“I don’t remember inviting you,” I said drily.
“That’s a vampire myth,” he shot back just as drily. “I don’t need to be invited. I would have thought they taught you that here.” He winked. I rolled my eyes. He followed me and I let him. Gladly. The truth was, I didn’t think I wanted to be alone just yet. I was wired and exhausted and worried.
And I liked having him around. He was distracting. In a good way.
He paused, nodding to Chloe, who was still sound asleep on the common room sofa. “Want me to pull her hair?”
I grinned, shaking my head. He took a step forward.
“What are you doing?” I grabbed his arm.
“I’m going to sniff her.”
I blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”
“You’re worried about those vitamins, right? I might be able to smell them in her blood and I might be able to tell if they’re messing her up.”
“They’re definitely messing her up,” I muttered, touching the bruise on my jaw. “But go ahead. That could help. Just don’t wake her up.”
“Hello? Give me a little credit. Vampire stealth, remember?”
“Vampire arrogance, you mean.”
“That too.”
It went against a lifetime of training to crush on a vampire and, worse, to watch him skulk toward one of my friends. My hands actually twitched. But I stayed where I was. I trusted Quinn Drake, despite the fact that I was the latest in a long line of vampire hunters.
He was graceful as moonlight, fluid and pale as he draped over Chloe. She slept on peacefully, utterly unaware. Not exactly proof of the effectiveness of our education. Then again, right now, neither was I. Quinn was a dark silhouette out of any standard vampire horror movie, leaning over, teeth gleaming. And I just waited trustingly, patiently, hopefully.
Grandpa would pop a blood vessel if he could see me now.
I pushed that out of my mind and watched as Quinn’s nose hovered along the line of Chloe’s neck, sniffing as if she was a fine wine. His fangs lengthened. I tensed, took a step, stopped. He inhaled, or whatever passed as a smell-seeking inhalation for the undead, and then recoiled sharply.
He didn’t speak as he approached, just jerked his head down the hall toward my room. Later, I’d have to ask him how he knew that was my room. Right now, I just wanted to know why he was wiping his nose as if he’d snorted pepper. I shut the door quietly behind him. The single lamp lit on my desk cast his face into shadows.
“Well?” I demanded.
“Those aren’t vitamins,” he said.
“I knew it!” I winced nervously. “What are they?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “There are vitamins in there—they have a very distinctive smell. But there’s something else too.”
I wiped my damp palms on my pants. “She’ll never believe me. When can you get the lab results from your brother?”
“Maybe tomorrow. I’ll make him hurry.”
“God, her mom gave her those.” I rubbed my arms, suddenly cold. “And she’s hidden a whole stash of them somewhere so I can’t even flush them. Well, maybe something here will convince her.”
“Is that why you bugged that room upstairs?”
I nodded. “I thought Will was going to get better. And that whatever he was into, some of his friends might know about it. I don’t know. But students keep getting this weird flu that doesn’t get better. Something’s just off.”
I fumbled the microphones out of my pocket and switched the first one on. The quality wasn’t very good; the scratchiness of the background was louder than the voices, but it was better than nothing. I’d set the motion sensor recorder to switch on and off throughout the evenings and late at night. I figured there was less chance of people whispering in the common room at lunchtime when anyone might hear them. It was mostly complaints about classes and people leaving milk out of the fridge in the kitchenette. I listened for about a half hour, fast-forwarding where I could. Quinn leaned against my door, patient in a way I hadn’t thought he was capable of being. He was usually teasing or taunting or eager for a fight. I was seeing another part of his personality, quiet and thoughtful but just as intense.
“Nothing,” I said, dejected. “I guess it was a stupid idea.”
“Wait.” He pushed away from the wall. “Let me hear that one again.” I handed it to him, showing him how to rewind. He held it up to his ear. “It’s faint but …” He listened harder and I suddenly envied him his supernatural senses. I’d never envied a vampire before. I was too fond of sunlight and spaghetti and ice cream.
“Got it,” he said, his eyes flaring triumphantly. He rewound again and repeated what he heard for my benefit. “Are you sure this stuff works? Shut up, you moron, someone will hear you. It’s pretty steep for a bunch of vitamins. I told you, they’re better than vitamins—watch it. Leave it, we’ll never get behind that TV. It weighs a ton.”
I shot to my feet. “They dropped some!”
He nodded smugly but stopped me from reaching for the doorknob. “Let me go.”
“What? Why?”
“For one thing, I can move an ancient TV that weighs a ton without making much noise.”
“Oh. Good point.” Use the tools you’ve got. It was a hunter motto. And it made sense, even if my tool, in this case, was a vampire.