Dead Girls' Dance

“It’s not enough. We need Amelie on his side. And Oliver.’”

“Oliver’s the one who put him in the cage! And Amelie—she walked away. I don’t think we can get anything from her, Michael.’”

“Try,’” he said. “Go. You have to.’”

Claire blinked. “You mean—go out there? At night?’”

Michael looked exhausted suddenly. And very young. “I can’t do it. I can’t trust Eve enough to let her out of her room, much less go out and talk to some of the most powerful vampires in town. Call Detective Hess, or Lowe. Don’t go alone…but Claire, I need you to do this. I need you to make it right. I can’t—’”

It was written all over his face, the things he couldn’t do. The limits he’d crashed into with so much force it had left him broken and bleeding in the wreckage.

“I know,’” Claire said. “I’ll try.’”

It was dark, it was Morganville, and she was sixteen years old. Not the best idea ever, going out of the house again, but Claire put on her darkest pair of jeans, a black shirt, and a big, gaudy cross that Eve had given her. She felt queasy at the idea of stakes. Doubly queasy at the idea of actually stabbing somebody with one.

I still have Protection, Amelie said so.

She hoped that would actually mean something.

Claire called Detective Hess’s number from the card Eve had left pi

“I need a ride,’” Claire said. “If you’re willing. I need to talk to Amelie.’”

“Even I don’t know how to get to Amelie,’” Hess said. “Best-kept secret in Morganville. I’m sorry, kid, but—’”

“I know how to get to her,’” she said. “I just don’t want to walk. Given—the time.’”

There was a second of silence, and then the sound of a pen scratching against paper. “You shouldn’t be out at all,’” Hess said. “Besides, I don’t think you’re going to get anywhere. You need to find somebody who can back up Shane’s story. That means one of his dad’s biker buddies. There may be one or two ru

“What about his dad?’”

“Trust me, you’re not going to find Frank Collins. Not before the powers that be do, anyway. Every vampire in town is out tonight, combing the streets, looking for him. They’ll find him eventually. Not a lot of places he can hide when it’s an all-out effort.’”

“But—if they catch him, that’s kind of a good thing. He could tell them Shane didn’t do it!’”

“He could,’” Hess agreed. “But he’s just crazy enough to think burning in a cage alongside his kid is going out in a blaze of glory. Some kind of victory. He might say Shane was part of it just to punish him. We can’t know.’”

She couldn’t deny that. Claire swallowed hard. “So…are you going to give me a ride or not?’”

“You’re determined to go out,’” Hess said. “In the dark.’”

“Yes. And I’ll walk if I have to. I just hope I don’t—have to.’”

His sigh rattled the phone speaker. “All right. Ten minutes. Stay inside until I honk the horn.’”

Claire hung up the phone and turned, and nearly bumped into Michael. She yelped, and he reached out and steadied her. He kept hold of her arms even after she didn’t need the steadying support anymore. He felt warm and real, and she thought—not for the first time—how weird it was that he could seem so alive when he really wasn’t. Not exactly. Not all the time.

He looked like he had something he wanted to say, but he didn’t know how to say it. And finally, he looked away. “Hess is coming?’”

“Yeah. Ten minutes, he said.’”

Michael nodded. “You’re going to see Amelie?’”

“Maybe. I’ve got exactly one shot. If that doesn’t work, then…’” She spread her hands. “Then I guess I talk to Oliver instead.’”

“If…you do see Amelie, tell her I need to talk to her,’” he said. “Will you do that for me?’”

Claire blinked. “Sure. But—why?’”

“Something she said to me before. Look, obviously I can’t go to her. She has to come here.’” Michael shrugged and gave her a tiny curve of a smile. “Not important why.’”

That raised a little red flag in the back of her mind. “Michael, you’re not going to do anything, well, crazy, right?’”

“Says the sixteen-year-old about to walk out the door in the dark to go see a vampire? No, Claire. I’m not going to do anything crazy.’” Michael’s eyes glittered suddenly with some fierce emotion. It looked like rage, or pain, or some toxic mix of both. “I hate this. I hate letting you go. I hate Shane for getting himself caught. I hate this—’”

What Michael was really saying, Claire understood, was I hate me. She totally got that. She hated herself on a regular basis.

“Don’t punch anything, okay?’” Because he had that look again. “Take care of Eve. Don’t let her go crazy, okay? Promise? If you love her, you need to take care of her. She needs you now.’”

Some of the fierceness faded out of his eyes, and the way he looked at her made her go all soft and warm inside. “I promise,’” he said, and rubbed his hands gently up and down her arms, then let go. “You tell Hess that if anything happens to you—anything—I’m killing him hard.’”

She smiled faintly. “Ooooh, tough guy.’”

“Sometimes. Look, I didn’t ask before—is Shane okay?’”

“Okay? You mean, did they hurt him?’” She shook her head. “No, he looked pretty much in one piece. But he’s in a cage, Michael. And they’re going to kill him. So no, he’s not okay.’”

The look in his eyes turned a little wild. “That’s the only reason I’m letting you go. If I had any choice—’”

“You do,’” she said. “We can all sit here and let him die. Or you can let Eve go on her wild-ass rescue mission and get herself killed. Or you can let sweet, calm, reasonable Claire go do some talking.’”

He shook his head. His long, elegant hands, which looked so at home wrapped around a guitar, closed into fists. “Guess that means there’s no choice.’”

“Not really,’” Claire agreed. “I was kind of lying about that choice thing.’”

Detective Hess was surprised when she gave him the address. “That’s old-lady Day’s house,’” he said. “She lives there with her daughter. What do you want with them? Far as I know, they’re not involved in any of this.’”

“It’s where I need to go,’” Claire said stubbornly. She had no idea where Amelie’s house was, but she knew of one door into it. She’d been thinking about ways to explain how you could open a bathroom door and be in a house that might be halfway across town, but all she could think of was folded space, and even the most wild-haired physicists said that was nearly impossible.

But she liked folded space better as an explanation than crazy booga-booga vampire magic.

“You going prepared for trouble?’” he asked. When she didn’t answer, he reached into the glove compartment of the car and pulled out a small jewelry-type box. “Here. I always carry spares.’”

She opened it and found a delicate silver cross on a long chain. She silently put it around her neck and dropped it down the neck of her shirt. She already had a backup, one of Eve’s handmade wooden ones, but this one felt…real, somehow. “I’ll give it back to you,’” she said.

“No need. Like I said, I’ve got more.’”

“I don’t take jewelry from older men.’”

Hess laughed. “You know, I thought you were a mousy little thing when I first saw you, Claire, but you’re not, are you? Not underneath.’”

“Oh, I am mousy,’” she said. “All this scares the hell out of me. But I don’t know what else to do, sir, except try. Even a mouse bites.’”

Hess nodded, the laughter fading out of his face. “Then I’ll try to give you the chance to show some teeth.’”

He drove the half mile or so, navigating dark streets with ease. She saw glimpses of people moving in the dark, pale and quick. The vampires were out in force, he’d said, and he was right. She caught a burning reflection of eyes as the car turned a corner. Vampire eyes reflected light like a cat’s. Disturbing.