a curse, I tried downshifting to force the transmission to slow the truck. But it was too late.
Jaw clenched, I gripped the wheel as hard as I could and tried to turn the truck with the curve, but I was going too fast. The truck rocked onto its left wheels and kept right on going. The world flipped over and over as glass shattered and rained through the air. My seat belt jerked tight, slamming the air out of my chest.
Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to use magic and drive at the same time, was the last thought I had.
SAVANNAH
I hung up the phone, and that’s when I heard him. It was like Tristan was right behind me, whispering in my ear.
“I want you to feel what I feel, Savannah,” he murmured. “I need you to have faith in us like I do. I need you to want to keep trying, to fight back with me, to help me find a way to change their minds.”
His voice was so clear inside my head that I actually whirled around, thinking he must have snuck into the bathroom after us.
But he wasn’t there.
I popped my head outside the door. No Tristan in sight, not in the short hallway leading to the bathrooms or in the cafeteria-turned-dance-floor beyond.
“Savannah?” Carrie said, pausing in the process of reapplying her mascara. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” I forced a smile. “Just thought I heard someone yelling for us outside.”
I shut the door again, pretended to check my makeup in the mirror.
And then it hit me…wave upon wave of pain over my entire body. Pain on a level I’d never experienced before, not even during that week when I was sick my freshman year as the start of puberty awakened my two genetic sides and caused an internal battle between them that nearly killed me.
Oh sweet God in heaven. I really was dying this time.
I grabbed the counter, bracing my hands on the cold laminate, my legs shaking so hard I was afraid I would fall down without the sink’s support. What was wrong with me?
“Sav? Sav! What is it?”
I could hear my friends’ voices, distant, muffled. I shook my head, my focus turning inward. What was going on with my body? Was this a sign that the bloodlust was about to take over completely or something? No, it couldn’t be. I’d felt the bloodlust before. It was nothing like this.
“What’s wrong with her?” Michelle asked in a high voice.
“I don’t know. Get a teacher,” Carrie ordered.
Anne moved toward the door, but I grabbed her arm to stop her. “No, wait. It’s not…” I closed my eyes and mentally searched for the source of the pain. “It’s not me. I mean, I’m okay.”
“Then what’s the matter?” Anne said, crouching down in front of me.
I shook my head again. “I don’t…”
And then I knew. And in that moment, I actually wished it had been the bloodlust or any other new vampire development in my body. Anything other than what my heart, my instincts, my very soul said it was.
“Oh God. It’s Tristan,” I whispered. I didn’t know how I knew. But I knew. Something was wrong. He was hurt badly. And I had to tell someone.
“Huh?” Anne said.
My eyes flew open as I pushed her to the side and fumbled with the bathroom door. But it was locked.
“Is Emily Coleman here?” I asked, trying to get the lock turned on the knob.
“Who?” Michelle asked.
“Tristan’s sister!” My shaking fingers couldn’t manage to work the lock properly. Stark fear combined with desperation, turning me into something close to an animal. I wrapped both hands around the knob, heard a satisfying breaking of wood and groaning metal, and the doorknob came off in my hands. I tossed it to the floor with a loud clang.
“Savannah!” Carrie gasped.
But I was already headed out the door and down the short hall toward the strobing lights and shallow pool of balloons in the middle of the cafeteria, searching for a certain blonde who ought to be here. The senior cheerleaders always ran the semiformal dance; it was their way of helping to raise funds to support the cheer squads. Emily had to be here somewhere.
Bingo. The punch table.
“Stay here,” I shouted to my friends, and something in my expression or my tone made them listen to me for once.
I tried not to run, settling for pushing my legs into the longest strides I could manage in these stupid heels on the slippery floor.
Emily’s head popped up when I was still halfway across the dance floor. She must have read something on my face because she stared at me as I approached.
“Tristan,” I gasped when I finally reached the table and leaned across it. “Something’s wrong. You need to call him.”
Her eyebrows drew together in worry or confusion. But at least she grabbed her phone and tried to call him.
“He’s not answering,” she shouted over the music.
“He’s hurt somewhere. We have to find him,” I told her as she circled around the table.
“How do—”
“I don’t know how. Maybe he was doing a connection spell or something. I thought I heard him talking to me, and then I felt his pain.” Even as I led the way across the cafeteria, I could still feel an incredible amount of pain throbbing throughout my body.
I pushed the doors open too hard. They slammed into the brick wall of the building. Emily’s eyes widened.
But it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except getting to Tristan in time.
“Where’s your car?” I asked her.
She turned right, and I spotted the infamous pink convertible in the row closest to the sidewalk.
“What are you doing?” she asked as I grabbed the passenger door’s handle.
“I’m going with you,” I said.
“You can’t. You two are not supposed to—”
“I can still feel his pain.” In fact, it was stronger now that we’d left the cafeteria. “I think we can use it to find him.”
“You can’t be serious.”
I opened the door and slid in.
Huffing out a loud sigh, Emily got in, started the car and headed out of the parking lot. At the stop sign, she said, “Which way?”
I twisted toward the left, and the pain was a little less. “Go right.”
Our progress was too slow as we repeated the process at every intersection. But my feelings were all we had to go on. Emily had tried calling her parents, but they had no idea where Tristan was. Apparently he was supposed to have picked up Bethany half an hour ago but never showed up. Emily ended the call without explaining why she was worried about him or that I was with her.
Ten minutes later, we found ourselves heading out of town toward Drip Rock Road.
“Why would he be out here?” Emily muttered.
I had to wonder the same thing. It was in the opposite direction of Bethany’s house.
But I couldn’t worry about that right now. I could barely breathe, the pain was so strong. “He’s close. Go slow,” I said.
Thankfully she slowed down. Otherwise we might have ended up with flat tires from the glass in the curve of the road, which she narrowly avoided running over.
Tristan’s truck had taken out a huge section of wood and barbed wire