Awake at Dawn (43 page)

Kylie grinned. “You didn’t want to lose him, Holiday.”

“He’s growing on me,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean—” 362/375

“Right.” Kylie laughed.

Holiday frowned. “I’ll bet Della and Miranda are waiting for you.” Kylie hugged Holiday before leaving. When she walked out of the office, Kylie looked toward the dining room and suddenly she wasn’t so sure she was ready to face everyone. So much had happened and she hadn’t even had time to adjust. Right then, she felt a hand slip inside hers.

She jumped and started to pull away, but stopped when she recognized the warmth of the palm in hers.

“Hey,” Lucas said, and gave her a tug. “Let’s take a walk.” She let him lead her behind the cabin that housed the office. The moment they stepped in the secluded spot beneath the trees, he stopped and turned and faced her.

“I’m really sorry I hit you.” His hold on her hand tightened.

She shook her head. “You didn’t mean to do it.”

“But I still did it.” He gave her hand another light tug and drew her closer. “Burnett said you … you healed me.”

“Yeah,” she said, feeling the warmth of his chest even though she wasn’t pressed against him. She inhaled and realized that Lucas smelled like the woods. The scent of the trees and the moist earth clung to him.

“You might have even saved my life,” he said.

“Yeah, but I was the reason you got hurt in the first place.”

“Doesn’t matter.” He shot her a sly smile. “You know there’s an old vampire legend that says if someone saves your life, you must stay with them forever.”

She cut her gaze up at him. “You’re not vampire.” He leaned down. His lips were so close to hers that she could taste them. “And for the first time in my life, I wish I were.” He inhaled. “But since I’m not vampire, I think the least I can do is give you a thank-you kiss.”

363/375

“The least you can do,” she said, and then his lips touched hers. It wasn’t overtly sexy like the kiss they’d shared at the falls, or the ones they shared in the dreams, but it didn’t make it any less special. Or any less harder for her to pull away from. But she did pull away. It was just … too soon. But later, maybe … yes, maybe.

“We … we should probably go join the others.”

“Yeah.” And they walked in silence and he didn’t let her hand go until they walked into the dining hall.

Kylie was nearly overwhelmed by everyone wanting to make sure she was okay. She wasn’t sure who had spilled the beans about what had happened but it was clear they all knew.

Della, Miranda, Perry, Helen, and Jonathon all gathered around her.

Lucas stood back as if giving her space. But he’d meet her eyes every few minutes. Once she even waved him over, but he shook his head, as if somehow he knew she’d been unsure about offering him the invitation.

Or maybe it was because he was werewolf and his kind just always seemed to stay together. Nevertheless, she got an odd kind of feeling as if he was guarding her. She remembered how he’d protected her from the bullies when she’d been six and again she felt the bond that connected them. Now what Kylie needed to figure out was just exactly what that bond meant.

An hour later, Kylie’s closest friends were all still eating pizza and chatting about how their home visits went. “Oh,” Miranda said in her usual peppy voice. “I think I figured out what I did wrong with Socks. I’ll have the little stinker back to his old self in no time.”

“So, Miranda, your competition went okay?” Perry blurted the question out, sounding nervous. It was the first time he’d spoken to Miranda.

Kylie knew this was his way of saying he wanted to start over with her, and Kylie would have hugged him if she hadn’t been afraid Miranda might zap her with her award-winning pinky.

“It went fine,” she said, but Kylie couldn’t read Miranda’s expression.

364/375

“Why don’t you two just kiss and make up already?” Della said. “And then you can go somewhere alone and really suck face.” Miranda shot Della a huge frown that for sure meant an argument would follow later. Perry’s eyes went black as he stared at Della, and then he walked off, looking a little rejected. Kylie just leaned back in her chair and wondered if things would ever change.

But then … some things had already changed, hadn’t they? She found herself looking around for another face. While she tried really hard not to admit it, she missed Derek. More than that, she worried if he was okay.

She decided to go find Burnett and ask, but her phone beeped with an in-coming text.

She glanced at the caller ID. It was from the PI. Then Kylie saw she had a text from Sara. It read, “What did you do? Don’t lie. I know you did it.”

Kylie’s heart lurched. Great. What was she going to tell Sara?

Her phone beeped again. When Kylie read the message from the PI, she gasped. “Grandparents back. Spoke yesterday. They want to see you ASAP.”

Hope stirred inside her heart. Would this lead to the answer about who she was?

“Kylie?” Mandy called her name from the door.

Kylie turned around. “Yeah?”

“Holiday said for you to come to the office. Someone is here to see you.”

“Who is it?” Kylie asked, feeling panicked at the thought of it actually being them. Was she really ready to do this? Was she ready to meet Daniel’s adoptive parents? Her grandparents?

“I don’t know, but there was an old couple knocking on the gate a few minutes ago.”

And just like that Kylie heard the sound of cascading water. Something caught her attention out of the corner of her eye, and she looked 365/375

toward the log wall where a mixture of light and shadows swirled in soft, almost hypnotic patterns. Dancing death angels.

She glanced at Della and Miranda. Neither reacted. Apparently, Kylie was the only one to see the show playing on the other side of the room.

And then,

“Go and uncover your past so you may discover your destiny.”

“Is everything okay?” Della asked, looking concerned.

Kylie took a deep breath. “Yeah. Fine.” And she hoped she was right about that, too.

You won’t believe what happens next!

Read on for a preview of the third book in C. C. Hunter’s Shadow Falls series

Available from St. Martin’s Griffin in April 2012

Copyright © 2012 by C. C. Hunter

367/375

They were here. Really here.

Kylie Galen stepped out of the dining hall into the bright sunlight and looked over at the Shadow Falls office. Birds chirped in the distance, a rush of wind rustled the trees, but she mostly heard the sound of her own heart thudding in her chest.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

They were here.

Her pulse raced at the thought of meeting the Brightens, the couple who had adopted and raised her real father. A father she’d never known in life, but had grown to love in his short visits from the afterlife.

“Daniel?” she whispered her father’s name, almost as if requesting his presence. The one word seemed to be snatched and carried away by a sudden and unexpected gust of wind. She took one step and then another, unsure of the emotional storm brewing inside her.

Fear.

Excitement.

Curiosity.

Fear. Yes, a lot of fear.

But of what?

A drip of sweat, more from nerves than Texas’s mid-August heat index, rolled down her brow.

“Go and uncover your past so you may discover your destiny.”
The death angels’ mystical words replayed in her head. She took a step forward, then stopped. Even as her heart ached to solve the mystery of who 368/375

her father was, of who she was and, hopefully, what she was, her instincts screamed for her to turn and hide.

Was this what she feared? Learning the truth?

Until only a few months ago, before coming to Shadow Falls, she’d been certain she was just a confused teen, that her feelings of being different were normal. Now she knew better.

She wasn’t normal.

She wasn’t even human. At least not all human.

And figuring out her nonhuman side was a puzzle.

A puzzle the Brightens could help her solve.

She took another step. The wind, as if it was as eager to escape as she was, whisked past and picked up a few wayward strands of her blond hair, scattering them across her face.

She blinked and when she opened her eyes, the brightness of the sun had evaporated. Glancing up, she saw a huge angry-looking cloud hanging in the sky, directly overhead. It cast a shadow around her and the woodsy terrain. Unsure if this was an omen or just a summer storm, her heart danced faster.

Taking a deep breath that smelled of rain, she took one step when a hand clasped around her elbow.

What now?

Panic shot through her veins.

She swung around.

“Whoa. You okay?” Lucas asked, and his clasp around her arm lightened.

Kylie caught her breath, and stared up at his amazing blue eyes.

“Yeah. You just … surprised me. You always surprise me. You need to hum or whistle when you come up on me.”

“Hum or whistle,” he repeated, and almost smiled. Of course, he would see it as humorous. Werewolves were famous for being sleek, soundless, and intense. And Lucas was one hundred percent werewolf 369/375

and, at least where she was concerned, completely, overwhelming intense.

“Sorry.” His thumb moved in soft little circles over the crease in her elbow. She could feel her pulse rushing and fluttering against his touch.

And somehow that light brush of his finger felt … intimate. How did he make a simple touch feel like a sweet sin?

A gust of wind, now smelling like a storm, stirred his black hair and tossed it over his brow.

He continued to stare at her; the hint of humor in his gaze vanished.

“You don’t look okay. What’s wrong?” He reached up and tucked a wayward strand of her hair behind her right ear.

She looked away from him to the cabin that housed the office. “My grandparents … the adopted parents of my real dad are here.”

“I thought you were looking for them? Wanted to meet them?”

“I do. I’m just…”

“Scared?” he finished for her.

She didn’t like admitting it, but since werewolves could smell fear, lying wouldn’t help. “Yeah.” She looked back at Lucas and again saw humor in his eyes.

The thought that he was laughing at her caused a frown to pull at her lips. “What’s so funny?”

“You,” he said, as if she amused him. “I’m still trying to figure you out.

When you were kidnapped by a rogue vampire with ties to an under-ground supernatural world, you weren’t this scared. And now you reek of fear.”

“I reek?”

He appeared to purposely bite back his grin. “Not reek … just…” He paused, and then leaned in and lowered his voice. “Seriously, if this is the same couple I saw walking in here a few minutes ago, then they’re old and just humans. I think you can take them both, with both hands tied behind your back.”

370/375

Just humans.
If she didn’t know and like Lucas so much, his choice of words might have annoyed her.

“I’m not scared like that. I just…” She closed her eyes for a second, unsure how to explain something she wasn’t clear on herself, but then the words spilled out as if they’d been sitting on her tongue waiting for their chance to be acknowledged. “What am I going to say to them? ‘Oh, I know you never told my father he was adopted, but he figured it out after he died. And he came to see me. Oh, yeah, he wasn’t human. So could you please tell me who his real parents are? So I can figure out what I am?’” He must have heard the angst in her voice because his expression went from amused to concerned almost instantly. “You’ll find a way.”

“Yeah.” She wished she shared his confidence. Knowing she had to hurry, she started walking. His warm presence took the edge off her fear as they moved up the steps.

He stopped beside her at the door and brushed a hand down her arm.

“You want me to come inside with you?”

She almost told him yes, but stopped herself. He’d rescued her from that rogue vampire, but she knew this was one thing she needed to do alone. She thought she heard voices from inside and glanced back at the door.

She wouldn’t exactly be alone.

No doubt Holiday, the camp leader, waited for her inside, prepared to offer moral support and even a calming touch. Normally, Kylie objected to her emotions being manipulated, but right now might be an exception.

“Thanks, but I’m sure Holiday is in there.” He nodded, his gaze moved to her mouth. His head dipped down ever so slightly and his lips came dangerously close to hers.

ALSO BY C. C. HUNTER

Born at Midnight

Praise for
Born at Midnight

“
Born at Midnight
is addicting. Kylie’s journey of self-discovery and friendship is so full of honesty, it’s impossible not to fall in love with her and Shadow Falls … and with two sexy males vying for her attention, the romance is scorching.
Born at Midnight
has me begging for more, and I love, love, love it!”

—Verb Vixen

“There are so many books in the young adult paranormal genre these days that it’s hard to choose a good one. I was so very glad to discover
Born at Midnight
.