Kylie crossed her fingers that this whole mess could somehow have a good ending to it-that the only thing nasty to come out of it would be her sore ass.
"Be honest," Perry demanded.
Miranda hesitated before answering. "I ... I didn't kiss him back."
Della shifted her head closer to Kylie's ear and whispered, "She's lying."
Perry took a step closer to Miranda and studied her as if trying to figure out if he believed her. "Why don't I believe you?" He paused. "And even if you didn't kiss him back, you didn't stop him."
Miranda hesitated and then her shoulders dropped as if in defeat, and Kylie knew Miranda had decided to come clean.
"No. I didn't stop him. And yeah, maybe I did kiss him back just a little. But-"
"That's all I need to know." Raw and bitter pain filled Perry's colorchanging eyes and for a second all Kylie could think about was feeling that same hurt when she'd seen Trey with his new girlfriend plastered at his side. Then there was the pain of seeing Mandy kiss Derek. And don't forget when she learned that Lucas had run off with Fredericka.
"That's not fair," Miranda said.
"Oh, it's not fair, but that's just too bad," Perry said. "It could have been good between us." He turned around and walked away.
He got about ten feet down the path when Miranda called out to him.
"Aren't you curious about why I didn't stop him?"
Perry turned around and faced her. "I'm more curious as to why you think I should care."
Miranda's breath seemed to catch at Perry's words. She took several steps closer to him. "I didn't stop Kevin because ... because I was tired of waiting for you to kiss me."
"Really?" Perry's feet ate up the few feet between him and Miranda.
His right arm swept around her and pulled her against him. He didn't pause or even hesitate. He kissed her-not just a light peck, either. It looked to Kylie like the good kind of kiss, the kind Derek had given her last night. The kind of kiss a girl could feel all the way to her toes. And from the way Miranda leaned into Perry, Kylie could guess that Miranda's toes were feeling it all.
"Wow," Kylie muttered, and grinned.
"Yeah, wow." Della leaned in closer. "I think Perry just grew a pair."
Kylie bit down on her lip to keep from laughing. "If this was a movie, there would be some music playing in the background."
"I could sing," Della chuckled.
"And ruin it," Kylie teased back. "I've heard you singing in the shower." Both grinning, they looked back at the kissing couple.
Perry dropped his arms and stepped back. The abruptness with which the kiss ended seemed wrong. And it wasn't just Kylie who thought so. Miranda barely managed to catch herself.
Perry stared at Miranda, his expression not exactly one a person expected to see on a guy's face who'd just kissed a girl silly. The anger and hurt Kylie had noted earlier in Perry's eyes hadn't been wiped away with the kiss. If anything, he looked even angrier now.
"That," Perry said, his tone mirroring the emotion in his eyes. "That was just to show you that I would have been worth waiting for."
"Would have?" Miranda asked, her voice shaky.
"Yeah, would have." Perry turned and started walking away. But he stuck his right hand back and shot her the bird.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Figure it out," he said, but didn't look back.
Miranda swung back toward Kylie and Della. She put a hand to her lips and her eyes grew bright with moisture.
"Oh, crap." Kylie's heart clutched for her friend.
"Jerk," Della called out at Perry.
Holiday came running around the trail. She stopped and looked at the three of them and the departing Perry. "What just happened?" Holiday asked.
"Nothing," Della said.
Holiday glanced from Della to a teary-eyed Miranda who stood frozen watching Perry leave. Then the camp leader looked back at Della. "I heard it."
"Okay ... almost nothing," Della said, and shrugged.
Holiday, as if reading Miranda's emotional havoc, walked over and wrapped an arm around Miranda. "Come on, let's go talk?"
"What are you doing?" Della asked, stumbling into the kitchen at two a.m.
Kylie looked up from the computer screen. "Using a sledgehammer to make another window."
Della took a step back. "Are you having one of those funky dreams again?"
Kylie smiled. "No. I'm looking to see how many Brightens there are in the Dallas area."
"How many what?" Della dropped down at the kitchen table.
"Brightens. My dad's name was Brighten and Mom told me that his parents were in Dallas when they met. Since Daniel can't tell me what I am, I've got to find it out myself."
"But I thought ... Didn't you tell me he was adopted?"
"Yeah." Kylie looked back at the screen and frowned. "Damn, there are over a hundred Brightens in the metropolitan Dallas area. Who knew that was such a popular name?"
"If he was adopted then how is this going to help you figure out what you are?" Della leaned over to peer at the screen.
"Maybe they will help me find his real parents."
"I'd love to be a fly on the wall for that conversation. 'Hey, Grandma and Grandpa, I'm your granddaughter you never knew you had, but not really since I know you adopted my dad who died before I was born and I really don't care about you guys, I just want to know my real grandparents.'"
Kylie frowned at Della. "You are not helping me any."
"I'm just calling it like I see it."
"Well, I wish you wouldn't." Kylie closed her eyes and tried to hold on to the tiniest bit of hope she had. But deep down she was afraid Della was right. The chances of actually finding the Brightens were near impossible.
Getting them to tell her about his birth parents when she shouldn't even know he was adopted, well, it was probably going to take more than a sledgehammer to open that window.
"Hey," Della said, and nudged her shoulder. "Print up those numbers and Miranda and I can help you call them."
Kylie looked back at Della. "You would do that?"
"You gave me blood," Della said.
"Yeah, I did," Kylie said, and looked back at the computer screen. Then mentally she picked back up the sledgehammer and hit the print button.
"Let me go! Let me go!"
Two mornings later, something startled Kylie awake. Confused as to why she struggled in her own bed, she snapped open her eyes. The steam of her own breath floated above her face in snake-like patterns. The frigid air in the room told the time. Dawn.
She pulled the covers up to her neck and closed her eyes. And bam. The dream she'd just lived came crashing down on her.
Let me go! Let me go!
She heard her own scream like an echo, as if it was just now bouncing back from the dark corners of her bedroom. Her heart raced, pounded against her chest bone like a trapped animal. Thump. Thump. Thump. She wadded fistfuls of blanket in her hands and mentally fought being pulled back into the nightmare. Her efforts were futile. The dream became her reality.
Cloth ties cut into her arms as someone attempted to tie her down. Blinking, she tried to focus, but her vision seemed impaired.
Everything seemed impaired. Her head swam. She counted one, two, maybe three smeared and blurry figures standing over her. She kicked her legs, but an overwhelming sluggishness hampered her strength.
She pulled at the restraints, but the figures looming above multiplied. Their hands caught her limbs faster than she could move them. The ties around her wrists grew tighter. Unable to move, she watched in horror as another blurred figure came at her with a knife.
"No!" Her own scream jarred her from the nightmare. Snapping her eyes open, she clutched her fist and stared at the ceiling, afraid if she even blinked she'd be taken back.
"Just a dream. Just a dream." She repeated the words over and over. Rolling to her side, she tried to stand, but the dizziness from the dream now plagued her body for real. She fell back to the bed.
"Just a dream. Just a dream." She counted her breaths in and out, and only when the room's temperature dropped did she try to get up again. The wave of dizziness had passed, but the panic hung on. Her mind flashed through the frightening images, sending volts of fear coursing through her veins. Then she realized with horror that in the dream she had been the woman. She had been the ghost.
Grabbing her jeans, she slipped them on under her nightshirt. Not bothering to put on shoes or a bra, she scurried out of her room and out of her cabin. Her heart hadn't stopped racing when she came to the foot of the cabin steps. In spite of the hour, darkness hung like a cloak over the sky, only a glimmer of light clawing at the eastern horizon.
She started down the trail that led to Holiday's cabin, but remembered Holiday saying that she went to the office at first light.
Swinging around, Kylie ran down the path to the office. The ease and speed with which she moved should have been comforting, but it just served as a reminder that everything in her life was changing. And she didn't have a clue where those changes would lead her.
She'd gotten halfway to the office when her lungs finally demanded more oxygen. Drawing in deep breaths, she bent her knees slightly and rested her palms on her lower thighs. Staring down at her bare feet, she fought to keep images of the dreams from playing like a bad video in her head.
"Just a dream," she whispered into the dark silence.
And that's when she noticed it. The stillness. The dark dead silence. The kind of silence that meant she wasn't alone. The lack of cold told her this wasn't a spirit. She remembered the vampire who'd dared to enter the camp. The one Burnett insisted could have fed on her if that had been its intent. Was it back to finish the job?
She stood erect. Her first instinct was to run.
Her second was to scream.
Her third instinct, not nearly as strong as the first two, was to pull up her big girl panties and face whoever-or whatever-it was.
Before she actually fully embraced option number three, the world around her came back to life. Finding comfort in the frogs, an occasional bird, and the chirp of insects, she pushed back the panic from her chest.
No doubt the last few days had made her a bit suspicious. A second of silence in dawn's symphony didn't mean she was being followed.
Or at least not by a vampire. For some reason she remembered ... She cut her eyes to the edge of the path, where the trees loomed as if guarding the woods. No golden wolf eyes peered out at her from the darkness. No creatures of the night either. Obviously, the only thing following her right now was her own paranoia. Brought on stronger by the nightmare.
Letting go of another deep gulp of held-in oxygen, she started back down the path. She got a few more feet when she heard it. Before she could react, the whish of early morning air blasted past her.
Prepared to fight for her life, thinking only of rogue vampires, determined to prove she was not easy prey, she raised her arms.
Then she saw it.
Not a vampire.
The huge bird-a cross between a large blue heron and something that might have existed in prehistoric ages-parked its feathered ass in front of her. It flapped wings that had a seven- or eight-foot span. Shocked, and still not quite believing her eyes, Kylie gasped. The thing towered over her by a good two feet. Unsure what to do, she took one step back. The sparkles started forming immediately.
Crossing her arms over her chest, she felt stupid for not guessing right away. "That wasn't funny," she hissed when Perry appeared.
"What wasn't funny?" he asked, in a serious tone that she'd seldom heard leave Perry's lips.
"You scared the crap out of me, that's what. I'm really sick and tired of-"
"Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I saw you running. I wanted to make sure everything was okay."
She didn't know if it was his tone or his expression, but she knew he'd told the truth. He hadn't been pulling a joke. He'd been concerned.
"Everything's fine." Yet when she got a better look into his eyes, she realized nothing was fine.
Perry, the practical jokester, was in a world of pain. Almost a mirror reflection of the pain she saw in Miranda's eyes. And it was so stupid. If they both cared so much why didn't they just move past the whole Kevin thing?
"She really likes you, Perry," Kylie said before she could stop herself.
"She likes Kevin, too."
"She doesn't like Kevin. He kissed her, that's all. And you two weren't even going out."
"She knew I liked her," he said. "I sat with her almost every day at lunch."
"Yeah, but a boyfriend is supposed to do more than just sit with you at lunch."
"I know that," he smarted back. "And I would have ... I was just waiting for the right time."
"And why isn't now the right time?"
"It's too late," he said.
She shook her head. "You're really going to let a kiss come between you and someone you really care about? Are you that-"
"Stubborn?" he finished. "Yeah, it's part of being a shape-shifter. Which, obviously, you know nothing about because you almost got yourself killed."
"But if you care about her then-"
"Cared," he said. "I cared about her. Miranda's history." Little flickers of light started forming around him. "Oh," he said. "Thanks for trying to protect me the other morning. But seriously, don't ever do it again." The giant bird reappeared. The flap of its wings moving past sent Kylie's hair up in the air and at the same time a deep ache fluttered to the pit of her stomach.
The golden hue of light filling the office window met Kylie as she took that last turn. She stopped and let herself just stare at the window, remembering the somber look in Perry's eyes and wishing she could change that. Moving up the steps, she opened the door and called out Holiday's name so she wouldn't be worried about who visited at this ungodly hour.
"In my office," Holiday called back, and Kylie moved into the room. Holiday motioned for Kylie to sit down. Dropping into the chair, Kylie slumped back in the seat.
"Are you okay?" Holiday asked, sorting through a stack of mail. Kylie sighed. "Miranda's still depressed. I just ran into Perry, and I tried to talk to him but he's not listening. Not that he doesn't look as miserable as Miranda. He's not even making any jokes. Della is PMSing and therefore is losing her patience with Miranda because all Miranda wants to do is eat ice cream and whimper over losing Perry."
Kylie stopped to breathe for one second, then continued. She was babbling, but she couldn't stop. "Not that it's really Miranda or the PMS making Della so difficult. It's the idea of going home for parents weekend and spending it with her family. But Miranda, even when she's not depressed, has never liked dealing with Della's mood swings. So now, Della and Miranda are threatening to rip each other's hearts out and feed them to my cat. Actually, I think Della wanted Miranda's liver, it was Miranda who's going for Della's heart. So to answer your question ... No, nothing is okay."
Holiday looked up from the mail and offered one word. "Interesting."
"What's interesting?" Kylie had a vague flashback of being in Dr. Day's office and being psychoanalyzed.
Holiday's gaze shifted back to the mail. "Several things actually." She set a piece of mail apart from the others before looking up again. "But let's start with the fact that I didn't ask about Miranda, or Della, or Perry. I asked how you were doing."
"So I'm a freak because I care about my friends?" Kylie asked, suddenly feeling annoyed. And yeah, she was about to start her period, too, so it might be a bit of PMS. Or it could just be the hundred other problems sitting on her shoulders like an unhappy gorilla.
"I didn't mean to imply you were a freak." Holiday's soft, caring tone aggravated Kylie more than the psychoanalytical one. Probably because it made Kylie feel less like a freak and more like a bitch.
Holiday dropped her chin in her hands, a gesture so Holiday-like, that in Kylie's mind the camp leader's chin was permanently in her hand. "I was implying that I think you hide your own problems from yourself by concentrating on the problems of everyone else."
Kylie recalled that her reasons for her early morning jaunt to the office were not exactly about Perry or Miranda. So okay, maybe Holiday had a point. Not that Kylie really felt up to admitting it right now. "Then again, maybe I'm just a nice person." Kylie sank deeper in the chair and regretted getting pissy. None of Kylie's problems could be blamed on Holiday, and if anything, Holiday and their growing relationship was one of the few things that felt right in Kylie's life right now. For that reason, she offered an apologetic smile at the end of the sentence. "Nice? Oh, I don't doubt that." Holiday grinned. "So, let's try this one more time. How are you doing, Kylie?"
Kylie sat up and propped both her elbows on the desk. "How much time do you have?"
"However much time you need." Holiday let a few silent seconds pass and then asked, "What's going on with you and Derek?"
"Nothing. Why?" Kylie asked.
Holiday arched a suspicious brow. "I saw you skip out of the dining hall yesterday when he walked in, and the same thing happened at dinner."
"I just didn't want to talk to him." It was the truth. Part of it. Neither did she want anyone with the ability to read her emotions or smell her hormones to know how turned on she got by just looking at him. Until she could get her wayward thoughts in check, best not to be close to him in a crowd. Or alone, she admitted. And yeah, sooner or later she was going to have to explain that to Derek. Later being her first choice. "So something is wrong?" Holiday asked.
Kylie crossed her arms over her chest. "Am I imagining things, or didn't you just tell me to be careful not to..." She didn't want to say it out loud. "You warned me to be careful around him? And now that I'm being careful, you act as if that's wrong. What is it you want me to do?" Holiday pursed her lips to the side in thought. "Careful, yes. But I didn't mean for you to avoid him."
"You might not have meant that, but right now this is my way of being careful. My way of dealing with it."
Holiday held up her hand. "Fine. You deal with it your way." She paused, then let go of another deep sigh that told Kylie she didn't approve.
"Have you spoken with your stepdad yet?"
Kylie rolled her eyes. "Did my mom call you again? I swear. I don't get why she thinks it's such a great idea that I forgive the man, when she doesn't have plans to forgive him anytime in the next century."
Holiday's mouth did another one of those twists to the right as if she was considering the words before she released them. "He's divorcing your mom, not you."
Yeah, Kylie's mom had sort of said the same thing, but Kylie didn't buy it. "It sure as heck doesn't feel that way." She could still remember begging him to let her go live with him. But no, he hadn't wanted her, and why? She looked up at Holiday again. "Did my mom also tell you he's screwing a girl who's only a couple years older than I am?"
"No," Holiday said. "But you told me. The day we went for ice cream."
Sympathy filled her eyes. "Look, Kylie, I'm not saying he hasn't done something wrong. But this still isn't about you and him. If I let the relationship between my father and mother affect how I felt about them, I'd hate them both."
"I'm sorry, but I totally disagree. It might not be about him and me, but what he's done affected me," Kylie said. "It affected me in so many ways. For example, my mom called me yesterday and told me she's considering selling our house. The house I grew up in, the place I've called home all my life."
Holiday leaned back in her chair. "That's tough. I can still remember how upset I got when my mom sold our house. But..."
"No buts," Kylie said. "My mom shouldn't push me to do something that she can't even do. She can't forgive him. Maybe I can't forgive him, either. So just tell her that the next time she calls. Or maybe I'll tell her myself."
Holiday frowned. "It wasn't your mom who called. It was your stepdad.
And he said he's-"
"Oh, crap. He called you?" Kylie remembered how embarrassing it had been when her dad had hit on Holiday, gawking at her as if she was candy and he had a sweet tooth. "Please don't tell me he asked you out or anything?"
"No. He sounded genuinely worried. He said he keeps e-mailing and calling you but you don't answer."
"If he was so worried he could just show up for parents day. But does he do that? No. And you know why? I'll bet it's because his girlfriend doesn't want him to come. Her parents probably won't give her permission to leave town."
"Or maybe he doesn't show up because he thinks you don't want to see him." Holiday shook her head. "I just think ... maybe you should try talking to him." She bit down on her lip and then her mouth tightened to the right again. "Oh, hell. I've already tossed my two cents in. I might as well go for the quarter. I also think that you are using avoidance as a way of dealing with everything that's going wrong in your life right now. Your dad and now Derek. And frankly, I should add that avoidance is a poor excuse for a coping method. I know because I've tried it a time or two."
"Yeah," Kylie said, back to feeling pretty bitchy again, yet unable to stop. "But until another coping method magically appears in my bag of tricks, this one is going to have to do." She almost wanted to defend herself and tell Holiday that she wasn't avoiding everything. She'd spent the last day and a half calling Dallas area Brightens, trying to find her dad's adoptive parents, so she might find his real parents, so she might find out what she was.
Holiday frowned. "We all have to learn lessons the hard way, don't we?"
"I guess so," Kylie said, not sure it could get any harder. "I'm just not ready to deal with my dad ... stepdad ... or with what I'm feeling about Derek. Is it too much to ask to just be given a reprieve?"
"No, it isn't too much to ask. But generally speaking, the longer you put off dealing with something, the harder it is to solve. Sometimes, you just have to face things head-on. My dad used to say that you should look trouble right in the face and spit in its eye."
"I never mastered the art of spitting," Kylie said.
Holiday smiled then glanced at the mail again. Sighing, she raised her gaze. "Do you want to avoid this as well?" She pushed a letter across the desk.
"What?" Kylie stared at the envelope and saw her name scribbled in a familiar script.
Lucas's script. He had written her another letter.