Glass Houses

“Not exactly legal,” she said, and sat down on the steps. “The beer. Nobody here’s twenty-one.”

Michael and Shane clicked bottles. Honestly, it was juvenile. “Here’s to crime,” Shane said, and tipped his up. “Hey, it was a birthday present. Two six-packs. We’re only one down, so give us a break. Morganville’s got the highest alcoholics per capita of any place in the world, I’ll bet.”

Michael put the game on pause. “Is she leaving yet?”

“No.”

“If she starts trying to tell me I’m going to meet a tall dark stranger, I’m leaving,” Shane said. “I mean, the kid’s a head case, and I don’t want to be mean, but jeez. She really believes this stuff. And she’s got Eve half-convinced, too.”

There was no half about it, but Claire wasn’t going to say that. She just sat there, trying not to think too hard about anything…about her plans to get Shane free of his agreement, which had seemed really good back in the coffee shop and not so solid now. About the dull-knife scrape of pain in her back. About the desperation in Eve’s eyes. Eve was scared. And Claire didn’t know how to help that, because she was scared half to death herself.

“She was looking at the secret room,” Claire said. “When she was standing down here. She was staring right at it.”

Michael and Shane looked at her. Two sets of eyes, both guilty and startled. And one by one, they shrugged and went for the beer. “Coincidence,” Michael said.

“Total coincidence,” Shane agreed.

“Eve said that Miranda had some kind of vision about you, Shane, when—”

“Not that again! Look, she said she had a vision of the house on fire, but she didn’t say that until later, and even if she did, fat lot of good it did.” Shane’s jaw was tight. A muscle fluttered in it. He punched a button to release the game from pause, and road noise poured out of the television speakers, closing out any chance of conversation on the subject.

Claire sighed. “I’m going to bed.”

But she didn’t. She was tired, and aching, and jittery…but her brain was way too busy picking over things. She finally nudged Shane over on the couch and sat next to him as he and Michael played, and played, and played….

“Claire. Wake up.” She blinked and realized that her head was on Shane’s shoulder, and Michael was nowhere to be seen. Her first thought was, Oh my God, am I drooling? Her second was that she hadn’t realized she was so close to him, snuggled in.

Her third was that although Michael’s part of the couch was empty, Shane hadn’t moved away. And he was watching her with warm, friendly eyes.

Oh. Oh, wow, that was nice.

Embarrassment flooded in a second later and made her pull away. Shane cleared his throat and scooted over. “You should probably get some sleep,” he said. “You’re beat.”

“Yeah,” she said. “What time is it?”

“Three a.m. Michael’s making a snack. You want anything?”

“Um…no. Thanks.” She slid off the couch and then stood there like an idiot, unwilling to leave because he was still smiling and…she liked it. “Who won?”

“Which game?”

“Oh. I guess I was asleep for a while.”

“Don’t worry. We didn’t let the zombies get you.” This time, his smile was positively wicked. Claire felt it like a hot blanket all over her skin. “If you want to stay up, you can help me kick his ass.”

There were not one but three empty beer bottles on the table in front of Shane. And three where Michael had been, too. No wonder Shane was still smiling at her, looking so friendly. “That depends,” she said. “Can I have a beer?”

“Hell no.”

“Because I’m sixteen? Come on, Shane.”

“Drinking kills brain cells, dumbass. And besides. If I give you one, that’s one less for me.” Shane tapped his forehead. “I can do the math.”

She needed a beer, to stay down here next to him, because she was afraid she was going to do or say something stupid, and at least if there was alcohol involved, it wouldn’t be her fault, would it? But just as she opened her mouth to try to convince him, Michael came out of the kitchen with a bag of neon-colored cheese puffs. Shane grabbed a handful and stuffed his mouth. “Claire wants a beer,” he mumbled through orange goo.

“Claire needs to go to bed,” Michael said, and flopped down. “Scoot over, man. I don’t like you that much.”

“Dick. That’s not what you said last night.”

“Bite me.”

“I want another beer.”

“You’re cut off. It was my birthday present, not yours.”

“Oh, that’s low. You really are a dick, and just for that, I’m totally thrashing you.”

“Promises, promises.” Michael glanced at Claire. “You’re still here. No beer. I’m not corrupting a minor.”

“But you’re a minor,” she pointed out. “At least for beer.”

“Yeah, and by the way? How much does it suck that I’m an adult if I kill somebody, and not if I want a beer?” Shane jumped in. “They’re all dicks.”

“Man, seriously, you are one cheap drunk. Three beers? My junior high girlfriend could hold her liquor better.”

“Your junior high girlfriend—” Shane brought himself up short without finishing that sentence, and flushed bright red. Must have been good, whatever it was. “Claire, get the hell out of here. You’re making me nervous.”

“Dick!” she flung at him, and went up the stairs before he could nail her with the pillow he grabbed. It plunked into the wall behind her and slithered down to the bottom of the stairs. She was laughing, but she stopped when a shadow suddenly blocked access to the hallway at the top.

Eve. And Miranda, looking weirder than ever.

“Miranda’s leaving!” Claire called down. Which wasn’t such a great idea, because Eve looked upset, and Shane was drunk, and letting some vampire-crazy maybe-psychic kid walk home by herself was…bad, at best.

“Miranda’s not leaving,” Eve said, and clunked down the stairs, with Miranda drifting like a black-and-white ghost behind her. “Miranda’s going to do a séance.”

Below, in the living room, she heard Michael say, in outright horror, “Oh, shit.”

Chapter 12

E ve was so intense about it that not even Shane, three beers down, was able to exactly say no. Michael didn’t say anything, just watched Miranda with eyes that were way too clear for somebody who’d had the same amount to drink as Shane. As Eve cleared stuff off the dining room table and set up a single black candle in the center, Claire wrung her hands nervously, trying to get Michael’s attention. When she did, she mouthed, What do we do?

He shrugged. Nothing, she guessed. Well, nobody but Eve believed in it, anyway. She supposed it couldn’t really hurt.

“Okay,” Eve said, and sat Miranda down in a chair at the end. “Shane, Michael, Claire—sit down.”

“This is bullshit,” Shane said.

“Just—please. Just do it, okay?” Eve looked stressed. Scared. Whatever she and Miranda had been doing upstairs with those tarot cards had really made her nervous. “Just do it for me.”

Michael slid into the chair at the other end, as far from Miranda as he could get. Claire sat next to him, and Shane grabbed a seat on the other side, leaving Eve and Claire the closest to Miranda, who was shaking like she was about to have a fit.

“Hold hands,” Eve said, and grabbed Miranda’s left, then Shane’s right. She glared at Claire until Claire followed suit, taking Miranda’s other hand and Michael’s. That left Shane and Michael, who looked at each other and shrugged.

“Whatever,” Michael said, and took Shane’s hand.

“Oh, God, guys, homophobic much? This isn’t about you being manly men, it’s about—”

“He’s dead! I see him!”

Claire flinched as Miranda practically screamed it out. All around the table, they froze. Even Shane. And then fought the insane urge to giggle—well, Claire did, and she could see Shane’s shoulders shaking. Eve bit her lip, but there were tears in her eyes.