Ember’s face flashed before me once more, smiling and cheerful, the memory of her kiss making my stomach tighten. I shoved it away ruthlessly.
“Yes,” I said. “I understand.”
Ember
“Where’ve you been?” Dante asked as I came up the stairs, intending to go straight to my room to hide out the rest of the night. Unfortunately, my nosy twin stood at the top step, gazing down with wary green eyes.
I snorted. “What are you, my egg nanny? I’ve been surfing, what’s it look like?” I sidled past him and headed toward my room. He followed me down the hall, suspicious gaze searing the back of my neck.
“Who was the human that drove you home?” Dante asked. “I haven’t seen him before.”
“That was Garret,” I replied, hoping he wouldn’t see my burning face. “He’s the boy I told you about before, remember? The one that we met on the beach with Kristin and Lexi? The one who beat up those trolls for us. He’s a nice guy.”
Maybe too nice, my dragon whispered. I could still feel his lips on mine, the sudden impulse to reach up and kiss him, the flame that had lit my stomach when I did. What would Talon say if they knew?
Talon can eat their own tails, I thought back. That wasn’t the problem. Strictly speaking, pursuing a relationship with a human wasn’t entirely forbidden by the organization. Making a human fall in love with you was an easy way to control them, an easy way to get what you wanted. Dante was an expert at this; no matter where he was, who was around, he always had someone ready to give him a ride, a phone, the shirt off their back. He didn’t even have to try very hard. I thought it was pretty devious myself, but everyone in Talon knew how to manipulate human emotions. The fact that I had kissed a human meant nothing.
The reason I’d kissed a human was something else altogether.
I reached my room and turned to close the door, but Dante stepped between the frame, stopping me. His expression hovered between suspicion and concern. “Are you all right, sis?” he asked, watching my face. “I was worried about you. You took off with Lexi right after your training session, and you turned off your phone.”
The memory of my sadistic trainer made me bristle. “Jeez, you sound like Uncle Liam,” I scoffed, trying to get him off the subject. “I’m fine, so you can dial down your neurotic-twin radar. Garret and I went surfing, that’s all.”
And I kissed him. And I want to see him again, badly, so I can do it some more. Lizard balls, I am so screwed in the head.
“I can’t dial down my neurotic-twin radar,” Dante said, not moving from his place in the doorway. He stepped closer, putting a hand on my arm. “Not when my twin is upset. Not when I can sense something is really bothering her.”
“You know that overprotective twin-brother act? It can go a little far sometimes.”
“Hey, you and me? We’re all we have here.” Dante’s voice was completely serious. “If I don’t watch out for you, who will? So, come on, Tweedledee.” He gently squeezed my arm, then dropped his hand. “What’s going on? Did that human hurt you?”
“What are you going to do if he did? Eat him?”
“I’d be tempted, but no.” My twin gave me an impatient look. “And you’re evading the question. What’s wrong, Ember? Something is bothering you, and I want to know what. Talk to me.”
I hesitated. I did want to talk to someone, someone who could empathize, another dragon who might understand these strange, new, human feelings coursing through me. Feelings that, according to what my trainer had said just this morning, had no place in the life of a dragon. Would Dante get what I was experiencing? I’d always told him everything before.
“I was, um, just thinking about something my trainer said today,” I confessed, which wasn’t a complete lie. “She told me that humans are the inferior species, that we shouldn’t get too attached to any of them, because they’re just fodder in the long run. And that they would destroy us if they knew what we really were.”
He nodded. “I know. My trainer said the same.”
“Doesn’t that bother you?” I gestured vaguely down the hall, out the front door. “I mean, we’re living with two humans, all our friends are human and we talk to humans every single day. Sure, Liam and Sarah are working for Talon, but I wouldn’t consider them fodder. That just sounds so...heartless. You don’t think that way about Lexi and Calvin and the others, do you?”
“No.” Dante immediately shook his head, and I relaxed. “But we have to accept the fact that we’re not one of them, Ember. We’re not human. We live in their world, exist among them, but we’ll always be separate. Our trainers are right. We can’t get too attached to humans, ever.”
I pouted. That wasn’t what I wanted to hear. “Why not?”
“Ember.” Dante gave me a strange look. “Because we’re dragons. Humans are... Well, they’re not inferior, but they are lower on the food chain. We’re stronger, smarter and we live a thousand times longer than they do. All of our human friends—Lexi, Calvin, Kristin, everyone—they’re going to grow old and die, and our lives will barely have started. We’re just not in the same league, sis. You have to have realized that.”
My spirits sank even lower. That clinched it. I was definitely not telling him anything about me and Garret. He probably wouldn’t hunt the human down and eat him, but if I mentioned that I’d kissed a boy, he would want to know why. And I wouldn’t be able to tell him. I wasn’t even sure myself.
“Yeah.” I sighed. “I know.” Dante continued to watch me, worry and puzzlement shining from his eyes, but I had to be alone to think. “I’m gonna crash for a couple hours.” I sighed, reaching for my door. “If I’m not up in time for dinner, come kick my wall or something, okay?”
“Hang on,” Dante said, putting a hand on the door as I started to close it. “Kristin’s called four or five times,” he announced as I looked back. “She wants to know if you’re coming to her party tomorrow night.”
“That’s tomorrow?” Wow, the days rushed by fast. I hadn’t even realized it was the weekend already. A small thrill coursed through me. Weekends were the only times when I didn’t have to get up and meet my instructor. For the next two days, I was free.
Dante nodded, raising an eyebrow. “We’re still planning to go, I take it.”
“Of course.”
“And I suppose you’re going to lose track of the time while we’re at this party, and I’m going to have to come up with a believable excuse as to why we’re out past midnight.”
I beamed at him. “That’s why you’re the smart twin.”
“Uh-huh. And which are you?”
“The pretty one.”
He sighed. “Fine. I’ll take care of it. As usual.” He shook his head and gave me a wry grin. “Only for you, Tweedledee.”
After Dante left, I padded farther into my room and flopped on my bed, staring at the ceiling. Well, that had been less than satisfying. I couldn’t talk to Dante about my troubles, it seemed. He was my brother, but he was also a dragon. These feelings were as alien to him as they were to me. Strange as it sounded, I needed someone who really understood what I was going through. I needed a human.
I needed...a friend.
Rolling over, I dug out my phone, and scrolled to a familiar name on my contacts list.
“Hey, Lex,” I murmured when she picked up. “Are you busy?”
“Ohmygod, Ember!” came the voice on the other end. “No, of course not. Meet me at the Smoothie Hut in fifteen. You still have to tell me everything that happened with hottie Garret!”
“Yeah,” I muttered as my stomach twirled again with the memory. “I’ll be right there.”
Twenty minutes later, I sat at one of the outdoor picnic tables, two smoothies melting on the table, as Lexi slid into the seat across from me with an eager look.
“Well?” she said by wa
y of greeting, snatching one of the cups, clamping down on the straw like she wanted to bite it in half. “I’m mad at you, Em,” she announced without waiting for a reply. “You have me pick you up and drive you to the cove to meet Garret, and then you don’t even call to tell me how it went. I’ve been sitting on pins and needles for hours. So come on, Em. Spill...” She knocked on the table. “You and Garret were in the cove by yourselves, all afternoon. What happened? Anything fun?” She leaned in, smiling like a conspirator. “Did you show him how to skinny-dip?”
“What? No!” I made a face at her, feeling my cheeks redden. “Get your brain out of the sewer, guttersnipe. Nothing like that happened.”
“But something happened, right?” Lexi watched me carefully, searching my face for the truth. Suddenly self-conscious, I shrugged, and she frowned. “Ember, please. I saw you two at the mall yesterday. I know there’s something there. As my best friend, you are obligated to tell me everything in your life that deals with or around gorgeous boys. That’s part of the deal.”
“I don’t remember signing that contract,” I mumbled.
“Read the fine print, darling. Did he kiss you?”
My pulse jumped, but I shook my head. “No.”
“Did you kiss him?”
“Um...”
Lexi shrieked. I shushed her, frowning, and she lowered her voice, grinning like a loon. “I knew it! I knew there was something between you two.” She regarded me triumphantly. “Say it! Say I was right.”
“All right, yes! Fine, I kissed him. You were right.”
“Thank you. See, that wasn’t hard.” Lexi smiled sagely, and settled back to hear the rest of it. “So, what happened after you kissed him?”
“Nothing.” Now that I’d confessed, I couldn’t keep the sadness from my voice, the regret of what had followed. “I guess I freaked out a little. I had him take me home after that. We didn’t even talk.” Sighing, I picked moodily at the table. “I called you just a few minutes after he dropped me off. He probably hates me now, or at least thinks I’m an absolute freak.”
“I seriously doubt that.” When I didn’t answer, she drummed her fingers on the wood, impatient. “You are going to see him again, right? Tell me you’re going to see him again.”
“I don’t know.”
“What don’t you know? You like him, don’t you?”
“I...” I hesitated, thinking. I was a dragon; we weren’t supposed to have these kinds of feelings. But whenever I thought of Garret, something was definitely there. What did attraction feel like, anyway? Was it grinning every time you heard his voice, or feeling breathless whenever he turned his gaze on you? Was it wanting to see his smile, to hear his laughter because you knew something you said made him happy? I’d never felt anything like this before, that sense of just wanting to be near someone, to be close. And if that was the case... “I guess...I do.”
I liked Garret. A human.
Lexi nodded. “And he likes you, too. Don’t give me that doubting look, Em. Trust me, I’ve seen it before, and the boy has it bad. Why do you think he keeps showing up and hanging around?” She leaned back and grinned, confident in her analysis. “He’s completely smitten with you.”
Strangely, that thought made my stomach flutter. That someone like Garret could return my feelings... But this was so new. I never expected I could feel like this. I wasn’t supposed to feel like this, not according to Talon.
Glancing at Lexi, I gave her a pleading look, my voice coming out kind of desperate. “So, what am I supposed to do now?”
“Oh, Ember.” Lexi patted my arm with a confident smile, sixteen years of human experience shining through. “That’s easy. When you see him again, you pick up where you left off. And you don’t run away this time.”
“It might be too late for that.” I sighed, putting my chin in my hands, suddenly morose. “I have no idea where he is. I didn’t even get a phone number or an email.” Ironic, really, that my first real step as a human was also the thing that had driven him away. And now, I was dejected. Over a boy. Was this why dragons weren’t supposed to have human emotions? They made everything so complicated.
But Lexi was undeterred. “Ember, please. I know this town like the back of my hand, and it’s not a big place. We already know his apartment’s on the main strip. We’ll find him, trust me.”
“You’re awfully confident about that.”
She snorted. “A hottie like Garret kisses you and then vanishes without a trace? I’d be a sucky best friend if I didn’t help you get him back.”
Best friend. Until recently, I thought Dante was my only real friend. It had always been just us against everything. But I couldn’t talk to my brother about the human boy I had feelings for. He wouldn’t understand. Not only did Lexi understand these crazy, alien emotions, she was encouraging me to act on them.
I gave her a grateful smile. “Thanks, Lex.”
She grinned back, looking sly. “No problem. Just remember, when we find him again, I want to hear alllll the juicy details from here on. That’s my fee for helping you. Leave nothing out, okay?”
I laughed. “You’re horrible.”
“A girl has to have a hobby. And admit it, you’d be lost without me.”
My eyes rolled up. “How did I ever survive so long?”
“I have no idea, but the important thing is, I’m here now.” She rubbed her hands together, already scheming. “And good news for you. I already know where we’re going to look first.”
Garret
Apparently, parties at seven o’clock didn’t really start at seven o’clock.
“Garret? Ohmygod, hi!” Kristin greeted, looking surprised as she opened the door. “I didn’t expect you to show. You’re, uh, early.”
I checked my watch. It read 6:55, barely toeing the line of punctuality where I was from. Let another couple minutes slide, and you’d be begging your drill sergeant to make an example of you. Confused, I glanced back at the girl and switched the case of beer to my other hand. “You said 7:00 p.m. this Saturday, right?”
“Well, yeah, but...” She shrugged and opened the door wider. “Come on in. Nobody’s here yet, but make yourself at home.”
“Thank you.” I stepped through the door into the foyer, taking a quick scan of the room. Bright and airy, with floor-to-ceiling windows that gave a clear view of the ocean, it was large, open and quite expensive looking. Everything was decorated in white. The walls—those not dominated by windows, anyway—were white. The kitchen was white marble and stainless steel. A white leather sofa curled in an L-shape around a black-and-white coffee table, which sat beneath a seventy-two-inch flatscreen on the wall. There were small splashes of color throughout the house—blue pillows on the sofa and fake trees in the corners—but most everything else was a stark, unyielding white.
“You can put the beer in the fridge, and there’s more there, if you want one,” Kristin called from a half-open door down the hall. “Or soda. Help yourself. People should be arriving soon.”
Uncomfortable, I took care of the beer then wandered into the living room, feeling awkward and out of place. Parties and strange houses weren’t really my thing. I would adapt, of course, but the only reason I was here hadn’t arrived yet and, from the looks of it, wouldn’t be here for a while.
“So, where’s your cousin?” Kristin asked, still yelling at me from down the hall. I wondered why she didn’t come out of her room if she wanted to talk. “What was his name, again? Travis or something?”
“Tristan,” I called back. “He came down with something and couldn’t make it.”
“Oh,” Kristin said. That was all. No “That’s too bad” or “I hope he feels better.” After another few seconds, I heard the door close down the hall. Just as well. My partner wasn’t really sick, of course. He was hunched over his laptop, watching the front do
or of the Hill residence. If the two guardians left the house, he would follow, see where they were going. If they didn’t, he would continue to observe. I was glad Tristan was on the computer tonight and not me. He didn’t mind long hours of surveillance; it was one of the reasons he was so good at what he did. Nothing escaped his notice, no matter how small or insignificant. If something strange was going on at the Hill residence, Tristan would know about it.
I also had a mission to accomplish tonight, though mine would be very different.
* * *
“I think we’re onto something,” my partner had said last night, regarding me over the open take-out cartons on the counter. Outside the window, the sun was setting over the ocean, tinting the sky pink and the clouds a brilliant red. I sat in the living room, carton of Mongolian beef in hand, picking at it with my chopsticks and trying not to think of how the sunset somehow reminded me of her. “I think I know what our next move should be.”
“How do you figure?” I muttered.
“Simple.” Tristan tossed back a carrot, looking thoughtful. “Ask her out.”
I nearly choked on an onion, swallowing with difficulty. “Out?” I gasped.
“Yes, out.” My partner seemed happily oblivious to my burning face. “On a date, Garret. You do know the word, right? Teenagers do it all the time.” He waved an airy hand, still holding the chopsticks. “Dinner, movies, all that garbage. Get her talking. Get her to trust you. It shouldn’t be too difficult—she did kiss you, after all, right?”
My face heated even more, remembering. “That doesn’t mean anything,” I protested. “Dragons assimilate to whatever surroundings they’re in. She could have kissed me for any number of reasons.”
“Regardless.” Tristan shrugged. “I don’t see her kissing anyone else, do you? And being asked on a date is common human practice, so there’s no reason she should refuse. Eventually, she’ll invite you inside, and then we’ll be in business. Plant a few bugs around the house, and boom...we’ll have them.”