control of the bloodlust. She believed the myth that vampire blood killed descendants. I’d have to convince another vamp to do the deed. But who? I knew only one vampire. Her dad. And I had no idea how to convince Mr. Colbert to turn me, or even where they lived.

I knew someone who might know their new address, though. And she was in the phone book. I slipped out of the theater to make the call. Thankfully she answered.

“Hey, Michelle, it’s Tristan Coleman. From first period office aide—”

A loud squeak made me hold the phone away from my ear. What the heck?

“Michelle? Are you still there?” I asked, wondering if her phone had died.

“Yep! I’m here,” she breathed.

Okay. “I know it’s weird for me to call you like this, but I was hoping you could do me a huge favor. Do you know Savannah’s new address? I need to talk to her father.”

“Say no more,” she said, her voice rising with each word. “I always thought you two would make the perfect couple.”

That made two of us.

“They bought that old haunted house across the tracks from the Tomato Bowl. You know, the green-and-white Victorian?”

“Yeah, I know the one you’re talking about.” I was already headed down the ramp to my truck in the back parking lot. “Thanks, Michelle.”

“You know, Savannah’s been really sad this week. Everyone says it’s because you two were secretly dating and then broke up, but she won’t talk about it at all. Did you dump her?”

“No. It was the other way around actually.”

Silence. Finally she said, “Well, I hope you get back together.”

“I’m sure trying.”

“Good luck!”

I thanked her, then ended the call, got in my truck and headed across town, trying to plan what in the world I could possibly say to convince her dad to turn me when I couldn’t even convince his daughter.

At the house, I parked by the curb, turned off the engine, then sat for a few minutes listening to the ticking of my truck’s engine as it cooled down.

Was I doing the right thing? Or should I do what everyone else wanted and let her go?

I closed my eyes, and as always Savannah’s face was right there in my mind waiting for me. I had a thousand memories of her…as a sweet little girl with flowers in her hair giving me the softest of kisses on the playground in the fourth grade… dressed as a breathtaking angel dancing barefoot with me in the leaves outside this year’s masq ball.... She feared she would lose control and kill me, but all I knew was the innocent, loving side of her. Everyone wanted me to see her as some kind of monster. But I didn’t know how to do that.

I couldn’t give up on her. Not yet. Not if there was one last shot at making everything right again.

I got out of my truck and walked across the front yard, still clueless as to what the heck I would say to her dad. The front porch creaked as I stepped onto it. I paused, my pulse pounding. Was I nervous about the creepy house, or talking to her dad?

Both, I decided, but kept going anyway. The loud whine of a saw started somewhere deep inside the house, and I froze at the front door. A chain saw? Oh man, this was like every horror movie I’d ever seen come straight to life. Still, I went ahead and knocked. A vampire would hear me even over the saw.

The noise stopped, and too soon, the door opened.

The only time I’d seen Savannah’s father was on the return trip from the vamp council’s headquarters in Paris. Mr. Colbert had appeared every inch the vampire then in a polished suit, his emotionless face set like carved marble.

Tonight, he wore a button-up shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows, and jeans, both covered in dirt and sawdust. He seemed nothing more than an average guy hard at work on his house.

And I’d come to ask him to turn me into a vampire.

Mr. Colbert didn’t seem surprised that I was there. But he didn’t invite me inside, either. “Hello again, Tristan. How may I help you this evening? Savannah is not home.”

“I know that, sir. That’s why I’m here now. I need your help.”

He stared at me, unmoving. I’d hoped we could have this talk inside. Not that it would have been any easier there. I cleared my throat.

“I love Savannah. And this isn’t some teenage hormone thing, either. I’ve loved her since we were kids. I’ve never felt anything even close to this with anyone else. And I know she loves me, too.”

My heart pounded harder. It didn’t help that he could probably hear it. My hands turned hot and damp. I shoved them inside my front jeans pockets.

“You know the promises she has made.” He wasn’t asking me.

I nodded anyway. “The council and the Clann are afraid she’ll kill me and break the treaty. Savannah’s afraid of that, too. But I think there’s another option.”

A single thick black eyebrow rose in silent question. The way he was able to stand so still was more than a little unnerving.

If I was successful tonight, would I be able to freeze like that, too?

“You could make me a vampire.”

Seconds ticked by. A breeze kicked up, making the trees rustle behind me. The wind wasn’t strong enough to dry the sweat running down my back, though.

Finally, Mr. Colbert stepped away from the door. “Come inside.”

Was that his way of agreeing to turn me?

Heart racing, I entered the house, my every step making the hardwood floors creak and groan. He shut the door behind me then led the way to a dark maroon leather couch in the room to the right. Sawdust made the floor slippery and the air smell like pine, and tools lay all over the place.

He gestured toward the couch, and we sat at opposite ends, angled to face each other.

As soon as I was seated, he asked, “You are really willing to give up your humanity for my daughter?”

I didn’t hesitate. At least this much I was sure about. “Yes, sir.”

He studied my face. “You seem confident. But perhaps that is because you do not know what being a vampire is truly like. Shall I tell you?”

Less sure I wanted to hear this, I forced a nod. Might as well find out the gory details of what I was getting into. Though part of me would rather find out later once I was turned and couldn’t be tempted to chicken out.

“We vampires are an evolved species,” he began. “Things that were once dire problems, such as daylight, are no longer threats to us. It may seem that we are the perfect beings, able to walk among humans, appearing relatively normal, with only fire, staking or decapitation to worry about. We are immortals. No sickness will ever harm us, and we will never age past the point in life at which each of us is turned. We are able to read the minds of fellow vampires and humans, but not descendants. We gain great speed, strength and agility.”

He paused, letting silence fill the room so long I was forced to reply. “Doesn’t sound like being a vampire is all that tough so far.”

His silver gaze, a more intense version of Savannah’s, locked onto me. “Yes, it would seem so. But within hours of first awakening as a vampire, you feel a thirst that is like nothing you could ever imagine. It is the bloodlust clawing at your very insides, the craving for human blood, and any human’s blood will do. In the first few weeks, many vampires accidentally kill even their loved ones because of this blinding thirst.”

Okay, not so great to be a vamp in the beginning. “But it goes away, right?”

“The bloodlust lessens after a while. But it never completely goes away. And being around someone like yourself with such powerful, magic-laced blood in your veins presents special challenges. That power calls to even the oldest of vampires as strongly as if we have just been turned. Even at my age of over three hundred years, I find it difficult to be around a descendant for long.”

I shifted uneasily, making the couch creak. “But you can do it. I mean, you married Sav’s mom. And you were around a bunch of descendants in the woods a couple weeks ago and you were okay.”

His lips stretched into a cold smile. “With Savannah’s mother, I had the assistance of a charm her mother created for me—a spell that only Savannah’s grandmother knew, which dampened the bloodlust and made it bearable. And in the forest with the Clann, it is true that I managed not to attack anyone, but it was a great struggle not to. If I had been younger, I might not have had the control to stop myself.”

I turned my head to stare at the empty black opening of the fireplace. “So I wouldn’t be able to be around my family for a while.”

“If it even worked. Unfortunately, it is impossible to successfully turn a descendant.”

I stared at him again. “I’ve heard the stories. I don’t believe them. They’re just lies to keep descendants from trying to become vamps.”

He was gone and back so fast I felt a breeze, returning to stand by the coffee table with a knife and two saucers. “I will prove it is the truth. Cut yourself, just a little, please, and catch the blood in a saucer. Then add my blood to yours and see what happens.” He sliced his finger, and a dark red puddle rapidly formed in one saucer. Then he handed me the knife, his finger already healed as if it had never been cut in the first place. “When you are done, we will continue this discussion outside.”

Then he was gone, leaving the front door open. Apparently he didn’t want to test his control around a bleeding descendant. Was it really that big a problem?

I cut my finger like he had, letting the blood drop onto the clean saucer. When the pool was roughly the size of a dime, I used the knife to scrape up a few drops of his blood from the other saucer and drip it into mine.

I’d thought he and everyone else had been lying. But when I saw the two combined types of blood turn into one thick, gooey black circle that smelled like rotting roadkill left in the sun, then sizzle and give off tendrils of smoke, I knew it wasn’t a myth. And that was from a few drops of vamp blood. What would more vamp blood do inside a descendant’s body?

There was no way to turn me into a vampire.

I noticed a piece of paper stuck to the back of the saucer. A Band-Aid. I tore its thin wrapper open with my teeth and covered the cut on my finger, then headed out to the porch on shaking legs.

“If you knew, why bother telling me what being a vamp is like?” He’d been toying with me since I got here, making me think I had a shot at becoming a vampire and being with Savannah forever. If he hadn’t been her father, I would have been tempted to punch him.

“So you would know just how impossible it is for you two to be together.”

I stared at the street lamp, its light throwing long shadows across the yard.

Sheer desperation made me say, “There has to be a way we can be together. If you love her, tell me what to do, what to say to make them change the rules. You know it can be done. You did it yourself. You married her mother. Give us the chance to have that, too.”

“But it did not work. Even after Savannah’s mother was kicked out of the Clann, our union was a danger to the peace treaty because of what it produced.”

“You mean Savannah.”

He nodded. “You two could produce another dhampir like her if she does not fully turn vampire first. And the council, as well as the Clann, will never allow that to happen again.”

An image flashed before me of a little girl with curly red hair like her momma. And maybe green eyes like her daddy. I’d never thought about being a dad someday, but something clenched in my chest all the same, making it hard to breathe.

Mr. Colbert didn’t seem to notice. “That child would be a danger to vampires and descendants alike, even more than Savannah is. Like Savannah, it could grow into a fully immortal vampire with its father’s legendary Coleman magical abilities, or into the next Coleman witch with the speed, strength and agility of a vampire. Either way, it would present enormous risks. Risks that the council—and I am sure the Clann—will never consider acceptable.”

I couldn’t be turned into a vampire. And as long as I was still human and Savannah could still have kids, the Clann and the council wouldn’t let us be together. “What happens if she fully turns?”

“There will still always be the risk that she could end your life. Your parents will not care whether you are a member of the Clann. You will always be their child, and they will do whatever is necessary to protect you.” He turned to me now, placing a hand on my shoulder. “If there was a way for you and my daughter to be happy together, I would do everything in my power to assist you. But there is no way the rules will be changed for you. And I can promise you from experience that even the strongest of love cannot long survive being on the run, or some of the tactics either side might employ in an attempt to draw you out of hiding.” His hand fell away. “The constant hiding alone drove Savannah’s mother away from me.”

I wanted to believe he was wrong, that things would be different for Savannah and me. That what we had together could survive anything, including being on the run from the council and the Clann.

But what if he was right? The Clann had already taken Sav’s grandmother from her. Would my parents be desperate enough to go after Sav’s mother next? Or her father? Would the vamps go after Emily to get to me?

Savannah and I could never live with ourselves if any of that happened. Savannah was struggling to deal with her grandmother’s death as it was.

And that’s when it hit me. There was nothing left to try. The Clann and the council were going to get their way, no matter how much Savannah and I wished otherwise.

No amount of football game losses could have prepared me for the crushing defeat that slammed me now. I’d never been in this situation before. I’d always been able to find a way to get what I wanted in life. Not because I was spoiled, as Emily teased me, but because Dad had always said if you wanted something enough and kept working at it, you’d find a way.

He was wrong. The one thing I wanted more than anything else in life was to be with Savannah. But I couldn’t. Not now, and if her father was to be believed, not ever. Not as long as the Clann and the council hated and feared each other.

I made my feet carry me down the porch steps to my truck, and then I headed for the prison that my home had become.

CHAPTER 6

SAVANNAH

Tristan had given up.

Until that moment, I hadn’t realized just how much faith I secretly had in him. Tristan was a fighter at heart, and he almost always got what he wanted. He wanted us to be together again, so if there was a real solution, he would find it.

Except this time he obviously hadn’t.

He didn’t have to tell me it was truly over. I could feel the frustration and despair rolling off of him every time we passed each other in the main hall between classes. I could see it in the bleakness in his eyes, in the defeated slump of his shoulders. And most of all in how he couldn’t seem to look me in the eye anymore.

It was over.

I tried to tell myself that it wasn’t the end of the world, that maybe someday my heart would heal and I’d find someone new.

When the lies didn’t work, I tried to throw myself into school and Charmers stuff with the hope that, if I could just stay busy enough, then eventually I would find a way to breathe deeply again without that aching need to cry.

There wasn’t a real sense of time passing over the next few weeks while I waited for our sophomore year to end. At home, I filled every spare second by helping Dad remove old wallpaper and flooring in the house. Unfortunately, this still left me with far too much free time now that the Charmers Spring Show and team auditions had passed. Team auditions day had been the one day when I actually hadn’t had a single free moment for four blessed hours, as I’d had to shoulder all the manager workload while both of my fellow sophomore managers successfully re-auditioned for the team. I tried to be happy for them, and happy that it left me as the only choice for head manager for next year. Most of all, I tried not to regret the fact that the vamp council had banned me from ever dancing in public again so I wouldn’t accidentally reveal my vamp side to humans. I doubted I could even remember how to dance now anyways.

In March, the team also held officer auditions. Mrs. Daniels had me stay late after school that day to run the music while she and two judges scored the candidates on their officer solo and group routines. Bethany Brookes became one of the junior lieutenant officers, which didn’t surprise anyone. She was a good leader for the team, always willing to help others, always so happy and sweet and outgoing. It was like she had this perpetual ray of light beaming on her everywhere she went. Probably why her nickname on the dance team was Lil Miss Sunshine.

I wished I could be like her. But everything about my life was the polar opposite of hers. While Bethany was spinning in the spotlight, I was huddled in the dark backstage, and I couldn’t find a way out. I wanted to be the girl I was a year ago, before I got sick and learned all my family’s secrets, before I took a chance and let myself fall for a boy I could never have. Before Nanna died, and Mom was gone all the time on the road.

But I couldn’t go back, and I couldn’t change what I’d done or stop what I was now becoming. All I could do was fake a smile for my friends at lunch every day and pretend everything was all right.

And make sure I never looked back over my shoulder at the Clann table or the boy I could never be with again.

“Savannah?” Anne asked, her voice louder than usual in the cafeteria.

I jumped, knocking over my drink in the process. We all dived for napkins to sop up the spill while I muttered apologies. Well, there went my liquid lunch. All other food smelled too gross to eat lately.

“Are you in?” Anne repeated once Lake Savannah was managed on the table.

“In?” I stared at her in confusion. I really needed to stop spacing out so much around others.

“To go shopping this weekend,” Michelle answered, staring at me. When I didn’t answer, she added, “For dresses for the semiformal spring dance? We’re going to the mall in Tyler this Saturday.” Her tiny frame practically bounced in her seat.

A semiformal dance? Why would I want to go to that?

Carrie stared at me as if I were a new species of germ under a microscope.

Anne just rolled her eyes. “Earth to Miss Space Cadet. The dance is in two weeks. We’re all going. Including you.”

Cringing, I opened my mouth to argue.

Anne shook her head, her chestnut-colored ponytail swinging wildly. “No way, don’t even think about bailing on me. These two have dates. I don’t. Therefore you will be coming with me. I am not standing on the sidelines alone the whole night.”

“Then why go—” I began.

“For the dresses, of course!” Anne grinned. “Hey, don’t look at me like that. Even tomboys like me enjoy playing princess every once in a while.”

Carrie snickered.

Anne ignored her. “Come on, Sav. You never do anything with us anymore. Just because we’re not cool like your precious Charmers…”

It was my turn to groan and roll my eyes. “Don’t start with that again.”

Anne bared her teeth in the semblance of a smile. “Then don’t make me! Come shopping with us. Come to the dance. Pretend to be human again for a change.”

I froze. Did they know…?

No. No way could they guess my secrets. I was just being paranoid.

But maybe, just to be safe, I should try harder to fit in and be normal. “Fine.” I sighed, already regretting giving in. “Let’s go shopping this weekend.”

Michelle squealed and started raving about some prom magazines she’d bought to help prep us for the occasion. I nodded and tried to look interested.

Suddenly, the full meaning of Anne’s words registered with me.

“Wait a second.” I turned toward her. “Why aren’t you going with Ron?” She and Ron Abernathy had been dating for months, just like Tristan and me. In fact, their first date had been at the Charmers’ masq ball last October.

Where Tristan and I had danced together outside in the leaves, the full moon’s light making his fake knight’s armor shine as if it had been plated in real silver…

“…so we’re not seeing each other anymore,” Anne finished in a mumble.

I’d spaced out again and missed hearing her answer. Geez, I was a crappy friend lately. “I’m sorry, it was too loud in here. What did you say?”

Anne stared at me then shrugged. “I said he and I got into an argument and I broke up with him. We’re not together anymore.”

“What was the fight about?”

Anne gathered up her things. “It was…family stuff. I really don’t want to talk about it. And the bell’s about to ring anyway. Come on, let’s go.”

I opened my mouth to argue but the bell rang, cutting me off. Then I got a good look at the set of Anne’s chin. Stubborn as she was, I wouldn’t get anything more about it from her today.

Obviously something major had happened that I’d missed either because I hadn’t been paying attention or she hadn’t wanted to tell me. When had she broken up with Ron? Had she been upset and I hadn’t even noticed? Had she tried to call to talk about it?

I caught up to her at the trash cans. “Anne, wait. At least tell me when you broke up with him.”

She took her time pouring her soda into the trash. “It was the week after your grandma…”

Oh. So that’s why I hadn’t heard about it. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you. That week was—”

She gave a quick shake of her head. “Don’t worry about it. I would have been out of it, too. Ready for third period?”

Part of me wanted to push her harder, find out what had happened. She had seemed completely blissed out every time Ron was around. What had changed?

Then again, who was I to try and pry the details of a painful story out of her? It wasn’t like I’d told her anything about my own breakup with Tristan. Or how Nanna had really died, or my family’s many secrets....

Yeah, I was definitely in no position to be nosy.

But it was one more thing between us pushing our friendship apart, and I didn’t know how to fix it.

And yet, I had to try.

* * *

I did my best to stay in the present and pay attention that Saturday when we all went dress shopping in Tyler, first at the mall then at several boutiques Michelle had looked up. I wanted to care about dresses and hairstyles and the merits of gold jewelry versus silver and rhinestones versus pearls. Maybe if I pretended hard enough, I could forget about the reality of my crazy, messed-up life and be normal again, at least for a little while. And maybe then the growing distance between me and my friends would disappear.

I tried to act excited as I gave Michelle total freedom to put together my look for the dance. But she didn’t make it easy when she picked out a long black satin dress with a plunging neckline and sequined straps. Black. On a vampire. It was so cliché it was ridiculous. Except she didn’t know what I was turning into, and she insisted it made my pale skin and red hair glow. More like glow in the dark. Still, what did I care how I looked? I wouldn’t be there with Tristan, and I would never be interested in anyone else. So as long as it made Michelle happy, it was fine with me.

“Hey, Sav, are you okay?” Michelle asked, surprising me from my thoughts as I sat in Anne’s desk chair the following Saturday night. I hadn’t even noticed her walk over.

Anne continued to tease Carrie mercilessly about being too wimpy to let Michelle apply her mascara. Carrie calmly ignored her as she sat on the daybed and put on mascara with the help of a small compact mirror.

“I’m fine,” I lied to Michelle, having to swallow back a lump so I could talk.

Carrie suddenly swiped Anne on the tip of the nose with the mascara wand, leaving a big spot of black. Anne screeched and stole the mirror, then licked her finger to wash off the spot. She called Carrie a rude name then stuck her wet finger in Carrie’s ear, making the blonde shriek out a few choice words about Anne’s germs.

“Watch your mouth, missy!” Carrie’s mother yelled from the living room where all three sets of their parents waited, no doubt armed with cameras and video recorders.

My mother was on the road somewhere in Arkansas tonight, unaware I was even going to the dance. I hadn’t mentioned it to her, and apparently neither had Dad. And of course the idea of being here to record the night in a scrapbook had probably never even occurred to my dad.

Did vampires scrapbook?

Probably not. They wouldn’t want a visual record of just how long they had lived.

“But Mom—” Carrie began.

“Carrie Lynn, you watch that mouth or you’ll go to that dance with a mouthful of soap.”

That made me crack my first sincere smile of the evening.

Michelle giggled, then dropped to her knees beside me on the thick carpet. “It’s good to see you smiling again.”

I blinked at her, unsure how to respond. “Sorry. Guess I’ve been a bit of a downer lately.”

She shrugged. “I would be too if I lost a guy that hot and then he turned around and started dating Bethany Brookes like it was no big deal.” Scowling, she sat back on her bare feet. “I thought you two were going to get back together! Especially after he called me the night of the Charmers Spring Show.”

Wait, what? It felt like my eyes were about to pop out of my head as I struggled to choose which question to ask first. And how did she even know I’d been dating him? I hadn’t told anyone but Anne. Someone else must have blabbed. Maybe someone in the Clann, like one of the Brat Twins? Or maybe a Charmer…one of the dancers or managers might have put two and two together after noticing Tristan and I were both gone from school and Spring Show practice at the same time and then he quit volunteering to help the team.

That answered how Michelle might have heard about us, but not the rest of it.

I took a breath and started with one question at a time. “He’s dating Bethany?”

She nodded, her hazel eyes big and solemn. “Rumor has it they’re going to the dance together.”

Wow, he sure waited a long time to get over me and move on.

Once again, I found myself trapped in a battle between my head and my heart. Logically I knew I should be happy for him. Bethany would make him laugh, go to parties with him, eat lunch in the cafeteria with him and the descendants. His parents would probably adore her, too. If I really loved him, I should want nothing but the best for him, right?

My heart said it infinitely preferred for him to be as miserable as I was for the rest of his life.

I sighed and moved on to the next question. “Why did he call you the night of the Spring Show?”

“He wanted to know where you had moved to. He needed to talk to your dad, I think. He made it sound like he wanted to get your dad’s permission to date you publicly or something.”

My breath caught in my lungs and refused to budge. There was only one possible reason that he would want to talk to my dad. And it wasn’t to get permission to date me publicly. Dad didn’t have that kind of clout with the vamp council. But he could turn a human into a vampire.

Why was I surprised that Tristan would have asked my dad to turn him? Of course Tristan would have tried everything he could think of to get us back together.

Michelle glanced over her shoulder then shot to her feet. “Anne, you stop that right now! You’re going to ruin my creation.”

Still in shock, I barely had time to move my feet out of her path before she took off across the room to grab Anne’s wrist and wrench a brush away.

“But you left all this down,” Anne complained from where she was leaning down in front of her vanity trying to pin up the hair at the nape of her neck.

“Those curls are supposed to be down,” Michelle argued, batting Anne’s hands away. “It adds to the cascade effect.”

“More like the sloppy effect,” Anne muttered back. “It looks like I didn’t use enough hairspray or something.”

I clutched the sides of the chair by my legs, staring down at the black satin shimmering over my knees. Tristan had gone to ask my dad to turn him.

And yet now he was dating someone else.

What had Dad said to convince Tristan so completely to give up on us?

The doorbell rang, announcing the arrival of Carrie’s and Michelle’s dates. I went through the motions of posing for group shots in the living room while their parents buzzed around us, their camera flashes blinding me as my mind circled in confusion. Tristan’s actions didn’t make sense. First he made me think I would never get him to see the reality of our situation. Then he apparently went on a suicide mission to my dad to ask to be turned even though he knew the turning process could only result in his death and the start of a brand-new war between the vamps and the witches. And now just a few weeks later…he was dating Bethany Brookes.

The camera flashes stopped, but my thoughts didn’t. Nor did the lump in my throat go away.

Michelle and Carrie rode with their dates in Carrie’s car, and Anne and I followed in Anne’s truck to the JHS campus where the dance was being held in the cafeteria. I was momentarily distracted by the process of trying to exit the truck without revealing my underwear to everyone in the parking lot. Slits in dresses were both a blessing and a curse, allowing us to walk but making the climb out of a truck a real problem. Then we were all together again and stumbling on our heels across the parking lot and into the cafeteria.

The inside of the circular room had been transformed for the night. The dance committee, headed by the senior cheerleaders, had chosen Night at the Movies for the theme. We navigated our group around twelve-foot-high cardboard reels of movie film and equally giant buckets filled with yellow and white balloons tied in bunches to look like enormous popcorn, as a white fog from an unseen fog machine swirled around our ankles. Most of the tables and chairs had been removed to allow room for dancing, so we cut straight across the room toward the back.

Anne led us all up a set of carpeted stairs I’d never paid attention to before. They ended at a loft space above the kitchens and serving area. Tonight the second floor was decorated with a shimmering silver curtain backdrop and several movie reels as props for professional photos, which Anne insisted we had to have taken of our group right away in order to beat the line she was sure would develop soon.

Wait a second. Photographs. Now that I was definitely turning into a full vamp, were photos a problem? I’d had plenty taken before, of course. And earlier at Anne’s house, I’d been too in shock about Tristan to think about all the pictures the parents were taking of us.

But now I had time to think. And freak out. Wasn’t there some rule about how vampires couldn’t show up in photos? What if that was true? I’d never asked Dad about it. We’d covered everything else…the bloodlust, draining with a kiss, stakes, decapitation, holy water, garlic, crosses and churches and Bibles and holy ground and fire, even how our hybrid race of vamps was supposedly the creation of the demoness Lilith, who according to Jewish myths was once the true first wife of Adam. But vamps and photos? Nope, we’d missed that one. Was my vamp side developed enough that this would apply to me too now? Would I simply not show up in the photos and freak everyone out later?

A quick call to Dad would clear the question right up. I fumbled in my handbag for my cell phone.

“Sav, it’s our turn.” Anne tugged at my wrist.

“Wait, I just need to make a quick—”

“Later,” she said, pulling me ever closer to the silver tinsel-draped backdrop where the others were already being posed by the photographer.

I found Dad’s number on speed dial. “Okay. Just let me call my dad first.”

Anne snatched the phone away just as I hit the call button. “And to think you used to hate these things! Five seconds, pretty princess, then you can make your precious phone call.”

“Would you give me that?” I lunged for the phone, but she was faster, dropping it down the front of her dress into her cleavage.

“Anne!” I gasped.

“Not going after it there, are ya?” She snickered. “Now turn around and say cheese.”

I turned toward the photographer’s voice and formed some semblance of a shocked smile.

Then I heard Dad’s voice coming from between my best friend’s boobs.

Silence reigned for five long seconds as Dad called out my name in question.

Then everyone erupted in laughter. Even me. And oh, man, did it feel good to laugh like that, as if I was taking my first deep breath after drowning for months.

Anne’s cheeks turned pink as she bent forward at the waist and reached down the front of her dress. Then her head popped up as she gasped. “Oh no.”

“Savannah? Savannah! Are you okay?” Dad yelled from somewhere below Anne’s chest. Judging by the rectangular bulge now at Anne’s stomach, the phone had slid way past her bra.

The group laughter turned hysterical at that point, and my eyes teared up as Anne shimmied and wiggled, trying to get the phone out of her dress.

“Oh no, my makeup jobs!” Michelle wailed as apparently Carrie and Anne both teared up, too. “Come on.”

Michelle hustled all of us, still laughing, down the stairs toward the bathrooms.

“Quit bumping me or it’s gonna fall out and break on the stairs,” Anne hissed, still clutching the phone at her stomach, as we passed another group headed up the stairs. They froze and stared at us in horror.

“Dad, hold on, I’m fine,” I called out toward Anne’s stomach. “Just…” I was laughing too hard to breathe properly. “Just hang up. I’ll call back and explain later, I promise.”

In the bathroom, we all grabbed handfuls of toilet paper and tried to repair our eye makeup as best we could. I’d never had much on to start with, thank goodness. But Carrie looked like a raccoon, which made me laugh even harder.

Anne went into one of the two stalls, her expression sour. “I should throw this darn thing down the toilet.”

“I am still here and waiting for an explanation.” Dad sounded more than a little tense.

I snickered behind a hand to muffle the laughter. Bet he’d never been in quite this position before.

“Oh, um, sorry sir,” Anne said. “Just let me get you out from under my dress…”

“I can assure you I am presently nowhere near you or your dress,” Dad snapped. “Are you girls high on something?”

Carrie, Michelle and I all howled with fresh laughter.

Red-faced, Anne finally emerged from the stall and held out my phone.

“Ew, you are going to wipe it off, right?” Carrie’s nose wrinkled with disgust.

“It wasn’t… I had a shower this… Oh fine.” Giving up, Anne wiped the phone with a paper towel, hanging up on my father in the process.

Oooh, that was going to tick him off for sure. “Better let me call him back quick,” I said, still smiling as Anne gave me the phone. I found his number, hit the call button, lifted it to my ear, then pretended to sniff my phone. “Hey, Anne, you wearing a new perfume tonight?”

That set Carrie and Michelle off into fresh giggles.

Dad answered on the first ring. “What is going—”

“Sorry, Dad,” I interrupted the potential tirade. “I was going to call you and ask you if it was okay for me to get photos taken here at the dance. But Anne stole my phone and hid it in the only, um, pocket she had in her dress. And then she had a…wardrobe malfunction and had trouble getting the phone back out.” A snicker escaped me. “I’m sorry if we worried you.”

A long pause filled the connection before he cleared his throat. “Well, at least you sound as if you are having a good time for a change. Call me before you leave.”

His words surprised me. He was right. I was actually having a good time. A great time, in fact.

Now if I could just avoid seeing Tristan dancing with Bethany all night…

CHAPTER 7

TRISTAN

It was a dumb thing to do, going out to Drip Rock Road. I was already running fifteen minutes late in picking up Bethany, and my favorite hilltop was in the opposite direction of her house.

Still I found myself driving out there, needing…something. Fresh air. Quiet. A few minutes of freedom.

My parents had kept me on total lockdown every minute I wasn’t at school. They’d let me loose tonight because I’d taken Mom’s repeated, not-so-subtle suggestion and asked Bethany to go with me to the dance. Not because I had any interest in Mom’s choice of replacement girlfriends. I just needed to see Savannah outside of class one last time before the school year ended.

So I’d called Bethany as instructed last week. And then I’d thrown on the tux Mom had rented and left the house tonight with the corsage Mom had picked up for Bethany. But when it came time to exit my driveway and cross the road to the country club subdivision where Bethany’s house was, I’d turned in the opposite direction and come out here instead.

Even though the sun was setting, the air was still warm with no breeze to cool it off. The darkening sky over the pines below shimmered from the heat. And it was only the start. In the coming weeks as summer came on full force, being outside past eleven in the morning would become pure torture. Already it felt like I’d stumbled into a swamp. Even the air was trying to choke the life out of me.

I glanced at the corsage, waiting like a silent demand from my mother on the dashboard of my truck. Mom would be ticked off if she knew I was letting the corsage wilt instead of rushing straight over to Bethany’s with it like the good little boy Mom expected me to be.

I looked at the hills around me, and then to the sky. In the east, the first stars were just starting to wink into view. And I wondered for the thousandth time where Savannah was right now. Was she at Anne’s house with her friends, getting ready, smiling into a mirror while those long fingers of hers fixed her hair and makeup?

Was she thinking about me at all?

I knew she was going to arrive at the dance looking more beautiful than ever. Earlier this week in the office, I’d picked up an image from Michelle’s thoughts of Savannah in a long black satin dress. Michelle had been really proud about finding that dress for Savannah. If Michelle’s memory was anything to judge by, she had a right to be proud. Savannah was going to look even more stunning than usual.

Tonight, watching Savannah but unable to hold her in my arms or dance with her was sure to be an exercise in torture. Especially with another girl on my arm all night.

A smarter guy would have stayed home.

Except I couldn’t. Just like I couldn’t convince myself to give up on us. I’d tried. Over and over, I’d told myself that there was nothing we could do. There were too many powerful people standing in our way. But every time I told myself to let her go, everything inside me rebelled. I couldn’t imagine my future without Savannah in it.

How could two people seem so perfect together, be so happy together, and yet be so wrong in so many others’ eyes?

There had to be an option I was missing. Maybe I was too close to the problem. Or maybe I didn’t know enough about the council. My parents I understood…they were just trying to protect me. They couldn’t understand that Savannah wasn’t dangerous to me. But if the council could be convinced to change their minds about Savannah and me, and if I could create a bloodlust-dampening spell that would make it safe for Sav to be around me, surely my parents would change their minds, too. There was no way their fear of vamps could be stronger than their love for me. I knew that, deep down, they wanted me to be happy. I just needed a way to get rid of their fear.

I’d thought Savannah and I were it, that our love would be the proof everyone needed to break down the fear and hate on both sides. Now it looked like we would have to get rid of the prejudice before we could be together. But how?

Savannah knew more about the council than I did. If I could get her to talk to me, we could figure something out together that might appease the council. But she wouldn’t talk to me, because she was listening to everyone else, letting their fear beat her down and convince her to stop fighting for us. And yet I knew she loved me. There wasn’t a single doubt in my mind about that. Yes, we’d both kept the secret about her vampire side from each other. But what we’d felt together hadn’t been a lie. The way we’d talked, kissed, held each other, the way she’d looked into my eyes so many times…I’d never felt anything more real, no magic on earth stronger, than that.

I would never feel anything like it again.

But I couldn’t fight this battle alone. I needed Savannah’s help. How could I convince her that we could make this work when she wouldn’t even talk to me?

Magic. I could do a spell that would allow her to feel how I felt. I could literally give her my confidence, my faith and belief in what we had together. Then she’d have the confidence to want to fight again.

The cafeteria would be dark during the dance. Surely there would be the perfect opportunity to pull Savannah out of sight at some point. If the spell worked, she would agree to dream connect with me later tonight. And then we’d figure out a new game plan together.

What spell should I use? Dad had never taught me how to give someone confidence.

Then again, why worry about using a specific spell anyways? Using magic wasn’t about the words I said. It was about focusing on what I wanted to make happen, injecting those intentions with my willpower, and then releasing the spell so it could take effect.

As I got back into my truck, feeling for the first time in weeks like I could breathe again, I created the spell in my mind.

“I want you to feel what I feel, Savannah,” I murmured as I started my truck’s engine. “I need you to have faith in us like I do. I need you to want to keep trying, to fight back with me, to help me find a way to change their minds.” I envisioned those thoughts filling with energy. And then I released them into the air toward where I figured Sav would be by now…at the dance.

I carefully turned toward town and headed down the hill. I could pick up Bethany and be at the dance in fifteen minutes. The spell would probably take effect immediately. I hoped it lasted long enough. Once I got to the cafeteria, I would need a few minutes to find Sav, another minute or two to talk to her and get her to agree to dream connect with me tonight.

The truck rushed down the steep road, which was straight for a long stretch. But I could see the sharp curve ahead. I tapped on the brakes to slow down for it.

Nothing happened.

I pressed the pedal all the way to the floorboard. The brakes didn’t respond, the truck still picking up speed as the curve drew closer and closer.

Muttering a curse, I tried downshifting to force the transmission to slow the truck. But it was too late.

Jaw clenched, I gripped the wheel as hard as I could and tried to turn the truck with the curve, but I was going too fast. The truck rocked onto its left wheels and kept right on going. The world flipped over and over as glass shattered and rained through the air. My seat belt jerked tight, slamming the air out of my chest.

Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to use magic and drive at the same time, was the last thought I had.

SAVANNAH

I hung up the phone, and that’s when I heard him. It was like Tristan was right behind me, whispering in my ear.

“I want you to feel what I feel, Savannah,” he murmured. “I need you to have faith in us like I do. I need you to want to keep trying, to fight back with me, to help me find a way to change their minds.”

His voice was so clear inside my head that I actually whirled around, thinking he must have snuck into the bathroom after us.

But he wasn’t there.

I popped my head outside the door. No Tristan in sight, not in the short hallway leading to the bathrooms or in the cafeteria-turned-dance-floor beyond.

“Savannah?” Carrie said, pausing in the process of reapplying her mascara. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” I forced a smile. “Just thought I heard someone yelling for us outside.”

I shut the door again, pretended to check my makeup in the mirror.

And then it hit me…wave upon wave of pain over my entire body. Pain on a level I’d never experienced before, not even during that week when I was sick my freshman year as the start of puberty awakened my two genetic sides and caused an internal battle between them that nearly killed me.

Oh sweet God in heaven. I really was dying this time.

I grabbed the counter, bracing my hands on the cold laminate, my legs shaking so hard I was afraid I would fall down without the sink’s support. What was wrong with me?

“Sav? Sav! What is it?”

I could hear my friends’ voices, distant, muffled. I shook my head, my focus turning inward. What was going on with my body? Was this a sign that the bloodlust was about to take over completely or something? No, it couldn’t be. I’d felt the bloodlust before. It was nothing like this.

“What’s wrong with her?” Michelle asked in a high voice.

“I don’t know. Get a teacher,” Carrie ordered.

Anne moved toward the door, but I grabbed her arm to stop her. “No, wait. It’s not…” I closed my eyes and mentally searched for the source of the pain. “It’s not me. I mean, I’m okay.”

“Then what’s the matter?” Anne said, crouching down in front of me.

I shook my head again. “I don’t…”

And then I knew. And in that moment, I actually wished it had been the bloodlust or any other new vampire development in my body. Anything other than what my heart, my instincts, my very soul said it was.

“Oh God. It’s Tristan,” I whispered. I didn’t know how I knew. But I knew. Something was wrong. He was hurt badly. And I had to tell someone.

“Huh?” Anne said.

My eyes flew open as I pushed her to the side and fumbled with the bathroom door. But it was locked.

“Is Emily Coleman here?” I asked, trying to get the lock turned on the knob.

“Who?” Michelle asked.

“Tristan’s sister!” My shaking fingers couldn’t manage to work the lock properly. Stark fear combined with desperation, turning me into something close to an animal. I wrapped both hands around the knob, heard a satisfying breaking of wood and groaning metal, and the doorknob came off in my hands. I tossed it to the floor with a loud clang.

“Savannah!” Carrie gasped.

But I was already headed out the door and down the short hall toward the strobing lights and shallow pool of balloons in the middle of the cafeteria, searching for a certain blonde who ought to be here. The senior cheerleaders always ran the semiformal dance; it was their way of helping to raise funds to support the cheer squads. Emily had to be here somewhere.

Bingo. The punch table.

“Stay here,” I shouted to my friends, and something in my expression or my tone made them listen to me for once.

I tried not to run, settling for pushing my legs into the longest strides I could manage in these stupid heels on the slippery floor.

Emily’s head popped up when I was still halfway across the dance floor. She must have read something on my face because she stared at me as I approached.

“Tristan,” I gasped when I finally reached the table and leaned across it. “Something’s wrong. You need to call him.”

Her eyebrows drew together in worry or confusion. But at least she grabbed her phone and tried to call him.

“He’s not answering,” she shouted over the music.

“He’s hurt somewhere. We have to find him,” I told her as she circled around the table.

“How do—”

“I don’t know how. Maybe he was doing a connection spell or something. I thought I heard him talking to me, and then I felt his pain.” Even as I led the way across the cafeteria, I could still feel an incredible amount of pain throbbing throughout my body.

I pushed the doors open too hard. They slammed into the brick wall of the building. Emily’s eyes widened.

But it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except getting to Tristan in time.

“Where’s your car?” I asked her.

She turned right, and I spotted the infamous pink convertible in the row closest to the sidewalk.

“What are you doing?” she asked as I grabbed the passenger door’s handle.

“I’m going with you,” I said.

“You can’t. You two are not supposed to—”

“I can still feel his pain.” In fact, it was stronger now that we’d left the cafeteria. “I think we can use it to find him.”

“You can’t be serious.”

I opened the door and slid in.

Huffing out a loud sigh, Emily got in, started the car and headed out of the parking lot. At the stop sign, she said, “Which way?”

I twisted toward the left, and the pain was a little less. “Go right.”

Our progress was too slow as we repeated the process at every intersection. But my feelings were all we had to go on. Emily had tried calling her parents, but they had no idea where Tristan was. Apparently he was supposed to have picked up Bethany half an hour ago but never showed up. Emily ended the call without explaining why she was worried about him or that I was with her.

Ten minutes later, we found ourselves heading out of town toward Drip Rock Road.

“Why would he be out here?” Emily muttered.

I had to wonder the same thing. It was in the opposite direction of Bethany’s house.

But I couldn’t worry about that right now. I could barely breathe, the pain was so strong. “He’s close. Go slow,” I said.

Thankfully she slowed down. Otherwise we might have ended up with flat tires from the glass in the curve of the road, which she narrowly avoided running over.

Tristan’s truck had taken out a huge section of wood and barbed wire fence as it either rolled or plowed through the ditch and field, coming to a stop right side up several yards off the road. I didn’t remember getting out of the car or even pulling to a stop. I just found myself running through the field toward that crushed-in hunk of metal and praying that he would be okay.

As I ran around to the driver’s side, I felt all his pain stop like a switch had been flipped off.

“Tristan!” I screamed, grabbing the handle of his door. But the twisted door wouldn’t budge. “Emily, I can’t feel him anymore. Call for help!”

I reached in through the broken-out window, carefully found the side of that strong column where his pulse should be throbbing out a steady beat to me. It was there, but just barely.

“Tristan, please,” I whispered. “Please don’t go.”

CHAPTER 8

Emily finished talking to someone on her phone. Then she reached past me and touched her brother’s shoulder.

“Oh God,” she gasped. “Tristan, don’t you dare die on me!” She yanked repeatedly at the door handle, her once smoothly styled French twist flying loose in all directions.

“Together on three,” I told her, grabbing the windowsill of the door, ignoring bits of glass as they ground into my hands. “One, two, three.”

We jerked as hard as we could, and the door burst open so quickly we landed on our butts in the grass. I scrambled to my feet, fighting the stupid heels as they sank into the soft dirt. Emily must have more practice with heels. She was already back at Tristan’s side, her hand pressed to his shoulder again.

“We have to get him out,” she muttered. “Then I can work on him better.”

“Do you know what you’re doing?” I asked. What if moving him made his injuries worse?

“We have to try. The ambulance won’t be here for another five or ten minutes. And his pulse—”

“I know.” I didn’t want to hear her say what I already knew, that his heartbeat was way too weak. That we were losing him.

We couldn’t lose him. I couldn’t lose him. I didn’t care if I couldn’t be with him. I had to know he was alive in this world somewhere. Otherwise I’d go crazy.

“Okay, get his feet,” I said as I grabbed his shoulders and tugged him toward me. Emily squeezed in between me and the door and freed his feet from the twisted frame and steering column.

Somehow we got Tristan out of the truck and onto the ground. I cradled his head in my lap, stroking the blood away from his forehead, while Emily knelt on her knees at his side.

“There’s so much broken,” she whispered.

“Please,” I murmured, begging her, begging God, begging a universe that had been nothing but cruel to me, in the hope that maybe it would finally answer just one request.

Emily closed her eyes and pressed her hands to Tristan’s chest as if she were about to do CPR. But she never pushed down. Instead, she sat perfectly still, her palms laid flat on the stained red and white shirt. The skin on my arms and the back of my neck erupted in prickles of pain far stronger than I’d ever felt before, even when Tristan was using magic while fighting Dylan. That had been a fire ant attack. This was like being in the middle of a swarm of really ticked off wasps. God, she was a strong witch. But was she strong enough?

If only I’d been allowed to learn how to use magic....

I bent over him, the pain in my chest my own now, the staggering force of it curling me over. Blood streamed from a gash in Tristan’s forehead near his left temple, and the bloodlust was there in the distance, wanting my attention. But nothing could dull the sheer terror pounding through my veins now, not even the bloodlust.

“Please, Tristan, stay with me,” I whispered against his forehead, my lips moving against the only clear area at his right temple, his hair brushing my nose and cheek.

And then I heard it. A strong, solid heartbeat, followed by more of the rapid, barely-there taps.

“Again, Emily,” I whispered.

More pinpricks stabbing at my arms and neck as she ramped up the energy level.

Another strong heartbeat beneath my fingertips. And another. And another, each one evening out the rhythm into a steady pulse again.

Tears streamed down my face now. I looked up at her for confirmation, needing to know I wasn’t imagining it.

“He’s coming back!” she cried out, grinning.

“That’s it, Tristan,” I murmured, stroking bits of glass out of his hair. “Keep fighting. Come back to us.” Come back to me.

Wailing in the distance. The ambulance was here. They pulled to a stop on the road, two figures jumping out from the cab to unload a gurney from the back end of the vehicle.

“He’s going to be okay now, I think,” Emily murmured. “A few stitches here and there and some broken bones that’ll have to be reset, which I’m sure the Clann will help heal faster. But he’ll be okay.”

I held Tristan’s right hand as the emergency workers wrapped a brace around his neck then got a stretcher under him so they could lift him up onto the gurney. When they carried him toward the van, I kept holding on, walking beside Tristan. He still hadn’t woken up. I needed to see those green eyes looking back at me before I could be sure he’d be all right.

“Ma’am,” one of the emergency workers said to me. “You have to let go so we can load him.”

“I want to go with him.”

Emily laid a hand on my forearm. “You can’t. I called my parents. They’re on the way to the hospital already. They’ll be there waiting.”

“I don’t care. I have to go.”

“You can’t,” Emily said, more firmly this time. “You know what will happen.”

“Please,” I begged her. “I have to know he’ll be all right.”

“He will be. But you have to let him go now.” She leaned in close and whispered, “Please don’t make me use magic on you to save you. I know you love him. I promise I’ll call with updates.”

At that moment, I almost hated her. But some more logical part of me made me let go of his hand and step away.

“What’s your friend’s number?” she asked as the emergency workers slid Tristan into the ambulance.

“What? Why?”

“Because I’ve got to follow them. You need someone to come pick you up.”

I told her Anne’s number, and she punched it in. She didn’t have to say much before Anne agreed to come get me.

“She says she’ll be here in ten minutes,” Emily said after ending the call. “Now what’s your number?”

I looked at her in confusion, my mind too focused on the closing ambulance doors to be able to process her question.

She touched my shoulder. “Savannah, I need your number so I can call you with updates.”

“You’ll really call me?” I asked.

A smile tugged at her lips. “I said I would, didn’t I? Didn’t Tristan ever tell you I always keep my promises?”

So I told her my number. Then I wondered where exactly I’d left my phone. Maybe Anne had it.

She punched the number into her phone. “Are you going to be okay till she gets here? Do you want me to stay with you?”

“No!” Panic made me nearly shout. The driver for the ambulance threw a quick glance over his shoulder as he climbed in behind the wheel. “No, please follow them.” She would be my only contact at the hospital. My only way of knowing if Tristan got worse.

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