Fane was waiting outside my English class when first period ended.
"Want to get out of here?"
No, Aurora. Just say no.
I smiled. "Yeah."
As we headed for the double doors, I caught a quick glimpse of Noel. Her eyes widened. She shouldn't look so surprised. Wasn't she the one who told me Scott Stevens was herbal tea? I would think Fane Donada was the type of guy who merited the Mouseketeer stamp of approval.
"Are you ready to try out the tank?" Fane asked when we reached his car.
He opened the passenger door for me. And they said chivalry was dead. Turns out it came in the most unexpected places.
I raised a brow before climbing in. "Where are we going?"
"Anywhere you want."
"How about Portage Glacier?"
"Hop in."
Oh, I was bad skipping class...again. This time I wasn't even staying on school property. It's not like I could concentrate on a word my teachers said, anyway. Not with Fane on the brain 24/7.
Math and science just didn't mean as much when I'd faced death three times. Four, counting Dante's driving.
Unlike Dante, Fane handled his car with care. I nearly giggled. Fane drove a piece of shit. He probably had to be gentle or she'd fall apart over the first speed bump.
Fane hadn't lied, the tank moved at a steady, slow speed, even after Fane got onto the highway going south.
I stared out the window as Fane wound his way along the base of the Chugach Mountains. The Seward Highway skirted the shores of the Turnagain Arm. Admittedly, I lived in one of the most beautiful places in the world. Still didn't mean I wanted to freeze my ass off half the year.
"I love this drive," I said.
"I'm impressed."
I raised a questioning brow.
"You seem completely at ease while I'm driving," Fane continued.
"I don't think it's you so much as the tank."
He smiled. "Are you hungry? I could pull off in Girdwood."
"No, keep driving."
I faced the ocean on the right. It was gray and full of silt-crusted icebergs floating in and out on the tide. I only looked away when Fane pointed out mountain goats on the left. He had an uncanny ability to spot them, even with his eyes on the road.
The parking lot at Portage Glacier was empty when we pulled in.
My memories of the place were of the summer time and great glossy icebergs floating by in Portage Lake as Mom and I watched from the edge of the parking lot. The glacier itself had receded over three miles in the last century. I'd never walked across the frozen lake to the edge of the glacier in the winter, but now it sounded like a good idea.
I tightened my scarf before stepping onto the ice. I couldn't actually see it with all the snow coverage.
Fane drifted silently by my side. I felt like we were walking on the moon. There wasn't another human in sight. The lake was covered in snow that crunched beneath our shoes. Fane and I blazed a trail across the expanse of white.
We rounded a corner carved into the lake by a mountain and saw the glacier in the distance. I wondered if Fane was as drawn to that great river of ice as I was.
We walked up to the jagged edge of the glacier. Chunks of white ice glowed unnaturally blue. The pieces looked as though they were lit from within.
"This really is an amazing place," I said.
"It's the last frontier," Fane said.
"Too bad it's so cold and dark."
"Are you kidding? That's my favorite part."
"We should turn back," I said. "My bus is going to be leaving soon."
He laughed. "I can drive you home now, remember?"
"Yeah, I guess that's true. We should still turn back. I really need to do my homework. Oh, and start going to class. I don't want to spend my summer in school or worse...next school year at Denali."
The way to the glacier felt like a journey of many miles, but the way back was quick.
"What about you?" I asked. "Do you plan on going to college?" I sort of doubted it.
He shrugged. "I don't know. I hadn't really thought about it lately. I guess it's time to move on to a higher education. Meet new people."
"You mean friends who aren't junkies?"
"They aren't junkies."
I raised a brow.
"Well, I guess they are sort of junkies, but I can't judge them."
"What's your roommate into?"
"Besides foreign films and rare books - not much."
"Real barrel of sunshine he is," I said.
"He's depressed."
"Maybe Alaska's not the best place for him."
Fane huffed. "He's like that no matter where he goes."
"Have you been a lot of places together?"
"Before moving to Alaska we were roommates in New York."
I whistled. "Wow, New York to Alaska. I guess you really needed a change in scenery."
"Call of the wild," Fane said and laughed. "It was my dream to come out to the far north. One day, I told Joss I was moving and that he could join me or stay behind."
"Wow, you guys must be really...close."
I wasn't sure how to respond to that. Wasn't it kind of weird for two teenage guys to move across the country together?
"Joss lost his family, too. We've been rooming together for a long time."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
Fane squeezed my hand.
"Anyway, he wanted to check it out first, but I said I was moving - sight unseen. The decision was a bit tougher for Joss. You see, he loved New York's arts and culture, but hated the people. The idea of vast stretches of uninhibited land appealed to him...the lack of artistry and architecture was more difficult to swallow."
"We've got totems and igloos," I said, smiling.
Fane grinned back. "Joss is more of a Venus de Milo and Basilica di San Marco kind of guy."
"We have ice sculptures downtown."
Fane laughed. "You're tenacious. I thought you were sick of this state."
"It's still my home...and I still think it's beautiful. It's just..."
"Dark and cold?"
I nodded, but somehow I didn't mind so much anymore.
"I was about to come out looking for you," Mom said when I walked through the front door.
"Mom, I'm only forty minutes late."
"I was worried. You never answer your phone anymore."
"That's not true."
"What happened?"
"Nothing. Fane gave me a ride home." I kicked my boots off and shrugged out of my jacket. "My car phobia is cured. Isn't that great?"
You'd think my mom would look happier.
"Anyway, I'm home and I'm going to get started on homework," I said.
I headed upstairs without waiting for a response. I hadn't even had a chance to get through my English assignment when she came by to check on me later.
Her steps reached my back and stopped.
"What?" I asked when she didn't say anything. I turned in my chair to face her.
"You have a friend downstairs to see you."
It had to be Fane. Why else would my mom's face look so pinched? I skipped ahead of her down the stairs, but found Noel waiting in the entryway.
"Hey," I said.
"Hi."
Her hood was pulled back, her arms were pressed at her sides, legs together, face bent down.
"Want to come up to my room?" I asked.
"Sure."
"This is Noel," I said to my mom as we passed her on the stairs.
"Hello," Mom said.
"Hi, Mrs. Sky." Noel looked at the floor when she spoke.
Once I had Noel in my room I shut the door. "Sorry I haven't been hanging for a while," I said. "I was suspended and then...well..." I shrugged and flashed her a dopey grin.
Noel looked around my room. She was probably realizing we didn't have much in common. I was just a normal high school girl. Well, not exactly normal, but it would appear that way.
I expected her to be annoyed with me, to accuse me of not really being one of them. What I wasn't expecting was for her sudden change in expression.
"Why didn't you tell me you were macking on a vampire?"
I felt the color drain from my face. "What?"
"Fane Donado." Noel arched a brow.
"What about him?"
Noel huffed in disgust. "What do you think, Aurora?"
Fane was nothing like Patrick, or Ivo, or the rabid lunatic.
He was just a high school boy...with dead parents, sharp back molars, and an immunity to cigarette smoke.
Normal.
All of a sudden my breathing went haywire. A succession of heavy gasps rasped up my throat as I fought for air. Oxygen wasn't going to my brain. I pulled at my neck.
Noel's leaned forward. "Aurora?"
"No." I clawed at my scarf. "It's not true. You're lying!" I shouted. "I don't believe you!"
Noel glanced at my door the louder I got. She walked over, contemplated me calmly, then slapped me across the face.
My cheek stung like a bitch. For such a petite stick of kindling, Noel packed a mean punch.
I put a hand on my cheek. "What the fuck, Noel!"
"Sorry. I was losing you. Are you telling me you didn't know Fane is a vampire?"
I did feel rather stupid now that she asked. Fane. I mean, come on, how thick was I? Conversations raced through my mind, all his odd little quirks, like the way he preferred the cold and dark and had no appetite for food. I don't eat meat. No, he just drank human blood. God, and his obsession with my scarf. It was probably like waving a red flag in front of a bull.
I shuddered.
I'd been lip-locking with a corpse. If Melcher knew, he'd probably tear the wooden cross off his wall and beat me with it.
"Of course he's a vampire," I said bitterly.
I was sure Noel had no idea what I was going through. In her world, having one's own personal suck buddy was probably the ultimate score, which made her humorless expression all the more confusing.
"This isn't good, Aurora."
I tried to read her eyes. "Why not?"
"Valerie, for one thing."
Jealousy raged inside my heart. How many love bites had Fane pressed into Valerie's skin? How many times had he sucked her blood? I bet she'd enjoyed every minute.
I leapt to my feet and snarled. "What does Valerie have to do with this?"
"She won't be happy you stole her man."
"That's none of her business."
Noel pushed herself off the carpet. "She has powerful friends."
"I'm not afraid of a fight."
Noel looked me in the eye. "You should be."
"Is that why you came here? To warn me?"
"Not just you."
For a moment I struggled to breathe again. "You can't mean she'd hurt Fane?"
An image of sharp, pointy objects whirled through my mind.
Noel shifted and shrugged weakly. "I don't know."
For some reason that answer was worse than yes or no. It became a statement of certainty.
"She can't do that! She can't just..."
She couldn't just...what exactly? Murder a vampire? That was my job.
I looked at Noel helplessly. She shrugged again. "I don't want anything to happen to Fane, either. He's one of the nice ones."
"Shit!" I said, pacing my room. "I need to talk to him."
"Aurora..."
"I need to talk to him now!" I turned suddenly. "You have to get me out of here."
"But Aurora..."
I pulled the dagger and sheath from the top drawer of my nightstand.
Her mouth fell open. "What are you doing with a knife?"
I sat on my bed and yanked the right pant leg of my jeans up. "Can't be too safe. You know vampires, can't expect them to play nice all the time."
"But Fane..."
"Is capable of anything - just like the rest of them." I shoved the dagger into the holster around my leg. Didn't think I'd be needing it so soon. "It's one thing to get bitten, but a whole other to date one of those...things."
Noel looked at me curiously. "I just...How could you not know? I thought that's why you were with him."
Why else would I be with Fane? It was a fair question. Not one I was going to answer, but understandable.
I covered the dagger with my pant leg and stood up. "I'm ready."
"Aurora, please don't rush in like this."
"I'm just going to talk to him."
Noel looked at my leg. "Then why do you need a knife?"
"As a precaution." I breezed past her. "Let's go."