“Where’s your roommate?” Hunter asked Jenna.

“At the library, working on a paper,” Jenna replied. “She’ll be at least another hour.”

“This is Lucy,” Hunter introduced me. “You know Jenna, and that’s Kyla, Griffin, Drew, and Eric.”

Eric’s dark eyes snapped onto me. “Lucy Hamilton? You know Solange?”

“Yeah,” I said. At least he hadn’t called me Lucky. I’d probably let him live, despite the tone he was using, as if I’d personally kicked his puppy. “Why? Do you know Solange?”

“I know Kieran.”

“Oh.”

“She—”

“Stop right there.” I cut him off with a narrowed glare. “I might be pissed off at her but she’s still my best friend, and I’ll kick your ass if you say anything about her.”

He leaned back against the edge of the desk. “Yeah? Well, Kieran’s my best friend.”

“He’s my friend too,” I replied quietly.

Eric looked at me for a long moment before finally nodding his head once. “Okay.”

Hunter sat on the floor. “If you two are done with the macho pissing contest, can we get on with it? Why are you here, Eric? You’re not Black Lodge.”

“No, but Kieran said you might need this info.” He reached over and flipped on Jenna’s radio. It was a trick I knew well. It masked conversations in cases of bugging devices or vampires, take your pick.

“Is it about the woman who was just brought in?” Chloe asked. “’Cause we know about that already.”

“What woman?” Jenna asked quizzically.

“A wounded civilian,” Hunter said. “Bite marks.”

Jenna let out a whistle through her teeth. Eric looked at me. I looked back at him.

“What?” I said. “I didn’t bite her.”

“But you’re friends with vampires.”

“Oh my God,” I exclaimed, disgusted. I flopped back onto Jenna’s bed so I wouldn’t throw something at his head. Like a chair. “You guys are making me nuts. Kieran’s friends with vampires. So’s Hunter. So get off my case or I swear I’m going to torch this whole stupid school.”

Eric grinned unexpectedly. “That I’d like to see. You’re okay, Hamilton.”

“Gee,” I replied sweetly, sarcastically. “Thanks.”

He just laughed. “Anyway, we didn’t know there’s a civ here, but she’s not the first to be bitten this week.” He went serious. “She’s the third.”

I sat up. “The third? Why isn’t it in the papers? By now at least one of them should be screaming about how this is all because of a government conspiracy or chupacabras or some other weird-ass thing.”

“It’ll be in the papers tomorrow,” he confirmed. “Something about an escaped snake.”

“A snake,” I said, nonplussed. “What, like an escaped pet cobra? How damned big would the snake have to be to leave marks like that?”

Chloe made a face. “Too damned big.” She scrolled down her screen. “Is it in the Violet Hill Gazette? Or the Journal? Doesn’t matter,” she added before he could answer. “I can crack either of their servers in my sleep. I could totally delete an article.”

“No point,” Eric said. “Then they’d really think they were on to a story.”

“How did Kieran get the info?” Hunter asked.

“Does it matter?” His teeth flashed white in his dark face.

“I guess not,” she grumbled. “But he shouldn’t have told you we’re Black Lodge. Kinda defeats the whole secrecy thing.”

“With an uncle like his, what do you expect?” He shrugged. “Anyway, Huntsmen are all over, vampires are all over, so we need to be out there too. If you’re game.”

Hunter stood up. “Hell, yeah, we’re game. Are you kidding?”

They bumped fists like they were in some action movie. Hunter didn’t even glance at me. “Shut it, Lucy.”

I grinned at her all the way to the staircase. “You’re like Bruce Willis, dude. Or the Rock or something.”

“Can I at least be Lara Croft?”

“You don’t have the boobs.” I was still grinning when I snuck into my room.

Sarita sat up in her bed. “Your dad called like five times.” She looked at the clock disapprovingly. “And it’s past curfew.”

Chapter 11

Solange

When I opened my eyes again the sun was rising, scattering pink and orange light over pine trees and a mountain. But it wasn’t my pine trees or my mountains. It wasn’t Violet Hill. When I turned around there was nothing but moorland stretching out to a lake in the distance. The heather was purple and interspersed with tiny yellow flowers that looked like birds’ feet.

And I wasn’t falling into an unconscious sleep. I wasn’t even tired.

Dumbfounded, I watched the sun inch higher in the sky. I ran my tongue over my teeth. I still had fangs. I was still a vampire.

But the sun didn’t affect me.

I could smell wood smoke so I climbed a hill toward it, dipping down into a valley where a small stone cottage stood on the banks of a wide river. I really had no idea where I was or what was going on. The last thing I remembered was Kala shaking her rattle of dog teeth at me.

And now this.