A laugh escaped her, the sound like bells tinkling. “It wouldn’t matter if you did. They cannot hurt me.”

Oh, really? “Sorry to be the one to tell you this, but no one can withstand a blade.”

“I can. I cannot be cut.” Absolute confidence radiated from her.

His arms fell to his sides. “Who are you?” What are you? He quashed the second question before it could escape, not wanting to offend her. Again.

Besides, the answer really didn’t matter, he supposed. He was glad she was here, whatever she was.

“My name is Victoria.”

Victoria. He rolled the name through his mind. Soft, lovely. Like her. “I’m Aden.”

“I know,” she said, voice now hard.

“How?”

Again using those slow, measured steps, she circled him. “I’ve been following you for days.”

Days? No way. He’d only seen her that once. You’re not always the most observant of people, he reminded himself. “Why?”

In front of him again, closer than before, almost brushing against him, she said, “You know why.” Her breath was a lick of heat against his skin, like a bonfire on a winter day.

He liked it. A lot. But he would have given anything for actual contact. “I don’t.”

Her gaze met his, as hard as her tone had been. “You called us.”

On the phone? “I couldn’t have. I don’t even have your number.”

“Are you trying to provoke me?”

“No. I honestly didn’t call you.”

She pushed out a frustrated breath. “A week ago, you somehow overwhelmed my people with energy. Energy that was so strong, it left us writhing in pain for hours. Energy that latched onto us and tugged us to you as if we were tethered with rope.”

“I don’t understand. Energy? Sent by me?” A week ago, the only thing he’d done was kill a few corpses and meet Mary Ann.

With the thought, his eyes widened. The first time he’d seen Mary Ann, everything had ceased to exist before the world had seemed to explode in a burst of wind. Could that be what Victoria meant? And what did that mean for him and Mary Ann if it was?

“Who are your people? Where do you live?”

“I was born in Romania,” she said, ignoring his first question. “Wallachia.”

His brow furrowed as he considered her claim. A tutor had once forced him to do a report on Romania. He knew that Wallachia was north of the Danube and south of the Carpathians and that Wallachia was not what the town was now called. He also knew there was no way the wind he and Mary Ann had generated could have reached a place that far away. Right?

“Were you there when the energy hit you?”

“Yes. We move around a lot, but we had just returned to Romania. So what game do you play with us, Aden Stone? Why did you want us here?”

Us? No, he’d only wanted her. “If I was the one to send that energy, it wasn’t intentional,” he said.

She lifted her hand and rested her fingertips just below his ear. He closed his eyes for a moment, savoring. Finally. Contact. Her skin was burning hot, static, like lightning. Down her nails raked, gentle, so gentle, stopping at the base of his neck where his pulse hammered.

“Intentional or not,” she said, “my father was angered. And believe me, his anger is a terrifying thing. The stuff of nightmares. He wanted you dead.”

Aden was too entranced by her actions to be scared of her words. “Is that why you brought me here? To kill me?” Then why had she given him the blades? “You’ll understand if I don’t lie down and take it, I’m sure.”

The harshness of his tone must have jarred her because she backed away until she was no longer within easy reach. I should have kept my mouth closed, he thought darkly. What would it take to make her return?

“I said my father wanted you dead,” she admitted softly, gaze falling to the ground. “He no longer does. I convinced him to wait, to study you. We still feel the hum of your power, after all.”

One part of her speech intrigued him more than any other. “Why?”

She didn’t pretend to misunderstand. He wanted to know why she would seek to help him, a boy she knew nothing about. “You…fascinate me.” Her cheeks brightened with pink. “That was stupid of me to say. Pretend I said something else.”

“I can’t,” he said. Nor did he want to. “You fascinate me, too. I’ve thought about you since the moment I first saw you.” He didn’t tell her that had been months ago, in a vision. Didn’t tell her that sometimes she’d been the only thing in his life worth living for. “And when you visited me while I was sick…don’t try to deny it,” he added when she opened her mouth. “You took care of me, I know you did. I’ve wanted to spend time with you ever since.”

She shook her head as he spoke, tendrils of hair slapping her face. “We cannot like each other. We cannot become friends.”

“That’s good, because I don’t want to be your friend. I want to be more.” The words rushed from him, unstoppable. What he felt for this girl was different than what he’d ever felt for anyone else. It was more intense, consuming.

Maybe he should have kept that information to himself, as he’d told himself earlier, at least for a little while. But because of Elijah’s death-vision, he knew his days were numbered.

“You wouldn’t say that if you knew…” Her eyes narrowed on him. “Do you have any idea of what I am, Aden? Of what my father is?”

“No.” And it didn’t matter. He had four souls trapped in his head. Like he could really complain about someone else’s heritage, whatever it was.

Before he could blink, Victoria was once again in his face, pushing him backward until he slammed into a tree and lost his breath. He’d wanted her near him, but not like this. Not angry.

Her lips pulled back from her teeth, revealing sharp white fangs. “You would be running in terror if you knew.”

Those fangs…“But…you can’t be. You stood in sunlight. I saw you.”

“The older we are, the more the sunlight hurts us. The younger ones like me can stand in it for hours, unaffected.” There at the end, her voice rose. “Do you understand now? We use your people for food. Our mobile meals. Our blood on tap. And if we like that food enough, we drink again and again until that human becomes our blood-slave. But they never become our friends. To care for them is useless, for we will live on while they wither and die.”

He’d wondered what else was out there, and now he knew. “I can’t…I mean…A vampire.”

Suddenly, in his mind, one of Elijah’s visions opened up and he saw Victoria’s head against his shoulder, her teeth in his neck. He saw his knees buckle and his lifeless body fall to the ground. Saw her back away from him, mouth smeared with crimson, horror in her eyes.

He wanted to deny what he was seeing but couldn’t. He’d suspected Elijah’s ability was growing and this proved it. Victoria was here, real and in front of him. She’d led him into this forest, had touched his neck.

One day, Victoria would bite him. Drink from him. It wouldn’t kill him—someone’s knife would do that—but it would leave him helpless.

Could he stop it from happening? Did he want to stop it? Having Victoria in his life had somehow become almost as important to him as breathing.

The vision faded, and Aden blinked, his surroundings coming back into view. He was still in the forest, but Victoria was nowhere to be seen. With a sigh, he made his way back to the house, already knowing he wouldn’t sleep.

EIGHT

MARY ANN ARRIVED at school an hour and a half early. Presently, she was the only one outside, the sun barely peeking through the clouds. Good thing. She was shaking, unkempt. All night she’d sat at her computer, researching werewolves and paranormal abilities, replaying what had happened in the woods through her mind.

Though she’d printed hundreds of pages, she had found nothing substantiated, both subjects treated as fiction. In that fiction, werewolves were able to shift from animal to man, but even then none were reported as having the ability to insert their voices into human minds. But she knew, knew, that wolf had spoken inside her head.

The ability to make a body disappear was known as teleporting, and she also knew Aden had vanished. Knew his body had gone through the wolf’s but hadn’t come out the other side. She hadn’t imagined it. Her terror had been too real, and the feel of the wolf was still burned on her hand.

Was the wolf okay? The question had plagued her all night long, which in turn caused guilt to eat away at her. She should care more about Aden. Was he okay? Where had he gone? Had he returned? Could he return? She’d looked up Dan Reeves’s number but it was unlisted, so she’d almost driven over there. The only thing that had stopped her was the thought of getting Aden in trouble. That, and the fear of voicing what had happened and being told she was delusional.

I’m not crazy, she thought, pacing in front of the black double doors. She was going to confront Aden, demand answers. If he showed up. And if he denied his ability, she’d…what? Her shoulders sagged. She didn’t know what she’d do. Telling her dad—or any adult—would earn her a referral to one of her dad’s coworkers and perhaps medication. She’d known it in the forest, the first time the wolf had spoken to her, and she knew it now. Her friends would laugh at her, perhaps ostracize her.

A dark blue sedan eased into the parking lot, and Mr. White, the principal, emerged, briefcase in hand. He frowned when he saw her, his steps clipped as he approached. He was an older man with thinning hair and wrinkled features. His glasses were thick, as was his silver mustache.

“You’re here early,” he said.

She smiled; the action felt brittle. She’d always liked him because he’d always been kind to her, but she couldn’t feign her usual upbeat mood. “Just wanted to get away from my house to study for today’s chem test,” she lied.