"We only have one more year in school before college," she said. "I"m hoping you"ll at least wait until then?"
I could feel the sense of dread coming from Becky regarding this change. It could have simply been college-but this matter was also about a life change. Becky and I had been best friends since third grade. Our friendship wasn"t something either one of us was prepared to give up-and I had truly never thought about that when I envisioned being a vampire.
"I"d die without you, Raven," she burst out, hopping off her swing.
"Me too, Becky," I said, following after her. "Nothing will keep us apart."
"Not college-" she urged.
"Or the Underworld," I added. I was surprised I said it. It was new to me to be able to share the secret I"d been holding about Alexander, the Maxwells, and Sebastian. onspan> Her smooth forehead wrinkled in shock. She was still getting used to the idea of the new reality herself.
"Besides, it isn"t something we have to deal with now." I tried to rea.s.sure her. "Alexander hasn"t walked me down the cemetery aisle yet, has he? And neither one of us has really talked about college."
"We"ll agree to go to the same one, then. You and me and Matt and Alexander."
"Duh!" I said. I didn"t imagine Becky was planning to go to some fancy-schmancy college with outrageous tuition and a billion miles from Dullsville.
"Even if we have to meet in night cla.s.ses," she added.
"Agreed!" I put my arm around her shoulder.
"But what if you don"t wait until then?" she asked. "Alexander gave you that eternity ring." She pointed to my ring finger.
I never took off the glistening ring with a black diamond heart in the center. Not even in the shower or when I slept.
"Yes ... but..."
"I see the way Alexander looks at you. Now that I know the truth, I know what he is thinking. I thought it was just his European charisma." She laughed. "But it"s not, Raven. He wants you in a way that is not..."
"Human?" I asked.
She nodded her head.
I felt a huge beam of warm energy flood through me. But what I took as a compliment from Becky was something she meant as a big concern.
Though I felt melancholy about any type of change that led my best friend and me to being apart even for a minute, I did like the rea.s.surance from someone else that Alexander craved me in a way that only a vampire could.
"It will be okay, Becky," I said. "No matter what happens between Alexander and me, you and I will always be best friends. You can count on that forever."
Becky and I gave each other a quick hug before heading off to her truck to get some coffee.
I was ready for an eternity with my true love, but not an eternity apart from my best friend.
"I saw how quickly you yanked Luna off of me at the Crypt," Trevor said to me in the hallway the following day at school. "The lengths you go to, just to keep girls away from me."
"I was helping out Scarlet, not you. And on second thought, maybe I should have saved Scarlet by letting Luna paw on you instead."
He grinned mischievously. His devilish nature couldn"t mask his attractiveness. I felt ensnared by his gaze.
He fingered his blond locks and leaned in to me, then whispered, "It"s so clear who you"d really prefer to be your real boyfriend, and that"s me."
"When will you get over your delusions?" I asked. "I"m not even sure what Scarlet sees in you," I said.
Trevor inched even closer, his green eyes piercing through me. "But I think you do. I think you always have. Do you know why I like Scarlet?"
"Because she breathes?"
He smiled churlishly, his milky white teeth beaming. "Because she reminds me of you. When I am kissing her I imagine that I"m kissing you."
I was taken aback. Trevor never knew when to stop. "Don"t be cruel! She"s my friend."
"Which is worse?" he asked, getting in my face. "That I kiss her and think of you? Or that when I"m on the end of her succulent lips, that I might not be thinking of you?"
Trevor was a tease. Of course I didn"t want him to use Scarlet, and I didn"t want him to like me, either. But was I being honest with myself when there was a tiny piece of me that got a rise out of Trevor"s torment? Or was it just something I"d grown accustomed to all my life?
Trevor drew me in to him. "How about now I"ll kiss you and you can see for yourself who I am thinking of?"
I pushed against him as hard as I could, my black nails standing out against his yellow polo shirt. I knew he wasn"t going to force a kiss on me, but his embrace told me he got a kick out of my trying to squirm away from him.
For a moment, I thought about kissing him back, giving him the biggest shock of his life. But I remembered Alexander. And his lips were the only ones I wanted to be on the end of-regardless of how much I wanted to torment my nemesis.
"I can spit," I told him instead.
Trevor immediately released me and jumped away. "I"d say "You wouldn"t dare," but I know you would."
"Don"t tempt me," I said, adjusting my dress.
"Halloween is coming," he said as if it was a warning. "Jagger is planning to have a spectacular event down at the Crypt. Luna, Scarlet, all the girls wi"> How did Trevor always know more about the vampires" plans than I did?
"I"ll be there. With Alexander," I charged back.
"What horrible monster will you come as this year?" he asked. "Yourself?"
I really loathed Trevor. No matter how hard I tried, he always seemed to be one step ahead of me.
"I"ll be the one dressed as your psychiatrist," I said, and headed off for cla.s.s.
I felt extra groggy when I awoke in Alexander"s coffin. I lazily rolled over and snuggled up close to him, hoping to doze back to sleep. He caressed my hair and I felt amazingly at peace in his embrace.
"Good morning, Monster Girl!" I heard a familiar voice say.
Then a cell phone was turned on, illuminating the inside of the casket, and I saw green eyes staring back at me. How did I get in a coffin with Trevor Mitch.e.l.l? Where was Alexander? What was happening?
I tried to break open the coffin lid, but it wouldn"t budge. I pushed against it with my feet as hard as I could.
"Let me out!" I screamed. "Let me out!"
"It"s too late," my nemesis said. "We are here together for eternity."
His hand crept across my neck as if it was marking his territory.
I smacked it away. "Let go!" I yelled. "Alexander!"
"Isn"t this what you wanted?" Trevor asked.
"Not with you! Never with you!"
"But I thought it was me all along. When you were little, didn"t you try to get me to bite you so I could turn you into a vampire? It"s what you always wanted, Raven."
"Let me out!"
I screamed and kicked and pleaded. I could feel my nails sc.r.a.ping against the wooden casket lid. I was sure my fingers were dripping with blood.
"Raven!" I heard a girl"s voice say.
I awoke with my fingers digging into my school desk. Becky was nudging me in the side.
I tried t"0ean>I tro hide my embarra.s.sment as all my cla.s.smates stared at me. I was used to stares-but this time I felt like an idiot. I glanced around, and one particular student was grinning back at me: Trevor. I felt like somehow he"d just witnessed my whole dream, too. Beads of sweat peppered my brow, and I wiped my perspiring hands on my black tights.
Mr. Simmons glared at me and shook his head.
"Miss Madison," he said in a teacherly voice. "I"d give you a detention, but I"m afraid you"d sleep through that as well."
For the first time in high school, I agreed with one of my teachers.
3 The Devil Wears Doc Martens.
That night at the Crypt, I was anxious to see what information I could get on Jagger"s Halloween haunted house plans and how Luna and Romeo"s relationship was percolating.
Alexander drove me to the club, and when I entered, the new lovebats were cuddling next to the bar. Luna was stroking Romeo"s wavy hair and flashing her b.u.t.terfly lashes. When he broke away to serve a drink, she blew kisses at him.
I was really impressed with how quickly her affections had turned to Romeo. But I couldn"t blame her. He was really cute, and being older made him alluring, too.
When Luna caught sight of me, she waved me over. She was sitting at the bar in a tattered black shirt, a coral-colored flirty skirt, and chunky Doc Martens with pink laces.
I was shocked and checked around to make sure I really was the object of her attention. She waved again, as if it were obvious we were old friends; Alexander hung by Sebastian while I headed to the bar.
She spun around on the barstool. "Isn"t Romeo dreamy?" Luna stopped and pressed close to me as if she wanted to literally rub her words in my face.
"Uh ... yes," I agreed.
"And he"s so mature. Not like these younger guys." I knew who she meant and who that comment was directed toward: Alexander. Funny, these younger guys had been fine with her before as she tried to date most of them.
"Well, I think some guys here are really mature," I said defensively.
She didn"t have time for my response and threw her long pink locks behind her. "Romeo loves so many things," she explained. "And I"m one of them!"
"That"s great." I was really excited for Luna; after all, I was the one who set her up with Romeo, so naturally I wanted them to hit it off. But Luna Seshad a way of turning everything good into something adversarial. Instead of letting me find joy in her newfound happiness, she was tormenting me.
Luna twirled a piece of her Barbie-pink hair around her snow-white fingers. "He said he always liked me but thought I was younger than I am. I think it"s because of my smooth skin."
"Yes, that"s probably it." I did my best not to roll my eyes.
"And he knows what he wants out of life. He isn"t floundering around like the guys in this town-freaking out at commitments. Romeo is mature-he"s not a total commitment-phobe, unlike some people around here."
I did my best not to yank her off the barstool.
"I"m so happy you finally found someone," I said like a thrilled parent.
Luna stopped twirling her hair. Her smile stiffened, and I knew she didn"t like my crack.
"Well, I"ll have you know, we talked all last night about our future-that is, when we weren"t making out. Romeo wants to take me downstairs to the covenant altar, bite me, and bond our lives together for eternity. Isn"t that dreamy?" She batted her eyelashes purposefully.
My heart dropped. How could they make that decision so quickly? It had only been a few days-nights, in their case. Or was this one of Luna"s lies to get me jealous? Or even worse, was this another Maxwell ploy, like it had been with Sebastian, to be bonded without his knowledge? I a.s.sumed that Romeo had heard by now that the downstairs club was built right over a Civil War burial site. I wasn"t sure if this idea was something real or something Luna made up to spite me.
Instead of being mad, I decided to try the opposite approach.
"I"m the one that fixed you up, remember? I"m so happy that you found love so quickly."
"Oh yeah. That"s right," she said as if she was disappointed it had been me who was the one who had found her true-love-for-the-moment. Her scowl brightened, and she gushed like a bride. "Then I have you to thank," she said. "You can be my bridesmaid!"
She gave me a fake girlie hug-the kind that the popular girls at Dullsville High give when they greet each other at their lockers, then talk behind one another"s backs.
The last thing I wanted was for Luna to beat me to the covenant altar. In Romania, fine. But here in Dullsville? I was first in line. And to be her bridesmaid? Forget it. I wasn"t even going to attend!
The Maxwell twins were known for their tricks. It wasn"t too long ago that Jagger and Luna tried to trick Sebastian into bonding with her for eternity. Was Romeo the next ong L the nee to be taken to the sacred altar unknowingly? That wasn"t part of my plan when I had arranged for them to date.
"Does he even know he"s the groom?" I charged. "You do have a history of leaving important information out when taking your boyfriends to a covenant altar. Like the fact that it"s on sacred ground."
"He knows. Romeo knows all about the Crypt. And about the burial sites below the Covenant. It was his idea to be bonded, not mine," she said, triumphantly flipping her nose at me. "Can you say the same about your boyfriend?"
Her words stung me. Always giving me a jab about Alexander and my relationship. And she was diverting me from the task at hand.
If Romeo really did want to be with Luna, perhaps it was a good thing. The more she knew that it made me jealous, the faster she"d be to get hitched. Maybe I was thinking about this in the wrong way. The sooner Luna was locked and loaded to some guy, the sooner I could breathe easy that she wouldn"t be so stuck on Alexander. So what was there not to like about this plan?
"Sure," I said. "You should do it soon! Before he gets away. You name the time, and we"ll go shopping for dresses."
"Well..."