Jayden couldn't stop thinking about Robyn and got up several times to look across the cul-de-sac at her house. What he expected to see, he wasn't certain, but he somehow thought that if the lights were out over there, then Robyn was okay, wasn't she?

  He didn't feel sure.

  He contemplated going over there and climbing the ladder again, but what good would that do her? If she had pulled it off and if she hadn't been discovered, then he might risk ruining everything by showing up. He looked at his phone. Jazmine had texted him goodnight and sent a red heart, then added I LOVE YOU. Jayden stared at the words.

  She loved him?

  He put the phone away and hid his face under the covers. What was he doing?

  You can't be with Robyn and you know it. It's impossible.

  It annoyed Jayden so much that she was right over there, all the time, and he would often see her in her window, yet he could never be with her. Seeing her tonight, coming to her room, being close to her again, made him feel so good. He even missed fighting with her. Seeing her feisty green eyes get on fire when she got mad at him. Even that, he missed.

  Why did their parents have to hate each other? And why did their fighting have to make their lives miserable? It wasn't fair. It wasn't their fault that the adults couldn't figure things out. Vampires or not.

  They act like a bunch of kindergarteners.

  He hated what he was doing to Jazmine. He liked her, and he enjoyed being with her, but the fact was, she wasn't Robyn. No matter how hard he tried to forget Robyn, he kept comparing Jazmine to her. Not that Jazmine wasn't great, she really was, but she just wasn't…her. It made no sense to Jayden why he was still so hung up on the same girl he had liked since he was a young child, but you didn't choose who you fell for, did you? Just as little as you chose your family. Falling in love was a state of momentary insanity, wasn't it? It made no sense and you couldn't talk someone out of it.

  Jayden pulled the covers off his head and stared out at the moon. Who was he kidding? Dating Jazmine would only mean him ending up hurting her at some point, right? It wasn't fair to her.

  But you will never get to be with Robyn. Never.

  He sat up, breathing heavily. It looked like the moon was grinning at him from the black sky.

  Fact was, Jayden knew what he had to do, even though it completely devastated him to do it.

  "Even you know it, don't you?" he asked the moon.

  It answered by sending him another wide grin.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The ambiance in our house was very strange the next day. At least, I felt so. I went downstairs to eat breakfast and found my brother already sitting there. He seemed to be almost glowing as he slurped his dandelion and blueberry smoothie. He still looked emo, with hair covering half his face, but somewhere behind it, I thought I saw a smile. A satisfied and happy smile. At least as close to it as he could get.

  His skin looked amazing. Over the past several weeks, since my mom turned him into a vampire, he had gone from the typical pimple-filled teenager to become this strikingly gorgeous creature who belonged on the cover of a magazine. It was hard not to stare at him, even though he was hiding behind that hair. It only made him more mysterious and harder for people not to stare. As I looked at him in my kitchen, all I could see was the way I had seen him the night before, turned into this bat-like creature, fangs pierced through the skin of that poor man he had sucked dry.

  I shivered at the thought and turned my back on him. My mom stood in front of me, a very green smoothie in her hand, a mischievous smile on her red lips.

  "Good morning, dear." She held up the smoothie. "Asparagus?"

  I felt like throwing up when she said it, but took it, not daring to do anything to defy her today.

  "Good for your skin," she said and wiped away some lint from my shirt. Then she looked up. "You need it."

  "Thanks. I guess."

  "I’m getting straight A's this grading period," my brother said, smirking. "Beat that, homeschool."

  My mom handed me something that was supposed to be a piece of bread, but it didn't really look like it.

  "It's no-rye, rye bread. It's gluten free, egg free, and dairy-free," she said, smiling like I should be very happy at how much she thought of my wellbeing. "My own recipe."

  I smiled again. "Nice."

  I sat down and ate it, remembering how I used to cheat and sometimes buy something in the cafeteria at school. I missed getting a real meal at least once or twice a week.

  I ate the very dry bread and drank the smoothie that made me want to throw up, wearing a smile on my face to not make my mother suspicious of me. Yet, she still seemed to be. She kept staring at me like she was waiting for me to say something or burst into tears and simply spill it all.

  "I gotta get going," my brother said and got up. "I have school. Hey, do you remember that? School?" he said addressed to me.

  I grimaced, showing how annoying I thought he was, but the fact was I enjoyed him acting a little more normal like he used to before he changed. He grinned and left the kitchen just as there was a knock on the door. My mom turned on her heel and looked at me like I knew who it could be. I shrugged, then walked out there and opened it. Outside stood Mr. Aran, one of his tarantulas crawling on his neck.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Jazmine was exhausted when she ate her breakfast. She had barely slept two hours last night, and now she had to go to school. It was almost too hard. Her mother seemed cheerful, though, as she was doing the dishes in the kitchen. Her dad had already left for the paper company, as usual. Jazmine stared at her mother, who was singing as she put the dishes away. Jazmine couldn't stop thinking about what she had seen the night before. First, her mom and that cat and the strange light surrounding them, then the vampire party and…well, the biggest surprise, Melanie turning out to be a wolf and not a vampire. Yes, that was the surprise.

  What the heck was wrong with this neighborhood?

  "You look tired," her mom said.

  "I didn't sleep well last night," she said.

  "I see. It's the moon," she said, grabbing another plate. "I can never sleep when it’s full either."

  "That's probably just it, then," Jazmine said and jumped down from the stool at the counter. Her mother handed her a lunch bag, holding onto it a little while and looking deep into her daughter's eyes.

  "Are you sure you're all right?"

  Where do I begin? Well, my best friend's family are all vampires, killing people. A girl I know is a werewolf and just ate a pastor who was also a vampire, and my mom is glowing with the cat in the living room, talking to it, sounding crazier than a bat. But other than that, I am perfectly fine. It's just the usual teenage problems, right?

  Jazmine nodded reassuringly. "Yes. I’m just tired, that's all."

  Her mother exhaled. "Good. Because I don't want you to come down with something. It is flu season, after all. Lots of it going around, they said on TV this morning."

  "Did they say anything else?" Jazmine asked.

  Her mother tilted her head. "Like what?"

  "I don't know. Any events last night?"

  People being found dead at the church?

  "Well, the wolf attacked again," she said.

  "Really?"

  "Yes, at the church, can you imagine? They were having some sort of midnight mass and apparently the beast killed a couple of people there. The pastor has since disappeared. It's this whole big story. Good thing you don't go out at night, right?"

  Her mother wiped the counter where Jazmine had spilled some milk from her cereal. Jazmine nodded.

  "Sure. I would never dare to. Not with everything that is going on."

  Her mother smiled, looking slightly manic, or maybe that was just something Jazmine believed.

  "Good. Now, so far, the attacks have only happened at night, so as long as we stay inside at night, we should be fine. But I want you to be alert during the day as well. Come back straight from school, promise?"

  Jazmine nodded. "Promise." She grabbed her backpack and left the house. She grabbed her bike and rode it out of the cul-de-sac, thinking about Melanie and where she might have woken up this morning and whether she remembered anything at all from what she had done, when suddenly she ran her bike straight into something, or rather someone.

  Jazmine tumbled to the asphalt and scraped her arm and knee. A hand helped her get up. His grasp was icy cold. When she saw who it was, she let out a small gasp.

  "A-Adrian?"

  "Do we know each other?" he asked.

  She got up and wiped dirt off her jeans. She shook her head. "N-no not really. But I know your sister."

  He smiled. He was so handsome, Jazmine couldn't take her eyes off him, even though everything inside of her screamed to.

  "I see. Well, be more careful next time, will you?"

  "Careful?"

  "Yeah, when riding your bike. You rode it straight into me."

  Jazmine laughed, feeling silly. It got awkward. "Oh, that. Yes, well…I am so, so sorry. I hope I didn't…hurt you?"

  She put her hand on his. He had scraped it, but as they stared at it, it slowly healed up. Jazmine gaped, then pretended not to have seen it. She wanted to pull away, but he grabbed her hand in his.

  "I like your nails," he said and looked at them closely. "How do you make them change colors like that?"

  She looked down at them too. They were going from red to purple to blue, then back to red. She pulled her hand away.

  "I…I don't…"

  "Is it some kind of nail polish?" he asked. "That's pretty cool."

  She shook her head. Her nails had been acting weird lately and she had been hiding them in her shirt, so no one would see them.

  Adrian approached her. He stood very close to her, then reached up and touched her face. She could feel his icy breath on her skin and she shivered. He looked into her eyes, studied them very closely.

  "Your eyes," he said. "They do it too."

  Jazmine shook her head and looked away. "I should…"

  Adrian grabbed her arm and held her steady while their eyes locked once again. Jazmine didn't know whether to be afraid of him or flattered by his interest in her.

  "It's truly amazing," he said. "They change, just like your nails. Look…now they're doing it very fast. It's like one of those…"

  "Mood rings?" she asked.

  "Yes," he said. "Just like that."

  Jazmine pulled out of his tight grip, then backed away from him, while he stared into her eyes, making her feel all warm and weird inside. "I have to… I should…" she said as she grabbed her bike and pedaled away so fast her legs hurt once she finally reached the school.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  "How can I help you, Mr. Aran?" I asked, my eyes not leaving the tarantula on his neck for even a second.

  He smiled. "I was just wondering if you heard what happened last night. At the church?"

  I shook my head. "I can't say I have."

  "Huh," he said, his eyes examining me. He inhaled with a sizzling noise. "Terrible tragedy. Terrible."

  "Oh. I am sorry."

  "Four dead bodies. Sucked dry of blood."

  I acted startled. I think I was getting quite good at it by now. "Oh, my."

  "It was all over the news. You sure you didn't hear about it?"

  "I never watch TV in the morning," I lied. It amazed me how good I was getting at lying. And it scared me a little too.

  "They say it was the wolf," he said. "Again. Attacking churchgoers at a midnight mass. That's what the police said. Actually, it was that guy who lives right over there, the officer on the motorcycle, who gave me a ticket when I rode into town. Funny, huh?"

  I cleared my throat. "Hilarious."

  He forced another smile. It even looked fake. He wasn't as good an actor as I was becoming.

  "Anyway. I just wanted to hear if you knew anything. I got the feeling, a vibe, yesterday that your mother usually knows everything that goes on around here, am I right?"

  "She keeps track of what goes on, yes. But not more than any normal housewife, I think."

  That made him laugh. I wasn't sure why.

  "So, you don't know what happened?" he asked.

  I shrugged. "Not really. If the police say it's the wolf, then that was probably it. Hopefully, they'll shoot it soon, so we can move on with our lives."

  "Yee-es, well…it's the part about the bodies being sucked dry of blood that bothers me," he said.

  I cleared my throat again, slightly anxious this time. "Oh, yeah? Why is that?"

  "Where I come from, wolves don't drink human blood."

  "Really? I wouldn't know anything about that."

  He grabbed the spider between his hands and petted it. "We think it might have been va-a-ampires, don't we, Finn?"

  "Oh, the spider's name is Finn, is it? That's…nice. Well, I don't really believe in fairy tales. Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Aran?"

  He petted the spider on its back. I swear I heard it sigh, satisfied. "Not for now. But…maybe later?"

  I stared at the strange man as he walked away, almost swaying on his long skinny legs away from my house. My mom came up behind me. I didn't see her, so it wasn't until she spoke that I knew. It made me jump.

  "What did he want?" she asked with a hiss.

  I shrugged. "I’m not sure I know."

  She looked after Mr. Aran as he disappeared down the street, playing with the tarantula in his hand.

  "Well, he better stay away from us, him and his…germ-filled spiders. Who knows what kind of diseases they might bring to our nice, quiet neighborhood. Stay away from that odd man. You hear me? He is not like us, Robyn. He doesn’t belong here."

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The sky above her was gray and heavy when she opened her eyes. Melanie blinked several times until she realized she was no longer dreaming. She was actually staring at the sky above her, the real sky, as in she was out in the open air, out of the shelter.

  She sat up. That was a big mistake. Her head was spinning like crazy and she felt so dizzy, she had to close her eyes once again to make it stop. When she opened them again, she realized she was in a strange place. Snow was all around her, covering the soil and grass beneath her. Melanie shuddered. To her surprise, she wasn't freezing, her fingertips weren't starting to turn purple, and her knees weren't shaking in the cold.

  How did I get all the way up here in the mountains?

  Little by little, images returned to her from the night before and it made her head hurt even worse. Had there been a party of some sort? She remembered people nicely dressed, women in cocktail dresses and men in suits, happy faces, talking and chatting and…and, then…

  Oh, dear God. Then they all turned into vampires. Nasty bloodsucking vampires.

  Melanie shook her head and wondered once again how she had come from the church downtown to all the way up there? She could see the town below her in the valley. She looked at her hands that looked normal, then at her body and clothes. Her shirt was torn where her larger muscles had appeared when transforming. She wondered why she wasn't cold at all. She got up to walk. Her legs were sore like had she run a marathon and it was tough to walk in the deep snow. In front of her, she saw paw prints, big, deep ones and she stared at them for a little while, when she suddenly remembered that someone had cried something about a wolf last night. Had there been a wolf at the party?

  Melanie shook her head and continued to walk. She had to get back to town somehow. Not that she wasn't fine outside, because she felt very comfortable, strangely enough. Even though she was wearing nothing but jeans and a T-shirt, the same thing she had been wearing when her friends had come for her at the shelter.

  Amy! Robyn! They came for me, didn't they? They let me out. And then they took me to…the church where…

  Melanie shook her head again. She couldn't really remember what had happened. Not in detail. It all felt like such a blur. She remembered staring at the party through the window, then seeing the people turn into vampires and then she remembered feeling such deep anger, such a furor she couldn't control herself.

  Melanie took a few more steps across the snow where the big animal had obviously run the other way the night before. Then she stopped and looked up, a terrified look on her face, then down at her fingers that she now remembered being big and having claws and…having…

  Fur? Oh, dear Lord. I was the wolf. I was the one they screamed about. And I…I…I bit…the pastor! I killed a pastor.

  Melanie sank to her knees as the realization slowly sank in.

  If I wasn't doomed before, then I certainly am now.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  My mom seemed particularly jumpy and uninterested in me doing my schoolwork. While I sat at the computer and did my assignments, she paced around in the kitchen, biting her nails, which I found very strange since she never bit her nails. She was very careful with that particular part of her body and often went to spas to have them cared for and painted. She always scolded me if I bit mine.

  What was going on? Did she know I had lied to her?

  She kept looking out the window, staring into the street like she expected someone to drive into the cul-de-sac. It had me greatly worried. Once she spotted Jazmine's mom drive up into her driveway, she made a sound and went to her office. I could hear her talking and guessed she had to be on the phone. I put my ear to the door and listened in.

  "I tell you, Briana. He was here. Yes, he was. He spoke to Robyn. And he brought that…that disgusting creature with him. Uh-huh, uh-huh, yes, I think so too. Uh-huh, yes, no, this can't continue. We must do something. Yes, it was bad, terrible. Last night at the church. I swear, that beast would have killed us all had we not fled from there. I looked into the eyes of that…that beast and I saw it. It wanted blood. It wanted to kill us. Yes, I saw her there. How can you say that? Uh-huh, uh-huh, no, I don't think so. Yes, I’m sure. I wouldn't say it if I wasn't. Yes, I agree. Okay. It's gonna be tough, but it has to be done. Will do. Bye now."