“Denmark.”
“Right.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Betsy, because I know you love him, but he is the spawn of the Ant and your dad. Who knows what twisted up his DNA?”
“That’s fair enough,” I admitted. We were slowly making our way from the beach to the mansion. “Especially when you consider the Ant’s other kid.”
“There’s nothing wrong with Laura that getting laid wouldn’t cure.”
I started laughing so hard I nearly dropped the baby. “That’s quite enough about my siblings from you,” I said, trying (and failing) to sound stern.
“Somebody’s got to help you keep it real.”
“Nobody’s said ‘keep it real’ for about five years.”
We walked through the front door and into the large receiving hall, and I still wasn’t used to the immensity that was Wyndham Manor. It made our place in St. Paul look like an RV. I was about to comment on that to Jess when I noticed a bunch of people running toward us.
I instinctively clutched the baby—What now, for God’s sake?—only to see them run straight past us.
“Betsy, oh my God! Look!”
I spun and looked. A kid—twelve? thirteen?—was falling, oh my God, he was actually falling from the third-level landing, headed straight for the marble floor. I thrust BabyJon at Jessica, but it was too late and the poor kid hit the floor with an awful, wet smack.
Chapter 38
Call an ambulance!” I screamed as a ring of adults surrounded the boy. “He’s—what the hell?”
He was growling. At least three adults went reeling backward, and I saw a blurred face, lots of white teeth, a snarl of fur.
And the sounds, dear God, the sounds! It was the noise you’d hear coming from a slaughterhouse. Or if a cat was tossed into a pack of wild dogs. It was chilling; it was terrifying.
Suddenly Jeannie was there, hauling Jessica and me back by our elbows. “You need to go,” she said firmly. “Now.” She was practically carrying us; our heels were dragging across the floor. “Right now!”
“What—what’s going on?” Jessica asked, trying to stare at the kid and extricate herself from Jeannie’s grip while keeping her balance.
“He’s only eleven. This is his first change. You need to leave right now. He won’t be able to—”
More adults fell back. One of them spun right into Jessica, and she—oh my God, she—
She dropped my brother. Right in the path of a brand-new werewolf.
The crazed adolescent (was there any other kind?) charged at my brother and bit him. I screamed, high and shrill . . .
(Elizabeth? What’s wrong?)
... and cried out for my brother, now surely dead at the hands of—
He was laughing.
BabyJon was laughing.
The new werewolf took off with his tail between his legs with at least three adults in pursuit, and suddenly the marble floor rushed up at me and hit me in the face.
Chapter 39
“. . . maybe she . . .”
“. . . couldn’t have . . .”
“... her a minute ...”
“. . . just the shock . . .”
I opened my eyes and saw Jeannie, Michael, Sinclair, and Jessica all peering down at me.
“Hey, there you are,” Jess said. She was, thank God, holding BabyJon, who was wriggling and whining to come to me. “You fainted.”
“I did not faint. Vampires don’t faint.”
“I know of at least one who does,” Sinclair teased.
“What happened?” I asked, sitting up.
“We were hoping you could tell us,” Michael said.
“Hey, one minute I’m minding my own business and the next some poor kid is falling to his death—except he didn’t die—and then trying to eat my brother. Who appears to be not eaten.”
In fact, BabyJon appeared to be fine. Which was impossible. I reached up and took him from Jess, inspected him, and found nothing except some saliva. No bite. No blood. Unbelievable.
“—don’t normally go through their first change until thirteen or fourteen,” Michael was saying. “Aaron’s only eleven; nobody expected him to change during this phase.”
“Is that why he did it while it was still daylight?” Jessica asked.
Nobody answered her, which was just rude. Super-Secret Werewolf Business, no doubt. And speaking of daylight, there wasn’t much of it left. I imagine Michael was going to have to get furry pretty soon. Which meant—oh, shit.
“Sinclair!” I cried. “This castle is practically all windows, what the hell are you doing out of our room?”
He looked at me as if I’d suddenly grown another head. “You were screaming,” he said simply. “In my head. I had to come.”
“He jumped down from the third-floor landing,” Jessica added. “I can’t believe his femurs aren’t in his lungs right now.”
“Gross,” was my only comment.
“I don’t understand any of this,” Michael said. “You said Aaron bit the baby? You must be mistaken; there isn’t a scratch on him. And whose baby is that, anyway?”
Oh, for the love—
“Wait a second. Wait.” Jessica frowned. She frowned harder. Her eyes went all narrow and squinty. Her lips twitched. Michael and Jeannie looked alarmed, but I knew that expression. It was her It’s on the Tip of My Tongue look.
Then: “Bite him.”
“What?”
“Bite the baby.”
“Nobody’s biting anybody’s baby,” I protested. “Least of all this one.”
“I’ll bite him,” Jeannie offered.
Jessica shook her head. “It’s got to be one of the vampires.”
“Ah,” Sinclair said. “I see what you’re getting at.”
“Swell,” I grumped. “Somebody want to clue me in?”
“BabyJon may well be immune to dangers others would find crippling, even fatal.”
“He’s not immune to anything,” I protested. “He’s had colds. He’s had shots at the pediatrician. He—don’t do that!”
Sinclair, moving with the spooky speed that, even after all this time, startled the hell out of me, dipped his head and slashed at BabyJon with his jaws. He made a rattlesnake look slow.
I lashed out and punched him in the eye before I knew what I was doing. Then, when I did know what I was doing, I slapped at his shoulders. It probably looked to the others like he was on fire and I was trying to put him out. “What—do you think—you’re doing?”
“Proving—ouch—Jessica’s theory.” He rubbed his eye. “Look.”
“Look at what, you psychotic?”
“Look at the baby.”
BabyJon yawned, unmoved by either a) the werewolf attack or b) the vampire bite.
“He doesn’t have a mark on him!” Jeannie marveled. “That’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen!”
“What, you’re saying he’s—what? Invulnerable?” I shook my head, feeling like I should be wearing a dunce cap. “But he’s not. You guys know he’s not. He’s skinned his knee crawling, he’s—”
“Invulnerable to paranormal harm,” Sinclair said, and Jessica nodded.
“Wait a minute,” Michael said. “That’s your baby?”
“Well, look who just caught up. Seriously? You guys think that’s what it is?”
“I saw Aaron try to bite him,” Jeannie said quietly. “It would have killed a normal infant.”
“When did you have a baby?” Michael asked, but I waved off his silly-ass questions.
“So that’s why Derik kept freaking out around him. He knew something was different about BabyJon, but not what. And—Jeannie, how would a Pack leader deal with something he could never hurt?”
“Why . . . I suppose he would try to gain dominance of some sort,” Jeannie replied slowly. “That’s their nature. That’s—”