Dean looked pathetic. “Let me guess. I blew it, right? You’ll never talk to me again.”
“No, it’s okay.” She sighed and slid into the chair. “It’s just that Jason’s not what I would call a great character reference.”
“I hear you. But then, I was working for Frank Collins, and my brother was a crazy biker dude, so it really wasn’t that much of a stretch.” He shrugged. “Thanks for cutting me some slack, Claire.”
“Everybody deserves a second chance. Hey, did you see Shane? I thought you wanted to talk to him.”
“I did. Where is he?”
“Gone to work. He just left.”
“I missed him?” Dean looked around, as if Shane would just materialize out of thin air. He looked disappointed when that didn’t happen. “Damn.”
“Well, it’s pretty busy in here. If you didn’t see him, he probably didn’t see you, either. It’s not like he’s avoiding you or anything.”
“Yeah, probably. So. You’re, ah, staying on? In Morganville?”
“Yes.” She left it at that. Between her new, completely amazing relationship with Shane, and the fact that Myrnin was teaching her physics so advanced that most Nobel Prize-winners would weep, no way was she leaving now. “You?”
He shrugged. “Got no place else to be. You still living at the Glass House?”
“Uh, no. I made a deal with my parents. I have to live at home with them until I’m eighteen, and then I can move back. Eve promised that they’d keep my room for me, though.” The truth was, she pretty much still lived there, and she looked forward to the time she spent with her friends—shared dinners, board games, zombie-smashing video games, and Wii tennis . . . And Eve doing dramatic readings from her favorite vampire books as Michael squirmed in embarrassment.
She looked forward to everything.
Morganville wasn’t perfect. It would never be perfect. But Amelie had kept her promise, and humans were starting to feel like equal citizens, not possessions. Not walking blood banks.
It was a start. Claire had plans for more, in time.
“Hey,” she said. “Maybe you could come over tonight, to the Glass House? Have dinner with us? I’m sure Shane would love to see you. It’d be a great surprise.”
“It would,” Dean said, and gave her a matching grin. “Yeah, okay. Seven o’clock?”
“Fine,” she said. “Listen, I have to get to work. See you then!”
He hastily stood up and shoveled his books and papers into his backpack. “I’m going too,” he said. “Just a sec.”
Is he hitting on me?Claire wondered. She knew what Eve would say, but she couldn’t quite believe it. Dean seemed like a nice guy—but there was a glint in his eye when he looked at her.
She wondered if she should just take off, but that seemed rude.
Oliver was watching her from his place at the bar. She nodded to him, and he gave her a cool look that told her just what he thought of her. No, they were never going to be friends. And that was fine with Claire. She still thought he was a creep.
Dean stumbled over his own feet getting up, jostled the arm of a jock at the next table, and had to apologize his way out of trouble, backing into Claire as he did so. She sighed, grabbed his backpack, and towed him toward the door.
She was surprised he didn’t fall over the cracks in the sidewalk, but once he was out of public view, he seemed to straighten up and be a little more coordinated. Huh. He was taller than she’d thought. Broader, too. Not Shane-broad, but solid, after all. It was the hair that fooled her—emo hair always made guys look kind of wimpy.
“Where are you heading?” she asked Dean. He adjusted the weight of his backpack on his shoulder.
“Oh, you know,” he said vaguely, and pointed down the street. She was starting to think that he really was trying to hit on her. The going-my-way routine must have been old when Rome was still building roads. “You all done with classes and stuff?”
“Mostly. I have a couple of labs still to finish out, extra credit stuff, really. You looked like you were studying hard.”
“Not really,” Dean said. “I mostly carry the books around just to make stupid girls like you think I’m safe to be around.”
She blinked, not sure she’d heard that right. He’d said it exactly the same way he’d said everything else. Like a nice, normal guy.
They were just passing an alley between the buildings. Nobody in sight.
“What—”
She turned her head toward him, and the last thing she saw was his backpack, full of books, heading at full speed toward her head.
Claire woke up not really sure she was waking up at all—everything seemed weird, smeared, dreamlike. She couldn’t move, and her head hurt so bad she started to cry.
She heard voices.
“. . . can’t believe you brought her here,” one said—she knew the voice, but she couldn’t place it; the headache was too huge to think around. “Are you mental? That’s not just anybody.She’s going to be missed, Dean!”
“That’s the point.” Dean. That was Dean’s voice. “I want them to miss her. I want them to look all over. They won’t find her until I want them to. Come on, Jason. Man up, already.”
“Dude, I knew you were crazy. I didn’t know you were stupid, too. We have to let her go.”
Sound of scuffling. Feet on wood. Grunts. Two men fighting.
One went down.
“Shut up,” Dean snapped. “You’re always whining. All you ever had to do was carry the bodies. I’m not even asking you to get your hands dirty.”
“No! Look, I knowher. You can’t—”
“That’s why she’s perfect. Everybodyknows her. C’mon, man, get it together. She’s just a girl. Worse, she’s a vamp lover. We’re making the world a better place, and having fun while we do it.” Dean laughed. It was the worst sound she’d ever heard from a human—and a good match for the worst sound she’d ever heard, period.
Jason must be Jason Rosser, Eve’s brother. The one Dean said he barely knew. Maybe this was some horrible dream. It made sense that she’d put Jason’s brother in a dream about being abducted and tied up, right? Because Jason had been accused of those murders . . .
Claire opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling of what looked like an old, abandoned house. Spackle was peeling off in sad sheets, hanging down, waving in a slight breeze through a broken window.
Jason had been accused of those murders. But he’d told Amelie, straight up, that he hadn’t killed anybody.
He’d just seen it happen. He’d never said who was behind it. Dean.
Claire felt short of breath. This is bad; this is really, really bad. . . .Her head felt like it had been smashed with a brick. She felt sick enough to barf, and when she tried to move, the pain got worse. She couldn’t do much, anyway. She was tied up, ankles and wrists.
There was sunlight coming in the window, but it was at a low angle. She’d been out for hours, and there was a bitter, nasty taste in her mouth. They’d given her something, on top of knocking her in the head. Maybe chloroform.
By twisting her wrist, she could see her watch.
Five o’clock.
The sun would be down soon. Nobody would have missed her yet; it wasn’t dinnertime, and she’d been casually intending to drop in at Myrnin’s lab to see how far he’d gotten with setting it back up. But he hadn’t been expecting her.
Nobody had been expecting her. Shane had gone to work, and wouldn’t be home until dark.
Phone.
It wasn’t in her pocket. They’d taken it.
She blinked, and she must have lost time, because when she opened her eyes again, Dean Simms was sitting next to her, staring down. In the doorway of the decaying room stood Jason Rosser, looking sick and ill at ease.
Dean was smiling like he owned the world.
“Hey,” he said. “So, you’re up and around, right? Good. I thought you’d be tougher. I mean, they all talk about you like you’re something special, but you went down just like the others. No problem at all.”