Never Bite a Boy on the First Date (21 page)

F
or a heart-stopping moment, I thought it was Milo. I thought he’d finally connected the dots and now he was here to kill me and Zach. I actually thought,
Well, at least this death will be faster than last time
. Then the streetlight beside the basketball court suddenly turned on. Bright yellow light flooded the area, illuminating the court and Zach’s furious face and the guy calmly aiming his crossbow at my sort-of-brother’s heart.

It wasn’t Milo. It was Daniel. I guess that shouldn’t have surprised me. He did have a habit of turning up at key moments. Most likely he had been following me since school ended, even though I’d told him to let me handle this.

Besides, Milo was adorable, but he didn’t seem like a particularly
successful
vampire hunter,
at least from what I’d seen. Oh, I wasn’t
un
happy to see Daniel. I wasn’t psyched about the pointy wooden thing, but I still liked the fierce hotness of the guy holding it. He didn’t look at all bothered by Zach’s bulging neck muscles.

“Wait,” I said. “Daniel, wait. Don’t shoot him.”

“Zero tolerance, Kira,” Daniel said. “That’s our policy. He’s tasted human blood; he’s dangerous now. We can’t have him running around risking all our lives.” His eyes shifted to me for a moment. “Especially yours.”

“But it’s my fault,” I said. “I’m the one who turned him. I don’t want him to die twice in one year because of me.” I stepped in between them and Daniel lowered the crossbow a little, although he didn’t put it down. “We can handle this. My parents didn’t get rid of me last year when I bit him—they’ll know how to deal with Zach.”

“I don’t need
dealing with
,” Zach growled. “I was behaving like a normal vampire should.”

“You see?” Daniel said. “It’s different with him, Kira. He can’t be trusted.”

Suddenly Zach grabbed my shoulders and
threw me aside. I crashed into the court’s high fence and thudded to the ground. A jolt of pain shot up my wrist and radiated through my whole body.

Zach hurled himself at Daniel, who didn’t have time to raise the crossbow. Zach knocked the weapon out of his hands and slammed his fist into Daniel’s face. Into Daniel’s perfect face! I let out a shout of anger.

“Zach, stop it!” I yelled.

Daniel staggered back but managed to dodge Zach’s next punch. He ducked and spun around, kicking Zach hard in the stomach. Zach tumbled, rolled, grabbed Daniel’s foot, and yanked him off balance. They rolled across the court, wrestling and punching and, although I’m sure they wouldn’t want me to share this, biting and hair pulling as well.

I used the fence to pull myself upright. I was pretty sure Zach had broken my wrist, which was a giant pain because we can’t exactly go to hospitals. Olympia would have to fix it, and even though we heal fast, it was still going to hurt
a lot
for a few days.

“Stop!” I shouted again. “Zach, it’s over! Leave him alone!”

Of course they didn’t listen to me. I spotted the crossbow and ran over to it, but I couldn’t figure out how to shoot it. I was pretty sure I’d impale my foot if I tried. But I could still point it.

“Zach, stop it now!” I commanded, aiming the bow at him.

Still not listening. Together they rolled and flailed so fast that I couldn’t possibly have hit the right one even if I’d known how to use the stupid thing. Frustrated, I walked over to them, waited until they rolled toward me, and then kicked Zach as hard as I could in the back of the head.

“OW!” he yelled, losing his grip on Daniel. Immediately Daniel seized his hands and wrenched them behind his back. Zach ended up with his face planted into the court. He bellowed something muffled into the pavement, but I think perhaps it was best that we couldn’t understand it.

“Kira, give me the crossbow,” Daniel said,
kneeling on Zach to hold him down.

“No, this isn’t fair,” I said. “I mean, I don’t like the guy, believe me. But I got a second chance. Shouldn’t he get one, too?”

Daniel’s gaze shifted over my shoulder. “What do you think?”

I turned around to find Olympia coming through the gate. She glanced up, and I realized Wilhelm must have been looking for us in bat form. A small, dark shape fluttered down from the sky, and a moment later the bat went
poof
and turned into Wilhelm. He looked all craggy and confused about being outside so soon after sunset. His gray hair stuck out in all directions.

“Teenagers,” he huffed at Olympia. “I warned you. They’re unstable. Too much TV, that’s what I say.”

Oh, please. He should talk.

“In
my
day—” he started.

“Yes, dear,” Olympia interjected. “But they can also learn. I agree with Kira.” She gave Daniel a stern, clear-eyed look. “We’ll handle it ourselves.”

“I’ll have to tell my family about this,” Daniel said. “I don’t know if they’ll agree.”

Wilhelm snorted. “Wait till they see where we’re going to put him,” he growled. “He’ll be a fine, upstanding member of society by the time he gets out.”

Olympia seized the back of Zach’s neck, her long fingernails digging into his skin. He let out a yelp. Daniel stood back, and Olympia lifted Zach to his feet.

“Be thankful,” she said to him. “A padded coffin is better than you deserve.” She marched him off the court, and as they disappeared around the corner of the school I could hear her lecturing him about mesmerizing family members and damaging school property and oh, yeah, murdering people.

Wilhelm grumbled something about pitchforks and stalked off after them, leaving me and Daniel alone on the basketball court.

“Thanks,” I said to him. “I mean, not that I needed rescuing or anything, but good effort.”

He smiled. “Well, thank
you
for solving the mystery. Not that I wouldn’t have figured it out
myself eventually, but it was helpful.”

I wrinkled my nose at him. “So none of your family members want to stake me anymore, right?”

“I’ll tell them everything,” Daniel said, pulling me close and putting his arm around me. “They’ll be fine. I’m not so sure your family feels very friendly toward me, though.”

“Nonsense,” I said. “They’ll be thrilled that I finally found a nice vampire boy to keep me safe from temptation.”

His smile was sweet and wicked at the same time. “Well,” he said, “hopefully not
all
temptation.”

I lifted my face and our lips met. He tasted like moonlight and mint juleps and the promise that we were going to live forever.

Maybe there were some things about being a vampire that didn’t suck at all.