The Hospital visit

"Home, I guess." Levi concentrated on the big-eyed puppy-dog look. It was clear his dad wasn't buying, and Levi wanted to go back to his room to make sure Ryan wasn't, um, sniffing around. "But I'll get right on all that homework," he said. He turned to go, turned back. "So the motel guy, is he going to be okay?"

"I'd suspect you of something, if I could figure out what it was," his father replied. "The motel guy is no longer my responsibility. My field is criminal justice, not medicine." He crossed to the kitchen table and picked up his olive green lawman jacket. "I'm going back out."

"Did you get another call?" Levi asked. "Is something going down?"

"Besides your grades?" His father cocked his head. "Did you take your Adderall today?"

"A gallon of it. Er, I mean, yes." Levi gave him a salute. "I'll be in my room." Then, just in case, he added, "I'm probably getting together with Max in a bit. His grades are even worse than mine. I want to help."

"You're quite the humanitarian."

Oh, yeah, right there was the proof that Levi had definitely inherited his dry wit from his old man.

"You wound me, Dad," he said.

He zoomed back into his room to find Ryan clacking away on his computer keyboard. It seemed so bizarre that an actual vampire was sitting at his desk, but not as bizarre that his best friend had been turned into a vampire.

"Hey," he said. "Keep your claws off." Ryan gave him one of his trademark sour glares and Levi said, "The deal with the motel guy is that he saw something at a window and it freaked him out so badly he had a heart attack. It wasn't you, was it?"

"No," Ryan said, but he looked interested.

"Okay, well, I'm going to the hospital to see if he'll tell me what it was."

Ryan looked uncomfortable. There was something up about him and the hospital. Maybe the fact that half of his sister had wound up in the morgue had put him off the place. Levi doubted it was the cafeteria food.

"Why would he tell you?" Ryan asked.

"Or...maybe the nurses will gossip," Levi said.

"I'll go with you," Ryan announced.

"Na-uh," Levi protested. He'd just had his daily quota of five minutes with Ryan and he certainly didn't want to overdo it. "You won't."

"Look." Ryan leaned toward him and the hairs on the back of Levi's neck stood straight up. "You and I both know that guy might have seen the Alpha. And if I can find the Alpha, I can help Max. So I'm going with you."

"Okay, okay," Levi said. "You can follow in your car."

"I didn't come here in a car," Ryan said.

"Okay, fine," Levi said, displeased. Maybe if Ryan did drive his car more often, instead of jogging all over the place like the Flash, he could cut down on the risk that someone might start to wonder about That Guy with the Eyebrows. He'd already been arrested for murder once—for the death of his sister, actually. Levi and Max had had a little something to do with that. Okay, a lot, by announcing that they had found Kate Harley's torso buried beside Ryan's house. But Sheriff Dad's crack forensics team had found skinny pale hairs, and not human hairs, on Kate Harley's corpse. So Ryan had been set free.

"But don't do anything blood sucking in my Jeep," he said opening up his doorand peering into the hallway. The coast was clear. "Like stick your head outthe window and let your fang out—"

"Shut up," Ryan said. "Let's go."

• • •

As surreptitiously as he could, Max cocked his head and listened to the faint echo of the cracking of a twig. Oblivious, Miley was picking her way down an incline. She had swapped out her heeled boots for flat ones better suited for hiking. It was too bad that she kept so much stuff in her trunk—he could have used the excuse that she wasn't dressed for investigating the preserve to avoid bringing her there.

Another twig cracked. Miley didn't hear that one, either. When she caught him looking at her, she gave her hair a toss beneath her knitted cap and kissed his cheek. His anxious frown melted into a grin. Her kiss had made his heart skip a beat.

"We should be close," she said, wrapping her hand around his and pulling the phone close so she could study the map. "Um, right?"

"It looks like it." He eased both their hands toward his chest, pulling her close, snagging another kiss. This one lasted longer. Then he put his free hand around her waist and held her as he kissed her again, slowly, savoring it. He felt as though the top of his head would explode. Miley was the first girl he had ever kissed—really kissed, not like in some dumb game like Truth or Dare. His heart thundered and he tried to remind himself that he couldn't get carried away. If he did, he might shift. And if he shifted . . .

"What was that?" she said, breaking the kiss.

That time, he had heard nothing but the roaring of his own pulse and the quickening of her heartbeat. Even now, he fought to concentrate, and to hear what had startled her.

Then, deep within his mind, he heard the growl of a vampire. It was like an echo inside an echo, and although it was faint, he heard it distinctly: one Vampire calling another. Seeking the clan.

He blinked and slid a glance toward Miley, to see if she had heard it, too. She'd heard something.

"What?" he asked.

She frowned slightly, listening. Then she relaxed. "It was nothing. I guess," she added tentatively. "I thought I heard voices."

"Like Leo?" He started to call out Leo's name, then wondered if he should. There were two strikes against it: one was that if someone was in the woods who should not be—the Alpha—Max didn't want to signal where he was. And the second was, well, it was pretty nice to be alone with Miley when she had her arms around him.

"Leo?" she called, settling his debate by taking the choice away from him. "Are you here?"

They both listened for a moment. He didn't hear anything. No Leo, no vampire growl. Maybe he had imagined it. He was still getting used to being a vampire; it was hard to know what was really happening and what was going on, because he was changing, becoming something he'd never dreamed existed.

A breeze tickled Miley's hair against her cheeks as she stood poised, listening. He couldn't get over how beautiful she was. How warm her skin was, and how good she smelled.

"I guess not," she said. She pressed her body against his. "Now, where were we?"

Looking for Leo, he almost replied. But that wasn't where they were.

As he kissed her again, Leo was far away from where they were.

On another planet, even.