SEVEN

Morning felt like the end of the world. Claire didn't remember sleeping, but she supposed she must have a little. Outside her window the sun was shining, and when she pulled the sash up a warming breeze fluttered the white curtains. It was going to be a nice day.

For the end of the world, anyway.

She rolled over in bed and found herself facing a lot of empty space--space that Shane had occupied sometimes, whether they were just lying together talking or watching TV or...doing other things. But no Shane. Not today. That side of the bed was smooth.

Claire rolled back over to face the other side, which was just a view of the blank wall and a dresser. On the dresser was a picture of her and Shane, arms around each other, laughing.

She squeezed her eyes shut. They felt raw and red, swollen from crying, and she knew she looked as miserable as she felt.

Get up,she told herself.You can't just lie around here all day, feeling sorry for yourself.

But if she got up, she might run into Shane in the hall or downstairs in the kitchen or......

Get up. You live here, too.

She didn't want to, but the idea of wallowing around in her misery didn't sound so great, either. She was tired of crying, and her head hurt. She needed something to drink, something to eat, and to tell Eve all about it.

Crawling out from under the covers, Claire realized that she was still wearing the clothes she'd thrown on to follow Myrnin; she hadn't bothered, in her generally awful mood, to undress. She took a fresh set with her to the bathroom (she noted that Shane's door was closed as she passed) and showered and dressed and fixed her hair. When she realized that she was actually taking longer than Eve generally did, mainly to avoid any possibility of coming into contact withhim , she sucked in a deep breath, dumped the old clothes in the laundry basket, and reached for the bathroom doorknob.

Her cell phone went off, scaring her so badly, she banged her elbow into the sink while reaching into her pants pocket.Ow. That hurt, hurt bad enough to make her take an extra second of deep breaths to stare down at the lit-up screen. She didn't recognize the number, not even the area code.Probably a wrong number.

She answered, and a voice on the other end, sounding brisk and businesslike, said, "May I speak with Claire Danvers, please?"

"I'm Claire." She swallowed a bubble of anxiety. Could it be about her dad? No, he was doing better--he'd said so himself. Everything was all right.

Then why was some stranger calling her?Now?

"My name is Mr. Radamon, and I am in charge of the Atomic, Biophysics, Condensed Matter, and Plasma Physics program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Did you receive our letter?"

Claire went entirely blank. "Your...letter?"

"You applied for admission into our program last year," Mr. Radamon said. He sounded so...normal.So human. Somehow, she'd expected an MIT honcho to sound more godlike, with thunder rolling in the background. "We replied about six months ago with an acceptance letter to your home address. I just wanted to be sure you got it."

"Oh.Oh , no, I didn't. My parents--my parents had to move. My dad is sick." MIT. MIT was on her phone. She took it away from her ear and started at it in dreamlike disbelief. "You said...I was accepted?"

"Yes," he said. "We do have an opening. But, of course, we need to confirm that you'll be able to attend at the beginning of next year. If you can't, we'll have to give the opportunity to another applicant. You understand?"

"Of course," Claire said, and felt a wave of hot excitement roll over her, followed by an ice-cold wave of realization. "You said...next year? As in January?"

"Yes, January," he said. "I hope that gives you enough time to make your arrangements. I'm sorry to hear your father is ill. I hope it's nothing serious."

Claire honestly didn't know what to say, and wasn't sure she could sayanything. She'd been dreaming of this moment for years, thinking about how cool and perfect she was going to sound, how she'd impress them with her adult attitude and control.

All she wanted to do was cry.I can't. I can't go. They won't let me, and this is my chance, my only chance.... MIT had been her dream ever since she'd been able to understand what they did there, what they taught, what they achieved. There, she'd learn things that even Myrnin couldn't fathom. She'd discover the secrets of the universe.

All she had to do was get the hell out of Morganville. Which she couldn't do.

"Miss Danvers?" said the voice of the future on the other end of a very long line. "Are you there?"

"Yes," she said. "I'm here."All the way here. "Mr. Radamon, I'm sorry. I'll need to get back to you a little later. I need to, uh, talk to my parents before I tell you for sure. Would that be okay?"

"Oh yes, absolutely. I'm sorry to spring this on you without any warning." He chuckled. "I know how exciting it can be to get this kind of news. I think I yelled my parents' house down when I got my acceptance letter. Most exciting moment of my life. Well, congratulations, Ms. Danvers. Please call me back when you have all your arrangements in hand. I'll need to hear from you within the week, of course."

"Of course," she repeated numbly. "Thank you, sir. Thank you very much."

"No thanks necessary; you were a brilliant candidate, and your scores are extremely impressive. We

look forward to having you on the team here."

She must have said something else, something nice and appreciative, but honestly, Claire couldn't think of anything except the giant letters flashing in front of her eyes...one set was MIT, and the other was OMG. She'd expected to feel a tremendous rush, but all she felt was...conflicted. And deeply, deeply scared.

The world had just opened up for her. Doves and angels and choirs singing. And all she could feel about it was...dread. Dread because she didn't think Amelie would release her in the first place, but even if she did...even if she did, what about Shane? If Shane was even talking to her ever again.

God, it was such amess.

She took another five minutes, sitting in silence, staring at her turned-off phone. Wondering who she should call. Her parents would support her no matter what; no help there. She wanted to talk to Shane, suddenly, but...but after last night...

She had nobody shecould talk to.

Well, she would have said something to Michael, who was in the living room, getting his stuff, but by the time she got her courage together, he was on his way. He just waved as he put on a sun-blocking black coat and hat and headed out the back door.

She shut her mouth, still trying to figure out how she felt. Mostly she just seemed...confused.

Eve was in the kitchen making pancakes. Alone.

"Morning, girlfriend," Eve said, and dumped some lumpy batter into a hot pan, where it immediately started to sizzle. "You look like you need carbs."

"Totally," Claire said, and sat down to rest her forehead in both hands. "Thanks."

"Yeah, no problem. Here." Eve grabbed a mug, filled it with coffee, and slid it to her on the table. "Caffeine. Makes the world all bright and sparkly, or maybe that's just me. Look, I gave you the fun mug."

In Eve's world, it was. It was a coffee mug with a dead-guy chalk outline on it, and it said he had decaf.

Claire mixed the coffee with all the things that made coffee drinking possible for her--milk, sugar, a little cinnamon--and sat nursing it, staring into the light brown surface but not seeing anything. She couldn't think. All she could do was...feel awful.

She needed to tell Eve, but saying it out loud would make it all real.MIT wants me to go there . Because part of her was so excited it was vibrating apart, and the other part, the practical part...that was crying. Did shewant to go...leave behind Morganville? Well, yes, obviously. But that meant leaving the people, too. Eve. Michael. Myrnin.Shane.

She wanted to talk about that, badly, but she just...couldn't. Not yet.

"Incoming!" Eve said, and as Claire looked up, slid a plate in front of her with two thick, steaming pancakes. A pat of butter melted like lava on top, and Eve thumped down a bottle of syrup. "Everything

gets better with pancakes. It's a law of the universe. Bonus for bacon, but we're out."

Eve had a plate, too, and sat down opposite her. Claire hadn't noticed, but Eve was makeup-free this morning, and her Goth-black hair was tied back in a simple ponytail. Even her clothes were subdued, or as much as Eve ever got--a form-hugging tee with a black-on-black skull design and a pair of black jeans. She picked up her fork and dug into her own plate.

Claire just watched the butter melt and poked at the pancakes a little. She dragged her fork through the syrup and spelled outMIT . Finally, she took a bite. They were good, really good, but as soon as she started to chew, tears came to her eyes and she could hardly swallow. She coughed to cover it, but Eve was watching her with a steady kind of focus that made it unnecessary.

"Hey," Eve said. "You know you can talk to me, right? About anything?"

Not about that. Not yet. But the other thing, yes. "Shane hates me," Claire said in a very small voice, and dragged her fork through the moat of syrup around the fortress of pancakes.

"Seriously?" Eve waited for Claire's nod before eating a bite of pancakes. She chewed and swallowed before she said, "Sorry, Claire Bear. He doesn't."

"You didn't hear what he said to me last night." That did it--the tears came now, for real, and she picked up her napkin and tried to wipe them away with shaking hands. God, what a mess she was.

"I heard what he said this morning before he blew out of here. He was angry at himself, not you--or, at least, more than at you. He said you'd gotten dragged away by Myrnin last night and he'd acted like a dick about it. Isn't that what happened?"

"Well, sort of. He was right--Idid go off with Myrnin."

"On a job."

"Yeah."

"Not on a date."

"Oh, God, no!"

"Then Shane acted like an ass, and he's got nothing to be jealous about, and he knows it. I saw him, Claire. Believe me, he knows he was wrong. He feels bad."

"Then why--?"Why didn't he come talk to me? Why didn't he try? Why did he just...leave?

"He's cooling down. It's a guy thing," Eve said. "He'll be okay when he gets back. And you? He said you were all angry about him watching sexy commercials on TV, which, frankly, is weird--you being mad about it, not him watching them, because I'm pretty sure teen boys get a pass on that. They can't help hitting the pause button when the half-naked girls show up."

"No, that wasn't it. It was--" She replayed it in her mind. A blur, a flutter of curtains. Whispers and laughter in the dark.

In the end, nothing she could truly say wasn't just a product of her tired mind and of jealousy.

"I thought he was with somebody," she finally said, miserably. "In his room. Some girl."

Eve ate a bite of pancakes, thinking about it, and then said, "And you honestly think he's that big a jerk, that not only does he cheat on you, he brings her back here, to our house? Where, I might add, I would personally open up a ten-gallon drum of whup-ass on him and any skank he dragged in here. Not to mention what Michael would do."

"No, I--I don't honestly think that. And, uh, thanks?"

"It's what friends do," Eve said graciously. "He didn't bring anybody back here--you know that. Besides, you were with us last night when he came home. What'd he do, smuggle her in under his coat?"

"I think she was a vampire," Claire said in a rush, without looking at Eve. In her blurry peripheral vision, she could see that Eve had stopped in the act of raising her fork to her mouth. Syrup dripped off, but the plate caught the damage.

Eve slowly put her fork back down.

"You think Shane's getting it from some vampire girl?"

Claire's frustration burned up suddenly, like flash paper. "I don'tknow ! I'm just telling you what itfelt like , Eve! There was a woman talking and laughing, and I went in his room, and there was a blur and wind and then he was alone.You fill in the blanks!"

"Oh, sweetie," Eve said. "You know that's totally frickin' insane, right? Because for one thing, Shane hates the hell right out of vampires. For another, he loves you."

"Maybe she's--I don't know--making him do it. They can do that, right? Yvette did."

"The last one who tried it didn't get very far, if you remember," Eve said. "And I heard on good authority that Yvette's ashes got sprinkled on the Founder's rose garden, so there's that. Shane's strong, and I don't just mean the muscles. I've never seen any bite marks on him. Have you?"

Claire had to shake her head reluctantly. She definitely hadn't seen any bites.She , on the other hand, had a collection of them, the worst from Myrnin. So maybe she was still, and badly, overreacting. Shane was acting jealous, but maybe he had reason, considering everything that had gone on with Myrnin.

Maybe that was why he was turning antivamp again.

"You're kind of freaking me out, you two," Eve said. "I mean, you're thestable one. And Shane, he's loyal to the point of stupid. If you two can't keep it together..." She didn't say it, but Claire knew she was thinking,What chance do Michael and I have? Claire had heard gossip when Eve wasn't around. Nobody was giving their vampire-and-human Romeo-and-Juliet act anything like good odds to go the distance.

And whatwas the distance, for a relationship where the vampire wasn't going to get any older, while Eve would? She knew, without even thinking about it, that Eve had spent long nights considering all this, going over and over it. So had Michael, probably.

Maybe love would conquer all. That was a nice thought, even if it wasn't realistic.

God, she wanted to blurt it all out to Eve--about Jason being held in that room at Founder's Square. About Bishop out stalking the streets. But she knew that would be a very bad idea. Amelie had been clear enough, and she wasn't in any mood to be forgiving.

She could tell her about MIT, but...no. That was private. She didn't want Eve to think she didn't care about her, because she did. She loved her.

But it wasMIT.

Eve ate a couple of bites of pancake, and so did Claire, even though she couldn't taste it at all.

"CB," Eve said, and made her look up. "It's okay. Whatever it was, Shane's not that guy you're thinking about. He'syour guy, and he's always going to be. Trust me. I know Shane, and he can be a jerk, but he can also be the best man I've ever met. And you, you make him better every day he's with you. Okay?"

"Okay," Claire said. She felt a little better, and also a lot worse, because that made leaving for Boston much harder. Maybe shehad been tired and made a lot out of nothing. "I should get going. I'm going to be late for class."

"Whatcha learning?"

"Probably nothing, considering how sleepy I am. But in theory, it's about multidimensional analysis and waveforms." Like she'd be studying at MIT. Only that would be a thousand times better, somehow.

"I have no idea what that is, but yawn, anyway, just on principle. Eat up. Pancakes is brain food."

"Apparently not grammar food."

"Wow. You college girls aremean. "

Claire had a pleasant enough morning.... The class ended up short one professor, so after ten minutes, they were free to wander off. Her next class was a lab, which she loved (and always aced). Then lunch, and a free afternoon to think things over.

As she sat outside under a tree, listening as the cool wind rustled the leaves overhead, she kept pulling out her phone. Kept pulling up the caller list and looking at the number. Finally, she typed in the contact info.Mr. Radamon, MIT.

Her finger kept hovering over the call button, but she didn't push it.

Yet.

It scared her when her cell phone vibrated. The picture that came up was a close-up of Myrnin's vampire bunny slippers. She sighed and answered, a little too sharply. "What?"

His voice sounded metallic and impatient over the tiny speaker. "Is that any way to speak to someone who employs you? And, I might add, could kill you at any time?"

"But won't," she said. "Has something happened? You know, withhim ? The old guy?"

"Him," Myrnin repeated. "No,he is still safely obscure at the moment, although there is an unprecedented effort to locate him going on, of course. But I need you for something else. Here, in the lab. Now."

"I thought you didn't need me today."

"In fact, I didn't. And now I do. Please."

"Thanks for sayingplease. "

"I do try to be polite. Now, do get a move on."

She hung up and, just for the sake of being stubborn, finished her Coke before getting up, dusting off, and grabbing her book bag.

She got a text message before she could take more than a few steps, and stopped in the shade of a tree to read it from the tiny screen. It was from Shane, and it said,Sry abt last night luv u .

She smiled in relief, and texted back,OMG luv u 2 so sry . She almost addedI need to talk , but that might make things worse. She'd talk later. Tell him. Ask him what to do about...about everything.

Claire closed the phone and held it to her heart for a few seconds, then slipped it back into her pocket. She felt about a thousand times better, no matter what was waiting for her at the lab; in fact, she hadn't realized how down she was until suddenly she was up again.

She was humming her new favorite song when she walked around the corner, heading for a shortcut to the lab, and ran into a crying girl who was running blindly for the shelter of the trees.

The girl went down. She looked terrified. It took Claire a second to recognize her, because she was expecting a student...but Miranda was far too young to be a student, maybe fifteen years old, and also Miranda was way, way too crazy.

Miranda was--or had been, anyway--Eve's friend, mostly because Eve took up strays and the vulnerable, and Miranda was both. Eve had also believed the girl was psychic, and Claire was inclined to believe it, too, because Miranda's guesses on things she shouldn't have known had always been too close for comfort. She was certainly weird enough, too.

Miranda had come into Claire's life early on in her Morganville experience, and she'd been vague and dreamy and sported vampire bites from her so-called Protector, whom Claire had considered a lot more predator than anything else. Since his death, Miranda had improved, but she'd stayed vague. Her clothes looked completely random and mismatched. Same for her makeup; she had some on, but it looked more like she'd forgotten to wipe off what she'd put on yesterday and just added to it. It was smudged and smeared, and not at all attractive.

She looked like a thin, starving rabbit of a girl.

And she was terrified.

"Hey," Claire said, and offered her a hand up. "Sorry about that. Miranda, what are you doing here on campus? You never come here. Do you?" The girl stared up at her in frozen dread, and Claire frowned a little. "What's wrong with you?"

"I came to warn you," Miranda said in a breathless rush. Her eyes were very wide and more than half crazy. "But it's all gone wrong." She took Claire's hand and pulled herself up, but she didn't let go. Her skin felt icy, and her eyes darted around in a paranoia Claire knew all too well. "They're coming!"

"No, they're not," said Monica Morrell, stepping around the corner of the concrete building where the groundskeepers kept their tools and mowers. "They're here, you crazy bitch. Oh, look, you found a little friend. A little friend who's completely stupid if she doesn't start walking away right now." Monica was pretty, perfectly made up, and wearing designer jeans and a spangled top, but she had an expression that made Claire's stomach twist. "Danvers. Don't you have to go save a puppy or the whales or something?"

Claire said nothing. Now it wasn't just Monica, but both her Lipstick Mafia girls, who came a few seconds late to the party. Gina was wearing a denim skirt and ass-kicking shoes, and Jennifer was basically a duplicate of Monica, only with knockoffs instead of designer originals.

That they'd target Miranda wasn't unusual; it was their standard operating procedure to pick out the weak and (presumably) helpless. It had been Claire's introduction to the warm, welcoming community of Morganville, running into these three in her dorm. She'd gotten beaten up and tossed down stairs, and, frankly, she knew she'd been lucky to get off that lightly.

Even so, even as bold as Monica was in her bullying, it was unusual that the Evil Trio was chasing Miranda around outdoors, in full view of the campus. Granted, they were herding her into the trees, where whatever unpleasant thing that was going to happen would happen in relative privacy, but still...this was bold, even for Monica.

Even when Miranda was easy, friendless prey.

"I said get lost, Claire," Monica said as Gina and Jennifer spread out to cut off easy retreat. "You've got about five seconds before I forget you're wearing that Founder's Pet pin and start kicking your skinny ass, just like old times."

"You're forgetting? I didn't know you were old enough to get Alzheimer's," Claire said. She tugged on Miranda's cold, trembling hand. "Just that you looked it. Come on, Mir. Let's go."

"Wait." That was Jennifer, stepping up to block their escape. "Not her. She stays."

"Why?"

"None of your business, bitch. You can go. She can't."

Claire glanced over at Miranda. "You said you came to warn me? About what?"

She looked miserable and defeated. "About them," she said. "I woke up and my head was hurting and all I could think about was that I had to tell you, had to warn you before it was too late. But I think I did the wrong thing. Sometimes it all gets mixed up in my head, what's coming, and what I should do about it. Sometimes it seems like I actually cause it. But this is definitely wrong now."

Gina said flatly, "No shit. I was just walking along and that crazy bitch came right up to me, babbled at me, andhit me . Look, I'm going to have a bruise." She pointed at her chin, which did look red on the side. "So I'm going to hit her back. That's all. You just stay out of it and we'll all be fine."

Claire looked at Monica and Jennifer. "Areyour friends staying out of it?"

"You really want to go there?" Gina's flat, dark stare was unsettling. "This isn't your business, Danvers. Walk away, go do whatever it is that smart freaks do when they're not being completely annoying."

She should have. That would have been the smart thing, the easy thing. But instead, something flared up inside her, something stubborn and bright and obstinate, and Claire said, "I'm not leaving anybody for you to pound on, especially not some helpless fifteen-year-old kid. You know that, right? That's what you're afraid of, that I'm going to stick around. Because now you've gottwo of us who aren't afraid to hit back. Andone of us has people on speed dial that you don't want to mess with."

"Are you threatening me?" Gina asked softly.

"Crap," Monica sighed. "Danvers, you've stepped in it now. It's all on you."

Gina's eyes were like a shark's, Claire realized; just blind menace, no thinking behind them at all.

When she smiled, that made it all the more eerie. Especially when she unfolded the pocketknife with the long, sharp blade she had hidden at her side. It made a soft, metallic clicking sound as it locked into place.

Miranda took in a sharp, shaking breath. "Oh no. It's all going wrong, so wrong.... This isn't what I meant to do...."

Claire shifted her attention to Monica, who was standing very still, face closed into a pretty, shallow mask. "You're going to let your psycho friend come after me. Even knowing what will happen when Amelie finds out."

Monica smiled, just a little. "What makes you think I can't make you disappear? Lots of places in this town to hide a body, especially if it's in little pieces. And you're just a little bitty thing, anyway."

Claire shook her head and looked at Miranda. "Why did you hit her?" she asked. "Gina. You came on campus, looked for her, and hit her. Why?"

"Because it had to happen that way." Miranda sometimes didn't make a whole lot of sense, and this was definitely one of those times.

Monica wasn't going to back down, not in front of her friends. Something had to change first. The balance had to shift, and fast, because Gina was working herself up to some genuine psycho-quality violence. As Gina was wont to do, actually.

Claire looked at Jennifer.

Jennifer seemed scared. This had clearly gone further than she'd thought or was comfortable with; Jen had always been the softest of the three of them, and this was especially true now. She'd been hurt recently, when a rave in town had turned into an all-out humans-versus-vamps brawl. When Shane and Claire had finally found her, she'd been balled up in a corner, thin party dress torn and stained with

blood. She'd been cut with broken glass, and had a couple of cracked ribs.

But from the haunted look in her eyes, Claire had to wonder if maybe, just maybe, she'd learned how it felt to be on the receiving end.

"Jen," she said, very quietly. "You don't have to be here. You know what it's like to be hurt, and you don't want to make someone else go through that. Just walk away."

Jen flinched and took a small step backward. She looked over at Monica, then at Gina.

"We were there for you, Jen," Monica said. "We've always been there for you. Don't you turn your back on us now. We know where you live, bitch."

"Yeah, she knows where I live, too," Claire said. "But she knows better than to show up there." She turned her attention back to Monica. "It's not just about scaring people out of their lunch money anymore, Monica. You're not the school bully. You're talking about real trouble,jail trouble, and you know how this is going to end. You need to stop this before you all get hurt, lots worse than anything you'd do to Miranda. Or to me."

Monica was staring back at her, and Claire had the oddest feeling that for the first time, Monica was seeing her. After all this time, all this anger, she was actuallycommunicating.

"Think," Claire said very softly. "Justthink . You don't have to make this happen. You don'tneed it, Monica. Everybody knows who you are. You don't have to keep on proving it to yourself and to everybody else."

That rocked Monica's head back, as if Claire had actually punched her in a vulnerable spot. Her lips parted, but whatever she was going to say...she didn't have time.

"You know what? I'm tired of the blah, blah, blah. Screw all this talking," Gina said, and came at Claire with the knife.

"Gina,no !" Monica yelled. She sounded shocked, as if she hadn't actually thought Gina would do it. As if Gina was all threat, no action.

But Claire had always known better.

That didn't make it feel any better as she watched Gina and the knife lunge straight for her.