Blinking, hoping to wash away the start of tears, she shoved the almost empty glass into the hands of the person beside her. No longer caring about showing respect, she took off at a dead run.
Five minutes later Kylie was still running. Running faster than she knew she could move. But was it vampire fast? The hot, muggy summer air filled her lungs and came out in gasps. Even with the night temperature clinging to the high eighties, a chill ran down her spine. Was she at this moment morphing into a vampire? Was she growing cold? Hadn't Della said it was painful? More like excruciatingly painful. Was she in pain? Emotionally yes. But physically? Not yet.
She kept moving. The sound of her feet hitting the ground filled her ears, and the sound of the thorny vines snagging her jeans and then ripping away seemed too loud. Her consciousness throbbed right along with the beating of her heart. Thump. Thump. Thump.
How many times had she told Della she wasn't a monster? And yet the mere idea that Kylie might be a vampire seemed ... too much.
The smell of the bonfire smoke clung to her clothes and filled her nose. Yet the taste of the sweet blood lingered on her tongue. She ran harder. Faster. Did her speed mean she was a vampire?
She didn't want to think about that.
Didn't want to accept it.
Her lungs finally gave out, declined the air she tried to force down. The muscles in her legs cramped and her knees shook. She stopped, her legs refusing to support her weight, and collapsed in the middle of a thorn-infested field. Pulling her legs to her chest, she hugged her shins and dropped her head on her knees.
She drew hot air into her lungs that now begged for oxygen. One breath, then two. Physically exhausted, she went still as the realization finally stuck. If she were a vampire, would she not have Della's stamina? Maybe that came with the change of body temperature. The dampness on her cheeks told her she'd been crying.
The air suddenly chilled. Turned cold.
Not vampire cold.
Dead cold.
She wasn't alone-another spirit had joined her. But who was it this time? Holiday had explained that in time, her abilities would increase and she would have to deal with more than one ghost at a time. But right now, there was only one ghost she wanted to see. Only one thing she wanted.
She wanted answers. "Daniel?" she called her father's name. And then louder. "Daniel Brighten. What am I?"
When he didn't appear, she screamed his name again and again. Her throat became sore, but she didn't stop. "You come here now. You give me answers or I swear to you, I'll never, NEVER acknowledge your presence again. I will shut you off, eradicate you from my mind, and refuse to see, talk, or even think of you again."
As the threat fell from her lips, she didn't even know if she had the ability to do it, but something inside her said she could. She dropped her head against her knees and tried to breathe.
Suddenly the cold grew nearer. She felt it surround her. Felt it wrap around her in a tight embrace. It wasn't just any cold, it was Daniel's cold.
She raised her face and saw his spirit kneel beside her. His blue eyes, the same light color as her own, met hers. His eyes, and most everything else about his facial features, from the oval-shaped face to the slightly turned-up nose, were so much like hers that it was a bit disturbing.
When his arm curled around her shoulders, the knot in her throat doubled. "Don't cry." He brushed a tear from her cheek. "My little girl should never cry." The icy touch shouldn't have been comforting, but it was.
"I drank blood and it was good." She spit out the words like a confession.
"And you see this as wrong?" he asked.
"I ... It scares me."
"I know," he said. "I remember feeling much the same the way."
"Did you drink blood? Are we ... vampires?" The word almost wouldn't come.
"I never tried blood." His expression filled with empathy. "But, Kylie, you didn't do anything wrong." His voice came out soft, his words soothing.
The cold, his cold, lessened her fear of the unknown and she felt ... loved.
Right then, she knew love had no boundaries, not even death. Love had no temperature. Maybe being cold wasn't altogether a bad thing. She leaned into him and drew comfort from his nearness.
Minutes passed. She blinked away her tears and sat up. He shifted from his kneeling position and sat beside her. Wiping her face, she stared at the father she'd never known in life. Yet, even separated by death, she felt the bond. "Tell me. Please tell me what I am."
The smile in his eyes faded. "I wish I could give you what you want, but I don't have the answers. I was older than you when I realized I was different from everyone else. But it wasn't until I was eighteen and away at college that things started happening."
"What kind of things?" she asked, and then somehow she knew. "You saw ghosts?"
He nodded and cupped his hands together. "I thought I had lost my mind. Then one day I met an old man fishing. He told me he was fairy."
"Did he tell you what you were?" she asked.
"No, just that I wasn't human and, of course, I thought he was crazy. It took me months before I believed him. When I went back to find him again, he was gone."
"But what about your parents?" Kylie asked. "Didn't they tell you?"
"No. And when my ability to recognize other supernaturals made sense to me, I realized they were both human. At that time, I didn't know that I couldn't have been their child. Since my death, I learned I was adopted. Not that it made them any less my parents. They loved me. And they would love you, too."
"They never told you that you were adopted? How could they lie to you like that?"
"Back then it was considered best to keep adoption a secret, even from the child. I have yet to find out who or what my real parents are. So you see, the answers you seek were the same answers I sought right before my death. Maybe you can discover them for us both."
"But..."
"But what?" he asked.
"I thought ghosts were all-seeing. They are in the movies, anyway. Isn't there someone on the other side who could tell you?"
He smiled. "You would think so. But no, even here, they want you to find your own answers."
"That freaking sucks," Kylie said. "Being dead should have some benefits."
He laughed. The sound echoed with familiarity. It was another thing she had gotten from him-the tenor of her laugh. Her thoughts went to her stepdad, the man whom she had loved so much and yet who had turned his back on her and her mom. She still didn't know if she could forgive him. If she wanted to forgive him. And then the strangest thought hit: she had loved the wrong father.