Us. The word sent a warm glow through my chest, replacing some of the panic and making it easier to breathe. "Um, no, it was in my duffel bag." I glanced down at the phone in my hand. I'd grabbed it for...some reason. Oh, yeah, because I'd been planning to...
He stepped closer to me, a foot away now, and I could smell the tiniest hint of his cologne. It slipped up my nose and down my throat. Oh, crap, I was losing it here. Maybe he'd put some sort of spell on me.
Okay. One date with him. Then I would absolutely have to put a stop to this. As long as the Clann and the vampire council didn't find out, one date would be no big deal, right?
"Still got your keys?" he murmured, his grin making him look like a little kid about to do something naughty.
Oh. The dance room. Perfect! No one would even know we'd been there.
Stuffing the phone in my pocket, I grabbed the keys from my truck's ignition then followed him across the dark campus up to the sports and art building's foyer doors.
"Deja vu," I murmured, unlocking the doors while he stood beside me, the warmth from his breath reaching out to caress my cheek in the cool night air.
He chuckled then followed me inside. The moon lit the way across the foyer. The stairwell was another matter though. It was on the side of the building opposite the moon. Lighted by the sun through the windows during the day, the stairs usually had no need for artificial lights to guide the way. Halfway up, the moonlight from the foyer faded away.
Strangely, I could still see. Weird.
On the third floor, I unlocked the dance-room doors and reached inside for the light switch. But a warm hand over mine stopped me.
"Maybe just the closet light?" he murmured.
I left the overhead lights off, found the closet light switch around the corner, then pushed open the door so the smaller room's light could shine into the dance room. He was right; the costume-closet light was equal to a lamp in the larger space beyond. And it shouldn't light up the dance room enough to be visible from outside the building.
"Sorry, I should have brought a blanket or something to sit on," he said with a sheepish grin.
"It's fine." Feeling suddenly shy, I sat down with him on the floor in the center of the dim room and tried to remember that this was the boy I'd spent countless hours with as a kid.
"I brought music if you want to put some on." He pulled out a stack of CDs from the plastic bag.
I took them over to the stereo then picked one out with shaking hands. The CD's label read Stressed Out #1. Smiling, I turned the volume all the way down before putting it in, then gradually turned the music up until it was at a good background level.
I returned to sit near him. "Stressed Out #1? Should I even ask how many volumes there are in that series?"
He laughed. "A few. The Clann are control freaks. All their rules make life a little...stressful."
"I know what you mean. I've got a lot of people setting the rules for me, too."
"You live with your grandma, right?" He opened the pizza box, picked up a slice of cheese pizza and set it on a paper napkin for me. Thank goodness he'd gotten a medium; I was so hungry I could eat the whole thing by myself. "I saw your grandma once. Last year. She looked like one tough lady."
I smiled. "She is. I live with my mom, too, though she's gone a lot of the time." He raised his eyebrows in silent question. I added, "She's a sales rep for a safety-products company."
He nodded, and we ate for a few minutes. I tried to chew slowly, but it felt like my stomach was eating itself with impatience. The pizza wasn't even making a dent in the hunger yet.
He'd gotten us both bottles of orange soda. He opened one and handed it to me, as if he'd assumed I wouldn't be able to get the lid open. The gesture was both sweet and amusing. Then he opened the other bottle for himself.
"So...will you finally tell me why you wouldn't go on a date with me before?"
Embarrassed, I looked down at the bubbles floating up in my soda. "Well, don't be mad, but you're sort of off-limits to me. You and everyone else in the Clann, actually."
"It figures. You've been off-limits to us ever since you and I got married in the fourth grade."
Heat flooded my cheeks, tempting me to press my drink against them. "You remember that?"
He grinned. "Hey, it's not every day a guy gets hitched."
I played with my bottle lid for a moment before getting the courage to ask, "Did your parents ever tell you why we couldn't be friends anymore?"
"Nope. Did yours?"
I shrugged, considering how to answer without lying or revealing too much. "My mom broke some Clann rule before I was born. So they kicked out my family and banned me from ever learning how to do magic."
"Huh. Must have been a major rule. I've never heard of any descendant being kicked out of the Clann before. Your grandma break the same rule, too?"
"Um, no. I think they just held her responsible for not stopping her daughter in the first place."
"I'd love to know what that rule was." He sounded grim.
"Uh...why?"
"I might have to try breaking it myself."
"What? Why? Don't you want to be the Clann leader someday?"
"No, I don't."
"Why not? I would think being able to do magic would be amazing." I almost confessed that I'd tried to do magic a few times with no luck. But something inside me held back.
He gave a short, humorless laugh. "Magic isn't always amazing. Sometimes it's a real pain in the butt." Something about the surprise on my face pushed him onward. "No, really. Magic is the reason I'm not playing football now. You know when I shoved Dylan out on the field during that game?" I nodded.
"I didn't exactly hit him with my hands."
My mouth dropped open. I'd seen magic being used right in front of me and didn't even know it. Wow. "What does it feel like? Doing magic, I mean?"
"Like relaxing."
"Is it like that for everyone in the Clann?"
"No, I don't think so. At least no one else seems to have the problems I do in controlling it."
Because he was the leading family's son? "Well, I'm sure it's like anything else in life. You probably just need more practice, right?"
"That's what Emily says. But that's the problem. All I do is control it. Otherwise I would be blowing up crap and setting fires right and left by accident. It's like keeping your hand clenched up in a fist every second you're awake. I can never relax, never forget about it. I get tired of it. And then there's the whole issue of the Clann elders trying to run my life. They don't care what I want, only what they have planned for me."